V. I.

Lenin

The Petrograd City Conference of the R.S.D.L.P. (Bolsheviks)

APRIL 14–22 (APRIL 27–MAY 5), 1917

8

Draft Resolution on the War

I

The present war is, on the part of both groups of the belligerent powers, an imperialist war, i.e., one waged by the
capitalists for world domination, for division of the capitalists’ spoils, for profitable markets for finance and
banking capital, and for the subjugation of the weaker nationalities.

The transfer of state power in Russia from Nicholas II to the
[provisional] government of Guchkov, Lvov, and others, to the government of the landowners and
capitalists, did not and could not alter the class character and
meaning of the war as far as Russia is concerned.

The fact that the new government is carrying on the same
imperialist war, i.e., an aggressive war of conquest, became
glaringly apparent when the government not only failed to
publish the secret treaties between ex-Tsar Nicholas II and the
capitalist governments of Britain, France, etc., but even
formally confirmed these treaties. This was done without
consulting the will of the people and with the express purpose
of deceiving them, for it is well known that the secret treaties
concluded by the ex-tsar are outrageously predatory treaties
that give the Russian capitalists a free hand to rob China,
Persia, Turkey, Austria, etc.

For this reason no proletarian party that does not wish to break
completely with internationalism, i.e., with the fraternal
solidarity of the workers of all countries in their struggle
against the yoke of Capital, can support the present war, or the
present government, or its loans, no matter in what glowing
terms these loans may be described.

Nor can any trust be placed in the present government’s promise
to renounce annexations, i.e., the conquest of foreign countries
or the forcible retention of any nationality within the confines
of Russia. For, in the first place, the capitalists, bound
together by the thousand threads of Russian and Anglo-French
banking capital, and intent on protecting the interests of
capital, cannot renounce annexations in this war without at the
same time ceasing to be capitalists, without renouncing the
profits from the thou sands of millions invested in loans,
concessions, war industries, etc. And secondly, the new
government, after renouncing annexations to mislead the people,
declared through Milyukov (Moscow, April 9, 1917) that it had no
intention of renouncing them. Finally, as revealed by Dyelo Naroda, a newspaper in which Minister Kerensky co-operates,
Milyukov has not even sent his statement on the renunciation of
annexations to other countries.

Therefore, in warning the people against the capitalists’ empty
promises, the Conference declares that it is necessary to make a
clear distinction between a renunciation of annexations in word
and a renunciation of annexations in deed, i.e., the immediate
publication of all the secret predatory treaties, of all acts of
foreign policy, and the taking of immediate steps to fully
liberate all peoples who are being oppressed, kept bound to
Russia by force or kept in a state of subjection by the
capitalist class, which is continuing the policy of ex-Tsar
Nicholas II, a policy that is a disgrace to our nation.

II

The “revolutionary defencism”, which in Russia has now permeated
almost all the Narodnik parties (the Popular Socialists,
Trudoviks, Socialist-Revolutionaries), the opportunist party of
the Menshevik Social-Democrats (the Organising Committee,
Chkheidze, Tsereteli, etc.), and the majority of the non-party
revolutionaries, reflects, in point of class significance, the
interests and point of view of the petty bourgeoisie, the small
proprietors, and the well-to-do peasants, who, like the
capitalists, profit by oppressing weak peoples. On the other
hand, it is a result of the deception of the masses by the
capitalists, who instead of publishing the secret treaties
confine themselves to promises and glib talk.

It must be admitted that the great mass of “revolutionary
defencists” are honest, i.e., they are really opposed to annexations, to conquests, to oppressing weak peoples; they
are really working for a democratic non-coercive peace among all the belligerents. This must be admitted for
the reason that the class position of the urban and rural
proletarians and semi-proletarians (i.e., of the people who earn
their living, wholly or partly, by selling their labour-power to
the capitalists) makes these classes uninterested in capitalist
profits.

Therefore, while recognising that any concessions to “revolutionary defencism” are absolutely impermissible and
virtually signify a complete break with internationalism and
socialism, the Conference declares that our Party will preach
abstention from violence as long as the Russian capitalists and
their Provisional Government confine themselves to threats of
violence against the people (for example, Guchkov’s unhappily
notorious decree threatening the soldiers with punishment for
arbitrary displacement of superiors), as long as the capitalists
have not started using violence against the Soviets of
Workers’, Soldiers’, Peasants’, Agricultural Labourers’, and
other Deputies, which organise themselves freely, and freely
elect and dismiss all public officers. Our Party will fight against the profound and fatal error of “revolutionary
defencism” solely by means of comradely persuasion, bringing
home the truth that the attitude of unreasoning trust of the
broad masses in the government of the capitalists, who are the
worst enemies of peace and socialism, is, in present-day Russia,
the chief obstacle to a speedy termination of the war.

