Page:The Proletarian Revolution in Russia - Lenin, Trotsky and Chicherin - ed. Louis C. Fraina (1918).djvu/398



Thanks to the peace secured—in spite of all its oppressiveness and insecurity—the Russian Soviet Republic is now able, for a certain time, to concentrate its efforts on the most important and most difficult phase of the Socialist revolution, on the problem of organization.

This problem is presented clearly and precisely to all toiling and oppressed masses in the fourth section of the resolution adopted on March 16, 1918, at the Moscow All-Russian Congress of Soviets, in the section which speaks of the self-discipline of the toilers and of the merciless struggle against chaos and disorganization.

The uncertainty of the peace secured by the Russian Soviet Republic is not determined, of course, by the fact that the Republic is now considering the renewal of military activity. With the exception of the bourgeois counter-revolutionists and their aids (the Mensheviki, etc.), no sensible statesman thinks of that. The insecurity of the peace is determined by the fact that in the imperialistic nations on the West and on the East of Russia, and possessing enormous military power, the upper hand may at any moment be gained by the military party, which is tempted by the temporary weakness of Russia and incited by the Socialism-hating capitalists.

Under such conditions our real, and not paper, guarantees or peace lie exclusively in the antagonisms between the imperialistic powers, which have reached the highest point,—manifested, on the one hand, in the renewal of the imperialistic slaughter of the peoples on the West; and, on the other, in the extremely keen imperialistic rivalry between Japan and America for supremacy on the Pacific and its coasts.

It is obvious that, in view of the weakness of such guarantees, our Socialist Soviet Republic is in an extremely precarious, undoubtedly critical international position. We must strain all our strength in order to utilize the respite granted us by this situation to cure the most severe wounds inflicted on the social organism of