p We must not be deceived by the present gravelike stillness in Europe. Europe is pregnant with revolution.

p Lenin

p The summer of 1914.... Imperialism had plunged mankind into a devastating, predatory war that was to bring incalculable misery and suffering, death to tens of millions of men at the front and measureless grief to their families - their mothers, wives and children at home. The war spread with avalanche-like speed, involving the whole world. It was a war between two groups of imperialist powers for the re-division of colonies and spheres of influence, for the plunder and enslavement of other peoples. One of the groups, the Quadruple Alliance, was headed by German imperialism; its other members were Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria. The other, the Entente, was headed by the British and French imperialists; tsarist Russia was one of its members. Later, Japan, Italy, the United States and other countries entered the war on the side of the Entente.

The outbreak of war found Lenin in Poronin. All the Bolsheviks living there gathered at his house to discuss the situation. Lenin told them it was imperative to devise new forms and methods of Party work to conform with war-time conditions, and re-establish regular contact with Russia as soon as possible. He felt sure that the war would accentuate all the contradictions of capitalism, intensify the class struggle in all countries, create and aggravate a general political crisis and thereby hasten the new revolution in Russia. That was an objective inevitability.