An Excursion on the Volga
On the first day of June we left on a special train for Nizhny Novgorod.
The expedition was composed of twenty-seven foreign delegates, plus the Russians that the Committee of the Third International had assigned to accompany us and to serve as interpreters and intermediaries. The man “in charge” was Lozovsky.
Among the passenger list was the entire Italian delegation, with their venerable leader D’Aragona, the fence-sitter Serrati and the amiable and listless Bombacci, who was more interested in displaying his good looks than in studying what was going on in Russia. We were also joined by Cachín, Frossard, and Rosmer and his companion, from France.
We arrived at Nizhny Novgorod on the following day, at eleven in the morning, and were met at the station by the local Soviet Committee and all the official representatives of the government.
The local garrison troops, assembled around the station, received us with military honors. As soon as the train reached the vicinity of the station a band struck up the first few bars of “The Internationale”, the government’s official song.
Once the train had come to a halt, the music stopped. But we had hardly set foot on the platform and greeted the official representatives, when the band once again played the song and all those present, except for the delegates, stood at attention in a posture of military salute.
The military seriousness of these men left us speechless.
I had been under the impression that the Soviet would come to meet us, but without pretentious displays of any kind; I would never even have dreamed of what I saw; I would never have believed such a thing was possible.
Meanwhile, the people, the crowd, remained some distance away from us, since the cordon of troops that had formed prevented them from getting any closer. I think that even if they were not prevented from doing so they would not have come any closer; but we shall refrain from commentary on this; we shall only relate the facts.
Once all the formal greetings and salutes came to an end, the scene rapidly changed and we boarded the cars that were waiting for us and left for the Volga, which a writer has referred to as “the backbone of Russia”.
The steamer was decorated and festooned with red flags and the placards of the Third International. Nor was the well known slogan, “Proletarians of all countries, unite!” missing.
Once we arrived at the steamer, we heard a tremendous noise that simultaneously sounded all around us. By order of the Soviet, all the sirens and horns of the ships and factories of the vicinity were saluting our arrival.
This din lasted for five minutes. Then, the band, which had just arrived, once again serenaded us with “The International”. Now this song was performed most majestically, since along with the sounds of the music the voices of the crowd singing the words joined in.
We were served a sumptuous banquet in the boat’s dining room.
The steamer possessed everything you could ask for with respect to comforts.
Just like the special rail cars that traveled the Russian rails in the times of Czarism, this steamer was one of the small specially outfitted steam-powered vessels that their owners used for excursions and scandalous orgies on the Volga.
The one we were using had once belonged to a famous nobleman.
Once the banquet was over, the car brought us to the city’s principal theater, where a meeting was scheduled.
The theater was full of people. Not one more person could have squeezed in there. Besides the curiosity that motivated them to hear what the delegates had to say, the local Soviet decreed that the day of our arrival would be a holiday, so that the people would come out to greet us.
Once the meeting was over, we returned to the boat, and it was decided that on the following day we would go upstream to visit the great metal factories of Sormovo; then, after visiting Sormovo, we would go downstream towards Nizhny Novgorod in order to then continue on towards Kazan, and then to Astrakhan, where Serrati proposed that we should disembark, if there was enough time.
The visit to the metal factories of Sormovo, which I believe, together with the metal factories of Putilov, in Petrograd, are the most important factories in Russia, brought us into contact, through the mediation of the official interpreters and delegates that accompanied us, with Russian workers.
Since it must be taken for granted that all our visits were always preceded by a notice from the Committee of the Third International and from the Soviet of the town we had just left, we were greeted by an official delegation in every town we visited.
Since Sormovo is not a municipality, properly speaking, but an industrial complex, some distance from any real cities, all those who live there work at its factories. When they are not working they have to leave the plant complex and the only authorities on the site are often the factory managers.
We were received by the factory manager, an enthusiastic communist who had lived for many years in Paris as an emigrant, and had returned to his country at the outbreak of the revolution.
We toured all the departments, most of which were in a very dilapidated condition, since the lack of raw materials prevented efficient work and postponed the repair of those defects that time and neglect cause.
These factories were built in order to compete with those of Putilov in the production of military goods during the Czarist era. They were unable to achieve their goal, and were redesigned for the construction of locomotives and agricultural machinery.
During the war they only made war goods, as they did at the time of our visit.
