German’ socialism came to be wholly associated with the extreme anti-liberal politics of the antisemitic and volkisch movement. The appeal here was mainly to the lower-middle classes—traders, craftsmen, small farmers, lower civil servants—and rooted in a combination of antisemitism, extreme nationalism, and vehement anti-capitalism
Probably in April of 1919, with the Munich ruled by the Communist Councils, [Hitler] wore, along with almost all the soldiers of the Munich garrison, the revolutionary red armband. That Hitler stood back and took no part whatsoever in the ‘liberation’ of Munich from the Raterepublik is said to have brought him later scornful reproaches from Ernst Rohm.
In a pointed remark when defending Esser in 1921 against attacks from within the party, Hitler commented: ‘Everyone was at one time a Social Democrat.