Page:Lars Henning Söderhjelm - The Red Insurrection in Finland in 1918 - tr. Annie Ingebord Fausbøll (1920).djvu/58

 declaration that the "valiant Red Guard of the Labouring Class shall always be maintained as an organisation," and that "the Revolution continues." In the journal of the Red Guard at Tammerfors the situation after the general strike is designated as an "armistice," during which the Guard is to be reorganised and put into good fighting condition.

One or two things seem to indicate that the revolution strike was organised at the instance of Russia. Lenin and his friends were not yet secure in their seats at St. Petersburg, and, on the other hand, they had their warmest adherents among the sailors in the Baltic fleet at Helsingfors. If the Bolsheviks had been forced to leave the Russian capital, Helsingfors would therefore have been an eminently suitable retreat. It is not improbable—certain features of the preparation for the strike lends support to this idea—that Finland's soil was to be prepared for making Helsingfors a safe head-quarter for Bolshevism. From this place the work for the world revolution could be directed just as well as, or better than, from St. Petersburg. Still, this is a conjecture which at least for the present cannot be proved.

When the strike broke out the country was without any supreme State power, and the Government had resigned. The exchequer was empty, and the food crisis had reached a crucial point. Free Finland did not find herself in any enviable position. As soon as the Lantdag had assumed the supreme power it had to choose a government. The Labour Party proposed an unmixed "Red" senate. This would, however, presuppose that a general pardon was to be granted for the crimes perpetrated during the week of the strike. As this was a condition impossible to fulfil, a purely bourgeoisie government was elected with Mr. Svinhufvud at the head.