production, to fix a minimum wage in any undertaking, and to
take steps to fix the prices at which manufactured articles are
to be sold.
(7) The Workmen’s Organs of Control have the right to control
all correspondence passing in connection with the business
of an undertaking, being held responsible before a court of
justice for diverting their correspondence. Commercial secrets
are abolished. The owners are called upon to produce to the
Workmen’s Organs of Control all books and moneys in hand, both
relating to the current year and to any previous transactions.
(8) The decisions of the Workmen’s Organs of Control are
binding upon the owners of undertakings, and cannot be
nullified save by the decision of a Workmen’s Superior Organ of
Control.
(9) Three days are given to the owners, or the administrators
of a business, to appeal to a Workmen’s Superior Court of
Control against the decisions filed by any of the lower organs
of Workmen’s Control.
(10) In all undertakings, the owners and the representatives
of workmen and of employees delegated to exercise control
on behalf of the workmen, are responsible to the government
for the maintenance of strict order and discipline, and
for the conservation of property (goods). Those guilty of
misappropriating materials and products, of not keeping books
properly, and of similar offenses, are liable to prosecution.
* * * * *
It was not until December 27, 1917--seven weeks after their arbitrary
seizure of the reins of government--that the Bolsheviki published the
details of their scheme. Both the original preliminary outline and the
later carefully elaborated scheme made it quite evident that, no matter
how loudly and grandiloquently Lenin, Trotsky, Miliutin, Smedevich,
and others might talk about the “introduction” of workers’ control, in
point of fact they were only thinking of giving a certain legal status
to the Soviet system of control already in operation. That system, as
we have already seen, had been in their hands for some time. They had
used it to destroy efficiency, to cripple the factories and assist
in paralyzing the government and the military forces of the nation.
Now that they were no longer an opposition party trying to upset
the government, but were themselves the _de facto_ government, the
Bolsheviki could no longer afford to pursue the policy of encouraging
the factory Soviets to sabotage. Maximum production was the first
necessity of the Bolshevist Government, quite as truly as it had been
for the Provisional Government, and as it must have been for any other
government. Sabotage in the factories had been an important means of
combating the Provisional Government, but now it must be quickly
eliminated. So long as they were in the position of being a party of
revolt the Bolshevist leaders were ready to approve the seizure of
factories by the workers, regardless of the consequences to industrial
production or to the military enterprises dependent upon that
production. As the governing power of the nation, in full possession of
the machinery of government, such ruinous action by the workers could
not be tolerated. For the same reasons, the demoralization of the army,
which they had laboriously fostered, must now be arrested.
In the instructions to the All-Russian Council of Workers’ Control,
published December 27, 1917, we find no important _extension_ of
the existing Soviet control; we do, however, find its _legalization
with important limitations_. These limitations, moreover, are merely
legalistic formulations of the modifications already developed in
practice and obtaining in many factories. A comparison of the full
text of the instructions with the account of the system of factory
control under the Provisional Government will demonstrate this beyond
doubt.[29] The control in each enterprise is to be organized “either
by the Shop or Factory Committee or by the General Assembly of workers
and employees of the enterprise, who elect a Special Commission of
Control” (Article I). In “large-scale enterprises” the election of
such a Control Commission is compulsory. To the Commission of Control
is given sole authority to “enter into relations with the management
upon the subject of control,” though it may give authorization to other
workers to enter into such relations if it sees fit (Article III). The
Control Commission must make report to the general body of workers and
employees in the enterprise “at least twice a month” (Article IV). The
article (No. 5) which deals with and defines the “Duties and Privileges
of the Control Commission” is so elaborate that it is almost impossible
to summarize it without injustice. It is, therefore, well to quote it
in full.
[29] This important document is printed in full at the end of the book
as an Appendix.
V. The Control Commission of each enterprise is required:
1. To determine the stock of goods and fuel possessed by the
plant, and the amount of these needed respectively for the
machinery of production, the technical personnel, and the
laborers by specialties.
2. To determine to what extent the plant is provided with
everything that is necessary to insure its normal operation.
3. To forecast whether there is danger of the plant closing
down or lowering production, and what the causes are.
4. To determine the number of workers by specialties likely to
be unemployed, basing the estimate upon the reserve supply and
the expected receipts of fuel and materials.
5. _To determine the measures to be taken to maintain
discipline in work among the workers and employees._
6. To superintend the execution of the decisions of
governmental agencies regulating the buying and selling of
goods.
7. (_a_) _To prevent the arbitrary removal of machines,
materials, fuel, etc., from the plant without authorization
from the agencies which regulate economic affairs, and to see
that inventories are not tampered with._
(_b_) To assist in explaining the causes of the lowering of
production and to take measures for raising it.
8. To assist in elucidating the possibility of a complete or
partial utilization of the plant for some kind of production
(especially how to pass from a war to a peace footing, and
what kind of production should be undertaken), to determine
what changes should be made in the equipment of the plant and
in the number of its personnel, to accomplish this purpose; to
determine in what period of time these changes can be effected;
to determine what is necessary in order to make them, and the
probable amount of production after the change is made to
another kind of manufacture.
9. To aid in the study of the possibility of developing the
kinds of labor required by the necessities of peace-times,
such as the methods of using three shifts of workmen, or any
other method, by furnishing information on the possibilities of
housing the additional number of laborers and their families.
10. _To see that the production of the plant is maintained
at the figures to be fixed by the governmental regulating
agencies, and until such time as these figures shall have been
fixed to see that the production reaches the normal average for
the plant, judged by a standard of conscientious labor._
11. To co-operate in estimating costs of production of the
plant upon the demand of the higher agency of workers’ control
or upon the demand of the governmental regulating institutions.
It is expressly stipulated that only the owner has “the right to give
orders to the directors of the plant”; that the Control Commission
“does not participate in the management of the plant and has no
responsibility for its development and operation” (Article VII). It is
also definitely stated that the Control Commission has no concern with
financial management of the plant (Article VIII). Finally, while it
has the right to “recommend for the consideration of the governmental
regulating institutions the question of the sequestration of the plant
or other measures of constraint upon the plant,” the Control Commission
“has not the right to seize and direct the enterprise” (Article IX).
These are the principal clauses of this remarkable document relating
to the functions and methods of the Soviet system of control in the
factory itself; other clauses deal with the relations of the factory
organizations to the central governmental authority and to the
trades-unions. They prescribe and define a most elaborate system of
bureaucracy.
So much for the _imperium in imperio_ of the Soviet system of
industrial control conceived by the Bolsheviki. In many important
respects it is much more conservative than the system itself had
been under Kerensky. It gives legal form and force to those very
modifications which had been brought about, and it specifically
prohibits the very abuses the Bolshevist agitators had fostered and
the elimination of which they had everywhere bitterly resisted.
Practically every provision in the elaborate decree of instructions
limiting the authority of the workers, defining the rights of the
managers, insisting upon the maintenance of production, and the like,
the Kerensky government had endeavored to introduce, being opposed
and denounced therefor by the Bolsheviki. It is easy to imagine how
bitterly that decree of instructions on Workers’ Control would have
been denounced by Lenin and Trotsky had it been issued by Kerensky’s
Cabinet in July or August.
Let us not make the mistake, however, of assuming that because the
Bolsheviki in power thus sought to improve the system of industrial
control, to purge it of its weaknesses--its reckless lawlessness,
sabotage, tyranny, dishonesty, and incompetence--that there was
actually a corresponding improvement in the system itself. The
pro-Bolshevist writers in this country and in western Europe have
pointed to these instructions, and to many other decrees conceived in
a similar spirit and couched in a similar tone, as conclusive evidence
of moderation, constructive statesmanship, and wise intention. Alas!
in statesmanship good intention is of little value. In politics and
social polity, as in life generally, the road to destruction is paved
with “good intentions.” The Lenins and Trotskys, who in opposition and
revolt were filled with the fury of destruction, might be capable of
becoming builders under the influence of a solemn recognition of the
obligations of authority and power. But for the masses of the people
no such change was possible. Such miracles do not happen, except in
the disordered imaginations of those whose minds are afflicted with
moral Daltonism and that incapacity for sequential thinking which
characterizes such a wide variety of subnormal mentalities.
By their propaganda the Bolsheviki had fostered an extremely
anti-social consciousness, embracing sabotage, lawlessness, and narrow
selfishness; the manner in which they had seized the governmental
power, and brutally frustrated the achievement of that great democratic
purpose which had behind it the greatest collective spiritual impulse
in the history of the nation, greatly intensified that anti-social
consciousness. Now that they were in power these madmen hoped that
in the twinkling of an eye, by the mere issuance of decrees and
manifestoes, they could eradicate the evil thing. Canute’s command to
the tide was not one whit more vain than their verbose decrees hurled
against the relentless and irresistible sequence of cause and effect.
Loafing, waste, disorder, and sabotage continued in the factories,
as great a burden to the Bolshevist oligarchs as they had been to
the democrats. Workers continued to “seize” factories as before, and
production steadily declined to the music of an insatiable demand
on the part of the workers for more pay. There was no change in the
situation, except in so far as it grew worse. The governmental machine
grew until it became like an immense swarm of devastating locusts,
devouring everything and producing nothing. History does not furnish
another such record of industrial chaos and ruinous inefficiency.
Five days after the seizure of power by the Bolsheviki, the Commissar
of Labor, Shliapnikov, issued a protest against sabotage and violence.
Naturally, he ascribed the excesses of the workers to provocation by
the propertied classes. That “proletarian consciousness” upon which
the Bolsheviki based their faith must have been sadly lacking in the
workers if, at such a time, they were susceptible to the influence of
the “propertied classes.” The fact is that the destructive anarchical
spirit they had fostered was now a deadly menace to the Bolsheviki
themselves. Shliapnikov wrote:
The propertied classes are endeavoring to create anarchy and
the ruin of industry by provoking the workmen to excesses
and violence over the question of foremen, technicians, and
engineers. They hope thereby to achieve the complete and
final ruin of all the mills and factories. The revolutionary
Commission of Labor asks you, our worker-comrades, to abstain
from all acts of violence and excess. By a joint and creative
work of the laboring masses and proletarian organizations, the
Commission of Labor will know how to surmount all obstacles
in its way. The new revolutionary government will apply the
most drastic measures against all industrials and those who
continue to sabotage industry, and thereby prevent the carrying
out of the tasks and aims of the great proletarian and peasant
Revolution. Executions without trial and other arbitrary acts
will only damage the cause of the Revolution. The Commission
of Labor calls on you for self-control and revolutionary
discipline.
In January, 1918, Lenin read to a gathering of party workers a
characteristic series of numbered “theses,” which _Izvestia_ published
on March 8th of that year. In that document he said:
1. The situation of the Russian Revolution at the present
moment is such that almost all workmen and the overwhelming
majority of the peasants undoubtedly are on the side of the
Soviet authority, and of the social revolution started by it.
To that extent the success of the socialistic revolution in
Russia is guaranteed.
2. At the same time the civil war, caused by the frantic
resistance of the propertied classes which understand very well
that they are facing the last and decisive struggle to preserve
private property in land, and in the means of production, has
not as yet reached its highest point. The victory of the Soviet
authority in this war is guaranteed, but inevitably some time
yet must pass, inevitably a considerable exertion of strength
will be required, a certain period of acute disorganization and
chaos, which always attend any war and in particular a civil
war, is inevitable, before the resistance of the bourgeoisie
will be crushed.
3. Further, this resistance takes less and less active and
non-military forms: sabotage, bribing beggars, bribing agents
of the bourgeoisie who have pushed themselves into the ranks
of the Socialists in order to ruin the latter’s cause, etc.
This resistance has proved stubborn, and capable of assuming
so many different forms, that the struggle against it will
inevitably drag along for a certain period, and will probably
not be finished in its main aspects before several months. And
without a decisive victory over this passive and concealed
resistance of the bourgeoisie and its champions, the success of
the socialistic revolution is impossible.
4. Finally, the organizing tasks of the socialistic
reorganization of Russia are so enormous and difficult that a
rather prolonged period of time is also required to solve them,
in view of the large number of petty bourgeois fellow-travelers
of the socialistic proletariat, and of the latter’s low
cultural level.
5. All these circumstances taken together are such that from
them result _the necessity, for the success of Socialism in
Russia, of a certain interval of time, not less than a few
months_, in the course of which the socialistic government must
have its hands absolutely free, in order to triumph over the
bourgeoisie, first of all in its own country, and in order to
adopt broad and deep organizing activity.
