The Kapp-Lüttwitz Putsch of 1920

[@fabovondestory]

Reject cringe Authorianism Embrace based democracy 🇩🇪

[@generaltom6850]

Based Republican.

[@RacerA8]

Embrace monarchism

[@DiamondKingStudios]

@generaltom6850My American reading comprehension forgot about the context for a minute and was thrown off by the capitalization lol

[@bigbubble4282]

Democracies always collapse to authoritarianism

[@christophmaier4397]

"le based democracy" that did nothing to prevent this coup. It was SOCIALIST WORKERS who stopped it!

[@justinian-the-great]

Have you ever considered doing a biography video on Erich Ludendorff, like you did on Stresemann? I kinda feel that, taking into the consideration that he was literally predecessor to Hitler as Germany's de facto dictator during WW1, he is very unknown. Not to mention that he was basically THE right-wing leader during the early Weimar era and even a member of a Nazi party for a time. I kinda feel that he is really unexplored as a person, particularly compared to his friend/superior Hindenburg.

[@MyILoveMinecraft]

Maybe even encompassing Paul von Lettow Vorbeck, as he also got active in politics as a contrast.

[@ekesandras1481]

Ludendorff really was a Hitler ante literam. He was the defacto dictator of Germany, his stroops stood in 1918 roughly were Hitlers troops stood again in 1941 - just a few kilometers away from the Russian capital, having occupied all of the Baltics, Belorus and Ukraine. For many older officers in Hitler's Wehrmacht all those things were nothing new, they had been to Reval (Tallin), Minsk, Smolenks, Dniepropetrowsk, Rostov on Don, Mariupol and Sevastopol just 23 years before. All the ideas for the general plan OST came out of the vast occupation in 1918. Even all the ideas for the Molotov-Ribbentrop-Plan were already there in Rapallo. Everything that happened later already had its predecessor a generation before under Ludendorff, even the idea of a total war.

[@Wn9618]

I bought an original copy from 1919 of his war memoirs and it’s infuriating how much of a self-serving prick he was, hardest read I’ve ever done

[@breakfaust]

Just opened a beer and rolled a spliff on my day off, as soon as I sit down to spark up, this video appears. Life is good. Weimar history + beer and a spliff !!!

[@SNCY29]

YEAH SPLIFF

[@P4Tri0t420]

Me too 😂😂 Except the day off💀😂

[@itsRAWRtime007]

sounds immersive

[@christopherflynn350]

you're so real for that

[@Hannah-jb5xj]

nothing better then a manatee video, a beer and a spliff!!

[@SubOptimalUsername]

You are one of the best history tubers on the tube.

[@tomtomtrent]

While calling social democrats “social fascists” seems kind of ludicrous and uncompromising, the actions of the SPD in this era sort of make it understandable why such a comparison arose

[@SirManateee]

Truly not their brightest hour

[@lawsharland7278]

tbf to the SPD, they were facing down numerous groups who actively sought to destroy the entire Weimar Government. The KPD, NSDAP, DNVP, were all openly working towards dismantling the entire democratic system. So in that context the harsh actions of the SPD, make a bit more sense, their unwillingness to compromise with groups like the KPD also makes more sense, as in their eyes the KPD and the communists were just another radical group seeking to destroy the democratic system.

[@artoriastheabysswalker]

The SPD worked real hard to make the slogan 'Wer hat uns verraten? Sozialdemokraten!' ring true. Selling out the working class at every oppurtunity the get and letting the right off the hook for every ever so outrageous offense. 'Social fascist' really isn't to much of a stretch

[@christophmaier4397]

social fascists is an accurate description, have you read marxist literature before denigrating a term that you dont even know the meaning of? They are Social fascists in the sense that they mobilize the proletarians in the defense of the capitalist system while often striving for corporatization of society.

[@yoghurtmale2844]

Oh no we tried to violently overthrow the government why did they not like us? - the KPD probably

[@sydneytilden2341]

21:48 is that Oswald Mosley on the far left?

[@Henry_HENRYISM]

Yes

[@seedyoda5714]

Surely he was on the far right

[@shellshockedgerman3947]

Oswald Mosley was such a gamer they allowed him to be a cabinet member despite not being a German citizen.

[@alexthred2179]

Gotta develop the background lore ya know.

[@tjitse3916]

@@seedyoda5714Google the QI episode in which Alan reders to ‘the guy on the far right’…..hilarious moment, ya might like it.

[@Schmoogie]

I guess you could say, it went kapp-utt! I'll see myself out

[@krecioks2598]

One of the best history channels!!!

[@Zestrayswede]

"They weren't punished for their clear acts of treason and many returned to government" I'm getting déjà vu

[@mausklick1635]

Liberalism is just utterly pathetic and self-defeating and will always give way to fascism eventually.

