[The speaker then took up an inquiry regarding a suggestion of Japanese
intervention in Siberia. He said the hypothesis that whenever one
country sends troops into another country those troops invariably stay
where they are sent, and annexation is the result, was false; if such
were the case there would be a bad outlook for the north of France. He
argued that if the Japanese did intervene it would be as friends of
Russia and enemies of Germany, to preserve the country from German
domination, and he proceeded thus:]
Russia lies absolutely derelict upon the waters, and now it has no power
of resistance at all; there can be a German penetration from end to end
of Russia, which, I think, will be absolutely disastrous for Russia
itself, and certainly will be very injurious to the future of the
Allies. I suspect that at this moment a German officer is much safer
traveling at large through Russia than an allied officer. Why? Not
because the Russians love the Germans, but because, as a matter of fact,
the German penetration has really struck at the root of Russian power. I
was informed the other day that only one bank was allowed at Moscow.
That bank is a German bank.
The Bolshevist Government, I believe, sincerely desire--I hope not too
late, though I fear it may be so--to resist this German penetration. How
can they resist it when they themselves or their predecessors have
destroyed every instrument which makes resistance possible?
Inevitably Russia's allies have to ask themselves whether, if Russia
herself has destroyed every instrument of self-protection which she once
possessed, they cannot themselves among themselves supply that which she
now lacks. We do that in Russia's own interests and for Russia's own
sake, if it is done. It is not done to satisfy the greed of this or that
power. That is the Allies' point of view. May I ask the House to
consider the question from the Russian point of view? It is impossible
to penetrate the future. Russia has always been a country of surprises,
and that she remains at the present moment. What are the things which
most of us fear for Russia when we look to the future? Frankly, I tell
the House what I myself fear for Russia is this: Under the impulse,
under the shadow of the great revolution, the cataclysm of social order
has been shaken to its foundations, and many disasters, and I fear many
crimes, have been committed.