# Nikolai Krylenko — Ten Days That Shook the World character guide

> Nikolai Krylenko in Ten Days That Shook the World by John Reed.

**Role:** supporting

**Also known as:** Krylenko, the Bolshevik Krylenko, Comrade Krylenko

**First appearance:** 0011-i-background

## Snapshot

The Bolshevik officer who could shout down a room of hostile soldiers, Krylenko embodied the revolution's gamble on turning the army itself against its old commanders.

## Who they are

Krylenko belongs to the militant Bolshevik cadre pushing the revolution from the barracks and the front lines into the heart of state power. His authority rests on a fragile wager: that soldiers and workers will follow revolutionary officers over the old military hierarchy, even as critics insist the peasants, not the industrial workers, are the true people of Russia. His rise matters because the revolution's survival depends on whether armed men like his will obey the Soviet Government or the old command.

## In the story

### [IV: The Fall of the Provisional Government](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/iv-the-fall-of-the-provisional-government)

Announces the Twelfth Army's support for the insurrection at the Congress.

### [Decrees](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/3-decrees)

People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs, co-signs military decrees.

### [From Krylenko](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/20-from-krylenko)

Issues Order Number Two declaring Dukhonin an enemy of the people.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/characters/krylenko
- Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se
- All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/characters