[21] Bolshevism at Work, by William T. Goode, pp. 96-97.
It is impossible to continue silent. It has constantly been brought to the knowledge of the Viborg Soviet (Petrograd) of the terrible state of affairs existing in the city prisons. That people all the time are dying there of hunger; that people are detained six and eight months without examination, and that in many cases it is impossible to learn why they have been arrested, owing to officials being changed, departments closed, and documents lost. In order to confirm, or otherwise, these rumors, the Soviet decided to send on the 3d November a commission consisting of the president of the Soviet, the district medical officer, and district military commissar, to visit and report on the “Kresti” prison. Comrades! What they saw and what they heard from the imprisoned is impossible to describe. Not only were all rumors confirmed, but conditions were actually found much worse than had been stated. I was pained and ashamed. I myself was imprisoned under czardom in that same prison. Then all was clean, and prisoners had clean linen twice a month. Now, not only are prisoners left without clean linen, but many are even without blankets, and, as in the past, for a trifling offense they are placed in solitary confinement in cold, dark cells. But the most terrible sights we saw were in the sick-bays. Comrades, there we saw living dead who hardly had strength enough to whisper their complaints that they were dying of hunger. In one ward, among the sick a corpse had lain for several hours, whose neighbors managed to murmur, “Of hunger he died, and soon of hunger we shall all die.” Comrades, among them are many who are quite young, who wish to live and see the sunshine. If we really possess a workmen’s government such things should not be.
Following the example of Mr. Arthur Ransome, many pro-Bolshevist writers have assured us that after 1918 the Red Terror practically ceased to exist. Mr. Ransome makes a great deal of the fact that in February, 1919, the Central Executive Committee of the People’s Commissaries “definitely limited the powers of the Extraordinary Commission.”[22] Although he seems to have attended the meeting at which this was done, and talks of “the bitter struggle within the party for and against the almost dictatorial powers of the Extraordinary Committee,” he appears not to have understood what was done. Perhaps it ought not to be expected that this writer of fairy-stories who so naïvely confesses his ignorance of “economics” should comprehend the revolutionary struggle in Russia. Be that how it may, he does not state accurately what happened. He says: “Therefore the right of sentencing was removed from the Extraordinary Commission; but if, through unforeseen circumstances, the old conditions should return, they intended that the dictatorial powers of the Commission should be returned to it until those conditions had ceased.” Actually the decision was that the power to inflict the death penalty should be taken from the Extraordinary Commissions, except where and when martial law existed. When Krylenko, Diakonov, and others protested against the outrage of permitting the Extraordinary Commissions to execute people without proof of their guilt, Izvestia answered in words which clearly reveal the desperate and brutal spirit of Bolshevism: “If among one hundred executed one was guilty, this would be satisfactory and would sanction the action of the Commission.”
[22] Russia in 1919, by Arthur Ransome, pp. 108-114.
As a matter of fact, the resolution which, according to Mr. Ransome, “definitely limited the powers of the Extraordinary Commission,” was an evasion of the issue. Not only was martial law in existence in the principal cities, and not only was it easy to declare martial law anywhere in Soviet Russia, but it was a very easy matter for accused persons to be brought to Moscow or Petrograd and there sentenced by the Extraordinary Commission. This was actually done in many cases after the February decision. Mr. Ransome quotes Dzerzhinsky to the effect that criminality had been greatly decreased by the Extraordinary Commissions—in Moscow by 80 per cent.!—and that there was now, February, 1919, no longer danger of “large scale revolts.” What a pity that the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission did not consult Mr. Ransome before publishing its report in February of this year! That report shows, first, that in 1919 the activities of the Extraordinary Commission were much greater than in 1918; second, that the number of arrests made in 1919 was 80,662 as against 46,348 in 1918; third, that in 1919 the arrests of “ordinary criminals” nearly equaled the total number of arrests made in 1918 for all causes, including counter-revolutionary activity, speculation, crimes in office, and general crime. The figures given in the report are: arrests for ordinary crimes only in 1919, 39,957; arrests for all causes in 1918, 47,348. When it is remembered that all the other revolutionary tribunals were active throughout this period, how shall we reconcile this record of the Extraordinary Commission with Mr. Ransome’s account? The fact is that crime steadily increased throughout 1919, and that at the very time Mr. Ransome was in Moscow conditions there were exceedingly bad, as the report of arrests and convictions shows.
Terrorism continued in Russia throughout 1919, the rose-colored reports of specially coached correspondents to the contrary notwithstanding. There was, indeed, a period in the early summer when the rigors of the Red Terror were somewhat relaxed. This seems to have been connected with the return of the bourgeois specialists to the factories and the officers of the Czar’s army to positions of importance in the Red Army. This could not fail to lessen the persecution of the bourgeoisie, at least for a time. In July the number of arrests made by the Extraordinary Commission was small, only 4,301; in November it reached the high level of 14,673. To those who claim that terrorism did not exist in Russia during 1919, the best answer is—this very illuminating official Bolshevist report.
On January 10, 1919, Izvestia published an article by Trotsky in which the leader of the military forces of the Soviet Republic dealt with the subject of terrorism. This was, of course, in advance of the meeting which Mr. Ransome so completely misunderstood. Trotsky said:
By its terror against saboteurs the proletariat does not at all say, “I shall wipe out all of you and get along without specialists.” Such a program would be a program of hopelessness and ruin. While dispersing, arresting, and shooting saboteurs and conspirators, the proletariat says, “I shall break your will, because my will is stronger than yours, and I shall force you to serve me.” Terror as the demonstration of the will and strength of the working-class is historically justified, precisely because the proletariat was able thereby to break the will of the Intelligentsia, pacify the professional men of various categories and work, and gradually subordinate them to its own aims within the fields of their specialties.
On April 2, 1919, Izvestia published a proclamation by Dzerzhinsky, president of the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission, warning that “demonstrations and appeals of any kind will be suppressed without pity”:
In view of the discovery of a conspiracy which aimed to organize an armed demonstration against the Soviet authority by means of explosions, destruction of railways, and fires, the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission warns that demonstrations and appeals of any kind will be suppressed without pity. In order to save Petrograd and Moscow from famine, in order to save hundreds and thousands of innocent victims, the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission will be obliged to take the most severe measures of punishment against all who will appeal for White Guard demonstration or for attempts at armed uprising.
[Signed] F. Dzerzhinsky, President of the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission.