Speech therapy portal / For beginners / Lenin and German money. Agents of the revolution. Was Vladimir Lenin a spy for Germany?

Lenin and German money. Agents of the revolution. Was Vladimir Lenin a spy for Germany?

18.11.2023

24 February 2012, 14:10

The film (2004) documented the long-circulated version that the October Revolution was made with German money. The film caused a shock among people of the old Soviet culture (and me too). It is not easy for them to believe that the Bolsheviks were brought to power by the diabolical plan of the German Foreign Ministry, developed and implemented by one of the first Russian revolutionaries, Alexander Parvus. (based on a documentary film shown on RTR in 2004) Until recently, this story was shrouded in secret. This secret was carefully hidden by the Bolsheviks, their German patrons, and German financial circles involved in the implementation of what is still called the “Great October Socialist Revolution.” This is a documented version of the activities of the man who brought Lenin to power. Berlin.. Here, in the capital of Germany, which had already been at war with Russia for six months, a gentleman arrived from Constantinople, well known to the police under the name Alexander Parvus. Here he waited for an important meeting, on which not only his fate depended, but also the fate of Germany, the fate of the country, citizenship which he unsuccessfully sought for many years. Parvus came to Berlin on the recommendation of the German ambassador to Turkey von Wangeiheim. An influential diplomat close to Kaiser Wilhelm II in a secret telegram advised not to trust Pargus too much, nevertheless, the meeting took place - in the most closed and aristocratic department of Kaiser Germany - the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. No minutes of the conversation were kept, but a few days later - March 9, 1915 Parvus provided his 20-page memorandum, which was essentially a detailed plan to bring Russia out of the war through revolution. We managed to find this memorandum plan in the archives of the German Foreign Office. Speaks Natalia Narochnitskaya, author of the book "Russia and Russians in the First World History": - Parvus's plan was grandiose in its simplicity. It contained everything - from the geography of revolutionary actions, strikes, strikes that were supposed to paralyze the supply of the army, to a plan of a grandiose scale to destroy civil and national identity. The collapse of the Russian empire from within was also the central point in Fargus's plan - the rejection of the Caucasus, Ukraine, and the Baltic states. Never before has Germany had such an expert on Russia, who knew all its weaknesses so much. He says: - Alexander Parvus - in fact, this is Israel Lazarevich Gelfand. “Parvus” was his pseudonym, taken from Latin - it clearly did not actually correspond to the appearance of this obese man, because “parvus” in translation means “small”. For the leadership of the Kaiser's Germany, this plan to destroy Russia from the inside was simply a gift of fate - the First World War was underway. After just a few months of the war, it became clear to the German command that it was necessary to liquidate the eastern Russian front as soon as possible and transfer all forces to the western one - where Russia’s allies, the British and French, were fighting. In addition, Turkey, which entered the war on the side of Germany, recently suffered a crushing defeat from Russian troops in the Caucasus . The Germans started talking about a separate peace with Russia, but Emperor Nikolai Romanovich and the Supreme Duma put forward the slogan “War to a victorious end.” Speaks Zbinek Zeman (Czech Republic), biographer of Alexander Parvus: - Parvus wanted a revolution to take place in Russia. The Germans wanted to take Russia out of the war. These were two goals that were completely different from each other. In his memorandum plan, Parvus constantly referred to the experience of the first Russian revolution of 1905. This was his personal experience . Then he became about one of the leaders of the Council of Workers' Deputies created in St. Petersburg, in fact its founding father. Alexander Parvus was one of the first political emigrants to return to Russia in 1905, at the height of strikes and walkouts. Natalia Narochnitskaya, author of the book “Russia and Russians in the First World History”": - It was he, and not Lenin at all, who played the role of first violin. Lenin generally came to the preliminary examination. At that time in St. Petersburg they were already in the lead Parvus and Trotsky. Both were spirited journalists. Somehow they managed to get their hands on two newspapers - "Start" And " Russian newspaper". Soon the circulation of these publications, at a symbolic price of one kopeck, grew to one million copies. N. Narochnitskaya: - Parvus was the first to realize that manipulation of public consciousness is the most important tool of politics. IN December 1905 The population of the empire was gripped by panic. On behalf of the St. Petersburg Council, a certain “Financial Manifesto” was published, in which the country's economy was painted in the darkest colors. The population immediately began withdrawing their bank deposits, which almost led to the collapse of the country's entire financial system. The entire composition of the Council, including Trotsky, was arrested. Soon the author was also taken into custody provocative publications. When arrested, he presented a passport in the name of an Austro-Hungarian citizen, Karl Vaverka, then admitted that in reality he was a Russian citizen, a tradesman, wanted since 1899 Israel Lazarefich Gelfand. He revealed the following about himself: he was born in the Minsk province in the town of Berezino in 1867. In 1887 he went to Switzerland, where he graduated from university. Known in socialist circles as the author of theoretical articles. Marital status: married, has a 7-year-old son, does not live with his family. Elisabeth Heresch (Austria), biographer of Alexander Parvus: - While in prison, Parvus ordered expensive suits and ties for himself, took pictures with friends, and used the prison library. Visitors came - so Rosa Luxemburg visited him while in St. Petersburg . The punishment turned out to be not severe - three years of administrative exile in Siberia. On the way to the appointed place, taking advantage of the carelessness of the guards, Parvus fled. Autumn 1906 he appears in Germany, where he publishes a book of memoirs, “In the Russian Bastille during the Revolution.” This was the first success of Parvus’s black PR in creating a negative image of Russia in the eyes of the German reader. After a meeting at the Foreign Ministry with Parvus in 1915 High-ranking German officials appreciated his subversive experience. He becomes the main consultant to the German government on Russia. Then