THE PRESS AND PROPAGANDA.
In the late World War, along with aeroplanes, tanks, poison gases
and other marvels of military _technique_, a new and powerful weapon
came to the fore, viz: _propaganda_. Strictly speaking, it was not
altogether new, for as far back as 1826 Canning said, in the House of
Commons: "Should we ever have to take part in a war we shall gather
under our flag all the rebels, all those who, with or without cause,
are discontented in the country that goes against us." But now this
means of conflict attained an extraordinary development, intensity
and organisation, attacking the most morbid and sensitive points of
national psychology. Organised on a large scale, supplied with vast
means, the propaganda organs of Great Britain, France and America,
especially those of Great Britain, carried on a terrible warfare by
word of mouth, in the Press, in the films and ... with gold, extending
this warfare over the territories of the enemy, the Allies and the
neutrals, introducing it into all spheres--military, political, moral
and economic. The more so, that Germany especially gave grounds enough
for propaganda to have a plentiful supply of irrefragable, evidential
material at its disposal. It is difficult to enumerate, even in their
general features alone, that enormous arsenal of ideas which, step by
step, drop by drop, deepened class differences, undermined the power of
the State, sapped the moral powers of the enemy and their confidence
in victory, disintegrated their alliance, roused the neutral powers
against them and finally raised the falling spirits of their allied
peoples. Nevertheless, we should not attach exceptional importance to
this external moral pressure, as the leaders of the German people are
now doing, to justify themselves: Germany has suffered a political,
economic, military and moral defeat. It was only the interaction of all
these factors that determined the fatal issue of the struggle, which,
towards its end, became a lingering death-agony. One could only marvel
at the vitality of the German people, which, by its intellectual power
and the stability of its political thought, held out so long, until at
last, in November, 1918, "a double death-blow, both at the front and
in the rear," laid it in the dust. In connection with this, history
will undoubtedly note a great analogy between the parts played by the
"Revolutionary Democracies" of Russia and of Germany in the destinies
of these peoples. After the _débâcle_ the leader of the German
Independent Social Democrats acquainted the country with the great and
systematic work which they had carried on, from the beginning of 1918,
for the breaking down of the German Army and Navy, to the glory of the
social revolution. In this work one is struck by the similarity of
method and _modus operandi_ with those practised in Russia.
While unable to resist British and French propaganda, the Germans were
very successful in applying this means to their Eastern antagonist, the
more so that: "Russia created her own misfortunes," said Ludendorff,
"and the work which we carried on there was not too hard."
The results of the interaction of the skilful hand of Germany with the
movements which arose, less from the fact itself of the Revolution than
from the individual character of the Russian rebellion, exceeded the
highest hopes of the Germans.
The work was carried on in three directions--political, military and
social. In the first we note the idea, quite clearly and definitely
formulated and systematically carried out by the German Government,
_of the dismemberment of Russia_. Its realisation took shape in the
proclamation, on November 15, 1916, of the Kingdom of Poland[20] _with
a territory which was to extend eastward "as far as possible"_; in the
creation of the States of Courland and Lithuania--"independent," but
in union with Germany; in the sharing of the White Russian provinces
between Poland and Lithuania, and, finally, in the prolonged and very
persistent preparation of the secession of Little Russia, which took
place later, in 1918. While the former facts had a meaning only in
principle, concerning, as they did, territories actually occupied by
the Germans and defined the character of the future "annexations," the
attitude assumed by the Central Powers with respect to Little Russia
exercised a direct influence on the stability of our South-Western
front, creating political complications in the country and separatist
tendencies in the Army. I shall return to this question later.
The German Headquarters included an excellently organised
"press-bureau," which, besides influencing and directing the home Press,
also guided German propaganda, which penetrated mainly into Russia and
France. Miliukov quotes a circular issued by the German Foreign Office
to all its representatives in neutral countries: "You are informed that
on the territory of the country to which you are accredited, special
offices have been instituted for the organisation of propaganda in the
States, now fighting with the German coalition. The propaganda will
be engaged in exciting the social movement and, in connection with
the latter, strikes, revolutionary outbreaks, separatism, among the
constituent parts of these States, and civil war, as well as agitation
in favour of disarmament and the cessation of the present sanguinary
slaughter. You are instructed to afford all possible protection and
support to the directors of the said propaganda offices."
It is curious that, in the summer of 1917, the British Press took up
arms against Sir George Buchanan and the British Propaganda Ministry
for their inertness in the matter of influencing the Democracy of
Russia and of fighting German propaganda in that country. One of the
papers pointed out that the British bureau of Russian propaganda had
at its head a novelist and literary beginners who had "as much idea of
Russia as of Chinese metaphysics."
