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898 The June Battle in Veneto
higher level, was accordingly only a sideshow to the attempts at peace that were being
made during 1917. As an affair, it belonged to 1918.
The key facts and the content of the discussions and correspondence are sufficiently
well-known.2146 At the end of January or in mid-February 1917 (here, the information
already becomes muddled), the mother of Empress Zita, Maria Antonia von Bour-
bon-Parma, met with one of her sons (or both), Prince Sixtus von Bourbon-Parma
(and Prince Xavier) in Neuchâtel in Switzerland. Both were officers in the Belgian
Army. The Archduchess spoke of her son-in-law’s desire for peace, of which Sixtus had
already been informed by the boyhood friend of Emperor Karl, Count Tamás Erdödy.
However, Sixtus felt that something substantial was needed in order to set a peace
initiative in motion. He wrote a list for his mother : Alsace-Lorraine, Belgium, Serbia.
The Emperor was to state his position on all three points. Strangely, Italy was left out.
Had Sixtus forgotten about it ? With the agreement of Count Czernin, Karl then wrote
a letter on 17 March in which he gave his response to all three points, as requested, in
very general terms, and also made no mention of Italy. This was no way forward, as
the French President Poincaré also told Prince Sixtus. In order to be able to create a
more solid foundation, Sixtus and Xavier Bourbon-Parma travelled to Vienna. They
met Emperor Karl and probably also Minister Czernin, who subsequently appeared to
want to forget the incident. The next day, Sixtus was also handed a letter from Emperor
Karl. (‘Mon chèr Sixte’, written in ink pencil throughout), which was probably written
by Karl himself, but was without doubt signed by him. Czernin knew nothing of the
letter. In this letter, which was presented as a personal communication, Sixtus was re-
quested to assure the French President that Emperor Karl would ‘support the justified
claims for restitution [by France] with regard to Alsace-Lorraine’. This was not entirely
what Sixtus had been looking for, since the word ‘justified’ was open to a wide range of
possible interpretations, but for the time being it had to suffice.2147 Belgium was to be
reinstated and retain its African territories, Serbia was also to be preserved and possibly
receive access to the sea. And again, there was no reference to Italy. This subject appears
to have been addressed on another sheet of paper.
At the end of March, Sixtus forwarded the letter to the French President, Poincaré.
Shortly afterwards, on 19 April 1917, talks were held in St. Jean de Maurienne between
the French Prime Minister Ribot, the British Prime Minister Lloyd George and the
Italian Prime Minister Orlando and his Foreign Minister Sonnino.2148 Lloyd George
and Poincaré knew of the Austrian venture, but did not reveal the correspondence of
the Austrian Emperor to the Italians. Certainly, however, they were anxious to know
whether Italy might lower the demands it had made regarding the price of peace agreed
in the Treaty of London. Sonnino replied with a clear ‘no’. This would trigger a revolu-
tion in Italy. Did Orlando and Sonnino really know nothing of the fact that the Chief
of the Italian General Staff, Cadorna, had indicated to Austria-Hungary just over two
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