Russia & The Struggle for Peace/Chapter 1
Part I: Introductory
CHAPTER ONE
THE REVOLUTION AND THE
ALLIES
NEVER perhaps in history has a great Revolution been less foreseen abroad; probably nothing in history has perplexed people more.
At first sight this is strange, because the Revolution was developing in Russia for more than two years, and no honest observer ought to have failed to see its approach. And yet people here had not the slightest idea that revolution was imminent, and when it actually occurred they were taken by surprise. And then the British public was absolutely unprepared to understand either the causes of the Revolution or its meaning.
But after all it is not unnatural that the Revolution was so great a surprise. Probably no country in the world was less known than Russia. Ideas even of Russian geography were most hazy. The ethnography of Russia was virtually a Chinese puzzle to the majority; and a good many Englishmen are now probably for the first time making themselves acquainted with Ukrainians, Lithuanians and other races and nationalities of Russia. Russian economics have seldom been touched upon, and Russian social life was less understood than that of Mexico or Japan. There were available one or two good books on Russia, but those (notably the famous Klutchevsky's "History of Russia") are little known and little read. Unfortunately other books, of a biassed character, written either by illiterate compilers or clever charlatans, have lately acquired a rather considerable influence in this country.
It sounds paradoxical, but it is nevertheless a grim reality, that the political rapprochement between England and Russia, which might have been expected to contribute to a better understanding of Russia and of the Russian people, had, on the contrary, an exactly opposite effect. From the very beginning of the rapprochement in 1907 it became the fashion to depict Russia and the Russian people with sentimental flattery. The previous conception of Russia as a backward country, with rotten political institutions and a monstrous despotism, was said to be biassed and false. Russia had to be "discovered" again. And since then Russia and the soul of Russia have been successfully "discovered" many a time. The real aim of these discoveries was not so much to give a full and veracious account of real Russia, as to blind the British people to Russian realities. So long as the political interests of the two countries were regarded as opposed, the sharpest and most implacable critic of Russian political institutions and public life used to be considered rather useful and therefore welcome. But when the Governments of Britain and Russia decided upon a common policy and a political rapprochement, a change of public opinion about Russia was deemed necessary. And that is precisely why the greater part of these "discoveries" of Russia and of that mysterious "Russian Soul" differ very little from the old-fashioned political art of applying "whitewash."
To reconcile the free British people with the Russian autocracy was, of course, no easy undertaking. Dislike of Russian political institutions was deep-rooted. A free and proud people like the British not only had a deep repugnance to the Tsardom, but could scarcely admire or like a people which was content to live and suffer under a rotten autocracy. But the political aims of the State demanded a reconciliation; and there is never any lack of imaginative genius when the "highest interests of the State" demand it. Thus it was that the very difficult problem of reconciling British public opinion with reactionary Russia was quickly solved, and with ingenious simplicity. The solution was the discovery of "Holy Russia." It was declared that Russia was unlike other countries which are "hopelessly plunged in commercialism and materialism." It was declared that her mystical, religious and unpractical inhabitants, and her institutions, must not be judged from the materialistic Western point of view. Autocracy would certainly be abominable for the Western peoples, and for Western culture. In Russia it was quite different. Russia suffered under the autocracy in a material sense, but that was the mystical way of her spiritual perfection. And so on. Thus the "Holy Russia" school not only justified the autocracy but even glorified it. The legend about the Tsar as the "Little Father" of the millions of Russian peasants was cleverly disseminated. The Tsardom was no longer a nightmare and a curse. It became the mystical focus of Russia's spiritual life.
The theory of Holy Russia and the discovery of the mystical Russian soul, with its semi-religious relations to the Tsardom, were at first received in England rather sceptically. But politically it was too convenient a conception to give way before scepticism. It fulfilled its function of relieving the conscience of the people and making the rapprochement with the Tsardom plausible. As always happens with convenient theories of this sort, the legend of a Holy Russia and its Little Father was easily swallowed by an undiscriminating public opinion.
