Railroad and occupied territory map of western and central Europe, northern Africa, and Turkey. A German postcard map postdating the taking of Riga on the Baltic Sea on September 3, 1917 but before the German advance in February, 1918. The inset shows the Western Front and French-occupied territory in Alsace, then German Elsass.
Von uns besetzt 603000 qkm.Vom Feind besetzt 14000 qkm.Gebiet der SeesperreFestungenEisenbahnenNeutraler SchiffswegUnser Front im Westen.We occupy 603,000 square kilometers.The enemy occupies 14,000 square kilometers.Area of blockadefortressesrailwaysneutral shipping routeOur front in the West.Reverse:Reverse:Europa im Weltkrieg.(Zugelassen vom Ministerium des Innern.)No. 15. Druck u. Verlag v. Felix Grosser, Dresden-A.1.Europe in the World War.(Approved by the Ministry of the Interior.)No. 15. Printing and Publishing bu Felix Grosser, Dresden A.1.
"This peace is no peace of understanding and agreement, but a peace which Russia, grinding its teeth, is forced to accept. This is a peace which, whilst pretending to free Russian border provinces, really transforms them into German States and deprives them of their right of self-determination. This is a peace which, whilst pretending to re-establish order, gives armed support in these regions to exploiting class warfare, putting the working class again beneath the yoke of oppression which was removed by the Russian Revolution. This is a peace which gives back the land to the land-lords and again drives the workers into the serfdom of the factory owners. . . . Under the present conditions the Soviet Government . . . is unable to withstand the armed offensive of German Imperialism and is compelled, for the save of saving Revolutionary Russia, to accept the conditions put before it. . . . We declare . . . that we are going to sign immediately the treaty presented to us as an ultimatum but at the same time we refuse to enter into any discussion of its terms."
Gregory Sokolnikov speaking on March 3, 1918 at the Brest-Litovsk peace conference between Russia and the Central Powers. Negotiations broke down over the status of Russia's occupied territories, the right of self-determination of those who lived there, and the refusal of Germany to evacuate territory it occupied. Leon Trotsky, then head of the Russian delegation, left the negotiations on February 10, saying Russia would not sign Germany's proposed peace treaty, but would withdraw from the war. Germany resumed the war against a Russia incapable of resisting. On the night of February 23–24 Vladimir Lenin persuaded the Petrograd Soviet and the Central Executive Committee of the Congress of Soviets to approve the treaty, arguing that the country had no means to resist, that Germany would otherwise continue its advance, and that the conqueror's future terms would be even harsher.
Brest-Litovsk: The Forgotten Peace; March 1918 by John W. Wheeler-Bennett by John W. Wheeler-Bennett, pp. 268–269, publisher: The Norton Library, publication date: 1971, first published 193
1918-03-03, 1918, March, Brest-Litovsk, Central Powers rail and occupation map