they allocate him first tranche - one million gold marks. Then they will follow new millions “for revolution” in Russia. The Germans relied on internal unrest in the enemy country. From the "Plan of Parvus":“The plan can only be implemented by the party of Russian Social Democrats. Its radical wing, under the leadership of Lenin, has already begun to act... " First Lenin and Parvus met in Munich in 1900. It was Parvus who convinced Lenin to print "Spark"in his apartment, where an illegal printing house was equipped. : - The relationship between Parvus and Lenin was problematic from the very beginning. These were two types of people who had difficulty getting along with each other. At first it was ordinary envy - Lenin always saw in Parvus ideological rival . An already difficult relationship became complicated due to the scandal with Gorky. Parvus offered to represent the copyright of the “petrel of the revolution” when staging Gorky’s play "At the bottom". By agreement with Gorky, the main income was to go to the party treasury - that is, under the control of Lenin, and a quarter to Gorky himself - which was a lot. In Barilna alone the performance was shown over 500 times. But it turned out that Parvus appropriated the entire amount - 100 thousand marks - to himself. Gorky threatened to sue Parvus. But Rosa Luxemburg convinced Gorky not to wash dirty linen in public. Everything was limited to a closed party court, to which Parvus did not even appear. In a letter to the leadership of the German Social Democrats, he cynically stated that "d The money was spent on a trip with a young lady around Italy... ". This young lady was herself Rosa Luxemburg. Winfried Scharlau (Germany), biographer of Alexander Parvus: - It was a political scandal that caused great damage to his name, and gave the opportunity to many revolutionaries to establish their opinion of Parvus as a deceiver. And now in Switzerland Parvus had to see Lenin again - the one to whom he assigned the main role in his plan. From memory Krupskaya, Lenin in 1915 year spent whole days sitting in local libraries, where he studied the experience of the French Revolution, with absolutely no hope of applying it in Russia in the coming years. E. Heresh: - Word spread quickly about Parvus’s arrival. Parvus rented the best room in the most luxurious hotel in Zurich, where he spent time surrounded by lush blondes. His morning began with champagne and a cigar. In Zurich, Parvus distributed a large sum of money among Russian political emigrants and went on a date with Lenin in Bern, where he found him having lunch in a cheap restaurant among “his own people.” Lenin was unhappy that Parvus was seeking a meeting in a public place. Therefore, the fateful conversation was transferred to the modest emigrant apartment of Lenin and Krupskaya. From the memories of Parvus: "Lenin sat in Switzerland and wrote articles that almost never went beyond the emigrant environment. He was completely cut off from Russia and sealed as if in a bottle. I shared my views with him. Revolution is possible in Russia only if Germany wins ". N. Narochnitskaya: - The question arises - why did Parvus choose Lenin? It was Parvus who found him and gave him this chance. Lenin was a cynic and even among the revolutionaries not everyone was ready to take money from the enemy at the time of the Patriotic War. Parvus as -as if he understood Lenin’s terrible ambition, his unprincipledness, Parvus made him understand that Lenin would have new opportunities, and these opportunities were money. Vahan Hovhannisyan, Deputy of the National Assembly of Armenia from the Dashnaktsutyun party: - It was in May 1915 that the Swiss famous meeting between Lenin and Parvus took place, when Lenin accepted Parvus’s plan for the destruction of Russia - “power for the Bolsheviks, defeat for Russia.” During these months - April, May, summer of 1915, the entire world press wrote about the genocide against the Armenian people. This destruction began in the year 15 and is known in history as the genocide of the Armenian people by the Ottoman Empire. Lenin did not find a word of sympathy, not a word of condolences even for the Armenian Bolsheviks. Parvus appeared as the evil genius of the Armenian people, and it was then that Parvus warned Lenin against any pro-Armenian gestures and speeches. The solution is quite simple. The solution lay in the special position of Parvus in Turkey. The main organizers of the Armenian genocide, ministers in the government of the Young Turks Tala Pasha and Enver Pasha became his closest friends. Having left for Turkey for three months after the scandal with Gorky, Parvus lived there for five years. E. Heresh: - Parvus pushed aside all ideology and began to amass his enormous fortune. He acted as an arms speculator, sales agent, merchant, businessman, publicist and as a consultant to the government of the Young Turks. His residence was on the prince's islands. In a short time, becoming a super-influential person, Parvus played a significant role in Turkey's decision to enter the war on the side of Germany. N. Narochnitskaya: - His plan directly states that all this is purely a matter of money. And he understood that the country was being torn apart and parts of it falling away during the war would be a collapse for the state. Having formed an alliance with Lenin, Parvus heads to the capital of Denmark, a neutral state during the First World War. In Copenhagen it was easier to establish ties with Russia. Here parvus was to create " offshore"to launder German money. E. Heresh: -After the meeting in Switzerland, Lenin no longer wanted to meet Parvus in person. He sends his confidant, Yakov Ganetsky, to Copenhagen in his place. In Copenhagen, Parvus creates a commercial export-import company, appointing Yakov Ganetsky, Lenin’s contact, as its manager. After “October” 17, Ganetsky will be appointed by Lenin as Deputy Chief Commissioner of the State Bank... The office headed by Ganetsky made it possible to send his people under the guise of “business partners” to Russia to create an underground network. Z. Zeman:- He may have been the discoverer of what is called a “phrank organization” - these were cover organizations, conditional societies that did not do what they officially announced. Such an organization was the “Institute for the Study of the Social Consequences of War,” which Parvus opened in Copenhagen in 1915 with German money. Among his employees are A. Zurabov, former State Duma deputy, and Moses Uritsky, who established the work of courier agents. After "October" '17 Uritsky will be appointed by Lenin as Chairman of the Petrograd Cheka. Z. Zeman:- This is a very close connection between politics, economics and the secret services. At that time, this technology was still in a trial, experimental stage. She was not yet developed at all. Neutral Denmark was then a “mecca” for