The workshops were quite impressive. Those that were in the best condition were the foundries and rolling mills and the ones that lathed and finished light artillery and machine guns. At the time of our visit they were building their first tank. They used a tank that the British had abandoned when the Red Army entered Baku as a model.
The British tank was partially dismantled and next to it was the new one they were building.
Once our tour of the factory complex was finished, a meeting was held, which was announced by the blaring of the plant’s sirens.
Since the houses and apartments of the workers were within the factory grounds, the whole population attended the meeting to hear the speakers.
The attitude displayed by the great majority of those who attended the meeting was one of complete indifference. Seeing them, one would have thought that their sole desire was to adjourn this meeting as soon as possible so they can go home to eat dinner, since it was getting late in the day.
In the faces of most of the women who attended the meeting, one could detect scornful amusement and incredulity regarding what was being said.
We noticed that those who smoked cigarettes had no cigarette rolling paper; but ingenuity found a substitute.
With a scrap of paper from a magazine or any other source—the silk band in typewriters was much sought after—they made a finely crafted and elegant cone; then, on the open end of the cone they folded, in the shape of a square, a piece of about one or two centimeters in length. In this manner they improvised a pipe that they filled with tobacco, or something similar. The narrow part of the cone was cut off and now you have made a cigar. All you need is a match, and you can smoke. I have included an account of this procedure because it is so ingenious and because it shows how necessity is the mother of invention.
After having returned to the boat, we went downstream towards Nizhny Novgorod, where the boat docked and we had dinner. Once dinner was finished, we continued downstream towards Kazan, which we were scheduled to reach by the next day.
When the steamer was ready to depart, the serenade of the sirens and whistles recommenced, which lasted until we lost sight of the town.
The journey on the Volga was one of the most wonderful experiences of my life, and if I were capable of it, if my pen had the descriptive faculty of bringing to life on paper the beauty of a trip on such a great river, I would describe it for the delight of the reader. Not possessing such abilities, allow me to forebear from breaking the spell, and restrict my efforts to the task at hand.
Our reception in Kazan was not as impressive or as ostentatious as our reception in Nizhny Novgorod, perhaps because it was a less important city.
Upon disembarking we were met by the Soviet of the town and all the communist representatives. Again we were treated to the band playing “The Internationale” and all the military formalities.
We drove through the town in official automobiles, and at night attended another meeting.
I was beginning to get sick and tired of these public formalities.
The Soviet of the town had hardly just arrived on the stage, preceded by the speakers who were designated to address the crowd, along with all the delegates, and once everyone was seated, the band attacked “The Internationale”.
The president of the local Soviet, who was the chairman of meeting, began the meeting with some opening remarks; after his opening speech, as he prepared to yield the floor to the first designated speaker, the band struck up more music and more “Internationale”.
While the foreign speakers addressed the crowd, there was no applause, because the workers did not understand us; but once their speeches were translated into Russian, every paragraph was punctuated by applause, just as in the case of the Russian speakers; then the band played “The Internationale”, which everybody had to stand there and listen to while the most fervent communists saluted with the military salute.
It was a veritable obsession. It ended up causing us such disgust that, to one degree or another, every one of us tried to sneak away if we heard there was going to be a meeting or an official reception.
That same evening we departed for Simbirsk.
Our reception at Simbirsk was just as elaborate as our reception at Nizhny Novgorod.
It was about one kilometer from the docks where we left the boat to the town, but we almost did not make it.
The cars were barely operational, but the Soviet did not have the means to repair them.
We were brought first to the social center of the Soviet, where we were treated to a snack.
After lunch we went to a large square, situated in the center of the town, in which all the troops of the garrison were assembled to attend another meeting with more music.
In the center of the military formation a stage was built in the shape of a funeral bier, about four meters high, for delivering speeches.
After watching the troops march in parade formation, some of us went to the theater and some to the Military Academy of the Red Army, where there was another meeting.
We watched a funeral procession that called our attention to a typical feature of Russia.
The casket was carried on the men’s shoulders and was open. Its lid was carried by four persons who followed behind.
It is customary not to put the lid on the coffin until it is lowered into the ground. It would seem that no one wants to deprive the deceased from basking in the sunlight until the very last minute.
It will be understood that, now that we were in Simbirsk and on an officially authorized mission, there would be no lack of allusions to what was most important. And what could be more important for Simbirsk and for the communists than recalling that we were visiting Lenin’s birthplace?
