Page - 381 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

The Final Offer 381 negotiations with the Entente. On 20 May the general mobilisation was announced in Italy for 23 May. This did not mean, however, that the mobilisation had only been commenced on this date. It had already been underway for weeks and months. In fact, as early as the day of the mobilisation order itself, the Italians were already partially operational. In Rome, on the afternoon of Pentecost Sunday, 23 May, Baron Macchio was handed the Italian declaration of war on Austria-Hungary, as was Minister Burián in Vienna by the Duke of Avarna. With disarming honesty, it stated : ‘Determined to ensure the protection of Italian rights and interests by any means at its disposal, the Italian government cannot evade its duty to take those measures for the purpose of fulfilling national aspirations against any current or future threat imposed on it by events. His Majesty the King declares that he regards himself from tomorrow onwards in a state of war with Austria-Hungary.’ The majority of Italians believed the predictions that it would be a short war, which would end in an Italian victory.911 They believed the simplified portrayal, according to which a democratic state was waging war against an undemocratic, atavistic construct like Austria-Hungary. Germany was more or less blanked out. It was also irrelevant for this war, which had been thought up by an intellectual minority, that the south of Italy and large parts of the peasantry literally had to be forced to go to war. Only in retro- spect did it seem that everything had to happen in this way and that  – as was stated on a poster embedded into the table on which the armistice with Austria-Hungary was signed on 3 November 1918  – ‘with the victory of Italian arms, the end of the World War’ was brought about.912 Italy declared war on Turkey on 20 August 1915 and on Bulgaria on 19 October 1915. The Italian declaration of war on the German Empire, however, did not take place until the following year, on 28 August 1916. Austria-Hungary responded to the Italian step with an imperial manifesto, which had been prepared by the envoy Matscheko and was once more a textbook example of the use of language as a political instrument ; it was a type of literary supplement to the ‘Great War’ : ‘The King of Italy has declared war on Me. A breach of fidelity unknown in history has been committed by the Kingdom of Italy against both its allies […]. We have not threatened Italy, disparaged its reputation, infringed upon its honour or its interests […]. We have done more : when Italy cast its greedy glances across Our borders, We were determined to make painful sacrifices for the sake of maintaining the alliance and peace […]. But Italy’s covetousness […] could not be satisfied. And thus fate must take its course […]. The new treacherous enemy in the south is not a new opponent […] Novara, Mortara, Custoza and Lissa […]. I greet My tried and tested troops, I trust in you and your commanders ! I trust in My peoples, to whose unparal- leled self-sacrifice My fatherly thanks are due […] Franz Joseph m.p.’