him for a considerable time and had discussed all contingencies, so that he was alive to all the problems of our work abroad.
The bad state of the Russian railways was likely to complicate arrangements for quartering and feeding our men; and, as I had seen at Moscow that Russia was daily disintegrating into more or less autonomous units, I anticipated trouble and misunderstandings with local Soviets. Strife among the Russian parties was a further cause of anxiety. Just before I left, there was talk of an offensive on the part of the Social Revolutionary elements in the Moscow Bolshevist administration. I thought it unlikely to succeed but, in any case, Klecanda was determined to hold strictly to our principle of non-interference. In the Bolshevist Peace Treaties with the Germans and the Austrians it had been stipulated that no agitation should be tolerated in Russia against the German Government, the State or the army. With this leverage the Germans might compel the Bolshevists to make our position unpleasant; and the lack of any concerted Allied policy or, indeed, of any policy in regard to Russia, might complicate the position still further. With Klecanda all these possibilities were considered at Moscow; and my written instructions were that the army should defend itself vigorously in case it were attacked in Russia, or in Siberia, by any Russian party. We agreed also upon the tasks to be assigned to a number of our people in the army and in the Branch of the National Council. It is sad that we should have lost Klecanda so unexpectedly. He died at Omsk on April 28.
Savinkoff, the Social Revolutionary leader, was then at Moscow. An acquaintance inquired whether I should like to see him. I had dealt with his philosophical novels in a section of my book on Russia and was therefore interested to meet the author of “The Pale Horse.” I was disappointed in him. Politically, his view of Russia’s position was wrong, and he under-estimated the strength of Bolshevism; philosophically and morally, he failed to realize the difference between a revolution and individual acts of terrorism. Nor did he comprehend the distinction between offence and defence in war and revolution. Morally, he did not rise above the elementary notions of the blood feud. His subsequent career (he helped even Koltchak) revealed his weakness—the weakness of a Terrorist Titan transformed into a Hamlet.