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov Lenin, concerning whom Zinoviev said that his father “was of peasant origin” and that “he worked in the Volga region as the director of public schools”, was the scion of the capital we found ourselves in at that moment.
All the speeches made on that day in Simbirsk were just so many panegyrics to the person who was the leader of the communists, “that revolutionary without peer, that man who knew how to lead the proletariat to the greatest epic achievement humanity has ever known”.
Since I was not designated to take part in either meeting being held in Simbirsk that night, because I spoke at the one held on the square, I chose to attend the theater and get in touch with the civilian elements.
The crowd was large and it was hard to even approach the theater.
When I was seated in one of the chairs on the stage, Losovsky came to see me, in order to ask me if I wanted to attend the meeting at the Military Academy, since Serrati, who was designated to speak there with another delegate, was nowhere to be found.
I accepted his invitation, and immediately went to the Military Academy. We were served some tea and a sandwich in the Russian style, and then I had a little talk with Sadul.
Later we returned to the boat, in order to depart that same evening for Samara.
Near some shacks near the docks, among the piles of goods and the remains of things that had been abandoned there, we found about one hundred families squatting on the ground in the most complete disorder. Promiscuity, filth and poverty betrayed a condition of profound suffering. I asked why they were there, and I was told that they were families who had fled to the interior of Russia the year before, due to the invasion of the White general Denikin, and that now they were returning to their homes.
They had been waiting for a boat for days, and meanwhile they had to camp out exposed to the elements and in the midst of so much filth, without anybody bothering about their awful situation.
That same night, we departed for Samara, where the official receptions, meetings and renderings of “The Internationale” were repeated.
We spent one day in Samara. From there we went to Saratov, after stopping in Marxstadt (city of Marx), which was an old German colony, first settled by the Germans who were coaxed to come here during the rein of Catherine the Great with privileges that were respected right up until the outbreak of the revolution.
In Saratov we left the river to return by train to Moscow, first passing through Tula and Ivanovo-Voznesensk.
Before we end our account of our excursion on the Volga and return to Moscow, we must mention a few things that will certainly be of interest to the reader.
Before arriving in Samara, we visited some mines that were just then being opened.
These were some very productive mines at Gips, a bituminous outcrop that was almost entirely composed of good coal.
This coal could be used as a fuel for kilns requiring a high temperature; foundries for steel and other metals, for example.
If it were to be subjected to further chemical reactions, one could obtain from this Gips coal substitutes for benzene and petroleum. The residues from this chemical process could also be utilized as a fuel for processing other minerals. The ash that results from the burning of this fuel can be used as a substitute for cement, since it has the same properties as cement.
Based on geological tests that were carried out on this coal seam, these mines almost certainly contain approximately 24 million “pounds” of coal. If one takes into account the fact that one Russian “pound” is equal to sixteen kilograms, one will get an idea of the immense wealth of this mine.
We passed through some Moslem villages, colonized centuries ago by Turkish immigrants, which still uphold their religious practices and customs, and we wanted to know what they thought about the Revolution.
The Revolution means nothing to these people. To the contrary, they complained a great deal about the government, because it did not tolerate the teaching of the Koran in school. They wanted their children to learn how to read; but only the Koran, they were not concerned about anything else.
We asked them if they were satisfied with the distribution of lands authorized by the government.
“Here,” they told us, “the land is the same as before. Everyone has what they need and they do not want more.”
The poverty of these people, who live in the most fertile part of all central Russia, as their villages are nestled in the area known as the “black earth” region, which produces most of the wheat consumed in Russia, was something that lacerates the soul.
Material poverty and spiritual poverty.
Their houses, like the people themselves, had a poverty-stricken, primitive and rudimentary look. They had no other wish than to learn how to read the Koran and vegetate in poverty.
We also visited some day care schools in the vicinity of Samara, where we were received with the same sumptuousness that characterized all our other receptions.
We were treated to a banquet and the little boys and girls declaimed speeches for the occasion.
I inquired about the rules that govern the admission of children to the day care schools. In these public day care schools, it would be logical to assume that there would be no admissions standards. I was told that all the boys and girls were the children of communists; since it was the communists who were responsible for the revolution, it was their offspring who were selected to enjoy preferential treatment. And in the day care schools, just as in every other Government institution, you are not admitted unless you are an active communist—a member of the party—and this applies to all jobs that have a limited number of openings. Where there are lots of jobs, non-communists are accepted.