[@DioTheGreatOne]

OMG you guys orange man literally austrian painter!!111!! Edit: Thanks for the gold kind stranger

[@alexanderwhittaker5855]

Wasn't expecting a video so soon, but always a pleasant surprise. Enjoy the holidays, you've earned it!

[@alpha-raygaming5252]

You know between my advancement from armchair historian HOI4 player to actually picks up books and reads them whilst assessing sources and visiting archives actually writes on history type guy. Thus has been such a great channel for analytical and entertaining content.

[@J-Bahn]

19:20 too Prussian! As someone born in Heidelberg I find this very funny. There needs to be a TV series on the political history of the Weimar Republic.

[@Luxnutz1]

Thank You Sir Manatee for another brilliant explanation of the Kapp Putsch. It shows how the Prussian Military Class had the last word and the lesson would not be learned in the Beer Hall putsch in 1923. Could the story about Guillaume Schnaebelé or Wilhelm Schnäbele be told?? As well as Smalkalda War???

[@P4Tri0t420]

I highly recommend the german movie with the same title if you want to know more about it , it is really authentic

[@RussianRepublican1917]

“The Kapp Lutwitzz putsch” that is the most German sounding coup I think I have ever heard

[@JokerDR71]

The Weimar Republic could have greatly benefited from some support of the western democracies, but they got nothing only hardships

[@lmort3217]

Amazing video, however isn’t the photo at 0:18 Phillip Schiedemann rather than Karl Liebknecht?

[@generaltom6850]

Yeah, he made a mistake.

[@SirManateee]

Yes, that was a mistake

[@lmort3217]

@ ah ok, really amazing video though ur whole channel has been so so useful for studying history

[@ianxxi]

Love this channel! 😊

[@Luxnutz1]

The story about the Guillaume Affair and the Baader Meinhof story too

[@steuben6372]

Why are your videos so good?

[@Wn9618]

Looking forward to this! I’ve never been able to look in depth at the Putsch before, but it’s importance in understanding the institutional turbulence of the subsequent decade is so apparent even from a layman’s perspective. Thanks!!

[@pbh81]

Christmas during the WW1 would interesting. Great video as always

[@deniswood5271]

Going over the history of the Weimar Republic I have a strong dislike for the SPD. Not in this instance against a potential dictatorship but doing so little against the far right.

[@DiamondKingStudios]

Probably also the infighting with other factions on the left; if they were able to agree to a stronger coalition, at least out of temporary inconvenience (which would at least have required the SPD to concede some of their more moderate strategies), I would guess that it would have prevented some of the developments in the later decades.

[@shellshockedgerman3947]

They had to, because their grip on power was uncertain and the instrument of state power was manned by people who had right wing tendencies. The Reichswehr and the many police forces were manned by ruralists and well-educated middle class that were more sympathetic to the right wing because of their environment or they were entirely apolitical, as most of the CID agents were. The ironic thing is that in the last days of the democracy, it was the apolitical elements that showed greatest resistance to the Nazi takeover because of their gratitude to the Weimar republic leaving them alone and seeing the Nazi takeover as politicization of their jobs.

[@laisphinto6372]

You certainly didnt read enough about Weimar Republic because the rightwing wasnt the Major threat especially in the beginning you Had Like 20 Coup attempts by the left the Thing is the SPD Had to Play a Dangerous Game constantly outplaying every groups against each Other using the rightwing to crush the leftwing , then later use the leftwing to crush the rightwing they did that Shit so Many times

[@artoriastheabysswalker]

​@@shellshockedgerman3947 They had themselves to blame for that weak grip. In the aftermath of the Revolution of November 1918 the SPD higher ups allied with the right wing (most importantly the army) to combat the same revolutionaries that brought them to power. Instead of using the revolutionary momentum of late 1918 to achieve the liberation of the working class they chose to uphold the bourgoiesie (of many party higher ups were part already) thereby leaving the right wing in a position to challenge them instead of sweeping the reactionaries away.

[@sitskrieg317]

@artoriastheabysswalkeryeah but seems like the revolutionaries were way more radical than them so that isn’t what they wanted

[@sahilhossain8204]

Lore of The Kapp-Lüttwitz Putsch of 1920 momentum 100

[@MrEmeraldDragon13]

I was surprised to see the swastika in the presentation’s photos (great video by the way). There was one on a military truck and another on a Friekorp helmet, though there may have been more. I was under the impression that the Nazi’s popularized the icon, Hitler specifically selecting it for the party. Can anyone answer why it was on Friekorp supplies during the coup attempt?

