Ruhr Red Army
The
Ruhr Red Army was a workers' uprising on
March 21,
1920, in which workers stayed out on strike in the Ruhr Valley, the richest industrial area of
Germany. The
Communists formed a Red Army, but the German army was able to defeat them. The "Red Rising" gave the government reason to treat the Communists very brutally. Between
1919 and
1922 there were 356 political murders in Germany.
Walther Rathenau, Germany's Foreign Minister, was murdered as part of the escalating violence.