2-to what extent did the events September 1918-jan1919 amount to a revolution

Question 1

The revolution from below/ abdication of Kaiser

Answer 1

• Mutinies began in Kiel on the 29th October, which failed and 600 were killed after the commanders of the German navy ordered the boats to be sent out to sea once again
• 4th November over 100,000 people mutinied and across the next 5 days, Bolshevik styles uprisings occurred.
• 8th November communist style councils had been set up by workers, soldiers and navy members in all major cities and ports, but they weren’t necessarily communist; instead they wanted to put an end to the old political structuer
• the Kaiser abdicated on the 9th November after introducing his initial reforms a month earlier, due to growing pressure from Germany after the USA said they would provide more lenient terms if the Kaiser abdicated
• interim government containing 3 SPD members and 3 USPD members was set up known as the council of peoples commissars to begin a movement towards real elections

-The idea of the ‘revolution from below’ appeared to be the beginning of a national revolution but in reality those involved were not looking for communist style revolution and the SPD wants peace and stability, simply asking for a break down of the previous political system

Question 2

The spartacist uprising

Answer 2

• Despite the requests of Karl Liebknect and Rosa Luxemburg, the Spartacists decided to form an uprising on the 1st January 1919, led by the newly formed KPD party which had split from the USPD
• Their motivations included the left wing chief of police being fired in Berlin, and Eberts decision to fire on USPD members who did not leave the palace when they were requested to, which led to the more radical members foreign the KPD
• Ebert used to freikorps (a right wing paramilitary organisation) to have many KPD members killed without any mercy, with both leaders being brutally murdered and the uprising being suppressed by 13th January, limiting the revolutionary nature of it

Question 3

Ebert’s reforms

Answer 3

• Ebert Gröner pact on the 10th November mobilised the army in support for Ebert, it meant that the government wouldn’t get involved in military affairs in return for the army helping the government suppress any revolutionary army in the subsequent years, which regained some control over the army despite many members being involved in the mutiny
• the army held their strong elitist position
• The Stinnes-Legien agreement on the 15th November was an agreement with industrialists to appease both the middle class and the working class, it meant that if unions were legally recognised and workers given an 8 hour day, they wouldn’t be able to interfere in private ownership and free market
• within 6 days Ebert had mobilised the army, industrialists and workers, and no further revolutions occurred until January by the Spartacists, which was quickly suppressed by Ebert

Question 4

The judiciary and army

Answer 4

• The judiciary remained completely unreformed under Ebert, who gave up much of his socialist tendencies in order to try and stop divisions between the DVP/DNVP and the working classes which had already been enhanced by the war
• this appeased the workers, who controlled the judiciary through bias against the left wing and in favour of the right wing
• this included given left wing journalist Fechenbach 11 years for violation press laws whilst Hitler was given 5 years for treason but only served 11 months of the sentence
• they also never sentenced Rathenaus murderers (who solved the munitions crisis under the KRA)
• the Army kept up its strong political position despite the abdication of the Kaiser; it undermined Ebert in 1923 when General von Seeckt refused to fire on revolutionaries in the Munich putsch