V. I. Lenin

Every specific turn in history causes some change in the form of
petty-bourgeois wavering, which always occurs alongside the
proletariat, and which, in one degree or an other, always
penetrates its midst.

This wavering flows in two “streams”:
petty-bourgeois reformism, i.e., servility to the bourgeoisie
covered by a cloak of sentimental democratic and “Social"-Democratic phrases and fatuous wishes; and
petty-bourgeois revolutionism—menacing, blustering and boastful in words, but a mere bubble of disunity, disruption and
brainlessness in deeds. This wavering will inevitably occur
until the taproot of capitalism is cut. Its form is now changing
owing to the change taking place in the economic policy of the
Soviet government.

The leitmotif of the Mensheviks [1] is: “The
Bolsheviks have reverted to capitalism; that is where they will
meet their end. The revolution, including the October
Revolution, has turned out to be a bourgeois revolution after
all! Long live democracy! Long live reformism!” Whether
this is said in the purely Menshevik spirit or in the spirit of the Socialist-Revolutionaries, [2] in
the spirit of the Second International or in the spirit of the
Two-and-a-Half International, [3] it amounts to the same thing.

The leitmotif of semi-anarchists like the German “Communist Workers' Party”, [4] or of that section
of our former Workers' Opposition [5] which has left or
is becoming estranged from the Party, is: “The Bolsheviks
have lost faith in the working class.” The slogans they
deduce from this are more or less akin to the “Kronstadt” slogans of the spring of 1921. [6]

In contrast to the whining and panic of the philistines from among reformists and of the philistines from among revolutionaries, the Marxists must weigh the alignment of actual class forces and the incontrovertible facts as soberly and as accurately as possible.

Let us recall the main stages of our revolution. The first
stage: the purely political stage, so to speak, from October 25
to January 5, when the Constituent Assembly [7] was dissolved. In a matter of ten weeks we did a hundred times more
to actually and completely destroy the survivals of feudalism in
Russia than the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries did
during the eight months they were in power—from
February to October 1917. At that time, the Mensheviks and
Socialist-Revolutionaries in Russia, and all the heroes of the
Two-and-a-Half International abroad, acted as miserable
accomplices of reaction. As for the anarchists, some stood aloof
in perplexity, while others helped us. Was the revolution a
bourgeois revolution at that time? Of course it was, insofar as
our function was to complete the bourgeois democratic revolution, insofar as there was as yet no class struggle among
the “peasantry”. But, at the same time, we accomplished a great deal over and above the bourgeois
revolution for the socialist, proletarian revolution:
1) we developed the forces of the working class for its
utilisation of state power to an extent never achieved before;
2) we struck a blow that was felt all over the world against the
fetishes of petty-bourgeois democracy, the Constituent Assembly
and bourgeois “liberties” such as freedom of the press for the rich; 5) we created the Soviet type of
state, which was a gigantic step in advance of 1795 and 1871.

The second stage: the Brest-Litovsk peace. [8] There was a riot of revolutionary phrase-mongering against
peace—the semi-jingoist phrase-mongering of the
Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks, and the “Left” phrase-mongering of a certain section of the
Bolsheviks. “Since you have made peace with imperialism
you are doomed,” argued the philistines, some in panic and
some with malicious glee. But the Socialist-Revolutionaries and
the Mensheviks made peace with imperialism as participants in
the bourgeois robbery of the workers. We “made peace”, surrendering to the robbers part of our property,
only in order to save the workers' rule, and in order to be able
to strike heavier blows at the robbers later on. At that time we
heard no end of talk about our having “lost faith in the
forces of the working class"; but we did not allow ourselves to
be deceived by this phrase-mongering.

