From the series Pages from the history of the workers’ movement
In the Publisher’s Introduction
to the writings by Paul Frölich, Rudolf Lindau, Albert Schreiner, and Jakob Walcher collected in Rivoluzione e controrivoluzione in Germania (Revolution and counter-revolution in Germany
) [Pantarei, 2001], three fundamental themes
characterising the German revolution are identified.
The first theme focuses on the counterrevolutionary role of Social Democracy
, and the counterrevolutionary awareness of men such as Ebert, Scheidemann, Noske, and other members of the government
, who initially acted to appease the revolutionary attempt and then, when that proved insufficient, to crush it in bloodshed.
The second theme is that of the generous energies expressed by the German proletariat
. Here, the emphasis is on the spontaneous nature of the revolutionary wave, which erupted both in Germany and Russia primarily from the desire of the masses for peace. As Lenin wrote in his article The Collapse of the Second International [1915], revolutions cannot be made
, because they arise from crises and historical upheavals that are objectively ripe (regardless of the will of parties and classes)
. However, subsequently, without a party organised and entrenched in previous years, the revolution is condemned to be disarmed and the revolutionary movement to flow back into the bourgeois stream. In that sense, the SPD worked systematically to bring the revolution back into the fold of the democratic republic, which had remained unfinished in 1848.
This brings us to the third theme: The limits and shortcomings of the revolutionary political movement, of the organisation that was supposed to guide that process, making the best use of the abundant energy that the class had to offer
. The Lenin-Luxemburg debate on the role of the party took on a dramatically concrete significance in Germany.
The military defeat
As early as mid-August 1918, the military leaders Hindenburg and Ludendorff advocated the urgency of an armistice and peace. Between the end of September and the beginning of October, they renewed their plea to Wilhelm II because — declared Ludendorff — the army cannot wait another 48 hours
. But in order to share responsibility for peace, army leaders and the Kaiser believed it was necessary to extend the government to the existing majority in the Reichstag, including the Social Democrats. The fear of revolution, which the German leaders aimed to prevent with a compromise from above, played a decisive role in this decision.
Hence, for the first time since its birth, the SPD got ready to exercise power, but in support of the bourgeois order. On October 3rd, Wilhelm II appointed Prince Max von Baden as the Reich’s new chancellor, at the head of a government including two SPD ministers: Gustav Bauer and Philipp Scheidemann. Von Baden immediately proposed an armistice based on fourteen points
to American President Woodrow Wilson.
Although they were the first to call for negotiations, unable to hold the external front any longer and fearing revolution on the internal front, the military leaders deemed the conditions of peace unacceptable
. Absolving themselves of all responsibility, they were already fuelling the narrative of the stab in the back
, which would be later used by nationalists to blame the defeat on domestic enemies
. This narrative would blend with the myth of an army returning home unbeaten
, forming an explosive ideological mix.
Leaders without troops
On October 7th, a conference of the Spartacus Group was held in Berlin, which was also attended by the Bremen communists. It urged the proletariat not to be satisfied with parliamentarisation, but to get ready for the socialist revolution, which would entrust power to the Workers’ and Soldiers’ Councils.
Aware of the danger, the SPD ministers proposed an amnesty for political prisoners and asked in particular for the release of Karl Liebknecht, in order to strip him of his image as a martyr and to give at least the impression of a sincere desire for democratisation. Liebknecht was released on October 23rd. A crowd of thousands met him at Potsdam station.
Nevertheless, Pierre Broué observes that Liebknecht was alone
: He thought there was no time to lose and that the revolution had been too much delayed, but he also knew he could bring to it only a banner and not a group of leaders
. Otto Franke, Paul Levi, and Wilhelm Pieck were all leaders without troops at least in Berlin [...] where their followers amounted to just about 50
.
In the Reich, the workers’ vanguard in the factories was mainly organised in the ranks of the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany (USPD). In Berlin, the workers largely followed the revolutionäre Obleute (revolutionary delegates
): a group that originated in the lathe turners’ association of the metalworkers’ trade union, bringing together specialised workers that held a key position in the armaments industry. Opposed to the SPD’s support for the war, they mainly joined the USPD, and in the months of the November Revolution they were strongly present in Berlin’s Workers’ and Soldiers’ Councils. Their main exponents were Emil Barth, Richard Müller, Georg Ledebour, Ernst Däumig, and Paul Scholze. Broué points out that there were 120,000 workers controlled by the network
of the revolutionäre Obleute in November. For the Spartacus Group, therefore, there was the problem of a direct link
with the workers’ vanguard, independent of the centrism of the USPD.
Tactical confusion
When he was released, Liebknecht received the proposal to become one of the USPD leaders. He turned it down, highlighting his disagreement with centrism, but together with another two Spartacists — Pieck and Ernst Meyer — he entered the Workers’ Council at the head of the revolutionäre Obleute’s organisational network. There, however, he was repeatedly outvoted on tactical options for mobilising the masses.
