Leon Trotsky: The Red Army

(March 13, 1934)

[Writings of Leon Trotsky, Vol 6, 1933-1934, New York ²1975, p. 246-259]

Mankind is clearly being drawn into a new war by the so-called course of events, that is, the impersonal factor that in an emergency enables responsible politicians to establish their alibis. Two of the possible breeding places of war have already taken shape with an ominous clarity: the Far East and Central Europe In both variations, which, by the way, can easily interfuse, the Soviet Union must inevitably be drawn into the whirlpool of events. This perspective poses the following question before every reflecting individual: just what does the Red Army represent? Concurrently, far too often political passions and tendentious publicity have turned this question into an insoluble enigma.

The author of these lines participated most intimately in building and training the Red Army during the first seven years of its existence; during the next four years he followed its development either personally or from access to original sources; during the last period — that is, his five years of exile — he could follow its evolution only in the role of an attentive reader. Needless to recall, his forced exile is bound up with the author's sharply critical attitude toward the policies of the present ruling stratum of the Soviet bureaucracy.

In no way intending to disclaim his own conclusions and evaluations, the author desires, first of all, to provide the reader with a brief review of the fundamental psychological and material elements of the problem, equipping him with certain general criteria that would enable him to grasp the true essence of the Red Army from beneath the veils of the enigma.

Excluding the two predraft ages — the years, nineteen and twenty — the Red Army contains nineteen draft ages, from twenty-one to forty years; the term of active service is five years, with fourteen years of reserve service, first and second class. This implies that incorporated today within the ranks of those subject to military duty, there are still the four youngest age groups of the imperialist war; the three youngest age groups of the civil-war period — a greater number, actually, since youths of twenty and even nineteen were often drafted — and twelve age groups comprising those who had received or are receiving their military training under peacetime conditions.

Increasing at the annual rate of almost 3,000,000, the population of the USSR today is close to 170,000,000. A single draft right now comprises some 1,300,000 men. Allowing for file strictest physical and political examination, not more than 400,000 would be eliminated. Consequently, a standing army with a two-year term of service would have greatly to exceed 2,000,000 men. Such a burden, however, could not be borne by any national economy under the modern conditions of military technology.

From the very outset, the Soviet government aimed toward instituting a territorial-militia system. As early as the Eighth Congress of the Bolshevik Party, in the spring of 1919, the regulations, accepted in accordance with the military report presented by the author of this article, read as follows: "We would acquire the best army possible by creating it on die basis of the compulsory military training of workers and peasants under conditions closest to their daily routine of work. The general recovery of industry, the rise of collectivization and of the productivity of agricultural labor would create the healthiest basis for the army, the regiments and divisions of which would correspond to factories, districts, etc. … We are heading precisely toward such an army, and we shall attain it sooner or later."

But the militia, in its pure form, has its own Achilles' heel A certain number of weeks or even months are required for mobilization before the territorial army can be set in motion. During this critical period, the frontiers of the country must be protected. Thus, the correlation of a territorial-militia system with a standing army is dictated by the position of a country whose immense far-flung frontiers are at a distance of 10,000 kilometers from one another. The proportions in which these two systems supplement each other today were not arrived at immediately, and they continue to change under the influence of growing technology and experience.

The czarist standing army, comprising 1,300,000 soldiers, the bulk of whom were illiterate and poorly equipped, was dissolved completely within the 18,000,000 mobilized recruits during the war. The chain of defeats and, subsequently, the two revolutions of 1917 swept this army from the face of the earth. The Soviets had to build anew. Beginning with 100,000, the Red Army, in the course of the civil war, grew to 5,000,000. The standing, or cadre, Red Army was formed from precisely this field army, by means of consistent reductions. Today it numbers, all told, 562,000; together with the GPU troops, 620,000 soldiers, with 40,000 officers. The curtailments were made so that the army, though preserving in entirety its function of a military shield, would be capable of maximum subsequent expansion. Thus, an infantry division on peacetime basis numbers only six to seven thousand soldiers, that is, about one-third of its wartime strength. But precisely for this reason, the Red Army is not able to absorb into its ranks more than 260,000 soldiers, whose terms depend upon the nature of the service — two years in the infantry and four years in the navy. The balance of more than 600,000 recruits would have to be completely absorbed by the territorial troops, where the training term is from eight to eleven months. But the pure militia corps themselves likewise require standing cadres, about 1,500 men to a rifle division, that is, less than 10 percent of wartime strength. In order to be capable of absorbing the entire mass of the available human material, the cadres of the territorial divisions alone would have to exceed the present numerical strength of the army — 620,000 men — in which case the country once again would be deprived of its military shield. For this reason, the cadres of the territorial corps are so fixed as to absorb annually a trifle more than 200,000 men. The 300,000-400,000 remaining youths have to get their military training under the supervision of these same cadres, but outside the regular army ranks, through improvised training battalions and regiments.