The greatest significance of Lenin’s words lies in their recognition
of the seriousness of the non-military forms of resistance, sabotage,
and the like, and of the “low cultural level” of the “socialistic
proletariat.” Reading the foregoing statements carefully and
remembering Lenin’s other utterances, both before and after, we
are compelled to wonder whether he is intellectually dishonest, an
unscrupulous trickster playing upon the credulity of his followers,
or merely a loose thinker adrift and helpless on the swift tides of
events. “For the success of Socialism ... not less than _a few months_”
we read from the pen of the man who, in June of the previous year,
while on his way from Switzerland, had written “Socialism cannot now
prevail in Russia”; the same man who in May, 1918, was to tell his
comrades “it is hardly to be expected that the even more developed
coming generation will accomplish a complete transition to Socialism”;
who later told Raymond Robins: “The Russian Revolution will probably
fail. We have not developed far enough in the capitalist stage, we are
too primitive to realize the Socialist state.”[30]
[30] _Vide_ testimony of Robins before U. S. Senate Committee.
And yet--“the success of Socialism ... not less than a few months!”
By the latter part of February, 1918, it was quite clear that the
Soviet control of industry was “killing the goose that laid the golden
eggs”; that it was ruining the industrial life of the nation. The
official press began to discuss in the most serious manner the alarming
decline in production and the staggering financial losses incurred in
the operation of what formerly had been profitable enterprises. At the
Extraordinary Congress of Soviets, in March, 1918, the seriousness of
the situation caused great alarm and a desperate appeal was made to the
workers to increase production, refrain from sabotage, and practise
self-discipline. The congress urged “a merciless struggle against chaos
and disorganization.” Lenin himself pointed out that confiscation of
factories by the workers was ruining Russia. The very policy they had
urged upon the workers, the seizure of the factories, was now seen as a
menace.
On April 28, 1918, Lenin said: “If we are to expropriate at this
pace, we shall be certain to suffer a defeat. The organization of
production under proletarian control is notoriously very much behind
the expropriation of big masses of capital.”[31] He had already come to
realize that the task of transforming capitalist society to a Socialist
society was not the easy matter he had believed shortly before. In
September he had looked upon the task of realizing Socialism as a child
might have done. It would require a Freudian expert to explain the
silly childishness of this paragraph from _The State and Revolution_,
published in September, 1917:
[31] _Soviets at Work._ I have quoted the passage as it appears in the
English edition of Kautsky’s _Dictatorship of the Proletariat_, p.
125. This rendering, which conforms to the French translations of the
authorized text, is clearer and stronger than the version given in the
confessedly “improved” version of Lenin’s speech by Doctor Dubrovsky,
published by the Rand School of Social Science.
Capitalist culture has created industry on a large scale in
the shape of factories, railways, posts, telephones, and so
forth; and on this basis the great majority of the functions
of the old state have become enormously simplified and reduced
in practice to very simple operations, such as registration,
filing, and checking. Hence they will be quite within the reach
of every literate person, and it will be possible to perform
them for the usual “working-man’s wages.”[32]
[32] _The State and Revolution_, by N. Lenin, p. 12.
Thus it was in September, before the overthrow of the Provisional
Government. Then Lenin was at the head of a revolting faction and
presented the task of reorganizing the state as very simple indeed.
In April he was at the head of a government, confronted by realities,
and emphasizing the enormous difficulty and complexity of the task of
reorganization. _The Soviets at Work_ and the later booklet, _The Chief
Tasks of Our Times_, lay great emphasis upon the great difficulties to
be overcome, the need of experienced and trained men, and the folly
of expecting anything like immediate success. “We know all about
Socialism,” he said, “but we do not know how to organize on a large
scale, how to manage distribution, and so on. The old Bolshevist
leaders have not taught us these things, and this is not to the credit
of our party.”[33]
[33] _The Chief Tasks of Our Times_, p. 12.
The same man who had urged the workers to “take possession of
the factories” now realized how utterly unfitted the mass of the
workers must be for undertaking the management of modern industrial
establishments:
To every deputation of workers which has come to me complaining
that a factory was stopping work, I have said, “If you desire
the confiscation of your factory the decree forms are ready,
and I can sign a decree at once. But tell me: Can you take
over the management of the concern? Have you reckoned what
you can produce? Do you know the relations of your work with
Russian and foreign markets?” Then it has appeared that they
are inexperienced in these matters; that there is nothing
about them in the Bolshevist literature, in the Menshevist,
either.[34]
[34] _Idem_, p. 12.
Lenin and his associates had been brought face to face with a condition
which many Marxian Socialist writers had foreseen was likely to exist,
not only in Russia, but in far more highly developed industrial
nations, namely, a dangerous decline of production and of the average
productivity of the workers, instead of the enormous increase which
must be attained before any of the promises of Socialism could be
redeemed. A few figures from official Bolshevist sources will serve
to illustrate the seriousness of the decline in production. The great
Soromovo Works had produced fifteen locomotives monthly, even during
the last months of the Kerensky régime. By the end of April, 1918, it
was pointed out, the output was barely two per month. At the Mytishchy
Works in Moscow, the production, as compared with 1916, was only 40 per
cent. At this time the Donetz Basin was held by the Bolsheviki. The
average monthly output in the coal-fields of this important territory
prior to the arrival of the Bolsheviki was 125,000,000 poods. The
rule of the Bolsheviki was marked by a serious and continuous decline
in production, dropping almost at once to 80,000,000 poods and then
steadily declining, month by month, until in April-May, 1918, it
reached the low level of 26,000,000 poods.[35] When the Bolsheviki were
driven away, the production rose month by month, until, in December,
1918, it had reached 40,000,000 poods. Then the Bolsheviki won control
once more and came back, and at once production declined with great
swiftness, soon getting down to 24,000,000 poods.[36] These figures, be
it remembered, are official Bolshevist figures.
[35] _Economicheskaya Zhizn_, May 6, 1919.
[36] _Idem._
So serious was the decline of production in every department that a
commission was appointed to investigate the matter. The commission
reported in January, 1919, and from its report the following facts
are quoted: in the Moscow railway workshops the number of workmen in
1916 was 1,192; in 1917 the number was 1,179; in 1918 it was 1,772--an
increase of 50 per cent. The number of holidays and “off days” rose
from 6 per cent. in 1916 to 12 per cent. in 1917 and 39.5 per cent. in
1918. At the same time, each car turned out per month represented the
labor of 3.35 men in 1918 as against 1 in 1917 and .44 in 1916. In the
Mytishchy Works, Moscow, the loss of production was enormous. Taking
the eight-hour day as a basis, and counting as 100 the production of
1916, the production in 1917 amounted to 75, and only 40 in 1918. In
the coal-mines of the Moscow region the fall of labor productivity was
equally marked. The normal production per man is given as 750 poods
per month. In 1916 the production was 614 poods; in 1917 it was 448
poods, and in 1918 it was only 242 poods. In the textile industries the
decline in productivity was 35 per cent., including the flax industry,
which does not depend upon the importation of raw materials.[37] In the
Scherbatchev factory the per-capita production of calico was 68 per
cent, lower than in 1917, according to the _Economicheskaya Zhizn_ (No.
50).
[37] For most of the statistical data in this chapter I am indebted to
Prof. V. I. Issaiev, whose careful analyses of the statistical reports
of the Soviet Government are of very great value to all students of the
subject.--AUTHOR.
It is not necessary to quote additional statistics from the report of
the investigating commission. The figures cited are entirely typical.
The report as a whole reveals that there not only had been no arrest
of the serious decline of the year 1917, but _an additional decline at
an accelerated rate_, and that the condition was general throughout
all branches of industry. The report attributes this serious condition
partly to loss of efficiency in the workers due to under-nutrition, but
more particularly to the mistaken conception of freedom held by the
workers, their irresponsibility and indifference; to administrative
chaos arising from inefficiency; and, finally, the enormous amount of
time lost in holding meetings and elections and in endless committees.
In general this report confirms the accounts furnished by the agent of
the governments of Great Britain and the United States of America and
published by them,[38] as well as reports made by well-known European
Socialists.
[38] See the British _White Book_ and the _Memorandum on Certain
Aspects of the Bolshevist Movement in Russia_, presented to the Foreign
Relations Committee of the U. S. Senate by Secretary of State Lansing,
January 5, 1920.
As early as April, 1918, Lenin and other Bolshevist leaders had taken
cognizance of the enormous loss of time consumed by the innumerable
meetings which Soviet control of industry involved. Lenin claimed, with
much good reason, that much of this wasteful talking was the natural
reaction of men who had been repressed too long, though his argument is
somewhat weakened by the fact that there had been eight months of such
talk before the Bolshevist régime began:
The habit of holding meetings is ridiculed, and more often
wrathfully hissed at by the bourgeoisie, Mensheviks, etc.,
who see only chaos, senseless bustle, and outbursts of petty
bourgeoisie egoism. But without the “holding of meetings” the
oppressed masses could never pass from the discipline forced
by the exploiters to conscious and voluntary discipline.
“Meeting-holding” is the real democracy of the toilers, their
straightening out, their awakening to a new life, their
first steps on the field which they themselves have cleared
of reptiles (exploiters, imperialists, landed proprietors,
capitalists), and which they want to learn to put in order
themselves in their own way; for themselves, in accord with
the principles of their, “Soviet,” rule, and not the rule of
the foreigners, of the nobility and bourgeoisie. The November
victory of the toilers against the exploiters was necessary; it
was necessary to have a whole period of elementary discussion
by the toilers themselves of the new conditions of life and
of the new problems to make possible _a secure transition to
higher forms of labor discipline, to a conscious assimilation
of the idea of the necessity of the dictatorship of the
proletariat, to absolute submission to the personal orders of
the representatives of the Soviet rule during work_.[39]
[39] _The Soviets at Work_, p. 37.
There is a very characteristic touch of Machiavellian artistry in this
reference to “a secure transition to higher forms of labor discipline,”
in which there is to be “absolute submission to the personal orders
of the representatives of the Soviet rule during work.” The eloquent
apologia for the Soviet system of industrial control by the workers
carries the announcement of the liquidation of that system. It is to
be replaced by some “higher forms of labor discipline,” forms which
will not attempt the impossible task of conducting factories on
“debating-society lines.” The “petty bourgeois tendency to turn the
members of the Soviets into ‘parliamentarians,’ or, on the other hand,
into bureaucrats,” is to be combated. In many places the departments
of the Soviets are turning “into organs which gradually merge with the
commissariats”--in other words, are ceasing to function as governing
bodies in the factories. There is a difficult transition to be made
which alone will make possible “the definite realization of Socialism,”
and that is to put an end to the wastefulness arising from the attempt
to combine the discussion and solution of political problems with work
in the factories. There must be a return to the system of uninterrupted
work for so many hours, with politics after working-hours. That is
what is meant by the statement: “It is our object to obtain _the free
performance of state obligations by every toiler after he is through
with his eight-hour session of productive work_.”
Admirable wisdom! Saul among the prophets at last! The romancer turns
realist! But this program cannot be carried out without making of
the elaborate system of workers’ control a wreck, a thing of shreds
and patches. Away goes the Utopian combination of factory and forum,
in which the dynamos are stilled when there are speeches to be
made--pathetic travesty of industry and government both. The toiler
must learn that his “state obligations” are to be performed after the
day’s work is done, and not in working-time at the expense of the
pay-roll. More than this, it is necessary to place every factory under
the absolute dictatorship of one person:
Every large machine industry requires an absolute and strict
unity of the will which directs the joint work of hundreds,
thousands, and tens of thousands of people.... But how can
we secure a strict unity of will? By subjecting the will of
thousands to the will of one.[40]
[40] _The Soviets at Work._
If the workers are properly submissive, if they are “ideally conscious
and disciplined,” this dictatorship may be a very mild affair;
otherwise it will be stern and harsh:
There is a lack of appreciation of the simple and obvious
fact that, if the chief misfortunes of Russia are famine and
unemployment, these misfortunes cannot be overcome by any
outbursts of enthusiasm, but only by thorough and universal
organization of discipline, in order to increase the production
of bread for men and fuel for industry, to transport it in
time, and to distribute it in the right way. That, therefore,
responsibility for the pangs of famine and unemployment
falls on _every one who violates the labor discipline in any
enterprise and in any business_. That those who are responsible
should be discovered, tried, and _punished without mercy_.[41]
[41] _Idem._
Not only must the workers abandon their crude conception of industrial
democracy as requiring the abolition of individual authority, but
they must also abandon the notion that in the management of industry
one man is as good as another. They must learn that experts are
necessary:[42] “Without the direction of specialists of different
branches of knowledge, technique, and experience, the transformation
toward Socialism is impossible.” Although it is a defection from
proletarian principles, a compromise, “a step backward by our Socialist
Soviet state,” it is necessary to “make use of the old bourgeois
method and agree to a very high remuneration for the biggest of the
bourgeois specialists.” The proletarian principles must still further
be compromised and the payment of time wages on the basis of equal
remuneration for all workers must give place to payment according to
performance; piece-work must be adopted. Finally, the Taylor system of
scientific management must be introduced: “The possibility of Socialism
will be determined by our success in combining the Soviet rule and
Soviet organization of management with the latest progressive measures
of capitalism. _We must introduce in Russia the study and the teaching
of the Taylor system, and its systematic trial and adaptation._”[43]
[42] A much later statement of Lenin’s view is contained in this
paragraph from a speech by him on March 17, 1920. The quotation is from
_Soviet Russia_, official organ of the Russian Soviet Government Bureau
in the United States:
“Every form of administrative work requires specific
qualifications. One may be the best revolutionist and agitator
and yet useless as an administrator. It is important that
those who manage industries be completely competent, and be
acquainted with all technical conditions within the industry.