speculators. But even against this background, Ganetsky’s arms smuggling activities were so provocative that they became the reason for his arrest and then deportation from the country. Hans Bjerkegren (Sweden), author of the book "Russian Post" says: - In Stockholm at that time there were banks, businesses, and people like Parvus, Ganetsky, Vorovsky, Krasin lived here - just criminals, smugglers. Parvus came to Stockholm from Copenhagen two or three times a month to personally manage affairs. Agents arriving from Russia stayed in his six-room apartment. Among Parvus' regular agents were famous Bolsheviks - Leonid Krasin and Vaclav Vorovsky, who were simultaneously part of Lenin’s inner circle. Parvus got Krasin a job at the German company Siemens-Schuher as manager of the Petrograd branch. After "October" 17, Krasin will be appointed People's Commissar of Trade and Industry by Lenin. For Vorovsky, Parvus establishes an office of the same company in Stockholm. After "October" '17, Vorovsky will be appointed by Lenin as plenipotentiary envoy in Sweden and other Scandinavian countries. Thus, “commercial ties” are being actively established between Stockholm and Petrograd. Through catalogs of offered goods, Parvus agents transmit secret information written in invisible ink, including instructions from Lenin from Zurich. But the main task of these companies was to circulate the money that Parvus received from Germany for the Bolshevik party treasury. Often these were fictitious loans for transactions that almost never materialized. In Copenhagen, Parvus becomes especially close to the German ambassador to Denmark, Count Brochdor of Brassau. This sophisticated aristocrat becomes a personal friend of Parvus and his main lobbyist in Berlin. From 1922 to 1928, the Count would be the German Ambassador to Soviet Russia. Alexander Parvus generated ideas easily and simply. So in the fall of 1915, he conveyed a new proposal to the count. Through diplomatic channels, he transports him to Berlin. It was a description of some financial transaction. According to its author, it will not cost Germany much, but will lead to a large collapse in the ruble exchange rate in Russia. With this financial provocation, Parvus wanted to repeat his success of 1905. I was interested in the proposal. And Parvus is immediately invited to Berlin for a consultation. Then he promises to organize a major political strike in Russia. He receives 1 million rubles on the eve of 1916. Mass strikes took place in Petrograd and southern Russia. But they did not develop into a massive armed uprising, scheduled by Parvus for January 9. The people did not succumb to provocations then. In Berlin they doubted whether the money was reaching its target. It was suggested that Parvus was simply embezzling money. Parvus urgently needed to prove the effectiveness of his work. From the "Plan of Parvus":“Particular attention should be paid to the city of Nikolaev, since two large warships are preparing for the launch there in a very tense situation...” The battleships “Empress Catherine” and “Empress Maria” built at the Nikolaev shipyards and commissioned in 1915 were Russian a response to the dominance of two German battleships in the waters of the Black Sea. German ships sailed under the Turkish flag and boldly fired at the coast and port cities. The battleship "Empress Maria" was superior to the German ships with numerous heavy artillery and fast speed. And then Parvus’s “tip” came true. On October 7, 1916, the battleship Empress Maria was blown up and a terrible fire broke out, killing more than two hundred sailors. N. Narochnitskaya: - The grandeur of his cunning plan was to destroy the defense consciousness. Thousands of newspapermen paid by him, even deputies of the State Duma, gloated about the defeat of their own army, and during successful offensives they shouted that the war was “shameful and senseless.” He became the first author on political technology to transform the domestic war into a civil war. The German Foreign Ministry's interest in Parvus has reappeared after the February revolution. We had to hurry. Provisional Government o continued the war with Germany, confirming its allied obligations to France and England. At the same time, the United States of America also opposed Germany. Funding for Parvus was again unfrozen. To carry out the plan, Parvus was Lenin is needed. But not in Switzerland, but in Russia... German high-ranking officials, together with Parvus, developed plan to transport Lenin to Russia. The route passed through Germany. According to martial law, citizens of an enemy country had to be immediately arrested when crossing the border. But by personal order of the Kaiser, an exception was made for Lenin and his assistants, Russian subjects. E. Heresh: - Lenin said that under no circumstances should you buy tickets with German money. Therefore, Parvus bought them privately. The departure of internationalist immigrants from Switzerland turned out to be very stormy. A group of patriotic Russians gathered at the station. They have already said that the Germans paid Lenin “good money.” When those departing began to sing “internationale,” shouts were heard all around: “German spies!”, “The Kaiser is paying for your passage!” A small scuffle broke out at the station, and Lenin fought back with an umbrella he had prudently grabbed in advance... E. Heresh:- The so-called “sealed” carriage was part of a regular train. It’s interesting that all other German trains had to let Lenin’s train pass, so important was this “state matter” for Germany. In total, 33 people were accommodated in the “sealed” carriage. There was famine in Germany. But the passengers of the special train had no problems with food. Lenin with Zinoviev They constantly drank freshly purchased beer. In Berlin, the train was placed on sidings for a day, and under the cover of darkness, high-ranking representatives of the Kaiser arrived at the train. It was after this meeting that Lenin revised his “April Theses”. In Sweden, Lenin sent Radek to a meeting with Parvus. From the memoirs of Parvus:“I conveyed to Lenin through a mutual friend that now peace negotiations are necessary. Lenin replied that his business is revolutionary agitation. Then I said: tell Lenin that if state policy does not exist for him, then he will become a tool in my hands...” On the day of Lenin's arrival, a photograph of Lenin appeared in the Swedish newspaper of left-wing democrats "Politiken" with the caption - "leader of the Russian revolution." E. Heresh:- By this time, Lenin had already been outside Russia for ten years - in exile, and in his homeland hardly anyone remembered him, with the exception of some party comrades, so this signature was absolutely absurd. But... this is how Parvus “worked”. On the instructions of Parvus, Yakov Ganetsky directed a grand meeting of Lenin at the