Provisional Government for his complicity in the Kornilov affair. He
flatly refused to resign, and surrounded by three immense Cossack
armies lay at Novotcherkask, plotting and menacing. So great was his
power that the Government was forced to ignore his insubordination.
More than that, it was compelled formally to recognise the Council
of the Union of Cossack Armies, and to declare illegal the
newly-formed Cossack Section of the Soviets....

In the first part of October a Cossack delegation called upon
Kerensky, arrogantly insisting that the charges against Kaledin be
dropped, and reproaching the Minister-President for yielding to the
Soviets. Kerensky agreed to let Kaledin alone, and then is reported
to have said, "In the eyes of the Soviet leaders I am a despot and a
tyrant.... As for the Provisional Government, not only does it not
depend upon the Soviets, but it considers it regrettable that they
exist at all."

At the same time another Cossack mission called upon the British
ambassador, treating with him boldly as representatives of "the free
Cossack people."

In the Don something very like a Cossack Republic had been
established. The Kuban declared itself an independent Cossack State.
The Soviets of Rostov-on-Don and Yekaterinburg were dispersed by
armed Cossacks, and the headquarters of the Coal Miners' Union at
Kharkov raided. In all its manifestations the Cossack movement was
anti-Socialist and militaristic. Its leaders were nobles and great
land-owners, like Kaledin, Kornilov, Generals Dutov, Karaulov and
Bardizhe, and it was backed by the powerful merchants and bankers of
Moscow....