Talk:Freikorps

Just a question
Whats the vehicle next to the soldiers in the first picture? R34p3r2006 (talk) 09:56, 30 July 2020 (UTC)


 * The annotation of the bottom says "Panzerwagon". To me it looks like a "do it yourself" armored vehicle. 2600:6C63:647F:673D:A3F2:499D:D93E:A233 (talk) 01:25, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

Untitled
I am wondering should this article be melded into Weimar paramilitary groups and have [Freikorps] as a redirect page? It is good that someone sees alltogether all the paramilitary groups and shows the disintegration of German society during the Weimar period.WHEELER 18:31, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I believe the Friekorps actually existed before Weimar was formally estabished. They were really at their strongest in the period of the provisional government between the fall of the monarchy and the adoption of the Weimar constitution.

So the answer to your question is no.216.209.78.47 20:07, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I agree with the first poster, this page needs a merge. RomanK79 (talk) 08:11, 8 September 2014 (UTC)


 * No, this page should not be merged. The Freikorps had a distinct identity that marked them out. More importantly, and this is something this page does not explain at all, the Freikorps were created by the German state. The other paramilitary groups were loyal to political parties. Nowhere would you know that from reading this page that the Freikorps were founded in December 1918 by General Wilhelm Groner and his right-hand man, General Kurt von Schleicher. The statement about the Freikorps being right-wing is a little inaccurate. In December 1918, much of Berlin was under the control of elements of the radical left, and there was believed to be a shortage of reliable soldiers to defend the new republic from the threat of a Communist putsch. The Freikorps were supposed to be volunteers who could be depended upon to defend the new republic. The Freikorps were not supposed to be a political force; it just happened that sort of men who tended to volunteer for the Freikorps were usually on the extreme right. What this article should say is that the Freikorps were created by the state and became a sort of Frankenstein's monster that ultimately turned against its creators, in a certain way. --A.S. Brown (talk) 20:22, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

Innacurate early history
Historically, a "Friekorps" -- usualy used in English as "Free Regiment" was NOT a militia but a mercenary unit. They were "free" to change their allegience if their employer, whether a duke, a margrave or a prince ("furstin") or even an urban republic, decided that it could no longer afford to pay them.

German military law recognized them as legal soldiers, even when traveling from one country to a new job in another, and I read a book of military law, carried in the late 1800's, that required a Friekorps be allowed to pass unhindered through neutral countries.

Look up the history of the Thirty Years War.68.5.64.178 20:04, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I would think a merger would work better as well. This article only talks about a very specific group. 2001:4C28:4000:721:185:26:182:30 (talk) 08:09, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

Freikorps members -- outsiders during the Third Reich?
Source for this? It doesn't sound very credible that nationalistic, anti-communist ex-soldiers would be uninterested in Nazi aims (or of no use to Nazis).

If I'm not mistaken, part [probably individual members rather than a specific formation] of the Garde-Kalvarie later ended up in the SA. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bill Vick (talk • contribs) 16:47, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

Merger proposal
I have proposed that Weimar paramilitary groups be merged into this article.
 * no - look to the top of the page. Freikorps were at least 100 years older than the ill-fated republic. --89.49.142.139 (talk) 09:45, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
 * This discussion is clearly moribund, so I have removed the merger template. --- RepublicanJacobite  The'FortyFive'  03:32, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

most ended up as ss genrals — Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.210.198.140 (talk) 15:29, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps a comparison would be interesting
As I noted above, the Freikorps were founded in December 1918 to defend the new republic from being overthrown by Communists. The Freikorps were volunteers whose only job was to defend the government; in no way were the Freikorps intended to be a political force. But a very particular sort of men tended to volunteer for the Freikorps, namely the World War I veterans who could not adjust to civilian life and still craved for the carnage and mayhem of war. The sort of men who loved killing people during the war, and still longed to go on killing understandably had a lot of trouble adjusting to civilian life. That sort of veteran who could not fit into civilian life almost always were on the extreme right. It should noted that not all German veterans of World War I were like this; the pacifistic League of the War Wounded had three times the total membership of the Freikorps. The sort of veteran who loved war and could not get enough of it were the ones who joined the Freikorps; the ones who had enough of war did not. Furthermore, this was not unique to Germany. There are striking resemblances between the sort of German veteran who joined the Freikorps and the sort of British veteran who joined the Black and Tans. The sort of British veteran who wanted to go on killing and could not fit into post-war British society usually ended up in the Blacks and Tans; much of the brutality of that force seems to be due to the sort of men who volunteered as opposed to some sort of innate anti-Irish racism within British society. This is something that historians have often commented upon, and perhaps this article should mention that. A.S. Brown (talk) 20:59, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

Communist uprisings
This is unclear - which communist uprisings?