As for us, neither in our Government departments nor at the Stavka did
we have any organ whatever which was even in some degree reminiscent of
the mighty Western propaganda institutions. One of the sections of the
Quartermaster-General's department had charge of technical questions,
concerning relations with the Press, and was left without importance,
influence, or any active task. The Russian Army, well or badly, fought
in primitive ways, without ever having recourse to that "poisoning of
the enemy's spirit," which was so widely practised in the West. And it
paid for this with superfluous torrents of blood. But if opinions may
differ regarding the morality of destructive propaganda, we cannot but
note our complete inertness and inactivity in another and perfectly
pure sphere. We did absolutely nothing to acquaint foreign public
opinion with the exceptionally important part played by Russia and
the Russian Army in the World War, with the enormous losses suffered
and the sacrifices made by the Russian people, with those constant
majestic deeds of self-sacrifice, incomprehensible, perhaps, to the
cold understanding of our Western friends, which the Russian Army made
whenever the Allied front was within a hair's-breadth of defeat....
Such a want of comprehension of the part played by Russia I have
met with almost everywhere, in wide social circles, long after the
conclusion of peace, in my wanderings over Europe.
The following small episode is a burlesque, but very characteristic
instance of this. On a banner presented to Marshal Foch "from American
friends" are depicted the flags of all countries, lands and colonies,
which in one way or another came within the orbit of the Entente; the
Russian flag occupies the forty-sixth place, after Hayti and Uruguay
and immediately after San-Marino.
Is this ignorance or triviality?
We did nothing to lay a firm moral foundation for national unity during
our occupation of Galicia, did not draw public opinion to our side
during the occupation of Roumania by the Russian troops, did nothing
to restrain the Bulgarian people from betraying the interests of the
Slavonic races. Finally, we took no advantage of the presence on
Russian soil of an enormous number of prisoners, to give them at least
a correct idea of Russia.
The Stavka, firmly barricaded within the sphere of purely military
questions connected with the carrying out of the campaign, made no
attempt to gain any influence over the general course of political
events, which agrees completely with the service idea of a national
army. But, at the same time, the Stavka distinctly avoided influencing
the public spirit of the country so as to lead this powerful factor to
moral co-operation in the struggle. There was no connection with the
leading organs of the Press, which was represented at the Stavka by men
possessing neither weight nor influence.
When the thunderstorm of the Revolution broke and the political
whirlwind swept up and convulsed the Army, the Stavka could remain
inert no longer. It had to respond. The more so, that suddenly no
source of moral power was to be found in Russia which might have
protected the Army. The Government, especially the War Office, rushed
irresistibly down the path of opportunism; the Soviets and the
Socialist Press undermined the Army; the Bourgeois Press now cried
"videant consules ne quid Imperio detrimenti caparet," now naïvely
rejoiced at the "democratisation and liberation" which were taking
place. Even in what might have been considered the competent spheres
of the higher military bureaucracy of Petrograd there reigned such a
variety of views, as plunged the public opinion of the country into
perplexity and bewilderment.
It turned out, however, that for the conflict the Stavka possessed
neither organisation nor men, neither technique nor knowledge and
experience. And, worst of all, the Stavka was in some way or other
shoved and thrown aside by the madly-careering chariot of life. Its
voice grew weaker and sank into silence.
[Illustration: The Old Army: a review. General Ivanov.]
[Illustration: The Revolutionary Army: a review. Kerensky.]
The second Quartermaster-General--General Markov--had a serious task
before him--he had to create the necessary apparatus, to establish
communications with the important papers, to supply the Stavka with
a "megaphone" and raise the condition of the Army Press, which was
leading a wretched existence and which the army organisations were
trying to destroy. Markov took up the task warmly, but failed to do
anything serious, as he only remained in office two months. Every step
of the Stavka in this direction called forth from the Revolutionary
Democracy a disingenuous accusation of counter-revolutionary action.
And Liberal Bourgeois Moscow, to which he turned for aid, in the form
of intellectual and technical assistance in his task, replied with
eloquent promises, but did absolutely nothing.
Thus the Stavka had no means at all, not only for actively combating
the disintegration of the Army, but for resisting German propaganda,
which was spreading rapidly.
* * * * *
Ludendorff says frankly and with a national egotism rising to a high
degree of cynicism: "I did not doubt that the _débâcle_ of the Russian
Army and the Russian people was fraught with great danger for Germany
and Austria-Hungary.... _In sending Lenin to Russia_ our Government
assumed an enormous responsibility! This journey was justified from a
military point of view; _it was necessary that Russia should fall_. But
our Government should have taken measures that this should not happen
to Germany."[21]
Even now the boundless sufferings of the Russian people, now "out of
the ranks," did not call forth a single word of pity or regret from its
moral corrupters....
With the beginning of the campaign, the Germans altered the direction
of their work with respect to Russia. Without breaking their
connections with the well-known reactionary circles at Court, in the
Government and in the Duma, using all means for influencing these
circles and all their motives--greed, ambition, German atavism, and
sometimes a peculiar understanding of patriotism--the Germans entered
at the same time into close fellowship with the Russian Revolutionaries
in the country, and especially abroad, amongst the multitudinous
emigrant colony. Directly or indirectly, all were drawn into the
service of the German Government--great agents in the sphere of spying
and recruiting, like Parvus (Helfand); provocateurs, connected with the
Russian Secret Police, like Blum; propaganda agents--Oulianoff (Lenin),
Bronstein (Trotsky), Apfelbaum (Zinovieff), Lunacharsky, Ozolin, Katz
(Kamkoff), and many others. And in their wake went a whole group of
shallow or unscrupulous people, cast over the frontier and fanatically
hating the _régime_ which had rejected them--hating it to the degree
of forgetfulness of their native land, or squaring accounts with this
_régime_, acting sometimes as blind tools in the hands of the German
General Staff. What their motives were, what their pay, how far they
went--these are details; what is important is that they sold Russia,
serving those aims which were set before them by our foe. They were all
closely interlaced with one another and with the agents of the German
Secret Service, forming with them one unbroken conspiracy.
