... declares: in this moment those elements of
the Russian nation, those groups and parties who have dared to lift
their hands against the free will of the Russian people, at the same
time threatening to open the front to Germany, must be liquidated
with decision!...
"Let the population of Petrograd understand that it will encounter a
firm power, and perhaps at the last moment good sense, conscience and
honour will triumph in the hearts of those who still possess them...."
All through this speech, the hall rang with deafening clamour. When
the Minister-President had stepped down, pale-faced and wet with
perspiration, and strode out with his suite of officers, speaker
after speaker from the Left and Centre attacked the Right, all one
angry roaring. Even the Socialist Revolutionaries, through Gotz:
"The policy of the Bolsheviki is demagogic and criminal, in their
exploitation of the popular discontent. But there is a whole series
of popular demands which have received no satisfaction up to now....
The questions of peace, land and the democratization of the army
ought to be stated in such a fashion that no soldier, peasant or
worker would have the least doubt that our Government is attempting,
firmly and infallibly, to solve them....
"We Mensheviki do not wish to provoke a Cabinet crisis, and we are
ready to defend the Provisional Government with all our energy, to
the last drop of our blood-if only the Provisional Government, on all
these burning questions, will speak the clear and precise words
awaited by the people with such impatience.
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