Other despotisms there have been, but none whose
origin was so grimly fantastic in its baseness, and the beginning of
whose end was so gruesomely ignoble. What is amazing is the myth of its
irresistible strength which is dying so hard.
* * * * *
Considered historically, Russia's influence in Europe seems the most
baseless thing in the world; a sort of convention invented by
diplomatists for some dark purpose of their own, one would suspect, if
the lack of grasp upon the realities of any given situation were not the
main characteristic of the management of international relations. A
glance back at the last hundred years shows the invariable, one may say
the logical, powerlessness of Russia. As a military power it has never
achieved by itself a single great thing. It has been indeed able to
repel an ill-considered invasion, but only by having recourse to the
extreme methods of desperation. In its attacks upon its specially
selected victim this giant always struck as if with a withered right
hand. All the campaigns against Turkey prove this, from Potemkin's time
to the last Eastern war in 1878, entered upon with every advantage of a
well-nursed prestige and a carefully fostered fanaticism.
Pages:
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135