30 HUMAN LIFE IN RUSSIA
expressed it, the Russian machinery and tractor cemeteries
"surpass the wildest imagination." In fact, Soviet agriculture,
based as it was on mechanization, was wrecked by the back-
wardness of the Russian peasant.
The publication of Dr. Schiller's above-mentioned work led
to a controversy with the Soviet Government. The Soviet
claimed that Schiller could not have published his report
without the sanction of the German Government, and that
his criticism of Russian agricultural policy constituted an un-
friendly act on the part of Germany. Nevertheless, Dr. Schiller
remains the agricultural expert at the German Embassy at
Moscow. Professor Auhagen, a predecessor of Dr. Schiller's in
this post, had a similar experience. The Bolshevik Government
made difficulties over his reports, and he had to leave Russia.
These incidents show why the experts^ or rather their
superiors, are unable to publish anything, however scientific
or objective, about the real position in Russia. Friendly
Governments having diplomatic representatives accredited to
Moscow have an interest in preventing such reports from
reaching the public, for otherwise their economic relations
with the Soviet Union would be jeopardized. There is no doubt
that the Foreign Offices of various European states possess
reports from their experts containing the full facts about
Russian conditions.1
Deprived of every economic inducement, the Russian
peasant has resisted the demands made upon him. Dr. Schiller
well remarks that the Soviet Government, in its dealings with
the peasantry* is in the position of a general who has con-
centrated all his forces to consolidate a new position and
improve his technical equipment, but whose troops are suddenly
demoralized at the very moment when the external conditions
of success appear to be present. "Without abandoning the
strategic plan," Dr. Schiller writes, "an attempt is now being
made to restore discipline by changes in tactics, material
1 See chapter entitled "The Outer World and the Soviets.9*