At the time of the outbreak of war there was hardly a single spiritual barrier left to an alliance with Russia. Ten years ago, before the discovery of "Holy Russia," it would not have been so easy to fight in comradeship of arms with Tsarist Russia. The United States, which had remained somewhat sceptical of this theory that Russia for the sake of her spiritual perfection needed the blessing of Tsardom, waited until the Revolution made it possible for her to join Russia and Russia's Allies.
In the course of the war the real Russia emerged. It became better known in Western Europe thanks to Russian literature, which was then widely translated and read. Russian literature helped to show many people that the real soul of Russia had nothing in common with this fallacious, essentially contemptuous and "sugary" legend of "Holy Russia." It exposed the lie that the Russian people were content with the abject conditions of their life; that in curious contradiction with the rest of mankind they enjoyed, as it were, inwardly with a sweet suffering, oppression and misery, the squalor and poverty of their existence.
But in spite of the positive influence of Russian literature the justification of Tsardom made ever greater progress during the war. It is true that in the Grand Alliance of Western Democracies Russia was given the rather modest function of a "Steam Roller," but all that was spoken, and all that was written in newspapers and books, about Russia during the war was intended to convey the idea that we had always made a big mistake about her and that there was nothing objectionable in Russia's political institutions. With the exception of a small remnant of the Liberal and Labour Press the whole British Press exalted Russia's Government, her political institutions, and her public life. The Alliance added to the justification of Tsardom a certain amount of official politeness and indeed of flattery.
It is, therefore, not astonishing that people in this country were perplexed when the Revolution came about.
When the Russian Workers and Soldiers tore down the crumbling pillars and rotten institutions of what was being glorified in this country as Holy Russia; when the Autocracy became in a few hours a sad memory, and the "Little Father" was reduced to the proportions of a mean-spirited nonentity, the people of England, who had been taught to believe that this dark corner of Russia was the real and "Holy" Russia, were greatly bewildered. The speedy and complete liquidation of the Tsardom was astounding and painful to the followers of the Holy Russia school. They asked themselves anxiously: "Where is the army of the Tsar? Why do the Soldiers not rush to rescue their beloved Chief? Why are the peasants so indifferent? Why do they suffer this humiliation? Why do they allow themselves to be robbed of the Tsardom which is the means and end of their perfection?" The Revolution was in fact a day of great anxiety and bitter disappointment to the whitewashers. Their ten years' labour of justification and glorification of Tsardom was torn to pieces. But they were not willing to give up their theory. When they had satisfied themselves that the Tsar's abdication was definite, they made a desperate attempt to save the glory at least of the Tsardom. They hastened therefore to assert, first, that the Revolution was a mere reaction against the treacherous Government which, under the influence of an immoral Empress, a German Princess, had contemplated a separate peace with the Enemy; and, secondly, that the Tsar's abdication was a "noble act" of his own will," dictated by his devotion to his people and the "great European cause which he served so well."
To-day we know too much about the causes and the meaning of the Revolution to need seriously to consider the attempts to save the theory of Holy Russia and to represent the Tsar as a martyr to his love for "his" people and for the Allied cause. I mention it only because it was the unfortunate origin of all the discrepancies of the Allied diplomacy towards Russia after the Revolution. Only thus can the confusion and wavering of the Allies be explained. Their badly-informed spokesmen believed in the tales about the Little Father. They had been told that a rising of the peasants in the "million of Russian villages" to restore the sanctuary of Tsardom was possible, even probable; and they therefore could not bring themselves to think that the Revolution was final. As statesmen, of course, they considered that they had to be very cautious in their attitude towards a revolution. They sent greetings to the Russian people, expressed their joy over the establishment of a democratic Government, but all that in an astonishingly cool spirit, with many reservations, and (monstrously enough) coupled with compliments to the Tsar. This type of greetings to the Revolution, coupled with the strange compliments to the overthrown tyrant, produced the most painful impression in Russia. There the disappointment was as bitter as it was unexpected. For instance, the "Rabotchaia Gazetta" (the organ of the Minimalists, the leading group at that time) published very bitter comments on Mr. Bonar Law's official speech of congratulation to Russia, with its tribute to the ex-Tsar, under the title, "Greetings to Nicholas!"[1]
This initial and fundamental blunder of the Allies towards the Russian Revolution was almost entirely due to the work of those traducers who had substituted for the true, authentic, creative genius of Russia the despised offal of Russian culture, of those who had pronounced as "Holy" the bigoted and unholy corner of darkest Russia.