The third stage: the Civil War, beginning with the
Czechoslovaks [9] and the Constituent Assembly crowd and ending with Wrangel, [10] from 1918 to
1920. At the beginning of the war our Red Army was
non-existent. Judged as a material force, this army is even now
insignificant compared with the army of any of the Entente
powers. Nevertheless, we emerged victorious from the struggle
against the mighty Entente. The alliance between the peasants
and the workers led by proletarian rule—this achievement
of epoch-making importance—was raised to an unprecedented
level. The Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries acted as the
accomplices of the monarchy overtly (as Ministers, organisers
and propagandists) and covertly (the more “subtle” and despicable method adopted by the Chernovs and Martovs, who
pretended to wash their hands of the affair but actually used
their pens against us). The anarchists too vacillated helplessly, one section of them helping us, while another
hindering us by their clamour against military discipline or by
their scepticism.

The fourth stage: the Entente is compelled to cease (for how
long?) its intervention and blockade. Our unprecedentedly
dislocated country is just barely beginning to recover, is only
just realising the full depth of its ruin, is suffering the most
terrible hardships—stoppage of industry, crop failures,
famine, epidemics.

We have risen to the highest and at the same time the most
difficult stage of our historic struggle. Our enemy at the
present moment and in the present period is not the same one
that faced us yesterday. He is not the hordes of whiteguards
commanded by the landowners and supported by all the Mensheviks
and Socialist-Revolutionaries, by the whole international
bourgeoisie. He is everyday economics in a small-peasant country
with a ruined large-scale industry. He is the petty-bourgeois
element which surrounds us like the air, and penetrates deep
into the ranks of the proletariat. And the proletariat is
declassed, i. e., dislodged from its class groove. The factories
and mills are idle—the proletariat is weak, scattered, enfeebled. On the other hand, the petty-bourgeois element within
the country is backed by the whole international bourgeoisie,
which still retains its power throughout the world.

Is this not enough to make people quail, especially heroes like
the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries, the knights of the
Two-and-a-Half International, the helpless anarchists and the
lovers of “Left” phrases? “The Bolsheviks are reverting to capitalism; the Bolsheviks are done for. Their
revolution, too, has not gone beyond the confines of a bourgeois
revolution.” We hear plenty of wails of this sort.

But we have grown accustomed to them.

We do not belittle the danger. We look it straight in the
face. We say to the workers and peasants: The danger is great;
more solidarity, more staunchness, more coolness; turn the
pro-Menshevik and pro-Socialist-Revolutionary panic-mongers and
tub-thumpers out with contempt.

The danger is great. The enemy is far stronger than we are
economically, just as yesterday he was far stronger than we were
militarily. We know that; and in that knowledge lies our
strength. We have already done so tremendously much to purge
Russia of feudalism, to develop all the forces of the workers
and peasants, to promote the world-wide struggle against
imperialism and to advance the international proletarian
movement, which is freed from the banalities and baseness of the
Second and Two-and-a-Half Internationals, that panicky cries no
longer affect us. We have more than fully “justified” our revolutionary activity, we have
shown the whole world by our deeds what proletarian revolutionism is capable of in contrast to Menshevik-Socialist
Revolutionary “democracy” and cowardly reformism decked with pompous phrases.

Anyone who fears defeat on the eve of a great struggle can call
himself a socialist only out of sheer mockery of the workers.

It is precisely because we are not afraid to look danger in the
face that we make the best use of our forces for the struggle—we weigh the chances more dispassionately,
cautiously and prudently—we make every concession that will strengthen us and break up the forces of the enemy (now
even the biggest fool can see that the “Brest peace” was a concession that strengthened us and dismembered the forces
of international imperialism).

The Mensheviks are shouting that the tax in kind, the freedom to
trade, the granting of concessions and state capitalism signify
the collapse of communism. Abroad, the ex-Communist Levi has
added his voice to that of the Mensheviks. This same Levi had to
be defended as long as the mistakes he had made could be
explained by his reaction to some of the mistakes of the
“Left” Communists, particularly in March 1921 in
Germany [11] ; but this same Levi cannot be defended when, instead of admitting that he is wrong, he slips
into Menshevism all along the line.

