when you least expect that she will fight at all."[1] Allied Ministers assured the public that Russia would fight again, and those who said that Russia was worn out and could not fight any longer were denounced as "traitors."
Had the Allies at that time only been less zealous in looking for treason and more ready to learn the truth, they might have seen that Russia's situation was critical and that a breakdown was inevitable. They might at least have been able to rearrange their military plans and review their war aims, bringing them into accordance with the real and not the imaginary strength of the Allied forces.
- ↑ It was in the spirit of frivolous ideas like this that revolutionary Russia was driven into the July offensive which led to the final disaster.
How frivolously Allied observers used to report upon the terrible privations of the Russian people during the war may be illustrated by the following quotation from Mr. Stephen Graham's book on Russia published two months before the Revolution. "Russia in 1916" is surely the chief classic in all this literature of deception regarding Russia and the attitude of the Russian people towards the war. For instance, after describing the shortage of food and fuel, and giving some striking instances of the privations of the people, Mr. Graham contrives to give the impression that the Russian people were only too glad to endure all these sufferings for the sake of the army. He relates the following conversation between two Russians:
"The army has meat, tea, sugar, white bread?" asks one.
"Yes, the army has all these in plenty." "Slava Tebye Gospody! (Glory be to God)," is the rejoinder, "That's all right!" (page 43).
