Page:Lars Henning Söderhjelm - The Red Insurrection in Finland in 1918 - tr. Annie Ingebord Fausbøll (1920).djvu/162

 these tales have always proved to be hugely and deliberately exaggerated. So much is true that the White, protected by the German name, have plundered and murdered unarmed, peaceful working-men in the said districts. The Germans, these the great ruffians of the world war, are loathed by everybody, and therefore the White are trying by the aid of the terror of the Germans to paralyse the soldiers of our Red revolutionary army, as they are not able to defeat them in any other way.

"Working-men! Revolutionary soldiers! We must not let the provocative terror of the Germans damp our revolutionary courage. We know, certainly, that they are clever at their trade of war. But hitherto the Germans have not to our certain knowledge engaged with the forces of the Red Guard in close formation. And we imagine that the imperialist government of Germany hesitates to embark on such an enterprise, for the working-men of Germany will not, it is presumed, silently permit this to happen, as their representatives have already before raised their voices against the armed excursion of their government to Aland.

"Comrades! Working-men! All that are found in the ranks of the White Guard must be treated as the enemies of the people, whatever nationality they belong to. The revolutionary working-man does not even turn aside from a German, professional murderer, for he knows that he is fighting for liberty and right.

"You Finnish working-man, peasant, and crofter, for centuries your race has been tried; you have been forced to suffer great hardship. Your fame has gone round the world, although you have lived in the slavery of capitalism. You are just now under the eye of the proletariat of the whole world. Column upon column is written daily about your stubbornness, your strong fight. About you, who have only a couple of months ago shaken off your