fought by the oppressed against their oppressors, the war which Marx had declared to be the only just war.
It was perfectly natural that capitalism should culminate in civil war, that the imperialist war between the bourgeois States should lead to a war between the classes. Our party foretold this development at the very outset of the war, in the year 1914, when no one dreamed of revolution. Nevertheless it was manifest that the intolerable burdens which the war imposed upon the working class must lead to an insurrection of the proletariat. It was, moreover, perfectly clear that the bourgeoisie could not possibly ensure a lasting peace, for the conflict of interests between the various groups of plunderers was too vital.
Our predictions have been entirely fulfilled. After the terrible years of war, brutality, and devastation, a civil war against the oppressors began. This civil war was opened by the Russian revolutions of March and November, 1917; it was continued by the Finnish revolution, the Hungarian revolution, the Austrian revolution, and the German revolution; revolutions in other countries have begun. The bourgeoisies cannot bring about a lasting peace. The Allies overcame Germany in November, 1918; the robbers’ peace of Versailles was signed many months later; but no one knows when the final settlement will be effected. It is plain to all that the peace of Versailles is not lasting. Quarrels have already broken out between the Jugo-Slavs and the Italians, between the Poles and the Czecho-Slovaks, between the Poles and the Lithuanians, between the Latvians and the Germans. In addition, all the bourgeois States have combined to attack the republic of the victorious Russian workers. Thus the imperialist war is ending in a civil war, of which the inevitable outcome will be the victory of the proletariat.
The civil war is not the result of any party’s caprice; its coming has been no chance matter. The civil war is a manifestation of the revolution, and the revolution was absolutely inevitable because the robber war