Collected Works of V. I. Lenin - Vol. 13 - From Marx to Mao

476V. I. LENINary nation, now the proletariat could no longer combine itsinterests with the interests of other classes hostile to it;let the bourgeoisie bear the responsibility for the nationalhumiliation—the task of the proletariat was to fight for thesocialist emancipation of labour from the yoke of the bourgeoisie.And indeed the true nature of bourgeois “patriotism” wasnot long in revealing itself. Having concluded an ignominiouspeace with the Prussians, the Versailles governmentproceeded to its immediate task—it launched an attack towrest the arms that terrified it from the hands of the Parisproletariat. The workers replied by proclaiming the Communeand civil war.Although the socialist proletariat was split up into numeroussects, the Commune was a splendid example of theunanimity with which the proletariat was able to accomplishthe democratic tasks which the bourgeoisie could only proclaim.Without any particularly complex legislation, in asimple, straightforward manner, the proletariat, which hadseized power, carried out the democratisation of the socialsystem, abolished the bureaucracy, and made all officialposts elective.But two mistakes destroyed the fruits of the splendidvictory. The proletariat stopped half-way: instead of settingabout “expropriating the expropriators”, it allowed itselfto be led astray by dreams of establishing a higher justicein the country united by a common national task; such institutionsas the banks, for example, were not taken over, andProudhonist theories about a “just exchange”, etc., stillprevailed among the socialists. The second mistake wasexcessive magnanimity on the part of the proletariat: insteadof destroying its enemies it sought to exert moral influenceon them; it underestimated the significance of direct militaryoperations in civil war, and instead of launching a resoluteoffensive against Versailles that would have crownedits victory in Paris, it tarried and gave the Versailles governmenttime to gather the dark forces and prepare for the bloodsoakedweek of May.But despite all its mistakes the Commune was a superbexample of the great proletarian movement of the nineteenthcentury. Marx set a high value on the historic significance