18.09.1997

The crisis in Russia

From ‘The Call’, paper of the British Socialist Party, September 13 1917

The course of events developed rapidly in Russia last weekend.

On Saturday general Kornilov, commander in chief of the Russian armies, ... presented M Kerensky and the Provisional Government with an ultimatum demanding that he, general Kornilov, should be appointed dictator and invested with “all civil and military powers in order that he might, using his own judgement, form a new government for the administration of the country”.

This ultimatum was confirmed later by general Kornilov in person in a telephone communication to the premier. M Kerensky’s reply to this demand - a demand which was denounced as representing “a desire on the part of certain circles in Russian society to profit by the grave condition of the country and to establish an order contrary to the conquests of the Revolution” - was to deprive general Kornilov of his post and dismiss him from the army.

The premier then directed general Lukomsky, chief of the general staff, provisionally to take over the general command. General Lukomsky refused, and openly threatened civil war on the front, the opening of the front to the Germans and the conclusion of a separate peace if the dismissal of general Kornilov was persisted in. General Lukomsky was thereupon dismissed, martial law declared in Petrograd and arrangements made to cope with the military forces which general Kornilov is said to be leading against the capital.

The executive committee of the Council of Workmen’s and Soldiers’ Delegates, in a proclamation issued jointly with the executive committee of the peasants’ delegates, denounced general Kornilov as “a traitor and an enemy of his fatherland” ... and called upon soldiers to remain loyal to the Provisional Government.

The incidents related above confirm the fears we expressed last week of the growing strength of the counterrevolutionary movement ... Kornilov’s march to Petrograd shows very clearly that the commanding officers of the old regime are prepared to assume direction of the floating counterrevolutionary opinion that has assailed the Revolution since its birth ...

Nevertheless that general Lukomsky ventures to threaten a separate peace with Germany to gain support for the counterrevolution shows that the Russian people desire peace with a passionate urgency.

Months since, the Russian government asked the Allies to revise their war aims, and the Allies may yet pay dearly for their failure to respond. By holding fast to their treaties for the spoliation of the enemy they may yet restore the tsar - which seemingly they desire.

It is more than clear that the Revolution is imperilled by the war; that peace is indispensable for the economic and political fruition of the overthrow of tsardom.