Reinhardt, Georg-Hans (1887–1963) own though a process of “Gleichschaltung,” and thereafter governed Germany under the Führerprinzip The Reichstag was retained merely as a constitutional and propaganda shell, used on rare occasions to override German military law and traditions to permit Hitler to sack Field Marshals and generals at will, and for important Nazi speeches that looked better with a dedicated audience ready to respond as one RREICHSVERTEIDIGUNG (RVT) German homeland air defense, comprising networks of radar, radio stations, Flak batteries, and day and night fighters REICHSWALD, BATTLE OF See Germany, conquest of REICHSWEHR “State defense.” The German army, 1871–1933 The “Black Reichswehr” was an illegal force, organized in secret as “Arbeitskommandos” (“labor commandos”) to supplement the 100,000 man “Versailles Army” permitted Germany under terms of the Treaty of Versailles (1919) Units of the Black Reichswehr rebelled in 1923, and it was thereafter disbanded The regular Reichswehr was renamed the Wehrmacht in 1935 The Reichswehr’s preferred image immediately after World War I was of itself standing everywhere defiant and on foreign fields, until “stabbed-in-the-back” by domestic traitors That was patent nonsense: the General Staff had refused to fight any more offensive battles on the Western Front, and the Reichswehr was hurled out of its trenches by a great Allied offensive in the summer of 1918 Nevertheless, the accusation had psychological plausibility for millions of ordinary Landser who in fact stood everywhere outside the homeland on armistice day (November 11, 1918) Some bestrode one-third of defeated Tsarist Russia, along with parts of the Caucasus and Baltic States Others were across the Italian frontier, while others were still in Belgium and in France Yet, all that was a chimera: Imperial Germany’s allies, Austria and the Ottoman Empire, were exhausted and collapsing long before November, while retaining German territorial gains in western Russia depended almost wholly on the outcome of fighting on the Western Front Most importantly, the Reichswehr was militarily defeated in the west and in headlong retreat during the fall of 1918, with whole armies no longer obeying orders to fight See also Night of the Long Knives; Reichenau, Walter von REINHARD See Aktion Reinhard REINHARD LINE See Bernhardt Line REINHARDT, GEORG-HANS (1887–1963) German general Commander of Army Group Center from August 1944, he took over in the wake of the disaster 915