The Bullitt Mission to Russia Part 7

On the other hand, such essentials of economic life as are available are being utilized to the utmost by the Soviet Government. Such trains as there are, run on time. The distribution of food is well controlled. Many industrial experts of the old regime are again managing their plants and sabotage by such managers has ceased.

Loafing by the workmen during work hours has been overcome. (Appendix, p. 57.)

SOCIAL CONDITIONS

The destructive phase of the revolution is over and all the energy of the Government is turned to constructive work. The terror has ceased.

All power of judgment has been taken away from the extraordinary commission for suppression of the counter-revolution, which now merely accuses suspected counter-revolutionaries, who are tried by the regular, established, legal tribunals. Executions are extremely rare.

Good order has been established. The streets are safe. Shooting has ceased. There are few robberies. Prost.i.tution has disappeared from sight. Family life has been unchanged by the revolution, the canard in regard to "nationalization of women" notwithstanding. (Appendix, p.

58.)

The theaters, opera, and ballet are performing as in peace. Thousands of new schools have been opened in all parts of Russia and the Soviet Government seems to have done more for the education of the Russian people in a year and a half than czardom did in 50 years. (Appendix, p. 59.)

POLITICAL SITUATION

The Soviet form of government is firmly established. Perhaps the most striking fact in Russia today is the general support which is given the government by the people in spite of their starvation. Indeed, the people lay the blame for their distress wholly on the blockade and on the governments which maintain it. The Soviet form of government seems to have become to the Russian people the symbol of their revolution.

Unquestionably it is a form of government which lends itself to gross abuse and tyranny but it meets the demand of the moment in Russia and it has acquired so great a hold on the imagination of the common people that the women are ready to starve and the young men to die for it.

The position of the communist party (formerly Bolsheviki) is also very strong. Blockade and intervention have caused the chief opposition parties, the right social revolutionaries and the mens.h.i.+viki, to give temporary support to the communists. These opposition parties have both made formal statements against the blockade, intervention, and the support of antisoviet governments by the allied and a.s.sociated governments. Their leaders, Volsky and Martov, are most vigorous in their demands for the immediate raising of the blockade and peace.

(Appendix, p. 60.)

Indeed, the only ponderable opposition to the communists to-day comes from more radical parties--the left social revolutionaries and the anarchists. These parties, in published statements, call the communists, and particularly Lenin and Tchitcherin, "the paid bourgeois gendarmes of the Entente." They attack the communists because the communists have encouraged scientists, engineers, and industrial experts of the bourgeois cla.s.s to take important posts under the Soviet Government at high pay. They rage against the employment of bourgeois officers in the army and against the efforts of the communists to obtain peace. They demand the immediate ma.s.sacre of all the bourgeoisie and an immediate declaration of war on all nonrevolutionary governments. They argue that the Entente Governments should be forced to intervene more deeply in Russia, a.s.serting that such action would surely provoke the proletariat of all European countries to immediate revolution.

Within the communist party itself there is a distinct division of opinion in regard to foreign policy, but this disagreement has not developed personal hostility or open breach in the ranks of the party.

Trotski, the generals, and many theorists believe the red army should go forward everywhere until more vigorous intervention by the Entente is provoked, which they, too, count upon to bring revolution in France and England. Their att.i.tude is not a little colored by pride in the spirited young army. (Appendix, p. 62.) Lenin, Tchitcherin, and the bulk of the communist party, on the other hand, insist that the essential problem at present is to save the proletariat of Russia, in particular, and the proletariat of Europe, in general, from starvation, and a.s.sert that it will benefit the revolution but little to conquer all Europe if the Government of the United States replies by starving all Europe. They advocate, therefore, the conciliation of the United States even at the cost of compromising with many of the principles they hold most dear. And Lenin's prestige in Russia at present is so overwhelming that the Trotski group is forced reluctantly to follow him. (Appendix, p. 63.)

Lenin, indeed, as a practical matter, stands well to the right in the existing political life of Russia. He recognizes the undesirability, from the Socialist viewpoint, of the compromises he feels compelled to make; but he is ready to make the compromises. Among the more notable concessions he has already made are: The abandonment of his plan to nationalize the land and the adoption of the policy of dividing it among the peasants, the establishment of savings banks paying 3 per cent interest, the decision to pay all foreign debts, and the decision to give concessions if that shall prove to be necessary to obtain credit abroad. (Appendix, p. 64.)

In a word, Lenin feels compelled to retreat from his theoretical position all along the line. He is ready to meet the western Governments half way.

PEACE PROPOSALS

Lenin seized upon the opportunity presented by my trip of investigation to make a definite statement of the position of the Soviet Government. He was opposed by Trotski and the generals, but without much difficulty got the support of the majority of the executive council, and the statement of the position of the Soviet Government which was handed to me was finally adopted unanimously.

