The Establishment of the Weimar Republic and Its Early Problems » The Kaiser's Abdication and the German Revolution, 1918-19

Germany in autumn 1918: a country facing defeat

In 1918 Germany was an empire ruled by Kaiser Wilhelm II. It had a parliament, the Reichstag, but real power lay with the Kaiser. He chose the chancellor (the head of the government) and he commanded the army. Germany had been fighting the First World War since 1914, and by autumn 1918 it was losing.

• Defeat at the front: a huge German attack in spring 1918 failed to win the war. From August the Allies (Britain, France and their partners, now joined by fresh American troops) pushed the German army back. On 29 September General Ludendorff, one of the army's two top commanders, told the Kaiser that the war could not be won and that Germany must ask for peace.
• Hunger at home: the British navy had blockaded German ports for years, stopping food and supplies getting in. People were hungry, cold and worn out, and they blamed the men in charge.
• Pressure for change: in October the Kaiser made Prince Max of Baden chancellor and gave the Reichstag more power. Prince Max asked the American President, Woodrow Wilson, for peace terms. Wilson made it clear that the Allies would not make peace with the Kaiser and his generals still in control. Many Germans now saw the Kaiser as the main obstacle to ending the war.

Key terms:

• Kaiser: the German emperor.
• Abdication: when a monarch gives up the throne.
• Mutiny: when soldiers or sailors refuse to obey their officers.
• Republic: a country with no monarch, where the head of state is chosen by the people or their representatives.
• Armistice: an agreement to stop fighting while peace terms are worked out.
• Social Democratic Party (SPD): the largest party in the Reichstag, supported mainly by workers. It wanted change through parliament, not violence.

Mutiny and unrest: the revolution begins

The revolution started in the navy. At the end of October 1918, naval commanders ordered the fleet out for one last battle against the British. The sailors knew the war was lost and saw no reason to die for their officers' honour. Crews at the port of Wilhelmshaven refused to obey.

On 3 November the mutiny spread to the great naval base at Kiel. Sailors there protested to free their arrested comrades, and shots were fired. By 4 November the sailors, joined by local workers, controlled the town. They set up a workers' and soldiers' council to run it.

9 November 1918: the Kaiser goes and a republic is declared

On 9 November the revolution reached Berlin. Workers went on strike and huge crowds marched into the city centre. Soldiers in the city refused to stop them.

• The abdication is announced: the Kaiser was at army headquarters at Spa, in Belgium. His generals told him that the army would no longer follow him. In Berlin, Prince Max did not wait for the Kaiser to agree. He announced the abdication himself.
• Ebert takes over: Prince Max handed the job of chancellor to Friedrich Ebert, the leader of the SPD.
• A republic is declared: that afternoon the SPD politician Philipp Scheidemann declared a republic from a window of the Reichstag building. He acted fast because Karl Liebknecht, a far-left leader, was about to declare a workers' republic on the model of communist Russia. Liebknecht did so about two hours later, from the royal palace.

On 10 November Wilhelm II crossed the border into exile in the Netherlands, where he lived for the rest of his life.

The armistice, 11 November 1918

The new government's first task was to end the war. On 11 November a German group led by the politician Matthias Erzberger signed the armistice in a railway carriage in the forest of Compiègne in France. The fighting stopped at 11 o'clock that morning.

The terms were harsh. Germany had to pull its troops out of France and Belgium, hand over large numbers of weapons including its submarines, and let Allied troops occupy German land west of the River Rhine. The blockade would carry on until a peace treaty was signed.

The timing mattered. The German group was led by a civilian politician, not by the Kaiser or the army's top commanders, and it signed two days after the republic was declared. From its very first days the republic was linked to defeat, even though the war had been lost before it existed.

Ebert's new government

On 10 November Ebert set up a temporary government called the Council of People's Representatives. It had six members: three from the SPD and three from a more left-wing party that had broken away from it.

This is why historians call the German Revolution a limited one. The Kaiser had gone and Germany was becoming a democracy, but the army and the old officials kept their power. The far left felt betrayed, and that anger led to the events in the lesson Threats From Left and Right: Spartacists and the Kapp Putsch.

The elections were held on 19 January 1919. The SPD won the most votes, and parties that supported democracy won a large majority. Because Berlin was still unsafe, the National Assembly met in the quiet town of Weimar in February 1919 and chose Ebert as the republic's first president. This is why the new state is known as the Weimar Republic.

Exam-style question

Extract A (a practice extract written for this lesson, in the style of a modern history book)

From a modern history textbook.

By 9 November 1918 Wilhelm II was a ruler in name only. Hidden away at army headquarters in Spa, he clung to the fantasy of leading his troops home to crush the revolution. His own generals bluntly told him that the army would no longer follow him. In Berlin, his chancellor did not even wait for his agreement before announcing that he had gone. The next morning the abandoned Kaiser slipped quietly across the Dutch border, deserted by those who had once obeyed him.

(a) What impression does the author give about the abdication of the Kaiser?
You must use Extract A to explain your answer. [6 marks]