Page - 534 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

534 Lutsk : The End of an Illusion (II) received support at the court in Vienna and among many Austrian and Hungarian politicians. A strong voice had been above all that of the influential Hungarian Count Gyula Andrássy the Younger, who, ‘stressing the imminent disintegration of the Aus- tro-Hungarian Monarchy, has positively requested Hindenburg’.1255 However, a curious constellation emerged : Falkenhayn, who had registered a considerable drop in prestige and influence as a result of the poor position of the German troops at Verdun and after the beginning of the allied counteroffensive on the Somme, saw himself once again threatened by dismissal and replacement by Hindenburg and Ludendorff. In this way, the interests of Conrad and Falkenhayn joined for rather irrational reasons, since nei- ther of them wanted an extension of the power of the duumvirate in the Eastern Front High Command. Imperial Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg, on the other hand, worked consistently to extend the influence of Hindenburg, since he needed the reputation of this man in order to overcome the symptoms of the crisis, which were also becoming palpable in Germany.1256 The Chancellor pointed to the magical power of the name of Hindenburg and ultimately, on 3 July, nothing else was left for Falkenhayn to do but propose to the Emperor the establishment of a ‘Hindenburg front’ in the east. Now, however, it was suddenly the German Kaiser who hesitated and feared a personal loss of prestige if he appointed Hindenburg. The Eastern Front High command finally sub- mitted a formal application for the subordination of all troops of the Central Powers and attempted to make this palatable to the Imperial and Royal Army High Command by holding out the prospect of extensive German support for Volhynia and Galicia. Whether he wanted to or not, Falkenhayn had to forward the proposal to Cieszyn. The German Plenipotentiary General, August von Cramon, called on Conrad in or- der to present the plan to him, found the latter with his wife Gina in a coffee house (which irritated Cramon beyond measure) and, as he noted, ‘surrounded by a throng of prying eyes and waiters’, presented the proposal, as per his instructions. He ‘naturally [suffered] a rebuff’.1257 Conrad opposed with vehemence a reorganisation of this nature. But did he even have any room for manoeuvre left ? The Austro-Hungarian north-eastern front was on the point of collapse, and since it could not be assumed that the Russians had become so hugely superior overnight, that their soldiers were suddenly much better than the Austro-Hungarians, or that the Austrian generals, General Staff, staff officers or subal- terns, likewise the NCOs and soldiers, had suddenly become so much worse and could no longer lead and fight, something else must have been going on. Shortages could be observed, above all in the case of ammunition for the heavy artillery, since the South Tyrol offensive had been built not least on vast artillery superiority. There, however, all stockpiles had been used up. At the same time, the battles in East Galicia, Poland and Bukovina required more than could be continuously produced. However, none of this is enough to explain why the Imperial and Royal armies collapsed.