Finland station in St. Petersburg - with an orchestra, with flowers, with an armored car and Baltic sailors. An urgent “encryption” was sent to Berlin: “..Lenin’s entry into Russia was a success. He works entirely according to our wishes...” The next day Lenin spoke with the “April theses.” N. Narochnitskaya: - These “April theses” contained a program and tactics for the complete destruction and destruction of the entire state system to the ground. Already the first paragraph of the theses contains a call for so-called “fraternization” with the enemy. Surprisingly, the “fraternization” coincided with the suspension of hostilities by the German side. Massive desertion began. After Lenin’s arrival in Petrograd, German money poured into the Bolshevik treasury. Parvus feverishly exchanges telegrams with his agents. Speaks Kirill Alexandrov, historian: - Ganetsky’s telegram - “.. we are organizing a rally on Sunday. Our slogans are “All power to the Soviets”, “Long live workers’ control over the arms of the whole world”, “Khl:), peace, freedom...” Roughly speaking, in all the slogans that could appeal to the already disorganized masses who followed the Bolsheviks and who ultimately carried out the October revolution were piled up in a heap .. E. Heresh: - Those leaflets and slogans with which Lenin wanted to stir up the Russian capital Petrograd during the July 1917 putsch, all of them came from the pen of Parvus. The goal of the Bolsheviks during the riots in July 1917 there was a seizure of the counterintelligence Directorate of the General Staff. It was here that documents and correspondence of persons exposed in relations with the enemy were concentrated. Counterintelligence, without the consent of the provisional government, organized a “leak” of compromising evidence to the press. The Provisional Government was forced to open an investigation accusing the Bolsheviks, led by Lenin, of treason and organizing an armed rebellion. From the testimony of witnesses: “The Bolsheviks paid more for a strike day than for a working day. For participation in demonstrations and shouting slogans from 10 to 70 rubles. For shooting in the street - 120-140 rubles.” The money coming from Germany was sent to the Siberian and Russian-Asian trading banks. The main managers of this money were Ganetsky's relatives. N. Narochnitskaya: - Sitting in his luxurious estates, wearing diamond cufflinks, Parvus repaid the country with a revolution, which he did not feel sorry for, which he hated. But for himself he left a piece of a completely different world. From the testimony of witnesses: “In Copenhagen we went to Parvus. He occupied a mansion, had a car, was a very rich man, although a Social Democrat. All those accused in the case of high treason were released on a large cash bail. Meanwhile, the Provisional Government was planning to sign separate peace with Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria, but not with Germany. A date was set for November 8-9. This scenario would deprive Lenin of his main trump card in the struggle for power, and Parvus would have to answer to the German Foreign Ministry for wasted money. " Delay is like death! Now everything hangs by a thread!“- Lenin cried hysterically. On October 25 (or November 7 according to the new style) the Bolsheviks illegally seized power. Lenin and Trotsky became leaders. Immediately after the coup, another 15 million marks were transferred to Lenin to support him - after all, the Bolshevik government was not popular among the population. At the same time, peace negotiations with Germany began. Germany's harsh territorial claims caused a violent reaction in Russian society. Even Lenin's comrades considered the acceptance of such conditions dangerous. Lenin insisted on concluding peace on any terms: “We have no army, and a country that does not have an army must accept an unheard of shameful peace!” N. Narochnitskaya: - What was torn away from Russia was exactly what Germany was going to conquer when starting the First World War. And the tragedy was that the surrender of these vast territories did not occur as a result of military defeat, but on the contrary - at the moment when victory was almost in hand.. Trotsky played his game. He made a statement: " We stop hostilities, but we don’t sign peace!” In response to Trotsky's bold statement, Germany immediately resumed the offensive. Without encountering any resistance, German troops easily advanced deep into Russia. The new conditions already provided for about a million torn off kilometers. It was larger than the territory of Germany itself.. This agreement immediately turned Russia into a second-rate state. This was the price to pay for power. Parvus expected that Lenin would give him Russian banks in gratitude. But that did not happen. Lenin conveyed to Parvus: " Revolution cannot be made with dirty hands." Then Parvus decided to take revenge. During 1918 there were two attempts on Lenin’s life!! What the Kaiser was preparing for Russia boomeranged against Germany. Germany was defeated in the war. The Kaiser fled. The German government was headed by Parvus's friends - the socialists. Social upheaval and devastation along the lines of Bolshevik Russia were not part of Parvus’s plans. On the night of January 14 Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg were killed. This murder was ordered and paid for by Parvus. Having achieved the final goal for both Lenin and Berlin, Parvus turned out to be of no use to either one or the other. E. Heresh: - In this story, Parvus, like a puppeteer, pulled the strings, the puppets, who acted out the performance he had invented, which we still call “revolution.” Lenin died in January 1924. Parvus died in December of the same year. A few German comrades came to his funeral. His grave is lost. And in Russia, the name of the man who brought Lenin to power will be consigned to oblivion... The film itself: http://armnn.ru/index.рhp?option=com_content&view=article&id=449:2010-07-14-18-32- 11&catid=44:interesting Updated 24/02/12 14:49: Sorry if anyone has seen the movie before. I saw it not in 2004, but now I was in shock. Very reminiscent of today. Who is playing the role of Parvus today and who is paying him money to organize this in our country? Who?
Berezovsky, Malashenko, Nemtsov. (photo found on the Net-net link) Updated 24/02/12 15:01: aniase 02/24/12 14:39 I would like to clarify that the thread stretches further. It is reliably known that the revolution in Russia was financed by some American banks. This also means Obama and Clinton US Ambassador to Russia McFaul, specialist in color revolutions Updated 24/02/12 15:13: Who plays the role of Lenin? Who plays the role of Lenin today? Tell me, who is Parvus, who is Lenin? And whose money is the Internet running on? After all, it’s enough to pay one, 2, 3, then the crowd and competent manipulation of it.

