After World War I the provisional Carinthian state assembly on 11 November 1918 declared the accession of the former Duchy of Carinthia as a whole to the newly established Republic of German-Austria, while the new State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs (SHS) raised claims to southern Carinthian territories with a predominantly Slovene-speaking population and had begun to occupy the lands south of the Drava river. On December 5 the Carinthian state assembly decided to array paramilitary "Heimwehr" troops, whose armed resistance led to several clashes of arms ("Abwehrkampf"), until a ceasefire was mediated by a US commission under Lt. Col. Sherman Miles on 14 January 1919.