Page - 420 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

420 Factory War and Domestic Front, 1915 very different interests of the two halves of the Empire. Since the first months of the war, representatives of the Imperial and Royal War Ministry and the German authori- ties had been engaged in negotiations on the provision of goods in short supply for the metal and armaments industries of the Dual Monarchy. In return, Austria-Hungary supplied the German Empire with raw materials. There was some criticism of this because Austria-Hungary did not recognise the need for the German Empire to also continue supplying the neutral states with goods in the normal amount. It was above all economic relations with Italy that evoked resentment in the Danube Monarchy. Furthermore, Germany and Austria-Hungary engaged in rivalry in the neutral markets and outbid each other in order to buy the required raw materials. Only in August 1915 was a partial solution reached by means of the establishment in Berlin of a Rubber Compensation Department (Gummiausgleichsstelle), which had to handle the entire rubber supply of the Central Powers. In return for the provision of rubber holdings to the German Empire, Austria-Hungary received 25 per cent of the entire available seizure. Later, similar compensation departments were also created for other resources and materials.996 There is something else that is worth noting : because most of the war economy com- petences converged in the war ministries of the German Empire and Austria-Hungary, or at least touched on these, the importance of the representatives of the Imperial and Royal War Ministry in Berlin increased to such an extent that they ultimately de facto surpassed the diplomatic representation, especially since the Imperial and Royal ambassador in Berlin found it increasingly difficult to represent the Hungarian half of the Empire as well. Instead, Karl Heinrich von Lustig-Prean concluded the negotia- tions on securing army requirements, ensured an accelerated transportation of urgently needed resources and, in reverse, forwarded those goods that had been ordered from German firms in Austria-Hungary.997 Overall, however, it was not only the difficulty of shaping German-Austrian rela- tions in an orderly fashion that manifested itself. It was especially the very different interests of Austria and Hungary that also prevented a consistent moulding of the economic and social spheres. After Hungary had already limited the competences of the War Ministry at the beginning of the war and prevented the War Surveillance Office from coming into force by establishing a parallel institution, this path continued to be consistently trodden in 1915. This happened in order to circumvent any possible domination on the part of the Austrian half of the Empire. Tisza and the Hungarian parliament jealously guarded their political and economic independence. Negotiations on the exchange of goods were correspondingly difficult and contributed to the growth of all kinds of resentments. The anger over the Hungarian stance was also reflected by most of the authors who wrote for the Carnegie Foundation after the war on Aus- tro-Hungarian policy and administration, on economic matters, on the feeding of the