The work began with a widespread Revolutionary and Separatist
(Ukrainian) propaganda among the prisoners of war. According to
Liebknecht, "the German Government not only helped this propaganda,
but carried it on itself." These aims were served by the Committee
of Revolutionary Propaganda, founded in 1915 at The Hague by the
Union for the Liberation of the Ukraine in Austria by the Copenhagen
Institute (Parvus's organisation), and a whole series of papers of a
Revolutionary and Defeatist character, partly published at the expense
of the German Staff, partly subsidised by it--the _Social Democrat_
(Geneva--Lenin's paper), _Nashe Slovo_ (Paris--Trotsky's paper), _Na
Tchoozhbeenie_ (Geneva--contributions from Tchernoff, Katz and others),
_Russkii Viestnik_, _Rodnaya Retch_, _Nedielia_, and so forth. Similar
to this was the activity--the spread of Defeatist and Revolutionary
literature, side by side with purely charitable work--of the Committee
of Intellectual Aid to Russian Prisoners of War in Germany and Austria
(Geneva), which was in connection with official Moscow and received
subsidies from it.
To define the character of these publications it is enough to quote
two or three phrases expressing the views of their inspirers. Lenin
said in the _Social Democrat_: "The least evil will be the defeat
of the Czarist monarchy, the most barbarous and reactionary of all
Governments." Tchernoff, the future Minister of Agriculture, declared
in the _Mysl_ that he had one Fatherland only--the International!
Along with literature the Germans invited Lenin's and Tchernoff's
collaborators, especially from the editorial staff of _Na
Tchoozhbeenie_, to lecture in the camps, while a German spy, Consul Von
Pelche, carried on a large campaign for the recruiting of agitators for
propaganda in the ranks of the Army--among the Russian emigrants of
conscript age and of Left Wing politics.
All this was but preparatory work. The Russian Revolution opened
boundless vistas for German propaganda. Along with honest people, once
persecuted, who had struggled for the good of the people, there rushed
into Russia all that revolutionary riff-raff which absorbed the members
of the Russian secret police, the international informers and the
rebels.
The Petrograd authorities feared most of all the accusation of want of
Democratic spirit. Miliukov, as Minister, stated repeatedly that "the
Government considers unconditionally possible the return to Russia of
all emigrants, regardless of their views on the War and independently
of their registration in the International Control List."[22] This
Minister carried on a dispute with the British, demanding the release
of the Bolsheviks, Bronstein (Trotsky), Zourabov and others, who had
been arrested by the British.
Matters were more complicated in the case of Lenin and his supporters.
Despite the demands of the Russian Government, the Allies would
undoubtedly have refused to let them through. Therefore, as Ludendorff
acknowledges, the German Government despatched Lenin and his companions
(the first group consisted of seventeen persons) to Russia, allowing
them free transit through Germany. This undertaking, which promised
extraordinarily important results, was richly financed with gold and
credit through the Stockholm (Ganetsky-Fuerstenberg) and Copenhagen
(Parvus) centres and through the Russian Siberian Bank. That gold
which, as Lenin expressed it, "does not smell."
In October, 1917, Bourtsev published a list of 159 persons brought
through Germany to Russia by order of the German General Staff. Nearly
all of them, according to Bourtsev, "were revolutionaries who, during
the War, had carried on a defeatist campaign in Switzerland and were
now William's voluntary or involuntary agents." Many of them at once
assumed a prominent position in the Social Democratic party, in the
Soviet, the Committee[23] and the Bolshevik Press. The names of Lenin,
Tsederbaum (Martov), Lunacharsky, Natanson, Riazanov, Apfelbaum
(Zinoviev) and others soon became the most fateful in Russian history.
On the day of Lenin's arrival in Petrograd the German paper _Die Woche_
devoted an article to this event, in which he was called "a true
friend of the Russian people and an honourable antagonist." And the
Cadet semi-official organ, the _Retch_, which afterwards boldly and
unwaveringly waged war against the Lenin party, greeted his arrival
with the words: "Such a generally acknowledged leader of the Socialist
party ought now to be in the arena, and his arrival in Russia, whatever
opinion may be held of his views, should be welcomed."
On April 3rd Lenin arrived in Petrograd, where he was received with
much state, and in a few days declared his theses, part of which formed
the fundamental themes of German propaganda: "Down with war and all
power to the Soviet!"
