The Dominion MONDAY, JULY 25, 1921. THE RESULTS OF BOLSHEVISM

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 257, 25 July 1921, Page 4

The Dominion MONDAY, JULY 25, 1921. THE RESULTS OF BOLSHEVISM

The fearful famine in Russia which already threatens tens of millions of people with starvation has not come suddenly I’M a bolt out of the blue, but '.v air/ore seen and foretold months ago by competent observers of Prussian affairs. About two months ago, at the very time when Mr. P. Fraser, M.P. (then president of the so-called New Zealand Labour Party) was declaring that he considered Lenin and Trotsky to be “two of the world’s greatest statesmen,” authorities in touch with the progress of events in Russia were giving a detailed account of conditions in that country which made famine on an unparalleled scale inevitable. One of Saturday’s cablegrams spoke of drought and the failure of in SouthEastern Russia as causes of tho famine. No doubt these factors have intensified the catastrophe, but Russia would have been in the grip of famine to-day, or at all events famine would have been in very near prospect, even if the present agricultural season had been one of the best on record. The failure of food supplies is due first and foremost to the economic system instituted by the Soviet dictators—a system they recently made a belated effort to modify. The original Bolshevik theory was that the townspeople would obtain food from the peasants in exchange for manufactured articles. Under the Bolshevik blight, however, manufacturing industry and trade in Russia speedily withered away. The commodities which in theory ought to have been available to exchange for foodstuffs were not pr< duced. As Mr. Michael Farbman wrote at the end of May in the London Observer: "The fact that there was nothing to give tho peasants in exchange for their grain was tho chief reason for converting the State grain monopoly into a most cruel and devastating war on the peasants.” Against the merciless system of requisitioning instituted by tho Soviet Government some of the (peasants revolted at times in fierce armed uprisings, ]int ns a body thov found their main defence in limiting their activities as producers. Russia is starving primarily because her peasants are "going slow” after being deprived by Bolshevik fanatics of every incentive to industry. Since the bulk of what they produced was forcibly taken from them, they refused to produce. As Mr. Fareman points out. agriculture in Russia, had already been hard hit by the purely economic effects of the war—eno--mous mobilisations of peasants, terrific loss of horses and cattle, cessation in the production of and importation of agricultural machinery a.nd fertilisers, etc. "Yet.” he adds, "this complex psychological motive—the lack of an incentive on the part of tble peasants to till the. land, which gradually developed into a burning desire to starve the towns even a 4 tho expense of starving themselves —should bv no means lie lightly discarded.” To most people the motive animating the Russian peasants will doubtless seem rather simple and inevitable than complex. All essential facts in regard to the process by which Russia has been plunged into a famine which may rank as the most terrible in history are in any case plain. The Bolshevists destroyed an economic system which functioned with fair, efficiency, though by no means perfectly, and replaced it by a system which paralysed human effort. Famine on the dreadful scale described in the cablegrams is the direct outcome. It is hardly necessary to touch on the measures by which the Bolshevists lately attempted, in a kind of deathbed repentance, to modify their own system—notably by allowing tho peasants to trade freely with a portion of their produce. These backward steps came too late. The evil has been done, but the worst part of the penalty falls not upon the authors of tile Bolshevik inian.ity, but upon the helpless and illiterate human masses whom they have thus far kept in subjection by military force and terrorism.

In the artfclc which has already been Quoted, Mil. Fabbman gives some figures from the official (Soviet) returns of this vear’s food campaign in Russia. These show that, the gross figure of requisitioned grain is bm r ' To r than that of last year—9.B2 million needs (a pood is equivalent to 26 British pounds) as compared with 212 million needs last year. This year’s collection took place, however, on a territory twice os big as that of last year. The additional areas in which grain was requisitioned th's yea 1 ’ include Siberia and the Northern Caucasus, which are the richest grain-produc-ing areas in Russia outside- of the Ukraine. On the same territory as their requisitioning covered ta c t year, the Bolsheviks collected only 160 million noods—that is to say, as compared with last year the amount was reduced hv one-quarter. Tn order tn anproctate Russia’s present nlight it must be remembered ihat these results were obtained under a system of merciless extortion, elaborately organised, and also, that even with the larger quantities of grain available last year, the rations nroviclcd for a large proportion of the Russian people were on b’ttla bettor than a starvation basis. Another fact of dire portent for Russia is an enormous reduction in the quantity of grain reserved for The official retvtHs showed that of nn estimated requirement of UH million noods of seed grain, nnlv 62 millions 'covßl be obtained from the nea.sn.nts. To this nnmiint tlm Soviet Government added 32 million noods. taken from State "victualling funds” alroacta deficient. but. even so I"9S than half the spod o*rnin needed this year ■’•'as nrovided. Gn this stole of affm.rs famine was hound to follow as inevitably as night follows dav, and. as has been said, famine was forecasted months ago. It would be wide of the facts, however, to sug-r-et Hint the criminal• ineptitude of Bolshevik economic nolicy, has been exposed only in its later operation. As long ago as .Tanuarv. 1990. a report was made bv M. Rygorv to the Congress of National Economm Councils then silting in M6»cow which he was constrained to admit the ruinous disorganisation of practically all Russian industries. “Russia,” he said, “is living at onethird of the pre-war scale. For one o r two years we might subsist on pld stocky, but the stocks are coming to an end. . . .” In the same report

this Soviet official exposed the fallacy of believing than Russia’s economic plight, was in any important measure duo to the Allied blockade. The assumption (ho said) that the lifting of the blockade, and the conclusion of peace will alleviate the crisis in raw material is the greatest of errors. On the contrary, the* lifting of the blockade and the concluson of peace, if ever this should occur, will increase tho de-' mand for raw materials, for they are tho sole products Russia can exchange with Europe.

Russia, one of tho greatest foodproducing countries in the world, owes it to tho Soviet regime that tens of millions of her people are to-day threatened with starvation. If the Russian . masses are to be saved from this fate, enormous quantities of food must bo imported from abroad, and it is agafin due to the Soviet regime that Russia is all but completely deprived for the time being of the resources and organisation which would enable her to trade with other nations. Measures to import food l/avc been in train for some time pasl, but they are. marked by tho usual characteristics of Bolshevik administration—that is to sav, they fall far short of ordinary efficiency. The immediate prospects of the Russian people arc desnerate, and it is by no means unlikely that their miseries may react with damaging effect on other parts of Europe and on Turkey and other centres of disturbance in Asia, In the conditions brought about by widspread famine almost anything in tho shape of wild military adventure is possible. Tho greater danger, however, is that famine in Russia, following on and resulting from the destruction of constructive organisation, may “Balkanise” the Whole country—reduce it into a disorderly jumble of netty States warring one upon another. If Russia is to be saved from a catastrophe which would be only loss disastrous to thb rest of the world than to her own people it must be bv the efforts of elements in her population which have been submerged temporarily in the tide of Bolshevism, and by a complete reversal of tine Bolshevik policy and methods.