On June 20, the regiment received orders to dispatch to the front 500 machine guns with crews. The next day the troops held a meeting, at which they adopted a resolution—judging by its content, of Bolshevik origin—that they would go to the front only to fight a “revolutionary war”—that is, in defense of a government from which the “capitalists” had been removed and the Soviet had all the power. If, the resolution went on, the Provisional Government attempted to disband it, the regiment would resist.121 Emissaries were dispatched to other units of the garrison in quest of support.
The Bolsheviks, who played a major role in this mutiny, feared precipitous action likely to provoke a patriotic backlash. They had many enemies, ready to pounce on them at the slightest provocation: according to Shliapnikov, “our supporters could not appear alone on Nevsky without putting their lives at risk.”122 Their tactics, therefore, had to combine boldness with prudence: they agitated vigorously among the troops and workers to maintain a high level of tension, but opposed impulsive actions which could get out of hand and end in an anti-Bolshevik pogrom. On June 22,
The Military Organization is not calling for public appearances. Should the need arise, the Military Organization will call for a public appearance in agreement with the leading institutions of the party—the Central Committee and the Petrograd Committee.123
The Soviet went unmentioned. Such calls for restraint, subsequently cited by Communist historians as evidence that the Bolshevik Party bore no responsibility for the July riots, prove nothing of the kind: they merely show that the party wanted to keep tight control of events.
The first wave of discontent in the regiment was contained when the Bolsheviks dissuaded it from demonstrating and the Soviet refused to endorse its resolution. Resigned, the regiment dispatched 500 machine guns to the front.124
At this time, the government, jointly with the Soviet, also quelled incipient violence at Kronshtadt. The garrison at this naval base near Petrograd was under strong anarchist influence but its political organization was in the hands of the Bolsheviks headed by F. F. Raskolnikov and S. G. Roshal.125 The sailors had their grievance, namely the government’s forceful ejection of anarchists from the villa of ex-Minister Peter Durnovo, which they had seized after the February Revolution and made into headquarters. The anarchists at the villa behaved in so disorderly a fashion that on June 19 troops were sent to retake it and arrest the squatters.126 Incited by the anarchists, the sailors threatened on June 23 to march on Petrograd to free the prisoners. They, too, were restrained by the joint efforts of the Soviet and the Bolsheviks.
But even as they were restrained, the Machine Gunners were subjected to a steady barrage of inflammatory propaganda. The Bolsheviks called for the transfer of all power to the Soviet, to be followed by reelections to the Soviet which would leave it exclusively in Bolshevik hands; this, they promised, would immediately bring peace. They also demanded the “annihilation” of the “bourgeoisie.” The anarchists incited the troops to “pogroms on the Miliukov streets—Nevsky and Liteinyi.”127
According to V. D. Bonch-Bruevich, in the evening of June 29 an unexpected visitor appeared at his dacha in Neivola near the Finnish city of Vyborg, a short ride by commuter train from Petrograd. It was Lenin. Having traveled in a roundabout way—“from conspiratorial habit”—he explained that he was extremely exhausted and needed rest.128 It was most unusual behavior, quite out of character for Lenin. He was not in the habit of taking vacations in the midst of important political events even when he had better cause to feel exhausted, as in the winter of 1917–18. In this case, the explanation is doubly suspect because in two days the Bolsheviks were to open a conference of their Petrograd organizations which it is hard to conceive Lenin would have wanted to miss. His “conspiratorial” behavior is also puzzling, since he had no ostensible need to conceal his movements. The reason for his sudden disappearance from Petrograd, therefore, must be sought elsewhere: it is virtually certain that he had gotten wind that the government, having obtained enough evidence of his financial dealings with the Germans, was about to arrest him.
