Page:Albert Beaumont - Heroic Story of the Czecho-Slovak Legions - 1919.djvu/57

 The Bolsheviks refused to recognise its authority to do so, but the Ukrainians were free to do what they liked in an empire that was going to pieces, and where no authority of any kind excepting that of force was recognised. We were at the mercy of the Government of Kieff, and it required great firmness and diplomatic tact on the part of our leaders and the National Assembly to meet the situation.

Conferences were held at Kieff between our representatives and the Ukrainian Government, which were followed with intense anxiety by those of our officers and men who recognised the seriousness of the situation. Our discipline remained perfect, our obedience and loyalty to our leaders was unshaken, and any movement which they ordered we were ready to carry out at any risk or peril. The idea of a surrender of any kind was never entertained. It could not occur to any of our leaders, and no discussion on the point could even be tolerated. The Bolsheviks of Ukrainia and those of Moscow let time pass. They had no intention of resuming any offensive, of continuing the war as a military enterprise, and if they had any hopes at all it was simply a wild idea that they could corrupt the German and Austrian armies with theories similar to their own. This, in fact, was their dream down to the very day they began peace negotiations at Brest-Litovsk. Perhaps they had hopes that our army also would eventually break up after becoming infected with their ideas.

One day, shortly before the peace negotiations at Brest began, a delegation of Soviet orators came from Moscow to one of our camps. They spoke to some of our officers, and found them little amenable to their ideas. They then asked permission to speak to our men alone, without the presence of our officers. By that time our men had had ample opportunities of seeing what Bolshevism meant, and our officers had no misgivings about their loyalty. They consented to let the Bolshevik orators speak to the men. The companies were assembled, and they listened to the orators, who made inflamed speeches. They spoke vehemently about the capitalistic war, the crimes of the rich, who, they said, had brought on the war, and after passionate appeals they invited our soldiers to join their bands and the Red Guards for the overthrow of the rich, the capitalists, and the tyrannical classes.

Then the speakers looked round for applause, but there was none. On the contrary, one of our men got up to reply, and did so very cleverly. He told them in a few words that probably the Russians knew what they were about, and it was not for the Czechs to interfere. But on the other hand, the Czechs also knew their own business, and that was to fight the Austrians and the Germans, the biggest tyrants on