A Forgotten American Socialist's Indictment Of Russian Communism That Shaped American Policy

[EasyAce]

By Spyridon Mitsotakis
https://www.dailywire.com/news/24788/forgotten-american-socialists-indictment-bolshevik-spyridon-mitsotakis

. . . By November of 1917, the Bolshevik party was able to accumulate enough support in the capital of
Petrograd to seize power by force.

An outraged American socialist, John Spargo, wrote in his 1919 book Bolshevism: The Enemy of Political and
Industrial Democracy (the first anti-Soviet book in the English language):

The defenders and supporters of the Bolsheviki have made much of the fact that
there was very little bloodshed connected with the successful Bolshevik uprising
in Petrograd. That ought not to be permitted, however, to obscure the fundamental
fact that it was a military coup d'etat, the triumph of brute force over the will of the
vast majority of the people. It was a crime against democracy. That the people
were passive, worn out, and distracted, content to wait for the Constituent
Assembly, only makes the Bolshevik crime appear the greater.

Let us consider the facts very briefly. Less than three weeks away was the date set
for the Constituent Assembly elections. Campaigns for the election of representatives
to that great democratic convention were already in progress. It was to be the most
democratic constitutional convention that ever existed in any country, its members
being elected by the entire population, every man and woman in Russia being entitled
to vote. The suffrage was equal, direct, universal, and secret.

Apologists for the Bolsheviki insisted that they "resorted to desperate tactics because nothing effective was
being done to realize the aims of the Revolution, to translate its ideals into fact."

Nonsense, says Spargo. "Quite the contrary is true. The Bolshevik insurrection was precipitated by its leaders
precisely because they saw that the Provisional Government was loyally and intelligently carrying out the
program of the Revolution, in co-operation with the majority of the working-class organizations and their
leaders" . . .

. . . Russia as an American Problem accomplished two things. First, it pissed off Lenin, who complained about
it in a secret speech. But more importantly, it caught the eye of Secretary of State, Bainbridge Colby. He wrote
to Spargo: "Your reasoning is as tight and close as that of a first-class lawyer, and your use of citations gives
your chapters the power of a brief."

Spargo responded with a series of policy recommendations for the Woodrow Wilson administration to adopt
toward Russia. To Spargo's surprise, his declarations were adopted almost word-for-word. It's key principal —
the refusal to recognize the Communists as the legitimate rulers of Russia — became United States policy, and
remained so until Franklin Delano Roosevelt recognized Stalin's regime in 1933 (on the advice of the infamous
Walter Duranty of the New York Times).

The battle against the Soviet Union became the central cause of John Spargo's life, leading him out of Socialism
and into Conservatism. By the time he died, he was a supporter of Barry Goldwater.