We are not opposed to the management of industries by the
workers. _But we point out that the solution of the question
must be subordinate to the interests of the industry._
Therefore the question of the management of industry must
be regarded from a business standpoint. The industry must
be managed with the least possible waste of energy, and the
managers of the industry must be efficient men, whether they be
specialists or workers.”
[43] _The Soviets at Work._
In all this there is much that is fine and admirable, but it is in
direct and fundamental opposition to the whole conception of industrial
control by factory Soviets. No thoughtful person can read and compare
the elaborate provisions of the Instructions on Workers’ Control,
already summarized, and Lenin’s _Soviets at Work_ without reaching the
conclusion that the adoption of the proposals contained in the latter
absolutely destroys the former. The end of the Soviet as a proletarian
industry-directing instrument was already in sight.
Bolshevism was about to enter upon a new phase. What the general
character of that phase would be was quite clear. It had already
been determined and Lenin’s task was to justify what was in reality
a reversal of policy. The essential characteristics of the Soviet
system in industry, having proved to be useless impedimenta, were to be
discarded, and, in like manner, anti-Statism was to be exchanged for an
exaggerated Statism. In February, 1918, the Bolshevist rulers of Russia
were confronted by a grave menace, an evil inherent in Syndicalism in
all its variant forms, including Bolshevism--namely, the assertion
of exorbitant demands by workers employed in performing services of
immediate and vital importance in the so-called “key industries.”
Although the railway workers were only carrying the Bolshevist theories
into practice, acquiescence in their demands would have placed the
whole industrial life of Russia under their domination. Instead of a
dictatorship of the proletariat, there would have been dictatorship
by a single occupational group. Faced by this danger, the Bolshevist
Government did not hesitate to nationalize the railways and place them
under an absolute dictator, responsible, not to the railway workers,
but to the central Soviet authority, the government. Wages, hours of
labor, and working conditions were no longer subject to the decision of
the railway workers’ councils, but were determined by the dictators
appointed by the state. The railway workers’ unions were no longer
recognized, and the right to strike was denied and strikes declared
to be treason against the state. The railway workers’ councils were
not abolished at first, but were reduced to a nominal existence as
“consultative bodies,” which in practice were not consulted. Here was
the apotheosis of the state: the new policy could not be restricted
to railways; nationalization of industry, under state direction, was
to take the place of the direction of industry by autonomous workers’
councils.
In May, 1918, Commissar of Finances Gukovsky, staggered by the enormous
loss incurred upon every hand, in his report to the Congress of
Soviets called attention to the situation. He said that the railway
system, the arterial system of the industrial life of the nation, was
completely disorganized and demoralized. Freight-tonnage capacity had
decreased by 70 per cent., while operating expenses had increased 150
per cent. Whereas before the war operating expenses were 11,579 rubles
per verst, in May, 1918, _wages alone_ amounted to 80,000 rubles per
verst, the total working expenses being not less than 120,000 rubles
per verst. A similar state of demoralization obtained, said Gukovsky,
in the nationalized marine transportation service. In every department
of industry, according to this highly competent authority, waste,
inefficiency, idleness, and extravagance prevailed. He called attention
to the swollen salary-list; the army of paid officials. Already the
menace of what soon developed into a formidable bureaucracy was seen:
“The machinery of the old régime has been preserved, the ministries
remain, and parallel with them Soviets have arisen--provincial,
district, volost, and so forth.”
In June, 1918, after the railways had been nationalized for some time,
Kobozev, Bolshevist Commissar of Communications, said: “The eight-hour
workday and the payment per hour have definitely disorganized the whole
politically ignorant masses, who understand these slogans, not as an
appeal to the most productive efficiency of a free citizen, but as a
right to idleness unjustified by any technical means. _Whole powerful
railway workshops give a daily disgraceful exhibition of inactivity_ on
the principle of ‘Why should I work when my neighbor is paid by time
for doing no work at all?’”
Although nationalization of industry had been decided upon in February,
and a comprehensive plan for the administration and regulation of
nationalized enterprises had been published in March, promulgated as a
decree, with instructions that it must be enforced by the end of May,
it was not until July that the Soviet Government really decided upon
its enforcement. It should be said, however, that a good many factories
were nationalized between April and July. Many factories were actually
abandoned by their owners and directors, and had to be taken over. Many
others were just taken in an “irregular manner” by the workers, who
continued their independent confiscations. For this there was indeed
some sort of authority in the decree of March, 1918.[44] Transportation
had broken down, and there was a lack of raw materials. It was
officially reported that in May there were more than 250,000 unemployed
workmen in Moscow alone. No less than 224 machine-shops, which had
employed an aggregate of 120,000 men, were closed. Thirty-six textile
factories, employing a total of 136,000 operatives, were likewise idle.
To avert revolt, it was necessary to keep these unemployed workers
upon the pay-roll. Under czarism the policy of subsidizing industrial
establishments out of the government revenues had been very extensively
developed. This policy was continued by the Provisional Government
under Kerensky and by the Bolsheviki in their turn. Naturally, with
industry so completely disorganized, this led toward bankruptcy at a
rapid rate. The following extract from Gukovsky’s report to the Central
Executive Committee in May requires no elucidation:
[44] See text of the decree--Appendix.
Our Budget has reached the astronomical figures of from 80 to
100 billions of rubles. No revenue can cover such expenditure.
Our revenue for the half-year reaches approximately
3,294,000,000 rubles. It is exceedingly difficult to find a
way of escape out of this situation. The repudiation of state
loans played a very unfavorable part in this respect, as now
it is impossible to borrow money--no one will lend. Formerly
railways used to yield a revenue, and agriculture likewise. Now
agriculturists refuse to export their produce, they are feeding
better and hoarding money. The former apparatus--in the shape
of a Government Spirit Monopoly and rural police officers--no
longer exists. Only one thing remains to be done--to issue
paper money _ad infinitum_. But soon we shall not be able to do
even this.
At the Congress of the Soviets of People’s Economy in May, Rykov, the
president of the Superior Council of the National Board of Economy,
reported, concerning the nationalization of industries, that so far
it had been carried out without regard to industrial economy or
efficiency, but exclusively from the point of view of successfully
struggling against the bourgeoisie. It was, therefore, a war measure,
and must not be judged by ordinary economic standards. Miliutin,
another Bolshevist Commissar, declared that “nationalization bore a
punitive character.” It was pointed out by Gostev, another Bolshevist
official, that it had been carried out against the wishes of many of
the workers themselves quite as much as against the wishes of the
bourgeoisie. “I must laugh when they speak of bourgeois sabotage,”
he said. “_We have a national people’s and proletarian sabotage. We
are met with enormous opposition from the labor masses when we start
standardizing._” For good or ill, however, and despite all opposition,
Bolshevism had turned to nationalization and to the erection of a
powerful and highly centralized state. What the results of that policy
were we shall see.
IX
THE NATIONALIZATION OF INDUSTRY--I
To judge fairly and wisely the success or failure of an economic and
political policy so fundamental and far-reaching as the nationalization
of industry we must discard theories altogether and rely wholly upon
facts. Nothing could be easier than to formulate theoretical arguments
of great plausibility and force, either in support of the state
ownership of industries and their direction by state agencies or in
opposition to such a policy. Interesting such theorizing may be, but
nothing can be conclusively determined by it. When we come to deal with
the case of a country where, as in Russia, nationalization of industry
has been tried upon quite a large scale, there is only one criterion to
apply, namely, its relative success as compared with other methods of
industrial organization and management in the same or like conditions.
If nationalization and state direction can be shown to have brought
about greater advantage than other forms of industrial ownership and
control, then nationalization is justified by that result; if, on the
other hand, its advantages are demonstrably less, it must be judged a
failure.
Whether the nationalization of industry by the Bolshevist Government
of Russia was a sound policy, wisely conceived and carried out with a
reasonable degree of efficiency, can be determined with a fair approach
to certainty and finality. Our opinions concerning Karl Marx’s theory
of the economic motivation of social evolution, or Lenin’s ability
and character, or the methods by which the Bolsheviki obtained power,
are absolutely irrelevant and inconsequential. History will base its
estimate of Bolshevism, not upon the evidence of the terrorism which
attended it, ample and incontestable as that evidence may be, but upon
its success or failure in solving the great economic problems which
it set out to solve. Our judgment of the nationalization of industry
must not be warped by our resentment of those features of Bolshevist
rule which established its tyrannical character. The ample testimony
furnished by the official journals published by the Bolshevist
Government and the Communist Party enables us to visualize with great
clearness the conditions prevailing in Russia before nationalization
of industry was resorted to. We have seen that there was an alarming
shortage of production, a ruinous excess of cost per unit of
production, a great deal of inefficiency and waste, together with a
marked increase in the number of salaried administrative officials.
We have seen that during the period of industrial organization and
direction by the autonomous organizations of the workers in the
factories these evils grew to menacing proportions. It was to remedy
these evils that nationalization was resorted to. If, therefore, we
can obtain definite and authoritative answers to certain questions
which inevitably suggest themselves, we shall be in a position to
judge the merits of nationalization, not as a general policy, for all
times and places, but as a policy for Russia in the circumstances
and conditions prevailing when it was undertaken. The questions
suggest themselves: Was there any increase in the total volume of
production? Was the average per-capita production raised or lowered?
Did the new methods result in lessening the excessive average cost
per unit of production? Was there any perceptible marked increase in
efficiency? Finally, did nationalization lessen the number of salaried
administrative officials or did it have a contrary effect?
We are not concerned with opinions here, but only with such definite
facts as are to be had. The replies to our questions are to be found
in the mass of statistical data which the Bolsheviki have published.
We are not compelled to rely upon anybody’s opinions or observations;
the numerous reports published by the responsible officials of the
Bolshevist Government, and by their official press, contain an
abundance of statistical evidence affording adequate and reliable
answer to each of the questions we have asked.
Because the railways were nationalized first, and because of their
vital importance to the general economic life of the nation, let us
consider how the nationalization of railroad transportation worked out.
The following table is taken from the report of the Commissar of Ways
and Communications:
Working
Gross Working Expenses Wages and Profit and
Year Receipts Expenses per Verst Salaries Loss
(rubles) (rubles) (rubles) (rubles) (rubles)
1916 1,350,000,000 1,210,000,000 1,700 650,000,000 +140,000,000
1917 1,400,000,000 3,300,000,000 46,000 2,300,000,000 -1,900,000,000
1918 1,500,000,000 9,500,000,000 44,000 8,000,000,000 -8,000,000,000
These figures indicate that the nationalization of railways during
the nine months of 1918 was characterized by a condition which no
country in the world could stand for a very long time. This official
table affords no scintilla of a suggestion that nationalization was
succeeding any better than the anarcho-Syndicalist management which
preceded it. The enormous increase in operating cost, the almost
stationary receipts, and the resulting colossal deficit require no
comment. At least on the financial side the nationalization policy
cannot be said to have been a success, a fact which was frankly
admitted by the _Severnaya Communa_, March 26, 1919. To see a profit
of 140 million rubles transformed into a loss of 8 billion rubles is
surely a serious matter.
Let us, however, adopt another test than that of finance, namely, the
service test, and see whether that presents us with a more favorable
result: According to the official report of the Commissar of Ways and
Communications, there were in operation on October 1, 1917--that is,
shortly before the Bolshevist _coup d’état_--52,597 versts[45] of
railroad line in operation; on October 1, 1918, there were in operation
21,800 versts, a decrease of 30,797. On October 1, 1917, there were in
working order 15,732 locomotives; on October 1, 1918, the number had
dwindled to 5,037, a decrease of 10,695. On October 1, 1917, the number
of freight cars in working condition was 521,591; on October 1, 1918,
the number was 227,274, a decrease of 294,317.
[45] One verst equals .663 mile, roughly, about two-thirds of a mile.
The picture presented by these figures is, for one who knows the
economic conditions in Russia, simply appalling. At its best the
Russian railway system was wholly inadequate to serve the economic
life of the nation. The foregoing official figures indicate an utter
collapse of the railways at a time when the nation needed an efficient
railroad transportation system more than at any time in its history.
One of the reasons for the collapse of the railway system was the
failure of the fuel supply. In northern and central Russia wood is
generally used for fuel in the factories and on the railways. Difficult
as it might be for them to maintain the supply of coal under the
extraordinary conditions prevailing, it would seem that with enormous
forests at their disposal, so near at hand, they would have found it
relatively easy to supply the railways with wood for fuel purposes. Yet
nowhere in the whole range of the industrial system of Russia was the
failure more disastrous or more complete than here. According to an
official estimate, the amount of wood fuel required for the railways
from May 1, 1918, to May 1, 1919, estimated upon the basis of “famine
rations,” was 4,954,000 cubic sazhens,[46] of which 858,000 cubic
sazhens was on hand, leaving 4,096,000 cubic sazhens as the amount to
be provided. A report published in the _Economicheskaya Zhizn_ (No.