To the Menshevik shouters we shall simply point out that as
early as the spring of 1918 the Communists proclaimed and
advocated the idea of a bloc, an alliance with state capitalism
against the petty-bourgeois element. That was three years ago!
In the first months of the Bolshevik victory! Even then the
Bolsheviks took a sober view of things. And since then nobody
has been able to challenge the correctness of our sober
calculation of the available forces.

Levi, who has slipped into Menshevism, advises the Bolsheviks
(whose defeat by capitalism he “forecasts” in the same way as all the philistines, democrats, Social-Democrats and
others had forecast our doom if we dissolved the Constituent
Assembly!) to appeal for aid to the whole working class!
Because, if you please, up to now only part of the working class
has been helping us!

What Levi says here remarkably coincides with what is said by
those semi-anarchists and tub-thumpers, and also by certain
members of the former “Workers' Opposition”, who are so fond of talking large about the Bolsheviks now having
“lost faith in the forces of the working class”. Both the Mensheviks and those with anarchist leanings make a fetish
of the concept “forces of the working class”; they are incapable of grasping its actual, concrete meaning. Instead
of studying and analysing its meaning, they declaim.

The gentlemen of the Two-and-a-Half International pose as
revolutionaries; but in every serious situation they prove to be
counter-revolutionaries because they shrink from the violent
destruction of the old state machine; they have no faith in the forces of the working class. It was not a mere
catch-phrase we uttered when we said this about the
Socialist-Revolutionaries and Co. Everybody knows that the
October Revolution actually brought new forces, a new class, to
the forefront, that the best representatives of the proletariat
are now governing Russia, built up an army, led that army, set
up local government, etc., are running industry, and so on. If
there are some bureaucratic distortions in this administration,
we do not conceal this evil; we expose it, combat it. Those who
allow the struggle against the distortions of the new system to
obscure its content and to cause them to forget that the working
class has created and is guiding a state of the Soviet type are
incapable of thinking, and are merely throwing words to the
wind.

But the “forces of the working class” are not unlimited. If the flow of fresh forces from the working class is
now feeble, sometimes very feeble, if, notwithstanding all our
decrees, appeals and agitation, notwithstanding all our orders
for “the promotion of non-Party people”, the flow of forces is still feeble, then resorting to mere declamations
about having “lost faith in the forces of the working class” means descending to vapid phrase-mongering.

Without a certain “respite” these new forces will not be forthcoming; they can only grow slowly; and they can grow
only on the basis of restored large-scale industry (i. e., to be
more precise and concrete, on the basis of electrification). They can be obtained from no other
source.

After an enormous, unparalleled exertion of effort, the working
class in a small-peasant, ruined country, the working class
which has very largely become declassed, needs an interval of
time in which to allow new forces to grow and be brought to the
fore, and in which the old and worn-out forces can “recuperate”. The creation of a military and state
machine capable of successfully withstanding the trials of
1917-21 was a great effort, which engaged, absorbed and
exhausted real “forces of the working class” (and not such as exist merely in the declamations of the
tub-thumpers). One must understand this and reckon with the
necessary, or rather, inevitable slackening of the rate
of growth of new forces of the working class.

When the Mensheviks shout about the “Bonapartism” of the Bolsheviks (who, they claim, rely on troops and on the
machinery of state against the will of “democracy”), they magnificently express the tactics of the bourgeoisie; and
Milyukov, from his own standpoint, is right when he supports
them, supports the “Kronstadt” (spring of 1921)
slogans. The bourgeoisie quite correctly takes into consideration the fact that the real “forces of
the working class” now consist of the mighty vanguard of
that class (the Russian Communist Party, which—not at one
stroke, but in the course of twenty-five years—won for itself by deeds the role, the name and the power of the
“vanguard” of the only revolutionary class) plus the elements which have been most weakened by being declassed, and
which are most susceptible to Menshevik and anarchist vacillations.

