CONCLUSIONS

The following conclusions are respectfully submitted: 

1.  No government save a socialist government can be set up in Russia to-day except by foreign bayonets, and any governments so set up will fall the moment such support is withdrawn.  The Lenin wing of the communist party is to-day as moderate as any socialist government which can control Russia.

2.  No real peace can be established in Europe or the world until peace is made with the revolution.  This proposal of the Soviet Government presents an opportunity to make peace with the revolution on a just and reasonable basis—­perhaps a unique opportunity.

3.  If the blockade is lifted and supplies begin to be delivered regularly to soviet Russia, a more powerful hold over the Russian people will be established than that given by the blockade itself—­the hold given by fear that this delivery of supplies may be stopped.  Furthermore, the parties which oppose the communists in principle but are supporting them at present will be able to begin to fight against them.

4.  It is, therefore, respectfully recommended that a proposal following the general lines of the suggestion of the Soviet Government should be made at the earliest possible moment, such changes being made, particularly in article 4 and article 5, as will make the proposal acceptable to conservative opinion in the allied and associated countries.

     Very respectfully submitted.

     William C. Bullitt.

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APPENDIX TO REPORT

TRANSPORT

Locomotives.—­Before the war Russia had 22,000 locomotives.  Destruction by war and ordinary wear and tear have reduced the number of locomotives in good order to 5,500.  Russia is entirely cut off from supplies of spare parts and materials for repair, facilities for the manufacture of which do not exist in Russia.  And the Soviet Government is able only with the greatest difficulty to keep in running order the few locomotives at its disposal.

Coal.—­Soviet Russia is entirely cut off from supplies of coal.  Kolchak holds the Perm mining district, although Soviet troops are now on the edge of it.  Denikin still holds the larger part of the Donetz coal district and has destroyed the mines in the portion of the district which he has evacuated.  As a result of this, locomotives, electrical power plants, etc., must be fed with wood, which is enormously expensive and laborious and comparatively ineffectual.

Gasoline.—­There is a total lack of gasoline, due to the British occupation of Baku.  The few automobiles in the cities which are kept running for vital Government business are fed with substitute mixtures, which causes them to break down with great frequency and to miss continually.  Almost the entire fleet on the great inland waterway system of Russia was propelled by gasoline.  As a result the Volga and the canals, which are so vital a part of Russia’s system of transportation, are useless.