246 THE CLASS STRUGGLE DOCUMENTS 247 FACSIMILES OF SOVIET CIRCULARS issued to Foreign Soldiers on Russian Soil RUSSIAN SOCIALIST FEDERAL SOVIET REPUBLIC.
Why have you come to Ukraine?
izers of the capitalist production the owners of plants. factory owners, bankers with all their clique of lackey partisans (officials, engineers and others) fed on the crumbs of the profiteers attempt to utilize the coming crisis so that the deadly grip of hunger and disorganization will tighten the noose on the necks of the working class and thus crush the revolution.
Every worker, soldier, peasant. all the sons of the revolution must at this crucial hour unite and consciously use their capabilities, strong hands and mighty shoulders to preserve our economic system from that disorganization. Enterprises released from war orders and labor organizations must adapt themselves to the production of the vital necessaries for national consumption. Everyone must now remember that he works not for accumulating profits for capitalists but for the benefit of all the toilers; that the workers and peasants are becoming the real masters of our country and all must regard the factories, plants, other enterprises and forms of work with such unselfish considerations as befits the Socialist state of society.
The slowdown of war orders, the horrible disorganization which results in the cessation of work at the plants would bring grief to the worker heart, and the spectre of hunger and the fear of oncoming unemployment hovers over the heads of the large toiling masses.
This fear inherited from our enslaved fathers keeps our vigorous thoughts in capitalist captivity, dwarfs our great aspirations for the emancipation of the whole mankind from the yoke of exploitation, and overcomes them with fears for the morrow.
Only when the control shall rest in the hands of labor organizations, central as well as local, and energetically and actively applied, not hesitating even to use most drastic measures against capitalists, should the latter deliberately neglect the duties imposed on them; only when the control shall be put in close and direct contact with the general regulation and organization of production, in individual enterprises, as well as in a whole branch of an industry only then will it accomplish its aims and justify the expectations held out for it.
Control should be precisely understood as a transitory step towards an organization of the whole economic structure of the country on a social basis, as the immediate and necessary step in that direction, made by the masses themselves, and parallel with the work done in the central organs of the national economy.
Petrograd, July, 1918 To British and American soldiers.
Fellow workingmen!
Why have you come to Ukraine? Do you not know that táo war is over? da armistice is declared on the Western front, and preparations are being made for the peace conferenco.
Yet instead of arrangements being made for you to return home, to those dear ones, who with keen longing will be expecting you, you have been brought here to start a now war in Russia.
What havo you got to fight for now?
Ybon the allied governements invaded Russia from the North, in Mourmansk, and Archangel, and the East from Vladivostok, they publicly made a solemn declaration that they had no hostile intentione against the Russianpeople. They said, they had come in fact, to help us to get out of the clutches of German Imperialism. President Wilson gave is an Additional rdason that he desirod to protect tho Czecho Slovaks, who he alleged vere in dauger of being boirayod to the Germans.
These were morely hypocritical pretexts. Russia was not in the grip of the Kaisor. Russia did want ths kind of assistances of the Allies. The Czecho Slovaks word in no danger of betrayal. They were at perfect liberty to leave Russia unharmed, but they were bribed by the Alties to take up arms against the Russian Republic, and wero until we had defeated them, asource of danger to us.
But what excuse is there now for this fresh landing in the Ukraine, openly directed against Rassia? It may be that you have boen kept in ignorance of the tremendous events that have taketi place during the last month, although that is hardly possible. Wo tell you then, that there havo beon rerolations in Bulgaria, Austria Hungary and Germany.
Prussianism has been overthrown by the German workers and soldiers. Kaiser Wilhelm has flod to Holland. The Crown Prince Jias been shot. There is a new Government in Berlín controlled by a Workers and Soldiers Council.
On the west front fighting has ceased and the German, French, and British soldiers are fraterenizing.
In Atištris Ilungary too the old order has been overthrown by the workers. The Emperor Karl has abdicated. Hungary has broken away from Austria, and the Czecho Slovaks, as well as the other nations hitherto under the dominicn of the Hapsburgs have established their independence.
Whal pretext have the Allied governments now for invading Russia from tho South?
The menace of Prussian militarism no longer exists thanks to the German Revolution We hare offered to the Czecho Slovaks all facili ties to return to their own country, to join their liberated countrymen. Thero is no excuse at all for your landing in the Ukraine. It thert was over the slightest doubt as ko the intentions of tho Allied Governments, there can be none now. The purpose of the Allied invasion of Russia is to crush the Socinlist Republic, and re establish the reign of capitalism and landlordisın. You strely cannot be unaware of the tremendous change that has taken place in Russis. We have abolished capitalism and landlor: dism. The land belongs to the whole people: So, tõó, do the factorics. knines, railways and all the means of wealth production. All these things are uoder the direct contro of workers and peasants. We are constructing now society in which the fruits of labour will go to those who work. Bat the financiers of Wall Street and the City have greedy cyes for Gur vast storohouse of wealth. They want to control the rich coal basin of the Don, the oil wells of Baku, the cotton fields of Turkestan and minorals of the Caucasus, tho great (imbor forests of the North, and the yast corn lands of the South. They want to convert the million of workers and peasant of Russia into wago slaves to grind out profits for them.