41) stated that not more than 18 per cent. of the total amount of wood
required was felled, and that not more than one-third of that amount
was actually delivered to the railways. In other words, 82 per cent.
of the wood fuel was not cut at all, at least so far as the particular
economic body whose business it was to provide the wood was concerned.
Extraordinary measures had to be taken to secure the fuel. From
_Economicheskaya Zhizn_, February 22, 1919, we learn that the railway
administration managed to secure fuel wood amounting to 70 per cent. of
its requirements, and the People’s Superior Economic Council another
2 per cent., a very large part of which had been secured by private
enterprise. If this last statement seems astonishing and anomalous,
it must be understood that as early as January 17, 1919, Lenin, as
President of the Central Soviet Government, promulgated a decree which
in a very large measure restored the right to private enterprise.
Already nationalization was being pronounced a failure by Lenin. In an
address announcing this remarkable modification of policy he said:
[46] One sazhen equals seven feet.
If each peasant would consent to reduce his consumption of
products to a point a little less than his needs and turn over
the remainder to the state, and if we were able to distribute
that remainder regularly, we could go on, assuring the
population a food-supply, insufficient, it is true, but enough
to avoid famine.
This last is, however, beyond our strength, due to our
disorganization. The people, exhausted by famine, show the most
extreme impatience. Assuredly, we have our food policy, but
the essential of it is that the decrees should be executed.
_Although they were promulgated long ago, the decrees relative
to the distribution of food products by the state never have
been executed because the peasants will sell nothing for paper
money._
It is better to tell the truth. _The conditions require that we
should pitilessly, relentlessly force our local organizations
to obey the central power._ This, again, is difficult because
millions of our inhabitants are accustomed to regard any
central power as an organization of exploiters and brigands.
They have no confidence in us and without confidence it is
impossible to institute an economic régime.
The crisis in food-supplies, aggravated by the breakdown of
transportation, explains the terrible situation that confronts
us. At Petrograd the condition of the transportation service is
desperate. The rolling-stock is unusable.
Another reason for the failure of the railways under nationalization
during the first year’s experimentation with that policy was the
demoralization of the labor force. The low standard of efficiency,
constant loafing, and idleness were factors in the problem. The
interference by the workers’ councils was even more serious. When
the railways were nationalized the elected committees of workers,
while shorn of much of their power, were retained as consultative
bodies, as we have already seen. Toward the end of 1918 the officials
responsible for the direction of the railroads found even that measure
of authority which remained to these councils incompatible with
efficient organization. Consequently, at the end of 1918 the abolition
of the workers’ committees of control was decreed and the dictatorial
powers of the railroad directors made absolute. The system of paying
wages by the day was replaced by a piece-work system, supplemented by
cash bonuses for special efficiency. Later on, as we shall see, these
changes were made applicable to all the nationalized industries. Thus,
the principal features of the capitalist wage system were brought back
to replace the communistic principles which had failed. When Lomov,
president of the Chief Forest Committee, declared, as reported in
_Izvestia_, June 4, 1919, that “proletarian principles must be set
aside and the services of private capitalistic apparatus made use of,”
he simply gave expression to what was already a very generally accepted
view.
The “return to capitalism,” as it was commonly and justly described,
had begun in earnest some months before Lomov made the declaration
just quoted. The movement was attended by a great deal of internal
conflict and dissension. In particular the trades-unions were incensed
because they were practically suppressed as autonomous organs of the
working-class. The dictatorship of the proletariat was already assuming
the character of a dictatorship over the proletariat by a strongly
centralized state. The rulers of this state, setting aside the written
Constitution, were in fact not responsible to any electorate. They
ruled by fiat and proclamation and ruthlessly suppressed all who sought
to oppose them. They held that, industry having become nationalized,
trades-unions were superfluous, and that strikes could not be tolerated
because they became, _ipso facto_, acts of treason against the state.
Such was the evolution of this anti-Statist movement.
The unions resisted the attempts to deprive them of their character
as fighting organizations. They protested against the denial of the
right to strike, the suppression of their meetings and their press.
They resented the arbitrary fixing of their wages by officials
of the central government. As a result, there was an epidemic of
strikes, most of which were suppressed with great promptitude and
brutality. At the Alexander Works, Moscow, eighty workers were killed
by machine-gun fire. From March 6 to 26, 1919, the _Krasnaya Gazeta_
published accounts of fifteen strikes in Petrograd, involving more
than half the wage-workers of the city, some of the strikes being
attended with violence which was suppressed by armed troops. At the
beginning of March there was such a strike at the Tula Works, reported
in _Izvestia_, March 2, 1919. On March 16, 1919, the _Severnaya
Communa_ gave an account of the strike at the famous Putilov Works,
and of the means taken to “clear out the Social Revolutionary
blackguards”--meaning thereby the striking workmen. _Pravda_ published
on March 23, 1919, accounts of serious strikes at the Putilov Works,
the Arthur Koppel Works, the government car-building shops, and
elsewhere. Despite a clearly defined policy on the part of the press
to ignore labor struggles as far as possible, sufficient was published
to show that there was an intense struggle by the Russian proletariat
against its self-constituted masters. “The workers of Petrograd are in
the throes of agitation, and strikes are occurring in some shops. The
Bolsheviki have been making arrests,” said _Izvestia_ on March 2, 1919.
Of course it may be fairly said that the strikes did not of themselves
indicate a condition of unrest and dissatisfaction peculiar to Russia.
That is quite true. There were strikes in many countries in the early
months of 1919. This fact does not, however, add anything to the
strength of the defense of the Bolshevist régime. In the capitalist
countries, where the struggle between the wage-earning and the
employing classes is a normal condition, strikes are very ordinary
phenomena. The Bolsheviki, in common with all other Socialists,
pointed to these conflicts as evidence of the unfitness of capitalism
to continue; and of the need for Socialism. It was the very essence
of their faith that in the Socialist state strikes would be unknown,
because no conflict of class interests would be possible. Yet here
in the Utopia of the Bolsheviki the proletarian dictatorship was
accompanied by strikes and lock-outs precisely like those common to
the capitalist system in all lands. _Moreover, while the nations which
still retained the capitalist system had their strikes, there was not
one of them in which such brutal methods of repression were resorted
to._ Russia was at war, we are told, and strikes were a deadly menace
to her very existence. But this argument, like the other, is of no
avail. England, France, Italy, and America on the one side, and Germany
and Austria upon the other side, all had strikes during the war, but in
no one of them were strikers shot down with such savage recklessness as
in Russia under the Bolsheviki.
Where and when in any of the great capitalist nations during the war
was there such a butchery of striking workmen as that at the Alexander
Works, already referred to? Where and when during the whole course of
the war did any capitalist government suppress a strike of workmen with
anything like the brutality with which the Bolshevist masters of Russia
suppressed the strike at the Putilov Works in March, 1919? At first the
marines in Petrograd were ordered to disperse the strikers and break
the strike, but they refused to obey the order. At a meeting these
marines decided that, rather than shoot down the striking workmen, they
would join forces with them. Then the Bolsheviki called out detachments
of coast guards, armed sailors from Kronstadt and Petrograd formerly
belonging to the “disciplinary battalions,” chiefly Letts. The strikers
put up an armed resistance, being supported in this by a small body of
soldiers. They were soon overcome, however, and the armed sailors took
possession of the works and summarily executed many of the strikers,
shooting them on the spot without even a drum-head court martial. The
authorities issued a proclamation--published in _Severnaya Communa_,
March 16, 1919--forbidding the holding of meetings and “inviting” the
strikers back to work:
All honest workmen desirous of carrying out the decision of
the Petrograd Soviet and ready to start work will be allowed
to go into the factory on condition that they forthwith go to
their places and take up their work. All those who begin work
will receive an additional ration of one-half pound of bread.
They who do not want to resume work will be at once discharged,
without receiving any concessions. A special commission will
be formed for the reorganization of the works. _No meetings
will be allowed to be held...._ For the last time the Petrograd
Soviet invites the Putilov workmen to expiate their crime
committed against the working-class and the peasantry of
Russia, and to cease at once their foolish strike.
On the following day this “invitation” was followed up by a typical
display of Bolshevist force. A detachment of armed sailors went to the
homes of the striking workmen and at the point of the bayonet drove the
men back into the works, about which a strong guard was placed. The
men were kept at work by armed guards placed at strategic positions in
the shops. All communication with the outside was strictly prohibited.
Numerous arrests were made. With grim irony the Bolshevist officials
posted in and around the shops placards explaining that, unlike
imperialistic and capitalistic governments, the Soviet authority had
no intention of suppressing strikes or insurrections by armed force.
For the good of the Revolution, however, and to meet the war needs, the
government would use every means at its command to force the workmen to
remain at their tasks and to prevent all demonstrations.
A bitter struggle took place between the trades-unions and the Soviet
Government. It was due, not to strikes merely, or even mainly, though
these naturally brought out its bitterest manifestations. The real
cause of the conflict was the fact that the government had thrown
communism to the winds and adopted a policy of state capitalism. All
the evils of capitalism in its relation to the workers reappeared,
intensified and exaggerated as an inevitable result of being
fundamental elements of the polity of an all-powerful state wholly
free from democratic control. The abolition of the right to strike;
the introduction of piece-work, augmented by a bonus system in place
of day wages; the arbitrary fixing of wages and working conditions;
the withdrawal of the powers which the workers’ councils, led by the
unions, had possessed since the beginning of the Revolution, and the
substitution for the crude spirit of democracy which inspired the
Soviet control of industry of the despotic principle of autocracy,
“absolute submission to the will of a single individual”--these things
inevitably evoked the active hostility of the organized workers. It was
from the proletariat, and from its most “class-conscious” elements,
that the Bolshevist régime received this determined resistance.
Many unions were suppressed altogether. This happened to the Teachers’
Union, which was declared to be “counter-revolutionary.”[47] It
happened also to the Printers’ Union. In this case the authorities
simply declared that all membership cards were invalid and that
the old officers were displaced. In order to work as a printer it
was necessary to get a new card of membership, and such cards were
only issued to those who signed declarations of loyalty to the
Bolshevist authority.[48] The trades-unions were made to conform to
the decisions of the Communist Party and subordinated to the rule of
the Commissaries. Upon this point there is a good deal of evidence
available, though most of it comes from non-Bolshevist sources. The
references to this important matter in the official Bolshevist press
are very meager and vague, and the Ransomes, Goodes, Malones, Coppings,
and other apologists are practically silent upon the subject.
[47] See Keeling, _op. cit._
[48] _Idem._
The Socialist and trades-union leader, Oupovalov, from whom we have
previously quoted, testifies that “Trades-unions, as working-class
organizations independent of any political party, were transformed
by the Bolsheviki into party organizations and subordinated to the
Commissaries.” Strumillo, equally competent as a witness, says:
“Another claim of the Social Democrats--that trades-unions should be
independent of political parties--likewise came to nothing. They were
all to be under the control of the Bolsheviki. Alone the All-Russian
Union of Printers succeeded in keeping its independence, _but
eventually for that it was dispersed by the order of Lenin, and the
members of its Executive Committee arrested_.” These statements are
borne out by the testimony of the English trades-unionist, Keeling, who
says:
If a trades-union did not please the higher Soviet it was fined
and suppressed and a new union was formed in its place by the
Bolsheviks themselves. Entry to this new union was only open to
members of the old union who signed a form declaring themselves
entirely in agreement with, and prepared completely to support
in every detail, the policy of the Soviet Government.
Refusal to join on these terms meant the loss of the work
and the salary, together with exclusion from both the first
and second categories.[49] It will readily be understood how
serious a matter it was to oppose any coercive measure.
[49] _I.e._, the food categories entitling one to the highest and next
highest food rations.
Every incentive was held out to the poorer people to spy and
report on the others. A workman or a girl who gave information
that any member of the trades-union was opposed in any way to
the Soviet system was specially rewarded. He or she would be
given extra food and promoted as soon as possible to a seat
upon the executive of the union or a place on the factory
committee.
Soon after the first Congress of the Railroad Workers’ Unions, in
February, 1918, the unions of railway workers were “merged with the
state”--that is, they were forbidden to strike or to function as
defensive or offensive organizations of the workers, and were compelled
to accept the direction of the officials appointed by the central
government and to carry out their orders. At the second Congress of the
Railroad Workers’ Unions, February, 1919, according to _Economicheskaya
Zhizn_ (No. 42), this policy was “sharply and categorically opposed” by
Platonov, himself a Bolshevik and one of the most influential of the
leaders of the railway men’s unions. At the Moscow Conference of Shop
Committees and Trades-Unions, March, 1919, it was reported, according
to _Economicheskaya Zhizn_ (No. 51), the unions “having given up their
neutrality and independence, completely merged their lot with that of
the Soviet Government.... Their work came to be closely interwoven
with the state activities of the Soviet Government.... Only practical
utilitarian considerations prevent us from completely merging the
trades-unions with the administrative apparatus of the state.”
