The Russian Revolution полностью

Even so, it went to great pains to protect the Bolsheviks from government retribution. As early as July 5, a delegation of the Ispolkom went to Kshesinskaia’s to discuss with the Bolsheviks terms for a peaceful resolution of the affair. They all agreed that there would be no repressions against the party and that all those arrested in connection with the events of the preceding two days would be released.¹⁸⁹ The Ispolkom then requested Polovstev not to assault the Bolsheviks’ headquarters, as he had been expected to do momentarily.¹⁹⁰ It also passed a resolution forbidding the publication of government documents implicating Lenin.¹⁹¹

Lenin defended himself in several brief articles. In a joint letter with Zinoviev and Kamenev to Novaia zhizn’ he claimed never to have received “one kopeck” from Ganetskii and Kozlovskii, either for himself or for the party. The whole thing was a new Dreyfus or a new Beilis affair, engineered by Aleksinskii at the behest of the counterrevolution.¹⁹² On July 7, he declared that he would not stand trial because, under the circumstances, neither he nor Zinoviev could expect justice to be done.¹⁹³

Lenin always tended to overestimate the determination of his opponents. He was convinced that he and his party were finished, and like the Paris Commune, destined merely to serve as an inspiration for future generations. He considered moving the party center abroad once again, to Finland and even Sweden.¹⁹⁴ He entrusted to Kamenev his theoretical last will and testament, the manuscript of “Marxism on the State” (later used as the basis for State and Revolution), with instructions for publication in the event he was killed.¹⁹⁵ After Kamenev had been caught and nearly lynched, Lenin decided to take no more chances. During the night of July 9–10, accompanied by Zinoviev, he boarded a train at a small suburban railroad station to escape and hide in the countryside.

Lenin’s flight when his party faced the prospect of destruction was seen by most socialists as desertion. In the words of Sukhanov:

The disappearance of Lenin when threatened with arrest and trial [was], in itself, a fact worthy of note. In the Ispolkom no one had expected Lenin to “extricate himself from the situation” in just this way. His flight produced in our circles an immense sensation and led to passionate discussions in every conceivable way. Among the Bolsheviks, some approved of Lenin’s action. But the majority of the members of the Soviet reacted with a sharp condemnation. The Mameluks and the Soviet leaders shouted their righteous resentment. The opposition kept its opinion to itself: but this opinion reduced itself to an unqualified condemnation of Lenin from the political and moral points of view … the flight of the shepherd could not but deliver a heavy blow to the sheep. After all, the masses, mobilized by Lenin, bore the whole burden of responsibility for the July days.… And the “real culprit” abandons the army, his comrades, and seeks personal safety in flight!¹⁹⁶

Sukhanov adds that Lenin’s escape was seen as all the more reprehensible in that neither his life nor his personal freedom was at risk.

Kerensky, who returned to Petrograd in the evening of July 6, was furious with Pereverzev and fired him. Pereverzev, in his view, had “lost forever the possibility of establishing Lenin’s treason in final form, supported by documentary evidence.”¹⁹⁷ This seems a spurious rationale for Kerensky’s failure, in the days that followed, to take decisive action against Lenin and his followers. If no effort was made to “establish Lenin’s treason in final form” it was from the desire to placate the socialists who had sprung to Lenin’s defense: it was a “concession to the Soviets by a Government which had already lost Kadet support and could not afford to antagonize the Soviets as well.”* This consideration, indeed, was decisive in Kerensky’s behavior in July and the months ahead.

56. Mutinous soldiers of the 1st Machine Gun Regiment disarmed: July 5, 1917.

Kerensky now replaced Lvov as Prime Minister, while retaining the portfolios of War and Navy. He began to act as a dictator and, to give visible expression to his new status, moved into the Winter Palace, where he slept in the bed of Alexander III and worked at his desk.¹⁹⁸ On July 10 he asked Kornilov to assume command of the armed forces. He ordered the disarming and dissolution of units which participated in the July events; the garrison was to be reduced to 100,000 men, the rest to be sent to the front. Pravda and other Bolshevik publications were barred from the trenches.