The slogan “more faith in the forces of the working class” is now being used, in fact , to increase
the influence of the Mensheviks and anarchists, as was vividly
proved and demonstrated by Kronstadt in the spring of
1921. Every class conscious worker should expose and send
packing those who shout about our having “lost faith in
the forces of the working class”, because these tub-thumpers are actually the accomplices of the bourgeoisie and
the landowners, who seek to weaken the proletariat for their
benefit by helping to spread the influence of the Mensheviks and
the anarchists.

That is the crux of the matter if we dispassionately examine
what the concept “forces of the working class” really means.

Gentlemen, what are you really doing to promote non-Party people
to what is the main “front” today, the economic front, for the work of economic development? That is the
question that class-conscious workers should put to the
tub-thumpers. That is how the tub-thumpers always can and should
be exposed. That is how it can always be proved that, actually,
they are not assisting but hindering economic development; that
they are not assisting but hindering the proletarian revolution;
that they are pursuing not proletarian, but petty-bourgeois
aims; and that they are serving an alien class.

Our slogans are: Down with the tub-thumpers! Down with the
unwitting accomplices of the whiteguards who are repeating the
mistakes of the hapless Kronstadt mutineers of the spring of
1921! Get down to business-like, practical work that will take
into account the specific features of the present situation and
its tasks. We need not phrases but deeds.

A sober estimation of these specific features and of the real,
not imaginary, class forces tells us:

The period of unprecedented proletarian achievements in the
military, administrative and political fields has given way to a
period in which the growth of new forces will be much slower;
and that period did not set in by accident, it was inevitable;
it was due to the operation not of persons or parties, but of
objective causes. In the economic field, development is
inevitably more difficult, slower, and more gradual; that arises
from the very nature of the activities in this field compared
with military, administrative and political activities. It
follows from the specific difficulties of this work, from its
being more deep-rooted, if one may so express it.

That is why we shall strive to formulate our tasks in this new,
higher stage of the struggle with the greatest, with treble
caution. We shall formulate them as moderately as possible. We
shall make as many concessions as possible within the limits, of
course, of what the proletariat can concede and yet remain the ruling class. We shall collect the moderate tax in
kind as quickly as possible and allow the greatest possible
scope for the development, strengthening and revival of peasant
farming. We shall lease the enterprises that are not absolutely
essential for us to lessees, including private capitalists and
foreign concessionaires. We need a bloc, or alliance, between
the proletarian state and state capitalism against the petty-bourgeois element. We must achieve this alliance
skilfully, following the rule: “Measure your cloth seven
times before you cut.” We shall leave ourselves a smaller
field of work, only what is absolutely necessary. We shall
concentrate the enfeebled forces of the working class on
something less , but we shall consolidate ourselves all
the more and put ourselves to the test of practical experience
not once or twice, but over and over again. Step by step, inch
by inch—for at present the “troops” we have at our command cannot advance any other way on tbe
difficult road we have to travel, in the stern conditions under
which we are living, and amidst the dangers we have to face. Those who find this work “dull”,
“uninteresting” and “unintelligible”, those who turn up their noses or become panic-stricken, or who
become intoxicated with their own declamations about the absence
of the “previous elation”, the “previous enthusiasm”, etc., had better be “relieved of their
jobs” and given a back seat, so as to prevent them from
causing harm; for they will not or cannot understand the
specific features of the present stage, the present phase of the
struggle.

