Lüttwitz-Kapp Putsch

According to the Versailles Peace Treaty of June 1919, the German Army must be limited in future to 100,000 men; the existing volunteer militias are to be dissolved. When the Reich government begins to fulfil these conditions, it runs into violent refusal and resistance. Early on the morning of 13 March 1920, Reich Army general Walther Freiherr von Lüttwitz occupies the government quarter in Berlin with the „Erhardt Naval Brigade“, recently ordered dissolved by the Reich government, and names as Reich Chancellor the German nationalist politician Wolfgang Kapp.

© Deutsches Historisches Museum, Berlin Putschists blocking the Potsdamer Straße in Berlin

The Reich Army refuses to undertake military action against the putschists („the Reich Army does not shoot at the Reich Army“). As a result, SPD chairman Otto Wels and leading Social Democratic members of government call out a general strike. The ministerial bureaucracy refuses to follow Kapp’s directives. After that, the „Lüttwitz-Kapp Putsch“ is brought to an end within a few days. However, in Saxony, Thuringia, and in the Ruhr District, Communist elements use the opportunity to urge on the violent „proletarian revolution“ which they had been striving for. To suppress the uprising, the Reich government under Gustav Bauer (SPD) also uses non-regular army units – among them even the „Erhardt Naval Brigade“, which shortly before had taken part in the putsch against the Reich government.