[17] Barth traces the first documented use to a centrist political meeting in the Munich Löwenbräu-Keller on November 2,  1918, in which Ernst Müller-Meiningen, a member of the Progressive coalition in the Reichstag, used the term to exhort his listeners to keep fighting: As long as the front holds, we damned well have the duty to hold out in the homeland. ThoughtCo, Aug. 27, 2020, thoughtco.com/the-november-criminals-1221093. Wilde, Robert. "Yes, that's it, exactly, we were stabbed in the back". The editor of an SPD newspaper sued the journal for defamation, giving rise to what is known as the Munich Dolchstoßprozess from 19 October to 20 November 1925. Despite the similarity of the German word, sfn error: no target: CITEREFKershaw2016 (, Vascik, George S. and Sadler, Mark R. eds. Read the following statements and choose the correct option (a) November Criminals belonged to Hitler's associates (b) Nuremberg trials relate to the failure of the Weimer Constitution. Many of the November Criminals were a part of the early resistance members who eventually spearheaded the German Revolution of 1918 - 1919, several of which went on to serve as heads of the Weimar Republic which would serve as the basis for the post-war German reconstruction in the years to come. Kindle AZW file. It was picked up by right-wing political factions, and was even used by Kaiser Wilhelm II in the memoirs he wrote in the 1920s. These political opponents were chiefly right-wingers, and the idea that the November Criminals had ‘stabbed Germany in the back’ by engineering surrender was partly created by the German military itself, who maneuvered the situation so the civilians would be blamed for conceding a war that the generals also felt couldn’t be won, but which they didn’t wish to admit. However, even the SPD had a part in furthering the myth when Reichspräsident Friedrich Ebert, the party leader, told troops returning to Berlin on 10 November 1918 that "No enemy has vanquished you," (kein Feind hat euch überwunden! November Criminals (2017) PG-13 | Crime, Drama, Mystery. Watch options. )[19] and "they returned undefeated from the battlefield" (sie sind vom Schlachtfeld unbesiegt zurückgekehrt). Addison Schatch is a high school senior filling out a college application that requires him to write an essay listing his best and worst traits. [7], The Allies had been amply resupplied by the United States, which also had fresh armies ready for combat, but the UK and France were too war-weary to contemplate an invasion of Germany with its unknown consequences. The storm of anger will then turn against them," after which the military could step in again to insure that things would once again be run "in the old way". [2], Historians inside and outside Germany unanimously reject the myth, pointing out the German Army was out of reserves, was being overwhelmed by the entrance of the United States into the war, and by late 1918 had lost the war militarily. According to historian John Wheeler-Bennett, speaking from the British perspective, It was necessary for the Nazi régime and/or the German Generals to surrender unconditionally in order to bring home to the German people that they had lost the War by themselves; so that their defeat should not be attributed to a "stab in the back". https://www.thoughtco.com/the-november-criminals-1221093 (accessed May 12, 2021). Did You Know? Further blame was laid at their feet after they signed the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, which led to territorial losses and serious financial pain for the shaky new republic, including a crippling schedule of reparation payments. According to William L. Shirer, Ludendorff used the reviews of the book to convince Hindenburg about the validity of the myth. For other uses, see. [19] Right-wing groups used it as a form of attack against the early Weimar Republic government, led by the Social Democratic Party (SPD), which had come to power with the abdication of the Kaiser. Reviews the Clear Evidence That in Reality It Simply Lost the Will to Go on Fighting", Book review by Harold Marcuse, with 15 "stab-in-the-back" illustrations, 1918–1942, The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews, Bay Area Holocaust Oral History Project (BAHOHP), Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), National Political Institute of Education, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Stab-in-the-back_myth&oldid=1022777925, Military history of Germany during World War II, Short description is different from Wikidata, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 12 May 2021, at 12:36. (2016), last German offensive on the Western Front, Centre for the Study of the Causes of the War, "Ludendorff: The Soldier and the Politician", "Stabbed at the Front: After 1918 the Myth Was Created That the German Army Only Lost the War Because It Had Been 'Stabbed in the Back' by Defeatists and Revolutionaries on the Home Front. [20], On 