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

THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION AND CIVIL WAR39do not hand over power to the Soviets; that they do notoverthrow Kerensky; that they restore the old rotten compromisewith the bourgeoisie in a somewhat different form(say, “non-partisan” Kornilovites instead of Cadets); thatthey do not replace the apparatus of state power by theSoviet apparatus, do not offer peace, do not break withimperialism, and do not confiscate the landed estates. Letus assume that this is the outcome of the present waveringof the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks, of thispresent “September 12”.The experience of our own revolution tells us most clearlythat the consequence of this would be a still furtherweakening of the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks,their further separation from the masses, an incrediblegrowth of indignation and bitterness among the masses,a tremendous growth of sympathy with the revolutionaryproletariat, with the Bolsheviks.Under such conditions, the proletariat of the capitalwill be still closer to a Commune, to a workers’ uprising,to the conquest of power, to a civil war in its highest andmost decisive form, than it is at present; after the experienceof April 20-21 and July 3-4 such a result must berecognised as historically inevitable.“Rivers of blood,” shout the Cadets. But such rivers ofblood would give victory to the proletariat and the poorpeasantry, and it is a hundred to one that this victory wouldbring peace in place of the imperialist war, i.e., that itwould save the lives of hundreds of thousands of men whoare now shedding their blood for the sake of a divisionof spoils and seizures (annexations) by the capitalists.If April 20-21 had ended by the transfer of all power to theSoviets, and the Bolsheviks in alliance with the poorpeasantry had won in the Soviets, it would have saved thelives of the half million Russian soldiers, who certainlyperished in the battles of June 18, even if it had cost “riversof blood”.This is how every class-conscious Russian worker andsoldier figures, this is how he must figure, if he weighsand analyses the question of civil war now being raisedeverywhere; and, of course, such a worker or soldier, whohas experienced many things and given thought to them,