1. ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS PUT BY A CHICAGO DAILY NEWS CORRESPONDENT.
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5. What is the position of the Soviet Government in respect of an economic understanding with America?
We are decidedly for an economic understanding with America—with all countries but especially with America.
[...]
2. TO THE RED ARMY MEN.
Comrades, Red Army men!
The tsarist generals, Yudenich in the North and Denikin in the South, are once again bending every effort to vanquish the Soviet power and restore the power of the tsar, the landowners and the capitalists.
We know how a similar attempt by Kolchak ended. He did not succeed in deceiving the workers of the Urals and the peasants of Siberia for long. Having seen through the deception and having suffered endless violence, floggings and robbery at the hands of the officers, the sons of landowners and capitalists, the Ural workers and the Siberian peasants helped our Red Army defeat Kolchak. The Orenburg Cossacks came straight over to the side of Soviet power.
That is why we are fully confident in victory over Yudenich and Denikin. They will not succeed in restoring the power of the tsar and the landowners. That will never be! The peasants are already rising up in Denikin's wake. The flames of revolt against Denikin are burning brightly in the Caucasus. The Kuban Cossacks are grumbling and are stirring, resentful of Denikin's violence and robbery on behalf of the landowners and the British.
Let us then be firm, comrades, Red Army men! The workers and the peasants are rallying ever more solidly, consciously and resolutely, to the side of the Soviet government.
Forward, comrades, Red Army men, to the fight for the rule of workers and peasants against the landowners and the tsarist generals!
The victory will be ours!
3. SPEECH DELIVERED AT THE FIRST CONGRESS OF AGRICULTURAL COMMUNES AND AGRICULTURAL ARTELS.1
Comrades, I am very glad to greet on behalf of the government your first congress of agricultural communes and agricultural artels.2 You of course know from all Soviet government activities what tremendous significance we attach to the communes, artels and generally to all organizations that aim to gradually transform small individual peasant farms into socialized co-operative or artel farms. You are aware that the Soviet government allotted the sum of one thousand million rubles long ago to assist efforts of this kind.3
The Statute on Socialist Agrarian Measures 4 highlights the importance of communes, artels and other projects bent on a joint cultivation of the land. The importance of all enterprises of this kind is tremendous because there can be no question of building a stable socialist society if the old poverty-stricken peasant farms subsist. The Soviet government is exerting every effort to ensure that this statute will not be merely a law on paper but will in fact yield the intended benefits.
Only if we succeed in proving to the peasants the actual advantages of communal, collective, cooperative or artel cultivation of the soil, only if we succeed in helping the peasant through co-operative or artel farming, will the working class, the wielder of state power, be really able to convince the peasant that its policy is correct and thus secure a genuine and lasting following of millions of peasants. It is therefore impossible to exaggerate the importance of every measure intended to encourage co-operative or artel forms of farming.
We have millions of individual farms in our country scattered and dispersed across remote rural districts. It would be absolutely absurd to try to reorganize these farms immediately by decree or by bringing pressure to bear from above. We fully realize that we can influence the millions of small peasant farms only gradually, cautiously, and only with a real experiment. Peasants are far too pragmatic and cling far too tenaciously to the old methods of farming to consent to any serious change merely on the basis of advice or bookish instructions. Only when it is proven on the spot, by direct experience, that a transition to co-operative or artel farming is essential and possible, shall we be entitled to say that in this vast peasant country, Russia, an important step has been taken towards socialist agriculture.
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I have already said that the statute requires the communes to render assistance to the surrounding peasant population. We could not express it otherwise in the law or spell out practical instructions. Our business was to establish the general principles, and to rely on the politically-conscious comrades in the localities to find a thousand ways of applying the law, scrupulously, according to the concrete economic reality of a given locality.
Of course every law can be circumvented, even under pretence of observing it, and so the statute on assisting the peasants could become a mere lark if it is not applied scrupulously and could yield results quite contrary to the desired ones.
Communes, artels and co-operatives must make a neighbouring peasant's livelihood better through mutual contact and economic assistance, thereby proving to the peasants on the spot that a switch to collective farming would only bring beneficial consequences for them.
Naturally we shall be told that in order to improve farming we need a better situation than our current chaos, brought about by four years of imperialist war and two years of civil war, forced upon us by the imperialists. Given our current reality, how can anyone expect widespread improvement in farming?—may God grant that we manage to carry on and not perish from starvation!
