Leon Trotsky: Telegram to Lenin

[Copy. Telegram. True Copy. (File of outgoing communications for 1918) The Trotsky Papers 1917-1922, edited and annotated by Jan M. Meijer, The Hague. 1964, Vol. 2., p. 219, 221]

From: Kozlov

27/XII. No. 1526

To; Moscow – Chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars, Lenin.

All news from on the spot testifies that the extraordinary levy has extremely upset the local population and is having a disastrous effect on military formations. This is what the majority of the guberniyas say. In view of the bad position with regard to food it would appear essential to call a halt to enforcing the extraordinary levy or to radically mitigate its effect, at least in respect of the families of those called up.

Chairman of the Military Revolutionary Council, Trotsky