We also visited the Chuvashia Republic, one of the many Republics that comprise the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic.
After we were told about the distinguishing characteristics of the country, we asked about the nature of the autonomy that these Republics enjoyed within the centralist Russian regime.
Our hosts responded with a full explanation. The Republics were autonomous, but they were obliged to abide by all the orders, laws and decrees proclaimed by the Soviets, and were not permitted to modify them in any way.
They were also obliged to adapt the laws and decrees issued from Moscow to the economic, social and political conditions of each country; to pay taxes, at the same rate and under the same terms and conditions as the other provinces; to deliver to the Red Army the men requested by the latter and to abide by the discipline of the Communist Party and the dictatorship of the proletariat.
Since none of these explanations seemed to us to depict the autonomy they supposedly had and that they said that they enjoyed, we persisted in our objections and demands for clarification, and we came to the conclusion that all the autonomy they talked about was reduced to the fact that they could nominate residents of their respective Republics as candidates for the positions of local officials and authorities, although the number of each and their actual power were determined in Moscow. In other words, there was no autonomy.
We wanted to know about the effects of the Revolution, not so much in its political aspect, but with respect to the distribution of the landed estates to the peasants, since this was a preeminently agricultural region.
Since we were speaking with the scions of this Republic, they told us that the decisions of the Government in Moscow, with respect to the land question, had produced appalling effects and had led to worse living conditions than those they had previously enjoyed during the times of Czarism.
“Here,” they told us, “in this country, since our ancestors first settled it, there was a custom that involved periodic redistribution of all the arable land. Every three years, after discussion in meetings and conclaves of neighbors, the land was redistributed, and to prevent someone from always being disadvantaged compared to others who received good land or land very close to the village, due to his being given a share of land that was relatively infertile or far from the village, the distribution was carried out in such a way that no one would receive the lands he cultivated during the previous cycle in the new repartition. Under this system, each farmer took turns cultivating good or bad lands, close to or far from the village, as the periodic redistribution determined.”
“Now, all of this has disappeared. The man who seized or was given good land or a parcel close to the village during the redistribution following the revolution, lives better, works less and obtains a greater profit than the man who was given infertile land or a parcel far from the village.”
“We see instances where lands that were previously cultivated now lie fallow, because they are far from the nearest village or produce a low yield, and the farmers who own them, having no hope of improving their condition by means of a subsequent re-distribution, abandon them and move away. And this does not even take into the account the many farmers disgusted with the current system.”
“Why do you not petition Moscow?”, we asked them. “Avail yourselves of your autonomous rights. Maybe you would be successful if you can get them to respect your autonomy.”
“We already tried,” we were told; “but we achieved nothing. And then, we waited so long for even the most cursory response, that it would have been better to leave things as they were! Besides, party discipline and our duty to prevent the counterrevolution from lifting its head obliged us to yield and to be patient with regard to many issues.”
In Saratov we visited a communist agricultural colony; we would call it a State Farm here in Spain. We went there hoping to see an instance of real communism being established.
This is what we were able to ascertain concerning its organization:
The “Communist Colony” was an old farm owned by one of the wealthiest landowners in the region.
Immediately after the revolution the Soviet of Saratov seized the farm and appointed a director and an agronomic expert to manage its operation.
The permanent employees earned a wage of two thousand rubles per month in addition to the standard food ration. The casual laborers received the ration and 75 rubles per day.
The director could fire any worker whenever he thought it was advisable, without giving any reason, and with only eight days notice, and the workers were obliged to work eight hours a day like any industrial job.
Shocked by this information, I told Lozovsky that there was nothing communist about this, and that it was just like any of the other enterprises I had seen up until then. He responded that it was an experiment in communism. I was confused by this answer and by this experiment in communist organization.
And keep in mind that in order to visit the “Communist Colony” and to have an opportunity to study its organization, I had to travel about twenty kilometers in a truck, on an almost impassable road.
In Saratov, because it was an important industrial center, and also because it is a transport hub for all the products of a region rich in grain, which earned it classification as a population center of the first order, the gala receptions never ended.
