Page:Lars Henning Söderhjelm - The Red Insurrection in Finland in 1918 - tr. Annie Ingebord Fausbøll (1920).djvu/96

 their majority in the Lantdag, the party went over to "unparliamentary means of force," and created the Red Guard. And when the activities of the latter met with opposition from the Government, the Government was overthrown. Though the party did not intend to carry out a social revolution, they did not scruple to employ anything Russian Bolshevism could offer them of fine phrases, catch words, and other means of agitation as weapons.

From the previous statement, it would appear, too, why a revolution, an insurrection which lacked all ideal merit, which had no other purpose than that of dragging Finland into an Eastern chaos, and giving the power to a small set of political adventurers, why this revolution found the number of adherents it really did: the Red numbered more than 100,000 men.

The reason was that the masses did not at all understand the significance of the events they had been drawn into. Everything came little by little. Strike had followed on strike, disturbance on disturbance. This was "revolution." The lawful authorities of the country had not been able to check the lawlessness. They stood powerless. So then it was the "people" that had the power. And the attempts of the upper class to stop the manifestations of this curious popular rule were then a "shameful attempt at a State-stroke and a counter-revolution." It must be beaten down. Therefore, one entered the Red Guard, one armed oneself, and therefore one was willing to fight against the "slaughtering corps." It was a question of honour to serve the efforts of the proletariat and safeguard its position of power—all scruples were silenced by the mighty word "revolution." This word was also sufficient to quiet conscience if the sanguinary deeds of the comrades were felt as a heavy burden. And if that was not sufficient, there was the