The Bolshevik Myth · Chapter
VI: Chicherin and Karakhan explained
The narrator meets with Chicherin and Karakhan, discussing the revolution's prospects abroad, the blockade, and the peasantry.
What happens
The narrator meets with Chicherin and Karakhan, discussing the revolution's prospects abroad, the blockade, and the peasantry. Karakhan justifies requisitions and capital punishment as necessary for the Revolution, while Chicherin shows nervous energy and optimism about international communism. The narrator feels a veil drawn over his anarchist identity.
Themes in this chapter
Revolutionary Idealism vs. Reality
Chicherin and Karakhan express unfounded optimism about imminent revolution abroad and the peasantry's support, while the narrator points out the actual reactionary conditions.
Betrayal of Revolutionary Ideals
Karakhan justifies capital punishment and forced requisitions as necessary, contradicting revolutionary promises of freedom and equality.
Dictatorship and State Absolutism
Karakhan's casual discussion of arrests and executions, and Chicherin's control over information, reflect the authoritarian nature of the Soviet state.
Characters to notice
- Chicherin
People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, works late into the night, optimistic about revolution in England and America, personally handles documents, dismisses narrator's pessimism.
- Karakhan
Tall, well-groomed, sits in a sumptuous office with a tiger skin rug, justifies requisitions and capital punishment, dismisses narrator's skepticism about Communist influence abroad.
- Unknown Narrator
Feels his anarchist identity is deliberately obscured in official documents, discusses labor and revolution with Soviet officials, requests documents.
Key passages
“I felt as if a veil were stealthily drawn over my personality.”
The narrator senses that his anarchist identity is being deliberately hidden or downplayed by Soviet authorities.
Reflects the theme of betrayal of revolutionary ideals and the narrator's growing disillusionment.
“One mustn't be sentimental. I remember how hard it was for me, way back in 1917, when I myself had to arrest my former college chums.”
Karakhan admits to arresting his own friends but dismisses sentimentality as a weakness in revolutionary times.
Illustrates the theme of dictatorship and state absolutism, where personal relationships are sacrificed for state security.
“We have declared 'war to the palaces, peace to the huts,' and the muzhik lives like a barin now.”
Karakhan claims that peasants now enjoy luxuries from the city, but the reality of forced requisitions contradicts this.
Highlights the gap between revolutionary rhetoric and the harsh reality of economic collapse and survival.