In leisurely manner the meeting gathered momentum. A delegate from
the Russian troops on the Macedonian front spoke bitterly of their
situation. "We suffer there more from the friendship of our 'Allies'
than from the enemy," he said. Representatives of the Tenth and
Twelfth Armies, just arrived in hot haste, reported, "We support you
with all our strength!" A peasant-soldier protested against the
release of "the traitor Socialists, Mazlov and Salazkin"; as for the
Executive Committee of the Peasants' Soviets, it should be arrested
_en masse!_Here was real revolutionary talk.... A deputy from the
Russian Army in Persia declared he was instructed to demand all
power to the Soviets.... A Ukrainean officer, speaking in his native
tongue: "There is no nationalism in this crisis.... _Da zdravstvuyet_
the proletarian dictatorship of all lands!" Such a deluge of high
and hot thoughts that surely Russia would never again be dumb!
Kameniev remarked that the anti-Bolshevik forces were trying to stir
up disorders everywhere, and read an appeal of the Congress to all
the Soviets of Russia:
The All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers'
Deputies, including some Peasants' Deputies, calls upon the local
Soviets to take immediate energetic measures to oppose all
counter-revolutionary anti-Jewish action and all _pogroms,_ whatever
they may be. The honour of the Workers', Peasants' and Soldiers'
Revolution demands that no _pogrom_ be tolerated.
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