I 2 
Land & Water March 14, 191 8 
Russia and Japan: By Robert Wilton 
BV the collapse of Russia and the consequent 
advance of Austro-Gemian forces into Ukrainia 
and Muscovy, we are brought face to face with a 
new set of war problems which may be summed 
up in the words : enemv absorption of Eastern 
Europe and a large part of Asia, The immediate effect 
upon the Western Allies is apparent. Germany obtams 
access to food and raw materials. The people and the armies 
of the Central Powers will be fed and their industries invigor- 
ated. The mere prospect of securing such advantages, 
backed up by the rapid successes of the invaders, is sufficient 
to stiffen the "Teutonic" nations. They know that the 
Russian and Asiatic markets can compensate them 
hlierallv enough for their loss of trade in the West. 
Tliat" is not all. Germany's plans of conquest— political, 
economic, and territorial— forbodc a still greater menace to 
the Western Allies in the future. The invasion of Muscovy 
is but the first step, Gernianv's ultimate goal will not be 
attained till she has reached the shores of the Pacific and 
Indian Oceans. Japan long ago foresaw the danger. She 
feels it now more clearlv than we do.. The reason is simple 
enough. The (ierman* "peril affects her more immediately 
an<l directly. No sooner had German troops begun their 
march on Petrograd than a note of alarm and warning was 
sounded by the Japanese Press, and in response — almost 
under pressure of this movement — Viscount Motono, the 
F"oceign Minister, had to give assurances in Parliament that 
a Russian surrender to Germany would be met with pre- 
cautionary measures by Japan. 
His announcement let loose a flood of sensational rumour 
and conjecture. Restricting myself to legitimate surmises 
and to facts that are really" helpful to Allied public 
opinion, I shall attempt in this article to explain the causes 
and consequences of the new Easterp situation. • 
I. 
To initiated observers it was clear months ago that the 
' Revolution was being exploited by Germany in defiance of 
the interests and wishes of the great majority of the Russian 
people ; it was less obvious that the sober element among 
the Russians was waiting for some palpable indication from 
the Allies of their intention to support law and order in the 
only manner that could create any impression, namely, by 
armed intervention. This contingency arose when the 
Bolsheviks deliberately brought about the collapse of the 
Russian offensive in Galicia (July, 1917) ; it became pressing 
when Kerensky betrayed Kornilov to the Bolsheviks, and 
thereby ruined all hopes of restoring disciphne in the Russian 
armies ; it eissumed a tragic form in November with the 
usurpation of power by Lenin. The leading Bolsheviks pro- 
ceeded at once to initiate separate negotiations with the 
Germans. It was still not too late. The Bolsheviks had 
not yet been able to undermine and destroy every moral 
and material resource : Russia could still have ralUed herself 
if the AlUes had sho\Yn a strong hand ; Lenin and his crew 
were still susceptible to pressure from the outside. 
Why did the Allied governments fail to take action ? 
The causes of their inactivity must be sought not in the 
Russian situation, but rather in their respective domestic 
cares — in the whole combination of circumstances that still 
'' prive us of unity on what I may call the diplomatic front. 
On returning from Russia, last autumn, I wrote a series 
of articles in The Times, exposing the anti-national character 
of the Revolutionary movement, and privately called atten- 
tion to the necessity of immediate intervention, but waited 
in vain for some indication of Allied action. Having every 
reason to foresee the complete collapse of Russia unless prompt 
measures were taken, I decided to place my views in writing, 
and at the end of November (after Lenin's usurpation) 1 
drew up a memorandum, from which I cite the following ; 
If the Allied Governments are disposed to regard Russia as a 
" negligible quantity " for the rest of the war, they must be 
prepared (a) to waive an equitable solution of the Polish, Serbian, 
and Rumanian questions ; (6) to consider the eventuality of a 
weakened Russia being drawn into the service of the enemy ; 
and (e) to conclude peace without Russia. ... 
There is no reasonable ground to expect any improvement in 
the situation, but rather, on the contrary, a development of the 
process of disintegration that has been going on Since the outbreak 
of the revolution. 
"The failure of General Kornilov's plans has deprived the 
country of its one and only hope of revival by its own unaided 
efforts. . . . 
