Prepare for the new battles, our comrades-in-arms!

(may need the editing of  translation)

Manifesto of the Russian Social-Democratic Labor Party to all working people, to all workers, soldiers and peasants of Russia

August 12, 1917

Comrades!

Five months have passed since the revolutionary proletariat and troops overthrew the rule of the whip and the stick and put Nikolai Romanov under lock and key.

The worker threw off the chains in which his police order was chained. The soldier became a free citizen. Among the world's barbarity and brutality sounded the voice of the Russian revolution: "Peace and the brotherhood of nations."

The proletariat was ahead of the revolutionary fighters. From the very beginning, the Russian proletariat understood that for the success of the Russian revolution, for the cause of peace, for the cause of freedom, mutual support of the workers of all countries is necessary, an international uprising of the enslaved European bloodthirsty proletarians is necessary. His battle cry was the cry "Long live the international revolution!"

International capital responded to this call with a conspiracy against the Russian revolution. The Russian revolution meant for him a breakthrough of the imperialist front. The Russian revolution threatened to ignite the fire of the world uprising, to shatter and break the rule of capital, to plunge the golden calf into the dust.

For international stockbrokers and bank managers, the task was to stifle the Russian revolution at all costs, at all costs, to destroy its forces, to decapitate the international proletariat, to exterminate its party.

The Russian invaders entered into a close alliance with them, connected with secret threads. From the very first days of the revolution, the Russian financial bourgeoisie and its party, the so-called "People's Freedom Party", signed an agreement with predators of Western European imperialism. The Russian bourgeoisie had nothing against the overthrow of the tsar's autocracy, whose rule made it impossible even to wage war (this was hampered by the theft and debauchery of the tsarist ministers). But the further course of the revolution threatened her with innumerable "horrors": the revolution was to transfer the land to the peasants, curb capital, arm the workers, and put an end to the aggressive policy. The dirty secret treaties of the bloody czar swore allied bankers and loyalties to the common cause of seizing and strangling the Russian revolution. The entry into the war of America inspired the allied imperialists even more. They knew perfectly well the value of this "great democracy", which executes the electricity of its socialists, the small nations smother with weapons in their hands and talk about eternal peace with the mouths of their unprecedented cynicism diplomats. American billionaires who filled their cellars with gold, minted from the blood of dying in the fields of devastated Europe, added their weapons, their finances, their counterintelligence and their diplomats in order not only to smash their German colleagues in international robbery, but also to tighten up the remote a noose around the neck of the Russian revolution.

The Russian bourgeoisie proved to be connected with the capitalists of Europe and America and with common goals and a heavy gold chain, the ends of which converge in the banking houses of London and New York. So the capitalist bloc was organized against the revolution.

The petty bourgeoisie of Russia, the peasants' tops, part of the deceived workers and poor peasants did not see and did not want to see the whole danger of a capitalist conspiracy. Their parties, the Mensheviks and the Socialist-Revolutionaries, who have a majority in the Soviets, followed the big bourgeoisie. They took the standpoint of defense, not realizing that the bourgeoisie of all countries is deceiving the workers with this word and talking about defense, thinking about seizures. They did not dare take all power into their own hands and entrusted it to the bourgeoisie. They cordially greeted the "social-patriotic" agents of Western European and American capital, these deceivers and poisoners of the people. Every day they became more and more entangled in networks that placed international capital.

Only the revolutionary proletariat and its party, supported by the poorest peasants and soldiers, sounded the alarm. The Party of proletarian socialism, the party of the international revolution, steadily and consistently tore up the deceitful mask of peace-lovers from the predators of imperialism. She exposed all the intrigues of the bourgeoisie, she criticized the cowards, the indecision and helplessness of the Menshevik-Socialist-Revolutionary tactics. It insisted with all perseverance that the authorities should be completely transferred to the hands of democracy, a break with the capitalists of all countries, and the publication of all secret treaties concealed from the people. It demanded the immediate transfer of land to the peasants, workers' control over production, a universal peace concluded by the peoples themselves. "Bread, peace, freedom" - was written on her red banner.