After 100 years have passed since the October Revolution of 1917, interesting details are emerging about with whose help and with what means one of the most terrible tragedies in Russia was prepared.

The sources of financing for the Russian Revolution of 1917 and its main ideologists have occupied historians for many years. Interesting facts were made public in the 2000s, after some documents from German and Soviet archives were declassified. Researchers of the biography of Vladimir Ulyanov (Lenin) have repeatedly noted that the leader of the world proletariat was not scrupulous in the matter of receiving money to fan the “revolutionary fire.” Who benefited from inciting a civil war in Russia, how German and American bankers financed the Bolsheviks - read in our material.

EXTERNAL INTEREST

One of the main reasons for the outbreak of revolutionary unrest in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century was the country's participation in the First World War. The international armed conflict, which had no analogues at that time, was the result of intensified contradictions between the largest colonial powers that formed into the Entente (Great Britain, France, Russia) and the Triple Alliance (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy).

Conspiracy theorists also note that British and American bankers and industrialists had their own interests in this war - the destruction of the old world order, the overthrow of monarchies, the collapse of the Russian, German and Ottoman empires and the capture of new markets.

However, attacks on the Russian autocracy from abroad were carried out even before the global world conflict. In 1904, the Russo-Japanese War began, money for which was lent to the Land of the Rising Sun by American bankers - the Morgans and the Rockefellers. In 1903-1904, the Japanese themselves spent huge sums on various political provocations in Russia.

But even here the Americans were not spared: a colossal sum of $10 million at that time was lent by the banking group of the American financier of Jewish origin, Jacob Schiff. The future leaders of the revolution did not disdain this money, guided by the principle “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” The enemies were everyone who opposed the reactionary forces in Russia.

DESTRUCTIVE PROCESSES

As a result of the war with the Japanese, the Russian Empire lost the struggle for dominance in the Far East and the Pacific Ocean. According to the terms of the Portsmouth Peace Treaty concluded in September 1905, the Liaodong Peninsula along with the branch of the South Manchurian Railway and the southern part of Sakhalin Island were ceded to Japan. In addition, Korea was recognized as Japan's sphere of influence, and the Russians withdrew their troops from Manchuria.

Against the background of the defeats of the Russian Empire on the battlefields, dissatisfaction with the foreign policy and social structure of the state was maturing in the country. The destructive processes within Russian society began at the end of the 19th century, but only at the beginning of the 20th century they gained strength capable of crushing the empire, without whose approval until recently “not a single cannon in Europe could fire.”

The dress rehearsal for the 1917 revolution took place in 1905 after the famous events of January 9, which went down in history as Bloody Sunday - the shooting by imperial troops of a peaceful demonstration of workers led by the priest Gapon. Strikes and numerous speeches, unrest in the army and navy forced Nicholas II to establish the State Duma, which somewhat defused the situation, but did not fundamentally solve the problem.

THE WAR HAS COME

By 1914, the beginning of the First World War, reactionary processes in Russia were already systemic in nature - Bolshevik propaganda unfolded throughout the country, numerous anti-monarchist newspapers were published, revolutionary leaflets were printed, strikes and rallies of workers became widespread.

The global armed conflict in which the Russian Empire was drawn into made the already difficult existence of workers and peasants unbearable. In the first year of the war, the production and sale of consumer goods in the country decreased by a quarter, in the second - by 40%, in the third - by more than half.

"TALENTS" AND THEIR FANS

By February 1917, when the “popular masses” in the Russian Empire were finally ripe for the overthrow of the autocracy, Vladimir Lenin (Ulyanov), Leon Trotsky (Bronstein), Matvey Skobelev, Moses Uritsky and other leaders of the revolution had already lived abroad for many years. On what kind of money did the ideologists of a “bright future” subsist all this time in a foreign land, and quite comfortably at that? And who sponsored the smaller leaders of the proletariat who remained in their homeland?

It is no secret that the radical Bolshevik wing of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (RSDLP) raised money to fight the bourgeois capitalists by not always legal methods, or rather, often illegal. In addition to donations from altruists and provocateurs, such as the major industrialist Savva Morozov or Trotsky’s uncle, the banker Abram Zhivotovsky, expropriations (or, as they were called, “exes”), that is, robberies, were common for the Bolsheviks. By the way, the future Soviet leader Joseph Dzhugashvili, who went down in history under the name Stalin, took an active part in them.

FRIENDS OF THE REVOLUTION

With the outbreak of the First World War, a new upsurge of the revolutionary movement in Russia began, fueled, among other things, by money from abroad. The family ties of the revolutionaries operating in Russia helped with this: Sverdlov had a banker brother living in the USA, the uncle of Trotsky, who was hiding abroad, was handling millions in Russia.

An important role in the development of the revolutionary movement was played by Israel Lazarevich Gelfand, better known as Alexander Parvus. He came from the Russian Empire and had connections with influential financial and political circles in Germany, as well as with German and British intelligence. According to some reports, it was this man who was one of the first to pay attention to the Russian revolutionaries Lenin, Trotsky, Markov, Zasulich and others. In the early 1900s, he helped publish the newspaper Iskra.

One of the leaders of Austrian Social Democracy became another faithful “friend of Russian revolutionaries” Victor Adler. It was to him in 1902 that Lev Bronstein, who had escaped from Siberian exile and left his wife and two small children in his homeland, went. Adler, who subsequently saw in Trotsky a brilliant demagogue and provocateur, supplied the guest from Russia with money and documents, thanks to which the future People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs of the RSFSR successfully reached London.

Lenin and Krupskaya lived there at that time under the name Richter. Trotsky conducts propaganda activities, speaks at meetings of Social Democratic circles, and writes in Iskra. The sharp-tongued young journalist is sponsored by the party movement and wealthy “comrades in struggle.” A year later, Trotsky-Bronstein in Paris meets his future common-law wife, a native of Odessa Natalya Sedova, who was also interested in Marxism.

In the spring of 1904, Trotsky was invited to visit his estate near Munich by Alexander Parvus. The banker not only introduces him to the circle of European supporters of Marxism, initiates him into the plans for the world revolution, but also develops with him the idea of creating Soviets.

Parvus would also be one of the first to predict the inevitability of the First World War over new sources of raw materials and markets. Trotsky, who by that time had become deputy chairman of the St. Petersburg Council of Workers' Deputies, together with Parvus took part in the revolutionary events of 1905 in Petrograd, which, to their chagrin, did not lead to the overthrow of the autocracy. Both were arrested (Trotsky was sentenced to eternal exile in Siberia) and both soon fled abroad.

After the events of 1905, Trotsky settled in Vienna, generously sponsored by his socialist friends, lived in grand style: he changed several luxury apartments, and became a member of the highest social democratic circles of Austria-Hungary and Germany. Another sponsor of Trotsky was the German theorist of Austro-Marxism Rudolf Hilferding, with his support Trotsky published the reactionary newspaper Pravda in Vienna.

