Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-01-20
RusSia's Peril.

Through all the discussion of possible up
risings in Russia. owing to popular dscon-
tent with the methods of government and
the persistence in the war program,
there has been no disposition and no reason
to suspect the loyalty of the army 1t has
been believed by the world that Russia
menace from within would in the final test
be more than offset by the bulwark OF
armed men standing between the throne
and the masses. But yesterdays affair at
st. Petersburg, despite the official explana-
ton that it was the result of chance, casts
a wholly different light upon the situation.
1t offers the plainest evidence that the
army u.s. in part, disloyal; that some or the
soldiers in the ranks are secretly in sym
patty with the revolutionary propaganda
The theory of accident may be dismissed
as wholly improbable. In the first place
the ceremony of blessing the Neva is part
of the rigidly arranged schedule of official
religious events. Its date and its hour are
known long in advance. The preparations
for it are elaborate and are carefully made
That eight guns should be told off from
an artillery regiment for firing the salute
without precautions to see that they were
unloaded when not only the whole royal
circle and the entire diplomatic corps but
present within close range. is a preposter-
Gus assumption. If this had been an extra
ordinary occasion, hastily arranged. with
saluting battery chosen quickly from the
fortress. there might be a slim chance of
accident.
But the accident theory falls to the
ground, utterly discredited, in view of the
fact that the shot that caused the damage
was of the canister type, which is not used
in target practice. 1t is Furthermore re-
liably stated that one of the small missiles
picked up in the winter palace is of an
obsolete kind in point of artillery service.
The conclusion is inevitable that the CAMS
ter was placed in the gun by one of the
soldiers for the purpose of killing the car
and perhaps the whole imperial party as
sembled at the pavilion on the ice and in
the winter palace.
1t is difficult to conceive of one man doing
this undetected. If one, there must have
been three or four. And if this number of
soldiers could be found in Russias finest
regiment of artillery to be amenable to
the temptations of the nihilists, or inclined
without suggestion thus to fire upon their
sovereign and commander, why not thou
sands in the whole service? Or is it mere
coincidence that this particular group of
WOuiu-De dSSdSSlnS was 10 De 4OunO IN the
very battery which was detailed for the
salute on this particular occasion?
Any other conclusion than that the ranks
OF the Russian army are honeycombed with
dissatisfaction and a desire for a radical
Change seriously strains the law of chances.
II this is the case, then grave indeed is the
peril that now confronts Russia. Faced in
Asia by an aggressive, hitherto victorious foe,
in possession of all points of vantage; men
aced st home by secret bands of revolution
lists bent upon assassination; with the body
polite grievously disappointed at the fail
ure of the recent efforts to secure practi-
cable reforms; with great strike daily
growing in scope and intensifying the class
prejudices of the common people, and above
all with the army suspected of dsloyalty,
Russia is brought squarely before situa-
ton which demands the wisest action. The
war is unpopular because thus far unsuc-
cessful immensely costly and an impover-
tries of the people. The demand for re-
forms was never so urgent. Will the car
rise 10 the emergency, move for peace and,
disregarding the counsels of the reaction
aries surrounding him, give his people the
reforms they reasonably demand? Or will
he be governed by the prejudices of the dy-
nasty. cling fast to the doctrine that the
ruler is always wiser than his people and
refuse that for which the blood and the in
telligence of Russia today clamor so
loudly?