It is only natural for such doubts to arise. But if I had to reply to such objections, I would say this: assume that owing to the disruption of the economy, to the chaos, the shortage of goods, deficient transportation and the loss of cattle and implements, an extensive improvement of farming cannot materialize. Even so there is no doubt that individual cases of improvement are possible. However let us assume that even this is absent. Would that imply that the communes cannot improve the life of their neighbouring peasants, cannot show that collective agriculture is not a hot air balloon but a new program of the workers' government to assist the working peasants, to help them in their struggle against the kulaks? I am convinced that seen from this perspective, even granted the impossibility of improvement in our current chaos, a very great deal may be accomplished if there are conscientious Communists in the communes and the artels.
To bear this out, I would point to what has been called subbotniks in our cities. This is the name given to the voluntary work performed by urban workers during several hours of unpaid overtime devoted to some public need.
The subbotniks were begun in Moscow by the Moscow-Kazan Railway workers. An appeal made by the Soviet government cited how Red Army men brave unprecedented sacrifices and hardships at the front, and despite all this, are winning unprecedented victories over our enemies, and the appeal then urged a display of similar heroism and similar self-sacrifice at the rear to clinch our victories. Moscow workers answered that appeal with subbotniks.
There can be no doubt that Moscow workers suffer greater privation and want than the peasants. If you were to acquaint yourselves with their incredibly hard living conditions and gave some thought to the fact that they organized subbotniks nevertheless, you would agree that no instance of arduous conditions can be offered as an excuse for failing to emulate the Moscow workers.
Nothing served to enhance the prestige of the Communist Party in the towns, to increase the respect of non-Party workers for the Communists, as much as these subbotniks when they ceased being few in number and when non-Party workers saw in situ how the members of the governing Communist Party fulfill their obligations and duties, and perceived that Communists admit new members to the Party not to enjoy the privileges associated with membership in a governing party but to set an example of genuine communist labour, i.e., labour performed gratis. Communism is the highest stage in the development of socialism: when people work because they see the need of working for the common good.
We know that we cannot establish a socialist order presently—may God grant that it be established in our country during the lifetime of our children or perhaps grandchildren. But we say that the members of the governing Communist Party lug the heavier burden of the difficulties in the fight against capitalism, mobilize the best Communists for the war front and demand of the remnant that they take part in subbotniks. These subbotniks flourish in every large industrial city and the Party now demands of every member his participation in them, punishing the disobedient with expulsion from the Party even.
By organizing similar subbotniks in the communes, artels and co-operatives you can and must see to it that even under the very worst of conditions the peasant regards every commune, artel and co-operative as an association distinguished not by the subsidies it receives from the state but by the presence of some of the best working-class people who not only preach socialism for others but practice it themselves, who show that even under the worst conditions they can run their farm along communist lines and assist the peasant population roundabout in every possible way. On this question there can be no excuses like a shortage of goods, the absence of seed or loss of cattle.
This will be a test which will determine in any case the extent to which our difficult task was done. The assistance given by communes to their neighbouring peasants must not be a gift given out of superfluity but be socialist assistance, i.e., it must enable the peasants to make the switch from individual to co-operative farming. And this can be done only through the subbotnik method I have spoken about.
I am certain that this general meeting of representatives of communes, co-operatives and artels will discuss this and understand that the subbotnik principle is a powerful means of consolidating the communes and co-operatives and that it will yield such fruits that nowhere in Russia will there be a single case of peasant hostility toward the communes, artels or co-operatives.
However that is not enough. Peasants must harbour a favourable attitude toward the communes, artels or co-operatives. For our part we the representatives of the Soviet government will do everything in our power to help bring this about and to verify that state assistance from the one-thousand-million-ruble fund or others will be available only to communes or artels that have actually established closer relationships with their peasant neighbours. Unless that happens we judge that any assistance provided to artels and co-operatives is not only useless but downright harmful.
If you absorb the example of the urban workers who started the subbotnik movement despite having immeasurably worse living conditions than the peasants, I am sure that we shall bring about, with your general and unanimous support, a situation where each one of the several thousand communes and artels in existence will become a veritable nursery of communist ideas and alternatives for the peasants. The subbotnik movement will be seen as a real demonstration that although the rise in prosperity may still be small and feeble the trend is not a hot air balloon but a true outgrowth of the new socialist system.