In a country that was writhing in the grip of a three-year war, an unprecedented economic and financial crisis was growing like an avalanche. The hard hammer of war crushed and blotted out the surviving remnants of accumulated national labor. The country was becoming more and more like a paralyzed day by day. The destruction of the productive forces, the barbarous plunder of them, led to the collapse. War, like a huge vampire, sucked all the juices, took away all the forces. No fuel, no raw materials, no bread. The specter of hunger began to walk through the cities, through the poor quarters. The bottomless abyss of destruction opened up before the country.

Capital consciously pushes people into this abyss.

The big bourgeoisie aggravated the crisis, intensified anarchy, shutting down enterprises, disorganizing production. The cry of patriotism and the homeland, defamatory of the revolutionary workers, the united syndicators according to the plan worked out at their secret meetings, persistently and systematically impeded the course of production, in order to create chaos and confusion, putting the blame on the workers, seizing all power in their hands with tenacious paws. On the ruins of the national economy, reduced by the spasm of war, on the bones of the myriad of small, ruined hosts, the hyena of big capital, greedily grabbing fabulous profits on supplies, speculating on the hunger of the impoverished masses, conducted their insolent policy of attacking the working class. In the lower classes, a deep discontent and indignation with capital and its ministers was brewing. The murmuring of the million labor armies became more and more audible.

They were answered by the policy of the offensive. The united capital of the Allies pulled down its forces to storm the Russian revolution. English and American capitalists, who as creditors became masters of Russian life, united with their faithful Russian servants, decided to drive a deliberately unprepared army into battle. The outcome of the battle was not important to them. It was important for them to disrupt the truce, to resume military operations, and to strengthen the power of commanders. They needed to harness the exhausted army again in the chariot of war. With the roar of the cannons, they had to drown out the thunderclaps of the class struggle and the revolution.

The Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks approved the policy of the offensive and thereby issued with their heads both themselves and the revolution. Constant conciliation with the imperialists, the lack of any hint of decisiveness, they gave themselves captive to avid predators. With their own hands, they handed over power to the counter-revolutionary military clique. And the jubilant Aces of the bank and the stock exchange brazenly challenge now democracy, openly declaring their desire to wage war "to the end," that is, without end, until they burst from the pressure of the gold of the cellar of American Morgans until bloody dew rises through the fields of the torn earth.

The bourgeoisie has temporarily achieved its goal. Where are the proud calls for the brotherhood of all peoples? Where are the fluttering banners of the world revolution? These calls the Socialist-Revolutionaries and the Mensheviks replaced with calls for the continuation of the massacre. These banners spit and blackened the servants of the bourgeoisie, they gave them to the desecration of the heroes of the offensive, they mixed them with mud.

The growth of indignation and indignation was a response to this policy by the proletariat and advanced soldiers. And the stormy, spontaneous explosion of this indignation led workers and soldiers to the streets when the Cadet ministers, who received a secret report about the collapse of the offensive, hastened to leave and put all responsibility on their "socialist" servitors. On July 3-4, the leaders of petty-bourgeois "socialism" faced the leaders of the petty-bourgeois "socialism", to the Soviet majority a huge historical question: with whom are they with the proletariat against counter-revolution or counter-revolution against the proletariat? These days it was necessary to decide. It was necessary to choose clearly and definitely. And they chose, these ministerial socialists: against the workers and soldiers who put on their banner the slogan "All power to the Soviets!". The leaders of the Soviets summoned the restraint troops. Confused in compromise with the counter-revolution, They supported this counter-revolution and sent rifle barrels against the workers' battalions, against the color of the revolutionary forces, against the party of the proletariat. Only this party, our party, remained standing. Only she tried to make the speech peaceful and organized, going along with the masses. It was her revolutionary duty. This was demanded by her revolutionary honor.

The Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries, fulfilling the will of the bourgeoisie, disarmed the revolution and thereby armed the counter-revolution. The bourgeoisie gave them the opportunity to engage in a dirty business of restraint and defeat. With their tacit consent, the frenzied dogs of the vile bourgeois slander against the glorious leaders of our Party were sent down from their chains. They were the ignominious and shameful bargaining of the heads of the proletarian leaders, betraying them, one by one, to the enraged bourgeois. They gave up the heart of the revolution, which knocked on the whole world, the capital of Russia, at the mercy of the cadets and Cossacks. With their assistance, Pravda was defeated and a frantic campaign began against the left flank of the revolution.

