V. I.

Lenin

The answers of the French and the British governments clearly
demonstrate the soundness of our repeated assertions that
neither the Russian, nor the French, nor the British, nor the
German capitalist government can throw over the policy of
annexations, and that all such promises are designed to deceive
the peoples. [1]

We are fighting to seize Alsace-Lorraine, we are fighting for
victory, the French replied. Be good enough to comply with the
treaty and fight for Russian and German Poland, the British
replied.

The bitter truth that capitalism cannot be reconciled to a
non-annexationist policy has been exposed once more. The policy
of the “conciliators”, of those who wish to reconcile the
capitalists and the proletariat, the policy of the Narodnik and
Menshevik ministerialists, is an obvious failure. All their
hopes on a coalition government have been shattered, all their
promises have been exposed as mere verbiage.

And most harmful of all, as far as the cause of the revolution
and the interests of the toiling masses are concerned, is the
attempt to cover up the whole thing with phrases. Two shadings
stand out in this torrent of phrases, one as bad as the other.

Rabochaya Gazeta , the organ of the Menshevik ministerialists, brings grist to the Cadet mill. On the one
hand, it says: “On this basis [on the basis of the answers of
the two Allied powers] there can be no agreement between them
and us....” When they say “us”, do they mean the Russian
capitalists? The theory of the class struggle is thrown
overboard; it is much more profitable to spout phrases about
“democracy” In the abstract, while trampling underfoot the
elementary truth of Marxism, namely, that it is precisely
within a “democracy” that the gulf between the capitalists and the proletarians is widest.

On the other hand, Rabochaya Gazeta wishes to make “an attempt at revision [of the agreements and the treaties]
through a conference of representatives of the Allied governments to be specially convened”. The same old story:
agreement with the capitalists, which, in fact, signifies
deception of the workers by playing at negotiations with their class foes.

“ The pressure of the rank and file of the French and British
democracies, even pressure by the French and British proletariat
alone upon their respective governments...” writes Rabochaya Gazeta. In Russia the Mensheviks are supporting their own imperialist government, but in other countries they
want pressure to be brought to bear.... What is this, if not sheer phrase-mongering and humbug from beginning to end?

“ We are working for it [for world peace] by convening an
international socialist conference” ... to be attended by
ministers from among those ex-socialists who have sided with
their governments! This is “working” with a vengeance to deceive the people on a major scale by means of a series of
minor deceptions.

We have Dyelo Naroda phrase-mongering “à la
Jacobin”. That stern tone, those spectacular revolutionary
exclamations: “we know enough” ... “faith in the victory of our
Revolution” (with a capital letter, of course), “upon this or
that step ... of the Russian revolutionary democracy depend the
destinies ... of the entire Uprising [with a capital letter, of course] which the working people have so happily and
so victoriously begun.”

Obviously, if you write the words Revolution and Uprising with
capital letters it makes the thing look “awfully” frightening,
just like the Jacobins. Plenty of effect at small expense. For
the people who write this are virtually helping to crush the
revolution and impede the uprising of the working people by
supporting the Russian government of the imperialists, by supporting their methods of concealing from the
people the secret treaties, their tactics of putting off the immediate abolition of the landed estates, by supporting
their war policy of “offensive”, their high-handed insulting
behaviour towards the local representative bodies, their presumption to appoint or endorse the local
officers elected by the local population, and so on ad infinitum.

Gentlemen, heroes of the phrase, knights of revolutionary
bombast! Socialism demands that we distinguish between capitalist democracy and proletarian democracy, between
bourgeois revolution and proletarian revolution, between a
rising of the rich against the tsar and a rising of the working
people against the rich. Socialism demands that we distinguish our bourgeois revolution, which has ended (the
bourgeoisie now is counter-revolutionary),from the mounting
revolution of the proletarians and poor peasants. The former
revolution is for war, for preserving the landed estates, for “subordinating” the local organs of
self-government to the central government, for secret treaties. The latter revolution has begun to throttle
the war by revolutionary fraternisation, by abolishing the power
of the landowners in the local areas, by increasing the number
and the power of the Soviets, and by introducing everywhere the
elective principle.

The Narodnik and Menshevik ministerialists are spouting phrases
about “democracy” in the abstract, about “Revolution” in the
abstract in order to cover up their agreement with the imperialist, now definitely counter-revolutionary, bourgeoisie
of their own country—an agreement which, in effect, is turning into a struggle against the revolution of the
proletarians and semi-proletarians.

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Notes:
[1]
This refers to the replies of the French and British governments
to the declaration of the Provisional Government of March 27
(April 9), 1917, published in the newspapers on May 28 (June 10). The
French Note (like the British) welcomed the intention of the Provisional Government to secure the independence of
Poland, and mentioned France’s desire to fight in order to
“liberate” Alsace-Lorraine and obtain indemnities from
Germany. The British Note tried to justify Britain’s participation in the war. Both Notes expressed the hope of
Russia’s continued co-operation in fighting to win the war.