861.00/4931: Telegram
The Ambassador in Japan ( Morris ), temporarily at Omsk, to the Secretary of State
[Received July 29, 7:04 p.m.]
My conversations with Admiral Kolchak have failed to bring out any points not already familiar to the Allied Governments. He emphasized the provisional nature of his Government, which did not aspire to reconstruct the political life of Russia except so far as that might be necessary in order to obtain his single object, the overthrow of the Bolshevik tyranny in European Russia. He expressed his conviction that this object must be accomplished by the Russian people themselves and said that he did not desire or request the aid of foreign troops to fight Bolshevism. But he did need Allied assistance. Such need arose from two causes: 1st, the great length of the line of communication from the present front to the Port of Vladivostock and the complications already created along the railway by the presence of Czechs and other foreign troops, for reasons now a matter of history and in no way connected with Russia’s internal affairs; 2d, the control by the Bolsheviks of that part of European Russia which contained all developed resources and all the industrial plants, so that he and his associates elsewhere were without means to supply the manufactured materials necessary to continue the struggle. He therefore asked for two kinds of aid,—sufficient Allied troops adequately to guard the line of communication; and credits which would enable his Government to purchase supplies and equipment.
He fully recognized the demoralization of the Russian people, due to the sufferings of war and revolution, and was not opposed in principle to any plan of Allied supervision which would assure an honest distribution of the supplies which might be furnished. [Page 400] He approved heartily of my suggestion that in cooperation with Allied representatives I should discuss all details with his experts and endeavor to formulate a comprehensive plan to give the aid required. He took occasion in my second interview to pay a lasting tribute to the work of the Red Cross, “A service”, he said, “which: the Russian people would never forget”.
Sukine and I have agreed to discuss the situation under the following heads: 1st, Railway supervision, which is subdivided into (a) operation, chiefly the question of enforcing and protecting the authority of the Inter-Allied Committee and its agents, and (b) guarding, which includes the question of the Czechs, and the financing for the coming winter period. [2d], Required military supplies. 3d, Credits. 4th, Commercial relief. 5th, Red Cross relief. 6th, German and Austrian prisoners of war. 7th, A bill of rights.
The last requires a word of explanation. By it I mean a carefully prepared statement issued by Kolchak guaranteeing certain fundamental individual rights. Much of the discontent with the present Government, the demoralization and panic, is in my judgment due to the utter insecurity of person and property. All over Siberia there is an orgy of arrest without charges; of execution without even the pretense of trial; and of confiscation without color of authority. Fear—panic fear—has seized everyone. Men suspect each other and live in constant terror that some spy or enemy will cry “Bolshevik” and condemn them to instant death. A definite assurance, however bare in its terms, that [omission] will try to protect them is imperative. Fortunately the courts continue their functions and the habit of respect for them still exists. So here is an instrument for enforcing such a statement if the Government will make an honest effort to use it.
I am proceeding on three assumptions: 1st, that the action of the Supreme Council definitely and finally places our Government and its associates in opposition to the cruel tyranny of the Bolshevik regime in European Russia; 2d, that there is still a reasonable hope that the Kolchak movement will survive the present military crisis; 3d, that in such event we are prepared to give it help and support if practicable means can be devised.
I repeat these assumptions as I am more anxious not to embarass our Government in its policy toward this dark, complex, and difficult situation by going a step beyond the instructions received.