[@SirManateee]

The swastika does predate the nazis by quite a few decades and around 1900, it became a very omnipresent symbol of the 'völkisch' movement. After the November Revolution, a lot of anti-revolutionaries adopted that symbol because they saw themselves as fighters against the 'anti-German' republic

[@MrEmeraldDragon13]

That is very helpful; thank you!

[@einbaerchen2995]

I just noticed that there are audio tracks for a couple of different languages (really cool) but not for German xD

[@Pioneer_DE]

Another video? Careful to not overwork yourself!

[@Arltratlo]

in German history class in school we call it only the Kapp Putsch!

[@iGamezRo]

Post WW1 Germany would've been way more stable if it hadn't been a republic. I am not necessarily saying that Crown Prince Wilhelm should've been made Kaiser, but even a Hungary-style situation with a regent would've made much more people happy, or not wanting to overthrow the government at least. The Weimar Republic and its instability was the fault of the SPD. They thought that dismantling the system that constantly kept them at bay would no longer keep them at bay, but it fought back hard, finally culminating in something way worse and which nobody had imagined possible.

[@incursus1401]

yeah that is the same conclusion both democratic liberals post 1945 wrote about like Meinecke and modern international historians like Kershaw and Cristopher Clark came to

[@andreasl_fr2666]

The point of Versailles wasn't to create a stable or prosperous Germany , the goal was to de-Prussianize and de-Militarize the country. Basically , what was eventually done after WW2.

[@iGamezRo]

@andreasl_fr2666 And it backfired spectacularly. I am not an early 20th-century politician or geopolitical expert, but putting these kinds of restrictions on extremely proud people who couldn't accept that they lost and adding an unstable and hated system of government who actively worked with the winners to undermine that pride, you get a "Leader" to rise up and do very bad things for everyone who isn't "his people". Had the French been more forgiving, had the Polish Corridor not happened, and had post WW1 Germany not been a republic, there would've been big chances that the Nazis wouldn't have come to power. Even if the Kaiserreich had remained only in name under a regent, then negotiations over the decades would've improved Germany a lot, maybe even seeing Crown Prince Wilhelm return or his oldest son (who wouldn't have died in Belgium in 1940). I am not saying Europe wouldn't have been at war. It would've, but only against the Soviets.

[@SirManateee]

I respectfully disagree. Whether Germany would have been better off as an authoritarian state after WW1 or not is of course difficult to say and really just a matter of speculation. But in general, people do treat the Weimar Republic a bit unfairly when they say that it was unstable and that it had little chance of survival to begin with. By saying that, you're approaching the history of Weimar with its undignified end at the back of your head, which isn't the best way to understand it. Considering everything the young democracy had to go through (political turmoil, coup attempts, separatist movements, political violence, hyperinflation, allied occupation, long lasting effects of WW1 etc.) it's quite amazing that it withstood these trials and emerged from it in a period of relative stability until 1929. Most other democracies would probably have been crushed under this kind of pressure. During the Kapp-Lüttwitz Putsch, the working people made it very clear that they did not want an authoritarian dictatorship and up until 1930, far right parties such as the NSDAP and the DNVP struggled to get mass support. I'm not saying that the Weimar Republic didn't have its flaws, it certainly did. But it certainly didn't necessarily have to end with the rise of the NSDAP.

[@Wn9618]

@@SirManateeeGreat answer. I would also add that what frequently ircks me is the common trope even from well-regarded historians that Germans during the Weimar period were infantile and completely ignorant to democracy - which is complete nonsense considering the fact that Imperial Germany had universal male suffrage (granted the legislative branch did not have complete independent authority like modern day versions but still had substantial powers e.g the government needing their consenting vote on war bonds to start WW1 etc) whereas the UK for example didn’t implement universal male suffrage until after the war.

[@sevelofficial2696]

Never been here so early! Servus!

[@fluorescentpink573]

hey, great video :) i'd love to see more bios of people, like the one you did for stresemann - maybe hindenburg or ludendorff? i'd also love to see profiles of political parties or groups, like the KPD or DNVP if you're interested :)

[@MrMayorqw]

At 15:00, why does the soldier on the left foreground have a swastika in his helmet? I know that the symbol was already in circulation as a good-luck charm before the rise of the NSDAP, but did it already have any connotations with the military or (far-) right?

