Page - 148 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

148 Unleashing the War The individual examples could be multiplied endlessly, but it all amounted to one thing : these men must have been under the impression that the empires that started this war had been seized by a frenzy that allowed them to articulate unlimited enthusiasm for war. Vienna was, of course, not the Dual Monarchy. But Bohemia, Galicia, Bosnia or Hungary were just as churned up, carried away and excited by the beginning of the war. The attitude of Count Tisza had been clear. But on 28 July Count Apponyi also expressed on behalf of the opposition in the Hungarian Reichstag (Imperial Diet) its solidarity with the decision.352 In Zagreb, the capital city of the Kingdom of Croatia, which belonged to Hungary, there were demonstrations in favour of the conflict and the war against Serbia was celebrated. In Prague, Czechs and Germans organised a joint demonstration in favour of the war and even if Governor Prince Franz Thun-Ho- henstein supposedly had to help things along a little bit in order to avoid any jarring notes, the mood was clear and impressive.353 Only several weeks later did hidden and also open enunciations of sympathy for Serbia and Russia emerge. In the southern Slavic territories, where there had been wild excesses directed against Serbia, above all in Bosnia, the pro-Serbian populace remained reserved, so that the impression of a unified patriotic mindset emerged. Admittedly, everything was done in Austria-Hun- gary to suppress remarks in Germany that attempted to characterise the war as a con- flict between Germanism and Slavism. Such nonsense really did not fit with the Aus- tro-Hungarian monarchy. This state had stepped up in order to defend and consolidate its multinational structure, in which the Slavs enjoyed a prominent place. The view that this war might be a conflict with Slavism may perhaps have been held by one or two German nationalists. But the state taken as a whole now had to focus on the common ground. Nevertheless, people looked about themselves with mistrust. Detentions and arrests accumulated. Veterans and people’s militias voluntarily guarded streets and important buildings. Military patrols wandered through the locali- ties. There were shoot-outs, in which hardly anyone was injured, but which only served to increase the excitement.354 It then waned and only boiled up again when the troops marched off. Then the territories that had now suddenly become the rear area could go about readying themselves for daily life in wartime. All provisions that had been prepared since 1867 for a state of emergency now be- came effective. And there could be no greater state of emergency than a war. In accord- ance with the law of 5 May 1869 on the ‘Suspension of Basic Rights and the State of Emergency’, laws and regulations on arrests, expulsions and freedom of the press were rescinded. This emergency legislation had a supplement that stipulated the transfer of the powers of the political administration to the supreme commander of the armed forces and provisions on military jurisdiction, which could be extended to civilians insofar as they had a participatory function in military operations. The provisions of the Law on War Contributions likewise came into effect. The most important conse-