ABSTRACT
Bolshevism is certainly a challenge to Western Civilization, but it is not merely destructive. It is a positive theory of life, which is trying to draw to itself the energy released by the Russian Revolution in a large and compact section of mankind. Western Civilization cannot meet the challenge of Bolshevism simply by negative criticism. It must advance with its own conceptions of life, and penetrate the defences which the Bolsheviks have thrown up round the Soviet State. Whatever the motive, the result would be the same, but whereas a defensive policy would defer the crisis as long as possible, in the hope that the danger may pass with the adaptation of Bolshevism to the facts of life, an offensive policy assumes the inflexity of Bolshevism and the inevitability of a conflict. People often talk about the collapse of Bolshevism as if there was some alternative ready to take its place and to establish a Government on orthodox lines.