My discussion of this proposal with the leaders of the Soviet Government was so detailed that I feel sure of my ground in saying that it does not represent the minimum terms of the Soviet Government, and that I can point out in detail wherein it may be modified without making it unacceptable to the Soviet Government. For example, the clause under article 5--"and to their own nationals who have been or may be prosecuted for giving help to Soviet Russia"--is certainly not of vital importance. And the clause under article 4, in regard to admission of citizens of the soviet republics of Russia into the allied and a.s.sociated countries, may certainly be changed in such a way as to reserve all necessary rights to control such immigration to the allied and a.s.sociated countries, and to confine it to persons who come on legitimate and necessary business, and to exclude definitely all possibility of an influx of propagandists.

CONCLUSIONS

The following conclusions are respectfully submitted:

1. No government save a socialist government can be set up in Russia to-day except by foreign bayonets, and any governments so set up will fall the moment such support is withdrawn. The Lenin wing of the communist party is to-day as moderate as any socialist government which can control Russia.

2. No real peace can be established in Europe or the world until peace is made with the revolution. This proposal of the Soviet Government presents an opportunity to make peace with the revolution on a just and reasonable basis--perhaps a unique opportunity.

3. If the blockade is lifted and supplies begin to be delivered regularly to soviet Russia, a more powerful hold over the Russian people will be established than that given by the blockade itself--the hold given by fear that this delivery of supplies may be stopped. Furthermore, the parties which oppose the communists in principle but are supporting them at present will be able to begin to fight against them.

4. It is, therefore, respectfully recommended that a proposal following the general lines of the suggestion of the Soviet Government should be made at the earliest possible moment, such changes being made, particularly in article 4 and article 5, as will make the proposal acceptable to conservative opinion in the allied and a.s.sociated countries.

Very respectfully submitted.

WILLIAM C. BULLITT.

APPENDIX TO REPORT

TRANSPORT

_Locomotives_.--Before the war Russia had 22,000 locomotives.

Destruction by war and ordinary wear and tear have reduced the number of locomotives in good order to 5,500. Russia is entirely cut off from supplies of spare parts and materials for repair, facilities for the manufacture of which do not exist in Russia. And the Soviet Government is able only with the greatest difficulty to keep in running order the few locomotives at its disposal.

_Coal_.--Soviet Russia is entirely cut off from supplies of coal.

Kolchak holds the Perm mining district, although Soviet troops are now on the edge of it. Denikin still holds the larger part of the Donetz coal district and has destroyed the mines in the portion of the district which he has evacuated. As a result of this, locomotives, electrical power plants, etc., must be fed with wood, which is enormously expensive and laborious and comparatively ineffectual.

_Gasoline_.--There is a total lack of gasoline, due to the British occupation of Baku. The few automobiles in the cities which are kept running for vital Government business are fed with subst.i.tute mixtures, which causes them to break down with great frequency and to miss continually. Almost the entire fleet on the great inland waterway system of Russia was propelled by gasoline. As a result the Volga and the ca.n.a.ls, which are so vital a part of Russia's system of transportation, are useless.

FOOD

Everyone is hungry in Moscow and Petrograd, including the people's commissaries themselves. The daily ration of Lenin and the other commissaries is the same as that of a soldier in the army or of a workman at hard labor. In the hotel which is reserved for Government officials the menu is the following: Breakfast--A quarter to half a pound of black bread, which must last all day, and tea without sugar.

Dinner--A good soup, a small piece of fish, for which occasionally a diminutive piece of meat is subst.i.tuted, a vegetable, either a potato or a bit of cabbage, more tea without sugar. Supper--What remains of the morning ration of bread and more tea without sugar.

Occasionally sugar, b.u.t.ter, and chickens slip through from the Ukraine and are sold secretly at atrocious prices--b.u.t.ter, for example, at 140 roubles a pound. Whenever the Government is able to get its hands on any such "luxuries" it turns them over to the schools, where an attempt is made to give every child a good dinner every day.

The food situation has been slightly improved by the rejoining of Ukraine to Great Russia, for food is relatively plentiful in the south; but no great improvement in the situation is possible because of the lack of transport.

MANAGEMENT

Such supplies as are available in Soviet Russia are being utilized with considerable skill. For example, in spite of the necessity of firing with wood, the Moscow-Petrograd express keeps up to its schedule, and on both occasions when I made the trip it took but 13 hours, compared to the 12 hours of prewar days.

The food control works well, so that there is no abundance alongside of famine. Powerful and weak alike endure about the same degree of starvation.

The Soviet Government has made great efforts to persuade industrial managers and technical experts of the old regime to enter its service.

Many very prominent men have done so. And the Soviet Government pays them as high as $45,000 a year for their services, although Lenin gets but $1,800 a year. This very anomalous situation arises from the principle that any believing communist must adhere to the scale of wages established by the government, but if the government considers it necessary to have the a.s.sistance of any anticommunist, it is permitted to pay him as much as he demands.