ABSTRACT
The German military assisted by the internal divisions in the German revolutionary movements itself, put paid to these ambitions in the early weeks of 1919, when the Freikorps units systematically and effectively routed out and destroyed the insurrectionists with artillery, machine-gun, mortars and even flamethrowers. There German forces were combined into the Provisional Reichswehr, and while they were evidently adequate to maintain that kind of internal order which crushed out street-fighting rebels, in the mind of Quartermaster-General Wilhelm Groener they had yet another potential role to play. The Reichswehr carved out its own policy in virtual independence, leading to early protest and by a subsequent running battle with the diplomats who also had interests in Soviet Russia. The state of the Red Army and its actual combat efficiency would not lend support to the idea that the Soviet command was seeking a military commitment, but rather making a test of Reichswehr intentions.
