Comrades.— The war is over, why are you not returning home? The people in England and America went nearly mad with joy when the long hoped for peace at last arrived. But why is there no peace for you, and for us? President Wilson and his colleagues are in Europe, the other Allied governments have also appointed their delegates, and soon the Peace Conference will assemble. But in the meantime you are still condemned to fight and die, and war with all its horrors is raging in Russia.

For many long, weary agonizing months, perhaps years, your old folks, your wives, your little ones have been overwhelmed with anxiety about you. Now in their innocence their anxiety has been turned into joyful expectation of your return. Can you not picture them — every knock, every footstep they hear makes their hearts leap in the belief that it is someone bringing tidings of your homecoming. But your dear ones will wait in vain. Your masters continue to drive you through the valley of death, and you do not know, but that your bodies may rot in the mud and blood of the battlefield. Don’t you want to mingle with your loved ones again?

The war is over. Why don’t you go home?

For over four years your governments have kept you at war, and have condemned millions of your fellow citizens to death, and millions more to a fate worse than death. You made these fearful sacrifices for what you were led to believe to be the defense of Europe against the domination of the Kaiser, and once and for all to relieve the world from the crushing burden of armaments; from the menace of Prussian militarism.

Well, this menace is removed. Prussian militarism is crushed. The Kaiser is a fugitive. The German workers have risen in revolt and have delivered a death blow to the power of the reactionary Junker class.

Why, then, are you still fighting? Above all, why are you in Russia ?

The help of the Allied governments against Germany was ever desired by Russia. It is now quite unnecessary. It was never intended that the Allied troops in Russia were to fight Germans. This is perfectly obvious now since the war with Germany is apparently over, and yet the war against the Russian people still continues. Why? The reason is not far to seek.

Your masters see that the spirit of revolt is spreading to your countries. In both England and America the idea of Bolshevism is making rapid headway. Great labor demonstrations frequently take place at which the workers demand that the means of wealth production shall be taken over by the workers. At these meetings strong protests are expressed against the invasion of Russia. Your masters know that the source and center of the revolutionary world movement is Russia, and they are determined therefore to crush it out, and remove the menace to their power. That is why you are here. That is why your masters will not permit you to rejoin your loved ones who are eagerly looking forward to your return.

You see that the war has now been converted into a gigantic conflict between labor and capital. It is a conflict between progress and reaction. A conflict between those who are inaugurating a new area of social and economic liberty for the toiling masses, and those who desire to retain the present sordid commercial system, with its sweating, poverty and war. And you who obey the orders of your governments are fighting to maintain the old order, you are fighting on the side of reaction against the forces of labor and progress.

Is this worth dying for? Do you really desire to bleed and die in order that capitalism may continue? Say no!

Form Soldiers’ Councils in each regiment, and demand of your governments, demand of your officers to be sent home. Refuse to shoot your fellow workers in Russia - refuse to crush our workers’ revolution.