III

As for that most important issue of all, namely, how to end the
war—a criminal, predatory capitalist war that has brought
mankind to the brink of ruin, famine and destruction—as quickly as possible, by a truly democratic, non-coercive peace,
the Conference recognises and declares the following:

It is utterly senseless to suppose that this war can be ended by
a unilateral refusal of the soldiers of any one country
to continue the war, by a unilateral cessation, of military
operations, by the mere act of “sticking the bayonet into the
ground”.

Our Party will patiently but persistently explain to the people
the truth that wars are waged by governments, that wars
are always indissolubly bound up with the policies of definite
classes, and, therefore, this war, started by crowned brigands,
by monarchs like Nicholas II, and by uncrowned brigands—the capitalists, can be terminated by a truly
democratic, non-coercive peace only when the entire state power
passes to a class that is really not interested in safe
guarding capitalist profits, to the class of the proletarians
and semi-proletarians, which is really capable of putting an end
to the oppressive rule of Capital.

This class alone is capable of really renouncing annexations, of breaking free from the meshes of finance and
banking capital, and, under certain circumstances, not merely in
word but In deed, converting this predatory war into a revolutionary proletarian war, a war aimed, not at crushing weak
peoples, but to free the workers and peasants of the whole world from the yoke of Capital.

The Conference reiterates its protests against the base slander
spread by the capitalists against our Party to the effect that
we are in favour of a separate peace with Germany. We consider
the German capitalists to be as predatory as the Russian,
British, French, and other capitalists, and Emperor Wilhelm II
to be as bad a crowned brigand as Nicholas II or the British,
Italian, Rumanian, and all other monarchs. We have proclaimed
this view of our Party not only in Russian but also in German,
in the translation of Zinoviev’s and Lenin’s pamphlet
Socialism and War . [1]

Moreover, as editors of the Central Organ of our Party, and in
the name of the Party, the above-named comrades had declared
( Sotsial-Demokrat , Geneva, October 13, 1915

No. 47)
that if the revolution placed our Party in power while the war
was still on, we would forthwith propose openly to Germany,
together with all the other nations, a non-coercive, i.e., democratic, peace, and that in the event of the German, British, French and other capitalists declining such a peace, we would ourselves start a revolutionary war,
and call upon the workers of all countries to join us . [2]

The Conference fully endorses this declaration.

The Conference takes cognisance of the fact that in no other
belligerent country in the world is there such freedom as there
now is in Russia, or such revolutionary mass organisations as
the Soviets of Workers’, Soldiers’, Peasants’, and other
Deputies; and that nowhere else in the world, therefore, can the
transfer of the entire state power to the actual majority of the people, i.e., to the workers and poor peasants,
be achieved so easily and so peacefully.

The Conference declares that the money for the soldiers’ upkeep
should be raised not by loans, which only enrich the capitalists, but by imposing high income and property taxes on
the capitalists.

The Conference declares that so long as the majority of the
people, though enjoying complete freedom of agitation and
propaganda, have not yet come to realise how closely this war is
bound up with capitalist interests, there is only one practical
means of bringing this butchery of peoples to a speedy end.

This means is fraternisation at the front.

The Conference calls attention to the fact that even Novaye Vremya, that servile mouthpiece of the capitalist
interests, admits in a telegram from Kiev dated April 12 that
fraternisation has started at the front. Numerous reports from
soldier delegates to the Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’
Deputies in Petrograd confirm this.

By starting to fraternise, the Russian and German soldiers, the
proletarians and peasants of both countries dressed in soldiers’
uniforms, have proved to the whole world that intuitively the
classes oppressed by the capitalists have discovered the right
road to the cessation of the butchery of peoples.

By fraternisation we understand, first, the publication of
proclamations in the Russian and the German languages for
distribution at the front; second, the holding of meetings
between the Russian and the German soldiers at the front with
the aid of interpreters, these to be arranged in such a way that
the capitalists, and the generals and officers of both countries, who for the most part are of the capitalist class,
will not dare to interfere with these meetings, will not dare
even to attend them without the direct and special permission of
the soldiers, These proclamations and meetings must make clear the
above-stated views on war and peace, must bring home the fact
that if the state power in the two countries, Germany and
Russia, were to pass wholly and exclusively into the hands of
the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, the whole of
humanity would heave a sigh of relief, for then we would really
be assured of a speedy termination of the war, of a really
lasting, truly democratic peace among all the nations, and, at
the same time, the transition of all countries to socialism.

| Written between April 15 and 22 (April 28 and May 5), 1917 | |
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| Published according to the typewritten copy with Lenin’s corrections | |

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Notes:
[1]
See present edition, Vol. 21, pp. 301-06.— Ed .

[2]
See present edition, Vol. 21, p. 404.— Ed .