The Washington times., 1920-08-22

the time. We are religious and
believe in God, but we are going to
have free religion, without taxes
or rent, the same as the peasants
have free land without paying
rent" ,
That is the attitude now Of Rus
sian soldiers and peasants that
have been taught the Lenin doc
trine, according to Robins. Prob
ably the old feeling will come back;
men never change very suddenly.
They no longer celebrate in France
'the rule of the Supreme Being"
They are Catholic, Protestant, or
nothing.
On November next Lenin will
have ruled Russia for three years
more powerfully than the Gear
ever ruled it. And he rules by
consent of the people in Russia.
Trotzky has run the Russian
army better than the Gar ran it,
whatever you may think OF
Trotzky.
The Gear was beaten by Japan,
and the Car and his armies went
to pieces, with the allies all help
ing, against Germany.
Trotzky's Russian army drives
back Japan, holds back the Poles,
defies Europe and the world.
You may not like the Russian
army or what is back Of it, but
you want to know what it is doing
and why, and how.
Can Poland or any other coun-
try conquer Russia?
No. Russia can only be con-
quered by herself. A great Ger
man military authority told the
story before the late war began.
He said that if you take Paris,
you have France; if you take
Rome, you have Italy; if you take
London, you have England.
But if you take Petrograd and
Moscow both, you have not even
begun to take Russia.
Russia is like gigantic feather
bed; the farther in you 60 the more
you smother.
The Russians may be driven
back; they may be killed in hun
dreds of thousands. That doesn't
discourage them or keep them from
returning. They take their beat
ing and come back again.
They had three millions killed in
the war, they were supposed to be
gone forever. But they are feared
by all Europe now.
These things among others the
American should know, in case he
is invited later by League of Ma
tions to send his men and money
over, "to make quick work of Rus
sia" Before you undertake to
make quick work of Russia, get
out your ouija board, consult the
spirit of Napoleon. He tried it.
You wonder that the intellectual
commission sent from the United
States to Russia, headed by Elihu
Root. corporation lawyer, did not
bring back to this Government
some intelligent idea of Russian
conditions, some warning of the
fact that a revolutionary govern
ment in Russia might endure for
three years and bring back to Rus
sia the fighting power that broke
under the Car.
That American commission was
well described in the Russian
newspaper IsUestid. 1t said that
Root and his commission, seeing
a few men, a few places and things
especially picked out, knew as lit
tie about the real Russia as the
captain Of submarine knows
about the fish in the water. The
submarine is in the water, as the
American commission was in Rus
sia, and the submarine is sur
rounded on all sides by fishes. as
the American commission was sur
rounded by Russians. But the
captain Of the submarine doesn't
know much about the fishes when
he rises to the surface, for he
really hasn't got at them. And the
American commission didn't know
much about Russia, when Il rose
to the surface, back at home in the
United States, and said that the
revolutionary government in Rus
sia couldn't possibly last.
There were socialist and labor
men on that Russian commission.
but their minds were not prepared
to Judge revolutionary ma
chine getting to work. Duncan,
vice president of the American
Federation OF Labor. an able gran
ite cutter from Maine. was on the
commission. He made fine
speech to the excited Russians,
from which they gathered that he
advised the use Of the union label
as cure for their social ills.
Concerning his advice an i'm
portant Russian labor newspaper
suggested that probably Comradc
Duncan on his way across the