On the other hand, many favorable conditions were present. With
respect to natural resources, Russia is one of the richest countries
in the world. She has practically everything necessary to a healthy
and self-sufficing industrial life. Over this wealth the bolehevists
had full control. Lenin, the bolshevist chief, is conceded to have
been a remarkable executive, so that the socialist experiment was
conducted by a man not only well versed in Marxian doctrine, but
capable of exercising an intelligent and authoritative control of the
government. The bolshevist territory was blockaded by Great Britain,
France, and the United States, but trade connections between Russia
and the two last-named countries had been unimportant. Trade
connections with Germany and Sweden on the west, and China on the
east, were not broken off.

It is clear that the socialist experiment in Russia was attended by
important advantages and disadvantages. Whether or not bolshevism had
an absolutely fair trial is as yet impossible to say. On the other
hand, the disastrous failure of the experiment would seem to indicate
that it could not have met with any great degree of success under
fairly favorable conditions. The admissions of the bolshevist leaders
themselves, together with the conclusions of the most impartial
investigators of the experiment, justify the conclusion that socialism
in Russia failed because it was based upon false principles. The
bolshevists have been accused of having instituted a reign of terror,
bringing in its train lawlessness, murder, desecration of the church,
and the most brutal savagery. Into these charges we cannot go; it is
enough that the most reliable evidence goes to show that bolshevism,
as a nation-wide application of socialist doctrine, was a failure.