The July days opened a new page in history. For the first time a decisive victory was won by the counter-revolution and the power passed to the bourgeoisie and the military headquarters. Until then there was a dual power. Until then, tremendous power was in the hands of the Soviets. Behind them stood the armed masses of soldiers and workers, a free people. Now the Soviets have weakened themselves. Disarming the workers, disbanding the regiments of the revolution, having caught up with the Cossacks in the center, they bound themselves hand and foot, they turned into a pendant of the bourgeois government. The "socialist" ministers were shut up. They were put on the chain by their bourgeois colleagues. They are used when they need to be pacified, they are spit on when they try to protest.

Having transferred power to the counter-revolution and betraying the revolution, the leaders of the petty bourgeoisie, the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks, began to sign almost all the counter-revolutionary measures of the government. The red flag of freedom is lowered. In its place the black flag of the death penalty has risen. The shooting of soldiers and workers, censorship, judicial slander, counterintelligence, arrests, restoration of hated tsarist articles against political crimes, dirty protection slander - all the delights of the old regime are put into motion by the new government of "saving the revolution", the government arresting revolutionaries and issuing tsarist ministers and provocateurs , postponing the convocation of the Constituent Assembly and gathering today instead of him a counter-revolutionary "Moscow meeting" of the aces of industry and trade. " Having strengthened its position within the country, the counter-revolution passed to the old methods in the rest. Against the Ukrainians there is a decisive attack not only by decrees, but by cuirassiers. Dissolve the Finnish Sejm and threaten armed force with the very right to self-determination, which was so solemnly announced in official declarations. A dark intrigue is being waged through government envoys against the meeting of even the most moderate "socialists" in Stockholm.

The formula "the world without annexations" was put in the archive, and instead of it appeared the Milyukov-Guchkov "war to the full victory". Kerensky proclaims the slogan "to destroy the Bolsheviks" and sends "on behalf of the Russian people" a telegram to the closest relative of Wilhelm Hohenzollern and Nikolai Romanov to the English King George. The slogan of the revolution "Peace to huts, war to palaces" is replaced by the slogan "Peace to palaces, war to huts".

But the counterrevolution triumphs early in victory. Bullets do not feed the hungry. Cossack whip does not erase the tears of mothers and wives. An arcana and a loop do not dry the sea of ​​suffering. The bayonet does not reassure the peoples. General shouts do not stop the collapse of industry.

Underground forces of history work. Deep discontent is brewing in the depths of the masses. Peasants need land, workers need bread, and both need peace. Petrels flew all over the globe. In England, the workers are starting an open struggle for curbing capital, in France, soldiers are agitating for peace and revolution, in Germany - continuous ferment and strikes, in America, the bourgeoisie passes to the execution of socialists raising the banner of the struggle against the war. Spain is enveloped in the flames of the revolutionary struggle of classes. Financiers of all countries are already arriving at secret congresses to discuss the general question of an impending storm. For they already hear the iron stride of the workers' revolution. For they already see the inevitable.

In this battle, our party comes with deployed banners. She held them firmly in her hands. She did not incline them to rapists and dirty slanderers, to traitors to the revolution and servants of capital. It will continue to hold them high, fighting for socialism, for the brotherhood of nations. For she knows that a new movement is coming and the hour of the old world is coming.

Prepare for the new battles, our comrades-in-arms! Stoically, courageously and calmly, without succumbing to a provocation, save forces, build into battle columns! Under the banner of the party, the proletarians and soldiers! Under our banner, the oppressed villages!

Long live the revolutionary proletariat! 

Long live the alliance of the workers and the rural poor! 

Down with the counter-revolution and its "Moscow Conference"! 

Long live the world working revolution! 

Long live socialism! 

Long live the Russian Social-Democratic Labor Party (Bolsheviks)!

The Sixth Congress of the Russian Social-Democratic Labor Party (Bolsheviks)

Подробнее: http://comstol.info/2012/08/biblioteka/4369