"From other sources it was learned that the doubts and delays in the matter are not due so much to the declination [sic] of several of the Russian groups to participate in a conference with the Bolshevists, but to the pulling against one another of the several interests represented by the Allies. Among the Americans a certain very influential group backed by powerful financial interests which hold enormously rich oil, mining, railway, and timber concessions, obtained under the old régime, and which purposes obtaining further concessions, is strongly in favor of recognizing the Bolshevists as a de facto government. In consideration of the visa of these old concessions by Lenin and Trotzky and the grant of new rights for the exploitation of rich mineral territory, they would be willing to finance the Bolshevists to the tune of forty or fifty million dollars. And the Bolshevists are surely in need of money. President Wilson and his supporters, it is declared, are decidedly averse from this pretty scheme."
That President Wilson would naturally set his face against any such deliberate compromise between Mammon and lofty ideals it was superfluous to affirm. He stood for a vast and beneficent reform and by exhorting the world to embody it in institutions awakened in some people—in the masses were already stirring—thoughts and feelings that might long have remained dormant. But beyond this he did not go. His tendencies, or, say, rather velleities—for they proved to be hardly more—were excellent, but he contrived no mechanism by which to convert them into institutions, and when pressed by gainsayers abandoned them.
An economist of mark in France whose democratic principles are well known[108] communicated to the French public the gist of certain curious documents in his possession. They let in an unpleasant light on some of the whippers-up of lucre at the expense of principle, who flocked around the dwelling-places of the great continent-carvers and lawgivers in Paris. His article bears this repellent heading: "Is it true that English and American financiers negotiated during the war in order to secure lucrative concessions from the Bolsheviki? Is it true that these concessions were granted to them on February 4, 1919? Is it true that the Allied governments played into their hands?"[109]
The facts alleged as warrants for these questions are briefly as follows: On February 4, 1919, the Soviet of the People's Commissaries in Moscow voted the bestowal of a concession for a railway linking Ob-Kotlass-Saroka and Kotlass-Svanka, in a resolution which states "(1) that the project is feasible; (2) that the transfer of the concession to representatives of foreign capital may be effected if production will be augmented thereby; (3) that the execution of this scheme is indispensable; and (4) that in order to accelerate this solution of the question the persons desirous of obtaining the concession shall be obliged to produce proofs of their contact with Allied and neutral enterprises, and of their capacity to financing the work and supply the materials requisite for the construction of the said line." On the other hand, it appears from an official document bearing the date of June 26, 1918, that a demand for the concession of this line was lodged by two individuals—the painter A.A. Borissoff (who many years ago received from me a letter of introduction to President Roosevelt asking him to patronize this gentleman's exhibition of paintings in the United States), and Herr Edvard Hannevig. Desirous of ascertaining whether these petitioners possessed the qualifications demanded, the Bolshevist authorities made inquiries and received from the Royal Norwegian Consulate at Moscow a certificate[110] setting forth that "citizen Hannevig was a co-associate of the large banks Hannevig situated in London and in America." Consequently negotiations might go forward. The document adds: "In October Borissoff and Hannevig renewed their request, whereupon the journals Pravda, Izevestia, and Ekonomitsheskaya Shizn discussed the subject with animation. At a sitting held on October 12th the project was approved with certain modifications, and on February 1, 1919, the Supreme Soviet of National Economy approved it anew."
The magnitude of the concession may be inferred from the circumstance that one of its clauses conceded "the exploitation of eight millions of forest land which even to-day, despite existing conditions, can bring in a revenue of three hundred million rubles a year."
What it comes to, therefore, assuming that these official documents are as they seem, based on facts, is that from June 26th, that is to say during the war, the Bolshevist government was petitioned to accord an important railway concession and also the exploitation of a forest capable of yielding three hundred million rubles a year to a Russian citizen who alleged that he was acting on behalf of English and American capitalists, and that Edvard Hannevig, having proved that he was really the mandatory of these great allied financiers, the concession was first approved by two successive commissions[111] and then definitely conferred by the Soviet of the People's Commissaries.[112]
The eminent author of the article proceeds to ask whether this can indeed be true; whether English and American capitalists petitioned the Bolsheviki for vast concessions during the war; whether they obtained them while the Conference was at its work and soldiers of their respective countries were fighting in Russia against the Bolsheviki who were bestowing them. "Is it true," he makes bold to ask further, "that that is the explanation of the incredible friendliness displayed by the Allied governments toward the Bolshevist bandits with whom they were willing to strike up a compromise, whom they were minded to recognize by organizing a conference on the Princes' Island?... Many times already rank-smelling whiffs of air have blown upon us; they suggested the belief that behind the Peace Conference there lurked not merely what people feared, but something still worse or an immense political Panama. If this is not true, gentlemen, deny it. Otherwise one day you will surely have an explosion."[113]
Whether these grave innuendoes, together with the statement made by Mr. George Herron,[114] the incident of the Banat Republic and the ultimatum respecting the oil-fields unofficially presented to the Rumanians suffice to establish a prima facie case may safely be left to the judgment of the public. The conscientious and impartial historian, however firm his faith in the probity of the men representing the powers, both of unlimited and limited interests, cannot pass them over in silence.
One of the shrewdest delegates in Paris, a man who allowed himself to be breathed upon freely by the old spirit of nationalism, but was capable withal of appreciating the passionate enthusiasm of others for a more altruistic dispensation, addressed me one evening as follows: "Say what you will, the Secret Council is a Council of Two, and the Covenant a charter conferred upon the English-speaking peoples for the government of the world. The design—if it be a design—may be excellent, but it is not relished by the other peoples. It is a less odious hegemony than that of imperialist Germany would have been, but it is a hegemony and odious. Surely in a quest of this kind after the most effectual means of overcoming the difficulties and obviating the dangers of international intercourse, more even than in the choice of a political régime, the principle of self-determination should be allowed free play. Was that not to have been one of the choicest fruits of victory? But no; force is being set in motion, professedly for the good of all, but only as their good is understood by the 'all-powerful Two.' And to all the others it is force and nothing more. Is it to be wondered at that there are so many discontented people or that some of them are already casting about for an alternative to the Anglo-Saxon hegemony misnamed the Society of Nations?"
It cannot be gainsaid that the two predominant partners behaved throughout as benevolent despots, to whom despotism came more easily than benevolence. As we saw, they kept their colleagues of the lesser states as much in the dark as the general public and claimed from them also implicit obedience to all their behests. They went farther and demanded unreasoning acquiescence in decisions to be taken in the future, and a promise of prompt acceptance of their injunctions—a pretension such as was never before put forward outside the Catholic Church, which, at any rate, claims infallibility. Asked why he had not put up a better fight for one of the states of eastern Europe, a sharp-tongued delegate irreverently made answer, "What more could you expect than I did, seeing that I was opposed by one colleague who looks upon himself as Napoleon and by another who believes himself to be the Messiah."