Even if their opposition to
political union with non-proletarian parties was right as the basis of a
sound policy, to insist upon it at the moment of dire peril was either
treachery or madness. When a house is already on fire the only thing in
order, the only thing that can have the sanction of wisdom and honor, is to
work to extinguish the fire. It is obviously not the time to debate whether
the house was properly built or whether mistakes were made. Russia was a
house on fire; the Bolsheviki insisted upon endless debating.
Kamenev followed Trotzky's lead in attacking the Coalition Government. In a
subtle speech he supported the idea of splitting Russia up into a large
number of petty states, insisting that the formula, "self-determination of
peoples," applied to the separatist movement in the Ukraine. He insisted
that for the Russian working-people it was a matter of indifference whether
the Central Empires or the Entente nations won in the war. He argued that
the only hope for the Russian Revolution must be the support of the
revolutionary proletariat in the other European countries, particularly
those adjacent to Russia: "If the revolutionary proletariat of Europe fails
to support the Russian Revolution the latter will be ruined.
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