Wilson worried that the Constitution itself would not survive: "a nation can't put its strength into a war and keep its head level; it has never been… - Arthur Herman

never in history, past or present, had an autocratic regime handed over power with so little upheaval or bloodshed.

Kerensky. He was deeply committed to Russia's continuing the war — one reason the other Entente powers should have been eager to support him. But Kerensky did have one weakness that would ultimately prove fatal. As Russia was headed on its revolutionary course from autocracy to constitutional democracy, Kerensky fully expected there would be those who would try to derail its new destiny — but he assumed they would come from Russia's pro-czarist right, not from his supposed allies on the left. All his reading of history, especially the history of the French Revolution, had led him to this conclusion: what revolutions had to fear most was counterrevolution by those trying to reverse direction.

If there is any single lesson to be drawn from this book, it is that utopian dreamers in power tend to breed disaster. But not always, and not forever.