MONEY DOESN'T SMELL

During the outbreak of World War I, Lenin and Trotsky were on the territory of Austria-Hungary. They, as Russian subjects, were almost arrested, but Victor Adler stood up for the leaders of the revolution. As a result, both left for neutral countries. Germany and the United States were preparing for war: in America, President Woodrow Wilson, who was close to the tycoons of the financial world, came to power and the Federal Reserve System (FRS) was created; the former banker Max Warburg was put in charge of the German intelligence services. Under the control of the latter, Nia Bank was created in Stockholm in 1912, which later financed the activities of the Bolsheviks.

After the failed revolution of 1905, for some time the revolutionary movement in Russia remained with almost no “feeding” from abroad, and the paths of its main ideologists - Lenin and Trotsky - diverged. Significant sums began to arrive after Germany became bogged down in the war, and again largely thanks to Parvus. In the spring of 1915, he proposed to the German leadership a plan to incite a revolution in the Russian Empire in order to force the Russians to leave the war. The document described how to organize an anti-monarchy campaign in the press and conduct subversive agitation in the army and navy.

PARVUS PLAN

The key role in the plan to overthrow the autocracy in Russia was assigned to the Bolsheviks (although the final division in the RSDLP into Bolsheviks and Mensheviks occurred only in the spring of 1917). Parvus called “against the backdrop of a losing war” to direct the negative feelings of the Russian people against tsarism. He was also one of the first to propose supporting separatist sentiments in Ukraine, declaring that the formation of an independent Ukraine “can be considered both as liberation from the tsarist regime and as a solution to the peasant question.” Parvus's plan cost 20 million marks, of which the German government agreed to lend a million at the end of 1915. It is unknown how much of this money reached the Bolsheviks, since, as German intelligence reasonably believed, part of the money was pocketed by Parvus. Part of this money definitely reached the revolutionary treasury and was spent for its intended purpose.

The famous Social Democrat Eduard Bernstein, in an article published in 1921 in the newspaper Vorwärts, claimed that Germany paid the Bolsheviks more than 50 million gold marks.

TWO-FACE ILYICH

Kerensky claimed that Lenin's associates received a total of 80 million from the Kaiser's treasury. The funds were transferred, among other things, through Nia-Bank. Lenin himself did not deny that he took money from the Germans, but he never named specific amounts.

Nevertheless, in April 1917 the Bolsheviks published 17 daily newspapers with a total weekly circulation of 1.4 million copies. By July, the number of newspapers increased to 41, and circulation increased to 320 thousand per day. And this is not counting the numerous leaflets, each circulation of which cost tens of thousands of rubles. At the same time, the Central Committee of the Party purchased a printing house for 260 thousand rubles.

True, the Bolshevik Party had other sources of income: in addition to the already mentioned robberies and robbery, as well as membership fees of the party members themselves (on average 1-1.5 rubles per month), money came from a completely unexpected direction. Thus, General Denikin reported that the commander of the Southwestern Front, Gutor, opened a loan of 100 thousand rubles to finance the Bolshevik press, and the commander of the Northern Front, Cheremisov, subsidized the publication of the newspaper “Our Way” from government money.

After the October Revolution of 1917, financing of the Bolsheviks through various channels continued.

Conspiracy theorists claim that financial support for the Russian revolutionaries was provided by the structures of major financiers and Masonic bankers like the Rockefellers and Rothschilds. US Secret Service documents dated December 1918 noted that large sums for Lenin and Trotsky were channeled through Federal Reserve Vice President Paul Warburg. Fed leaders asked Morgan's financial group for another million dollars for emergency support of the Soviet government.

In April 1921, the New York Times reported that Lenin's account in one of the Swiss banks received 75 million francs in 1920 alone, Trotsky's accounts contained 11 million dollars and 90 million francs, Zinoviev and Dzerzhinsky - 80 million each. millions of francs (there are no documents confirming or refuting this information).

— Why did you decide to study the life of Vladimir Lenin and then write his biography?

— I started writing about Lenin after I conducted a large-scale study of the structure of the Bolshevik Party in the period 1917-1923. Then I studied not only those who were members of the Central Committee, but also ordinary communists. Actually, I wanted to understand how communists were responsible for the terrible events that happened in Russia and other countries. To do this, I needed an analysis of the political, economic and cultural background of the October Revolution of 1917.

In addition, I needed to identify the contributions of individual leaders, starting with the founder of the Soviet state, Vladimir Lenin. But to understand Lenin, studying general facts was clearly not enough.

— Was it difficult to access the archives?

— When in the early 1980s I began writing my trilogy about Lenin’s political life, only those historians who were trusted and considered one of their own in the USSR could gain access to the Soviet archives. Everything changed in 1991: already in September of this year I arrived in Moscow. And it was then - after the August putsch - that access to the archival documents of the CPSU Central Committee was opened.

For two years I studied these previously inaccessible treasures.

By the way, recently such research has become much easier to obtain in the archives of the Hoover Institute of War, Revolution and Peace at Stanford University. There are no less documents about the USSR and Russia than in Russian archives!

— What struck you most in Lenin’s biography?

— Access to major sources about Lenin’s life and work was limited by the Soviet authorities for many years. After his death, Lenin became something of an icon. Both in the East and in the West, his image (no matter whether positive or negative) was exploited in a political context. And when the archives were opened, it became possible to understand what Lenin was like in purely human terms.

He was a bright man who was blinded by his own brightness. He had his own charm. And Lenin was impartial in his calculations. At the same time, he was overwhelmed by uncontrollable passions, including an obsession with Marxism. Finally, Lenin cheated on his long-suffering, devoted wife.

He was a spoiled child and a dangerous genius rolled into one.

— What achievement of Lenin would you call the main one?

“Lenin helped bring Russia out of World War I and then saved the country from German intervention. And he was able to achieve this, despite active opposition within his party. Nevertheless, many lands that were part of the Russian Empire were occupied by Germany.

