ABSTRACT

A few weeks before the outbreak of the war, there was created under Austrian auspices at Lvov, a Bund for the Liberation of the Ukraine. The purpose of this organization was to create a united front among the many revolutionary groups, and to stimulate an independence movement inside the Ukraine. A problem sometimes arises about Lenin's knowledge of the source of payment – a question that assumes naive innocence on the part of one of the most professional of revolutionaries. Lenin met Bassok in January 1915, and Bassok presumably offered financial aid. In an 'Answer to Bassok', written on January 12th, Lenin claimed that they were not travelling on the same road, but, strangely, this note was not published until 1924. Bassok remained with the party, became a Soviet official, and was eventually purged by Stalin: when an attempt is made to construe an alibi, there usually is something to conceal.