--- title: Миръ и свобода въ Совдепіи (Peace and Freedom in Sovdepia) url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/mir-i-svoboda-v-sovdepii-1919/ description: A White Army cartoon titled 'Peace and Freedom in Sovdepia' shows a giant red, horned figure of Leon Trotsky wearing a Star-of-David pendant crouched… section: Collection --- [Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/) **Content note:** This 1919 poster uses antisemitic caricature (a demonic Trotsky wearing a Star of David) and depicts extrajudicial killing. This object is shown as it was published. [Why](https://propagandaarchive.org/about/#as-it-was) [![Миръ и свобода въ Совдепіи (Peace and Freedom in Sovdepia)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/mir-i-svoboda-v-sovdepii-1919.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/mir-i-svoboda-v-sovdepii-1919.jpg) # Миръ и свобода въ Совдепіи (Peace and Freedom in Sovdepia) A White Army cartoon titled 'Peace and Freedom in Sovdepia' shows a giant red, horned figure of Leon Trotsky wearing a Star-of-David pendant crouched over the Kremlin walls above an order signed in his name, while soldiers in queues and conical hats execute a prisoner over a heap of skulls below. The soldiers reflect the small Chinese contingents that did serve in Bolshevik units during the civil war; the demonic caricature of Trotsky, marked as Jewish, draws on the antisemitic 'Jewish Bolshevism' trope to cast Soviet rule as a foreign, monstrous occupation. - **Date:** 1919 - **Period:** [Interwar](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#era=interwar) - **Made by:** White movement propaganda (Russian Civil War); artist unidentified - **Region:** [Eastern Europe and Eurasia](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#region=eastern-europe-eurasia) - **Country:** [Russia White Movement](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#country=russia-white-movement) - **Medium:** [Poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#medium=poster) - **Issuer type:** [Mixed](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#actor=mixed) - **Regime:** [White Movement](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#regime=white-movement) - **Leader:** [Anton Denikin](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#leader=anton-denikin) - **Audience:** [Domestic public](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#audience=domestic-public) - **Purpose:** [Demonize](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#purpose=demonize) - **Themes:** [War and the military](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=war-military), [Race and ethnicity](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=race-ethnicity) - **Event:** [Russian Civil War](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#event=russian-civil-war) - **Techniques:** [Name-calling](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/name-calling/) [Scapegoating](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/scapegoating/) [Fear appeal](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/fear-appeal/) - **Source:** Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are - **Source:** [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:WhiteArmyPropagandaPosterOfTrotsky.jpg), retrieved September 28, 2026 - **Rights:** Public domain (per Wikimedia Commons) http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/photo/t1919b.htm or http://historydoc.edu.ru/catalog.asp?cat_ob_no=12438&ob_no=13597 ## Text on the object Original (Russian) · read from the image, not independently checked ``` МИРЪ и СВОБОДА ВЪ СОВДЕПІИ. Р.С.Ф.С.Р. РАБОЧ. КРЕСТ. ПРАВИТ. ПРИКАЗЪ. [illegible — several lines of small printed order text] [illegible title] Левъ Троцкій ``` English translation (machine translation by Claude, not verified by a fluent reader) ``` PEACE and FREEDOM IN SOVDEPIA. R.S.F.S.R. WORKERS' AND PEASANTS' GOVERNMENT. ORDER. [illegible — several lines of small printed order text] [illegible title] Leon Trotsky ``` 'Sovdepia' is a hostile coinage from 'Sovdep' (Soviet of Workers' and Peasants' Deputies), used by anti-Bolshevik propaganda for Soviet Russia. The body paragraph of the 'Order' document on the Kremlin wall is too small and low-resolution in this scan to read; the signature beneath it is legible as 'Lev Trotsky' but the official title before the name is too blurred to transcribe with confidence. [← Mayakovsky, Советская азбука (Soviet Alphabet), letter Б (Moscow, 1919)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/mayakovsky-soviet-azbuka-1919/) [РСФСР расчётный знак, 500 рублей, reverse with the multilingual slogan (Soviet Russia, 1919) →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/rsfsr-500-rubles-reverse-slogan-1919/) ## Using the same techniques - [Passional Christi und Antichristi: the emperor kisses the pope's foot (leaf 'Antichristus')](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/passional-christi-antichristi-emperor-kisses-pope-1521/) (1521 · Name-calling, Card stacking) - [Ondersoeckt de Geesten, ofse van den Duyvel syn, of niet (the De Witt brothers as devils)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/ondersoeckt-de-geesten-de-witt-devils-1672/) (1672 · Scapegoating, Name-calling) - [The Highlanders Medley, or The Duke Triumphant (A Loyal Song)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/highlanders-medley-duke-triumphant-1746/) (1746 · Name-calling, Transfer) - [The Bloody Massacre perpetrated in King Street Boston on March 5th 1770 by a party of the 29th Regt.](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/revere-bloody-massacre-king-street-1770/) (Mar 1770 · Name-calling, Card stacking) - [Marche du Dom Quichotte moderne pour la deffence du Moulin des Abus (March of the Modern Don Quixote in Defence of the Mill of Abuses)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/dom-quichotte-moulin-des-abus-1791/) (1791 · Name-calling, Transfer) - [Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/) (Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling) - [Exit Liberté a la Francois! or Buonaparte closing the Farce of Egalité, at St. Cloud (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/exit-liberte-buonaparte-gillray-1799/) (Nov 21, 1799 · Name-calling) - [Van Moscouw tot Elba moest ik wyken (From Moscow to Elba I had to give way), Napoleon caricature by Wijnand Esser](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/van-moscouw-tot-elba-napoleon-esser-1814/) (1814 · Name-calling)