RUSSIA’S CHAOS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXVI, Issue 18073, 11 January 1921, Page 5

RUSSIA’S CHAOS

SOVIET AND CHILDREN. FOREIGNERS MISLED. PARENTS’ POIGNANT MESSAGE. News from Petrograd trickles through continually, in spite of Bolshevik barriers, writes the correspondent of a London paper. I have now received from a reliable source information as to the fate of the children under the Soviet regime. I should like to translate textually a poignant message which has reached me. It is in the form of an 5.0.5., the writer not knowing whom his words would reach and when. He says:— “I am especially depressed by the fate of my children. They have not had sufficient food for many months. Their education has ceased. And then, most awiul of all, the moral level of our life has descended very low. The children are depressed, physically and morally. What can I do to tear them out of this cesspool, to return them to the light and to pure air? iam writing this not to provoke your pity, but that you should know our sufferings. Life is becoming impossible.” This tragic appeal of a distracted parent clashes somehow with the Utopia described to us by sundry foreigners who have had a hasty glimpse of Soviet Russia under the vigilant supervision of their Bolshevik friends. The Bolsheviks are past masters at creating the piirage of success, but some day the truth will out. So, for example, it is only now that we have obtained details of the visit to Russia of Frossard and Cachin, the two French protagonists of Leninism. These two gentlemen, it appears, not knowing a single word of the language, were completely at the mercy of their unscrupulous ciceroni. The story is told of whole works, long closed down, being again restarted for their benefit by agents of the Extraordinary Commission, These gentlemen were very anxious to become acquainted with the Bolshevik system for the welfare of children. Their desire was satisfied. They were shown a children's home, spick and span, full of children looking very sleek and happy. When the Frenchmen arrived the little ones were just sitting down to a plentiful lunch. Frossard and Cachin naturally were unable to discover that this was but a show arranged specially for them. The happy-looking children were the progeny of various commissars and other high functionaries brought together for the occasion. The supreme effort of the day Was obtained when one of the little boys, addressing himself to the foreign guests in very decent French, remarked: “It is a disgrace that the French Socialists have not yet joined the Third International.” Such a statement from one so youthful struck the Frenchmen with the greatest respect for a system which makes even of young children ardent Communists! Here, again, it was was not explained that the youthful prodigy was the little son of the Red dictator of Petrograd, Zinovieff. His governess had carefully rehearsed with him the words which were to be said to Cachin and Frossard. There may be solitary instances where energetic men and i women have been able to maintain I a high standard of education and j discipline in a school. 1 These are exceptions. But as a whole the entire educational system, as everything else that the Bolsheviks touch, is in a state of complete dissolution. Science is in abeyance, morals are very low, and famine is as terrible a reality for the great mass of the children as for their parents and teachers.