New-York tribune., 1918-02-18
Economically, the Country,
With Its Industries and
Railways, Is Breaking Up
War of Classes
RACES Everywhere
Each Geographical Area
Has Own Policy; Some
Issue Paper Money
BY Phillips rice

FETR0GRAD. Feb. 17.-Russia has
now reached the point where her whole
economic structure. together with her
industries, railway system and trade
apparatus. is broken up and crashing
hoadlonE to the ground.
Tho process is taking Nlacc on so
vast a scale that it is impossible for
,hc contemporary world to realize all
that is happening over this immense
territory.
One fact alone is namely. that
the whole country is splitting UP into
geographical areas, each of which is
running its own economic and indus
t'ial policy. while some areas are COM
mcnclng financial operations and issu-
ins their own paper money.
An attempt was made by the late
Provisional Government during last
summer TO establish in Petrograd
central economic council which should
control the production and distribu-
ton Of the chief necessities Of life for
thc whole country.
Corn Monopoly Failure
Pressed by the moderate Social Dem
ocrats in the Soviet, the Provisional
Government declared monopoly on
corn and attempted the reQuisition Of
cereals at prices fixed for each dis
trict. But the passive opposition of
the commercial interests. which We're
thriving on speculation, was too strong
for them, and the government, com
posed as it was Of conflicting ee-
mcuts, was unable to show the requi-
sitc authority or exert the necessary
pressure.
II the food commission fixed price
for rcqusitioning corn in one province
the local landlords, in league with the
corn dealers, would agree to hide their
stocks and sell them secretly at double
the price. Knowledge that this was
going on was the chief cause of the
wave Of agrarian pogroms that broke
out in the central provinces during the
autumn. BY the time inland naviga-
ton was about TO close practically
nothing had been done to secure the
winter food supply for the northern in
dustrial centres, and the peasants from
the non-food producing provinces be-
gan to flock down the Nolga and the
principal railways, buying at quays and
stations sacks Of flour at famine prices
from the spectators.
ganized state control. As a result Of
all this the workers in the industrial
centres Of Northern Russia began to
take the law into their own hands.
The urban proletariat, in fact, instinct
ivelv felt that the industrial life OF the
country was being killed through lack
Of common plan, and. together with
tho peasants, who saw their age-long
hopes of acquiring the lands they had
worked being dashed to the ground by
the Cadet bankers and ministers, they
decided to act for themselves.
Tho fall of the provisional govern
ment had probably quite as much to do
with its incapacity to tackle the land
and economic questions as with its
weakness and indecision on the ques-
ton Of bringing the war to an end
Auarchistic-sy syndicalist psychology be
gan to spread. The workers began to
take the factories under their own con-
troll, naming their own factory com
mittees and even trying to work them
without waiting for any general plar
for the whole country.
There was thus no organized centre
through which raw materials could be
obtained. The banks then refused
credit and, after the November revolu-
ton, were seized and declared nation.
alzed by the Bolshevik government
The bank servants and technical stats
thereupon went on strike, so that s
deadlock was reached.
Thus the industrial system as it col
lapses sets fire to he whole socia'
fabric and class war now RACES with
unabated fury, the proletariat masse.
pltted in this struggle against the
mall but well organized technical an,
intellectual stats that were the bour
geoisic of Russia.
IN this bacchanalia of collapsing in
dustres. private speculation, anarchica
seizures by communal committees ant
attempts to nationalize banks. it is still
possible to see the general direction
N which the country is drifting. 1t i
clear. at least that industry is bein,
demobilzed. that the war is over il
Russia and that the war industries ar
turning to The production Of those ar
ticles OF commerce for the lack Of which
Russia has been reduced to beggary 70
the last eighteen months.
Bolsheuik Po1uer Waning:
SkoaL ~