Lenin's first actions seemed so absurd and so clearly anarchistic that
they called forth protests not only in the whole of the Liberal Press,
but also in the greater part of the Socialist Press.
But, little by little, the Left Wing of the Revolutionary Democracy,
reinforced by German agents, joined overtly and openly in the
propaganda of its chief, without meeting any decisive rebuff either
from the double-minded Soviet or the feeble Government. The great wave
of German and mutinous propaganda engulfed more and more the Soviet,
the Committee, the Revolutionary Press, and the ignorant masses, and
was reflected, consciously or unconsciously, even among those who stood
at the helm of the State.
From the very first Lenin's organisation, as was said afterwards, in
July, in the report of the Procurator of the Petrograd High Court of
Justice, "aiming at assisting the States warring against Russia in
their hostile actions against her, entered into an agreement with the
agents of the said States to forward the disorganisation of the Russian
Army and the Russian rear, for which purpose it used the financial
means received from these States to organise a propaganda among the
population and the troops ... and also, for the same purpose, organised
in Petrograd, from July 3rd to 5th, an armed insurrection against the
Supreme Power existing in the State."
The Stavka had long and vainly raised its voice of warning. General
Alexeiev had, both personally and in writing, called on the Government
to take measures against the Bolsheviks and the spies. Several times
I myself applied to the War Office, sending in, among other things,
evidential material concerning Rakovsky's spying and documents
certifying the treason of Lenin, Skoropis-Yoltoukhovsky and others.
The part played by the Union for the Liberation of the Ukraine (of
which, besides others, Melenevsky and V. Doroshenko were members)[24]
as an organisation of the Central Powers for propaganda, spying and
recruiting for "Setch Ukraine units," was beyond all doubt. In one of
my letters (May 16th), based on the examination of a Russian officer,
Yermolenko, who had been a prisoner of war and had accepted the part
of a German agent for the purpose of disclosing the organisation,
the following picture was revealed: "Yermolenko was transferred to
our rear, on the front of the Sixth Army, to agitate for a speedy
conclusion of a separate peace with Germany. Yermolenko accepted this
commission at the insistence of his comrades. Two officers of the
German General Staff, Schiditzky and Lubar, informed him that a similar
agitation was being carried on in Russia by the sectional president of
the Union for the Liberation of the Ukraine, A. Skoropis-Yoltoukhovsky,
and by Lenin, as agents of the German General Staff. Lenin had been
instructed to seek to undermine by all means the confidence of the
Russian people in the Provisional Government. The money for this work
was received through one Svendson, an employee of the German Embassy in
Stockholm. These methods were practised before the Revolution also. Our
command turned its attention to the somewhat too frequent appearance
of "escaped prisoners." Many of them having surrendered to the enemy,
passed through a definite course of intelligence work, and having
received substantial pay and "papers," were permitted to pass over to
us through the line of trenches.
Being altogether unable to decide what was a case of courage and what
of treachery, we nearly always sent all escaped prisoners from the
European to the Caucasian Front.
All the representations of the High Command as to the insufferable
situation of the Army, in the face of such vast treachery, remained
without result. Kerensky carried on free debates in the Soviet with
Lenin on the subject whether the country and the Army should be broken
down or not, basing his action on the view that he was the "War
Minister of the Revolution," and that "freedom of opinion was sacred to
him, whencesoever it might proceed." Tzeretelli warmly defended Lenin:
"I do not agree with Lenin and his agitation. But what has been said by
Deputy Shulgin is a slander against Lenin, _Never has Lenin called for
actions which would infringe upon the course of the Revolution. Lenin
is carrying on an idealist propaganda._"
This much-talked-of freedom of opinion extremely simplified the work
of German propaganda, giving rise to such an unheard-of phenomenon as
the open preaching in German, at public meetings and in Kronstadt,
of a separate peace and of distrust of the Government, by an agent
of Germany, the President of the Zimmerwald and Kienthal Conference,
Robert Grimm!...
What a state of moral prostration and loss of all national dignity,
consciousness, and patriotism is presented by the picture of Tzeretelli
and Skobelev "vouching" for the _agent provocateur_; of Kerensky
importuning the Government to grant Grimm the right of entry into
Russia; of Tereshtchenko permitting it, and of Russians listening to
Grimm's speeches--without indignation, without resentment.
During the Bolshevik insurrection of July the officials of the Ministry
of Justice, exasperated by the laxity of the leaders of the Government,
decided, with the knowledge of their Minister, Pereverzev, to publish
my letter to the Minister of War and other documents, exposing Lenin's
treason to his country. The documents being a statement signed by two
Socialists, Alexinsky and Pankratov, were given to the printers. The
premature disclosure of this fact called forth a passionate protest
from Tchkheidze and Tzeretelli, and terrible anger on the part of the
Ministers Nekrassov and Tereshtchenko. The Government forbade the
publication of information which sullied the good name of comrade
Lenin, and had recourse to reprisals against the officials of the
Ministry of Justice. However, the statement appeared in the Press.
