MEMORANDUM
The British Embassy have received a telegraphic report from the British Ambassador at Petrograd, respecting the situation existing on January 1, 1918. After reporting the failure of the peace negotiations with Germany owing to the latter's insistence on the continued occupation of the Balkan [Baltic] provinces the Ambassador says:
The existence of the Bolsheviki government is so dependent on their undertakings to secure a democratic peace that they can with difficulty recede from their position, but if they are unable to secure peace they can hardly retain power for long. If they fall they will almost certainly be succeeded by the Social Revolutionary Party whose first step will probably be to ask the Allies to enter into negotiations for the conclusion of a general peace. If the reply to this proposal is unfavourable the negotiations with Germany will be renewed and, as the party cannot command the services of any statesman of known strength, the final result will probably be the acceptance of the German peace terms.
WASHINGTON, January 6, 1918.
[Received January 7.]