Visits to government offices; military parades and marches; visits to factories and industrial plants, speeches, meetings, tea and the ubiquitous musical band that never left us alone when we arrived in any city with its “Internationale” blaring away like there was no tomorrow.
The two days we spent in Saratov were very busy and profitable ones. Only one thing was lacking: that the people, the real people, not the people who played the parts of extras and chorus during our public appearances, receptions and rallies, would have really participated in the celebrations and joined in the proclamations of contentment and the brouhaha that seemed to accompany our presence.
In Saratov, as I pointed out above, we left the Volga, for my part with great reluctance, and took the train, the same one that we took from Moscow to Nizhny Novgorod, which had been sent to Saratov to pick us up.
We departed on the second day from the station, at night, towards Tula. It would still be many days before the Congress would begin. We were therefore in no hurry to get to Moscow so we chose to pay a visit to Tula.
Tula is also an important industrial center. Its industries are largely devoted to military production and this is also where samovars are made.
We visited a cartridge factory, whose workers were bitter and resolute anti-Bolsheviks.
Three months prior to our visit, they staged a strike which they lost; in retaliation the Bolsheviks imposed repressive conditions when they returned to work, and also condemned thirty-five strikers, who were considered the ringleaders of the conflict, to penalties that varied from one to eight years in prison.
It is necessary to point out—always in the interest of the most absolute impartiality and so that the reader’s judgment should not be distorted—that the case of these workers given prison sentences for striking at the munitions factories of Tula should not be taken at face value, or as a stick with which to beat the Bolsheviks.
We shall say, without beating around the bush, that the penalties imposed by the Soviet seemed to us harsh and disproportionate; but we must also say that the strike was unjustified, as well as that it had a counterrevolutionary effect at the time.
The workers in the munitions factories of Tula, even under the Czars, enjoyed privileges and advantages that the workers in other factories did not possess. These advantages were also respected by the Soviet Government, insofar as they were consonant with the possible range of wages and working conditions that were maintained for the rest of the workers.
And enjoying these advantages, finding themselves in a position of superiority with respect to the rest of the workers throughout Russia, what justification can be given for this strike?
But there is one other factor that makes the circumstances surrounding this strike all the more tragic.
I have said that the munitions factories of Tula are the most important military plants in all of Russia, which is to say that they are the only factories in Russia that manufacture cartridges, bayonets and small arms for the Army, for which items they were the sole suppliers. In these factories, they decided to declare the strike and stage the conflict at the very moment when the whole world was anticipating the Polish threat to invade Russia. Would such a strike not leave the Red Army defenseless against the enemy?
We shall always say that this strike cannot be defended under such circumstances.
It could not be justified by the need for reforms, since the situation of these workers was better than that of any other workers in all of Soviet Russia. On the other hand, their strike could have led to the invasion of Russia by reactionary armies.
One can always label as excessive the penalties imposed on the thirty-five workers thought to be ringleaders of the strike; but their conduct, like that of their comrades, was neither appropriate nor just.
The commander-in-chief of the Red Army forces that guarded, and then suppressed the strike at these munitions plants was an anarchist, a member of one of the existing anarchist groups.
We wanted to talk to this anarchist; but since he did not know how to speak French, and we did not know how to speak Russian or English, which were the languages he spoke, we were unable to ask him any questions about what really happened during this strike.
Thanks, however, to a young man from the city who spoke fluent French, we were nonetheless able to get a completely different impression of the country’s situation.
The way this young man expressed himself immediately left us in no doubt that we were speaking with a person who was not at all favorable towards Bolshevism and the revolution itself, due to the fact that his account suffered from the same partiality as those of the government officials and government sympathizers, but in a totally opposite sense.
He confirmed the opinion I had formed regarding what the Russian people, the people of the villages and cities we had visited, really thought about us. He said that we were just a handful of individuals that the Bolsheviks had recruited in Europe and paid a large sum of money to play the part of delegates from the socialists and communists of the world, and that is why the people kept their distance from us and privately laughed at the farce we all represented. This impression was later confirmed by many people I would later talk to in Moscow. It was not, then, an invention of my interlocutor; it was true that all, or most, of the population thought in precisely these terms. From Tula—since we still had some time—we went to Ivanovo-Voznesensk, a famous center of the textile industry, known as the Russian Manchester.
We shall omit a description of all the official receptions, which were also quite dazzling, to avoid boring the reader with repetition.