In its turn the Executive Committee of the Soviet of Workmen's and
Soldiers' Delegates exhibited a touching care, not only for the
inviolability of the Bolsheviks, but even for their honour, by issuing
on July 5th a special appeal calling on people "to refrain from the
spreading of accusations reflecting dishonour" on Lenin and "other
political workers" pending the investigation of the matter by a special
commission. This consideration was openly expressed in a resolution
passed by the Central Executive Committees (on July 8th), which,
while condemning the attempt of the Anarchist-Bolshevist elements to
overthrow the Government, expressed the fear that the "inevitable"
measures to which the Government and the military authorities must
have recourse ... would create a basis for the demagogic agitation of
the counter-Revolutionaries who, for the time being, gathered round
the flag of the Revolutionary régime, but who might pave the way for a
military Dictatorship."
However, the exposure of the direct criminal participation of the
leaders of Bolshevism in acts of mutiny and treason may have obliged
the Government to begin repressions. Lenin and Apfelbaum (Zinoviev)
escaped to Finland, while Bronstein (Trotsky), Kozlovsky, Raskolnikov,
Remniov, and many others were arrested. Several Anarchist-Bolshevist
newspapers were suspended.
These repressions, however, were not of a serious character. Many
persons known to have been leaders in the mutiny were not charged at
all, and their work of destruction was continued with consistency and
energy.
* * * * *
While carrying the war into our country the Germans persistently
and methodically put into practice another watchword--peace at the
Front. Fraternisation had taken place earlier as well, before the
Revolution; but it was then due to the hopelessly wearisome life in the
trenches, to curiosity, to a simple feeling of humanity even towards
the enemy--a feeling exhibited by the Russian soldier more than once
on the battlefield of Borodino, in the bastions of Sevastopol, and in
the Balkan mountains. Fraternisation took place rarely, was punished
by the commanders, and had no dangerous tendencies in it. But now the
German General Staff organised it on a large scale, systematically
and along the whole Front, with the participation of the higher Staff
organs and the commanders, with a detailed code of instructions, which
included the observation of our forces and positions, the demonstration
of the impressive armament and strength of their own positions,
persuasion as to the aimlessness of the War, the incitement of the
Russian soldiers against the Government and their commanders, in whose
interest exclusively this "sanguinary slaughter" was being continued.
Masses of the Defeatist literature manufactured in Germany were passed
over into our trenches, and at the same time agents of the Soviet and
the Committee travelled quite freely along the Front with similar
propaganda, with the organisation of "exhibition fraternisation," and
with whole piles of _Pravda_, _Trench Pravda_, _Social Democrat_, and
other products of our native Socialist intellect and conscience--organs
which, in their forceful argumentation, left the Jesuitical eloquence
of their German brethren far behind. At the same time a general
meeting of simple "delegates from the Front" in Petrograd was passing
a resolution in favour of allowing fraternisation for the purpose of
revolutionary propaganda among the enemy's ranks!
One cannot read without deep emotion of the feelings of Kornilov,
who, for the first time after the Revolution, in the beginning of
May, when in command of the Eighth Army, came into contact with this
fatal phenomenon in the life of our Front. They were written down by
Nezhintsev, at that time captain of the General Staff and later the
gallant commander of the Kornilov Regiment, who in 1918 fell in action
against the Bolsheviks at the storm of Ekaterinodar.
"When we had got well into the firing zone of the position," writes
Nezhintsev, "the General (Kornilov) looked very gloomy. His words,
'disgrace, treason,' showed his estimate of the dead silence of the
position. Then he remarked:
"'Do you feel all the nightmare horror of this silence? You understand
that we are watched by the enemy artillery observers and that we are
not fired at. Yes, the enemy are mocking us as weaklings. Can it be
that the Russian soldier is capable of informing the enemy of my
arrival at the position?'
"I was silent, but the sacred tears in the eyes of this hero touched me
deeply, and at this moment I vowed in my mind that I would die for him
and for our common Motherland. General Kornilov seemed to feel this. He
turned to me suddenly, pressed my hand, and turned away, as if ashamed
of his momentary weakness.
"The acquaintance of the new Commander with the infantry began with
the units in the Reserve, when formed in rank, holding a meeting and
replying to all appeals for the necessity of an advance by pointing
out how useless it was to continue a Bourgeois war, carried on by
'militarists.' When, after two hours of fruitless discussion, General
Kornilov, worn out morally and physically, proceeded to the trenches,
he found a scene there which could scarcely have been foreseen by any
soldier of this age.
"We entered into a system of fortifications where the trench-lines
of both sides were separated or, more correctly, joined by lines of
barbed wire.... The appearance of General Kornilov was greeted ... by
a group of German officers, who gazed insolently on the Commander of
the Russian Army; behind them stood some Prussian soldiers. The General
took my field-glasses and, ascending the parapet, began to examine the
arena of the fights to come. When someone expressed a fear that the
Prussians might shoot the Russian Commander, the latter replied:
"'I would be immensely glad if they did; perhaps it might sober our
befogged soldiers and put an end to this shameful fraternisation.'
