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Occupation Of The Ruhr




Initiated by French Prime Minister Raymond Poincaré , the Invasion took place on January 11 , 1923, with the aim of occupying the centre of German Coal , Iron and Steel production in the Ruhr Area valley.

The occupation was initially greeted by a campaign of Passive Resistance , and a few incidents of Sabotage (which the Nazis were later to portray as a myth of widespread armed resistance). In the face of economic collapse, with huge Unemployment and Hyperinflation , the Strikes were eventually called off in September 1923 by the new Gustav Stresemann coalition government, which was followed by a State Of Emergency . Despite this, civil unrest grew into Riot s and Coup attempts targeted at the government of the Weimar Republic, including the Beer Hall Putsch .

Internationally the occupation did much to boost sympathy for Germany, although no action was taken in the League Of Nations in response to what was a clear breach of League rules. The French, with their own economic problems, eventually accepted the Dawes Plan and withdrew from the occupied areas in July/August 1925.


BIBLIOGRAPHY


  • Michael Ruck, ''Die Freien Gewerkschaften im Ruhrkampf 1923'' (Frankfurt am Main, 1986);

  • Barbara Müller, ''Passiver Widerstand im Ruhrkampf. Eine Fallstudie zur gewaltlosen zwischenstaatlichen Konfliktaustragung und ihren Erfolgsbedingungen'' (Münster, 1995);

  • Stanislas Jeannesson, ''Poincaré, la France et la Ruhr 1922-1924. Histoire d'une occupation'' (Strasbourg, 1998);

  • Elspeth Y. O'Riordan, ''Britain and the Ruhr crisis'' (London, 2001);

  • Gerd Krüger, Das "Unternehmen Wesel" im Ruhrkampf von 1923. Rekonstruktion eines misslungenen Anschlags auf den Frieden, in Horst Schroeder, Gerd Krüger, ''Realschule und Ruhrkampf. Beiträge zur Stadtgeschichte des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts'' (Wesel, 2002), pp. 90-150 (Studien und Quellen zur Geschichte von Wesel, 24) on the background of so-called 'active' resistance ;

  • Conan Fischer, ''The Ruhr Crisis, 1923-1924'' (Oxford / New York, 2003);

  • Gerd Krumeich, Joachim Schröder (eds.), ''Der Schatten des Weltkriegs: Die Ruhrbesetzung 1923'' (Essen, 2004) (Düsseldorfer Schriften zur Neueren Landesgeschichte und zur Geschichte Nordrhein-Westfalens, 69);