In Riga we found it difficult to realize that we had finally escaped from the Bolsheviks, and it was only when we arrived in London, on Oct. 19, having travelled via Berlin, that we really felt that at last we had reached safety and civilization.
‘Gang of Marauders.’
In London I found people who were interested in Russia actively discussing the proposed trading agreement with the Bolsheviks, but nobody who had had any experience of them supported the scheme or were other than strongly opposed to it. I have spent the best part of the last three years in Russia, partly with the Reds and partly with the Whites, and during the whole of that time I occupied myself as a business man.
All my personal business interests are centred in Russia, and I have everything to gain by resumption of trade with that country, but notwithstanding, I am absolutely and uncompromisingly opposed to any trade relations whatsoever with the Soviet power. I shall have nothing whatever to do with Russia in so far as trading is concerned while the Bolsheviks remain in power. I regard trading with the gang of marauders who now wield power in that country as unsound in theory and in practice.
The basis of all business is credit, and the basis of credit is reputation. The Bolsheviks are thieves. Their word is worthless and their stock in trade is principally stolen gold, and I decline to become a receiver of stolen property even at the instigation of the British Government.
Mr. W. B. Vanderlip told me in Moscow that as soon as Mr. Harding took office the United States would recognize the Soviet Government and trading between the States and Russia, would be in full swing this coming year.
With all due respect to Mr. Vanderlip and his fantastic contract (which is not worth the paper it is written on) I do not believe that the United States of America will have anything whatever to do with the Soviet Government or that the United States Government will follow the lead of the British Government by entering into an ignoble contract with the biggest bunch of murderers and scoundrels the world has ever seen, or do any act which will tend to increase the power of a gang of marauders whose aim is to smother the truly democratic form of government which obtains in the States, and in the building up and protection of which the sons of America have so gallantly shed their blood in the past.
I should like the people of America to know that, apart from Mr. H. G. Wells and certain misguided members of the British Government, there are only two classes of people in England who desire that England should trade with the Bolsheviks, viz: those manufacturers and merchants who have large stocks of goods on hand which they are unable to dispose of, and the Direct Action people and their associates. Outside these two classes the people of England are opposed to any dealings with Lenine & Co.
“The Enemies of Mankind.”
For those manufacturers and merchants, whether they be English or American, who wish to trade with the Bolsheviks, I have nothing but contempt. They are the sort of people who fleeced their respective countries during the war, who lost no opportunity of taking advantage of their country’s plight, and to-day they are willing to deal with the enemies of mankind, if by so doing they can fill their own pockets.