RUSSIA IN THE MASS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVII, Issue 17664, 28 December 1920, Page 5

RUSSIA IN THE MASS.

VICTIMS OF TYRANNY. | AWAITING OUTSIDE HELP. j RED ARMY'S FIGHTING VALUE- j The following article is by a corresponj dent who has lately been in South Russia i I and who speaks from his knowledge of j | the Russians and his experience of recent i j events on the spot. ; The Russian is utterly unlike the Englishman; a few examples will show how ; | completely his attitude of' mind differs j from ours. A Russian peasant wants to i go by train ; he walks to the nearest sta- . tion, and wrapping hifnself in his sheep- : ■ skin coat he sits down and waits (it the ' train to come : an hour, .-dx hours, a couple of days, a week ; it is all the same to him : so long as he can get hot tea several times a day. ; i There was a Russian soldier named j Michael whom I knew very well; he had ! fought against the Germans ; the l>ol- , i shevik power arose, and being taken over by them he became a "' Rtd" : the Ukrainians captured him and he became • one of Petlura's army ; from there he somehow drifted to the " Creens." and ! was a freebooter, with his hand against I every man; he was next taken prisoner by the Volunteer Army, and joined it as a " White"; by the Volunteers he was lent to the British Mission, and served them well. His needs were simple ; first . and foremost a master to tell him what to do ; then clothes and food ; and he was satisfied. Given a good officer he would ! fight bravely on any side with the vaguest ; ideas as to what he was fighting for. Literally hundreds of Russians of every class have said to me during the [ last year: "Russia cannot right herself: . we must have outside help " —and this is I true, for Russians as a whole have reached such depths of despair and misery I that they have almost given up struggling. j They want the British to come, for they say the British rule without giving offence to the ruled, whereas the Germans are insulting and bullying, but that if j the British will not help, they must call '• I in the Germans, for better German help : I than no help at all. \ The Army. : Reports from Russia speak of Bolshevik ■ arniies," " divisions, ' " regiments." I and " battalion.:." To the British public j | this conjures up a vision of columns of i | Red troops with transport and guns, each j i soldier equipped and armed, -and march i * n g joyously forward to battle for his | cause. Just as the Bolshevik theories of j government are by no means all bad on J paper, so are their armies well organised ! —on paper. Every unit was systematically j | renumbered last spring:—The let, 2nd, I | and 3rd battalions form the Ist Regiment, j ' the 4th, sth. and 6th the 2nd Regiment, ; j the 301 st, 302 nd, and 303 rd the 101 st [ ] Regiment, and so on up to numbers so | stupendous that they would stagger the mind even of Marshal Foch. Regiments I 1, 2, and 3 form the Ist Brigade. 4, 5, I and 6 the 2nd Brigade, and so on : every J division and army has its commander and I staff. The artillery and cavalry' are ori ganised in the same way; even transport i and supplies have a sketchy existence—on paper. All this is done from Moscow—on paper. In reality, these armies are nothing more than an armed rabble, kept at the front against its will by a small minority, who bully the docile majority into submission. Ninety-five per cent, of the so-called officers at the front are useless—for the Jews, who are the driving force of the Bolshevik movement, rarely come up to the front line, although each regiment has a commissar attached to it. The men are armed with every imaginable sort of shooting instrument—Russian, English, German, Austrian. French, and Japanese rifles—all filthy dirty and coated with rust. Clad in Rags. Uniform consists of a man's own rags, and whatever he can loot, or steal from prisoners or the dead. When following up a Bolshevik retirement their dead are usually half naked, having been stripped of all their clothing by their comrades. On one occasion when the Bolsheviks were retreating under heavy fire, I found a dead man with his trousers and boots gone; they had been taken under machinefun fire by some comrade who must have ad considerable need of the garments. Another time I found a young Russian cavalry officer who had ventured too far ahead of a cavalry attack; some retiring Bolshevik horseman had found time to leap from his horse, strip off the officer's boots and trousers, and poke out his eyes. A battalion may consist of " anything from 40 to 150 men. and an effort is now being made to standardise the battalion at 100 rifles. I have known divisions which consisted of less than 1000 men. The Bolshevik artillery is hardlv worth taking into consideration as, even when they have guns and ammunition they do not' know' hovr to use them. The cavalrv is sometimes good and the machine gunners not * olv j ' althou ?, h the .v prefer fighting at 2000 yds to coming to close quarters During the last six months there has been a noticeable improvement in the Bolshevik forces, as they are gradually drooping their socialist ideas of runnino- the army, and are going back to the old" military methods. Now Bolshevik officers have their servants, and soldiers have to salute or stand to attention while speaking to an officer or commissar. Foreign Volunteers. Looking upon the Bolshevik forces as a whole, it is a fair estimate to say that about one-fifth serve voluntarily, and are ready to fight provided that the risk to themselves is small and the chance of loot promising. These are the Chinese, Letts, Esthonians, released criminals, scum from the towns, and communists. Of the rest two-fifths are conscripted peasants who do as they are ordered, but hate fighting, and only want peace ; the other two-fifths are conscripted men who, if they dared, would kill their Bolshevik officers "and go over to the anti-Bolsheviks. Against trained troops, the Bolshevik military forces in South Russia would be completely powerless. In addition, they have no incentive to fight there ; the country is drained dry of food and goods, and without loot the communists will not fight. Also, wearied of fighting their own countrymen for two years, both sides show a decided liking for bloodless victories, and prefer to beat back the enemy bv bluff whenever possible. I have collected Bolshevik propaganda leaflets printed in Moscow in Russian, Arabic, Turkish, English, Polish, French, German, Italian, and other languages. ' Bolshevism is set forth in these papers bv experts in the art of persuasion, and to eneducated people, who have not seen the scheme at work, it must appear txth attractive and feasible. Also, their propaganda work among the soldiers opposed to them is very well done, ard in many ways more to be feared than their military attacks.