Page - 711 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

The Reopening of the Reichsrat 711 The radical programme ultimately played no role in the Czechs’ preparation for the meeting of the Reichsrat. Instead of resorting to the detailed presentation of the es- tablished rights of the Bohemians and Moravians, it was finally decided to attack du- alism head-on on 30 May 1917, the day on which the suspension of parliament after more than three years was to come to an end. It had been created, they claimed, for the purpose of oppressing the peoples. The transformation of the ‘Habsburg-Lorraine Monarchy into a federal state of free and equal national states’, based on the free right of nations to self-determination, was to be demanded.1622 The Czech Union did not yet want to go so far as to demand the dissolution of the Empire, as the radicals had done in agreement with the émigrés, but whatever was to be said in the speeches had to sound threatening enough, at least for those who believed in the state as a whole. The southern Slav deputies also wanted to take the national principle as their start- ing point and demand in the Reichsrat the unification of all territories of the Dual Monarchy inhabited by Slovenes, Croats and Serbs in a state body constructed on democratic foundations under the sceptre of the ruling dynasty.1623 Ruthenians and Ukrainians made it clear that they wanted to break away from Polish Galicia. The Poles, however, spoke of a united and independent Poland and ultimately addressed something that affected them like no other country : none of the crown lands had suffered even remotely as much as Galicia. The Poles, therefore, wanted to demand the re-establishment of the civil administration, urgent economic measures and ‘moral compensation for the evaluation and condemnation of conditions in Galicia as well as those of the Poles in Galicia during the war’.1624 Everything was summarised in this list for which above all the Army High Command could be blamed. Now, individual cases were no longer examined but instead blanket judgements were made, just as the Army High Command had done : the extension of the war zone, the summary courts-martial and the military governors had all been wrong, and now reparations were demanded for them. Others also complained about the military authorities and had just cause to do so. The action taken against deputies who had been treated vexatiously and arrested was mentioned, as were the caprice and the cruelties. It was above all the case of their colleague Cesare Battisti that rankled with the Italian deputies. Like other prominent Italians, he had fled to Italy in 1915 and had enlisted in the Italian Army. Battisti had been taken prisoner at the beginning of July 1916, convicted a few days later of high treason and garrotted.1625 The German parties, which had just as much reason to complain, because arbitrary acts had also been committed against their deputies, generally saw themselves forced on to the defensive. They encountered Czech attempts to threaten millions of Sudeten Germans as well as the efforts of the southern Slavs and the Italians. And there were repeated references to the Russian Revolution. It was suited more than any other event of the previous months to be taken as a benchmark and a model.