Der Fuehrer - Hitler's Rise to Power (1944) - Heiden

242 DER FUEHRER'I am no magician!' Then the defeated general himself was forced outand the Kaiser said to him sadly that he would now have to build up anew Reich with the help of the Social Democrats. All changes tookplace behind the strange human facade of an old general who had beenpensioned off even before the war, Field Marshal Paul vonBeneckendorff and Hindenburg. Two weeks after Ludendorff's fall,Hindenburg advised his own Kaiser to abdicate and flee to Holland; inhis person the army overthrew the monarchy in order to preserve itself.Hindenburg did this prudently, more by agreeing with nods andmurmurs of assent to what others said. He allowed Groener,Ludendorff's successor, to say to his Kaiser on November 9, 1918: 'Thearmy will march home under its leaders and commanding generals,quietly and in order. It will not do this under Your Majesty's command,for it no longer stands behind Your Majesty.' Thus the generals firstbrought democracy to Germany and overthrew their emperor. Both weredone under pressure of events, particularly because Woodrow Wilsondemanded it in the name of the Allies, and even more in pale fear beforethe force of the people which was no longer to be held in check. Ludendorfffirmly maintained on the day of his downfall that 'I believe all tobe lost, and expect Bolshevism to come to us.' Two weeks later, thehead of the Social-Democratic Party, Friedrich Ebert, became Presidentof the now republican German Reich.This was the downfall of the German 'Kaiserreich,' the historicmoment of the German revolution. It was also the beginning of theofficers' counter-revolution. In a purely military sense the war was notcompletely lost as yet; as statements made by the Allied generals show.But the military leaders of Germany preferred to lose the war and evento overthrow their emperor in order to save the army and beat down therevolution.But the army could not be saved, at least not for the moment. Thesoldiers, disgusted, threw their guns away and went home. It is true thatfinally this hurt the new republic even more than the old army. Forwhen the government tried to organize troops to defend the youngrepublic against the counter-revolution, it found that it had scarcelyenough soldiers among its own supporters to do so, and its veryexistence was threatened by dislike of the workers for everythingmilitary.