Up to now, this last category of drafted men has far from received its required six-month period of military training, and only recently has it been thoroughly covered. Over and above this, youths of nineteen and twenty receive the so-called predraft training, which generally takes two months, outside the ranks of the regular army. There remains to mention field exercises, drilling the civilian population — women among the number — in chemical warfare and the rapidly developing military sports. Within this sphere, exceptionally important is the public organization, Ossoaviokhim [Friends of Defense], with a membership of 12,000,000. Predraft training, field exercises, military training outside the territorial corps and the regular army — these are the basic elements of the complex and, in a certain sense, eclectic system. During autumn months, when the alternate effective forces of the territorial divisions are assembled and when field exercises take place, up to 1,500,000 men are under the colors.

To give a detailed analysis of the Red Army, branch by branch, would be to encumber this article with a mass of approximate figures that may be obtained without much difficulty from reference books readily available. The general structure of the various military branches is determined much more directly by military technology than by the character of the social regime. A Soviet Army division approximates that average type that was developed in the advanced armies of the entire world after the war. Perhaps it may not be superfluous to point out that the general numerical strength of the peacetime Red Army is, to a certain degree, elastic. If need arises, the Commissariat of War has the right to detain soldiers for an additional period of four months. In general, the eclectic character of the system provides the opportunity to reenforce those sections that are threatened most without stepping outside the peacetime framework. Thus, there would be nothing surprising if it should transpire that, after strengthening the Amur frontiers or fortifying the approaches to a railroad, the war department had created special new military units for the defense of the strengthened positions.

As regards the probable size of a wartime army, one can give at best only the most general orienting data. In its recent estimates, the Soviet staff took as its point of departure a Germany that was disarmed and more or less friendly. Due to geographic reasons alone, there was, and is, little probability of the appearance of French or English troops in the Russian theater of war. Consequently, the blow from the West can be dealt only through the direct neighbors of the USSR — Romania, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland — with the material support of much more powerful enemies. During the initial period of war, the bordering nations could muster together 120 infantry divisions. Setting the general, hypothetical numerical strength of the enemy armies at 3,500,000 men, the mobilization plan of the Red Army would have to assure for the western frontier an initial army of approximately 4,000,000. During a single war year, for every 1,000 soldiers fighting at the front, 750 men are required to fill in the gaps. Leaving out of consideration those returning from hospitals to the front, two years of war would draw out of the country about 10,000,000 men.

Extremely conditional as these figures have been hitherto, today they must, to a great degree, remain hanging in midair; Germany is arming itself feverishly and, besides, chiefly against the USSR. On the other hand, the adjoining states of second and third rank, while they preserve in general a vacillating position, doubly seek to insure themselves by means of a rapprochement with their eastern neighbor. But the old estimates preserve some interest even now, since, in the meantime, only a very big question mark can be put at the basis of new estimates. As regards the far eastern frontier, here — during the next two or three, years, at any rate — the fighting can involve hundreds of thousands and not millions of fighters, because of all the conditions of the war arena. The combined character of its military system results in the qualitative heterogeneity of the composite elements of the Red Army and its many-millioned reserve. This fact by itself, however, does not entail any special danger; an army in action represents a huge conveyor that pulls in gradually semi-finished material and perfects it on die way. In any case, one thing is indubitable: the USSR's capacity for mobilization has as its limits not human but technical resources.

From 1928 to 1933, the official budget of the army and navy increased from 744,000,000 to 1,450,000,000 rubles, that is, almost double. These figures do not include expenditures that fall upon local Soviet organizations and public organizations — Ossoaviokhim and so forth. As regards the capital outlays for war industries, these are included in the estimates of the National Economic Commissariats, and not in those of the War Department

