Kiel mutiny summary full#

Although they were unaware of the operational plan, a significant number of sailors and stokers grew worried by the preparations and they began a small-scale mutiny during the final days of October 1918. Some of the leading voices calling for the operation also considered it possible that the navy’s sacrifice could reignite the German population’s “will” to continue the war.

Kiel mutiny summary full#

They also feared that the officer corps would lose honour if the war came to an end without the full deployment of the surface fleet, something that had been considered too great a risk up to this point in the war. The men behind the operation were especially worried by the prospect that their ships, built at tremendous cost since the turn of the century, would be surrendered to Britain as part of an Armistice deal. Over the course of the remainder of the month, as the diplomatic exchange of notes began to discuss terms of an Armistice, led by Admiral Reinhard Scheer (1863-1928), the German Navy’s highest command set in place secret plans for a major naval assault upon the Royal Navy. The leadership of the German Navy was shocked by this prospect and refused to believe that Germany was defeated. In his first note, Prince Max requested that Wilson bring an end to the war upon the basis of his fourteen points. The first elections for the new Constituent German National Assembly (popularly known as the Weimar National Assembly) were held on 19 January 1919, and the revolution effectively ended on 11 August 1919, when the Constitution of the German Reich (Weimar Constitution) was adopted.On 3 October 1918 the new German government led by Prince Max von Baden (1867-1929) initiated an exchange of diplomatic notes with US President Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924). The same alliance of political forces succeeded in suppressing leftist uprisings in other parts of Germany, with the result that the country was completely pacified by late 1919. This allowed the army and the Freikorps ( nationalist militias) to act with enough autonomy to quell the communist Spartacist uprising of 5–12 January 1919 by force. In this endeavour, SPD leftists sought an alliance with the German Supreme Command. Instead, it sought to peacefully integrate them into the new social democratic system. Fearing an all-out civil war in Germany between militant workers and reactionary conservatives, the SPD did not plan to strip the old German upper classes completely of their power and privileges. The SPD opted instead for a national assembly that would form the basis for a parliamentary system of government. The revolutionaries, inspired by communist and socialist ideas, did not hand over power to Soviet-style councils as the Bolsheviks had done in Russia, because the leadership of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) opposed their creation. Shortly thereafter, Emperor Wilhelm II fled the country and abdicated his throne. These disturbances spread the spirit of civil unrest across Germany and ultimately led to the proclamation of a republic to replace the imperial monarchy on 9 November 1918, two days before Armistice Day. Instead of obeying their orders to begin preparations to fight the British, German sailors led a revolt in the naval ports of Wilhelmshaven on 29 October 1918, followed by the Kiel mutiny in the first days of November. In the face of defeat, the Naval Command insisted on trying to precipitate a climactic pitched battle with the British Royal Navy utilizing its naval order of 24 October 1918, but the battle never took place.

The first acts of the revolution were triggered by the policies of the Supreme Command ( Oberste Heeresleitung) of the German Army and its lack of coordination with the Naval Command ( Seekriegsleitung). Revolutions and interventions in Hungary.

Conscription disturbance at the Brisbane School of Arts.