Collected Works of V. I. Lenin - Vol. 26 - From Marx to Mao

THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION AND CIVIL WAR37a union of the proletariat with the peasantry can give peaceto people worn out by a most unjust and criminal war,when that union can give the peasantry all the land, inthat country, at that exceptional moment in history, apeaceful development of the revolution is possible andprobable if all power is transferred to the Soviets. Thestruggle of parties for power within the Soviets may proceedpeacefully, if the Soviets are made fully democratic, and“petty thefts” and violations of democratic principles, suchas giving the soldiers one representative to every five hundred,while the workers have one representative to everythousand voters, are eliminated. In a democratic republicsuch petty thefts will have to disappear.When confronted with Soviets that have given all theland to the peasants without compensation and offer ajust peace to all the peoples—when confronted with suchSoviets the alliance of the British, French and Russianbourgeoisie, the Kornilovs, Buchanans, 25 Ryabushinskys,Milyukovs, Plekhanovs, and Potresovs is quite impotentand is not to be feared.The bourgeoisie’s resistance to the transfer of the landto the peasants without compensation, to similar reformsin other realms of life, to a just peace and a break withimperialism, is, of course, inevitable. But for such resistanceto reach the stage of civil war, masses of some kindare necessary, masses capable of fighting and vanquishingthe Soviets. The bourgeoisie does not have these masses,and has nowhere to get them. The sooner and the moreresolutely the Soviets take all power, the sooner both SavageDivisions and Cossacks will split into an insignificantminority of politically-conscious Kornilov supporters anda huge majority of those in favour of a democratic andsocialist (for it is with socialism that we shall then bedealing) alliance of workers and peasants.When power passes to the Soviets, the resistance of thebourgeoisie will result in scores and hundreds of workersand peasants “keeping track of”, supervising, controlling,and registering every single capitalist, for the interestsof the workers and peasants will demand struggle againstthe capitalists’ deception of the people. The forms andmethods of this accountancy and control have been devel-