LEADERS IN THE RED REGIME

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 229, 21 June 1919, Page 7

LEADERS IN THE RED REGIME

■■■ ■ ——-a— — THE ASSOCIATES OF LENIN AND TROTSKY . , A STRANGE COMPANY , One oi the, most curious features of the Bolshevist liiovemcnt is the high. percentage of non-Russian elements amongst its leaders (writes a correspondent of tho ,■Sydney "Sun"). . . Of tho 20 or 30 commissaries or leaders who provide the central machinery of the Bolshevist movement, not less than 75 per' cent. are Jews.. Karachan is an Armenian. ■ Fetors, tho. head of Iho Moscow Extraordinary Commission, aud Vatseitis, ; the Connjujnder-in-Chiet", are Letts. Only. ■Lenin, Bucharin, Petrovsky, Tchitcheriu, Lunacharsky, and Krilenko aro Russians. Of theso Lenin is' a law unto himself, Bucharin is an independent;.with independent views and an independent attitude inside the party, Krilenko is n degenerate, while Tchitcherin and Lunacharsky are to be regarded rather as sentimental and somewhat feeble-minded visionaries than as active revolutionaries. If Lenin is tho brains of tho mo\*:ment, the Jews provide the executive officers. Of all the Bolshevist leadei'3 Petrovsky, 1 the Commissary for the Interior, and a former member of the Duma, is practically- the only ono who can in any way he described as a working man. The rest are all intellectuals of bourgeois or petty bourgeois origin. Zinovieff. 1 If tho gulf betweeiv Lenin and- Trotsky is' a wide oiie, there is little to choose, .with regard to gCVral ability and influence, between 'Trotsky and Zinovieff. Trotsky, it is true,, is generally regarded both.in Russia arid outside it as the second man in the' Bolshevist I'artv, and the probable successor of Lenin. Trotsky, too, it was who was 'summoned from the front lust August, .after the . attempt on Lenin's life, to take charge of the Bolshevist rudder of State. Aiul yet it may he 'doubted whether,-the impetuous Commissary for War lias as great an iiiliuence with Lenin a3 .the more' logical and strictly "Bolshevist" ZinoviefT, who during many years of exile has been Lenin's closest-friend and inseparable companion.

■ Ovsei Gershon Api'elbaum, alias Zinoyieff, Uadomyslsky, Slmtsky, Grigorjeff, was born in the Ukraine in 1883. In his early youth lie came under Lenin's influence, and has remained under it ever since. Like nearly all the genuine Bolshevist leaders, he suffered imprisonment during tho days of Hie old regime, ami after his release was forced to llee abroad. During the ten years immediately preceding tho war lie was one of the most active members of the Bolshevist Central' Committee, and for some years was secretary of the party. At the beginning of the war he was with Lenin In Galtda, and,took a firm stand.be,side his chief in Ms wholesale deiiumia(tion .of militarism and of the war aims of .both sets of belligerents. From 19H uiif.il the March Revolution he edited with . Lenin the "Social Democrat," a paper published in Switzerland' and devoted mainly to a sweeping condemnation of those Socialists who supported the war. 0 r who inado no active resistance .to it.

Of short stature, Jirond shouldered, clean shaven, with firm moulh, cold, calculating eyes, abnormally largo head and high ' forehead, Zinovielf certainly gives one the impression of a man of intellect. It is a cruel face, but one feels instinc. t.ively that is tho face of a man of refleotire, logical cruelty, rather 'than of the passionate nature of a Trotsky: A tins orator, Zinovielf has something of the dialectical brilliance of Lenin. He. has, however, .few. original ideas, and must be regarded chiefly as a phonograph of his master, lie is a bitter enemy of the English, and during the linst Ihrec months has been trying lo instil inlo the minds 'of the ; workmen of Petrograd. a. passionate .hatred,for England as "the' country which can never be reconciled to ■ Russia:" As virtual dictator of Pe.trograd, lie is responsible for the savage cruelties and.'murders which.have been 'committed in I'etrograd in the name of the Revolution. Perhaps the i'retiuent panics which the "advance posts" of Bolshevism has' experienced during the past"yea? have affected his nerves. At any. rate, the.terror has been very, much worse in Pelrogrnd than in Moscow." Sverdloff. . Of the same .bitler, implacable typo is Sverdloff, the president of the AllRussian Executive Committee, whoso death.was recently, reported in Ihe Bolshevist..wireless, Born in 1885 at. j\ T ijniNovgorod,. and like Trol.skv the son of a.chemist.and a Jew, Sverdloff, after tho usual gymnasium . education,began his own career .in a chemist's shbp:' \Vhen only 17, however,, he was sentenced to two.weeks' imprisonment for inking part in a demonstration at. a.student's' funeral, and . for the next ten years his life was one. long round of imprisonment and Icojlis.ions with the police. .- . Willi coal-black hair, fierce eyebrows, piercing eyes, and black moustache and pointed beard, .'Sverdloff is a striking figure, somewhat after the manner of a ; .Spanish. Inquisitor, fvijt lacking in con age, lie,:maW an efficient chairman at (he various meetings of the Central' Executive Committee or the All-Russian Congress, of Soviets. - Krilenko. It. would be'unfair both to Sverdliff and .to" Zitaovieff to include-Krilenko in the 6am'o classification. • And yet Krilenko's. portrait is given next in, order, ilot so. ii)uch because .of its resemblance To iho', preceding types, but because it affords t>. striking example'of the depths* to which the'mind, soured against society,• can sink''in its'contorted perversion. ■

