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====Freikorps 1918-1923====
[[File: Freikorps One.jpg|300px|thumb|left|Freikorps in the Saar (1919)]]
By 1919 the socio-economic situation was so dire, that the communists and other extreme leftists believed that the time had arrived for revolution. All over Germany - workers, councils and revolutionary committees seized control of cities in the period from late 1918 to mid-1919. From Bremen to Munich there were mini Communist Revolutions.<ref> Waite, Robert <i>Vanguard of Nazism: The Free Corps Movement in Post-War Germany, 1918–1923 </i> (New York, Norton & Company, 1997), p. 14 </ref>
The Spartacist Revolt led by Rosa Luxembourg and Karl Liebknecht sought to seize Berlin in January 1919. It was the most serious left-wing revolt of the Weimar era. The revolutionaries occupied public buildings all over the city. The Social Democratic government did not have sufficient forces to put down the revolt turned to the Freikorps in the city and in the surrounding districts. The veterans easily quelled the revolt and murdered its leaders in cold blood. Soon after the Freikorps put down the revolt they took part in wave of terror in the city and beyond. The Freikorps targets and killed many left-wingers in and around Berlin.