Their enemies have summoned the world to shudder and protest against them.
When I am tempted to join the wailers and the mud-slingers my mind goes back to a conversation on the docks of Vladivostok in June, 1918. Colonel Robins, of the American Red Cross, was talking to Constantin Sukhanov, President of the Soviet.
"If no help comes from the Allies, how long can the Soviet last?"
Sukhanov shook his head ruefully.
"Six weeks?" queried Robins.
"It will be hard to hold on longer," said Sukhanov.
Robins turned to me with the same question. I, too, was dubious about the outlook.
We were sympathizers. We knew the might and the vitality of the Soviet. But we saw also the tremendous obstacles it confronted. And the odds seemed against it.
Forces Ranged
Against the
Bolsheviks.
In the first place the Soviet faced the same conditions that had overwhelmed the Czar and Kerensky governments, i. e., the dislocation of industry, the paralysis of transport, the hunger and misery of the masses.
In the second place the Soviet had to cope with a hundred new obstacles—desertion of the intelligentsia, strike of the old officials, sabotage of the technicians, excommunication by the church, the blockade by the Allies. It was cut off from the grain