Amidst the colossal ruin of the country and the exhaustion of
the forces of the proletariat, by a series of almost superhuman
efforts, we are tackling the most difficult job: laying the
foundation for a really socialist economy, for the regular
exchange of commodities (or, more correctly, exchange of
products) between industry and agriculture. The enemy is still
far stronger than we are; anarchic, profiteering, individual
commodity exchange is undermining our efforts at every step. We
clearly see the difficulties and will systematically and
perseveringly overcome them. More scope for independent local
enterprise; more forces to the localities; more attention to
their practical experience. The working class can heal its
wounds, its proletarian “class forces” can recuperate, and the confidence of the peasantry in proletarian
leadership can be strengthened only as real success is achieved in restoring industry and in bringing about a regular
exchange of products through the medium of the state that
benefits both the peasant and the worker. And as we achieve this
we shall get an influx of new forces, not as quickly as every
one of us would like, perhaps, but we shall get it nevertheless.

Let us get down to work, to slower, more cautious, more
persevering and persistent work!

August 20, 1921

Endnotes

[1] The
Mensheviks were adherents to a right-wing trend in the
Russian Social-Democratic movement. They received their name at
the close of the Second R.S.D.L.P. Congress in August 1905, when
at the elections to the Party's central organs they found
themselves in the minority ( menshinstvo ), and the revolutionary Social-Democrats headed by Lenin won the majority
( boishinstvo ); hence the names Bolsheviks and
Mensheviks. The Mensheviks sought to secure agreement between
the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. In the period of dual power
after the bourgeois-democratic revolution of February 1917, when
the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie as represented by the
Provisional Government intertwined with the dictatorship of the
proletariat and peasants as represented by the Soviets, the
Mensheviks and the Socialist-Revolutionaries accepted-posts in
the Provisional Government, supported its imperialist policy and
opposed the mounting proletarian revolution. In the Soviets the
Mensheviks pursued the same policy of supporting the Provisional
Government and diverting the masses from the revolutionary
movement.

After the October Revolution, they became an openly counter-revolutionary party, organising and participating in
conspiracies and revolts against Soviet power.

[2] The
Socialist-Revoiutionaries were members of a peasant-orietned party in Russia, which emerged at the end of
1901 and beginning of 1902.

After the February bourgeois-democratic revolution in 1917 they
were, together with the Mensheviks, the mainstay of the
counter-revolutionary Provisional Government of the bourgeoisie
and landowners, while their leaders held posts in that government. Far from supporting the peasants' demand for the
abolition of landlordism, the Socialist-Revolutionary Party
pressed for its preservation. The Socialist-Revolutionary
Ministers of the Provisional Government sent punitive detachments against peasants who seized landed estates.

At the close of November 1917, the Left
Socialist-Revolutionaries formed an independent party.

During the years of foreign military intervention and the Civil
War the Socialist-Revolutionaries, carried on counter-revolutionary subversive activities, supported the
interventionists and white guards, took part in counter-revolutionary plots and organised terrorist acts against
leaders of the Soviet government and the Communist Party. After
the Civil War they continued their hostile activities within the
country and among whiteguard émigrés.

[3] The
Two-and-a-Half International (whose official name was the International Association of Socialist Parties) was an
international organisation of Centrist socialist parties and
groups that had been forced out of the Second International by
the revolutionary masses. It was formed at a conference in
Vienna in February 1921. While criticising the Second
International, the leaders of the Two-and-a-Half International
pursued an opportunist, splitting policy on all key issues of
the proletarian movement and sought to utilise their association
to offset the growing influence of the Communists among the
working-class masses.

In May 1925, the Second and Two-and-a-Half Internationals merged
into the so-called Socialist Labour International.

[4] The Communist Workers Party of Cermany was formed in April 1920 by
“Left” Communists, who had been expelled from the
Communist Party of Germany at the Heidelberg Congress in
1919. In November 1920, in order to facilitate the unification
of all communist forces in Germany and satisfy the wishes of the
best proletarian elements within it, the C.W.P.G. was temporarily admitted to the Comintern with the rights of a
sympathising member on the condition that it merged with the
United Communist Party of Germany and supported its actions. The
C.W.P.G. leadership did not fulfil the instructions of the
Comintern Executive Committee. For the sake of the workers still
supporting the C.W.P.G., the Third Comintern Congress decided to
give it two or three months in which to convene a congress and
settle the question of unification. The C.W.P.G. leadership
failed to fulfil the decision of the Third Congress and
continued their splitting tactics with the result that the
Comintern Executive Committee was compelled to break off
relations with the party. The C.W.P.G. found itself outside the
Comintern and subsequently degenerated into an insignificant
sectarian group that had no proletarian support whatever and was
hostile to the working class of Germany.