Only then shall we gain a lasting victory over the old ignorance, the impoverishment and the want. Only then will any future difficulties we may encounter hold out no terrors for us.
4. TO MEMBERS OF THE COUNCIL OF DEFENCE.
The situation on the railways is catastrophic in the extreme. The delivery of grain has ceased. Truly urgent measures are needed to save the country. The following measures must be implemented (and other relevant measures of a similar nature must be sought) in the course of two months (February and March):
I. The personal bread ration is to be reduced for those not working on the railways and is to be increased for those working on them.
Let thousands more perish but the country will be saved.
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5. TELEGRAM TO J. V. STALIN. February 16, 1920.
Stalin,
Revolutionary Military Council of the South-Western Front, Kharkov.
Priority. By direct line.
February 16, 1920
Today I heard you and all the others very clearly, every word. Threaten to shoot the incompetent person in charge of communications who cannot give you a good amplifier and ensure uninterrupted telephone communication with me.
I approve the reduced requisitioning and the obligatory distribution of a part of the requisitioned grain to the poor. You must first of all interest the poor.
Lenin
6. TELEGRAM TO G. K. ORJONIKIDZE
Orjonikidze,
Revolutionary Military Council, Caucasian Front.
April 2, 1920
Again I urge you to display caution and maximum good will towards the Moslems, especially on advancing into Daghestan. Do everything to demonstrate, and in the most emphatic manner, our sympathy for the Moslems, their autonomy, independence, etc.1
Give me more precise and more frequent information on how things stand.
Lenin
7. THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR.
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Song of the plains (1933) |
Farewell of Slavianka (1912) |
Berne: The defeat of the Bolsheviks is complete. On the Ukrainian front they flee pell-mell and the same thing happens on the Romanian front. The Bolshevik hordes scatter, completely demoralized, in terror and panic.
Moscow: Moscow's National Bank has been robbed for the third time in a short while. Everything points to a perfectly organized gang tolerated and trained to loot the bank's cash reserves systematically.
The attacks in Moscow evince a vast plot against the Bolsheviks. The conspirators come from all political parties and social classes.Among them are generals, princes and professors. Red newspapers think they consort with agents of the Entente.
New York: Some five thousand Russians attempted to demonstrate on Fifth Avenue for an official recognition of the Government of the Soviets by the United States. The protesters and the police clashed. Several marchers were hurt and five revolutionary firebrands arrested.
Paris: The news confirm the tremendous defeat of the Bolsheviks. Before liberation troops entered Petrograd the rabble committed unheard-of excesses, not sparing foreign diplomatic missions even.
The Bolsheviks have retaken Tsarkoiselo. The Bolsheviks got reinforcements from the Archangel and Moscow fronts. Twenty-seven commissars of the Red Army have been shot.
General Yudenich waits on the Petrograd front. Yudenich needs more rifles.1
The news from Russia state that the Red Army advances northwest of Gatchina. The war has entered a new phase. The Whites botched their attempt to aid Yudenich's thrust.
Berlin: Five thousand soldiers of Belmont's army operating in Russia will return to Germany.
Helsingfors: A planned mobilization of Finnish troops has been put off.
Lloyd George has delivered a speech in the House of Commons voicing opposition to intervention in Russia.
Reval (Germany): General Yudenich retreats to "Tobograff" (?) in Estonia.
The setbacks suffered by German troops in the Baltic provinces continue.
Copenhaguen: The negotiations between British delegates and representatives of the Soviets over an exchange of prisoners of war have broken down owing to the demands put forth by the Russian delegation.
A dispatch from Reuters states that Irkutsk and Omsk have been evacuated.
Telegrams are saying that all the ministers of the Government presided by Admiral Kolchak perished in a railway accident. There are no further details.
Paris: The Bolsheviks have taken Odessa.
London: The Bolsheviks in their triumphal advance have reached the shores of the Caspian Sea. The Allies have taken precautionary measures in the Black Sea. The American fleet of the Mediterranean heads to the Sea of Azov. Apparently the Allies plan to send two hundred thousand soldiers to oppose the Bolsheviks.
Warsaw: The Polish front is being reinforced given the proximity of the Bolsheviks.
General Brusilov. It is said that some time ago General Denikin captured General Aleksei Brusilov and had him shot.
Helsingfors: The Bolsheviks have gone on the offensive against White Russia.