"At the positions of a neighbouring regiment the Commander of the Army
was greeted by the _bravura_ march of a German Jaeger regiment, to
whose band our 'fraternising' soldiers were making their way. With the
remark, 'This is treason!' the General turned to an officer standing
next him, ordering the fraternisers from both sides to be told that if
this disgraceful scene did not cease at once he would turn the guns
loose on them. The disciplined Germans ceased playing and returned to
their own trenches, seemingly ashamed of the abominable spectacle.
But our soldiers--oh! they held meetings for a long time, complaining
of the way their 'counter-Revolutionary commanders oppressed their
liberty.'"
In general I do not cherish feelings of revenge. Yet I regret
exceedingly that General Ludendorff left the German Army prematurely,
before its break-up, and did not experience directly in its ranks those
inexpressibly painful moral torments which we Russian officers have
suffered.
[Illustration: Before the battle in the Revolutionary Army: a meeting.]
[Illustration: Types of men in the Revolutionary Army.]
Besides fraternisation, the enemy High Command practised, on an
extensive scale and with provocatory purpose, the dispatch of flags
of truce directly to the troops, or rather to the soldiers. Thus,
about the end of April on the Dvinsk Front there came with a flag of
truce a German officer, who was not received. He managed, however, to
address to the crowd of soldiers the words: "I have come to you with
offers of peace, and am empowered to speak even with the Provisional
Government, but your commanders do not wish for peace." These words
were spread rapidly, and caused agitation among the soldiers and
even threats to desert the Front. Therefore when, a few days later,
in the same section, _parliamentaires_ (a brigade commander, two
officers, and a bugler) made their appearance again, they were taken
to the Staff quarters of the Fifth Army. It turned out, of course,
that they had no authorisations, and could not even state more or
less definitely the object of their coming, since "the sole object of
the pseudo-_parliamentaires_ appearing on our Front," says an order
of the Commander-in-Chief, "has been to observe our dispositions and
our spirit, and, by a lying exhibition of their pacific feelings, to
incline our troops to an inaction profitable to the Germans and ruinous
to Russia and her freedom." Similar cases occurred on the Fronts of
the Eighth, Ninth, and other Armies.
It is characteristic that the Commander-in-Chief of the Eastern German
Front, Prince Leopold of Bavaria, found it possible to take a personal
part in this course of provocation. In two radiograms, bearing the
systematic character of the customary proclamations and intended for
the soldiers and the Soviet, he stated that the High Command was ready
to meet half-way "the repeatedly expressed desire of the Russian
Soldiers' Delegates to put an end to bloodshed"; that "military
operations between us (the Central Powers) and Russia could be put an
end to _without Russia breaking with her Allies_"; that "if Russia
wants to know the particulars of our conditions, let her give up her
demand for their publication...." And he finishes with a threat: "Does
the new Russian Government, instigated by its Allies, wish to satisfy
itself whether divisions of heavy guns are still to be found on our
Eastern Front?"
Earlier, when leaders did discreditable things to save their armies and
their countries, at least they were ashamed of it and kept silence.
Nowadays military traditions have undergone a radical change.
To the credit of the Soviet it must be said that it took a proper
view of this provocationary invitation, saying in reply: "The
Commander-in-Chief of the German troops on the Eastern Front offers us
'a separate truce and secrecy of negotiations.' But Russia knows that
the _débâcle_ of the Allies will be the beginning of the _débâcle_ of
her own Army, and the _débâcle_ of the Revolutionary troops of Free
Russia would mean not only new common graves, but the failure of the
Revolution, the fall of Free Russia."
* * * * *
From the very first days of the Revolution a marked change naturally
took place in the attitude of the Russian Press. It expressed itself on
the one hand in a certain differentiation of all the Bourgeois organs,
which assumed a Liberal-Conservative character, the _tactics_ of which
were adopted by an inconsiderable part of the Socialist Press, of the
type of Plekhanov's _Yedinstvo_; and on the other in the appearance of
an immense number of Socialist organs.
The organs of the Right Wing underwent a considerable evolution, a
characteristic indication of which was the unexpected declaration of
a well-known member of the _Novoye Vremya_ staff, Mr. Menshikov: "We
must be grateful to destiny that the Monarchy, which for a thousand
years has betrayed the people, has at last betrayed itself and put a
cross on its own grave. To dig it up from under that cross and start a
great dispute about the candidates for the fallen throne would be, in
my opinion, a fatal mistake." In the course of the first few months the
Right Press partly closed down--not without pressure and violence on
the part of the Soviets--partly it assumed a pacific-Liberal attitude.
It was only in September, 1917, that its tone grew extremely violent in
connection with the final exposure of the weakness of the Government,
the loss of all hope of a legal way out of the "no thoroughfare" which
had arisen, and the echoes of Kornilov's venture. The attacks of the
extremist organs on the Government passed into solid abuse of it.
