Page:Michael Farbman - Russia & the Struggle for Peace (1918).djvu/168

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
156
The Struggle for Peace

the sitting. "Nobody can say anything more after Rodichev." "Print his speech and distribute it in millions of copies at the front and among the people."

On the proposal for adjournment the representative of the Tartars, Maxudov, member of the Duma, voiced a strong warning that the thirty million Mahommedans in the country, loyal and affectionate subjects of Russia, did not desire the humiliation of Turkey. "If the party wants to count on their sympathy, let it delete from its programme the destruction of Turkey and the annexation of Constantinople." Maxudov's speech was received with hisses and murmurs of disapproval, and was answered by Kokoshkin, who pointed out that the conquest of Constantinople was a matter of cold calculation and not of feeling, a political and not a religious question.

In its Resolution the Congress expresses its complete confidence in the Provisional Government "in its foreign policy, which is based on faithfulness to established treaties." It further expresses its conviction that the Provisional Government "will unflinchingly stand by the war-aims of liberation of small nationalities to which our democratic Allies are pledged." After the Resolution was passed, Miliukov arrived at the Congress, and further emphasised its meaning in the following words: "I associate myself with your decision on the war. The whole world is interested in the attitude of our Party towards the war. The eyes of all the world are on us. They expected a wise decision from you, and you have made it."

I have purposely described the proceedings of this Congress fully and in detail, as they express very clearly the mentality of the propertied classes of Russia and of the Provisional Government at that time. The Foreign policy expressed by the Cadet Congress, and especially Rodichev's speech, aroused great indignation in the country. In the Allied countries it made the opposite impression, and was taken as the voice of Russia. The appeal of the Russian imperialists to the Allies "not to