This is a guide for how to create an SSH reverse tunnel that automatically re-establishes after disconnection. This is useful if you have a computer without a public IP (e.g. behind NAT) and you need SSH access wihout forwarding a port from the gateway.
In this case, you're not using the ssh -R option to set up a reverse tunnel; you're specifying the autossh -M option instead. The autossh -M parameter causes autossh to set up a tunnel on that port which autossh uses for its own purposes (to regul