It is doubtful whether the Russian People will soon be in a Position to participate in the Solution of these Questions
Of necessity, one could come to an agreement on this point if it were possible to foresee that such a situation would not last too long, but would soon disappear in the presence of durable and well-defined juridical relations. But this cannot be foreseen by anybody if the Lettish question is made dependent on the Russian people. Who would venture to affirm that the Russian people will soon be in a position to manifest freely its will and share in the settlement of these questions?
Admiral Koltchak, for instance, has obtained, on certain conditions accepted by him, the promise of support from the Allied and Associated Powers, and he is backed up by the Russian Political Conference. But he is as yet only in Siberia; much time will elapse before he reaches the Volga, and from there Moscow is yet far; but after all Moscow is not the whole of Russia. Meanwhile, in the South, the Bolsheviki have decided, it appears, to give final battle to Admiral Koltchak. Even supposing that Admiral Koltchak wins the most brilliant of victories, much time will pass before tranquillity returns to the country, before he succeeds in re-establishing the administrative machinery, and a Constituent Assembly is elected in which the “Russian people will be in a position to make its will known freely.”
Even leaving these arguments aside, can one be sure that the government of Admiral Koltchak and the Constituent Assembly convened by him will be recognised as authoritative and as the expression of the free will of the Russian people? It is evident that in no case will this happen without the hottest opposition. Kerensky and his above-named colleagues, the Paris Section of the Union for Russian Regeneration, and the Russian Republican League in their declaration (Humanité, 21st May, 1919) say, evidently aiming at the party of Koltchak, “It is necessary that the governments of the free peoples declare openly that they will never recognise, in Russia, any government whatsoever which is a dictatorship of one man or of a group and does not acknowledge the principle of popular sovereignty nor take the essential measures for its realisation.” In another direction, the Russian National and Democratic Union (Bloc), comprising the various leagues set up for the regeneration of Russia, protests violently against the conditions imposed by the Allied and Associated Powers on Admiral Koltchak and accepted by him (Patrie, 15th June, 1919). So the future opposition to the future Russian government is already there, and even makes an appeal for support to all the free peoples. But who can say definitely that with this support either Kerensky or Koltchak will be in a position to get the upper hand?
And again, should the government of Lvov-Kerensky, or simply that of the latter alone, be recognised as enjoying legal continuity?
It is doubtful that the Russian Political Conference and Admiral Koltchak are agreed. M. A. N. Briantchaninoff, the Chairman of the Slav Congress in Moscow and of the Russian National Committee in London, talks openly of the unheard-of inability of the Lvov-Kerensky and Co. government (Daily Telegraph, 24th May, 1919). And the All-Russian Constituent Assembly of the 5th January, 1918, under the famous presidency of M. V. Tchernoff, which included Messrs. Lenin and Trotsky? But M. Gregory Schreider proves that the members of the Constituent Assembly of 5th January, 1918, were shot by order of Admiral Koltchak (Daily Telegraph, 28th May, 1919). Koltchak would perhaps like to continue in the same way. In any case, before taking up the case of Latvia, the Constituent Assembly would have to decide the question of summoning Admiral Koltchak to judgment; and that might take up much time, considering the complexity of the question and the bias of the representatives of the Russian people, entailing debates of indefinite length. Consequently, whoever the candidate may be whose power will be recognised as expressing the free will of the Russian people, one may be quite confident that a violent struggle will ensue against him. For, to talk of free expression of the will of the people, either with or without the assistance of a foreign commission, in a country devastated by war and corrupted by Bolshevism, is naturally inadmissible until the most elementary order is established and the billows of political passion have subsided. And thus years will pass by, during which the question of the countries detached from Russia will remain without solution.