The Red Conspiracy | Page 7

country, stirring
up the people against Kaiserism and the war profiteers and urging the
soldiers to turn their weapons against the imperial government itself.

While Liebknecht was defying the authorities, the naval forces
mutinied at Kiel. The Socialists then called a general strike for
November 11, 1918, as a prelude to the revolution. Scheidemann and
Ebert had been supporting the government of Prince Max of Baden, the
successor of Von Hertling, as chancellor of the empire, and had
deprecated the idea of a revolution. But when Scheidemann saw that
the revolution was certainly coming and that he and his colleagues
would probably be left stranded, he joined the movement with his
powerful organization, stepped in and grasped the power. A national
council of soldiers, sailors and workmen was formed at Berlin, but the
provisional government was shaped by Scheidemann, Ebert and others
of the majority Socialists by virtue of their excellent political
machinery. The Ebert-Scheidemann government fought many a bitter
struggle with growing radicalism. Their government represented the
most moderate group of the Socialists and received the support of the
Centerists and others because these were far more opposed to the
Socialists of the extreme left, such as the Spartacan Communists.
Several revolts engineered by the Spartacans were put down with
considerable bloodshed. In January, 1919, soon after the defeat of the
Spartacides in Berlin, Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, their
leaders, were put to death, and their minority party seemed to diminish
in strength. In the latter part of May, 1919, the majority Socialists of
the reactionary Ebert-Scheidemann group were at first opposed to the
signing of the Treaty of Paris, whereas the Spartacans, and also the
Independent Socialists under the leadership of Hugo Haase and Karl
Kautsky, tried to force their opponents to sign it, so that the people of
Germany might soon blame the "reactionaries" for the humiliation, and
rise in rebellion to overthrow them.
In Bavaria the anti-war sentiment spread rapidly, fostered by the efforts
of Kurt Eisner. King Ludwig abdicated the throne on November 16,
1918, and Eisner took up the reins of power, forming a Socialist
government. After a few weeks Eisner broke with the
Ebert-Scheidemann government of Berlin, and soon after was
assassinated. Not long after this the Bavarian communists imposed the
Soviet form of government on the country, much to the dislike of many
of the inhabitants, especially those living outside of Munich. The

peasants of Bavaria rebelled against the communist-soviet government
of Munich, which finally fell, after the Noske-Ebert-Scheidemann
forces had marched against the city.
Very many years ago Socialists began to spread their doctrines as best
they could in the realms of the Czar. Many a Marxian was arrested for
attempting to undermine the Russian government and sent into exile in
Siberia. The World War having broken out, Russia suffered terribly,
and this suffering, especially of the masses, caused great
discontentment and made the people an easy prey to the revolutionary
forces of Socialism. The bureaucratic Czarist regime finally broke
down in March, 1917, as soon as the revolution started. Three main
contending parties attempted to ride into power on the revolutionary
tide; the Cadets, the Moderate Socialists (i.e., the Mensheviki, and
Social Revolutionists) and the Bolsheviki or revolutionary Socialists.
The Cadets were the first to gain the upper hand, but were soon swept
away, for they strove to satisfy the soldiers, workers and peasants with
abstract, political ideals. The Mensheviki and Social Revolutionists
succeeded the Cadets.
The demand for a Constitutent Assembly was one of the main
aspirations of the Russian Revolution. It was on the eve of its
realization that Bolsheviki, in November, 1917, by a coup d'état seized
the reins of power. The elections for the assembly took place after the
Bolsheviki had gained the upper hand and the Bolsheviki were defeated.
The Constituent Assembly was actually convened in Petrograd in
January, 1918, but the Bolsheviki dispersed the parliament at the point
of the bayonet. Russia was then ruled by Lenine, head of the soviet
system of government. The government was a "dictatorship of the
proletariat," characterized by injustice, violence, oppression, and
bloodshed, the Soviets being little more than tribunals of punishment
and execution, instruments of terror in the hands of the Autocrat Lenine.
The Bolshevist government has met with continual opposition from the
opposing groups of Socialists in Russia and has been attacked by the
Allies, principally on the Archangel front and in the Gulf of Finland.
The Finns, Lithuanians, Poles, Czecho-Slovaks, Rumanians, Ukranians,
and especially Admiral Kolchak's Siberian forces waged a relentless

warfare against the Bolsheviki tyranny either for political reasons or to
rescue the countless millions of Russians who suffered so terribly from
the Lenine system of dictatorship. By the latter part of February, 1920,
the Lenine government seemed to be overcoming all military
opposition.[A]
The Socialists