You have heard the
statements of two representatives of the Army committees; these
statements would have some value _if their authors had been
representatives of the Army_-" Wild applause. _"But they do not
represent the soldiers!"_ Shaking his fist. "The Twelfth Army has
been insisting for a long time upon the re-election of the Great
Soviet and the Army Committee, but just as your own _Tsay-ee-kah,_
our Committee refused to call a meeting of the representatives of
the masses until the end of September, so that the reactionaries
could elect their own false delegates to this Congress. I tell you
now, the Lettish soldiers have many times said, 'No more
resolutions! No more talk! We want deeds-the Power must be in our
hands!' Let these impostor delegates leave the Congress! The Army is
not with them!"
The hall rocked with cheering. In the first moments of the session,
stunned by the rapidity of events, startled by the sound of cannon,
the delegates had hesitated. For an hour hammer-blow after
hammer-blow had fallen from that tribune, welding them together but
beating them down. Did they stand then alone? Was Russia rising
against them? Was it true that the Army was marching on Petrograd?
Then this clear-eyed young soldier had spoken, and in a flash they
knew it for the truth.... _This_ was the voice of the soldiers-the
stirring millions of uniformed workers and peasants were men like
them, and their thoughts and feelings were the same.
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