18 November 1919, Ludendorff and Hindenburg appeared before the Untersuchungsausschuß für Schuldfragen ("Committee of Inquiry into Guilt") of the newly elected Weimar National Assembly, which was investigating the causes of the World War and Germany's defeat. They can now make the peace which has to be made. In 1912, during the rebellion of Pascual Orozco, Villa aroused the suspicion of Gen. Victoriano Huerta, who condemned him to death, but Madero ordered a stay of execution and sent Villa to prison instead.Villa escaped from prison in November and fled to the United States.After Madero’s assassination in 1913, Villa returned to Mexico and formed a military band of several thousand men … [10] On 30 October the Ottoman Empire capitulated at Mudros. Ludendorff and Hindenburg knew they had to sign the Treaty of Versailles to end the war and blamed it on all on the government for putting them in the situation where they had no choice but to sign it. Exploitation: From Soldiers to Hitler's Revisionist History. November Criminals (film) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia November Criminals is a 2017 American crime drama film, directed by Sacha Gervasi and written by Gervasi and Steven Knight, and based on Sam Munson's 2010 novel The November Criminals. Many of the Bavarian Soviet Republic's leaders were Jewish, allowing antisemitic propagandists to connect Jews with Communism, and thus treason. [9] German scholar Boris Barth, in contrast to Steigmann-Gall, implies that Doehring did not actually use the term, but spoke only of 'betrayal'. Conservatives, nationalists and ex-military leaders began to speak critically about the peace and Weimar politicians, socialists, communists and German Jews. Moreover, the Social Democrats that held the majority in the Weimar Government was pressured both by the left and right wing seeking to usurp power. Wilson's response insisted that Germany institute parliamentary democracy, give up the territory it had gained to that point in the war, and significantly disarm, including giving up the German High Seas Fleet.[15]. The terms, arranged by telegraph with the Allied Authorities in Paris, were communicated to the Austrian commander and accepted. The government becomes known as the november criminals. In the West, Germany had had successes with the Spring Offensive. When he recovered, Ludendorff decided Germany could not win and would need to seek an armistice, but he also knew the military would be blamed, and decided to move this blame elsewhere. https://www.historyhit.com/convicted-nazi-war-criminals-who-got-off-easy The last day of World War One was November 11 th 1918, known as Armistice Day. A pair of college bound friends (Chloë Grace Moretz and Ansel Elgort) find themselves falling for one another, but after the mysterious murder of their classmate they defy the authorities to uncover the truth. Instead, the census showed just the opposite, that Jews were over-represented both in the army as a whole and in fighting positions at the front. In Spring 1919, Max Bauer – an Army colonel who had been the primary advisor to Ludendorff on politics and economics – published Could We Have Avoided, Won, or Broken Off the War?, in which he wrote that "[The war] was lost only and exclusively through the failure of the homeland. The hope was that the Allies could secure an end to the hostilities of the First World War (also called the Great War), by the signing of an armistice, a The weakness of Germany's strategic position was exacerbated by the rapid collapse of the other Central Powers in late 1918, following Allied victories on the Macedonian and Italian fronts. Ludendorff's eyes lit up and he leapt upon the phrase like a dog on a bone. How the Treaty of Versailles Contributed to Hitler's Rise, Interwar Germany: The Rise and Fall of Weimar and the Rise of Hitler, World War II: Colonel General Heinz Guderian, Who Were Hitler's Supporters? ThoughtCo. "The November Criminals." The November Criminals were named so by German political opponents who thought the German army had enough strength to continue and that surrendering was a betrayal or crime, that the German army had not actually lost on the battlefront. Further "proof" of the myth's validity was found in British General Frederick Barton Maurice's book The Last Four Months, published in 1919. "The November Criminals." Charges of a Jewish conspiratorial element in Germany's defeat drew heavily upon figures such as Kurt Eisner, a Berlin-born German Jew who lived in Munich. The November Criminals. The German historian Friedrich Meinecke attempted to trace the roots of the expression "stab-in-the-back" in a 11 June 1922 article in the Viennese newspaper Neue Freie Presse. Ludendorff and Hindenburg, supreme commanders of the German army, were primarily responsible for the creation and popularization of the myth that the army was not defeated on the battlefield, but was betrayed on the German home