ly held by themselves, and these
same Whites refused to believe that the village where I had spent the
preceding night was in the possession of the Reds. It is largely an
affair of scouting parties, of patrols dodging each other through the
forest tracks, of swift raids, of sudden conviction (often entirely
erroneous) on the part of one side or the other, that it or the enemy
has been "encircled." The actual number of combatants to a mile of front
is infinitely less than during the German war. Further, since an immense
proportion of these combatants on both sides have no wish to fight at
all, being without patriotic or political convictions and very badly fed
and clothed, and since it is more profitable to desert than to be
taken prisoner, desertion in bulk is not uncommon, and the deserters,
hurriedly enrolled to fight on the other side, indignantly re-desert
when opportunity offers. In this way the armies of Denikin and Yudenitch
swelled like mushrooms and decayed with similar rapidity. Military
events of this kind, however spectacular they may seem abroad, do not
have the political effect that might be expected. I was in Moscow at the
worst moment of the crisis in 1919 when practically everybody outside
the Government believed that Petrograd had already fallen, and I could
not but realize that the Government was stronger then than it had been
in February of the same year, when it had a series of victories and
peace with the Allies seemed for a moment to be in sight. A sort of fate
seems to impel the Whites to neutralize with extraordinary rapidity any
good will for themelves which they may find among the population.
This is true of both sides, but seems to affect the Whites especially.
Although General Baron Wrangel does indeed seem to have striven more
successfully than his predecessors not to set the population against him
and to preserve the loyalty of his army, it may be said with absolute
certainty that any large success on his part would bring crowding to
his banner the same crowd of stupid reactionary officers who brought
to nothing any mild desire for moderation that may have been felt by
General Denikin. If the area he controls increases, his power of
control over his subordinates will decrease, and the forces that led to
Denikin's collapse will be set in motion in his case also. [*]

* On the day on which I send this book to the printers news
comes of Wrangel's collapse and flight. I leave standin