New-York tribune., 1920-01-10
Soviet Russia
Bolshevism Analyzed
BY a French Scholar

BOLsHnvIK RUSSIA BY Etienne An
tonell Alfred A. Knopf, New York.
Professor Antonelli, distinguished
sociologist and economist, preserves in
large measure the scholars objectivity
Of viewpoint even in dealing with such
highly controversial subject as Boil
shevism. The author served as a
French officer during the war; he was
wounded at the Western front and
received the Croix de Guerre. Be-
tween him and the men who signed the
Brest-Litovsk peace there is naturally
an impossible gulf. But it must be
reckoned to his credit that he is
able to base his criticism Of the Boil
shevik regime upon fact and not upon
fiction, that he is able to retain the
fine scientific instinct for truth even
in discussing men whose actions and
principles he loathes.
Readers who feel that Russia should
supply an occasional variation to Will
lam S. Hart's thrilling performances
on the motion picture screen will be
disappointed in M. Antonelli's work
Although he spent nearly a year in
Petrograd and Moscow as military
attache to the French Embassy he has
few exciting personal adventures to
relate. In fact, he declares that there
we're fewer robberies in Petrograd un-
der the Bolshviki than in Paris during
the pre-war period. The practise Of
summarily shooting looters, instituted
by the soviet authorities, proved a
considerable aid in maintaining order.
In fact, the author found Bolshevism
in practise the very reverse of chaos.
1t was rather q state of calm and
deathlike order.
M. Antonelli describes the person.
alities Of the Bolshevik leaders. OF
Trotzky, he says:
Tall, slender, with bright, intelli-
gent eyes, with q nose arched above
large and voluptuous mouth, an enor-
nous head Of black, tangled hair,
little Mephistophelian goatee beneath
smooth shaven face, Trotzky, full of
Importance and very active in dis
orderly but intelligent way. is an ex-
cellent actor"
He describes Lunacharsky, the Boil
shevik Minister Of Education, as fol-
lows:
with the thin, emaciated profile of
a, Slav Christ, mild, mystical eyes and
gentle mind, which has more of art
than of strength of will, he is one of
the most attractive types of the group"
The author contends that the Bolshe-
Wiki gained and maintained their power
by mixture Of duplicity, audacity and
demagoguery. BY constantly outbid-
ding their political exponents they won
over enough popular support to accom-
plish the November revolution. They
successfully resisted all attempts to
oust them, partly by ruthlessly employ
ing the machinery of government which
they had taken over against their enc
mics, partly by spreading disinte-
grating propaganda among the war
weary troops whom the Conservative
leaders vainly attempted to marshal
against them.
At the time when NJ. Antonelli left
Russia, in May, 1918, the "Red" army
had not come into existence and the
civil war was still an opera bouffe af-
fair, in which there was a good deal
more talking than fighting. The author
does not discuss the developments Of
the last eighteen months and the trans
formation Of the miserably organised
Red" Guards into formidable mill
tary machine. So far as it goes, how
ever, the work is excellent. It contains
far more fact and far less fancy than
may be found in most books on the sub
lect. And at the present moment, when
Bolshevism has achieved at least tenn
porary triumph within the old Russian
Empire, it is fact rather than fancies
that we need