Vladimir Lenin is delivering a wartime rallying speech to Red Army troops who are about to depart for the Polish Front durint the Polish-Soviet War (1919–1921). Polish forces, led by Marshal Józef Piłsudski, had recently advanced into parts of Ukraine, and the Soviet government was mobilizing a massive military counter-offensive.
Lenin’s address focused heavily on ideological framing and military discipline, emphasizing three core messages to the departing soldiers:
Lenin emphasized that the conflict was directed solely at the Polish ruling class rather than ordinary citizens, noting the recognition of Poland’s independence.
He maintained that Soviet Russia had pursued peace and offered territorial concessions, but was compelled to fight because Western capitalist powers (the Entente) were supporting Polish aggression.
Lenin instructed the troops to conduct themselves with restraint and demonstrate that they were arriving not as conquerors, but as liberators of the working class.
The speech concluded with cheers and the playing of L’Internationale by a military brass band.
Next to Lenin appears Leon Trosky and behind him Lev Kamenev, which were central pillars of the Soviet state in the epoch.
However, following Lenin’s death in 1924, Joseph Stalin consolidated absolute power and both of them were labeled as enemies of the state, and eventually purged (Kamenev was executed in 1936, and Trotsky was assassinated in exile in 1940).
To align the public record with Stalin’s rewritten history, the Soviet regime ordered the photograph to be heavily manipulated. Graphic technicians and retouchers physically airbrushed Trotsky and Kamenev completely out of the picture.