Page:The Proletarian Revolution in Russia - Lenin, Trotsky and Chicherin - ed. Louis C. Fraina (1918).djvu/48

 of its great importance, ignored by the Anglo-French press, and maliciously emphasized by the German press. We Marxists must face the truth soberly, being confused neither by the sweet diplomatic and ministerial lies of one group of imperialistic belligerents, nor by the sniggering and smirking of its financial and military rivals of the other belligerent group. The whole course of events in the March Revolution shows clearly that the English and French embassies, with their agents and "connections," who had long made tremendous efforts to prevent a "separate" agreement and a separate peace, between Nicholas II and Wilhelm II, had at last determined to dethrone Nicholas and provide a successor for him.

The rapid success of the revolution, and, at first glance, its "radical" success, was produced by the unusual historical conjuncture, in a strikingly "favorable" manner, of absolutely opposedmovements, absolutely different class interests, and absolutely hostile political and social tendencies. The Anglo-French imperialists were behind Milyukov, Guchkov & Co. in their seizure of power in the interests of prolonging an imperialistic war, with the objects of waging the war more savagely and obstinately, accompanied by the slaughter of new millions of Russian workers and peasants, that the class of Guchkov might have Constantinople, the French, might have Syria, the English Mesopotamia, etc. That was one element in the situation, which united with another and opposite element,—the profound proletarian and popular mass movement, consisting of all the poorest classes of the cities and the provinces, revolutionary in character and demanding bread, peace and real freedom.

The revolutionary workers and soldiers overthrew the infamous Czarist Monarchy, down to its very foundations; and they were neither elated nor depressed by the fact that for a certain brief epoch of history, because of merely fortuitous circumstances, they were being aided by the efforts of Buchanan, Guchkov, Milyukov & Co., who simply desired to replace one monarch by another.

Such, and such only, was the lay of the land. Such, and such only, must be the understanding of the statesman who is not afraid of the truth, and who wishes sanely to balance and evaluate the social forces that are aligned in the revolution at any given moment. This is necessary not only from the standpoint of the present peculiarities of these forces, but also from the standpoint of their more