Page - 729 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

The Military Administration in the Occupied Territories 729 by the women in their aprons, since it fell apart, or whether as an exception it might be possible to get hold of some meat and fat. Mourning had also become an everyday occurrence. Women in black clothes, chil- dren who were trying to come to terms with the death of their fathers, the news that someone had gone missing… all this was hardly noticed any more. And in the newspa- pers, now only those who could afford to pay were placing death notices. The war no longer seemed to revolve around how positions were held militarily, or whether battles were won or lost but instead, primarily on securing life’s essentials. A significant portion of the correspondence between the higher-ranking commanders was also dedicated to this subject. And time and again, the amount of food that was left to eat was calculated, re-calculated and mentally scraped together. Here, it was not only the produce that could be provided domestically that counted. Almost more attention was paid to obtaining food from the occupied territories. The success of the administration of these territories was then also measured in terms of what could be gleaned from them. The Military Administration in the Occupied Territories From the summer of 1915, Austria-Hungary maintained occupying troops in Russian Poland, who were to be followed in 1916 by similar troops in Serbia, then in Monte- negro and Albania, and finally in Romania, Italy and Russia. Just as no preparations had been made for waging a long war, the same was true of existing anywhere as an occupying force over a longer period of time, stationing occupying troops, monitoring the entire administration and, while not squeezing the countries dry, at least exploiting them intensively in economic terms. There were no personnel available who had been thoroughly prepared and trained for the administrative role. This was not the only problem, however.1669 There were competing interests in almost all areas. In Poland, the German and Austro-Hungarian interests clashed, as they did in Romania, where Bulgarian wishes and demands also came into play. In Serbia, a conflict of interests between Austria-Hungary and Bulgaria, which enjoyed a certain degree of support from the German Empire, was inevitable. As if that were not enough, the Hungarian declared Serbia to be within the ‘Hungarian sphere of influence’, and at the same time made its lack of interest in Poland known. The only places where there was no dispute were Montenegro and Albania, since these countries were so poor that they had no attraction as occupied territories and certainly not as ‘colonies’.1670 On 25 August 1915, a Military Government General was established in Poland, which established its headquarters in Lublin.1671 Russian Poland  – and this was all that was affected  – was, therefore, divided. The north became a German zone of occupation,