Ruhr Crisis of 1922–23

a serious international conflict in connection with the Franco-Belgian occupation of the Ruhr. On Dec. 11, 1922, the German multimillionaire H. Stinnes published a statement implying that the German government should not pay reparations. On Jan. 11, 1923, in reply to Germany’s failure to fulfill its reparation obligations, French and Belgian troops occupied the Ruhr Basin, which constituted about 7 percent of Germany’s postwar territory and accounted for 72 percent of its coal production and more than 50 percent of its pig iron and steel production. The German government called on the population of the Ruhr to carry out “passive resistance” and sabotage; seeking to contain the working people’s struggle against the offensive of the German monopolies, the government stirred up nationalist feelings. The occupying authorities met the passive resistance with repression: they moved about 130,000 people out of the Ruhr into other parts of Germany, imposed fines, and handed down death sentences. Only the Soviet government protested the occupation. The occupation of the Ruhr (the evacuation of the occupying troops, which began in August 1924, was completed only in August 1925) left Germany on the brink of an economic catastrophe; it exacerbated the class struggle and intensified the political crisis in Germany.