Essentially, the mutinies in Kiel and Wilhelmshaven came about through suicidal orders, low morale, and the fever-dream desire of the Germans to try and force a (more) favorable set of terms to their armistice.

After the failure of the Spring Offensives (Operation Michael, as well as the follow-up offensives and battles on the Lys, Aisne, Metz, and Second Marne), it was generally agreed by almost everyone in Germany that the war was going to end. Victory had essentially been written off as these battles were the last vestiges of German offensive strength were used up.

Initially, the series of operations was successful, with Michael essentially undoing many of the British gains from the Somme in 1916. However, success was along a limited front in Michael, and follow-up offensives (Georgette, as well as Blücher-Yorck, and Gneisenau) along the northern sectors of the front were supposed to exploit supposed weaknesses in the Allied lines caused by pressure of the main attacks as well as draw enemy divisions out of the main sector of the front (where Michael had been conducted) in hopes that further offensives in that sector could exploit and further weaken the Allied forces.

This had severely depleted German front-line forces and, with manpower starting to run out and with political unrest at home exacerbated by famine as well ever-rising food prices, some sort of prestige-solution to victory had to be arranged. However, this victory could not come from the German Army.

On the run since the start of the Hundred Days Offensive, with French, British, and American armies in a consistent, general offensives pushing against the beleaguered Germans, and their reserves spent, there was no way for the Germans to mass the necessary military weight behind any sector of the front so they could land a decisive blow. There were simply too many fires to put out all at once for the Army, and the number of men trickling in as replacements was barely sufficient, and wholly incapable of forming any sort of meaningful, new, formations. Further, the Spring Offensives had culled the most experienced men out of the German army as they had been sent to the now-decimated assault battalions that had led the way in the Spring. By this point, the German Army was capable really of only defensive operations, and only barely so, without the smattering of veterans in the ranks to steel the fragile and under-trained forces now being sent into battle.

However, the Navy still existed. It was still largely intact, and despite having been bottled up after the Battle of Jutland, remained in theory an effective fighting force. Franz Ritter von Hipper, commander of the German High Seas Fleet ordered his navy to sally forth in a last-ditch attempt to engage the British Royal Navy, in the hopes that this show of German Imperial strength could help to soften the harshness of any Allied demands, tempering them by reminding the Allies that this was a negotiated settlement; that the Germans still could, and would, continue to fight on if the terms of the cessation of hostilities were not to Germany's liking. Besides this slightly "practical" aspect to the reason there was a second to it, stemming from inter-service rivalry between teh Army and Navy, as well as the placement of the burden of defeat amongst the three pillars of the German state at this time - Army, Navy, and the civilian government. The Army, clearly, had done its part with the Spring Offensives. However, the navy hadn't really participated except for the U-Boat campaigns, after Jutland, and thus the decision by Hipper to sortie forth was an “emotional one, arising from officers' forebodings...if [the German Navy] surrendered to the British without once having been fully engaged in battle” (Stevenson, 400) they would bear the full burden of blame, with politicians and generals alike saying things along the lines of: "If only the Navy had done its part, we might have won!"

Thus, the orders of 24 October 1918. It ordered the general mobilization and sortieing of the German Navy as a grand fleet to find and engage the Royal Navy in what was to be a battle of total annihilation. On 27 October, the orders were received by the fleet, and on 29 October, when the order to set sail was given, the crew of three warships in the Third Naval Squadron refused to set sail, seeing the orders for what they were: a suicidal vainglorious charge where the navy was to sink itself in a last gasp attempt at saving a dying Germany. They were joined by the battleships Thüringen and Helgoland, whose crews also refused to participate in the sortie. Officers were allowed to leave, and the crews of the ships essentially took over, for a time. These mutinies were put down, when torpedo boats were used to threaten the warships on 30 October. The crews gave in at that point, and the fleet was to be sent to Kiel, where the rest of the navy was to assemble.

Further mutinies took place at Kiel, with additional ships participating, and the mutiny even spreading onto land, into the city itself. The Army was sent in when ships flew the Red Flag in Kiel, and fired on both civilian naval protesters with what became known as Red Monday after much of the city began to rally alongside the mutineers. From there, revolution spread throughout Germany like a wildfire. Munich, Köln, Hamburg, all rose in popular demonstration stemming, in large part, from this open defiance of the Kaiser in Kiel and Wilhelmshaven, despite German attempts at censoring reports.

These revolts were incredibly important to the armistice. These revolutions led to the collapse of the de facto dictatorship under Hindenberg and Ludendorff, led to the abdication of the Kaiser and to the formation of the SPD government that eventually accepted the armistice terms.

As for the numbers of men, they were massive by the end, but started with relatively modest beginnings. Three battleships and several assorted screening vessels to start. 438 men from the Thüringen were arrested, as were the crew of Helgoland. Another 47, from Markgraf were imprisoned as ringleaders of the entire the Wilhelmshaven mutiny. Numerous men of the other ships were, of course, arrested and imprisoned as well. Another 20,000, many of whom joined the mutiny in Kiel, consisted in large measure of the sailors themselves, but also dissatisfied citizenry that marched and demonstrated for the release of the imprisoned crew of those ships that had mutinied in Wilhelmshaven. By the "end" of the mutiny, every single ship at Kiel had raised a red flag of support except for one, SMS Konig.

The rebellion was finally brought under control by the SPD through a rather carefully timed and ingenious move by Gustav Noske, a member of the German Reichstag. He traveled to Kiel and managed to get himself elected as the president of the sailors' revolutionary council and was thus able to bring calm and order to the city, as well as quell the mutiny itself, restoring order quite quickly to the city.