We are faced by the possibiUty of a German landing not only 
in Esthonia, but also in Finland, which will entail the severance 
of our shortest comniunii;ations and a threat to the Murman 
and Archangel lines. 
The reaction induced by revolutionary excesses has become 
so widespread that the appearance of a strong government, able 
to impose its will, would be hailed by all except the Extremist 
minority. Without impetus from the outside efforts in this 
direction will be unavaiUng, and we may have to wait years 
before anarchy in Russia is Ijrought to an end. 
Allied intervention (the landing of contingents in the North and 
of troops in the East) is necessary in the interests of Russia and 
of the Allies. It is needed urgently. Its effects woiM be beneficent 
and immediate. 
However, nothing came of my efforts. It was argued that 
the Bolsheviks were already too strong; that "we must 
give them a chance": they might not, after all, conclude 
a separate peace ; whereas any act of intervention on 
our part might "throw them into the arms of Germany." 
The wily Bronstein-Trotsky took advantage of our supine- 
ness to play the tragi-comedy of defiance to the Germans at 
Brest-Litovsk, while behind this screen, successfully bluffing 
Allied opinion and deriving encouragement from our 
Pacifist Press, his associates proceeded to break down anti- 
Bolshevik resistance in Russia. Their efforts were . directed 
more particularly against the Cossacks, against the volunteer 
army raised by Alexeiev and Kornilov in the South-East, 
and against the Ukrainian Rada. By insidious propaganda, 
by bribery and promises of land, and finally by open force / 
— using for this purpose regulars drawn from tlie front, 
which was thus practically opened to the Germans, and 
hired mercenaries known as Red Guards — they were slowly 
but surel}' attaining their object. Bereft of transport, 
munitions, and money, which had fallen by foul means into 
Bolshevik hands, the Cossacks and their supporters waited 
for AlUed help. We shall know some day through what a 
tragedy of watching and waiting Kaledin lived till he finally 
shot himself, what trials Alexeiev and Kornilov endured 
before their hosts withered, what heart-searching qualms 
shook the Ukrainian delegates, faced by the alternative of 
accepting an ignominious peace or seeing their land com- 
pletely ruined by Bolshevism. 
While this appalling consummation of Russia's ruin was 
being relentlessly enacted, the antics of the artful Trotsky 
were being followed with wrapt attention by the uninitiated 
and ehciting unbounded admiration from blind and envious 
leaders of democracy in AUied lands. The Allied govern- 
ments and peoples appeared to be obUvious of the fact that 
the Bolsheviks were helping only themselves and Germany. 
The Brest-Litovsk performance achieved its purpose : it 
effectually stayed the hand of the Allied governments. 
Trotsky was, however, so infatuated with his own apparent 
success that he began to believe in the universal victory of 
Bolshevism, and carried the Brest-Litovsk farce beyond 
prescribed limits. For this vain . delusion sympathisers 
in other countries were largely responsible. But German 
diplomacy had to show some documentary results from its 
laborious and costly arrangements with the Bolshevik con- 
spirators, and faute de mieux conclude'd a pact with the 
Ukrainians. 
Baron von Kiihlmann had expected to bring the gift of 
all Russia to the Reichstag in the form of a treaty signed by 
Lenin and Trotsky. Diplomacy had had its innings wdthout 
achieving all its puFposes. The "mailed fist" thereupon 
went in to settle matters in an expeditious manner. Aero- 
planes headed the march of the invaders, throwing adequate 
proclamations, and reserving their bombs for Petrograd as 
an additional argument in favour of a separate peace. Light 
reconnoitring parties captured strategic points and railway 
junctions. The Bolsheviks at the front had sold cavalry 
and artillery horses, machine guns, rifles, and ammunition 
to the German in exchange for money and goods "made in 
Germany." .All the guns fell into the hands of the enemy 
because they could not be moved. Besides the so-called 
"armies" under "Comrade" Krylenko had no officers and 
no stomach for fighting. They were the remains of an 
armed force that quickly melted away. And even when the 
Bolshevik delegates finally signed the treaty of peace with 
closed eyes, the Germans continued their flanking move- 
ments in Finland and Ukrainia. 
11. 
What were the international aspects of the Russian 
tragedy ? Two months before the German invasion, I wrote, 
but did not publish — ^so that the Allied governments should 
have full freedom to consider the question — a statement 
