It was launched in response to nationalist anger over the government's decision to end passive resistance against the French and Belgian occupation of the Ruhr.

Groups from the Black Reichswehr called labor commandos (Arbeitskommando) led by Bruno Ernst Buchrucker wanted to bring down the Reich government of Chancellor Gustav Stresemann and replace the parliamentary democratic republic with a national dictatorship.

The putsch was prompted when on 26 September 1923 the government ended passive resistance to the French and Belgian occupation of the Ruhr[1] that had begun in January 1923 after Germany defaulted on the war reparations payments required by the Treaty of Versailles.

[2] The commandos were officially civilian volunteers tasked with finding and collecting weapons caches, but in reality they were troops being trained under the Reichswehr in violation of the 100,000 man limit on the German army imposed by the Treaty of Versailles.

[3] Buchrucker learned about the arrest warrant issued against him on 30 September in Berlin and drove to Küstrin (since 1945 Kostrzyn nad Odrą, Poland), about 320 km to the southeast.

There he ordered the leader of the city's labor commandos, Major Fritz Hertzer, to have his men move inside the fortifications of the Old Town the following morning.

Buchrucker pointed out his units' numerical superiority and asked the commander "not to stand in his way, the great national moment has now come".

[6] In Berlin, putschists from the labor commandos briefly controlled the Spandau Citadel and Fort Hahneberg but were forced to surrender to the Reichswehr.