Page:Karl Kautsky - Georgia - tr. Henry James Stenning (1921).pdf/24

 exhausted was this object of the middle party to be finally attained.

Thus the Menshevists were soon eclipsed in Russia, but not in Georgia. In that country there were no Cadets, and no Bolshevists of importance. The majority of the Socialists of Georgia, supported by Jordania, had been unfriendly to the Coalition policy, and demanded a purely Socialist ministry. The Revolution brought the Social-Democracy of Georgia, as a compact and resolute party, to a dominant position, which was not seriously contested from any quarter in the country.

But it was a bad heritage into which this party entered. The immediate situation was desperate, in view of the masses of Russian soldiers, filled with Bolshevist hatred against Menshevist Georgia, which in their retreat from the yet more hostile and ferocious Turks, broke up into plundering bands and swarmed into Georgia.

Apart from this, the economic position of the country was grievous in the extreme, and its enduring power was slight. Even before the war it had suffered considerably from the neglect of its agriculture and its industry, and the inadequacy of its means of communication. And to this was now added the devastation of four years of war, and protracted isolation from the industry and civilisation of Europe.