An Unfortunate Document

Marxist Theory · 2026-05-13

Core Argument¶

Lenin's central thesis is that the Petrograd Soviet's appeal to the army represents a fundamental betrayal of socialist principles and a capitulation to Russian imperialism. The appeal claims that Russian soldiers are defending the revolution, not the capitalists, while simultaneously calling on German and Austrian workers to rise against their own ruling classes. Lenin argues this position is logically incoherent and politically dishonest: if the war was started by the capitalists of all countries, as the Soviet's own appeal admits, then Russian soldiers fighting under a capitalist government are necessarily defending Russian capitalists. The Soviet leadership cannot have it both ways — it cannot denounce the imperialist character of the war in general while refusing to draw the revolutionary conclusion that the Russian working class must break with its own bourgeoisie. The article is a polemic against the Narodnik and Menshevik leaders who, in Lenin's assessment, have "sunk completely to the level of defending Russian imperialism" by refusing to take power from the Provisional Government and end the war on revolutionary terms.

Theoretical Grounding¶

The analysis is grounded in Lenin's theory of imperialism as developed in Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, written just the previous year. The argument rests on the proposition that the First World War is an imperialist war — a war for the redivision of the world among rival capitalist powers — and that this character is determined not by the particular monarchs or governments in power but by the class nature of the states involved. Lenin draws on the Marxist distinction between the form of the state (monarchy or republic) and its class content (bourgeois rule), arguing that replacing Wilhelm with German capitalists changes nothing about the predatory nature of the war.

The article also deploys the Marxist method of exposing contradictions between words and deeds, between professed internationalism and actual class collaboration. Lenin's insistence on telling the working class "the bitter truth" rather than offering comforting illusions reflects the Bolshevik tradition's rejection of what Lenin elsewhere called "revolutionary phrase-mongering" — the substitution of radical-sounding slogans for a clear class analysis of the concrete situation. The piece sits squarely within the Marxist tradition's critique of social chauvinism and centrism, anticipating the split between revolutionary and opportunist wings of the international workers' movement that would crystallise around the Zimmerwald Left.

Conjunctural Relevance¶

The article was published in Pravda on 16 May (3 May Old Style) 1917, in the immediate aftermath of the February Revolution that had overthrown the Tsar. Russia was in a state of dual power: the bourgeois Provisional Government held formal state authority, while the Petrograd Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies possessed the real allegiance of the armed masses. The Soviet's Menshevik and Socialist Revolutionary leaders had chosen not to take power, instead offering conditional support to the Provisional Government — a policy Lenin characterised as "revolutionary defencism," the justification of the war on the grounds that Russia's revolution needed defending against German militarism.

The specific document Lenin attacks is the Soviet's appeal to the army, which attempted to reconcile support for the war effort with revolutionary rhetoric. The conjuncture was defined by the question of war and peace: whether Russia would continue fighting the imperialist war alongside the Entente powers or whether the revolution would open a path to a general European revolutionary upheaval. Lenin's April Theses, published just weeks earlier, had called for "no support for the Provisional Government" and for the transformation of the imperialist war into a civil war of the oppressed against their oppressors. This article applies that strategic line to a concrete political document, demonstrating how the Soviet leadership's refusal to break with the bourgeoisie on the war question was not a tactical compromise but a class betrayal.

Where the Argument Continues¶

This article is a fragment of Lenin's broader polemical campaign of 1917, collected in volumes of his Collected Works covering the period from the February Revolution to the October insurrection. The argument about the character of the war and the necessity of breaking with the bourgeoisie is developed at greater length in The Tasks of the Proletariat in the Present Revolution (the April Theses) and The State and Revolution, written later that year. On the In Defence of Marxism website, the theoretical framework Lenin deploys here is elaborated in articles on Lenin's theory of imperialism and the Marxist analysis of war, particularly pieces examining the First World War's place in the history of capitalist crisis. The broader corpus of the Revolutionary Communist International's theoretical output applies this method to contemporary conflicts, arguing that the class character of states — not the particular regimes in power — determines whether wars are imperialist or progressive.

Connections¶

This article should be read alongside Lenin's Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism (1916) for the theoretical foundation of the argument about the war's character. It connects to Lenin's The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky (1918), which extends the critique of centrism and social chauvinism to the German Social Democratic leadership. Within the Marxist tradition, the piece exemplifies the method of "concrete analysis of a concrete situation" that Lenin and Trotsky counterposed to abstract moralising. For contemporary readers, the article's method — exposing the gap between radical rhetoric and class-collaborationist practice — remains relevant to analysing the politics of reformist parties and trade union leaderships who combine anti-capitalist language with support for capitalist governments in times of crisis.

Key Quotes¶

"If the working masses 'have no need' for the war, if the war was started not only by the tsars, but by 'the capitalists of all countries' (as was definitely stated in the appeal issued by the Soviet), then, obviously, any nation involved in this war who tolerates a government of the capitalists is actually 'defending' the capitalists."
"Comrade soldiers, we should say to them, so long as we put up with our capitalist government, so long as the tsar's secret treaties are considered a holy of holies, we are carrying on an imperialist war of conquest, we are defending predatory treaties concluded by ex-Tsar Nicholas with the Anglo-French capitalists. That is a bitter truth. But it is the truth. The people should be told the truth."
"The overthrow of tsars, with power passing to the capitalists, alters nothing whatever as far as the nature of the war is concerned."
"Is it not trebly insincere, when, in the name of the Russian revolution, which has given power to the Russian imperialist capitalists, you demand of us, Germans, a revolution against the German imperialist capitalists?"
"Does it not look as if your 'internationalism', your 'revolutionism' are for foreign consumption only; as if revolution against the capitalists is only for the Germans, while for the Russians (despite the seething revolution in Russia) it is agreement with the capitalists?"
"Chernov, Chkheidze, and Tsereteli have sunk completely to the level of defending Russian imperialism. It is a deplorable fact, but a fact nevertheless."