Immediately after Robespierre's fall, the deputies and secret policemen who had enthusiastically executed thousands coined the term 'the Reign of Terror' and attributed every atrocity solely to him. As British observer Watkin Tench noted, subordinate tyrants who previously prostrated themselves before Robespierre framed him as a solitary monster to screen themselves from public odium, recasting their own active complicity as forced submission.

Maximilien Robespierre's fatal miscalculation before the National Convention was threatening an unstated list of corrupt deputies without naming them. Rather than cowing his targets into submission, this ambiguity forced every deputy who had taken bribes or overstepped during the Terror to assume they were on his hit list. Driven by fear of execution, disparate rivals united to pre-emptively shout him down and demand his arrest.

Figures like Fabre invented a vast foreign conspiracy, telling Robespierre exactly what he wanted to hear. This fictional narrative provided the perfect pretext to eliminate both corrupt officials and political opponents like Hébert and Danton under the guise of protecting national security.

Radicals like Collot d'Herbois and Billaud-Varenne overthrew Robespierre expecting to control the Committee of Public Safety and maintain the Terror without him. However, eliminating Robespierre dismantled the fear holding the Convention captive. Moderate deputies quickly abolished emergency measures, stripped the committees of their powers, closed the Jacobin Club, and ultimately arrested the very conspirators who initiated the coup, illustrating how removing a figurehead can trigger uncontrollable systemic collapse.

Robespierre built his political dominance on solemn, unyielding moral righteousness, but Marc-Guillaume Vadier dismantled his aura on the convention floor through mockery. By parodying Robespierre's self-pity and highlighting his connection to the eccentric prophetess Catherine Théot, Vadier prompted widespread laughter. Having no sense of humor, Robespierre was completely unable to respond, losing his composure and his voice as the assembly turned against him.

When Joseph Fouché was summoned to Paris under grave suspicion for horrific atrocities in Lyon, he did not wait passively for an interrogation. Instead, he boldly went straight to the National Convention floor to justify his record on revolutionary terms, confronted Robespierre directly, and successfully ran for president of the Jacobin Club. By taking immediate initiative and maneuvering in the open, Fouché disrupted Robespierre's plans and secured political leverage.

Robespierre operated through a binary lens where any policy disagreement was treated as existential corruption and treason. While this absolute conviction initially intimidated rivals, it reduced his political playbook to a single predictable maneuver: moral denunciation followed by purges. Once opponents recognized that he could neither compromise nor alter his tactics, worldly politicians coordinated easily to counteract his speeches and strip away his advantage of surprise.

By repeatedly threatening an unspecified cabal of conspirators in the Jacobin Club and the Convention without naming individuals, Robespierre made every deputy feel directly endangered. Politicians who previously shared little common ground—corrupt deputies, ultra-left de-Christianizers, and moderates—became convinced they were marked men. This collective terror incentivized them to coalesce around operators like Fouché to strike preemptively against Robespierre before he struck them.

While technocrats on the Committee of Public Safety drafted hundreds of decrees on three hours of sleep, Robespierre retreated home for six weeks, periodically reappearing only to lecture colleagues on morality. As historian R.R. Palmer noted, isolating oneself virtuously while leaving the grinding operational burden to others fatally undermines a leader's authority. His colleagues came to see his moralizing as self-indulgence rather than leadership.