[@webkeylocknope9691]

The swastika (better yet, the Hakenkreuz) was already associated with German nationalism way before the Nazis in the late 19th and early 20th centuries since it was tied to racial pseudoscience and supremacist ideologies. Several old sites in different nations, spanning through Europe and Asia, were found to bear the swastika symbol, which lots of scholars mistakenly interpreted as evidence of a shared ancestry. One of them, Heinrich Schliemann, who during his excavation of Troy in the 1870s, discovered swastikas on artifacts and linked them to a supposed ancient "Aryan civilization", a theory that resonated with nationalist thinkers eager to tie Germany’s heritage to an imagined superior lineage. These interpretations were neither scientific nor objective, but were embraced by the early völkisch movements anyway, which sought to glorify the Germanic race and its supposed cultural destiny. So, the point being that German purists at the time encountered the symbol and began linking its appearance to the idea of a shared point/origin. They essentialy claimed that it was proof of a singular, primordial culture that had once united these civilizations, of which the Germanic branch was the purest and most direct descendant. This association actually led to some interesting consequences, and is reflected in the modern German term for "Proto-Indo-European", the hypothetical common linguistic ancestor of Romance, Germanic, Slavic, Persian, Indic, and other language families. In German, this term is still called "Indogermanisch" (aka, asserting the Germanic languages privileged status among the others). sorry for writing a novel

[@ReidBottorff]

​@@webkeylocknope9691well said!

[@haroldofold8045]

21:46 what on earth is Oswald Mosley doing there? I wonder the circumstances behind that

[@zachjordan7608]

You might be my favourite youtuber, never stop what you do! we talked by email a while ago, I hope you are still interested in making a video on the institute for sexology

[@SirManateee]

It is absolutely still on my ever-growing list of things that I want to talk about. I'll get back in touch with you when the time has come ;)

[@colindunnigan8621]

Whoa! That's a lot of dueling scars ole Kapp is sporting!

[@DioTheGreatOne]

German Teddy Roosevelt isn't real he can't hurt you! German Teddy Roosevelt: 14:20

[@somenuggett6653]

Could you make a playlist of the background music used in your videos? Love it, but dont want to geek out publicly over the fact that you used the first movement of Felix Mendelssohn's Scottish Symphony in the video

[@joshuafrimpong244]

2:09 the only place where the German army were not in a losing position by the end of the war was in Tanzania, so i feel that the stab in the back myth could be seen with some levels of hypocrisy, if this myth was even true (most certainly not)

[@lehnaru9132]

Are you forgetting the Eastern Front?

[@joshuafrimpong244]

@lehnaru9132 the end of the war. That had already finished

[@andreasl_fr2666]

If my leaders had signed the treaty of Versailles after I spent 4 years in the mud I would be really really mad. I would definitely feel stabbed in the back.

[@andreasl_fr2666]

Emphasis on "feel"

[@sahhaf1234]

I think you should make a program about the history of the german left.

[@ted1091]

Right now, America feels very Weimar

[@SNCY29]

Haven’t even started watching the video yet and learned smth, neat (that it was called Kapp Luwitz not just Kapp haha)

[@victinity]

A manatee video is exactly what I needed

[@kidmohair8151]

a series on the various putsches that will lead up to...well, yaknow.

[@heitorfontenele2041]

Glórias dublagens🦊🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷🦊

[@sbabcock7476]

Wonderful video. You, sir, are a gentleman & a scholar. A true credit to manatee-kind.

[@Sleepymaxi]

why make a video about germany and not have a german dub?

[@SubOptimalUsername]

You are better than an onion fried in butter

[@mattBLACKpunk]

26:54 some things never change 💀

[@aymankhan2670]

@Sir Manatee please make a video about the city of Thorn in Westprussia and the Bromberg Massacre

[@rct3LP]

He made a video about polish German relations. And Germans in polish areas

[@ted1091]

You omit one critical fact: England France and the US blockaded Germany to force it to sign the Versailles Treaty. That included all humanitarian aid. As a direct result, 800,000 German civilians starved to death. If you don't think that fact fueled right-wing extremism, you need a history lesson yourself.

[@Henry_HENRYISM]

Nice vid

[@anderson._.._.8801]

Post ww1 Germany is so wild and interesting A complete shit show

[@zwilder1]

I suggest the book 'Rise And Fall of the Third Reich' as it gives a much more nuanced view of the events of that time

[@matheuspinho4987]

Ah, yes Weimar Republic: that time Germany had the political and economical stability of an African country...

[@generaltom6850]

Don’t forget the 20s. It could have been a successful democracy.

[@HeartForHaerin]

wokewashed history

[@IronWarhorses]

I have a photo of a German Freikorps armoured train at the Kapp Putsch, maybe you would be willing to do a collaboration with my channel? Nice to see the Freikorps is basically MAGA, essentially jobless angry men blaming everybody else for their problems.

[@laisphinto6372]

You say that Like the Freikorps Had No reason to overthrow the SPD. That IS the Same group WHO used the Freikorps plenty of Times AS useful Guys to crush leftwing uprisings also funnily they are used Afterwards because after the Kapp Putsch the leftwing attempted also a Coup again