V. I.

Lenin

Now that “socialists” have become members of the cabinet , [1] things will be different, the defencists
have been assuring us. It did not take more than a few days to
reveal the falsity of these assurances.

We all know what indignation was aroused among the soldiers and
workers by ex-Minister Milyukov’s statement that he had no
intention of publishing the secret treaties which ex-Tsar
Nicholas II had concluded with the British and French capitalists. And now, what does Mr. Tereshchenko, the
new Minister of Foreign Affairs, the associate of
Skobelev and Tsereteli, have to say on this question?

Tereshchenko admits that “this question [i.e., the secret
treaties] arouses passions”. But what does he do to cool these
passions? He simply repeats what Milyukov, who has just
been deposed, said before him.

“ Immediate publication of the treaties would amount to a break
with the Allies,” Tereshchenko declared in a statement to the
press.

And the “socialist” ministers are silent and condone the system
of secret diplomacy.

The coalition cabinet has brought no changes. The tsars secret
treaties remain sacred to it.

And you, gentlemen, want this not to “arouse passions”? What do
you take the class-conscious workers and soldiers for? Or do you
really regard them as “rebellious slaves”?

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Notes:
[1]