London: The Lithuanian and Polish armies continue to press their advantage. They took thirteen thousand Bolsheviks prisoner.
Progress of the Bolsheviks. The strength of the Bolshevik forces is evident and increases by the hour, conquering by blood and fire everywhere. Russia has already assumed this Bolshevik superiority as a necessary evil. People on the know say that the Bolsheviks have softened their primitive theories somewhat but that the danger to neighbouring countries is obvious.
Basilea: The Bolsheviks have reaped a full victory over Denikin's troops. The newspaper Pravda states that a prominent Cossack leader has been taken prisoner by the Red troops. These control all of northern Siberia.
Fleeing the blaze. The Council of People's Commissars has departed Moscow owing to the havoc caused by the plague. Moreover a portion of the Red garrison has rebelled.
Paris: News from Warsaw state that according to "Jarononki" (?), a close friend of Pilsudski the head of the Polish Government, Poland will be the target of a vigorous Bolshevik offensive in March and April. According to "Mawiski" (?), who was held prisoner in Moscow during the invasion, Russia has long been ready for an invasion of Poland with the aid of German officers. These statements were endorsed by a German officer the prisoner of the Poles who said that the Bolsheviks fret over the problem of transportation because they have only four hundred steam locomotives, no coaches and no fuel. As Mawiski left Moscow on December 13th Russian newspapers detailed a military campaign against the Poles.
Ukraine and Odessa. Ukrainian troops have captured Odessa.
Moscow: Admiral Kolchak, captured by the Red troops, will be driven to Moscow for trial.
Vladivostok: The Japanese have occupied several towns without encountering any resistance. Strong detachments safeguard city banks that had many millions stolen. Reinforcements are expected for a march on the Bolsheviks.
Moscow: Red troops have captured Odessa.
Copenhaguen: Great Britain and Russia have underwritten a prisoner exchange deal.
London: The Secretary of the Supreme Allied Council has delivered a note to the press stating that the Allies recommend to countries bordering on Russia to not wage war against the Republic of the Soviets. Elsewhere the note states that trade between Russia and the rest of the world is so necessary that the Allied powers will encourage it to the greatest extent possible on condition that Moscow's Government halts its Bolshevik atrocities and imitates the diplomatic ways of the civilized Governments of the world.
Strasburg: A Socialist Congress read out a letter from Lenin saying that French socialists will not be admitted to the International.
Berlin: Germany has signed a trade deal with Russia. The first will export machinery and seeds to the second in exchange for raw materials.
To disabuse our popular elements who dream about Utopian working conditions in keeping with Russia's we transcribe below some articles of the Soviet Labour Code, deemed by Lenin and Trotsky to be their magnus opus, which they sent to the Labour Department of Washington (paradoxical though it may seem to their radical admirers) for the purpose of acquainting American businessmen and industrialists with the Soviet Government's offer of guarantees to foreign investors.
The new Bolshevik economic and social order has its genuine expression in said Code, as will be seen:
Article 1, Section 1. Every able-bodied individual sixteen to fifty years old who regardless of gender or social status is not engaged in a job profitable or useful to the State will do compulsory work. Any call for a strike will be tried and be penalized as a felony. No unemployed person has the right to refuse any kind of work.
The eight-hour workday must be understood to be applicable only to industries whose needs can be met in this time frame. The constraint will not apply to other industries requiring a longer workday for full or effective production. Soviet Labour inspectors will set the daily worktime hours in every case.
Section 55. Wages. The remuneration in workshops, Enterprises and Institutions will depend on the nature of the work being performed and on a worker's expertise and productivity. Equalization of wages is hereby abolished.
Section 57. To implement the preceding Section, workers will be classified into groups and categories, being the responsibility of the Soviet Commissar of Labour to prescribe the remuneration for each group and category.
To claim or receive excessive wages in contravention of the prescribed ones will be penalized as a felony.
Every worker will be handed a blank passbook. On it he must write his name, surname, general data, the name of his supervisor or successive supervisors, the number of hours worked each day plus all other data germane to his work. He will show his passbook to the Soviet Inspector of Labour upon request at any time or under any pretext. His passbook will also serve to validate his daily wage.
A Tsarist plot has been uncovered involving many Germans and Russians with a vast list of contacts overseas.
News from Siberia say that a Japanese detachment met and annihilated a Bolshevik party. The Japanese too suffered substantial casualties.
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