Even more important, it was Russia’s exit from the war that contributed to Germany’s near-win. Such a scenario would have been fatal for Lenin, but this did not happen.

Thus, his greatest achievement set the stage for his worst nightmare.

Still, you shouldn’t put Lenin on a pedestal. He would never have taken power if Russia in 1917 had not been in an acute phase of economic, political and military crisis.

— What about foreign financing?

— Of course, the Bolsheviks received money from the German authorities, who wanted to weaken the Russian army and bring the “peace party” to power. Of course, this is not the only reason why Lenin came to power. But without German money at the beginning of 1917, Lenin would not have succeeded.

—Would anything have happened without Trotsky?

— Leon Trotsky was the strategist and tactician of the seizure of power in Petrograd in October 1917. He also convinced Lenin to refuse to unite with other leftist parties. Trotsky was an important figure. But like many politicians who wrote about their activities, he exaggerated his own contribution to the revolution.

In my opinion, Trotsky is a wonderful example of an arrogant revolutionary politician who, along with Lenin, did not understand how dangerous a dictatorship is.

Lenin was lucky to die in his bed! But Trotsky in 1940 fell victim to the system that he himself helped to build.

— And if you remember Joseph Stalin?

— Lenin always felt that Stalin could be used. In general, he appreciated Stalin's ability to control, intimidate and destroy. Lenin's mistake was that he believed that he could always keep Stalin under control. However, when Lenin began to experience health problems, Stalin stopped listening to him. Lenin felt like a father whom his own son decided not to know.

However, Russian and Western historians tend to exaggerate the importance of the contradictions that arose between Lenin and Stalin in 1922-1923.

This conflict is a very minor thing, especially in light of the emerging Soviet system.

In general, Lenin and Stalin are in many ways alike: they established a one-party system of government, mobilized society, created a manipulative statehood, committed judicial arbitrariness and stood at the head of militant atheism. Let's not idealize Lenin!

—Can we then call the path that Lenin chose to build the state realistic?

- You must be joking! Is it possible to modernize a country and improve people's lives if the economy and society are quarantined?

Lenin did not secure Russia even in international relations. Yes, he restrained the Communist International from making dangerous decisions, but this happened after the invasion of Poland in 1920, which turned into a real nightmare for Lenin himself and for the Red Army.

— How did the perception of Lenin’s personality change?

— Once upon a time his figure was considered quite controversial. Western communists admired him, his comrades relied on him.

I think that Lenin is not very popular now. And the conclusion that Leninism is a catastrophic way of organizing society, economics and politics is obvious.

Who will choose dictatorship if democracy exists?

There should be no doubt here: a democratic scenario for the development of events after the overthrow of the Romanovs in 1917 was not impossible. Although it’s difficult to envy Russia’s position at that time...

— What did Lenin give to modern politics?

“He contributed to the invention of totalitarianism.” He had predecessors in revolutionary France, and then followers from among the leaders of the world communist movement of the 20th century.

Despite his brilliant intellect (and perhaps because of it), he did not know what he was doing. Lenin looked at the world through a glass darkly. And for this “myopia” and lack of self-confidence, millions of people paid with their lives.

— What is Lenin’s legacy?

The communist past still leaves its mark on modern Russia, despite the fact that the communists themselves long ago lost power in the country. Demolishing monuments to Lenin will not help; approaches and practices must be reformed. And only then will it be possible to say that “deleninization” has occurred.

And the Lenin Mausoleum, standing on Red Square in his honor, is not only a provocative architectural object: it is a symbol of the unwillingness of the Russian authorities to abandon the past, which brought pain not only to Russia, but also to other states.

What happened exactly 95 years ago gave rise to rumors that Ilyich was a German spy.

This trip, which changed the course of world history, still raises many questions. And the main one: who helped Ilyich return to his homeland? In the spring of 1917, Germany was at war with Russia, and throwing a handful of Bolsheviks into the heart of the enemy, who preached the defeat of their government in the imperialist war, was to the advantage of the Germans. But not everything is so simple, says writer, historian Nikolai Starikov, author of the books “Chaos and revolutions - the weapon of the dollar”, “1917. The solution to the “Russian” revolution”, etc.

If Lenin had been a German spy, he would have immediately sought to return to Petrograd through German territory. And, of course, I would immediately get the go-ahead. But things were different. Let us remember: little Switzerland, where Ilyich then lived, was surrounded by France, Italy, Germany and Austria-Hungary, locked in mortal combat.

There were two options to leave it: through a country that was a member of the Entente or through the territory of its opponents. Lenin initially chooses the first one. March 5 (18) (hereinafter the date according to the new style is indicated in brackets. - Ed.) receives the following telegram from him: “Dear friend!.. We are still dreaming about the trip... I would really like to give you an order in England to find out quietly and That's right, I could drive through. Shake your hand. Your V.U.” Between March 2 (15) and March 6 (19), 1917, Lenin telegraphed his comrade Ganetsky in Stockholm, setting out a different plan: to travel to Russia under the guise of... a deaf-mute Swede. And on March 6, in a letter to V.A. Karpinsky, he offers: “Take papers in your name for travel to France and England, and I will use them to travel through England (and Holland) to Russia. I can wear a wig."

The first mention of Germany as a route appears in Ilyich’s telegram to Karpinsky on March 7 (20) - on the 4th day of searching for options. But soon he admits in a letter to I. Armand: “It doesn’t go through Germany.” Isn't all this strange? Vladimir Ilyich cannot agree with his German “accomplices” on passage through their territory and spends a long time inventing workarounds: either “quietly” go through England, or in a wig with someone else’s documents - through France, or pretend to be a deaf-mute Swede...

