FACTS FROM BOLSHEVIK SOURCES.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume IX, Issue 172, 7 July 1919, Page 3

FACTS FROM BOLSHEVIK SOURCES.

LENIN—THE WORKERS’ TYRANT.

RUIN AND FORCED LABOUR IN

RUSSIA.

(By ’Tlie Sunday Tinies’ ” Special Correspondent at Stockholm. Lieut.-Col. Sergius Cyon). I see in a telegram from London that in reply to a question put in , the House of Commons by Mr. Clement Edwards, Mr Shortt, in the course of his answer, referred to the ' Lenin Government as "a gang of I bloodthirsty scoundrels.” On the j other hand, a little while ago the ! well-known Swedish Bolshevik, M. * K. Kilborn, lecturing in Christiania. * on his visit to Russia, endeavoured to show that everything in Russia i was going on well, and that every- * body in Russia was quite well treatI What, is the real truth ! The an- | sr?r is m«'<t important, because [ there are many workmen in England 1 and a f air sprinkling of middle-class I Radicals, who still cherish the delnI sion that sotnetliing good is yet. to eon..* from the Bolshevik fegime. I have studied the question thoroughly from the best possible material available —that supplied from Bolshevik papers and publications, now so difficult to get out of Russia. Everything I write here is fact, or deduced from fact, taken from sources which emanate from the Bolsheviki themselves. COLLAPSE OF COAL PRODUCTION. Coal, as all will agree, plays the most important part in the economic , life of a country. It is the source of the mechanical energy which pro- ; duces the national wealth on which everything depends. Let us see what the Bolshevik organ ‘•Economic Life ” published in Moscow, has to say about the production of this mineral in Russia under the Bolsheviki. According to this publication, coal production in the Don district, the richest in the Empire. began i.q Tall immediately’ after the Bolsheviki came to power. In Opcemhcr. 1917. the total pro- • ion for the month was 90 million poods (I pood equals 371b5.). as .against 114 million poods in November. The figures for the first four months of 191 S. compared in percen- j tage with th'-se for the corresponding months of 191“. are as follow:

Figures for later months of last [ year have not been published. Out | they are known to be even worse, and that the total production for If»1S was scarcely 10 per cent of that of 1917. which was far below the normal average of the pre-revolutionary jx-ricd. .... • Still worse is it in the case of the coal mines. The Bolshevik paper frankly states that production began to decline immediately after the nationalisation of the mines. The total production for 1917 amounted io 98.8 millinn poods, making an average of about eight millions per month. Now, compare the production during the last months ot 1918;— . i 1918 Poods. j n f v ] .67-1.000 August 1.275.000 September 1.111.000 | October 1.107.000 November 9.t0.000 December SoO.OOO R AIIAVA ¥ ST A G NATION. These figures may not be fairly used as an argument against the na- ■ tionalisation of mines, but they cer- ; tainlv prove the utter failure of Hol- j shevik State machinery. “Economic . Life” further states that the number of workmen in main' mines has decreased from 30 to 50 per cent., and the decrease is continuing. The • paper admits that this is due to the food shortage, and makes the fol-. | lowing confession : “If starvation ! continues but. another month, coal ! production for these mines will ; cease altogether.” The state of general starvation ’-n ' Russia is the direct result of the , nationalisation of trade, which Lenin has now abolished, but too late, ii, is to lw feared. The first result, of the coal famine | has been, of course, to make chaos in railway traffic. The number of workablc’railwav engines has rapid-, h- sunk until in 19]s the total was oidv 1635. as against 22.162 in the previous year. The percentage of engines out of repair has risen from J 0.5 per cent in January. 1917, to 17.8 p.-r. ent in December, 1918. I PESSIMISTIC SOVIETS. The Bolshevik organ is refreshingly frank as to conditions in the t< xtiie industry. It says 'After the Bidshevik revolution in November. I 11-»7. the Workmen’s Committees be'.•an an intensive reorganisation of th.- work people, the r- suit of which l«a?t an enormously decreased production. and a condition of complete I ati.grbv in the textile factories. Con|inus workmen struggled against this state of affairs, hut it must be conceded that the greatest disharmony charact-rises the whole pro-r-'ss of nationalisation ot the lac™ - . .. V..„

i-.-nt sittings of the Central ExeC oniinith-p have been maiked ..v the cr.ate-i pessimism. Al a . inerting of the Central Executive oi I i •• Moscow Soviet a we- k or so ago * t emu said that, the food crisis was a '••■suit of the disorganisation of traffic, the situation in Petrograd being due to the fact I hat stocks of food were lying on the ’ Volga-Berguliiia :a:!way without means of transport. t':ie rolling stock.’’ he said, “is almost entirely useless.” This admission is an eloquent confession of the failure of Bolshevik attempts organisation of food distribution. COERCION AND STARVATION. Methods by whicn the Bolsheviki are attempting to reorganise production have been reveal'd by M. Michel Print-’rvold in the Stockholm ••So. rial Democrat.” M. Prmtervohl is Norwegian Socialist, and was sent ''./iins-ia ’to investigate by hi> partv. which 1» rather friendly to the j Boi.-h.'vj’J. He writ-.-: 1 A logx.d result of the endeavour ■to inerease pi r-cm-t i"ii that strikes ■ have been p:>-i:.->:t'd by decree and • «.i! ;■: < .-.-cd ;ii'i '. ! 1:/j-.-.; *bi the j of my iieiio-nre from Moscow lit vias (iev id« d to’'‘ck, <>ut t' 11 **-' ■■■■:!.- ‘ men a: th-- well-known rubber la.-- ! inrv. I’.'gatir.’ The- ■ men had times threatened strike airaiust reductiet. of t:i--r wac<-. Writes of ,-ioj <-es of private firms v re i* lii-'i as 1.-’v’o roubles .-i I-. . , ... “. £22 at the present rut- , ■ .v b l’>;e>. bit the Soviet Gwentment <ut. those wages down, so rb.ii the "age of the most highly t - workmer. is fi.vd at 1.''50 ! roubles yer rrn'inn. arid that of the j .mr./at t- -' : ■ iu.es ’ I It mav oe add'd that all kwkedI . workmen are 'deprived of their j oread and other cards, so that disj ciphne is maintained by threat of starvation.

BOLSHEVIK CAPITALISTIC METHODS.

Side by side with the prohibition of strikes the Bolsheviki are employing means cherished by capitalists, such as piecework and the system of premiums. This system was adopted by the All-Russian Trade Union Congress, heiij in Moscow last January, and was immediately introduced into the coal and mining industries in Moscow. Premiums are paid for all work done beyond that fiixed by tariffs. The chairman of the General Federation of Trade Unions, M. Tomsky, stated that since the introduction of the system individual production had increased by 40 to 50 per cent. Piecework has been introduced into the metal industry, and production as a result has gone up 50 per cent. History repeats itself. Lenin rules v. ith an iron hand as ruthlessly as Ivan the Terrible and Peter the Gnat, but with tins difference: The two Tsars suppressed the old aristocracy. ami tried to democratise Russia. while Lenin, pretending to be a representative of the workers, destroys all hope of a better future for the workmen, and mercilessly sacrifices both workmen and capitalists on the altar of his visionary ideals.

Million 1917. Cor. poods. month. 19! * per cent. January so. 3 11.6 February 37.2 13.6 March *>5.5 April 15 31.5