[5] The Workers' Opposition was an anti-Party faction formed in the Russian
Communist Party in 1920 by Shlyapnikov, Medvedyev, Kollontai and
others. It took final shape during the debates on the role of
the trade unions in 1920-21. Actually there was nothing of the
working class about this opposition, which expressed the mood
and aspirations of the petty bourgeoisie. It counterposed the
trade unions to the Soviet Government and the Communist Party!
considering them the highest form of working-class organisation.

After the Tenth Party Congress, which found the propagation of
the ideas of the Workers' Opposition incompatible with membership in the Communist Party, a large number of
rank-and-file members of that opposition broke away from
it.

[6] This is a reference
to the counter-revolutionary mutiny, which broke out in
Kronstadt on February 28, 1921. Organised by
Socialist-Revolutionaries, Mensheviks and whiteguards, it
involved a considerable number of sailors, most of whom were raw
recruits from the villages, who had little or no knowledge of
politics and voiced the peasants' dissatisfaction with the
requisitioning of surplus food. The economic difficulties in the
country and the weakening of the Bolshevik organisation at
Kronstadt facilitated the mutiny.

Hesitating to oppose the Soviet system openly, the counter-revolutionary bourgeoisie adopted new tactics. With the
purpose of deceiving the masses, the leaders of the revolt put
forward the slogan “Soviets without Communists”, hoping to remove the Communists from the leadership of the
Soviets, destroy the Soviet system and restore the capitalist
regime in Russia.

On March 2, the mutineers arrested the fleet command. They
contacted foreign imperialists, who promised them financial and
military aid. The seizure of Kronstadt by the mutineers created
a direct threat to Petrograd.

Regular Red Army units commanded by Mikhail Tukhachevsky were
sent by the Soviet Government to crush the mutiny. The Communist
Party reinforced these units with more than 500 delegates of the
Tenth Party Congress; all these men, with Kliment Voroshilov at
their head, had had fighting experience. The mutiny was snuffed
out on March 18.

[7] The elections to
the Constituent Assembly were held on November 12 (25), 1917
according to lists drawn up before the October Revolution. Most
of the seats were held by Right Socialist-Revolutionaries and
other counter-revolutionary elements. Though it did not mirror
the new alignment of forces that took shape in the country as a
result of the revolution, the Communist Party and the Soviet
Government felt the necessity of convening it because backward
sections of the working population still believed in bourgeois
parliamentarism. The Assembly opened in Petrograd on January 5
(18), 1918, but was dissolved on the next day by a decree of the
All-Russia Central Executive Committee when the counter-revolutionary majority in it rejected the Declaration of
Rights of the Working and Exploited People submitted by the
All-Russia Central Executive Committee and refused to endorse
the decrees of the Second Congress of Soviets on peace, land and
the transfer of power to the Soviets. The decision to dissolve
the Assembly was whole-heartedly approved by broad masses of
workers, soldiers and peasants.

[8] This peace treaty
was signed between Soviet Russia and the Quadruple Alliance
(Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria and Turkey) on March
5,1918. It was ratified on March 15 by the Extraordinary Fourth
All-Russia Congress of Soviets. The terms were extremely onerous
for Soviet Russia. They gave Germany and Austria-Hungary control
over Poland, almost the whole Baltic area and part of
Byelorussia; the Ukraine was separated from Soviet Russia and
bocame dependent upon Germany. Turkey received the towns of
Kars, Batum and Ardagan.