At the ninth Congress of the Communist Party, held in Moscow, Bucharin
proposed the adoption of certain “basic principles” governing the
status of trades-unions and these were accepted by the Congress:
“In the Soviet state economic and political issues are indivisible,
therefore the economic organs of the Labor movement--the unions--have
to be completely merged with the political--the Soviets--and not to
continue as independent organizations as is the case in a capitalistic
state. Being more limited in their scope, they have to be subordinate
to the Soviets, which are more universal institutions. But merging
with the Soviet apparatus the unions by no means become organs of the
state power; they only take upon themselves the economic functions of
this power.” In his speech Bucharin contended that “such an intimate
connection of the trades-unions with the Soviet power will present an
ideal network of economic administrative organization covering the
whole of Russia.” It is quite clear that the unions must cease to exist
as fighting organizations in the Bolshevist state, and become merely
subordinate agencies carrying out the will of the central power.
Even if this testimony, official and otherwise, were lacking, it
would be evident from the numerous strikes of a serious character
among the best organized workers, and from their violence, that
Bolshevism at this stage of its development found itself in opposition
to the trades-unions. And if the evidence upon that point were not
overwhelming and conclusive, it would only be necessary to read
carefully the numerous laws and decrees of the Bolshevist Government,
and to observe the development of its industrial policy, in order
to understand that trades-unions, as independent and militant
working-class organizations, fighting always to advance the interests
of their class, could not exist under such a system.
The direct and immediate reason for the policy that was adopted toward
the unions was, of course, the state of the industries, which made it
impossible to meet the ever-growing demands made by the unions. There
was, however, a far deeper and profounder reason, namely, the character
of the unions themselves. The Bolsheviki had been forced to recognize
the fundamental weakness of every form of Syndicalism, including
Sovietism. They had found that the Soviets were not qualified to carry
on industry efficiently; that narrow group interests were permitted
to dominate, instead of the larger interests of society as a whole.
The same thing was true of the trades-unions. By its very nature the
trades-union movement is limited to a critical purpose and attitude; it
makes demands and evades responsibilities. The trades-union does not
and cannot, as a trades-union, possess the capacity for constructive
functioning that a co-operative society possesses, for instance.
This fact was very clearly and frankly stated in March, 1919, by L. B.
Krassin, in a criticism which was published in the _Economicheskaya
Zhizn_ (No. 52). He pointed out that, apart from the struggle for
higher wages, “the labor control on the part of the trades-unions
confined itself the whole time to perfunctory supervision of the
activities of the plants, and completely ignored the general work
of production. A scientific technical control, the only kind that
is indispensable, is altogether beyond the capacities of the
trades-unions.” The same issue of this authoritative Bolshevist organ
stated that at the Conference of Electrical Workers it was reported
that “In the course of last year everybody admitted the failure of
workers’ control,” and that the conference had adopted a resolution “to
replace the working-men’s control by one of inspection--_i.e._, by the
engineers of the Council of National Economy.”
Instead of the expected idyllic peace and satisfaction, there was
profound unrest in the Utopia of the Bolsheviki. There was not even
the inspiration of enthusiastic struggle and sacrifice to attain the
goal. The organized workers were disillusioned. They found that the
Bolshevist state, in its relations to them as employer, differed from
the capitalist employers they had known mainly in the fact that it had
all the coercive forces of the state at its command, and a will to use
them without any hesitation or any mercy. One view of the social and
industrial unrest of the period is set forth in the following extract
from the _Severnaya Communa_, March 30, 1919:
At the present moment a tremendous struggle is going on within
the ranks of the proletariat between two diametrically opposed
currents. Part of the proletariat, numerically in the great
majority, still tied to the village, both in a material as well
as an ideological respect, is in an economic sense inclined to
anarchism. It is not connected in production and in interest
in its development. The other part is the industrial, highly
skilled mechanics, who fight for new methods of production.
_By the equalization of pay, and by the introduction of
majority rule in the management of the factories, supposed
to be a policy of democracy, we are only sawing off the limb
on which we are sitting_, for the flower of our proletariat,
the most efficient workers, prefer to go to the villages,
or to engage in home trades, or to do anything else but to
remain within those demolished and dusty fortresses we call
factories. Why, this means in its truest sense _a dictatorship
of unskilled laborers_!
This outcry from one of the principal official organs of the Bolsheviki
is interesting from several points of view. The struggle within the
proletariat itself is recognized. This alone could only mean the
complete abandonment of faith in the original Bolshevist ideal, which
was based upon the solidarity of interest of the working-class as a
whole. The denunciation of the equalitarian principle of uniform wages
for all workers, and of majority rule in the factories, could only come
from a conviction that Bolshevism and Sovietism were alike unsuited to
Russia and undesirable. The scornful reference to a “dictatorship of
unskilled laborers” might have come from any bourgeois employer.
From the official Bolshevist press of this period pages of quotations
might easily be given to show that the transformation to familiar
capitalist conditions was proceeding at a rapid rate. Thus, the
Bolshevist official, Glebov, reported at the Conference of Factory
Committees, in March, 1919: “The fight against economic disintegration
demanded the reintroduction of the premium system. This system has
produced splendid results in many instances, having increased the
productivity of labor 100 to 200 per cent.” The Bolshevist journal,
_Novy Put_, declared, “The most effective means for raising the
efficiency of labor is the introduction of the premium and piece-work
system as against daily wages.” The _Economicheskaya Zhizn_ (No. 46)
declared, “An investigation undertaken last month by the trades-unions
has shown that in 75 per cent. of the plants the old system of wages
has been reintroduced and that nearly everywhere this has been followed
by satisfactory and even splendid results.” The same issue of this
important official organ showed that there had been large increases
in production wherever the old system of wages and premiums had been
restored. At the Marx Printing Works the increase was 20 per cent.; at
the Nobel Factory 35 per cent.; at the Aviation Plant 150 per cent.;
and at Seminov’s Lumber Mill 243 per cent.
The _Severnaya Communa_ reported that “In the Nevski Works the
substitution of the premium system for the monthly wage system
increased the productivity of the working-men three and one-half
times, and the cost of labor for one locomotive dropped from 1,400,000
rubles to 807,000 rubles--_i.e._, to almost one-half.” Rykov, president
of the Superior Council of National Economy, one of the ablest of the
Bolshevist officials, reported, according to _Izvestia_, that “in the
Tula Munition Works, after the old ‘premium’ system of wages had been
restored, the productivity of the works and of labor rose to 70 per
cent. of what it was in 1916.”
These are only a few of the many similar statements appearing in the
official Bolshevist press pointing to a reversal of policy and a return
to capitalist methods. On March 1, 1919, a decree of the People’s
Commissaries was promulgated which introduced a new wage scale, based
upon the principle of extra pay for skill. The greater the skill the
higher the rate of wages was the new rule. As published in _Severnaya
Communa_, the scale provided for twenty-seven classes of workers. The
lowest, unskilled class of laborers, domestics, and so forth, receive
600 rubles per month (1st class), 660 rubles (2d class), and so on.
Higher employees, specialists, are put in classes 20 to 27, and receive
from 1,370 to 2,200 rubles a month. Skilled mechanics in chemical
plants, for example, receive 1,051-1,160 rubles. Unskilled laborers,
600 rubles, and chemical engineers more than 2,000 rubles a month.
Nationalization of industry meant, and could only mean, state
capitalism. Communism was as far away as it was under czarism. And many
of the old complaints so familiar in capitalist countries were heard.
The workers were discontented and restless; production, while it was
better than under Soviet control, was still far below the normal level;
there was an enormous growth of bureaucracy and an appalling amount of
corruption. Profiteering and speculation were rampant and inefficiency
was the order of the day. The following extract from an article in
_Pravda_, March 15, 1919, is a confession of failure most abject:
Last year the people of Russia were suffering from lack of
bread. To-day they are in distress because there is plenty of
foodstuffs which cannot be brought out from the country and
which will, no doubt, decay to a great extent when hot weather
arrives.
The misery of bread scarcity is replaced by another
calamity--the plentifulness of breadstuffs. That the situation
is really such is attested by these figures:
The Food Commission and its subsidiary organs have stored up
from August, 1918, to February 20, 1919, grain and forage
products amounting to 82,633,582 poods. There remained on the
last-mentioned date in railroad stations and other collection
centers not less than 22,245,072 poods of grain and fodder.
Of these stocks, according to the incomplete information by
the Transport Branch of the Food Commission, there are stalled
on the Moscow-Kazan and Syzran-Viazma Railroads alone not
less than 2,000,000 poods of grain in 2,382 cars. There are,
moreover, according to the same source, on the Kazanburgsk and
Samara-Zlatoostovsk Line, at least 1,300 more car-loads of
breadstuffs that cannot be moved.
All this grain is stalled because there are no locomotives to
haul the rolling-stock. Thus the starving population does not
receive the bread which is provided for it and which is, in
part, even loaded up in cars.
* * * * *
In a hungry land there must be no misery while there is a
surplus of bread. Such a misfortune would be truly unbearable!
On April 15, 1919, _Izvestia_ published an article by Zinoviev, in
which the famous Bolshevist leader confessed that the Soviet Government
had not materially benefited the average working-man:
Has the Soviet Government, has our party done everything that
can be done for the direct improvement of the daily life of the
average working-man and his family? Alas! we hesitate to answer
this question in the affirmative.
Let us look the truth in the face. We have committed quite a
number of blunders in this realm. _We have to confess that
we are unable to improve the nutrition of the average worker
to any serious extent._ But do the wages correspond with the
actually stupendous rise of prices for unrationed foodstuffs?
Nobody will undertake to answer this question entirely in the
affirmative, while the figures given by Comrade Strumilin
show that in spite of a threefold raise of the wage scale,
the real purchasing power of these wages had shrunk, on the
average, more than 30 per cent. by March of the current year,
as compared with May of last year.
The _Economicheskaya Zhizn_, May 6, 1919, gave a despondent account of
the coal industry and the low production, accompanied by this alarming
picture: “The starving, ill-clad miners are running away from the pits
in a panic, and it is to be feared that in two or three weeks not only
the whole production of coal will be stopped, but most of the mines
will be flooded.”
Nationalization of industry was not a new thing in Russia. It was,
indeed, quite common under czarism. The railways were largely state
owned and operated by the government. Most of the factories engaged
in the manufacture of guns and munitions were also nationalized under
czarism. It is interesting, therefore, to compare the old régime with
the new in this connection. Under czarism nationalization had always
led to the creation of an immense bureaucracy, politically powerful
by reason of its numbers, extravagant, inefficient, and corrupt. That
nationalization under the new régime was attended by the same evils, in
an exaggerated form, the only difference being that the new bureaucracy
was drawn from a different class, is written so plainly in the records
that he who runs may read. No country in the world, it is safe to say,
has ever known such a bureaucracy as the Bolshevist régime produced.
At the eighth All-Russian Congress of the Communist Party, held in
March, 1919, Lenin said: “You imagine that you have abolished private
property, but instead of the old bourgeoisie that has been crushed
you are faced by a new one. The places of the former bourgeoisie have
already been filled up by the newly born bourgeoisie.” The backbone
of this new bourgeoisie was the vast army of government officials
and employees. These and the food speculators and profiteers, many
of whom have amassed great wealth--real wealth, not worthless paper
rubles--make up a formidable bourgeoisie. Professor Miliukov tells of
a statistical department in Moscow with twenty-one thousand employees;
and of eighteen offices having to be visited to get permission to
buy a pair of shoes from the government store. Alexander Berkenheim,
vice-chairman of the Moscow Central Union of Russian Consumers’
Co-operative Societies, said: “The experiment in socialization has
resulted in the building up of an enormous bureaucratic machine. To buy
a pencil one has to call at eighteen official places.” These men are
competent witnesses, notwithstanding their opposition to Bolshevism.
Let us put it aside, however, and consider only a small part of the
immense mass of official Bolshevist testimony to the same general
effect.
On February 21, 1919, the Bolshevist official, Nemensky, presented
to the Supreme Council of National Economy the report of the
official inspection and audit of the Centro-Textile, the central
state organization having charge of the production and distribution
of textiles. There are some sixty of these organizations, such as
Centro-Sugar, Centro-Tea, Centro-Coal, and so on, the entire number
being federated into the Supreme Council of National Economy. From the
report referred to, as published in _Economicheskaya Zhizn_, February
25, 1919, the following paragraphs are quoted:
An enormous staff of employees (about 6,000), for the most
part loafing about, doing nothing; it was discovered that 125
employees were actually not serving at all, but receiving a
salary the same as the others. There have been cases where
some have been paid twice for the same period of time. _The
efficiency of the officials is negligible to a striking
degree...._
The following figures may partially serve as an illustration of
what was the work of the collaborators: For four months--from
August 25 to November 21, 1918--the number of letters received
amounted to 59,959 (making an average of 500 a day), and the
number of letters sent was 25,781 (an average of 207 per day).
