Red Front Fighters' League
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Roter Frontkämpferbund
Roter Frontkämpferbund |
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|---|---|
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| Leader |
Ernst Thälmann Willy Leow |
| Founded | July 1924 |
| Dissolved | May 1929 |
| Newspaper | Rote Front |
| Youth wing | Rote Jungfront |
| Membership | 130,000 by 1929 |
| Political position | Far-left |
The Roter FrontkämpferbundGerman: [ˈʁoːtɐ ˈfʁɔntˌkɛmpfɐˌbʊnt], "Alliance of Red Front-Fighters"), abbreviated RFB, was officially a non-partisan and legally registered association, but in practice a paramilitary organization under the leadership of the Communist Party of Germany during the Weimar Republic.
The first local groups of the RFB were established in July 1924 and Ernst Thälmann was elected the first leader of the federal committee during the first nationwide meeting in February 1925 in Berlin. Die Rote Front (English: The Red Front) was the newspaper of the RFB. The greeting of “Rot Front!” (English: Red Front!) while rising a clenched fist was responsible for the expression Rotfront, often used among friends and foes to refer to the organization instead of using the entire title of the alliance. The clenched fist "protecting the friend, fighting off the enemy" (German: "schützend den Freund, abwehrend den Feind") was the symbol of the RFB used on all its insignias and its registered trademark since March 1, 1926.
Until 1923 the Communist Party of Germany could depend on the Proletarian Hundreds (German: Proletarische Hundertschaften) to secure their meetings and demonstrations. After the ban of this organization in 1923, the Communist Party of Germany was in need to protect their political activities against attacks from the police and right-wing paramilitary organizations such as the Stahlhelm, Bund der Frontsoldaten and the Sturmabteilung. During the 9th national conference of the Communist Party of Germany in April 1924 it was decided to form a new defense organization, under the name Roter Frontkämpfer-Bund. The goal was to attract non-communist workers and lead them as a united front. The incidents in the City of Halle/Saale on May 11, 1924, where 8 workers were killed and 16 seriously wounded by shots fired by the police during a demonstration, the decision was made public to all local organizations of the party and soon after the first local RFB-groups were formed. Most of these first RFB-units were located in industrial cities, seaports and other traditional strongholds of the working class.
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