RUDIGER BERGIEN. Die bellizistische Republik: Wehrkonsens und "Wehrhaftmachung" in Deutschland 1918-1933.

Abstract

This extensively researched, conceptually ambitious, and powerfully argued book revisits a classic theme in the history of Weimar Germany: namely, the relationship between the armed forces and the Weimar Republic. According to the standard account, moderate social democratic politicians such as Friedrich Ebert or Gustav Noske brought in the remains of the wartime army in early 1919 and again in 1920 to crush socialist uprisings in major cities and industrial regions. Akin to a sorcerer's apprentice, they thus created a power that subsequently eluded their control. The army, forcibly reduced and professionalized due to the Versailles treaty, turned into a state of its own. It was hostile to the republic and actively undermined it during the crisis of the early 1930s, before becoming a bulwark of the Third Reich. In Rüdiger Bergien's view, this interpretation overstates the contrast between the republic and the army, whose interests continued to be promoted by Christian democratic and social democratic politicians throughout the 1920s. It also fails to account for the numerous paramilitary units and associations that pervaded German society and enjoyed government support. Instead, Bergien contends that there was a broad political consensus around military affairs. He even suggests replacing the notions of militarism and militarization, which assume a dichotomy between the military and wider society, with a new concept he labels Bellizismus (bellicosity).