There was, however, another reason which made the relations between the Allies and revolutionary Russia even more difficult. I refer to the unfortunate idea of appraising the Revolution not for its own sake or its worth to the Russian people but solely from the "military point of view." Here in England that seemed the most natural way of thinking; but in Russia it was felt to be a monstrous lapse. To look at the overthrow of the Autocracy and the liberation of the Russian people as no more than a means for the better prosecution of the war, was indeed cruel and stupid to the point of disaster. It was bound to frighten away Russia.
The Revolution was for the Russian people the greatest blessing that could ever happen. For them the war was but a means of liberation, and, whether all Russians were conscious of it or not, the great enthusiasm shown at the beginning for the war was only to be explained by the belief, hope or foreboding that the war would somehow or other lead to a new and better world. Without the hope that it would make Russia free the war had no meaning in Russia at all. English people will never understand the spirit of the Revolution and the extent of the disappointment felt in Russia when this "utilitarian" (as it was called there) point of view became known, so long as they decline to see that the Russian people were justified in looking upon the Revolution as the highest blessing in the world and in estimating all other things—the war included—by this new criterion: whether it helped or hindered the consolidation of the gains of the Revolution.
The Revolution had been the holiest and the highest hope of several generations of Russians. The best men and women had joyfully given their lives for its accomplishment. Russia at length became free; and Russia's Allies could think of nothing but of the effect that it might have upon their own military fortunes.
There was never a more bitter and unexpected disappointment than when Russia became conscious of this Allied "selfishness." It was a blunder; a heavy and bitter blunder on the part of the Allies. But what came later was a crime.
I refer to the sympathy, encouragement, and help given to every counter-revolutionist and adventurer who tried to overthrow the Revolution and promised to induce or to compel Russia to fight again. Only think of the British public and Press exalting and acclaiming Counter-Revolution in Russia! Anything more monstrous it was difficult to imagine.
And after all that has happened there are still people in this country who are sincerely astonished, and ask how it has come about that Russia's great affection towards this country has after the Revolution so suddenly been replaced by suspicion and mistrust? And the very newspapers which are chiefly responsible for the deplorable change rush in with an easy explanation of "German intrigue."
Not for the first or last time in the course of the war they have used "German intrigue" as a cover for their own ignorance or blunders. But in this instance the interdependence between the vilification of the Revolution in British and French newspapers and on the platform and the change in Russia's attitude towards the Allies is too clear. The part of "German intrigue" in destroying Anglo-Russian friendship we do not know. It may be great or small. But with the sinister rôle of a section of the British Press and politicians we are unfortunately only too well acquainted.
But whatever was the origin of the "intrigue" which led to the attempt to pervert the causes and the meaning of the Revolution, to-day there can be not the least doubt that:
(1) The Revolution was not caused by the treachery of the Court, the immorality of the Empress or the foul influence of Rasputin. On the contrary, the treachery of the Court was a desperate attempt to save the Tsardom from the coming Revolution.
(2) The Revolution was neither bellicose nor pacifist. It came not for the sake of a better prosecution of the war nor to end the war. The only aim of the Revolution was to save Russia from ruin and destruction. But, in view of Russia's exhaustion and the process of disintegration, the Revolution had only one way out—i.e., a speedy conclusion of the war. And the revolutionary democracy was able in about a fortnight's time after the Revolution to formulate the purpose of the Revolution with a clearness and prophetic foresight such as is only possible in moments of spiritual exaltation.
The Revolution was pacifist, not in principle, but as a matter of necessity. If the Revolution had taken place a year or two before, the same revolutionary democracy of Russia would certainly have conducted a revolutionary war.
As matters stood, the Counter-Revolution dressed itself in a bellicose cloak, not because it was devoted to the Allied cause, or disliked Germany, or was patriotic; but simply because the hated revolutionary democracy was pacifist. If the Revolution had insisted on continuing the war the Counter-Revolution would for the same reason have assumed a pacifist mask.
