Berezovo: A Revolutionary Russian Epic

“Even your political language smacks of bourgeois after-dinner games,” he mocked them. “What have ‘rules’ ever got you except the derision of the proletariat? There is only one way to fight the oppressive forces of Tsarist Autocracy, and it isn’t by selling the workers for the mythical status of Deputies in a Duma that Nicholas Romanov treats with clear contempt! It’s by creating and sustaining the correct conditions for armed struggle and forming the revolutionary vanguard of the militant working class, like we did in Moscow. Not by setting yourself up as an alternative government as these people did in Petersburg and then, when you get caught, say ‘Oh no, your Majesty, of course we weren’t opposing you! Armed Insurrection? Us? Nothing was further from our minds!’. That’s not revolutionary socialism. That’s gutless hypocrisy!”

“That’s not what was said at the trial, and you know it!” flared Oleg Karseneva. “And anyway, it’s a damned sight better than leading the workers into a dead end and then staying away while they were massacred by the Semionovsky!”

“Listen, comrade!” Fatiev snarled. “My brother didn’t stay away. He was in one of the last fighting brigades in Presnia. He fought and died fighting, killed by Dubasov’s artillery. Guns that were sent from Petersburg. Guns that couldn’t have been spared if your beloved Soviet hadn’t made such a mess of it and delivered themselves into the hands of the police. And if it happened again, I wouldn’t hesitate to give my life also, the same as he did. So don’t talk to me about staying away. Nobody stayed away.”

“Except Lenin,” Landemann said quietly.

The leader of the Berezovo Bolshevicks turned on him, his face contorted with rage, and would have struck him if Usov hadn’t quickly stepped between them.

“Calm down, Fatiev,” he warned. “This isn’t getting us anywhere.”

Ignoring him, Fatiev spoke over his shoulder to Landemann.

“Retract that statement,” he demanded.

“Never,” swore the Jew, his face white with passion. “Your precious Lenin set the Moscow workers up, urged them to form attack groups for street fighting but took damn good care not to be anywhere near the city when the fighting started. And everybody knows it!”

“That’s not true!” said Fatiev thickly.

He lunged again at Landemann, and again Usov blocked him.

“Shut up, David,” he ordered gruffly, “and Fatiev, you calm down. You’ll have the patrol here with all your shouting.”

Tamara Karseneva laughed quietly.

“Abram’s right, Fatiev,” she cooed. “Calm down. Let us all agree that Lenin just made a tactical decision not to be present. Personally speaking, as prepared as I am to give my life for the Struggle, like the majority of our Party, I do not see any profit in making sacrifices of our followers to prove a theoretical point.”

With a great effort, Fatiev transferred his gaze from Landemann to her. All the fight seemed to seep out of him. Unclenching his fists, he shook his head in despair.

“You still don’t understand, do you?” he muttered wearily. “If you don’t get the theory right, then you can never hope to succeed in practice. Lenin knows this. He knows that you can’t fight iron boots with felt slippers. He will never rest while the last vestiges of the Autocracy remain in Russia. And if that means unmasking the opportunists who seek to compromise in any way with the regime in the mistaken belief that Socialism can advance along a nice neat constitutional path without the necessary period of armed struggle, then…”

He fell silent, and looked down at his boots.

“In other words, you intend to split, split, and split again to get the Party you want,” said Oleg Karsenev bitterly.

“If that is what it takes, yes.”

“Why don’t you just leave the RSDLP and form another Party?” suggested Landemann from the corner.

Usov swung round to face him, irritated by the delay at reaching a decision.

“Keep out of this, David. It’s not our problem.”

“Abram’s right, David,” agreed Tamara Karseneva with a smile. “But don’t think we haven’t suggested it. The fact is, Fatiev here and all the militants know that if they secede from the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, they will be cutting themselves off from the majority of the committed workers and peasants. They will be like a bunch of castaways adrift on a raft, forced to watch each other dying of thirst and starvation. Finally, they would begin eating each other. And we all know who would be the last to go, don’t we Comrade?” she jeered at Fatiev. “Your beloved Lenin!”

“Better that than staying on a ship of fools.”

“Then you do admit that you have no legitimate place in the Party,” insisted Oleg Karsenev.

“Listen,” Usov interrupted them, “this isn’t getting us anywhere.”

Tamara shrugged apologetically.

“Abram Malachayivich is right. What we have to do is decide on how to deal with the situation in hand, not fight over our differences.”

“That just means you intend to try and fudge the issue as usual,” Fatiev accused her.