The indices relating to Soviet industry have become the public possession of the civilized world. True, the figures of growth that stagger the imagination have met more than once with the objection that the disproportions between the different branches of the national economy reduce greatly the coefficient of the effective functioning of the new industrial giants. The author is all the less inclined to underestimate such criticism, since he himself has advanced it more than once against the excesses of the optimistic official estimates. But in relation to the question that interests us here, serious limitations must be put upon this argument First the law that now prevails in the economy of the entire world is the profound disruption of all proportions, internal as well as international. Secondly, the general question of the equilibrium in the national economy of peacetime loses a great deal of its acuteness precisely from the viewpoint of military necessity. Mobilization, which intrudes from above into national economic life and which forcibly subordinates the latter to itself, is itself an organized disruption of all peacetime proportions. In any case, state centralization will represent tremendous superiorities for the purposes of war; and these must outweigh by far conjunctural and even organic disproportions in national economy. Concentrating in its hands economic and military plans, the Soviet government has, besides, the unrestricted opportunity to lodge in time the perquisites for future militarization into the very equipment of the most important enterprises.

For appraising the military-industrial efforts of the Soviet power during the last few years, some support can be gleaned from Stalin's announcement to the effect that the first five-year plan was fulfilled not 100 percent but 94 percent, chiefly because of the forced transfer of a considerable number of factories from peacetime production to military purposes. The official balance of the five-year plan — "94 percent of the plan" — may be challenged, and it has been challenged by the author of these lines. But what interests us here is another side of the matter. Stalin finds it possible to appraise publicly the loss that resulted from the adaptation of peacetime factories to military needs at 6 percent of the total gross production. From this we may obtain an indirect but clear characterization of the supplementary sacrifices that have been made for the defense — 6 percent is equivalent to approximately 6,000,000,000 rubles, a sum four times greater than the annual budget proper of the Red Army.

In the sphere of reequipping the army with artillery, decisive successes had been achieved even prior to 1932. During the last two years, the main efforts have been directed toward the production of trucks, armored cars, tanks and airplanes. As regards the construction of tanks, we may take as our point of departure the data relating to the production of tractors, which themselves are also very important to the army. Beginning practically at zero, tractor production has made a gigantic leap forward during the first five-year plan. At the beginning of the current year, there were already in the country more than 200,000 tractors; the present annual output of plants exceeds 40,000. The production of tanks has proceeded along a parallel course, attaining a very impressive scale, as evidenced by official reviews and maneuvers. The mobilization plans of the Red Army are based upon the requirement of thirty to forty-five tanks to each kilometer of the active front According to the statement of Voroshilov, people's commissar of army and navy, "entirely up-to-date tanks are available in sufficient numbers." We see no reason to doubt the correctness of this announcement

It is well known that, as a consequence of the World War, the navy was reduced to more than modest proportions. Out of 518,000 tons in 1917, only 82,000 remained in 1923. And even now the navy, which, it is true, has succeeded in reaching 140,000 tons, can pretend only to an auxiliary role in a sphere of defending the maritime frontiers. However, considerable efforts are being made by the war industry to strengthen the material branches of the fleet, submarines in particular.

Aviation occupies an immeasurably more important place. During the civil war, there were some 300 planes, largely antiquated and dilapidated, at the service of the Red Army. The construction of the aviation industry had to be begun practically from scratch, primarily with the aid of German technology and German engineers. In 1932, about 2,300 planes and 4,000 motors were produced for both military and civil aviation. Indubitably, this number was greatly surpassed in 1933. According to the dispatch carried by the semiofficial Le Temps, which is exceedingly chary of addressing any praise to the USSR, the delegation of French technicians that accompanied the minister of aviation, Cot, last autumn was "astonished and enthused" by the successes attained.

The French specialists had in particular the opportunity to become convinced that the Red Army was producing heavy bombers capable of a cruising radius of 1,200 kilometers; in event of a war in the Far East, all the political and military centers of Japan will be subject to a blow from the maritime provinces. Early in March die London Daily Mail carried a dispatch that one heavy bomber was being produced daily in the USSR and that measures had been taken to assure the construction of up to 10,000 planes a year. Needless to explain, the demonstrative character of this dispatch was dictated by consideration of internal British politics. But we see nothing fantastic in the figures of the Daily Mail The backward branch of aviation is the naval branch, where foreign models still predominate. But even here considerable achievements have also been gained in the last period.

In its report to the Disarmament Commission of the League of Nations, the government of the USSR specified 750 planes in the army for January 1, 1932. Taking this as a minimum figure — in any case, it is not exaggerated — and taking as our point of departure the fact that for the last three years the coefficient of growth of aviation has considerably surpassed the average coefficient set by Voroshilov for war technology as a whole, 200 percent — and this can hardly be disputed — it is not difficult to draw the conclusion that today there are more than 2,500 active planes in the army and navy. In any case, the potential productive power of the aviation industry on the side of the Soviets is immeasurably superior to that of Japan.

