El Nuevo mexicano., 1917-08-16
Russia Not Yet
Quite Down and Out
(By William English WaIling Of the
vigIlantes.)


(Mr, Walling is one OF a.number OF promi-
nent Socialists who have resigned from
the Socialist party, since the outbreak OF
the wal, because they believe that the
American Socialists are playing Ger
many's game. Mr.. Waning is Incidentally
an authority on Russia. and is the author
of 'Russia's Message" etc.
New York, Aug. 3.-Nobody who knows
Russia and the Russian Socialists believes
that Russia is down and out. On the con-
trary the present showdown Of the traitor
regiments In the army and the traitor ele-
ments at Petrograd was the one thing that
could save Russia for herself and for the
great cause for which the International de-
mocracy is fighting. Germany's tens OF
thousands Of paid spies--present IN every
regiment and every factory, and her hun
dreds of thousands of anarchist allies-not
positively pro-German, but preferring to de-
liver Russia to the Kaiser rather than to
the Kerensky Socialists made any other
cure impossible. The terrible plague had
to break out, delivering its hundreds of
thousands to be butchered by the Germans
and its tens Of thousands to be shot down
at the hands of loyal Russians.
/. am TIC prophet, and when ] predicted
these events again and again in recent
months and welcomed a small-scale civil
war as a chaos, / am sure ! saw no more
clearly than other who know Russia and the
Russian Socialists. Over and over again we
pointed out that there would be no separate
peace. But there was no denying the seri.
BUSINESS Of the anarchy in the army and at
Petrograd. I pointed out frequently that IL
ten per cent of the regiments mutinied in
time Of battle 1t would enable the Germans
to take an enormous number OF prisoners,
capture vast amounts of Russian supplies,
and occupy immense Russian territories. r
was always asked whether this wouldn't
lead to the capture of Petrograd. / replied It
would not, because a military advance into
the boundless tracts Of Russia becomes
more and more difficult as it progresses,
which gives Russia time to rally. And she
can be relied upon to rally because the
Overwhelming majority of her army is loyal.
This fact is so certain that 1t can be dem
onstrated by figures.
The plague spot of Russia is Petrograd.
Yet in the municipal elections held in Pet
rograd in June, the Notwithstanding
obtained only 25 per cent of the vote,
while SO per cent went to the Socialist fac
tions who support the government, a gov,
eminent that has at last declared for the
restoration of capital punishment in the
army and the use Of extreme measures to
put the anarchist-Socialists down. In Mos
COW the Kerensky-Socialists who have long
favored an even stronger policy, won the
leJuly elections by a large majority. The
other cities are still more loyal TO the
cause Of international democracy, while the
peasants all over the country-and they are
80 per cent of the population-demand the
immediate repression of the mutineers at
any cost.
1t is true that these traitors to interna-
tionalism and to their own Socialist govern
ment probably are numbered by the hum
dreds of thousands both at the front and
in the munition factories. But IL is certain
that Russia's militant democracy is num-
bered by the millions. And it is equally GER
tain that when a sufficient proportion Of the
traitors will have been shot or imprisoned
by the internationalist and Socialist gov
eminent the rest will be comparatively easy
to control.
1t Is the territorial immensely, the pow
erty, and the poor organization of Russia
that left her SO long the victim of czarism.
Only the vast sacrifice Of life caused by the
war could have yitalized this inchoate mass
sufficiently to enable it to throw off the
czarism. Only another such holocaust
could have fused it once more into a unit
ed whole, determined to stamp out anar-
chist Socialism in the way 1t could be
stamped out--by wholesale executions-and
TO fight the war to its only possible finish,
the overthrow of kaiserism.
For fully three months Russia travelled
steadily and rapidly in the direction of an
archy. Then, from the middle of June, the
Peasants Congress, the participation of the
Socialists in the government, and the sue
cessful military offensive in Galicia showed
that this progress towards chaos had been
checked, But the anarchistic elements
among the Socialists were as numerous and
aggressive as ever. They had never been
punished or even checked. A trial of
strength was unavoidable. Coming a few
months later it might have been fatal both
to the revolution and to the democracies
of the west. Coming when 1t did<it has
probably ensured both the future of Russia
and a democratic outcome for the war.