try in the company of the French delegates at the end of the congress, and it was further understood that no issue would be made of this matter in the Congress of the Red International. The delegates left this meeting and said nothing more about it. Suddenly, on the last day of the Congress, just before adjournment, Bukharin appeared as a representative of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party with a statement accusing the imprisoned anarchists of being "Machnovtzi" (members of Machno's band) and raised some question about releasing all of them.
Bukharin's appearance concerning the imprisoned anarchists raised a fierce storm of protest especially from a part of the French delegates who charged the Soviet government with bad faith in bringing up the subject when they had formerly agreed to keep it quiet.
Bukharin, representing the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party, reported their action on the subject of the imprisoned anarchists which accused them generally with supporting Machno and indicating tHat they were in prison on that account. Whether or not these anarchists were supporters of Machno I cannot say, neither do I know whether these particular anarchists were ever released. I heard later that some of them had refused to agree to leaving Russia when released and were on a hunger strike.
Machno at that time was a strange name to me but his prominence in this controversy on the floor of the Red International Congress aroused my interest and I began to inquire about him. But I soon realized that trying to find out who and what Machno is was like trying to uncover the identity of the devil. Thus, Machno was like a sore boil to the communist elements and they emphasized him as a murderer, bandit and counter-revolutionist. By the non-communist element, anarchists, many syndicalists, and others, Machno is highly praised. Some again, anarchists, and even communists, described the Machno movement as originally having good purposes, but claimed that it had become permeated with elements who were using it for their own particular purposes. When I left Moscow and summed up what I had learned about Machno I was forced to the opinion that this figure will never be quite understood by anyone. His motives will be appreciated or condemned according to the faction his appraisers adhere to. From this viewpoint then, the subject of Machno is important only because he presents one of the problems of the Russian situation. In short, it is not the personal qualities of Machno that we are concerned with, but the movement he has grouped around him.
There is abundant proof that the Russian revolution was not the venture of one particular party, but that it was the spontaneous outburst of the Russian masses. Only after the crash of Czarism do we see the various political parties coming out and manoeuvering for favorable positions. After a period of political moves the Bolsheviki stepped into power on promises and slogans that do not exist today. In fact they are in the same position now as when Kerensky's coalition government assumed their short term of power. But the Bolsheviki or Communists of Russia must undergo, because of their altered revolutionary policy, the same critical examination as any other group. That it still clings to revolutionary phrases is not a cause for adopting a watch-and-wait policy. Conditions, not words, are our chief concern, and only with a knowledge of the conditions of the Workers and Peasants in Russia can we apply the measure of the revolutionary yard-stick.