Aviation is indissolubly bound up with chemistry and, consequently, with that branch of industry that practically did not exist in czarist Russia. During the first five-year plan, 1,500,000,000 rubles were put into the chemical industry. In the past year, the gross bulk of the chemical products was valued at 1,750,000,000 rubles. As compared with czarist times, the production of sulfuric acid has increased five times, the production of super-phosphates as much as twenty-five times.

It is no secret that the Soviet government — incidentally, together with the governments of the whole world — did not bank for a moment upon the reiterated intentions to outlaw chemical warfare. Ever since 1921, the first Soviet laboratories producing poison gases and other substances have functioned systematically upon the basis of ever-more-extensive international information and with the assistance of qualified specialists. This work has never been halted for a single day. It is most difficult of all to venture forecasts in those most secret and ominous of spheres. Without in any way sinning against caution, it is possible, in my opinion, to state one thing: the Red Army is equipped, if not better, certainly not worse than the advanced armies of the West against any sort of catastrophic surprises in a sphere of chemical warfare — and, I may also add, bacteriological warfare.

However, the data relating to the outstanding quantitative achievements in the sphere of the production of artillery, machine guns, automobiles, tanks and planes requires an answer to the supplementary question: what is the quality of the military products? It is a matter of common knowledge that the record industrial figures were often achieved by a sharp worsening of the Soviet manufactures. Tukhachevsky, one of the Red Army commanders who pays the greatest attention to the complex demands of scientific technology, spoke at the last party congress very cautiously, but, in reality, very decisively in criticism of the belt-plan production.

The assertion of the Daily Mail purporting that the Soviet military planes are superior to the English contradicts directly the recent statements not only of Tukhachevsky but also of Voroshilov. It may be set down as an incontestable fact that the Soviet airplane motor still lags behind the best Western types.

In order to eliminate negative as well as positive exaggerations in the question relating to the quality of Soviet technology, we must not disregard certain considerations of a general character. During the first five-year plan, and to a large measure even now, the attention of the ruling circles was, and is being, concentrated upon those branches of industry that produce the means of production. In this sphere not only the quantitative but also the qualitative achievements are much higher than in the sphere of producing consumer goods. Though it may sound implausible, turbines and transformers are being made better in the USSR than shoes or wooden tables. The loom, as a general rule, is superior to the calico woven on it Under the capitalist regime, die pressure exerted by the consumers upon die entrepreneurs through die market assures the quality of the essential products. Under a planned economy, competition can be supplanted only by an organized control exerted by the consumers. The function of mass control is excessively weakened by the factual dictatorship of die Soviet bureaucracy, that of trusts among the number. The extremely low quality of the essential products indicates how far away the Soviet regime still is from the realization of those social tasks that it sets itself. Sooner or later, the struggle of the population for better-quality goods will be directed against the domination of the uncontrolled bureaucracy. But in cases where the customers, if not the consumers, are the influential grouping within the bureaucracy itself, in cases where the trusts work not for consumers but for other trusts and where, consequently, the delivery of orders is subject to specified guarantees, the quality of the products is satisfactory even now. And indubitably, the War Department is the most influential customer. Small wonder, then, that the machines of destruction are of superior quality not only to the consumer goods but also to the means of production.

Astonishing as it may seem, it is actually the case: the weak spot in the equipment of the Red Army at the present time is not guns and ammunition, not tanks, planes and gases, but horses. Parallel with the tempestuous industrialization and the feverish construction of tractors, the number of horses in the country dropped from 33,500,000 in 1928 to 16,600,000 at present — exactly one-half. The guilt for this blow to the national economy falls squarely upon the unpremeditated and unprepared policy in the sphere of collectivizing the peasant holdings. The loss of 17,000,000 horses has been far from covered as yet by 200,000-odd tractors with a total of 3.100.000 horsepower. At the same time, the demand of modern armies for horses has remained almost unchanged, despite the motorization of transport and military equipment; today, even as in the time of Napoleon, one horse is required for every three soldiers. After learning how to produce airplane motors and magnetos at home, the Soviet government found itself compelled to purchase horses abroad for the army during the last few years.

But onerous as the decline in horse breeding is to the national economy, it would be erroneous to overestimate the influence of this factor upon the course of a possible war, especially in the east A field army of 1,000,000 soldiers would require 300.000 horses. In any event this number is assured, together with a subsequent quantity necessary to make up for losses.

