and Moscow, the indignation against the treacherous and truly murderous German invasion reached a pitch of greatest intensity. In these alarming days and nights, the workers were ready to enlist in the army by the ten thousand. But the matter of organizing lagged far behind. Isolated tenacious detachments full of enthusiasm became convinced themselves of their instability in their first serious clashes with German regulars. This still further lowered the country's spirits. The old army had long ago been hopelessly defeated and was going to pieces, blocking all the roads and byways. The new army, owing to the country's general exhaustion, the fearful disorganization of industries and the means of transportation, was being got together too slowly. Distance was the only serious obstacle in the way of the German invasion.

The chief attention of the Austro-Hungarian government was centered on the Ukraine. The Rada, through its delegation, had appealed to the governments of the Central Empires for direct military aid against the Soviets, which had by that time completely defeated the Ukrainians. Thus did the petty-bourgeois democracy of the Ukraine, in its struggle against the working class and the destitute peasants, voluntarily open the gates to foreign invasion.

At the same time, the Svinhufvud government was seeking the aid of German bayonets against the Finnish proletariat. German militarism, openly and before the whole world, assumed the role of executioner of the peasant and proletarian revolution in Russia.

In the ranks of our party hot debates were being carried on as to whether or not we should, under these circumstances, yield to the German ultimatum and sign a new treaty, which--and this no one doubted--would include conditions incomparably more onerous than those announced at Brest-Litovsk. The representatives of the one view held that just now, with the German intervention in the internal war of the Russian Republic, it was impossible to establish peace for one part of Russia and remain passive, while in the South and in the North, German forces would be establishing a regime of bourgeois dictatorship. Another view, championed chiefly by Lenin, was that every delay, even the briefest breathing spell, would greatly help the internal stabilization and increase the Russian powers of resistance. After the whole country and the whole world had come to know of our absolute helplessness against foreign invasion at this time, the conclusion of peace would everywhere be understood as an act forced upon us by the cruel law of disproportionate forces. It would be childish to argue from the standpoint of abstract revolutionary ethics. The point is not to die with honor but to achieve ultimate victory. The Russian Revolution wants to survive, must survive, and must by every means at its disposal avoid fighting an uneven battle and gain time, in the hope that the Western revolutionary movement will come to its aid.

German imperialism is still engaged in a fierce annexationist struggle with English and American militarism. Only because of this is the conclusion of peace between Russia and Germany at all possible. We must fully avail ourselves of this situation. The welfare of the Revolution is the highest law. We should accept the peace which we are unable to reject; we must secure a breathing spell to be utilized for intensive work within the country and, especially, for the creation of an army.

At the conference of the Communist party as well as at the Fourth Conference of the Soviet, the peace partisans triumphed. They were joined by many of those who in January considered it impossible to sign the Brest-Litovsk treaty. "Then," said they, "our signature would have been looked upon by the English and French workingmen as a shameful capitulation, without an attempt to fight. Even the base insinuations of the Anglo-French chauvinists to the secret compact between the Soviet Government and the Germans, might in case that treaty had been signed find credence in certain circles of European laborers. But after we had refused to sign the treaty, after a new German invasion, after our attempt to resist it, and after our military weakness had become painfully obvious to the whole world, after all this, no one dare to reproach us for surrendering without a fight."

The Brest-Litovsk treaty, in its second enlarged edition, was signed and ratified.

In the meantime, the executioners were doing their work in Finland and the Ukraine, menacing more and more the most vital centers of Great Russia. Thus the question of Russia's very existence as an independent country is henceforth inseparably connected with the question of the European revolution.

CONCLUSION

When our party took over the government, we knew in advance what difficulties we had to contend with. Economically the country had been exhausted by the war to the very utmost. The revolution had destroyed the old administrative machinery and could not yet create anything to take its place. Millions of workers had been wrested from their normal nooks in the national economy of things, declassified, and physically shattered by the three years' war. The colossal war industries, carried on on an inadequately prepared national foundation, had drained all the lifeblood of the people; and their demobilization was attended with extreme difficulties. The phenomena of economic and political anarchy spread throughout the country. The Russian peasantry had for centuries been held together by barbarian national discipline from below and iron-Czarist rule from above. Economic development had undermined the former, the revolution destroyed the latter. Psychologically, the revolution meant the awakening of a sense of human personality among the peasantry. The anarchic manifestations of this awakening are but the inevitable results of the preceding oppression. A new order of things, an order based on the workers' own control of industry, can come only through gradual and internal elimination of the anarchic manifestations of the revolution.

On the other hand, the propertied classes, even though deprived of political power, will not relinquish their advantages without a fight. The Revolution has brought to a head the question of private property in land and the tools of production--that is, the question of vital significance to the exploiting classes. Politically this means ceaseless, secret or open civil war. In its turn, civil war inevitably nourishes anarchical tendencies within the workingmen's movement. With the disorganization of industries, of national finances, of the transportation and provisioning systems, prolonged civil strife thus sets up tremendous difficulties in the way of constructive organizing work. Nevertheless, the Soviet Government can look the future in the face with perfect confidence. Only a careful inventory of all the country's resources; only a rational organization of industries--an organization born of one general plan; only wise and careful distribution of all the products, can save the country. And this is Socialism. Either a complete descent to colonial status or a Socialist resurrection--these are the alternatives before which our country finds itself.

The war has undermined the soil of the entire capitalistic world. Herein lies our unconquerable strength. The imperialistic ring that is pressing around us will lie burst asunder by the proletarian revolution. We do not doubt this for a minute, any more than we doubted during our decades of underground struggle the inevitableness of the downfall of Czarism.

To struggle, to unite our forces, to establish industrial discipline and a Socialist regime, to increase the productivity of labor, and to press on in the face of all obstacles--this is our mission. History is working in our favor. The proletarian revolution will flare up, sooner or later, both in Europe and America, and will bring emancipation not only to the Ukraine, Poland, Lithuania, Courland, and Finland, but also to all suffering humanity.