This reference seems incongruous with what's stated in the lead: "Freikorps were raised to fight against the newly formed Weimar Republic, as well as their left-wing counterparts, through the early 1920s. These paramilitary organizations 'roamed the countryside, killing with impunity.' 'They engaged in bloody confrontations with republican loyalists and engineered some of the more notorious assassinations' of the Weimar period, and are widely seen as a 'precursor to Nazism'."

I added the clarification tag for now:

"Others, angry at their sudden, apparently inexplicable defeat, joined up in an effort to put down communist uprisings or exact some form of revenge."

Not sure if this article is monitored or not. If yes, please provide clarification. If not, I'd like to remove "communist uprisings" or add to read "so-called communist uprisings." --K.e.coffman (talk) 22:11, 27 November 2015 (UTC)


 * You need to read around the subject before proposing to delete material you're unsure of. In the wake of the First World War, revolution broke out in Germany inspired by the success of the Bolsheviks in Russia. The German Communist Party was founded in Dec 1918 and immediately launched the Spartacist uprising of 1919 in Berlin. They were put down by the Freikorps. Similarly the Munich Soviet Republic was overthrown by Freikorps troops in 1919. Just two examples. Bermicourt (talk) 09:10, 28 November 2015 (UTC)

Freikorps after the First World War
I've moved the text in the lede about the role and actions of the Freikorps after the First World War to this page for discussion. Some of it had already been tagged "dubious" and the 2 references were to newspaper articles that tend to simplify and hype stories. The articles don't quite reflect the text either. I'm sure there are elements of truth about it, but it may need to be balanced. I'll take a look at the German Wiki article which appears more comprehensive and may help.

--Bermicourt (talk) 16:15, 9 April 2017 (UTC)


 * The post-World War I history of the Freikorps is notorious and well-established--and there is a large section in this article that deals with it. I would say if there is any real problem with this article is its overemphasis on the comparatively unimportant and only tangentially relevant pre-WWI manifestations. But removing the post-WWI history entirely from the lead smacks of the newspeakish. Edit and source what's there further, fine. But don't just cut it out. I put it back and I think discussion can lead from there. Leaving it out for any length of time can actively mislead a reader in a much worse way then can less-then-ideal sourcing. Doprendek (talk) 02:34, 18 April 2017 (UTC)


 * I removed the section in good faith and placed it here for proper discussion. The references are poor, the text smacks of journalistic hype and another editor has already tagged it as "dubious". By putting it back in, you're not following good Wiki practice but appear to be pushing your own WP:POV. If this piece of history is so "well established" you would surely be able to find authoritative sources to back it up. Since you've broken normal procedure and put the words back, the onus is on you to source it properly and quickly. --Bermicourt (talk) 08:08, 18 April 2017 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the. —Community Tech bot (talk) 12:06, 9 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Pochod Freikorpsu v Hazlové u Aše 1938.jpg

Split proposal
I have added a "split" template to this page. My rationale is that the article currently deals with several topics which are only tenuously linked, namely: As far as I can see, the only basis for connecting (2) and (3) is the appropriation of the recognised term by the latter but this is pretty tenous and could easily be explained in prose. I can seen no basis for including (4) in the same article as (2) and (3) at all. My suggestion is that the current article be cut into articles addressing each of these four issues. —Brigade Piron (talk) 10:49, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
 * 1) The concept of a "free corps" in military doctrine;
 * 2) The Freikorps of the German states during the Napoleonic era;
 * 3) The Freikorps active in Germany and German-occupied parts of Eastern Europe in the aftermath of the First World War;
 * 4) French Corps francs active between 1940 and 1943.
 * Perhaps so. I came here by way of the assassination of Darlan in World War 2, and the lead might give a casual reader the impression that the assassin supported the Germans, which would be completely wrong Elinruby (talk) 20:50, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * I agree, though I think the change only would require the section on the Corps franc to be cut out. I think moving this article to a new name (i.e "Free corps") and restructuring it around a more general view of the concept of a free corps, while still including the historical context in Germany would be good. From there, more info about other specific countries could be added to further generalize things. Of course, this is precluding that someone would even want to rewrite the leading section AND write an entire new section dedicated to the concept of a free corps in general military doctrine, and also that there is a reliable set of criteria the page can stick to regarding whether or not something is a "free corps." I think later the Corps franc can also be re-evaluated as to whether or not it qualifies since the criteria are so unclear right now. — ComradeCheekiBreeki (talk) 19:59, 30 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I agree with ComradeCheekiBreeki's suggestion on structuring the article around a more general "free corps" topic considering there are other, non-German units of the same name. Perhaps an article rename is also justified? Owen250708 (talk) 11:38, 15 March 2022 (UTC)

