It is plain that the proletariat, when it rose to power in November, 1917, was faced by a task of unexampled difficulty, by the task of constructing a socialist economy in an utterly disorganised land. The disastrous heritage grew yet more disastrous at the close of the old imperialist war. The mere demobilisation of our army involved enormous expenditure. The transport system had already been shattered and disrupted by the war; demobilisation was the finishing stroke, and the railway system broke down almost completely. Thus transport came practically to an end as well as production.
This is absolutely no argument against the workers’ revolution. Had the bourgeoisie remained in power, it would have continued to wage the great imperialist war, would have continued to pay vast sums as interest to the French and to the British, and would have thrown all the burden — this is the chief thing to remember — upon the shoulders of the workers and peasants. Our poverty and exhaustion would more than ever have incited the proletariat to undertake the rebuilding of the old world upon new foundations; with even more economy and with a yet more careful system of organisation would it have been necessary to utilise our old resources; and it would have been necessary to transfer as much of the cost as possible to the bourgeoisie, would have been necessary to protect the working class with whatever powers and by whatever means were at the disposal of the proletarian authority. But this necessary work was thrust upon the revolutionary proletariat under conditions of almost incredible difficulty. The workers had fo clear up the mess which the imperialist lords had made.