agents should bring samples and, perhaps, a small travelling exhibition of selected goods, together with illustrated catalogues.
(c) The Germans influence the Russian press less through special journalistic agents than through the German prisoners of war who write for all kinds of papers throughout the country, especially in the smaller towns. Our Czech prisoners are counteracting their influence to some extent, but the whole thing needs organization.
(d) The Russian railways must be kept up. Without railways, there will be no army and no industry.
(e) The Germans have bought up Russian securities so as to control industry in future.
(f) The Germans are known to have influenced prisoners of war, for instance, by training Ukrainian prisoners for the Ukrainian army. The Allies might influence the German and Austrian prisoners who remain in Russia by means of the press and special agents.
(g) I succeeded in organizing a corps of 50,000 men out of Czech and Slovak prisoners. I have agreed with the French Government to send it to France; the Allies can help to transport it. They are excellent soldiers, as they showed in the offensive last June. We can organize a second corps of the same size. This must be done to prevent our prisoners from returning to Austria, where they would be sent to oppose the Allies on the Italian or the French front.
The Allies have agreed to provide us with the necessary means. In France we have also a small army, partly sent from Russia and partly composed of our refugees; and I hope that we shall likewise be able to form an army in Italy.
The significance of having the whole Czech army in France is obvious; and I must acknowledge that France understood the political importance of the matter from the outset and has supported our national movement in every way. M. Briand was the first statesman openly to promise our people the help of the French Republic. He it was who succeeded in putting into the Allied reply to President Wilson the explicit demand that the Czechoslovaks should be liberated. The Czechoslovaks are the most westerly Slav barrier against Germany and Austria. In present circumstances 100,000, nay, even 50,000 trained soldiers may be very important.
(14) My answer to the oft-repeated question, whether an army could be formed in Russia, is that a million men could be raised in from six to nine months. The Red Guard is unimportant and the Bolshevists have called upon the officers of the old Tsarist army to join their army as instructors. For the army, railways are needed.
Note.—To-day’s “Japan Advertiser” (April 11) publishes the following news:—
VOLUNTEERS LAY DOWN THEIR ARMS.
The Czechoslovak Corps on its way to France is Intercepted by Trotsky
Moscow, April 5.
