Lenin had not forgotten the scorn heaped on his ‘peace’ policy by the majority of Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries at the summer session of the All-Russian Congress. To ensure that there was no repeat, Trotsky planned to launch a pre-emptive coup, overthrowing the remnants of the Provisional Government and installing an all-socialist government in Petrograd, thus facing Lenin’s critics with a fait accompli. On the evening of 6 November, one day before the All-Russian Congress of Soviets was due to meet, Red Guards occupied every key point in the city.