If the Revolution does not succeed in killing the war, the war will destroy the Revolution—that was felt and believed by everyone in Russia. It was the universal creed. The counter-revolutionists knew and believed this quite as well as the revolutionists. And there is not the slightest doubt that they shouted so loudly for the war and "our noble Allied cause, which Russia must not desert," simply and solely because they knew that the longer the war dragged on and the longer the process of Russia's economic disintegration continued the easier it would be for them to destroy the Revolution.
The struggle for peace, in short, was the struggle for the consolidation of the Revolution, and the shouts that were raised for going on with the war were but a means for undermining and destroying the Revolution.
No doubt the many sins of the dastardly Government and of the putrescent Court stimulated the Revolution. But even if Rasputin had never existed and the Empress had been as virtuous as, say, the wife of the Procurator of the Holy Synod; if the Tsar had been more patriotic than the Editor of the Novoie Vremia, or Protopopov, his crazy Minister, had been quite sound and a supporter of the "knock-out-blow" policy—nevertheless the Revolution would have been inevitable. It might have come under less startling circumstances and probably a little later, but it would have come all the same.
The more we know about the Revolution and the forces that brought it about, the more we become convinced that the Revolution was not a dramatic and sudden act. The Revolution was not the beginning of a new development, but rather the end of a process begun long ago.
If by revolution we conceive a sudden and a dramatic cataclysm, then I am sure there was in Russia no revolution at all. Revolution, as I conceive it, is the long process of dying away and decomposition of an old social and political order and the upgrowing of a new social structure. The moment the new order presents its claims and takes possession of the political institutions of the State—that is the Revolution. Certainly the earlier the new order asserts itself and the more vitality the old order still retains, the more violent and the more dramatic is the revolution.
The Russian Revolution was bloodless and not at all violent, because the new order had put in its claims at a very late stage in the development of its own strength and in the corresponding decomposition of the old. At the moment of the Revolution the Russian Monarchy was virtually a corpse, without a trace of vigour or vitality. Its mortal sickness was upon it before the war. The war enormously hastened the end.[2]
The tragedy of Russia is that the war not only definitely destroyed the Monarchy, but undermined the economic foundations of the State. The new order was crippled by the war even before it was enthroned.
- ↑ The following are a few passages from this article in the "Rabotchaia Gazetta," which truly represented the general feeling in Russia at that time towards this unfortunate lack of tact and understanding on the part of Allied Statesmen: "Nicholas Romanov has received his first greetings. … While Revolutionary Russia was celebrating the victory over the tyrannical and pernicious dynasty of the Romanovs, in the English Parliament, Russia's Ally, Mr. Bonar Law said, 'I hope I may be allowed to express my sympathy to the late Tsar, who I believe was our true Ally for three years. …' Whose Ally, then, is the English Minister, Mr. Bonar Law?" the paper asks indignantly. "Is he the Ally of the deposed despot or of the new free Russia? …" Equally unfortunate was the lack of tact of the Allied Ambassadors and the patronising tone which they adopted towards the new Russian Government. The speech of the British Ambassador during the first official reception by the Provisional Government aroused universal indignation, and was equally sharply criticised in the Liberal and in the Socialist Press.
- ↑ We live, without any doubt, in a revolutionary epoch, and the Russian Revolution is only the forerunner of the great changes which await the world. The "order," which now possesses the power of the State, is evidently growing "old," and a new structure is looming. But whether there will be "Revolution" or whether the change will be accomplished without revolution depends entirely on two conditions: (1) When the new order will present its claims (the longer it is detained the less chance of a violent revolution), and (2) whether the old order is ready to make concessions, so as to let the new order come in gradually.
There are logically only two ways: either evolution or revolution. Arrest evolution, and revolution is inevitable. Unfortunately the majority of the propertied and power-possessing classes conceive "evolution" merely as a sanction of their "eternal and holy rights." At any rate, "evolution" is not disposed to keep up with the growth of the new order by satisfying its claims. "Holy Russia" was not unique. Many things are Holy in this sense. There are too many such sanctities. Land ownership is certainly "Holy." The wage system is "Holy." But there comes the fatal contradiction: a social order develops; "Holy" things never do. They are worshipped until they are mercilessly smashed.