Page:Lenin - The Proletarian Revolution and Kautsky the Renegade (1920).pdf/71



Kautsky is most decidedly convinced of his Internationalism, and calls himself an Internationalist, while dubbing the Scheidemannites "Government Socialists." But when defending the Mensheviks (Kautsky does not publicly confess his solidarity with them, but reflects their views to the last detail), Kautsky has shown in a most instructive manner the sort of Internationalism which he prefers; and since Kautsky is not an individual aberration, but a representative of his school, which inevitably grew up in the atmosphere of the Second International (Longuet in France, Turati in Italy, Nobs and Grimm, Graber and Nain in Switzerland, Ramsay Macdonald in England, and so forth), it will be instructive to dwell a little on Kautsky's Internationalism.

After pointing out that the Mensheviks had also attended the Zimmerwald Conference (a diploma of rather doubtful validity now), Kautsky sets out in the following manner the veiws of the Mensheviks, with whom he agrees: "The Mensheviks wanted a general peace They wanted all the belligerents to adopt the formula: No annexations, no indemnities. Until this had been achieved the Russian army was, according to this view, to stand fully prepared for battle. The Bolsheviks, on the other hand, demanded an immediate peace at any price; they were prepared, if need be, to make a separate peace; they endeavored to extort it by force, by increasing the disorganization of the army, which was great even without their efforts" (p. 27). In Kautsky's opinion the Bolsheviks ought not to have taken over the power in the State, and ought to have contented themselves with the Constituent Assembly.

The Internationalism of Kautsky and the Mensheviks is, therefore, this: To demand reforms from the Imperialist bourgeois Government, but to continue to support