Exact date for elections to the Constituent Assembly were not clearly set for a while and finally scheduled for November 12, 1917, with convocation of the Assembly in November 26 same year. That’s why Bolsheviks were determined to take the power before that.
Bolsheviks knew they had to preempt two things: the Assembly and the end of WWI. If they didn’t, they were finished.
Upon taking power, Bolsheviks proclaimed themselves to be guardians of the Revolution, in particular the guarantors of free elections. After election results were known they managed to postpone the convocation until January 5, 1918, on technicalities. By then, they had enough nerve to dismiss it by force. That action plunged Russia into long and bloody Civil War.
Bolsheviks capitulated to Germany on March 3, 1918.
Germany requested a cease-fire on October 3, 1918. By then, it was too late for Russia, which was doomed to become a ‘Worker’s Paradise’/GULag state.
I’m not so sure. IIRC, Russia’s army had pretty much collapsed by the point the Bolshevik’s were taking over. Their peace plan was as much a recognition of reality as anything else. Simply put, Russia at the time couldn’t keep up with modern warfare, one of the reasons Germany never got bogged down as it did in France. The Battle of “Tanenburg” (actually not at Tanenburg) essentially destroyed Russia’s military power.
I think, personally, that was one reason why the Socialist government failed: the (technically former) peasantry simply wasn’t going to defend people whose stated plans involved continuing the so-far disastrous war. Germany may not have lasted any longer, but that was not at all clear in Moscow.
I think it is one of few things we can assume with certainty in history. I insist that Germany would surrender even sooner with Russian front still open. Russian army was worthless (mostly due to refusal of Provisional Gov’t to enforce discipline) but still could do damage, distract and bleed Germans. Besides, Russia has enormous territorial resources to fall back on, as Napoleon and Hitler learned the hard way. There were plans to surrender Petrograd and continue fighting. That was another thing Bolsheviks were scared of.
Not so much “refusal” as “inability.” By 1917, many army units at the front were openly mutinous, some even murdering their officers; and there was a lot of Bolshevik or other revolutionary sentiment in the ranks.
Prov. Gov’t deliberately refused to re-introduce death penalty even for desertion at the front line. One of the main demands to Kerensky by Kornilov were death penalty at the front, at the rearguard troops and mobilization of factory workers, all unacceptable to the Socialists in Prov. Gov’t.
All those measures were in full force in Germany, Britain and France. In some respects, 1917 Russia was the freest country in Europe.