Council of People’s Commissars
To the Military Revolutionary Committee
The disorganisation of the food supply created by the war, and the lack of system, is becoming to the last degree acute, thanks to the speculators, marauders and their followers on the railways, in the steamship offices, forwarding offices, etc.
Taking advantage of the nation’s greatest misfortunes, these criminal spoliators are playing with the health and life of millions of soldiers and workers, for their own benefit.
Such a situation cannot be borne a single day longer.
The Council of People’s Commissars proposes to the Military Revolutionary Committee to take the most decisive measures towards the uprooting of speculation, sabotage, hiding of supplies, fraudulent detention of cargoes, etc.
All persons guilty of such actions shall be subject, by special orders of the Military Revolutionary Committee, to immediate arrest and confinement in the prisons of Cronstadt, pending their arraignment before the Revolutionary Tribunal.
All the popular organisations are invited to cooperate in the struggle against the spoliators of food supplies.
President of the Council of People’s Commissaries.
V. ULIANOV (LENIN).
Accepted for execution,
Military Revolutionary Committee attached to
the C. E. C. of the Soviets of W. & S. Deputies.