Each secretary had to deal with 10 letters received and 4 sent,
each typist with 2 letters sent, and each clerk with 1 letter
received and 0.5 sent. Together with chairs, tables, etc., the
inventory-book contained entries of dinners, rent, etc. When
checking the inventory of the department it was established
that the following were missing--142 tables, 500 chairs, 39
cupboards, 14 typewriters, etc. On the whole, the entries in
the book exceeded by 50 per cent, the number of articles found
on the spot.
Commenting upon this report the _Izvestia_[50] said: “An enormous staff
of employees in most cases lounge about in idleness. An inquiry showed
that _the staff of the Centro-Textile included 125 employees who were
practically not in its service, though drawing their pay. There were
cases where one and the same person drew his pay twice over for one
and the same period of time._ The working capacity of the employees is
ridiculously low; the average correspondence per typist was one letter
outward and one inward per day; the average per male clerk was a half
a letter outward and one inward.” We do not wonder, at Nemensky’s
own comment, “Such Soviet institutions are a beautiful example of
deadening bureaucracy and must be liquidated.”
[50] No. 63, 1919.
The disclosures made in the Centro-Textile were repeated in other
state economic institutions. Thus the _Izvestia_ of the State Control,
commenting upon the Budget for 1919, said:
The Audit Department sees in the increase of expenditure for
the payment of work a series of negative causes. Among these is
that it leads to a double working on parallel lines--_viz._,
the same work is done by two and even more sections, resulting
in mutual friction and disorder and bringing the number of
employees beyond all necessary requirements. We noticed on
more than one occasion that an institution with many auxiliary
branches had been opened before any operations to be carried on
by them were even started.
Furthermore, the work is mostly very slovenly and inefficiently
conducted. It leads to an increase of the number of employees
and workmen without benefit to the work.
In the _Bulletin of the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets_
(No. 15) we find this confession: “We have created extraordinary
commissaries and Extraordinary Commissions without number. All of
these are, to a lesser or greater degree, only mischief-makers.”
Lunacharsky, the Bolshevist Commissary of Education, is reported by the
_Severnaya Communa_ of May 23, 1919, as saying: “The upper stratum of
the Soviet rule is becoming detached from the masses and the blunders
of the communist workers are becoming more and more frequent. These
latter, according to statements made by workmen, treat the masses in a
high-handed manner and are very generous with threats and repressions.”
In _Pravda_, May 14, 1919, the Bolshevik, Monastyrev, wrote: “Such a
wholesale loafing as is taking place in our Soviet institutions and
such a tremendous number of officials the history of the world has
never known and does not know. All the Soviet papers have written
about it, and we have felt it on our backs, too.” _Izvestia_ of the
Central Executive Committee (No. 15), 1919, said: “Besides Soviets
and committees, many commissaries and committees have been instituted
here. Almost every commissariat has an extraordinary organ peculiar to
its own department. As a result we have numberless commissaries of all
kinds. All of them are more or less highly arbitrary in their behavior
and by their actions undermine Soviet authority.”
These are only a few of the many statements of a like character
published in the official Bolshevist press. In a country which had long
been accustomed to an immense bureaucracy, the horde of officials was
regarded with astonishment and alarm. Like the old bureaucracy, the
new bureaucracy was at once brutal and corrupt. No one can read the
reports published by the Bolsheviki themselves and fail to be impressed
by the entire absence of idealism so far as the great majority of the
officials are concerned, a fact which Lenin himself has commented
upon more than once. That there were and are exceptions to the rule
we may well believe, just as there were such exceptions under the old
régime of Nicholas II. Upon the whole, however, it is difficult to see
wherein the bureaucracy of the Bolsheviki was less brutal, less coarse,
or less corrupt than that of czarism. But again let the Bolsheviki
speak through their own recognized spokesmen:
According to _Izvestia_ of the Central Executive Committee, November
1, 1918, a commission of five which had been appointed to discover and
distribute metal among the factories in proportion to their needs was
found to have been bribed to distribute the metal, not in proportion to
the needs of the industries, but according to the value of the bribe.
From the _Weekly Report of the Extraordinary Commission_, No. 1,
page 28, we learn that the administration of the combined Moscow
nationalized factories was convicted of a whole series of abuses and
speculations, resulting in the embezzlement of many millions of rubles.
It was said that members of the administrative board and practically
all the employees took part in this graft.
From _Izvestia_ of the Central Executive Committee, November 3, 1918,
we learn that the Soviet of National Economy of Kursk, connected
with the Supreme Council of National Economy, was found guilty of
speculative dealings in sugar and hemp.
In the same important official journal, January 22, 1919, the
well-known Bolshevik, Kerzhentzev, in a terrible exposure from which
we have already quoted in an earlier chapter, says: “The abundant
testimony, verified by the Soviet Commission, portrays a very striking
picture of violence. When these members of the Executive Committee [he
names Glakhov, Morev, and Makhov] arrived at the township of Sadomovo
they commenced to assault the population and to rob them of foodstuffs
and of their household belongings, such as quilts, clothing, harness,
etc. No receipts for the requisitioned goods were given and no money
paid. “_They even resold to others on the spot some of the breadstuffs
which they had requisitioned._” Again, the same journal published,
on March 9, 1919, a report by a prominent Bolshevik, Sosnovsky, on
conditions in the Tver Province, saying: “The local Communist Soviet
workers behave themselves, with rare exceptions, in a disgusting
manner. _Misuse of power is going on constantly._”
A cursory examination of the files of the _Bulletin of the Central
Executive Committee of the Soviets_, for the first few months of
1919, reveals a great deal of such evidence as the foregoing. In No.
12 we read: “The toiling population see in the squandering of money
right and left by the commissaries and in their indecent loudness and
profanity during their trips through the district, the complete absence
of party discipline.” In No. 13 of the same organ there is an account
of the case of Commissary Odintzov, a member of the peace delegation
to the Ukraine, who was “found speculating in breadstuffs.” In No.
20 we read that “members of the Extraordinary Commission, Unger and
Lebedev, were found guilty of embezzlement.” No. 25 says that “a case
has been started against the commissaries, O. K. Bogdanov and Zaitzev,
accused of misappropriating part of the requisitioned gold and silver
articles.”
Let us hear from some of the leading Bolsheviki who participated in the
debate on the subject of the relation of the central Soviet authority
to local self-government at the eighth Congress of the Communist Party,
March, 1919. Nogin, former president of the Moscow Soviet, said: “The
time has come to state openly before this meeting how low our party has
fallen. We have to confess that the representatives both of the central
and the local authorities disgrace the name of the party by their
conduct. _Their drunkenness and immorality, the robberies and other
crimes committed by them, are so terrible as scarcely to be believed._”
Commissar Volin said: “Some of the local authorities give themselves
over to outrageous abominations. How can they be put a stop to? The
word ‘communist’ rouses deep hatred, not only among the bourgeoisie,
but even among the poorer and the middle classes which we are ruining.
What can we do for our own salvation?” Pakhomoff said: “I sent several
comrades to the villages. _They had barely reached their destination
when they turned bandits._” Ossinsky said, “The revolts now taking
place are not White Guard risings, as formerly, but rebellions caused
by famine _and the outrageous behavior of our own commissaries_.”
Zinoviev was equally emphatic in his declaration: “It cannot be
concealed from this meeting that in certain localities the word
‘communist’ has become a term of abuse. The people are beginning to
hate the ‘men in leather jackets,’ as the commissaries were nicknamed
in Perm. The fact cannot be denied, and we must look the truth in the
face. Every one knows that both in the provinces and in the large
towns the housing reform has been carried out imperfectly. True,
the bourgeoisie has been driven out of its houses, _but the workmen
have gained nothing thereby. The houses are taken possession of by
Bolshevist state employees_, and sometimes they have been occupied,
not even by the ‘Soviet bureaucrat,’ but by his mother-in-law or
grandmother.”
Not only has the bribery of officials grown, as revealed by the reports
of the Extraordinary Commissions, but many of the Bolshevist officials
have engaged in food speculation. That the greatest buyers of the food
illegally sold at the Sukharevka market are the highly paid Soviet
officials is a charge frequently made in the Bolshevist press. In
November, 1919, Tsurupa, People’s Commissary for Supplies, published an
article in _Izvestia_ (No. 207), exposing the speculation in foodstuffs
at the Sukharevka market, formerly the largest market for second-hand
goods in Moscow, now the center of illicit speculation. Tsurupa said:
At the present moment a number of measures are being drawn up
to begin war on “Sukharevka.” The struggle must be carried
on in two directions: first, the strengthening of the organs
of supply and the control over the work of Soviet machinery;
secondly, the destruction of speculators. The measures of
the second kind are, of course, merely palliative, and it
is impossible to overcome “Sukharevka” without insuring the
population a certain supply of the rationed foodstuffs.
Even among our respected comrades there are some who consider
“Sukharevaka” as an almost normal thing, or, at any rate, as
supplementing the gaps in food-supply.
* * * * *
Many defects in our organization are directly conducive to
speculation. Thus many head commissariats, centers, factories,
and works pay their workmen and employees in foodstuffs
exceeding their personal requirements, and, as a rule, these
articles find their way to “Sukharevka” for purposes of
speculation.
The foodstuffs which find their way to “Sukharevka” are sold
at such high prices that _only the upper circles of Soviet
employees can afford to buy them, the masses of consumers being
totally unable to do so_. These foodstuffs are at the disposal
of the--so to speak--_Soviet bourgeoisie_, who can afford to
squander thousands of rubles. “Sukharevka” gives nothing to the
masses.
The Moscow Extraordinary Commission is carrying on an active
campaign against “Sukharevka” speculation. As a result of a
fortnight’s work, 437 persons have been arrested, and a series
of transactions have been discovered. The most important cases
were as follows:
(1) Sale of 19 million rubles’ worth of textiles.
(2) Sale of three wagon-loads of sugar. (At the price of even
200 rubles, and not 400 rubles, a wagon of 36,000 pounds of
sugar works out at 8,000,000 rubles, and the whole deal amounts
to 24,000,000 rubles.)
(3) Seventeen wagon-loads of herrings.
(4) 15,000,000 rubles’ worth of rubber goods, etc.
In the course of the campaign of the Moscow Extraordinary Commission
above referred to it was discovered that the state textile stores
in Moscow had been looted by the “Communists” in charge of them.
Millions of yards of textiles, instead of being placed on sale in
the nationalized stores, had been sold to speculators and found their
way into the Sukharevka. During the summer of 1919 the Bolshevist
official press literally teemed with revelations of graft, spoliation,
and robbery by officials. The report of the Smolensk Extraordinary
Commission showed that hundreds of complaints had been made and
investigated. In general the financial accounts were kept with almost
unbelievable carelessness and laxity. Large sums of money were paid out
on the order of single individuals without the knowledge of any other
officials, and without check of any sort. Out of a total expenditure of
three and a half million rubles for food rations to soldiers’ families
there were no vouchers or receipts for 1,161,670 rubles, according to
the report. Commenting upon the reign of corruption in all parts of
Soviet Russia, the _Krasnaya Gazeta_, in an article entitled, “When Is
This to End?” said:
In the Commissariat of the Boards for the various
municipalities thefts of goods and money are almost of daily
occurrence. Quite recently representatives of the State Control
found that silk and other goods for over a million rubles
had been stolen within a short space of time from the goods
listed as nationalized. Furthermore, it has come out during
the inspection of the nationalized houses that thefts and
embezzlements of the people’s money have become an ordinary
occurrence. It is remarkable how light-fingered gentry who are
put to manage the confiscated houses succeed in getting away
after pocketing the money belonging to the Soviet, and all that
with impunity, _and yet the money stolen by them is estimated
not at hundreds of rubles, but at tens of thousands of rubles_.
Will there ever be an end to these proceedings? Or is complete
liberty to be given to the thieves in Soviet Russia to do as
they like?
Why does the Extraordinary Commission not see to the affairs of
the Commissariat of the Municipality? It is high time all these
Augean stables were cleaned up. This must stop at last. The
Soviet authorities are sufficiently strong to have some scores
of these thieves of the people’s property hanged. To close
one’s eyes to all this is the same as encouraging the thieves.
Here, then, is a part of the evidence of the brutality and corruption
of the vast bureaucracy which Bolshevism has developed to replace the
old bureaucracy of the Czars. It is only a small part of the total mass
of such evidence.[51] Every word of it comes from Bolshevist officials
and journals of standing and authority. It will not do to seek to evade
the issue by setting up the plea that corruption and brutality are
found in other lands. That plea not only “begs the question,” but it
destroys the only foundation upon which an honest attempt to justify
Bolshevism can be made, namely, the claim that it represents a higher
stage of civilization, of culture, and morality than the old. Only a
profound belief in the righteousness of that claim could justify the
recourse to such a terrible method of bringing about a change in the
social organization of a great nation. There is not the faintest shadow
of a reason for believing that Bolshevism has been one whit less
corrupt than the czarist bureaucracy.