Though differing in a greater or lesser degree in its understanding of
the social problems which the Revolution had to solve, though guilty,
perhaps, along with Russian society, of many mistakes, yet the Russian
Liberal Press showed an exceptional unanimity in the more important
questions of a constitutional and national character: full power to
the Provisional Government, Democratic reforms in the spirit of the
programme of March 2nd,[25] war until victory along with the Allies,
an All-Russia Constituent Assembly as the source of the supreme power
and of the constitution of the country. In yet another respect has the
Liberal Press left a good reputation behind it in history: in the days
of lofty popular enthusiasm, as in the days of doubt, vacillation and
general demoralisation, which distinguished the Revolutionary period of
1917, no place was found in it, nor in the Right Press either, for the
distribution of German gold....
The appearance, on a large scale, of the new Socialist Press was
accompanied by a series of unfavourable circumstances. It had no
normal past, no traditions. Its prolonged life below the surface, the
exclusively destructive method of action adopted by it, its suspicious
and hostile attitude towards all authority, put a certain stamp on the
whole tendency of this Press, leaving too little place and attention
for creative work. The complete discord in thought, the contradictions
and vacillation which reigned both within the Soviet and also among the
party groups and within the parties, were reflected in the Press, just
as much as the elemental pressure from below of irresistible, narrowly
egotistic class demands; for neglect of these demands gave rise to
the threat, which was once expressed by the "beauty and pride of the
Revolution," the Kronstadt sailors to Tchernov, the Minister: "If you
will not give us anything, Michael Alexandrovitch will." Finally, the
Press was not uninfluenced by the appearance in it of a number of such
persons as brought into it an atmosphere of uncleanness and perfidy.
The papers were full of names, which had emerged from the sphere of
crime, of the Secret Police and of international espionage. All these
gentlemen--Tchernomazov (a provocator in the Secret Police and director
of the pre-Revolutionary _Pravda_), Berthold (the same and also
editor of the _Communist_), Dekonsky, Malinovsky, Matislavsky, those
colleagues of Lenin and Gorky--Nahamkes, Stoutchka, Ouritsky, Gimmer
(Soukhanov), and a vast number of equally notorious names--brought the
Russian Press to a hitherto unknown degree of moral degradation.
The difference was only a matter of scope. Some papers, akin to
the Soviet semi-official organ, the _Izvestia of the Workmen's and
Soldiers' Delegates_, undermined the country and the Army, while others
of the _Pravda_ type (the organ of the Bolshevik Social Democrats)
broke them down.
At the same time as the _Izvestia_ would call on its readers to
support the Provisional Government, while secretly ready to strike
a blow at it, the _Pravda_ would declare that "the Government is
counter-Revolutionary, and therefore there can be no relations
with it. The task of the Revolutionary Democracy is to attain to
the dictatorship of the proletariat." And Tchernov's Socialist
Revolutionary organ, the _Delo Naroda_, would discover a neutral
formula: all possible support to the Coalition Government, but "there
is not, and cannot be, any unanimity in this question; more than that,
there must not be, in the interests of the double defence."
At the same time as the _Izvestia_ began to preach an advance, but
without a final victory, not abandoning, however, the intention of
"deciding over the heads of the Government and the ruling classes the
conditions on which the War might be stopped," the _Pravda_ called for
universal fraternisation, and the Socialist Revolutionary, _Zemlia i
Volia_, alternately grieved that Germany still wished for conquest,
or demanded a separate peace. Tchernov's paper, which in March had
considered that, "should the enemy be victorious, there would be an end
to Russian freedom," now, in May, saw in the preaching of an advance
"the limit of unblushing gambling on the fate of the Fatherland, the
limit of irresponsibility and demagogy." Gorky's paper, _Novaya Zhizn_,
speaking through Gimmer (Soukhanov), rises to cynicism when it says:
"When Kerensky gives orders for _Russian soil to be cleared of enemy
troops_, his demands far exceed the limits of military _technique_.
He calls for a political act, one which has never been provided for
by the Coalition Government. For clearing the country by an advance
signifies 'complete victory'...." Altogether the _Novaya Zhizn_
supported German interests with especial warmth, raising its voice in
all cases when German interests were threatened with danger, either
on the part of the Allies or on ours. And when the advance of the
disorganised Army ended in failure--in Tarnopol and Kalush--when Riga
had fallen, the Left Press started a bitter campaign against the Stavka
and the commanding personnel, and Tchernov's paper, in connection
with the proposed reforms in the Army, cried hysterically: "Let the
proletarians know that it is proposed again to give them up to the
iron embrace of beggary, slavery and hunger.... Let the soldiers know
that it is proposed again to enslave them with the 'discipline' of
their commanders and to force them to shed their blood without end, so
long as the belief of the Allies in Russia's 'gallantry' is restored."
The most straightforward of all, however, was afterwards the _Iskra_,
the organ of the Menshevist Internationalists (Martov-Zederbaum),
which, on the day of the occupation of the island of Oesel by a German
landing-party, published an article entitled "Welcome to the German
Fleet!"