It should also be added that the government, even though after considerable delay, has taken a series of measures to restore the stock of horses.

The question, however, is not restricted to horses alone. During the same period and for die same reasons, the country has suffered an equally serious drop in large and small cattle and has undergone extreme shortages in foodstuffs. This has led to hasty deductions, which have been drawn frequently in the world press, about the complete inability of the Soviets to wage even a defensive war. There is no disputing that the extremely yielding attitude on the part of Soviet diplomacy toward Japan up to the autumn of last year was dictated, among other things, by the foodstuff shortage. However, as the last year has demonstrated, the acuteness of this crisis was largely due to transitional circumstances. A single good crop has immediately raised the subsistence level of the country.

But even in the event of a poor crop, the government of a country that has a population of 170,000,000 and the monopoly of the grain trade will always be able to mobilize sufficient provisions for the front — obviously, of course, to the detriment of the rest of the population; but, in general, the civilian population of all countries, in the event of a new major war, has nothing to look forward to except famine and poison gases. In any case, the military supply bases in the Far East have been considerably replenished, thanks to the bumper crop. There is no reason for assuming that the Red Army may be caught unprepared with respect to any manner of supplies.

Beginning with 1918, the Red Army drew into its ranks 50,000 czarist officers, who composed 40 percent of the commanding staff, and about 200,000 non-commissioned officers, who played a very important role in the civil war. After the victorious conclusion of the civil war, about 80,000 officers were retired into the reserve. Today former czarist officers in the Red Army do not number even 10 percent They have given place to the Red commanders who had passed through the revolution and the Soviet military schools and academies.

The party, the Young Communist League, the trade unions, the administrative staffs of the nationalized industry, the cooperatives, the kolkhozes and Sovkhozes serve to educate innumerable cadres of young administrators who become accustomed to operate with masses of people and goods and to identify themselves with the state; they constitute an invaluable reservoir for the commanding staff. Another independent reservoir is provided by the highest predraft training given to the student youth. The students are enrolled into special training battalions, sometimes regiments, outside the regular army. In the event of mobilization, these training corps can be successfully expanded into rapid training schools for the commanding staff. Each graduate of the highest educational institution must serve a term of nine months — one year in the navy and the air force — with cadre troops, after which he undergoes examination for the rank of a reserve officer. Those with secondary-school training are permitted to take similar examinations after twelve months of service — two years in the fleet The proportions of this reservoir may be estimated from the fact that the number of students of both sexes is now close to 500.000, of whom about 40,000 graduate annually, and the number of students in the secondary schools is close to 7.000.000,

The junior officers — non-commissioned officers — who number 100.000, have to be trained from among the Red Army mass, in the course of actual service, by means of a special nine-month course in regimental schools. Certain difficulties arise in educating non-commissioned officers for the territorial corps. But in addition to holding over in the cadre-army volunteers who had completed their service term, the War Commissariat, leaning upon a series of auxiliary organizations, has sufficient resources at its disposal to insure the broad and intensive training of non-commissioned cadres, including the student youth among the number.

In the literature of the emigre officers and also partly in foreign military literature, it has become customary to speak somewhat contemptuously about the strategy of the civil war. The author, who for three years had to direct the day-to-day struggle against the lack of discipline and dilettantism and all forms of anarchy that accompanied the civil war, is not at all inclined to idealize the organizational or functional level of the Red Army during those harsh years. One must not overlook, however, the fact that these were the years of a great historical baptism for the army. Individual rank-and-file soldiers, non-commissioned officers, ensigns and lieutenants rose suddenly above the mass, disclosing talent for organization and capacity for military leadership, and they tempered their wills in a large-scale struggle. These self-taught men had to attack and retreat; they dealt and suffered defeat; and ultimately they emerged with victory. Subsequently, the best among them studied long and assiduously. From among the highest-ranking officers, all of whom passed through the civil war, 80 percent graduated from academies or took special courses to perfect themselves. From among the older commanding staff, about 50 percent received the highest military schooling, the rest, secondary. Military theory enabled them to discipline their minds, but did not kill the audacity that was steeled in the impetuous maneuvers of the civil war. Today, this generation is from thirty-five to forty years old — the age at which the physical and spiritual forces attain a balance, at which daring initiative leans upon experience, but is not yet crushed by the latter.