Sturmabteilung
Shouldn't the term Sturmabteilung (Brownshirts) be mentioned at least briefly in this article? 173.88.246.138 (talk) 15:54, 13 December 2021 (UTC)

Ukraine
I think it should be mentioned that there is also an Ukrainian paramilitary group that calls itself "Freikorps" and fights in the current conflict with Russia. --MrBurns (talk) 22:14, 14 February 2022 (UTC)

Re-added split proposal
I am dusting off the previous split proposal, which I see was removed some time back in an apparent act of vandalism. I've developed something of an idea for how these two new articles, Free corps and Freikorps respectively, should be formatted. As for the names, Free corps already exists but is a redirect to a list. Freikorps might need a qualifier on it (i.e Freikorps (Weimar Republic) or something of the sort), as other units of the name existed.

My reasoning for the split is thus: A "free corps" is a general type of military unit, whose naming was popularized by German states during the Age of Sail. Freikorps is the title of many of these German units, however not all free corps were German, and not all of them were called Freikorps. This current article is obsessed over the Weimar-era Freikorps paramilitaries, and in general is focused too much on German-speaking countries' implementations of this idea. While the second one is more understandable, the first one seems to be a confusion over the naming of this article, leading both people who want to talk about a "free corps" in general and people who want to talk specifically about the Weimar Freikorps to make edits in the same place. As such, to prevent confusion, the Weimar Freikorps needs its own home, and the page for discussion of what a "free corps" is in general needs to be separate as well.

The criteria I've developed for what can be considered a "free corps," just from skimming the writing, is that:
 * 1) The individuals in a free corps must be irregular or paramilitary. This does not mean they need to be unorganized or untrained (though many were), but merely that they are not "regular" fighters.
 * 2) A free corps needs to be under the nominal control of an established standing military force, while still being afforded a greater degree of autonomy than most members of said military.
 * 3) Unlike a band of mercenaries, a free corps as a whole is not formed for the purpose of, and does not fight exclusively for, money.

The second and third ones are most important, as they separate free corps from most other kinds of similar units. I think these criteria are enough for now, but if anyone has any suggestions I'm ready to hear them.

I've already started working on the leading section of the new "free corps" page (which in my opinion should remain with most of the current content on this page), and I will try to get it in a sandbox ASAP. In the meantime, I think that this article should be cleaned up and some consideration should be given as to what content goes where. ComradeCheekiBreeki (talk) 05:25, 24 October 2022 (UTC)


 * What other countries used "Free corps" aside Germany? The current article only lists France. Got any sources for others? //Lollipoplollipoplollipop::talk 21:49, 2 April 2023 (UTC)
 * The key here is to follow the sources. I don't have access to my military library right now, but it's interesting that Freikorps is much more common in English than 'free corps' (see Ngram Viewer) and that, if you type "free corps" into Google Books, you overwhelmingly get books on the German instantiation of this concept. Also the German Wiki article on this subject covers German units almost exclusively, from the 18th C to the early 20th C. So my sense at this early stage is that this article should focus on the German Freikorps, since that is the primary topic, but that there could be an overview section or separate article about other 'free corps' using whatever is most common in the literatur. Otherwise 'free corps' should be a dab article and the current List of Free Corps should be split, with German units moved here and units of other countries listed at the dab/separate article. Bermicourt (talk) 15:49, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

Hitler quote used to describe Freikorps
Under the Freikorps identity and ideals section, a quote from Adolf Hitler addressing the Hitler Youth is used to describe the Freikorps, "In our eyes, the German boy of the future must be slim and slender, as fast as a greyhound, tough as leather and hard as Krupp steel". An excerpt of this is used in the article saying 'They were to be as "swift as greyhounds, tough as leather, [and] hard as Krupp steel" so as to defend what remained of German conservatism in times of social chaos, confusion, and revolution that came to define the immediate interwar era.' It would be inaccurate to say this was a description used for the Freikorps when it was really intended for the Hitler Youth. Though many of these attributes may have been similar it's a misuse of this quote. AntonVonWerner (talk) 10:15, 9 September 2023 (UTC)
 * The quote is quite infamous. I see it as illustrative, rather than factual, but I tend to agree it's not a good quote to use in this context. Kleuske (talk) 10:20, 9 September 2023 (UTC)