The German Revolution, 1917-1923On 12 October 1923, Grigory Zinoviev, president of the Communist International wrote the following in "Pravda": "The German events are developing with the inexorability of fate. The path which it took the Russian Revolution twelve years to cover, from 1906 to 1917, will have taken the German Revolution five years, from 1918 to 1923. ... The proletarian revolution is knocking at Germany's door; you would have to be blind not to see it. ... Very soon, everyone will see that this autumn of 1923 is a turning-point, not just for the history of Germany, but for the history of the whole world." In fact, far from being on the point of triumphing, the German Revolution was on the verge of an irredeemable disaster which would soon inflict terrible consequences on Germany and the world. In this magisterial work, first published 1971 and still unsurpassed, Pierre Broue meticulously reconstitutes the six decisive years during which - between 'ultra-leftism' and 'opportunism', 'sectarianism' and 'revisionism', 'activism' and 'passivity' - the German revolutionaries attempted to begin a new chapter in the history of the proletariat. |
Contents
Chapter One The Battlefield | 1 |
Chapter Two Social Democracy Before 1914 | 11 |
Chapter Three The Lefts in German Social Democracy | 27 |
PART | 41 |
Chapter Six The Rise of the Revolutionary Movement | 89 |
Chapter Seven Problems of the World Revolution | 111 |
Chapter Eight The November Revolution | 129 |
Chapter Nine The Period of Dual Power | 157 |
Chapter TwentyFour The Split in the Italian Socialist Party | 475 |
Chapter TwentyFive The March Action | 491 |
Chapter TwentySeven The Moscow Compromise | 527 |
Chapter TwentyEight Unity Preserved With Difficulty | 555 |
Chapter TwentyNine A New Start | 585 |
Chapter Thirty The Rapallo Turn | 599 |
Chapter ThirtyOne For the United Front Against Poverty | 607 |
Chapter ThirtyTwo The Mass Communist Party Chapter ThirtyThree The Workers Government | 665 |
Chapter Ten The Crisis in the Socialist Movement | 189 |
Chapter Eleven The Foundation of the Communist Party | 209 |
Chapter Twelve The Uprising of January 1919 | 227 |
Chapter Thirteen The Noske Period | 261 |
Chapter Fourteen Stabilisation in Germany and World | 285 |
Chapter Fifteen The Communist Party After January 1919 | 299 |
Chapter Sixteen The UltraLeft Opposition and the Split | 323 |
Chapter Seventeen The Problem of Centrism | 333 |
Chapter Eighteen The Kapp Putsch | 349 |
Chapter Nineteen The Communist Party at the Crossroads | 381 |
Chapter Twenty Moscow and the German Revolutionaries | 393 |
Chapter TwentyOne The Great Hopes of 1920 | 421 |
A German Conception | 449 |
Chapter TwentyThree The First Steps of the Unified Communist | 459 |
Chapter ThirtyFive The Occupation of the Ruhr | 685 |
Chapter ThirtySix Crisis in the | 699 |
Chapter ThirtySeven An Unprecedented PreRevolutionary | 709 |
Chapter ThirtyEight The Overthrow of the Cuno Government | 733 |
Chapter ThirtyNine Preparing the Insurrection | 755 |
Chapter Forty Moscows View of the German Revolution | 779 |
Chapter FortyOne The German October | 791 |
Chapter FortyTwo Aftermath of Another Defeat | 817 |
Chapter FortyThree History and Politics | 839 |
Chapter FortyFour Grafting Bolshevism onto German Stock | 851 |
| 935 | |
Biographical Details | 959 |
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Common terms and phrases
activists amongst arrested attack August Berlin Bolsheviks bourgeois bourgeoisie Brandler Bremen called Central Committee Comintern Comintern Congress Communist International Communist Party comrades conference Correspondance internationale Däumig December decision declared defeat Democracy deutschen Revolution dictatorship Die Rote Fahne discussion Dokumente und Materialen Ebert ECCI elected Executive expelled factory councils Fischer Friesland German Communists German Revolution Geschichte der deutschen Hamburg Ibid Illustrierte Geschichte Independents insurrection January joined KAPD Kapp Putsch KPD(S leaders leadership Leipzig Liebknecht Luxemburg majority March Action masses metalworkers Moscow movement Müller November October opposition organisation Parteitag Paul Levi Pieck political proletariat putsch Radek Reichstag Reichswehr revolutionary delegates role Rote Fahne Ruhr Russian Revolution Saxony situation slogan Social Democrats socialist soldiers Soviet Spartacists Spartacus League split strike struggle Thalheimer trade unions Trotsky ultra-left united front USPD V.I. Lenin victory VKPD Volume Vorwärts votes whilst workers Zentrale Zetkin Zinoviev