[51] In _Les Bolsheviks à l’œuvre_, Paris, 1920, A. Lockerman gives a
list of many similar cases of looting and graft by commissars.
What of efficiency? Does the available evidence tend to show that
this bureaucratic system managed to secure a degree of efficiency in
production and distribution commensurate, in part, at least, with its
enormous cost? On the contrary, while there was a marked increase in
output after nationalization was introduced, due to the restoration
of capitalist methods of management, the enormous cost at which the
improvement was effected, for which the bureaucracy was responsible,
left matters in a deplorable condition. This can be well understood
in view of the fact, cited by Professor Issaiev, that in one of
the largest metal works in Moscow the overhead charges, cost of
administration, accounting, and so on, which in 1916, the last year of
the old régime, amounted to 15 per cent. of the total cost, rose to
over 65 per cent. in 1918-19. This was not an unusual case, but fairly
typical. Once again, however, let us resist the temptation to quote
such figures, based upon the calculations and researches of hostile
critics, and confine ourselves strictly to Bolshevist testimony.
At the end of December, 1918, Rykov, president of the Supreme Council
of National Economy, reported to the Central Executive Committee,
according to _Economicheskaya Zhizn_, “Now almost all the large and
medium-sized establishments are nationalized.” A few days later an
article by Miliutin, published in the same paper, said: “A year ago
there were about 36 per cent. of nationalized establishments throughout
Soviet Russia. At the present time 90 per cent. of industrial
establishments are nationalized.” On January 12, 1919, the same
journal reported that nationalization had become general throughout
Russian industry, embracing the textile and metallurgical industries,
glass-making, printing, publishing, practically all commerce, and
even barber shops. We are, therefore, in a fair position to judge the
effects of nationalization upon the basis of subsequent reports.
It is not as well known as it ought to be that the Bolsheviki, even
under nationalization, continued the practice, established under
czarism and maintained by the Provisional Government under Kerensky, of
subsidizing factories from the central treasury of the government. Bad
as this practice was under capitalism, it was immeasurably worse when
applied to industry under Soviet control and to nationalized industry.
It was not only conducive to laxity and bad management, but it invited
these as well as being destructive of enterprise and energy. The sums
spent for this purpose were enormous, staggering in their total. A few
illustrations must suffice to show this. According to _Economicheskaya
Zhizn_ (No. 50), in the month of January, 1919, the Metal Department
of the Supreme Council of National Economy distributed among the
various nationalized metallurgical works 1,167,295,000 rubles, and the
central organization of the copper industry received 1,193,990,000
rubles. According to a report of the Section of Polygraphic
Trades, published in _Pravda_, May 17, 1919, nineteen nationalized
printing-establishments lost 13,500,000 rubles during 1918, the deficit
having to be made up by subsidies from the central treasury. At the
Conference of Tobacco Workers, held on April 25, 1919, it was reported,
according to _Severnaya Communa_, that the Petrograd factories alone
were being operated at a loss approaching two million rubles a month.
It was further stated that “the condition of the tobacco industry is
bad. The number of plants has been decreased by more than half, and the
output is only one-third.” In the report of Nemensky on the audit of
the Centro-Textile, from which we have already quoted, we read:
The Finance Credit Division of the Centrotekstil received up to
February 1, 1919, 3,400,000,000 rubles. There was no control
of the expenditure of moneys. _Money was advanced to factories
immediately upon demand, and there were cases when money was
forwarded to factories which did not exist._ From July 1 to
December 31, 1918, the Centrotekstil advanced on account of
products to be received 1,348,619,000 rubles. The value of the
goods securing these advances received up to January 1, 1919,
was only 143,716,000 rubles. The Centrotekstil’s negligent
way of doing business may be particularly observed from the
way it purchased supplies of raw wool. Up to January 1, 1919,
only 129,803 poods of wool was acquired, whereas the annual
requirement is figured at 3,500,000 poods.
The value of the goods actually received was, according to this
authority, only 10 per cent. of the money advanced. We are told that
“money was forwarded to factories which did not exist.” That this
practice was not confined to the Centro-Textile we infer from the
account given in the _Izvestia_ of State Control (No. 2) of a firm
which obtained a large sum of money in advance for Westinghouse brakes
to be manufactured and supplied by it, though investigation proved
that the firm did not even own a foundry and was unable to furnish
any brakes at all. How much of this represents inefficiency, and how
much of it graft, the reader must judge for himself. The Bolshevist
newspaper, _Trud_, organ of the trades-unions, in an article dealing
with the closing down of nineteen textile factories, said, April 28,
1919:
In our textile crisis a prominent part is played also by the
bad utilization of that which we do have. Thus the efficiency
of labor has dropped to almost nothing, of labor discipline
there is not even a trace left, the machinery, on account of
careless handling, has deteriorated and its productive capacity
has been lowered.
In _Izvestia_ of the Central Executive Committee, March 21, 1919,
Bucharin said: “Our position is such that, together with the
deterioration of the material production--machinery, railways, and
other things--_there is a destruction of the fundamental productive
force, the labor class, as such_. Here in Russia, as in western
Europe,[52] the working-class is dissolving, factories are closing, and
the working-class is reabsorbed into the villages.”
[52] _Sic!_
From the report of the Supreme Council of National Economy, March,
1919, we learn that in the vast majority of the branches of Russia’s
industry the labor required for production had increased from 400 to
500 per cent. The Congress of Salesmen’s Unions, held at the end of
April, 1919, adopted a resolution, published in _Izvestia_ (No. 97),
which said, “The nationalization of commerce, owing to the pell-mell
speed of the methods employed in carrying it out, has assumed with us
extremely ugly forms, and has only aggravated the bad state of affairs
in the circulation of goods in the country, which was poor enough as it
was.”
These statements show that in the early part of last year the
Bolshevist régime was in a very critical condition. Demands for the
“liquidation” of the system were heard on every hand. Instead of this,
the resourceful rulers of Soviet Russia once more revolutionized their
methods. The period of nationalization we have been considering may be
described as the first phase, the period of the rule of industry by the
professional politicians of the Communist Party. When, in March, 1919,
Leonid B. Krassin[53] undertook the reorganization of the industrial
life of the nation, Bolshevism entered upon a new phase.
[53] Krassin’s first name is usually given as “Gregory,” but this is an
error. His full name is Leonid Borisovitch Krassin. He is a Siberian of
bourgeois extraction.
X
THE NATIONALIZATION OF INDUSTRY--II
The second phase of nationalization may be characterized as the
adoption by a political state of the purest capitalist methods. Krassin
was not a Bolshevik or a Socialist of any kind, so far as can be
learned. He severed his rather nominal connection with the Socialist
movement in 1906, it is said, and, thoroughly disillusioned, devoted
himself to his profession and to the management of the Petrograd
establishment of the great German firm of Siemens-Schuckart. He is said
to have maintained very cordial relations with Lenin and was asked by
the latter to accept three portfolios, namely, Commerce and Industry,
Transports, and War and Munitions. He agreed to take the appointment,
provided the Soviet Government would accept his conditions. He demanded
(1) the right to appoint specialists of his own choosing to manage all
the departments under his control, regardless of their political or
social views; (2) that all remaining workers’ committees of control be
abolished and that he be given the power to replace them by responsible
directors, with full powers; (3) that piece-work payments and premiums
take the place of day-work payment, with the right to insist upon
overtime regardless of any existing rules or laws.
Of course, acceptance of these conditions was virtually an abandonment
of every distinctive principle and ideal the Bolsheviki had ever
advanced. Krassin immediately set to work to bring some semblance of
order out of the chaos. The “iron discipline” that was introduced
and the brutal suppression of strikes already described were due to
his powerful energy. A martinet, with no sort of use for the Utopian
visions of his associates, Krassin is a typical industrial despot.
The attitude of the workers toward him was tersely stated by the
_Proletarskoe Echo_ in these words: “How Comrade Krassin has organized
the traffic we have all seen and now know. We do not know whether
Comrade Krassin has improved the traffic, but one thing is certain,
that his autocratic ways as a Commissary greatly remind us of the
autocratic policy of a Czar.”[54]
[54] Quoted by H. W. Lee, _The Dictatorship of the Proletariat_, p. 7.
Yet Krassin failed to do more or better than prolong the hopeless
struggle against utter ruin and disastrous failure. He was, after all,
an engineer, not a miracle-worker. Trades-unions were deprived of power
and made mere agencies for transmitting autocratic orders; tens of
thousands of useless politicians were ousted from the factories and
the railways; the workers’ control was so thoroughly broken that there
were not left in Soviet Russia a dozen workers’ committees possessing
the power of the printers’ “chapel” in the average large American
newspaper plant, or anything like the power possessed by hundreds, and
perhaps thousands, of shop committees in our industrial centers.[55]
But Krassin and his stern capitalist methods had come too late. The
demoralization had gone too far.
[55] In view of the denials of the dissolution of workers’ control,
circulated by _Soviet Russia_ and the whole body of pro-Bolshevist
propagandists, it may be well to clinch the statements made on this
point by quoting from an indisputable authority. In the issue of
_Economicheskaya Zhizn_, November 13, 1919, appears the following
paragraph:
“Schliapnikoff, Commissar of Labor in the Soviet Republic, writes: ‘The
principal cause of the deplorable situation of the Russian industry is
a total absence of order and discipline in the factories. The Working
Men’s Councils and the Shop Committees, created with the purpose of
establishing order in the factories, exercised an injurious influence
on the general course of affairs by destroying the last traces of
discipline and by squandering away the property of the factories. _All
those circumstances put together have compelled us to abolish the
Working Men’s Councils and to place at the head of the most important
concerns special “dictators,” with unlimited powers and entitled to
dispose of the life and death of the workmen._’”
Only a brief summary of the most important statistical data
illustrating the results attained during the remainder of the year
1919, that is to say, the second phase of nationalization, can be given
here. To attempt anything like a detailed presentation of the immense
mass of available official statistical data covering this period would
of itself require a large volume. If we take the _Economicheskaya
Zhizn_ for the months of October and November, 1919, we shall be
able to get a fairly good measure of the results attained during the
half-year following the reorganization of the system by Krassin. It
must always be borne in mind that the _Economicheskaya Zhizn_ is the
official organ of the Supreme Economic Council and of the Ministries
of Finance, Commerce and Trade, and Food. To avoid having to use the
name of the journal in almost every other line, the statements of fact
made upon its authority are followed by numbers inclosed in brackets;
these numbers indicate the issues from which the statements are
taken.[56]
[56] For the mass of translations covering this period the author is
indebted to Mr. Alexander Kerensky.
Turning our attention first to the important subject of transportation,
to which Krassin naturally devoted special attention, we find that on
the entire railway system of Soviet Russia the number of freight-cars
and trucks in daily service during August and September averaged
between 7,000 and 7,500. Of this number from 45 to 50 per cent.--that
is, from 3,500 to 3,750 cars--were used for carrying fuel for the
railway service itself; transportation of military supplies took 25 per
cent., from 1,750 to 1,850 cars; 10 per cent., from 700 to 750 cars,
were used for “evacuation purposes,” and only 15 to 20 per cent., 1,050
to 1,150 cars, for general transportation (_215_). It is worthy of
note that of this absurdly inadequate service for the transportation
of general supplies for the civilian population, 95 per cent. was used
for the transportation of wood fuel for the cities and towns (_229_).
Not less than 50 per cent. of all the locomotives in the country were
out of order at the beginning of November, 1919, and it was stated that
to increase the percentage of usable engines to the normal level would
require, under the most favorable circumstances, a period of at least
five years (_228_). Despite this deplorable condition there was still
a great deal of bureaucratic red tape and waste. At the meeting of the
directors of the Supreme Council of National Economy, in September,
Markov, a member, argued in favor of eliminating the red tape and
waste. He pointed out that wood was being transported to Moscow _from_
the West and at the same time _to_ the West from the North. The Main
Fuel Committee had rejected a proposal to exchange the supplies of wood
and thus save transportation (_214_). River transportation was in just
as bad a condition, to judge from the fact that the freight tonnage on
the river Volga was only 11 per cent. of the pre-war volume (_228_).