A Red officer may obtain charge of a battalion after eight years of service; after thirteen, a regiment; and after seventeen years, a division. These terms are still further shortened for those who graduate from military academies. The French delegation was astonished by the youth of the commanding staff of Soviet aviation; there are quite a few generals of the air force barely on the wrong side of thirty. Promotions in the service are achieved only through attainments in the service; promotions on the basis of seniority have been eliminated entirely. This system assures not only the youngest commanding staff in the world but also the selection of the most active and capable from among the youth.

In the Red Army, one-half of the soldiers and 70 percent of the officers belong to the party or the Young Communist League The highest commanding staff is composed almost entirely of party members. True, in the event of mobilization, the percentage of Communists would drop considerably, but still not enough to loosen the political skeleton of the army. To what extent the present ruling party may be called Bolshevik or Communist — that is another question. But the party, such as it is, endows the army with an indubitable political unity.

So long as the czarist officers occupied the chief place among the commanding stratum, they had to be duplicated by political commissars with unrestricted powers. The system of dual power flowing from this had to be tolerated as a lesser evil, because it was necessary, first of all, that the commanding staff gain the confidence of the revolutionary army and that the latter be fused by the unity of the new doctrine. In his own time, Cromwell made the following reply to those pedants who spoke scornfully about the military training of the bulk of his officers: "And for all that, they are excellent preachers!" And with the aid of his commanders from among the artisans and merchants, Cromwell crushed the brilliant officerdom of the king. The Red Army, under its system of dual power, fared no worse against its enemies than Cromwell. Today, thanks to the fact that the officers have become Communists, and Communists, officers, the principle of single leadership so necessary in the army has been instituted. Officer and preacher have now been fused into a single person.

His blind herd instinct was the most distinguishing trait of the old Russian soldier, nurtured under the patriarchal conditions of his village world. What the West referred to, partly in praise and partly in contempt, as the "Slavic soul" was the reflection of the amorphous and barbarous Russian medievalism. The "Christ-loving” army, which cast, at one time, an aura of omnipotence around czardom, was soaked to its marrow with traditions of slavery. In times long gone by, under the conditions of a semi-feudal Europe, this army could have had its superior points as the most finished exemplar of a universally predominating type. Suvorov, the generalissimo of Catherine II and Paul, was an incontestable master of the army of serf slaves. The Great French Revolution liquidated forever the military art of old Europe and of czarist Russia.

Since that time, it is true, czarism was still able to inscribe into its history annexation of stupendous territories, but it no longer won victories over the armies of civilized nations. A chain of great defeats and upheavals was necessary to remold in their flames the national character. The Red Army could be constituted only upon this new social and psychological basis. The Red warrior differs from the czarist soldier immeasurably more sharply than did the Napoleonic grenadier from the Bourbon soldier. The cult of passivity and of submissive capitulation before obstacles has been supplanted by the cult of political and social audacity and technological Americanism. Of the Slavic soul only a literary memory has remained.

The awakened national energy manifests itself in large and small things — first of all, in the growth of culture. The insignificant percentage of illiterate recruits is declining steadily; the Red Army does not let out of its ranks a single illiterate. Inside and outside the army there is to be observed a tempestuous development of all types of sport During the current year, in Moscow alone, 50,000 workers in civilian jobs and schools received medals for marksmanship. The army is switching more and more to snowshoes, and this is of inestimable military importance because of the climatic conditions. In the sphere of parachute jumping, glider flights and aviation, the youth is attaining great successes. The Soviet record flights into the stratosphere are well remembered. These peaks serve to characterize the entire mountain range of achievements.

In order to appraise the strength of the Red Army, it is not in the least necessary to idealize things as they are. It is too soon, to say the least, to speak about the prosperity of the peoples of the Soviet Union. There still are too much want, misery and injustice and, consequently, dissatisfaction. But the notion that the Soviet national masses tend to await assistance from the armies of the Mikado or Hitler cannot be regarded as anything except delirium. Despite all the difficulties of the transitional regime, the political and moral ties between the peoples of the USSR are sufficiently strong; at any rate, they are stronger than those among her probable enemies. What has been said above does not at all imply that a war — even a victorious war — would be in the interests of the Soviet Union. On the contrary, it would throw her far back. But the preservation of peace depends, at least, on two sides. Facts must be taken as they are: not only is war not excluded but it is also almost inevitable. He who is able and willing to read the books of history will understand beforehand that should the Russian Revolution, which has continued ebbing and flowing for almost thirty years — since 1905 — be forced to direct its stream into the channel of war, it will unleash a terrific and overwhelming force.