Goetz is lampooning a Kaiser word, defined, who ever stood up to him would be smashed. The events of the Revolution on November 9, 1918 proved him wrong. Reverence for the Hohenzollern dynasty could not survive a hopeless defeat of the armed forces. Crew members of the battleship ‘Kaiser’ had mutinied and hoisted the red flag.
Obverse: A German sailor kicks the Kaiser across the border marker into the tulip fields of Holland pointing with his thumb at the Kaiser’s own words, “Wersich mir entagegenstellt, den zerschmettere ich” (He who stands in my way will be smashed.)
Reverse: The new storms of the social democratic revolution are blowing, as indicated by the socialistic balloon hats, and their winds have broken the oak tree of Germany and the Kaiser’s castle. The date, November 9th, 1918, indicates the day of the Kaiser’s abdication.