Krilenko,' fhe ex-Comniander-in-Chief, "the! author, of the notorious fraternising order which' finally' destroyed the Russian Army, the inspirer of the murder of-Dukhonin, has become 10-day'Krilenko the Blood-sucker, Krilenko the Bolshev-. ist. Public .Prosecutor. Of all Bolshevist .types this is assuredly the most degen-erate-atid the-most perverted. Indeed, it may reasonably bo doubled whether.. Krilenko is in- reality ((uite sane. Even, in- crime it would -be a compliment to ■ compare.-him to Mural.' mid yet in his thirst, for blood and in his- hysterical shrieking for the death sentence he. is as insatiable 'tis a drug fiend in his craving for. cocaine or morphia. And vet Ilii.s is a mnii who has received a university education and who has practised as a lawyer. Still .a comparatively young man,'his "heavily lined face bears all tho' marks of early 'degeneration. Famous since' his student days as. a demagogic orator, Krilenko to-day employs all iiis talents in exciting and' inflaming lli» blood lust of the mob. The rumour.* which aptieared in the English Press regarding liis capture and death at the hands of the. Cossacks appear now to be untrue. The latest, news from Russia states that he is still alive and still exercising his nefarious powers as Public Prosecufn'-. Biicltairii and Kamenoff.

One of the most interesting Bolshevik tvpes,- in that lie is not a mere mouthpiece of Lenin, is Bucliarin. The son of a court official aiid a man of Rood education, Bucliarin has iftainlaincd an independent position inside the Bolshevik Party without e-.er taking any responsible' office. . Ho was the chief Bolshevik opponent of the liresl; Treaty, and baa written scvcial good pamphlets on the Bolshevik movement. One of these is liis notorious "Programme of the Communists'—a book, which reveals with almost brutal nakedness (lie real aims, and aspirations of the Bolsheviki. Still tinder 41), of small stature bill: of groat personal courage,, ho is theoretically more extreme and more doctrinaire In hi" ideals than Lenin. He is, moreover, the one Bolshevik wlio is not afraid to criticise Lenin or to.cross swords with him 111 a dialetieal duel. As far as pure intellect: n concerned, Kanionelf must rank alter Lenin as one of the chief intellectual forces of the movement. Only -10 years old, with his black moustache and beard Kamenelf looks very much older than his ago. T.ike tl'.e 'majority of his colleagues, be is a .Tew, his real name being Bosenfeldl. He wn? born of rich parents, and under the. old regime was a "hereditarv honorary burgher." A graduate of Moscow University, he ncqiiirod ltis Socialistic tendencies during his student days, anil like nianv 'Russian students ci'une inlo collision 'with the polico before his

twentieth year. ' Ho was a. member of the first Brest delegation, and has written a book on this much-discussed treaty. After the Brest peace lie was <ippointed Bolshevik Ambassador to Vienna, but was unable to proceed to his post owing to his arrest by the Finns, who kept him in prison until last July. To-day he fills n.n' important .role as President of tho. Moscow Soviet. He is a man of theories rather than a. man. of blood, and is nioro moderate in his views tJ an the majority of his colleagues. , Lunacharsky the Visionary. A typo vev.v different from any of the preceding is represented by Lunacharsky. This man is a Russian of good' family and the son of u State Councillor. Tali," with slightly drooping shoulders, silky beard and moustache' and pince-nez, , ho is a man x of mild appearance, mild manners, and soft speech. Ho. radiates mildness and softness, and In! dabbles in Bolshevism as he dabbles in art. He is essentially the muiablo visionary, the Bolshevist cranlt, tho Bolshevist educationist. "While no one could possibly be afraid of Lunacharsky as a revolutionary force, theru is no doubt that this revolutionary idealist is of considerable service to the Bolshevists as n propaganda agent. He is at the head of the Bolshevist Department of Education.

Lunacharsky, .however, has been instrumental in bringing back Gorky, if not as a Bolshevist sheep, at least into the Bolshevist fold, Gorky now directs a Bureau of Literature in I'etrograd, where talented but starving members of the aristocracy and the intelligentsia are engaged in translating 'William Morris and Ruskin for the edification of the proletariat.

liimachaisky, too, has been useful to the Bolshevists in'another respect'. When it .was found, that the Bolshevist persecution of the Church was creating a bad impression amongst the workmen and the peasmts, Lunacharsky, as an original adherent to the Orthodox I'aitli, was called upon to pour oil upon the troubled ,'wnters. and to start a "Bolshevising" movement inside the Church itself. Tn the autilmii of last year he engaged, therefore, in a number of public' "disputes" with the more' liberal priests of thv Orthodox Church, at which each side was allowet'l to state lis own case. It was on one of these occasions that Lunacharskv made his famous speech in which he compared Lenin's persecution of the capitalists with Christ's exmilsion of the money-lenders from the Temple, finishing with the startling peroration that."if Christ had been alive to-day He would have been a Bolshevist."