Page - 645 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

The Master’s New Servants 645 the period thereafter. Certain main features remained, however. It had already emerged during the course of the South Tyrol offensive that Karl tended to express his human- ism and his respect for human life by threatening the harshest punishments, should the soldiers be sacrificed recklessly. This was certainly a deeply ethical stance, but one that was sometimes the wrong one because it led to hesitation and waiting. For the soldiers, however, the important thing at first was that ‘their’ Emperor did not put their lives thoughtlessly at risk. Karl was popular.1462 His influence on certain elements of the conduct of war, obligated to humanitarian standards, continued where Emperor Karl made the dropping of aerial bombs over the home front of the enemy dependent on his personal approval, and likewise the deploy- ment of poison gas and of incendiary ammunition for combating enemy aircraft.1463 The Germans had no trouble in ensuring, however, that this decree was valid only for the Italian front but not for the joint front in the East. In the south-west, however, the comparison was immediately made with Italy, which by no means intended to impose such restraint on itself. This order was quickly assumed to reflect Karl’s pacifist im- pulses  – which was not the case  – but above all the influence of his wife Zita, a princess of the House of Bourbon-Parma by birth. A further problem for Emperor Karl was that in his efforts to force through his views, he attempted to avoid real or supposed obstacles by interposing in political affairs more strongly than was perhaps wise. This occasionally happened imprudently and prematurely. It could be repeatedly observed that the heir to the throne evidently had no sympa- thy for the Germans. The Adjutant General of Archduke Friedrich, Count Herberstein, gave thought to this as early as November 1914 and noted at the time : ‘We were very vexed about the rather childish, senseless and out of place remarks on the part of Archduke Karl, who […] insulted the “Prussians”, and especially Hindenburg, in a very coarse fashion.’1464 When he was then confronted with utterances and expressions that he was perhaps no longer even aware of, it could happen that he looked for an excuse.1465 Viktor Adler later argued that Karl never really had a chance, although he took the correct path and had his heart in the right place.1466 His dilemma was that he was supposed to fight against the war and in favour of peace, lead the Monarchy  – if possible, already consolidated by an imperial reform  – safely out of this war and shake off German dominance. He failed in all three tasks. The Master’s New Servants At his first audience with the Emperor, Prime Minister Koerber tendered his resig- nation. He was requested to continue the work of his ministry. Koerber soon had to recognise that it was not enough to merely continue his work. More vigorous interven-