On the Kronstadt Uprising

A BRIEF RECORD OF A CONVERSATION WITH A CORRESPONDENT FROM THE AMERICAN NEWSPAPER “THE NEW YORK HERALD”

Believe me, in Russia there are only two possible forms of government: the Tsarist regime or the Soviet system. In Kronstadt, certain madmen and traitors spoke of a Constituent Assembly. But can any sane person even entertain the thought of a Constituent Assembly under the utterly abnormal conditions prevailing in Russia? Today, a Constituent Assembly would be nothing more than a gathering of bears led by Tsarist generals, each with a ring threaded through their noses. The uprising in Kronstadt is, in truth, an utterly trivial incident—far less of a threat to Soviet power than the Irish forces pose to the British Empire.
In America, people tend to believe that the Bolsheviks are but a small group of malevolent individuals tyrannically dominating a vast number of educated men and women who, if the Soviet regime were abolished, could easily form an excellent government. This view is utterly false. No one is capable of replacing the Bolsheviks—except for generals and bureaucrats who have long since proven themselves utterly unfit for leadership. If abroad the significance of the Kronstadt uprising is exaggerated and it receives support from certain quarters, this is because the world has become divided into two camps: the capitalist West and Communist Russia.
Printed in English
March 15, 1921, in “The New York Herald,” M 197
Printed in Russian
March 26, 1921, in “Petrogradskaya Pravda,” No. 67

Reprinted from the text of “Petrogradskaya Pravda”