Manchester Democrat. [volume] (Manchester, Iowa) 1875-1930, 1918-03-13
LUCID INTERVALS IN THE RUS
SIAN DELIRIUM

Merely a mirage" is the verdict
which the saner elements III RUSSIA
have passed upon the interesting
peace which Messrs. Lenina ana
Trotzky have patched up with the
Germans. All the Russians, except
the Bolsheviki themselves, clearly
recognize that this peace amounts TO
an invitation to Germany to help her-
self to anything that takes her fancy
in the Russian ice-boX, and they pre-
dict that it will not be long before
some savior will arise who Will de-
liver Holy Russia from the despoll-
ing hands of the Teutons The Mod
crate Socialist Petrograd Dyen
writes:
"a great catastrophe has descend
ed upon us. Russia has been deliver
ed bodily to world-imperialism. Rus
STA is henceforth prey to the I'M
perialists of any country. She be-
comes a field for economic burglary
for any one who proves the most
successful for exploiting the labor
of Russians. Russia now becomes a
mere colony of European Imperial
lists and at the same time bone OF
!
source of near-eastern trouble"
Even the Petrograd Dyelo Naroda,
the organ of that Revolutionary So
cialist firebrand, Victor Tchernoff,
says:
Were the orders of the Bolshevik
adventures who have sliced the
Smolny Institute to be carried out, it
would mean nothing more nor less
than the delivery of Russia bodily to
Germany and Austria and the estab-
lishment of Prussian junkerism
throughout Europe. we
have been prepared for many things
from Lenine and Trotzky, but we con-
TESS we could not expect from them
such open treachery, such cynical be-
travail in the interests of Russia. such
frank contempt for the sacrifice OF
millions of Russian lives made by
our people during the last three years
of war. Until now, we believed that
Lenine and TrotZky were honest
Russians"
A similar verdict is passed by the
Popular Socialist Labor paper, the
PetrOgrad Rabotchaya- Gazeta, which
remarks:
1.-The Bolsheviki have destroyed the
last shred of Russia's power OF resls-
lance. That is their unquestionable
achievement, but they have not given
us, and can not give u.s. a just peace.
The Russians themselves seem to
view the Trotzky peace with disgust
and are beginning to get together in
opposition to the Bolsheviki, whose
rule they believe is tottering. Extreme
Socialists have begun to make common
cause with Constitutional Democrats.
and even some of Lenine's most vigor-
Gus supporters have deserted him. For
example, Maxim Gorkys paper, the
Petrograd Novaya Zhizn, formerly an
ardent enthusiast in the Maximalist
cause, has turned from Lenine in dis
gust, and thus characteriZeS that mys-
FERROUS person:
"Lenine-who remains, despite his
revolutionary past, typical Russian
squire-thinks he can subject the
whole Russian people to a cruel ex-
pertinent foredoomed to failure. He is
prepared to sacrifice tens Of thousands
of lives to test his ideas of govern
ment. The tragedy of it all does not
seem to trouble this slave Of dogma
VI ulS dSSoCldISo, WIZ al Z Ill Iui IL hiS
slaves" ......
The Liberal Moscow Russkiya Vedo-
mosti tells us that the anti-Lenine
forces are really getting together. 1t
writes:
Mortified by the enormity of the
Bolsheviki's crimes, all the Socialist
groups, even the most friendly dis
posed toward them hitherto, have
broken away from them. Even the
ranks of the Bolsheviki themselves
are beginning to be permeated with
the sense of their moral, isolation.
Most Of the cOmmissaries originally
appointed have deserted Lenine and
Trotzky, and there remains only a
small band of INSCRIPTIONS usurpers
who base their dictatorship on pointed
bayonets and undisguised arbitrary
force"
Some pretty plain speaking comes
from the Dyelo Naroda which, despite
it's Revolutionary Socialism, thinks
the Bolsheviki have carried things a
little too far. 1t makes no bones about
calling spade spade, and writes:
1.-THE rule Of the peoples commits
saries is the rule of usurpers who
have have seized the reins of govern
ment by sheer brute force and are US
ing them to realize their policy of
fantastic communism. In pursuit of
this policy, they have turned general
democratic peace into separate peace
system of state economy into an
economic catastrophe, and revolu-
tionary order into a civil war. The
Bolshevik government is not that Of
a majority of the people, for MAORI
ty would need no violent coercion to
recognize it's own government. 1t is
government of INSCRIPTIONS time-ser-
vers and despots, which does not
cease to be arbitrary and despotic
just because it is camouflaged by COM