The Russians

[“Neue Rheinische Zeitung” No. 279, April 22, 1849]

* Cologne, April 21. When the *Neue Rheinische Zeitung* began to appear almost eleven months ago, it was the first paper to point to the concentration of the Russian armies on our eastern frontier. At that time many a virtuous citizen spoke of exaggeration, unnecessary alarm-mongering, etc. |

It has since become clear whether we exaggerated or not. The Russians, initially merely covering their borders, turned to the offensive to the same degree that the counter-revolution succeeded. The Paris June victory brought them to Jassy and Bucharest; the fall of Vienna and Pest brought them to Hermannstadt and Kronstadt.

A year ago Russia was unarmed; at that time, in the first panicky terror before the omnipotence of the suddenly erupting revolution, it would have been easy to drive the 30,000-40,000 Russians out of Poland and establish a free Poland. The call was made to do so, but it was not wanted. The Russians were given time to arm, and now – a Russian army of 500,000-600,000 men surrounds us from the Niemen to the Danube and the Aluta. Along the Prussian border alone there stand, according to the *Ostsee-Zeitung*, some 150,000 men; the remainder are stationed in the interior, on the Galician border, in Moldavia and Wallachia, in Lithuania, Podolia and Volhynia, in the fortresses of Nowo-Georgiewsk (Modlin), Brest-Litovsk, Demblin and Zamosc, which, according to the *Ostsee-Zeitung*, have arms and reserve depots for 250,000 men.

The same paper writes: | |

“The establishment of stores for provisions is being pushed through by means of compulsory vouchers, according to which every landowner must deliver a certain quantity of produce in kind to serve for the provisioning of the army. Next year these vouchers will be accepted in payment of taxes. Hence the news, circulated some time ago, that the Russian government in Poland had had taxes collected a year in advance.”

We learn from another source what the acceptance of these vouchers really means. | |

The estate owners in Poland were forced to make enormous deliveries at the end of last year and the beginning of this year, but these were credited against their taxes; it was believed that the matter was thereby settled, but now the taxes must be paid in advance up to the end of this year.

The frightful masses of Russian troops that must have been amassed in Poland can already be seen from this method of forced provisioning.

Another paper, the Posener *Zeitung des Ostens*, reports from Posen, dated April 13:

“The number of Russian troops in the west: In the Kingdom [of Poland] there is Rüdiger’s corps – half of Rüdiger’s Fourth Corps, together with reserves, in all approximately 120,000 men. In Lithuania there is the so-called Grenadier Corps (formerly Szachowski’s) and part of the First Corps. The Guards are supposed to arrive later – their arrival has been spoken of for months. In Volhynia, where the headquarters is located in Dubno, stands the remainder of Czegodajew’s Fourth Regiment. Near Kiev there is a second auxiliary corps, at Krzemienice a mobile corps (Pawlow) about 6,000-8,000 men strong; finally, in Moldavia and Wallachia, Lüders’ corps is stationed, up to 65,000 men strong.”

What these troops are looking for there they themselves admit very naively:

“The common Russians, as well as the officers, are less reserved in their conversations. It is remarkable that to the question why they are stationed on the frontier they all give one and the same answer, namely the following: Our Emperor is the brother-in-law of the Prussian king. After the French had been defeated by the Russians in the great war, all the land as far as Paris belonged to the Emperor; he handed over the administration to various little German knyazes (princes) and appointed his brother-in-law, the Knyaz of Prussia, as supreme military governor. Now the French and the Germans have made a rebellion, and the German knyazes as well as the supreme governor asked the Emperor for help, and that is why we are now here on the frontier; if quiet does not return soon, we shall go over and restore order.” |

And as if this were not enough. Emperor Nicholas orders that a new recruit levy of 8 men per thousand shall take place in the western district of the empire. A list is enclosed, according to which recruits are to be levied in 21 governorates.

Thus do things look across the frontier. Half a million armed and organised barbarians are only waiting for the opportunity to fall upon Germany and make us into the serfs of the Pravoslavny Tsar, the orthodox Tsar.

Just as Transylvania was once already occupied by the Russians, just as the entry of 30,000 men there and of another 30,000 Russians directly via Galicia is now being demanded, just as the Banat Serbs likewise beseech the help of the Pravoslavny Tsar, so it will go here. We shall yet reach the point where the government and the bourgeoisie call the Russians into the country, as happened in Transylvania a short time ago. And things must come to this pass with us. The victory of the Viennese and Berlin counter-revolution has not yet sufficed for our purpose. But once Germany has felt the Russian knout, it will behave somewhat differently after all.

The Russians are the true liberators of Germany, we said in June of last year.* We repeat this today, and we are no longer the only ones to say it today!