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And the facts in the main are as follows: When the working class and the peasantry under our Party banner gained their first victory in October, 1917, then, notwithstanding that both in Petersburg and in Moscow part of the officers and all the cadets fought against us, still, on the morrow of our victory, our Government did not take vengeance, did not have recourse to repressions but on the contrary immediately offered all these elements an honourable peace—nay, more than that, offered them definite work, a chance to utilize their faculties.
Remember. Everybody knows that Krasnov, one of the most conspicuous reactionary generals, who had fought us near Petersburg, was taken prisoner and brought to Smolny. I saw him with my own eyes. Well, not a hair fell from this General Krasnov's head, not any insult was offered him, he left Smolny a free man, after pledging his honour not to fight us any more.
This is not a solitary fact, but typical of the policy of those days. Then in Moscow, after a whole week of the hottest fighting, after the revolutionary troops had been shut in the Kremlin and cannonaded by the cadets, guided by the „right“ Social Revolutionary Rudnov, after a week of the most terrible bloodshed, when the Moscow workers at last seized on the power, their Revolutionary Committee on the morrow or at the moment of the conclusion of the truce said: Return their arms to those who fought against us.
