1917-1920 the Struggle for Existence

Money did not become wholly worthless, and a host of bag men and hucksters, too numerous and unimportant to be im prisoned, continued private trade. The Government tried to eliminate them by entrusting distribution to the co-operatives, which had had an extensive network in Russia for many years. In spite of these efforts much of the lesser retail trade remained in private hands.

Attempts at

Peace.—Representatives of every section of anti-Bolshevik Russians, from the Social Revolutionaries Keren sky and Savinkov to the Grand Duke Nicolai Nicolaievich, ex commander-in-chief and uncle of the late tsar, went to Paris to enlist the support of the Peace Conference. But the Allies were chiefly concerned with Germany. They feared that circumstances might induce Germany and Russia to make common cause, and their first impulse was to neutralize the Bolshevik danger.

On Jan.

12, 1919, commissar for foreign affairs Chicherin asked the American State Department to open peace negotiations. On Jan. 16, the representatives in Paris of Great Britain, France, Italy and the United States discussed a general truce plan for Russia put forward by Lloyd George. President Wilson suggested that representatives of all Russian groups including the Bolsheviks should hold a meeting on the island of Prinkipo in the Sea of Marmora under the auspices of the Allies. The anti-Bolshevik governments in Russia refused to participate and the project was dropped.

In spite of continued hostility on the part of the French another attempt was made to reach a peaceful settlement. William C. Bullitt, attached to the American delegation in Paris, was sent to Petrograd in March, 1919. After a week's discussion he brought back peace terms which the Soviet Government pledged itself to accept, if the Allies agreed not later than April Io. The most important features of this document were a plan for the pacification of Russia on the basis of the status quo of its many Governments, a willingness by the said Governments, including the Soviet, to recognize responsibility for the financial obligations of the former Russian empire, an exchange of official representa tives between the Soviet Government and the foreign Powers, and an immediate withdrawal of foreign troops. In spite of warm support by Colonel House and the approval of Lloyd George and Orlando this project also was shelved. Bullitt later expressed the

opinion that the chief cause of failure was the rapid advance of Kolchak's army, which once more strengthened the belief that the Soviet Government was doomed to extinction.

Renewed Intervention.

The White armies of Admiral Kolchak in Siberia, General Denikin in southwestern Russia, and General Yudenich in Estonia had been amply supplied by the Allies with money, equipment and instructors. Kolchak threatened Kazan and Samara, on the Volga, in May and planned to reach Moscow before the end of June, but strategic co-ordination was lacking; neither Denikin nor Yudenich was ready. Kolchak could not withstand the full weight of the Red Army, which had now been welded into a competent fighting force. An attempt at diversion by the British in the north came too late to help him.

The next stage of the White campaign was more dangerous. Denikin made rapid progress northwards in the summer, and in mid-October had taken Orel, within 200 m. of Moscow, and was threatening the capital. Simultaneously Yudenich drove at Petro grad. His English tanks broke the weak resistance of the Reds, whose main forces were concentrated against Denikin. Yudenich's advance guard was within 1 o miles of Petrograd before the Soviet troops rallied. Then the tide ebbed. Yudenich was thrown back, and Denikin's offensive, heavily repulsed at Orel, fell to pieces. In December he was making a last stand at Novorossiysk in the Kuban and by April he had fled to Constantinople. Kolchak lost his capital, Omsk, in November and he finally resigned corn mand a month later. The Czechs betrayed him to the Red Army at Irkutsk. He was put on trial as a traitor, condemned to death, and shot on Feb. 7, 1920. The bewildering collapse of the White armies was due to the hostility of the masses in the territory they controlled no less than to military defeat.

Kolchak's execution marked the end of the intervention period, although Japanese troops were still in occupation of Vladivostok and the maritime provinces and General Wrangel was re-forming the shattered army of Denikin in the Crimea. Later, during the war with Poland, Wrangel had some successes on the mainland, but the armistice released overwhelming forces against him, and in Nov., 1920, the remnants of his army were transported by the Allied fleet to Constantinople.