In the first days of November, Liebknecht criticised the centrists’ wait-and-see policy, accusing them of submitting themselves to the initiative of their opponents. He placed his trust in the mobilisation of the masses who, however, had to be spurred on with demonstrations and street protests, and through the slogan of a general strike. On November 2nd, at a meeting of independents and revolutionaries, Ledebour introduced him to officer Waltz of the 2nd Guards Battalion — who would be arrested shortly afterwards — with whom he planned an uprising on November 4th. Liebknecht also opposed a Blanquist kind of armed action, without the previous mobilisation of the masses. However, his position was in a clear minority (46 votes to 5) and Ledebour’s was lately rejected (22 to 19), while the tactical option of Hugo Haase and the USPD, strongly backed by Müller, of waiting until the conditions were ripe for a guaranteed success, was approved.
In Stuttgart, on the contrary, where the Spartacists were strong within the USPD, a Workers’ Council was elected at the Daimler factory and announced a general strike on November 4th. However, the Stuttgart initiative remained isolated, and the members of the Workers’ Council were arrested.
The Kiel mutiny
The spark was lit in Kiel’s open-sea fleet, which was anchored off Wilhelmshaven, when its crews refused to obey the order of a last ditch attack on the Royal Navy. The sailors, arrested by the hundreds and sent back to Kiel, mobilised and sought the workers’ solidarity. On November 3rd, at a demonstration against war and repression, troops fired on the crowd, killing nine and wounding 29. In the night, the first Sailors’ Council of the German revolution was elected and many officers were arrested by their soldiers. Gustav Noske made his appearance: appointed as governor of Kiel by the government, he hastened to recognise the new Workers’ and Soldiers’ Council in order to quell the revolt. However, by then the agitation had spread to Wilhelmshaven, Bremen, and Hamburg. There, Frölich, at the head of armed sailors, occupied the daily Hamburger Echo and published the first issue of the newspaper of Hamburg’s Workers’ and Soldiers’ Council, with the title Die Rote Fahne (The red flag
), like that of the short-lived Stuttgart Council.
The revolution spread like wildfire from the ports of the northern coast to the whole of Germany. Soldiers’ and Workers’ Councils were formed in the Reich’s big cities, leading to the downfall of the existing monarchical regimes. The Russian ambassador was expelled from Berlin because he was a source of revolutionary contagion
. Rosa Luxemburg was released from prison on November 9th. In Bavaria Kurt Eisner — a former revisionist who had become a radical through pacifism
, according to Broué’s fitting definition — seized the initiative within USPD circles. Eisner organised a network of cadres in the Krupp workshops and other factories, forged bonds with the pro-socialist wing of the Peasants’ League and, after the king's flight, became president of the first Workers’ and Soldiers’ Council of the Bavarian Republic.
The revolution in the capital
On November 9th, it was Berlin’s turn. The workers marched from the industrial districts towards the centre of the empire’s capital, where red flags waved from the public buildings. Faced with a movement it knew was unstoppable, the SPD decided to back it in order to control it. It was the SPD which urged Wilhelm II to abdicate, in the hope of saving the monarchical principle. Shortly afterwards, with a hastiness criticised by Friedrich Ebert, Scheidemann proclaimed the Republic from a window of the Reichstag. As a symbol of the dual power established on November 9th, two hours later, Liebknecht announced the Socialist Republic
from a balcony of Berlin Castle. On the same day, Ebert was appointed chancellor by von Baden.
Otto Wels, appointed by Ebert as the military commander of the city of Berlin, urged the soldiers not to fire on the workers. Vorwärts printed a leaflet — There Will Be No Shooting!
— and preached unity between the two socialist parties: No Fratricidal Struggle!
. Ebert offered the independents a share in the government. After heated debates, the two parties reached a compromise on the names: Dittmann, Haase, and Barth were added to Ebert, Scheidemann, and Landsberg. Pretending to back the movement, the new government took on the same name as the Russian revolutionary government: Council of People’s Commissars.
The SPD and the soldiers
On November 10th, at the Busch Circus in Berlin, headquarters of the Workers’ and Soldiers’ Council, Liebknecht warned against the illusion of unity and the embrace of the SPD, these people who today are with the revolution and who only yesterday were its enemies
. But the soldiers, waving their weapons, chanted: Unity! Unity!
.
Wels’s role was fundamental, because he guaranteed the SPD the solid support of the Berlin garrison. Thus, although the majority of workers, especially in big cities, followed the independents, the SPD managed to shift the balance in its favour by leveraging the Soldiers’ Councils. The authors of Rivoluzione e controrivoluzione in Germania write: While the Workers’ Councils were truly representative of the working class, the eloquent offspring of the bourgeoisie, followed by clerks, intellectuals, non-commissioned officers, and even officers, played a leading role in the extremely heterogeneous mix of the Soldiers’ Councils. [...] The activity of the workers’ organisation was curbed at the crucial moment of the revolution. [...] The Soldiers’ Councils [...] proclaimed themselves the real defenders of the revolution and threatened to repress every attempt to transform the November Revolution into civil war. Thus, almost everywhere, the Councils were prevented from becoming a real instrument of government
.
In the comparison with the Russian Revolution, however, it can be hypothesised that, beyond the interclassism of the troops, the Spartacists’ tendency towards worker spontaneism favoured insufficient organisation among the soldiers.
The German revolution was nevertheless underway. At the Extraordinary Sixth Congress of Soviets, Lenin pointed out its strategic importance: Finally, and most important of all, we have come from being isolated internationally
.