In the office of the city Soviet, we had an opportunity to speak with the entire official cadre of the city, whom we questioned regarding the economic and political situation of the region.
“The economy,” we were told, “is in extremely bad shape. Of the hundreds of textile factories in the city and the province, barely two-dozen are in operation, and even these are not operating at full capacity. Most of the textile workers have had to emigrate, and take other jobs, if they can find any positions, or else suffer terribly from hunger and poverty due to a lack of resources.”
With regard to politics, the members of the Soviet boasted that Ivanovo-Voznesensk was one of the most solid bastions of Bolshevism.
“Here, in our city,” we were told, “the first Russian Soviet was formed in 1905, during that great revolutionary movement.”
“Even though no political party had resolved to create the Soviet, we took the initiative.”
“Now, from our Soviet, various comrades have been appointed to preside over the Soviets of several important regions of Russia, Saratov among others. This is proof of the confidence the party has in us; and we, obeying their orders, demonstrate the same degree of loyalty in return.”
In response to one of our questions, concerning whether the Bolshevik elements were predominant in 1905 in Ivanovo, they answered in the negative; at that time, the Mensheviks and the Social Revolutionaries were dominant in Ivanovo. “Even quite recently,” they claimed, “in the revolutions of March and November of 1917, they were in the majority here; but the communist party has gotten rid of them. Some have become communists; others have left the city. We are very strict with these counterrevolutionaries.”
We left Ivanovo-Voznesensk on that same night and on the following day, July 14, at eleven in the morning we arrived in Moscow.
During the fourteen days of our trip, we covered hundreds of kilometers, we visited Russian cities, villages and hamlets, we participated in more than thirty rallies and we saw some of the fundamental errors of Russian communism and the tremendous defects of communist centralization.
But what made the biggest impression on me was my visit to the day care school in Simbirsk.
When I found out that only the children of communists had the right to attend the day care schools, because their parents were the ones who made the revolution, the image of a bourgeoisie that was just as or even more cruel than the one that had been overthrown, and always more eager to pursue its own interests because it was new on the scene and needed to establish its predominance, arose in my mind with the rapidity of these visions that would never be erased from my mind. How much I would prefer to have been mistaken! How much I would have preferred that this could be no more than the work of a fevered hallucination experienced due to the prejudices that living in a capitalist regime had imposed on my thought process!
I must also mention a public marketplace, where all kinds of commercial transactions took place, in money and in kind, next to the docks at Simbirsk.
Most of the dealers were of Moslem origin, inhabitants of the region. The market sold everything. Not in great abundance; but everything was there.
I myself bought some of the sandals they wear in this country, for which I paid eight thousand rubles, and these were the cheapest ones I could find.
Bread, flour, meat, dried beans, hardware and housewares; you could find everything in this weekly marketplace, although the most abundant goods were clothing and, especially, shoes.
Let us say it again and once and for all, that the filthiness and the decrepitude we observed in the streets of Petrograd, and which we had only just glimpsed in Moscow, was the dominant note in all the other cities and towns we visited.
In Saratov it was indescribable. The piles of garbage and household wastes of every description were ubiquitous. There were streets that were almost impassable due to the stench.
Some groups of delegates, having just turned down a street, would turn around immediately and beat a hasty retreat. Such was the stench and the fetid odors that it was hard to breathe.
If the streets had not been so narrow and the houses so small (of one or two floors at the highest) it would not have been impossible to live in these neighborhoods.
Many houses were partially collapsed or looked like they were ready to collapse, due to an inability to repair them as a result of a shortage of materials, and this inability and the fact that many houses had been confiscated by the local Soviets, but were still uninhabitable, forced many families to live crowded together in small spaces, since they could not obtain the permission of the local Soviet to move into a house, and had no other way to get one; and the cost of this permission was unspeakable.
We were most interested in finding out whether the people were eager to learn how to read and write; we were assured that they were; although the results obtained so far were not as brilliant as they were in Moscow and Petrograd. Most people, tormented by the scarcity of food and forced to scrounge for their daily survival, relegated culture to a secondary concern.
The very human desire to preserve one’s own existence takes priority over the merits of cultural improvement.
One more observation that is most interesting: we never once saw a drunk on the streets. And everyone knows how much damage alcoholism has inflicted on Russia; Bolshevism can boast of this victory.
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