Conspiracy of "allies"

I am convinced that if by that time there were some secret agreements between Lenin and the German authorities, they were very vague. Otherwise, difficulties with its delivery to Russia would not have arisen in the first place. The Germans did not expect a successful February coup, they did not expect any revolution at all! Because, apparently, they were not preparing any revolution. And who prepared February 1917? For me, the answer is obvious: Russia’s Western “allies” in the Entente. It was their agents who brought the workers, and then the soldiers, onto the streets of Petrograd, and the English and French ambassadors supervised these events. Everything happened unexpectedly not only for the Germans, but also for the Bolsheviks. For the comrades were not necessary; the “allied” intelligence services were capable of organizing workers’ unrest and a soldier’s revolt without their help. But in order to bring the revolutionary process to the end (i.e., the collapse of Russia, which would allow it to be completely subordinated to the will of the Atlantic powers), it was necessary to add fresh Leninist yeast to the cauldron.

There is every reason to believe that in March 1917 it was the “allied” intelligence, in separate negotiations with the Germans, that convinced them not to interfere with the passage of the Bolshevik Russians (i.e., representatives of the enemy country, who, according to wartime law, should have been arrested and put behind bars until the end of the war). And the Germans agreed.

General Erich Ludendorff wrote in his memoirs: “By sending Lenin to Russia, our government assumed a special responsibility. From a military point of view, his passage through Germany had its justification: Russia was about to fall into the abyss.” Having learned the good news, Lenin rejoices. “You may say that the Germans will not give you a carriage.

Let’s bet that they will!” - he writes on March 19 (April 1). And then - to her: “We have more money for the trip than I thought... our comrades in Stockholm helped us a lot.” Two weeks passed between the two messages to my beloved (“it doesn’t go through Germany” and “they will give [the carriage]”), and during this time the USA, England and Germany decided the fate of Russia. The Americans gave the necessary money (indirectly, through the same Germans and Swedes) to the Russian radicals, and the British ensured the non-interference of the Provisional Government under their control. In Stockholm, where Lenin and his companions arrived after a long journey by train across Germany and then by ferry to Sweden, they calmly received a group visa to Russia from the Russian Consulate General. Moreover, the Provisional Government even paid for their tickets from Stockholm home! At the Finland Station in Petrograd on April 3 (16), the revolutionaries were greeted by a guard of honor. Lenin gave a speech, which he ended with the words: “Long live the socialist revolution!” But the new Russian government did not even think of arresting him...

Bucks in your bosom

In those same March days, another fiery revolutionary, (Bronstein), was preparing to return home from the United States. Like Vladimir Ilyich, Lev Davidovich received all the documents from the Russian consul in New York. On March 14 (27), Trotsky and his family left New York on the ship Kristianiafiord. However, upon arrival in Canada, he and several of his associates were briefly removed from the flight. But soon they were allowed to continue their journey - at the request of the Provisional Minister of Foreign Affairs. Surprising request? Not at all, considering that Miliukov is a personal friend of Jacob Schiff, an American tycoon, the “general sponsor” of several Russian revolutions. During the arrest, by the way, it turned out that Trotsky is a US citizen traveling on a British transit visa and a visa to enter Russia.

They also found 10 thousand dollars on him - a huge amount at that time, which he would hardly have earned from royalties for newspaper articles alone. But if this was money for the Russian revolution, then only a negligible part of it. The main sums from American bankers were transferred to the necessary accounts of verified people. This was nothing new for Schiff and other US financiers. They allocated funds to the Socialist Revolutionaries and Social Democrats in 1905, and also helped those who prepared February. Now the time has come to help the most “frostbitten” revolutionaries. By the way, in the case of Trotsky, this help was almost a family affair: Lev Davidovich’s wife, née Sedova, was the daughter of a wealthy banker Zhivotovsky, a partner of the Warburg bankers, and they, in turn, were partners and relatives of Jacob Schiff.

How did Lenin and Trotsky earn money allocated for the Russian revolution? Why did the enormous wealth of the Soviet country end up in the hands of “world-eating capitalists”, and a quarter of its gold reserves migrated to the West under a dubious “locomotive” contract? More about this in the upcoming issues of AiF.

External interest

Destructive processes

The war has come

"Talents" and their fans

Friends of the Revolution

Another faithful “friend of the Russian revolutionaries” was one of the leaders of the Austrian Social Democracy, Viktor Adler. It was to him in 1902 that Lev Bronstein, who had escaped from Siberian exile and left his wife and two small children in his homeland, went. Adler, who subsequently saw Trotsky as a brilliant demagogue and provocateur, supplied the guest from Russia with money and documents, thanks to which the future People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs of the RSFSR successfully reached London.

Lenin and Lenin lived there at that time under the name Richter. Trotsky conducts propaganda activities, speaks at meetings of Social Democratic circles, and writes in Iskra. The sharp-tongued young journalist is sponsored by the party movement and wealthy “comrades in struggle.” A year later, Trotsky-Bronstein in Paris meets his future common-law wife, a native of Odessa Natalya Sedova, who was also interested in Marxism.

Money doesn't smell

Parvus's plan

The key role in the plan to overthrow the autocracy in Russia was assigned to the Bolsheviks (although the final division in the RSDLP into Bolsheviks and Mensheviks occurred only in the spring of 1917). Parvus called “against the backdrop of a losing war” to direct the negative feelings of the Russian people against tsarism. He was also one of the first to propose supporting separatist sentiments in Ukraine, stating that the formation of an independent Ukraine “can be considered both as liberation from the tsarist regime and as a solution to the peasant question.” Parvus's plan cost 20 million marks, of which the German government agreed to lend a million at the end of 1915. It is unknown how much of this money reached the Bolsheviks, since, as German intelligence reasonably believed, part of the money was pocketed by Parvus. Part of this money definitely reached the revolutionary treasury and was spent for its intended purpose.

The famous Social Democrat Eduard Bernstein, in an article published in 1921 in the newspaper Vorwärts, claimed that Germany paid the Bolsheviks more than 50 million gold marks.

Two-faced Ilyich

Kerensky claimed that Lenin's associates received a total of 80 million from the Kaiser's treasury. The funds were transferred, among other things, through Nia-Bank. Lenin himself did not deny that he took money from the Germans, but he never named specific amounts.

After the October Revolution of 1917, financing of the Bolsheviks through various channels continued.

Related materials:

Site Map