Page - 368 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

368 ‘The King of Italy has declared war on Me promising.860 For his part, he regarded the resignation as very undramatic and stated : ‘[…] I saw that this situation required a man whose nerves can cope with it. In order to sit tight through such a situation, sangfroid, or in fact a sort of light-heartedness, is needed, so that the right moment is not missed, and I do not have that.’861 Weeks later he intimated that he had resigned because the Emperor had prevented him from taking part in talks on the cession of South Tyrol. Berchtold, Stürgkh, Tisza and the Hungarian Minister at the Royal Court, Count István Burián von Rajecz, met at Bu- chlov Castle. Once again, Berchtold had made his castle available for discrete talks. It concerned the matter of who would succeed him. Tisza was asked whether he wanted to assume the portfolio, but he rejected it categorically.862 On 13 January 1915, Berchtold was removed. His successor was Count Burián, who should have become Foreign Minister in 1912, but had to stand back in favour of Berchtold due to the obligation to reflect the national structure in ministerial appoint- ments. He had nonetheless exerted influence and was regarded as an extension of Tisza. Burián also found himself under immediate pressure from Germany, but he certainly did not want to yield to it. By now, however, the views of the politicians and the military diverged quite considerably. A man such as Alexander Hoyos, who was undoubtedly able to reflect the attitude of the Foreign Ministry as well as that of court circles very accurately, made it clear that the court camarilla talked with enormous frivolity about the possibility of an Italian entry into the war : ‘Let them try !’863 The attitude of the military added up to the exact opposite of this viewpoint. They thought that having another opponent would lead to a military catastrophe. Conrad had already said this as early as August 1914. He repeated it several times. The Foreign Ministry, on the other hand, advanced a completely different argument. Thus, on 27 January  – that is, after his departure  – Berchtold justified the refusal to cede Trentino to Italy by saying that such a sacrifice would only be seen as a sign of weakness and would have ‘had a depressing effect on the army and the entire population’.864 He made no mention of the Emperor not giving him any room for manoeuvre in negotiations. Gradually, with all eyes glued to something that appeared unavoidable, the ‘Italian crisis’ set in motion an increasingly hectic merry-go-round of proposals, counter-pro- posals and suggested solutions. Conrad conveyed to Burián an idea of Falkenhayn to the effect that Italy should be invited to join the Triple Alliance negotiations. This step was evidently to be taken in order to demonstrate the allegiance of Italy for all to see.865 Conrad did not reveal whether he believed that such an approach could yield success, but he prepared everything himself in order to demonstrate the strength of the Impe- rial and Royal armies by means of a successful battle to relieve Przemyśl. He evidently did not believe in such manoeuvres. The conference did not take place. The proposal to send the heir to the throne Archduke Karl to Rome was also not uninteresting. The idea emerged at the beginning of January 1915 and had evidently