front. Many Germans hated the government for signing the armistice in November 1918 - and called them the 'November Criminals'. Ludendorff replied with his list of excuses, including that the home front failed the army. The Weimar Republic under Friedrich Ebert violently suppressed workers' uprisings with the help of Gustav Noske and Reichswehr General Groener, and tolerated the paramilitary Freikorps forming all across Germany. From the moment the leaders of the victorious Allied nations arrived in France for the peace conference in early 1919, the post-war reality began to … As such, the book offered one of the earliest published versions of the stab-in-the-back legend. an act of violence condemned by contemporaries as a breach of morality or the laws and customs of war; When Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party came to power in 1933, they made the legend an integral part of their official history of the 1920s, portraying the Weimar Republic as the work of the "November criminals" who stabbed the nation in the back to seize power while betraying it. Simon and Schuster, New York, 2010. [10] On 3 November Austria-Hungary sent a flag of truce to ask for an armistice. They begin to take steps to deflect the blame to losing the war from themselves and the German Army to others. How to use prohibition in a sentence. The film has been released straight to video on demand, before a limited theatrical release. After the last German offensive on the Western Front failed in 1918, Hindenburg and Ludendorff admitted that the war effort was doomed, and they pressed Kaiser Wilhelm II for an armistice to be negotiated, and for a rapid change to a civilian government in Germany. Definition. [27] For example, on a few occasions it was used regarding the United States' involvement in the Vietnam War, without the antisemitic slant. November Criminals. The German Government agreed to sign the Treaty of Versailles in June 1919, to make peace. NOVEMBER CRIMINALS (Novemberverbrecher); conceived by the antirepublican Right (the DNVP and other unrepentant monarchists), the term was first used to identify any German who had a hand in either the Armistice* or the Versailles Treaty,* but it was soon applied to those prepared to fulfill the terms of Versailles (e.g., Walther Rathenau* and Gustav Stresemann*). Hindenburg refused to answer questions from the chairman, and instead read a statement that had been written by Ludendorff. The nickname "November Criminals" was given to the German politicians who negotiated and signed the armistice which ended World War I in November of 1918. The antisemitic instincts of the German Army were revealed well before the stab-in-the-back myth became the military's excuse for losing the war. The Imperial German Army then suppressed the results of the census.[4]. In spite of such tolerance, the Republic's legitimacy was constantly attacked with claims such as the stab-in-the-back. He is the author of the History in an Afternoon textbook series. At 5 o'clock in the morning on November 11, 1918, just north of Paris in the isolated Forest of Compiegne, representatives from the countries of France, Great Britain, and Germany held a clandestine meeting in a railway car. Rosenberg accused German Zionists of working for a German defeat and supporting Britain and the implementation of the Balfour Declaration.[b]. It was claimed that these groups had not sufficiently supported the war and had played a role in selling out Germany to its enemies. Even Catholics were viewed with suspicion by some due to supposed fealty to the Pope and their presumed lack of national loyalty and patriotism. The phrase was to Ludendorff's liking, and he let it be known among the general staff that this was the "official" version, which led to it being spread throughout German society. We would have to be ashamed of ourselves in front of our children and grandchildren if we attacked the battle front from the rear and gave it a dagger-stab. German reviews of the book misrepresented it as proving that the German army had been betrayed on the home front by being "dagger-stabbed from behind by the civilian populace" (von der Zivilbevölkerung von hinten erdolcht), an interpretation that Maurice disavowed in the German press, to no effect. Wilde, Robert. In the 1924 national election, the Munich cultural journal Süddeutsche Monatshefte published a series of articles blaming the SPD and trade unions for Germany's defeat in World War I, which came out during the trial of Adolf Hitler and Ludendorff for high treason following the Beer Hall Putsch in 1923. Nickname fo German politicians who sighned the armistice ending WW1; in November 1918; Term Stab in he back myth. [28], The idea that the German Army was betrayed by Jews and socialists at the end of World War I, "Stab in the back" and "November criminals" redirect here. Prohibition definition is - the act of prohibiting by authority. Malcolm asked