If youw ant to go down that route, that might be possible, but the majority of Germans and Germany wouldn’t have gone along with it. You might have a scenario where the federal government washed its hands of Berlin or some other parts of the country, which descended into semi-anarchy, nominally ruled over by crazies or “useful idiots” like the Spartacists. That’s somewhat believable.
To be fair, there were so many ‘red scares’ in that timeframe it’s hard to tell whether something was a genuine full-on revolution and what was just the authorities getting their knickers in a twist because the proles were giving them backchat. For example a riot in Glasgow led to the UK government deploying tanks and machine-guns on the streets while hyperventilating about a revolution on the Red Clyde - which was probably pretty unlikely.
There was also a general strike in the UK in 1926 which threatened/promised revolution in the eyes of many. In Brideshead Revisited, Charles Ryder joins a sort of government militia to put it down (there is no actual fighting).
Heh. A laughably british episode. After Churchill shafts the economy by dragging Britain back onto the gold standard at a ridiculous level and wages start collapsing, the TUC calls a limited national strike while bending over backwards to be as non-threatening and non-confrontational as possible, and the government returns the favour by organising a bowler-hatted militia, calling out the army and setting up its own propaganda rag, run by none other than Winnie, the man who arguably started the whole thing in the first place. It’s right up there with the Bonus Army on the list of narrowly averted revolutions.
To whom were the Spartacists useful?
Stalin, presumably. Useful Idiots.
Although there’s no denying they were also useful to the likes of the NSDAP by embodying the Red Menace and scaring the middle classes further over to the right wing.
The Spartacists were gone from the scene long before Stalin’s name was well-known.
(Capitalism, of course, has plenty of useful idiots of its own and always has had.)
Board wouldn’t let me post last night. The Spartacists were indeed gone by the day of Stalin*, you comment about Capitalists was pointless, ill-informed, threadshitting, and irrelevant, and I was referring to both the proto-Nazis and the emerging “Global Communists”.
*Reason being, that they were killed off or left to go worship at the altar of the Soviet Union.
I am resolved to repeat it whenever and wherever I encounter the “useful idiots” talking-point henceforth. It will always be relevant in that sense and it is entirely true.