Page:Through Bolshevik Russia - Snowden - 1920.djvu/56

 such work they are simply superb. I am quite convinced from my own observation that they have won their victories on the battlefield far more through their leaflets than their bullets. The propaganda trains they are sending daily to the Polish front are marvels of ingenuity. Inside and outside these trains are covered with vivid pictures portraying side by side the horrors of Capitalism and the glories of Communism in simple intelligible form, the horrid capitalist murdering the poor peasant or standing triumphant over a dying woman and child, whilst Communist fields bursting with grain yield to the sickle of the happy, sun-browned, well-fed harvester. Posters giving simple but effective figures, making glowing promises, or issuing electric appeals to the proletariat to "rise and shake off the hated chains of the bourgeoisie" decorate these railway carriages through the whole of their length. Over the Polish lines burst shrapnel cases filled with leaflets. Or they scatter Russian passports for all the Poles who wish to desert and come over the lines.

The value of propaganda on a big scale for the prosecution of its aims was discovered by the Government in Great Britain during the war. Large sums of public money were spent upon it. Against this use of the taxes British Socialists protested with warmth and unanimity as a