To prove the humanitarian character of the Bolshevist régime its
apologists in this country and in England have cited the fact that the
Soviet authorities offered a prize for the invention of a hand-cart
which would permit a maximum load to be pushed or drawn with a
minimum expenditure of human strength. Quite another light is thrown
upon this action by the data concerning the breakdown of mechanical
transportation and the rapid disappearance of horses from Moscow and
Petrograd. The number of horses in September, 1919, was only 8 per
cent. of the number in November, 1917--that is to say, under Bolshevism
the number of horses had declined 92 per cent. (_207_). Of course the
decline was not so enormous throughout the whole of Soviet Russia, but
it was, nevertheless, so serious as to prohibit any hope of making up
the loss of mechanical power by the use of horses. Accordingly, we find
arrangements for the organization of a rope haulage system for the
transportation of coal and food. In the Bazulk and Aktiubin districts
provision was made for the use of 6,000 carts to transport wood fuel,
and 10,000 carts for corn (_228_). Similar arrangements were under way
in other districts. From locomotives and steamers to transport food
and fuel there was a return to the most primitive of methods, such as
were used to transport the Great Pyramid in Egypt, as shown by the
hieroglyphs. For this purpose the peasants were mobilized (_228_). The
bodies of masses of men were substituted for horses and mechanical
traction. _Thus was reintroduced into Russian life in the twentieth
century the form of labor most hated in the old days of serfdom._
The fuel situation was exceedingly bad. Not more than 55 per cent.
of the fuel oil required could be obtained, the deficiency amounting
to over four million poods of oil (_221_). Only 33 per cent. of the
fuel wood required was obtained (_221_). The production of coal in the
Moscow region was 45 per cent. lower than in 1917 (_224_). To overcome
the shortage of fuel in Petrograd a large number of houses and boats
were ordered to be wrecked for the sake of the wood (_227_). To save
the country from perishing for lack of fuel, it was proposed that the
modest fir cones which dropped from the trees be collected and saved.
It was proposed to mobilize school-children, disabled soldiers, and old
and sick persons to collect these fir cones (_202_).
In the nationalized cotton-factories there were 6,900,962 spindles
and 169,226 looms, but only 300,000 spindles and 18,182 looms were
actually working on September 1st (_207_). On January 1, 1919, there
were 48,490 textile-workers in the Moscow District; six months later
there were 33,200, a reduction of 15,290--that is, 35 per cent.
(_220_). In the same period the number of workers engaged in preparing
raw cotton was reduced by 47.2 per cent. (_220_). In the metal works
of Petrograd there were nominally employed a total of 12,141 workers,
of which number only 7,585--that is, 62.4 per cent.--were actually
working. Of 7,500 workmen registered at the Putilov Works only 2,800,
or 37.3 per cent., were actually working on August 15th. At the Nevsky
Shipbuilding and Engineering Works not less than 56 per cent. of
the employees were classed as absentees for the first half of July,
70 per cent. for the second half, and 84 per cent. for the first
half of August. That is to say, of those nominally employed at this
important works the actual daily attendance was 44 per cent. during
the first half of July, 30 per cent. for the second half, and only 16
per cent. for the first half of August (_209_). Since then the Nevsky
Shipbuilding and Engineering Works have been entirely closed. It must
be remembered that even during the Kerensky régime the metallurgical
establishments in Petrograd District, which included some of the finest
plants in the world, gave employment to more than 100,000 workmen as
against 12,141 registered employees in September, 1919.
In the nationalized leather-factories of the Moscow District the
output of large hides was 43 per cent. less than the output of
1918, which was itself far below the normal average (_227_). In the
factories which were not nationalized the output of large hides
was 60 per cent. less than in 1918. The apparent superiority of the
nationalized factories indicated by these figures is explained by the
fact that the Centrokaja, the central administration of the leather
industry, gave preference to the nationalized factories in the supply
of tanning acids, fuel, and other necessities of production (_227_).
Just as in the metallurgical industry smaller undertakings had a
better chance of surviving than larger ones (_211_), so in the leather
industry[57] (_227_). In both cases the establishments not nationalized
are far more successful than the nationalized. The output of small
hides in nationalized undertakings fell by 60 per cent., and in the
establishments not nationalized by 18 per cent. (_227_).
[57] Yet we find the Bolshevik, Bazhenov, writing in the
_Economicheskaya Zhizn_ (No. 50), in March, 1919, the following
nonsense: “The only salvation for Russia’s industry lies in the
nationalization of large enterprises and the closing of small and
medium-sized ones.” Bazhenov is evidently a doctrinaire Marxist of the
school to whom one ounce of theory is of more worth than a ton of facts.
The four nationalized match-factories in the northern region employed
2,000 persons. The output in October, 1919, was 50 per cent. of the
normal output, the explanation being given that the falling off was due
to the fact that large numbers of workmen had to be sent off into the
villages to search for bread, while others had to be assigned to work
in the fields and to loading wood for fuel (_225_). The manufacture of
electric lamps was practically at a standstill. The Petrograd factories
were closed down because of a shortage of skilled workmen and technical
directors; the Moscow factories, because of the complete absence
of gas (_210_). The sugar industry was almost completely liquidated
(_207_).
In the report of the People’s Commissariat for Finance we get a
graphic and impressive picture of the manner in which this ill-working
nationalization was, and is, bolstered up. For financing the
nationalized industries appropriations were made as follows:
First six months of 1918 762,895,100 rubles
Second six months of 1918 5,141,073,179 “
First six months of 1919 15,439,115,828 “
The report calls attention to the fact that whereas it had been
estimated that there would be paid into the treasury during the first
six months of 1919 for goods issued for consumption 1,503,516,945
rubles, the sum actually received was 54,564,677 rubles--that is, only
3.5 per cent.
Some idea of the conditions prevailing can be gathered from the
desperate attempts to produce substitutes for much-needed articles. The
_ersatz_ experiments and achievements of the Germans during the war may
have had something to do with this. At all events, we find attempts
made in the cotton-factories to use “cottonized” flax as a substitute
for cotton (_207_). These attempts did not afford any satisfactory or
encouraging results. In consequence of the almost complete stoppage
of the sugar industry we find the Soviet authorities resorting to
attempts to produce sugar from sawdust (_207_). Even more pathetic is
the manner in which attempts were made to supply salt. This necessary
commodity had, for all practical purposes, completely disappeared from
the market, though on October 3d, in Petrograd, it was quoted at 140
to 150 rubles per pound (_221_). As a result of this condition, in
several districts old herring-barrels, saturated with salt, were cut
up into small pieces and used in cooking instead of salt (_205_). A
considerable market for these pieces of salted wood was found.
We may profitably close this summary of the economic situation in
Soviet Russia in October and November, 1919, by quoting from the report
of the Chief Administration of Engineering Works:
If we had reason to fear last year for the working of our
transport, the complaints of its inefficiency being well
grounded, matters have become considerably worse during the
period under report. Water transport is by no means in a better
position, whilst of haulage transport there is no need to
speak.... The consuming needs of the workmen have not been even
remotely satisfied, either in the last year or in the current
year, by the Commissariat of Food Supply, _the main source of
food-supply of the workmen being speculation and free market_.
But even the latter source of food-supply of the workmen in
manufacturing districts is becoming more and more inaccessible.
Besides the fact that prices have soared up to a much greater
extent than the controlled rates of wages, we see the almost
complete disappearance of food articles from working-center
markets. _Of recent times, even pilgrimage to villages is of
no avail. The villages will not part with food for money even
at high prices._ What they demand is articles of which the
workers are no less in need. Hence the workers’ escape from the
factories (_220_).
Unfortunately, a good many of the concerns enumerated [in the
Tula District] do not work or work only with half the output,
in spite of the fact that 20 of the shafts working yield
considerable quantities of coal, 10 mines supply much raw
material (15 milliard poods of minerals are estimated to be
lying in this district), whilst there is also a large number of
broken lathes and machinery which can, however, be repaired.
Bread for the workers could also be found, if all efforts were
strained (the district used to export corn in peace-time). All
these possibilities are not carried into life, as there are
no people who could by their intense will and sincere desire
restore the iron discipline of labor. Our institutions are
filled with “Sovburs” and “Speks,” who only think of their own
welfare and not of the welfare of the state and of making use
of the revolutionary possibilities of the “toilers in revolt.”
In the light of this terrible evidence we can readily believe what
Zinoviev wrote in an article contributed to the _Severnaya Communa_ in
January of this year. In that article he said: “King Famine seems to
be putting out his tongue at the proletariat of Petrograd and their
families.... Of late I have been receiving, one after another, starving
delegations from working men and women. They do not protest, nor do
they make any demands; they merely point out, with silent reproach, the
present intolerable state of affairs.”
We are not dependent upon general statements such as Zinoviev’s for
our information concerning the state of affairs in Soviet Russia in
January, 1920. We have an abundance of precise and authoritative data.
In the first place, Gregor Alexinsky has published, in admirable
translation, the text of the most important parts of the reports
made to the Joint Congress of the Councils of National Economy,
Trades-Unions and the Central Soviet Power. This congress opened in
Moscow on January 25, 1920, and lasted for several days. Important
reports were made to it by A. Rykov, president of the Supreme Council
of National Economy; M. Tomsky, chairman of the Central Council of
Trades-Unions; Kamenev, president of the Moscow Soviet; Lenin, Trotsky,
and others. Alexinsky was fortunate enough to secure copies of the
stenographic reports of the speeches made at this joint congress. In
addition to this material the present writer has had placed at his
disposal several issues of _Izvestia_ containing elaborate reports of
the congress. At the outset Rykov dealt with the effects of the World
War and the Civil War upon the economic situation:
During the past few years of Imperialistic (World) and Civil
Wars the exhaustion of the countries of Europe, and in
particular of Russia, has reached unheard-of proportions.
This exhaustion has affected the whole territory of the
Imperialistic war, but _the Civil war has been, as regards
dissipation of the national wealth and waste of material and
human resources, much more detrimental than the Imperialistic
war_, for it spread across the greater part of the territory of
Soviet Russia, involving not only the clashing of armies, but
also devastation, fires, and destruction of objects of greatest
value and of structures.
* * * * *
The Civil War, having caused an unparalleled waste of the
human and material resources of the Republic, has engendered
an economic and productive crisis. In its main features this
crisis is one of transportation, fuel, and human labor power.
Truly these are interesting admissions--here is “a very Daniel come to
judgment.” The civil war, we are told, has been “much more detrimental
than the Imperialistic war,” it has “caused an unparalleled waste of
the human and material resources of the republic.” Is it not pertinent
to remind ourselves that for bringing on the civil war the Bolsheviki
were solely responsible? There was no civil war in Russia until they
began it. The whole of the democratic forces of Russia were unitedly
working for the reconstruction of the nation upon a sound basis of
free democracy. They began the civil war in the face of the most
solemn warnings and despite the fact that every thoughtful person
could foresee its inevitable disastrous results. By Rykov’s confession
the Bolsheviki are condemned for having brought upon Russia evils
greater than those which the World War brought in its train. Of the
transportation problem Rykov has this to say:
Before the war, the percentage of disabled locomotives, even
in the worst of times, never rose above 15 per cent. At the
present time, however, we have 59.5 per cent. of disabled
locomotives--_i.e._, out of every 100 locomotives in Soviet
Russia 60 are disabled, and only 40 capable of working. The
repair of disabled locomotives also keeps on declining with
extraordinary rapidity; before the war we used to repair up to
8 per cent.; this percentage, after the October revolution,
sometimes dropped to 1 per cent.; now we have gone up, but
only 1 per cent., and we are now repairing 2 per cent. of our
locomotives. Under present conditions of railway transportation
the repairs do not keep abreast of the deterioration of our
locomotives, and _every month we have, in absolute figures, 200
locomotives less than the preceding month_. It is indispensable
that we raise the repair of locomotives from 2 per cent. up
to 10 per cent., in order to stop the decline and further
disintegration of railway transportation, in order to maintain
it at least on the level on which it stands at the present
time. As for the broad masses of the population, the workers
and peasants of Soviet Russia, _these figures simply mean
that there is no possibility of utilizing any one of those
grain-producing regions, nor those which have raw material and
fuel, that have been added to Soviet Russia as a result of the
victory of the Red Army_.
According to Trotsky, Rykov’s figures, depressing enough in all
conscience, did not disclose the full gravity of the situation. The
real number of disabled locomotives was greater than the figures
given, he said, for the reason that “we frequently call ‘sound’
half-disabled locomotives which threaten to drop out completely on
the morrow.” Rykov’s statements do more than merely confirm those
previously quoted from the _Economicheskaya Zhizn_: they show that from
October to January there had been a steady increase of deterioration;
that conditions had gone from bad to worse. The report proceeds to
illustrate the seriousness of the situation by concrete examples of the
actual conditions confronting the government:
We have a metallurgical region in the Ural mountains; but we
have had at our disposal until now but _one single special
train a month to carry metals from the Urals to central
Russia_. In order to transport 10 million poods[58] of metal by
one single train per month several decades would be required,
should we be able to utilize those scanty supplies of metal
which are ready in the Urals.
[58] One pood equals thirty-six pounds.
In order to deliver cotton from Turkestan to the textile
factories in Moscow, we have to carry more than one-half
million poods per month--up to 600,000 poods. But at this time
we have only about two trains a month; that is, scores of years
will be required for transporting under present conditions
from Turkestan those 8 million poods of cotton which we could
convert, but are unable to deliver to the factories.