Page:Emile Vandervelde - Three Aspects of the Russian Revolution - tr. Jean Elmslie Henderson Findlay (1918).djvu/250

 than a, probably decisive, struggle between two political principles. It is in this sense that it has justly been called a civil war in the Society of Nations.

This true nature of the great conflict was evident from its very beginning, and it becomes more evident every day.

The Russian Revolution, of which this War has been if not the fundamental reason at least the opportunity for the United States to come in.

America has had recourse to force of arms, only after having exhausted all the means of ending this great quarrel peacefully. She has definitely ranged herself now on the side of all free nations, that is to say, those having already accomplished their democratic revolution. On the other side, almost entirely isolated, are the last three semi-feudal, semiabsolute Powers, that of the Emperor of Germany, the sovereign of AustriaHungary, and of the Great Turk.

Against this triple force of oppression