On this day, 9 November 1918, German workers were fighting to end World War I as revolution swept the country and the Kaiser abdicated. Berlin was gripped by an anti-war general strike, while rebel sailors, soldiers and workers were taking to the streets. The deputy chairman of the Socialist Party (SPD), Philipp Schneidemann, learned that revolutionary socialist Karl Liebknecht, fresh from prison, planned to declare a socialist republic. So to avoid being outmanoeuvred, he defied the party leader and took to a balcony at the Reichstag where he declared a republic. That evening, dozens of workers from large Berlin factories, mistrusting the SPD leadership, occupied the Reichstag and announced elections to factory and army regiment councils to form a revolutionary government the following day.
Learn more about the German revolution in this book: https://shop.workingclasshistory.com/products/all-power-to-the-councils-a-documentary-history-of-the-german-revolution-of-1918-1919-gabriel-kuhn-ed https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1849762668542208/?type=3