The signing of the Brest Treaty was preceded by a vehement
struggle against Trotsky and the anti-Party group of “Left
Communists”. The treaty was signed thanks to a huge effort
on Lenin's part. It was a wise political compromise, for it gave
Soviet Russia a peaceful respite and enabled her to demobilise
the old disintegrating army and create the new, Red Army, start
socialist construction and muster her forces for the coming
struggle against internal counter-revolution and foreign
intervention. This policy promoted the further intensification
of the struggle for peace and the growth of revolutionary
sentiments among the troops and the masses of all belligerent
countries. After the monarchy in Germany was overthrown by the
revolution of November 1918, the All-Russia Central Executive
Committee abrogated the predatory Brest Treaty.

[9] Lenin refers to the
counter-revolutionary mutiny of the Czechoslovak Corps inspired
by the Entente with the connivance of the Mensheviks and
Socialist-Revolutionaries. The Corps, consisting of Czech and
Slovak war prisoners, was formed in Russia before the Great
October Socialist Revolution. In the summer of 1918 it had more
than 60,000 mon (altogether in Russia there were about 200,000
Czech and Slovak prisoners of war). After Soviet rule was
established, the financing of the Corps was undertaken by the
Entente powers, who decided to use it against the Soviet
Republic. Tomas Masaryk, President of the Czechoslovak National
Council, proclaimed the Corps part of the French Army, and
Entente representatives raised the question of evacuating it to
France. The Soviet Government agreed to its evacuation on
condition that the Russian soldiers in France were allowed to
return home. Under an agreement signed on March 26, 1918, the
Corps was given the possibility of leaving Russia via
Vladivostok, provided it surrendered its weapons and removed the
counter-revolutionary Russian officers from its command. But the
counter-revolutionary command of the Corps perfidiously violated
the agreement with the Soviet Government on the surrender of
weapons and, acting on orders from the Entente imperialists,
provoked an armed mutiny at the close of May. Operating in close
contact with the whiteguards and kulaks, the White Czechs
occupied considerable territory in the Urals, the Volga country
and Siberia, everywhere restoring bourgeois rule.

On June 11, soon after the mutiny broke out, the Central
Executive Committee of the Czechoslovak communist groups in
Russia appealed to the soldiers of the Corps, exposing the
counter-revolutionary objectives of the mutiny and calling upon
the Czech and Slovak workers and peasants to end the mutiny and
join the Czechoslovak units of the Red Army. Most of the Czech
and Slovak war prisoners were favourably disposed to Soviet
power and did not succumb to the anti-Soviet propaganda of the
Corps' reactionary command. Many of the soldiers refused to
fight Soviet Russia after they realised that they were being
deceived. Nearly 12,000 Czechs and Slovaks joined the Red
Army.

The Volga country was liberated by the Red Army in the autumn of
1918. The White Czechs were finally routed early in 1920.

[10]
Wrangel —baron, tsarist general and rabid monarchist. During the foreign military intervention and Civil
War he was a puppet of the British, French and
U.S. imperialists. In April-November 1920 he was commander-in-chief of the whiteguard armed forces in South
Russia. He fled abroad after his forces were defeated by the
Trotsky’s Red Army.

[11] The mistakes of the “Lefts” in the Communist Party of Germany were that they incited the working class to
premature actions. The German bourgeoisie utilised these
mistakes to provoke the workers into armed action at an
unpropitious time. A workers' revolt broke out in Central
Germany in March 1921. That revolt was not supported by the
workers of other industrial regions with the result that despite
a heroic struggle it was quickly crushed. For Lenin's assessment
of this revolt and criticism of the mistakes of the “Lefts” see his “Speech in Defence of the
Tactics of the Communist International” at the Third
Comintern Congress and his “A Letter to the German
Communists” (see present edition, Vol. 52, pp. 468-77 and
512-25).