The Army had its own military Press. The organs of the Army staffs and
of those at the Front, which used to appear before the Revolution,
were of the nature of purely military bulletins. Beginning with the
Revolution, these organs, with their weak literary forces, began to
fight for the existence of the Army, conscientiously, honestly, but
not cleverly. Meeting with indifference or exasperation on the part of
the soldiers, who had already turned their backs on the officers, and
especially on the part of the Committee organs of the "Revolutionary"
movement, which existed side by side with them, they began to weaken
and die out, until at last, in the days of August, an order from
Kerensky closed them altogether; the exclusive right of publishing Army
newspapers was transferred to the Army Committee and the Committees of
the troops at the Front. The same fate befell the _News of the Active
Army_, the Stavka organ, started by General Markov and left without
support from the weighty powers of the Press of the capital.
The Committee Press, widely spread among the troops at the expense of
the Government, reflected those moods of which I have spoken earlier
in the chapter on the Committees, ranging from Constitutionalism to
Anarchism, from complete victory to an immediate conclusion of peace,
without orders. It reflected--but in a worse, more sorry form, as
regards literary style and content--that disharmony of thought and
those tendencies towards extreme theories which characterised the
Socialist Press of the Capital. In this respect, in accordance with the
personnel of the Committees, and to some extent with their proximity to
Petrograd, the respective Fronts differed somewhat from one another.
The most moderate was the South-Western Front, somewhat worse, the
Western, while the Northern Front was pronouncedly Bolshevist. Besides
local talent, the columns of the Committee Press were in many cases
opened wide to the resolutions not only of the extreme national
parties, but even of the German parties.
It would be incorrect, however, to speak of the immediate action of the
Press on the masses of the soldiers. It did not exist any more than
there were any popular newspapers which these masses could understand.
The Press exercised an influence principally on the semi-educated
elements in the ranks of the Army. This sphere turned out to be nearer
to the soldiers, and to it passed a certain share of that authority
which was enjoyed earlier by the officers. Ideas gathered from the
papers and refracted through the mental prism of this class passed
in a simplified form to the soldiery, the vast majority of which
unfortunately consisted of ignorant and illiterate men. And among these
masses all these conceptions, stripped of cunningly-woven arguments,
premises and grounds, were transformed into wondrously simple and
terrifically logical conclusions.
In them dominated the straightforward negation: "Down!"
Down with the Bourgeois Government, down with the counter-Revolutionary
Commanders, down with the "sanguinary slaughter," down with everything
of which they were sick, of which they were wearied, all that in one
way or another interfered with their animal instincts and hampered
"free will"--down with them all!
In such an elementary fashion did the Army at innumerable soldiers'
meetings settle all the political and social questions that were
agitating mankind.
* * * * *
The curtain has fallen. The Treaty of Versailles has for a time given
pause to the armed conflict in Central Europe. Evident to the end that,
having regained their strength, the nations may again take up their
arms, so as to burst the chains in which defeat has fettered them.
The idea of the "world-peace," which the Christian churches have been
preaching for twenty centuries, is buried for years to come.
To us, how childishly naïve now seem the efforts of the humanists of
the nineteenth century, who by prolonged, ardent propaganda sought
to soften the horrors of war and to introduce the limiting norms
of International Law! Yes, now, when we know that one may not only
infringe the neutrality of a peaceful, cultured country, but give it
to be ravaged and plundered; when we can sink peaceable ships, with
women and children on board, by means of submarines; poison people with
suffocating gases and tear their bodies with the fragments of explosive
bullets; when a whole country, a whole nation, is quoted by cold,
political calculation merely as a "Barrier" against the invasion of
armed force and pernicious ideas, and is periodically either helped or
betrayed in turn.
But the most terrible of all weapons ever invented by the mind of man,
the most shameful of all the methods permitted in the late World War
was _the poisoning of the soul of a people_!
Germany assigns the priority of this invention to Great Britain. Let
them settle this matter between themselves. But I see my native land
crushed, dying in the dark night of horror and insanity. And I know her
tormentors.
Two theses have arisen before mankind in all their grim power and all
their shameless nakedness:
_All is permissible for the advantage of one's country!_
_All is permissible for the triumph of one's party, one's class!_
All, even the moral and physical ruin of an enemy country, even the
betrayal of one's native land and the making on its living body of
_social experiments_, the failure of which threatens it with paralysis
and death.
Germany and Lenin unhesitatingly decided these questions in the
affirmative. The world has condemned them; but are all those who speak
of the matter so unanimous and sincere in their condemnation? Have not
these ideas left somewhat too deep traces in the minds, not so much
perhaps of the popular masses as of their leaders? I, at least, am led
to such a conclusion by all the present soulless world policy of the
Governments, especially towards Russia, by all the present utterly
selfish tactics of the class organisations.
This is terrible.
I believe that every people has the right to defend its existence,
sword in hand; I know that for many years to come war will be the
customary method of settling international disputes, and that methods
of warfare will be both honourable and, alas! dishonourable. But there
is a certain limit, beyond which even baseness ceases to be simply
baseness and becomes insanity. This limit we have already reached. And
if religion, science, literature, philosophers, humanitarians, teachers
of mankind do not arouse a broad, idealistic movement against the
Hottentot morality with which we have been inoculated, the world will
witness the decline of its civilisation.
[Illustration: Before the battle in the Old Army: Prayers.]