Ludendorff why it was that he thought Germany lost the war. Rumours of War – Five Outlandish Lies Spun by WW1 Propagandists Published Date: 28 October, 2013 Many German soldiers believed that they might have actually prevailed on the Western Front in the last year of World War One were it not for the ‘November Criminals’ back home. [8] On the Western Front, although the Hindenburg Line had been penetrated and German forces were in retreat, the Allied army had not reached the western German frontier, and on the Eastern Front, Germany had already won the war against Russia, concluded with the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. Find 42 ways to say CRIMINALS, along with antonyms, related words, and example sentences at Thesaurus.com, the world's most trusted free thesaurus. [14], On 5 October, the German Chancellor, Prince Maximilian of Baden, contacted American President Woodrow Wilson, indicating that Germany was willing to accept his Fourteen Points as a basis for discussions. Roth's work claimed that most Jews involved in the war were only taking part as profiteers and spies, while he also blamed Jewish officers for fostering a defeatist mentality which impacted negatively on their soldiers. Robert Wilde is a historian who writes about European history. Ebert had meant these sayings as a tribute to the German soldier, but it only contributed to the prevailing feeling. Matthias Erzberger, a leading politician of the Catholic Zentrum party, was the representative of the new German government at Compiegne. The members of the Weimar republic were- the socialists, republicans, and the Catholics.They were known as the november criminal because germans believe that weimer republic was responsible for the defeat in world war 1.Therefore its supporters were mockingly known as November Criminals Many prominent figures testified in that trial, including members of the parliamentary committee investigating the reasons for the defeat, so some of its results were made public long before the publication of the committee report in 1928. The German politicians who mediated and signed the armistice that ended World War I in November 1918 were called ‘November Criminals’. The First World War raged from 1914 to 1918 in muddy, bloody trenches of western Europe, saw the introduction of the machine gun and poison gas into battle. These actions were believed to have deprived Germany of almost certain victory at the eleventh hour. Thus the conditions were set for the "stab-in-the-back myth", in which Hindenburg and Ludendorff were held to be blameless, the German Army was seen as undefeated on the battlefield, and the republican politicians – especially the Socialists – were accused of betraying Germany. We will therefore now bring those gentlemen into the ministries. [13] The attitude of the military was "[T]he parties of the left have to take on the odium of this peace. The attack made large gains at first but petered out and was pushed back; the allies followed this up by inflicting "The Black Day of the German Army" when they started to push the Germans back beyond their defenses, and Ludendorff suffered a mental breakdown. who negotiated and signed the armistice which ended World War I in November of 1918. While Germany might have won in the east, many troops were tied down holding their gains. Addison finds the shooter and gets shot... police shows up to the house and he gets rushed to hospital—ending scenes to the movie November Criminals. 'dagger stab legend')[a] was an antisemitic conspiracy theory, widely believed and promulgated in right-wing circles in Germany after 1918. Who were called the 'November criminals'? he repeated. It was particularly this testimony of Hindenburg that led to the widespread acceptance of the Dolchstoßlegende in post-World War I Germany. [11] Normally, during wartime an armistice is negotiated between the military commanders of the hostile forces, but Hindenburg and Ludendorff had instead handed this task to the new civilian government. (2020, August 27). Throughout his career, he railed against the "November criminals" of 1918, who had stabbed the German Army in the back. The November Criminals. The Dolchstoß was a central image in propaganda produced by the many right-wing and traditionally conservative political parties that sprang up in the early days of the Weimar Republic, including Hitler's Nazi Party. Official Trailer. It also led to transnational, global systems of captivity. November Criminals (2017) This is a crime drama about college bound friends find themselves falling for one another, but after the mysterious murder of their classmate, they defy the authorities to uncover the truth. The strikes were seen as having been instigated by treasonous elements, with the Jews taking most of the blame.[9]. The stab-in-the-back myth (German: Dolchstoßlegende, pronounced [ˈdɔlçʃtoːsleˌɡɛndə] (listen), lit. 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