There’s anything you want in the Finland, Vyborg, Tammerfors and other train stations. The old custom remains in force: you pay 3 to 4 marks at the buffet entrance and you can eat whatever you want. Hors d'oeuvre a plenty. Finns are very poorly disposed to Russians. The Finns are kinder. Russian troops are not kicked around.
I visited the famous 703rd regiment. All the travelers there are asked: "Are you for or against the offensive?" - If you’re for: "Beat him!" They have a distillery, they distill moonshine. They have women in the trenches.
They constantly go to Vilna. The Germans publish the Russian newspaper "Comrade" there, and it moves in trenches with an obvious note: "Printed in Vilna." Once the command sent four loyal regiments and artillery. The rebels were surrounded, and they surrendered without hesitation, dropping their weapons.
They say there are many former paid police informants among the Bolsheviks. B. is a witness. In general, reinforcements spoil on the shelves. Officers, by their own words, are well, but are discouraged. I remember a captain, who was at the front the entire time, and was wounded four times, and a student, who is feeding his whole family on his salary – confessing to him: "When I talk about the offensive and that I'll go forward, they call me a bourgeois." I want to cry.
I went into the house and gave the order for one of the group of deserters, one of the more insolent, to be singled out. I announced to the division that anybody who crosses the river Zbruch without being ordered to do so will be shot immediately. I then wrote out a personal decree demanding the immediate execution of the deserter. See more
I am no investigator and I have no idea who is most to blame for the vile drama we are witnessing. I have no intention of defending the adventurers and opportunists; all those who try to arouse the dark instincts of the masses are hateful and unpleasant to me, no matter what name they bear, or how much fine service they may have done in the past for Russia. See more
The “breach of the revolutionary army”, reported on by the head of the government, “War Minister”, Prince Lvov " ended in treason by the Grenadier Guards. The entire Eleventh Army, abandoning their positions, went running into the rear after them. See more
There can be no doubt that this so-called counter-revolution – a term which everybody interprets in his own sense – was engineered by the Germans to synchronise with their offensive. The news of what was passing in Petrograd was circulated among the troops at the front by German aeroplanes and by Bolshevik agitators, and the collapse of the Russian Army would never have been so complete but for this. See more
It was a little warmer, but the sun was not out. During the morning, as usual, I took a nice walk with my daughters. After breakfast we worked near the Arsenal. We cut down three fir trees and cut up still another tree which had fallen in the grass. I packed some books and then read. During the evening I read aloud.