The mood around me verged on ecstasy. It seemed that the mob would at any moment, spontaneously and unasked, burst into some kind of religious hymn. Trotsky formulated a short general resolution or proclaimed some general formula, on the order of: “We will defend the cause of the workers and peasants to the last drop of blood.”
Who is in favor? The crowd of thousands raised its hands like one man. I saw the uplifted hands and burning eyes of men, women, adolescents, workers, soldiers, peasants, and typical petty bourgeois figures …
[They] agreed. [They] vowed … I watched this truly grandiose spectacle with an unusually
By October 16, the Bolsheviks had at their disposal two organizations, each nominally subject to the Soviet: the Military-Revolutionary Committee to carry out the coup and the forthcoming Second Congress of Soviets to legitimize it. They had by now effectively superseded the authority of the Provisional Government in the Military Staff and that of the Ispolkom in the soviets. The Milrevkom and the Congress of Soviets were to carry out the Bolshevik decision, taken in deep secrecy on October 10, to seize power.
Sometime between October 3 and 10, Lenin slipped back into Petrograd: he did it so surreptitiously that Communist historians to this day have been unable to determine the time of his return. He lived in concealment until October 24 in the Vyborg District, surfacing only after the Bolshevik coup was already underway.
On October 10—one day after the Ispolkom and the Soviet Plenum had voted to constitute a Defense Committee and very likely in connection with that event—twelve members of the Bolshevik Central Committee gathered to decide on the question of an armed uprising. The meeting took place at night, surrounded with extreme precautions, in the apartment of Sukhanov. Lenin came in disguise, clean-shaven, wearing a wig and glasses. Our knowledge of what transpired on this occasion is imperfect, because of the two protocols taken only one has been published and even this one in a doctored version.152 The fullest account comes from the recollections of Trotsky.153
Lenin arrived determined to secure an unequivocal commitment to a coup before October 25. When Trotsky countered, “We are convening a Congress of Soviets in which our majority is assured beforehand,” Lenin answered that
the question of the Second Congress of Soviets … held for him no interest whatever: of what importance is it? will it even take place? and what can it accomplish even if it does meet? It is necessary to tear out [vyrazi’] power. One must not tie oneself to the Congress of Soviets, it is silly and absurd to forewarn the enemy about the date of the uprising. October 25 may serve at best as camouflage, but the uprising must be carried out earlier and independently of the Congress of Soviets. The party must seize power, arms in hand, and then we will talk of the Congress of Soviets.154
Trotsky thought that Lenin not only gave too much credit to the “enemy” but also underestimated the value of the soviets as a cover: the party could not seize power as Lenin wanted, independently of the soviets, because the workers and soldiers learned everything, including what they knew of the Bolshevik Party, through the medium of the soviets. Taking power outside the soviet structure would only sow confusion.
64. Grigorii Zinoviev.
The differences between Lenin and Trotsky centered on the timing and justification for the coup. But some members of the Central Committee questioned whether the party should even attempt to take power. Uritskii argued that the Bolsheviks were technically unprepared for an uprising and that the 40,000 guns at their disposal were inadequate. The most strenuous objections came again from Kamenev and Zinoviev, who explained their position in a confidential letter to Bolshevik organizations.155 The time for a coup was not yet: “We are profoundly convinced that to rise now means to gamble not only with the destiny of our party but with that of the Russian Revolution as well as that of the international revolution.” The party could expect to do well in the elections to the Constituent Assembly, capturing at a minimum one-third of the seats, thereby bolstering the authority of the soviets, in which its influence was on the ascendant. “The Constituent Assembly plus the soviets—this is the type of combined government institutions toward which we strive.” They rejected Lenin’s claim that the majority of Russians and international labor supported the Bolsheviks. Their pessimistic assessment led them to counsel a patient, defensive strategy in place of armed action.
To this argument Lenin responded that it would be “senseless to wait for the Constituent Assembly, which will not be with us, because this will complicate our task.” In this, he had the support of the majority.
