1917 Leon Trotsky

It has been decided and laid down that socialism cannot be introduced in Russia. This was proved, in near-Marxist fashion, by Mr. Milyukov at a meeting of the June 3 diehards, following the ministerial Menshevik Rabochaya Gazeta.And it was subscribed to by the largest party in Russia in general and in the Congress of Soviets in particular, the Socialist-Revolutionary Party, which, besides being the largest party, is also the party with the greatest ideological (disinterested) fear of seeing the revolution develop towards socialism.

Minister Peshekhonov uttered many beautiful and high-sounding phrases in his speech. He said that "we must divide equitably all we have", that "the resistance of the capitalists has apparently been broken", and many more phrases of that kind.

“The great withdrawal of the bourgeoisie from the government." This is what the main speaker of the Executive Committee, in a report he submitted last Sunday, called the formation of the coalition government and the entry of former socialists into the Ministry.

“Comrades, the resistance of the capitalists has apparently been broken.”

Plekhanov’s Yedinstvo (which even the Socialist-Revolutionary Dyelo Naroda justly calls a newspaper at one with the liberal bourgeoisie) has recently recalled the law of the French Republic of 1793 relating to enemies of the people.

Is there a way to peace without an exchange of annexations, without the division of spoils among the capitalist robbers?

There is: through a workers’ revolution against the capitalists of the world.

A note by Lenin in response to an attack in the Novoye Vremya paper. First published in Pravda No. 74 June 20 (7), 1917.

That the new coalition government is precisely this sort of alliance between the capitalists and the Narodnik and Menshevik leaders is far from obvious to all. Perhaps it is not obvious even to the Ministers belonging to these parties. Yet it is a fact.

First published in Pravda No. 74, June 19 (6), 1917.

It is a lie to say that “the Robert Grimms and the Rakovskys" have “collaborated” with the Bolsheviks (with whom they have never agreed) in any way.

"The laugh is on you, gentlemen of the S.R. and Menshevik fold! You are laughing at your own policy of trust in the capitalists and the government of the capitalists!"

"Bolsheviks are calling the proletariat, the poor peasants and all the toiling and exploited people to a conscious revolutionary struggle, and not to riots and disturbances."

Our paper is to be the organ of revolutionary socialism. Such a declaration would have been sufficient a short time ago. At present these words have lost value. For, both socialism and revolution are now professed by such elements, such classes, as, in their social nature, belong to the camp of the enemy whom we cannot conciliate.

"Dual power still exists. The only way out of the present situation is to have all power pass to the Soviets."

"The Russian ministeriable Narodniks and Mensheviks are in a hopeless muddle; every passing day adds to their self-exposure."