Interpreting Lvov to mean that Kerensky was offering him dictatorial powers, Kornilov responded that he preferred the third option. He did not crave power, he said, and would subordinate himself to every head of state; but if asked to take on the main responsibility, as Lvov (and, presumably, the Prime Minister) suggested he might, he would not refuse.46 He went on to say that in view of the danger of an imminent Bolshevik coup in Petrograd, it might be wise for the Prime Minister and Savinkov to seek safety in Mogilev and there join him in discussions on the composition of the new cabinet.
The interview over, Lvov at once departed for Petrograd.
Lukomskii, who was politically more astute, expressed suspicions about Lvov’s mission. Had Kornilov asked for his credentials? No, Kornilov replied, because he knew Lvov to be an honorable man. Why had Savinkov not asked his opinions of cabinet changes? Kornilov shrugged off this question.47
On the evening of August 25, Kornilov invited Rodzianko by telegraph to come to Mogilev, along with other public leaders, in three days’ time. Lvov wired a similar message to his brother. The meeting was to deal with the composition of the new cabinet.48
At 6 p.m. the following day (August 26), Lvov met with Kerensky in the Winter Palace.* Just as in his interview with Kornilov he had posed as a representative of the Prime Minister, so he now assumed the role of an agent of the Commander in Chief. Without telling Kerensky that he had asked Kornilov’s opinion of three options for restructuring the government, which he had formulated with his friends but presented as coming from the Prime Minister, he said that Kornilov demanded dictatorial authority. Kerensky recalls that on hearing this he burst out laughing. But amusement soon yielded to alarm. He asked Lvov to put Kornilov’s demands in writing. Lvov jotted down the following:
General Kornilov proposes:
1. That martial law be proclaimed in Petrograd.
2. That all military and civil authority be placed in the hands of the Commander in Chief.
3. That all ministers, not excluding the Prime Minister, resign and that provisional executive authority be transferred to deputy ministers until the formation of a cabinet by the Commander in Chief.
V. Lvov49
Kerensky says that as soon as he read these words everything became clear:50 a military coup was in the making. He might have asked himself why Kornilov had to employ as intermediary the former Procurator of the Holy Synod rather than Savinkov, or better yet, he might have rushed to the nearest telegraph to ask Kornilov or Filonenko whether the Commander in Chief had indeed commissioned Lvov to negotiate on his behalf. He did neither. His certainty that Kornilov was about to seize power was strengthened by Lvov’s insistence that Kornilov wanted Kerensky and Savinkov to depart that very night for Mogilev. Kerensky concluded that Kornilov wanted to take them prisoner.
There can be little doubt that the three “conditions” attributed by Lvov to Kornilov had been concocted by him and his friends in order to force the issue: they did not reflect Kornilov’s answer to what he had been told were questions posed to him by the Prime Minister. But they were just what Kerensky needed to break Kornilov. In order to obtain incontrovertible proof of Kornilov’s conspiracy, Kerensky decided for the time being to play along. He invited Lvov to meet him at 8 p.m. in the office of the Minister of War to communicate with the general by telegraph.
Lvov, who spent the interval with Miliukov, was late. At 8:30, having kept Kornilov waiting for half an hour, Kerensky initiated a telegraphic conversation, in the course of which he impersonated the absent Lvov. He hoped, he said later, with this deception to obtain either a confirmation of Lvov’s ultimatum or else a “bewildered” denial.
What follows is the complete text of this celebrated exchange as recorded on telegraphic tapes:
Kerensky: Prime Minister on the line. We are waiting for General Kornilov.
Kornilov: General Kornilov on the line.
Kerensky: How do you do, General. V. N. Lvov and Kerensky are on the line. We ask you to confirm that Kerensky can act in accordance with the information conveyed to him by Vladimir Nikolaevich.
Kornilov: How do you do, Aleksandr Fedorovich. How do you do, Vladimir Nikolaevich. To confirm once again the outline of the situation I believe the country and the army are in, an outline which I sketched out to Vladimir Nikolaevich with the request that he should report it to you, let me declare once more that the events of the last few days and those already in the offing make it imperative to reach a completely definite decision in the shortest possible time.
Kerensky [impersonating Lvov]: I, Vladimir Nikolaevich, am enquiring about this definite decision which has to be taken, of which you asked me to inform Aleksandr Fedorovich strictly in private. Without such confirmation from you personally, Aleksandr Fedorovich hesitates to trust me completely.
Kornilov: Yes, I confirm that I asked you to transmit my urgent request to Aleksandr Fedorovich to come to Mogilev.
Kerensky: I, Aleksandr Fedorovich, take your reply to confirm the words reported to me by Vladimir Nikolaevich. It is impossible for me to do that and leave here today, but I hope to leave tomorrow. Will Savinkov be needed?
Kornilov: I urgently request that Boris Viktorovich come along with you. What I said to Vladimir Nikolaevich applies equally to Boris Viktorovich. I would beg you most sincerely not to postpone your departure beyond tomorrow …
Kerensky: Are we to come only if there are demonstrations, rumors of which are going around, or in any case?
Kornilov: In any case.
Kerensky: Goodbye. We shall meet soon.
Kornilov: Goodbye.51
This brief dialogue was a comedy of errors with the most tragic consequences. Kerensky later maintained—and he persisted in this version to the end of his life—that Kornilov had “affirmed not only Lvov’s authority to speak in Kornilov’s name, but confirmed also the accuracy of the words which Lvov had attributed to him”—namely, that he demanded dictatorial powers.52 But we know from eyewitnesses at the other end of the Hughes apparatus that when the conversation was over, Kornilov heaved a sigh of relief: Kerensky’s agreement to come to Mogilev meant to him that the Prime Minister was willing to work jointly on the formation of a new, “strong” government. Later that evening, Kornilov discussed with Lukomskii the composition of such a cabinet, in which both Kerensky and Savinkov would hold ministerial posts. He also sent telegrams to leading statesmen inviting them to join him and the Prime Minister in Mogilev.53
Thanks to the availability of the tapes, it can be established that the two men talked at cross-purposes. As concerned Kornilov, all that he had confirmed to Kerensky posing as Lvov was that he had, indeed, invited Kerensky and Savinkov to Mogilev. Kerensky interpreted Kornilov’s confirmation to mean—without any warrant except such as provided by his fevered imagination—that Kornilov intended to take him prisoner and proclaim himself dictator. It was an omission of monumental proportions on Kerensky’s part not to inquire directly or even obliquely whether Kornilov had in fact given Lvov for transmittal a three-point ultimatum. In the conversation with Kerensky, Kornilov said nothing about the cabinet resigning and full military and civilian power being placed in his hands. From Kornilov’s words—“Yes, I confirm that I asked you [i.e., Lvov] to transmit my urgent request to Aleksandr Fedorovich to come to Mogilev”—Kerensky chose to infer that the three political conditions presented to him by Lvov were authentic as well. When Filonenko saw the tapes, he observed that “Kerensky never stated what he was asking and Kornilov never knew to what he was responding.”* Kerensky believed that by impersonating Lvov he was communicating with Kornilov in an understandable code, whereas he was speaking in riddles. The best that can be said in defense of the Prime Minister’s behavior is that he was overwrought. But the suspicion lurks that he heard exactly what he wanted to hear.