Seite - 551 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918
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The ‘Joint Supreme
War Command’ 551
non-one could warm to this idea, and ultimately dramatic changes occurred on this day
and in the days that followed. Italy declared war on the German Empire and Romania
declared war on Austria-Hungary. Romania attempted, as Italy had done, to divide the
Central Powers, since no declaration of war was sent to Germany. But what had worked
once did not work a second time : one day after the Romanian declaration of war on
the Habsburg Monarchy, the German envoy in Bucharest presented the declaration of
war of the German Empire. The German reaction was mildly reminiscent of May 1915,
when Austria-Hungary had become aroused about the ‘perfidiousness’ of Italy. Since
Falkenhayn had let the German Kaiser know time and again that Romania posed no
threat, the Chief of the German General Staff was no longer credible. When Cramon
rang Falkenhayn to inform him of the news, the latter simply did not want to believe
it, and the German Plenipotentiary General had to expressly and personally vouch for
the accuracy of the message before Falkenhayn would go to Kaiser Wilhelm. The next
day, Falkenhayn was dismissed and replaced by Hindenburg. Ludendorff received the
position of First Quartermaster. It was the third German Supreme Army Command
of the war.
If Conrad had hoped, however, that Falkenhayn’s dismissal would take care of the
question of the supreme war command or at least result in a solution in the interests of
Austria, he was mistaken. For one thing, in the German Empire a joint war command
had not been pursued only by Falkenhayn – far from it ; and for another thing the For-
eign Ministry in Vienna did not give up, since it sought to fetch the war back into the
political sphere and continue to push for the demolition of the Army High Command.
Cramon had found an outstanding contact person in the Army High Command in the
form of Count Herberstein, who became the mouthpiece of his Army Supreme Com-
mander, who evidently did not want to emerge from the shadows himself but instead
continue to play the role assigned to him – Archduke ‘Fritzl’, the silent Habsburger !
Friedrich and Count Herberstein could always be certain, however, of the agreement
of the Military Chancellery.
On 2 September, a telegram from Bolfras reached the Army High Command. It
stated : ‘His Imperial and Royal Apostolic Majesty deems the achievement of complete
agreement in the sense of a decisive supreme command as necessary.’ Conrad turned
to Ludendorff, but he was not interested in a war council, either. For Ludendorff, the
supreme war command could only consist of the German Kaiser holding supreme
command. Conrad turned to the Foreign Ministry for support, and argued that this
matter was also to be seen from the perspective of what effect German preponderance
would have after the war.1300 But the Foreign Ministry was in absolute agreement with
developments. Finally, Conrad presented his deliberations to the Emperor once more
during an audience on 3 September lasting one and a half hours. He argued by saying
‘that according to the 1st point of the official communication, all military decisions
THE FIRST WORLD WAR
and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918
- Titel
- THE FIRST WORLD WAR
- Untertitel
- and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918
- Autor
- Manfried Rauchensteiner
- Verlag
- Böhlau Verlag
- Ort
- Wien
- Datum
- 2014
- Sprache
- englisch
- Lizenz
- CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
- ISBN
- 978-3-205-79588-9
- Abmessungen
- 17.0 x 24.0 cm
- Seiten
- 1192
- Kategorien
- Geschichte Vor 1918
Inhaltsverzeichnis
- 1 On the Eve 11
- 2 Two Million Men for the War 49
- 3 Bloody Sundays 81
- 4 Unleashing the War 117
- 5 ‘Thank God, this is the Great War!’ 157
- 6 Adjusting to a Longer War 197
- 7 The End of the Euphoria 239
- 8 The First Winter of the War 283
- 9 Under Surveillance 317
- 10 ‘The King of Italy has declared war on Me’ 355
- 11 The Third Front 383
- 12 Factory War and Domestic Front, 1915 413
- 13 Summer Battle and ‘Autumn Swine’ 441
- 14 War Aims and Central Europe 469
- 15 South Tyrol : The End of an Illusion (I) 497
- 16 Lutsk :The End of an Illusion (II) 521
- 17 How is a War Financed ? 555
- 18 The Nameless 583
- 19 The Death of the Old Emperor 607
- 20 Emperor Karl 641
- 21 The Writing on the Wall 657
- 22 The Consequences of the Russian February Revolution 691
- 23 Summer 1917 713
- 24 Kerensky Offensive and Peace Efforts 743
- 25 The Pyrrhic Victory : The Breakthrough Battle of Flitsch-Tolmein 769
- 26 Camps 803
- 27 Peace Feelers in the Shadow of Brest-Litovsk 845
- 28 The Inner Front 869
- 29 The June Battle in Veneto 895
- 30 An Empire Resigns 927
- 31 The Twilight Empire 955
- 32 The War becomes History 983
- Epilogue 1011
- Afterword 1013
- Acknowledgements and Dedication 1019
- Notes 1023
- Selected Printed Sources and Literature 1115
- Index of People and Places 1155