The First World War Part 6

At the end of 1917, therefore, the British army and the British people were desperately tired. On 29 November Lansdowne voiced the reservations he had expressed privately a year previously in the Daily Telegraph, Daily Telegraph, calling for a compromise peace. At the front, Haig, who had at first planned to resume the Ypres battle when the weather improved in the spring, realised on 15 November that it would not be possible. However, he couched his decision in terms not of the losses caused by his own operations, but of those inflicted by the government. Initially two - and ultimately five - divisions, together with Plumer and six French divisions, were sent to reinforce the Italians. calling for a compromise peace. At the front, Haig, who had at first planned to resume the Ypres battle when the weather improved in the spring, realised on 15 November that it would not be possible. However, he couched his decision in terms not of the losses caused by his own operations, but of those inflicted by the government. Initially two - and ultimately five - divisions, together with Plumer and six French divisions, were sent to reinforce the Italians.

Of all the three Entente powers in the west, Italy was the shakiest in its hold on liberalism. First, the extension of the franchise in 1912 was undermined by the fact that 38 per cent of the electorate was illiterate. Second, socialist extremism was stronger than moderate reformism, and the only counter seemed to be the card of nationalism. Third, although entry to the war divided the country rather than united it, parliament was not consulted. Fourth, the economy was still predominantly rural, and it required the war to industrialise it. Moreover, with the war under way, Cadorna treated politicians with a contempt which blocked any alternatives to his own inept, if dogged, generals.h.i.+p. When in January 1916 Salandra suggested the formation of a council of war, combining the wisdom of generals and politicians, Cadorna declared that he was answerable only to the King. Criticised by the minister of war in the following month, he managed to force him to resign. He believed that the individualism of the Italians made them 'morally unprepared for war', and therefore saw the war as an opportunity to make peasants into Italians. His tool for doing this was harsh discipline. One in every seventeen Italian soldiers faced a disciplinary charge in the war, and 61 per cent were found guilty. About 750 were executed, the highest number of any army in the war, and Cadorna reintroduced the Roman practice of decimation - the killing of every tenth man - for units which failed to perform in battle.

The four battles on the River Isonzo in 1915 were followed by five more in 1916, and two in 1917. The Austrians on the Italian front had coined the phrase 'the battle of material' by September 1915, a full year before it was current in Germany. Normally outnumbered two to one, and unable to trade s.p.a.ce for time, they possessed in the Croatian general Svetozar Boroevie a commander who never wavered in his determination to regain ground lost, an objective he generally achieved until the sixth battle of the Isonzo in August 1916. Thus they played into the hands of an enemy resolved on attrition as an operational method. And that is what Cadorna had resolved to do by the beginning of 1916. He knew that, with Austria-Hungary's army divided over three fronts, he must eventually wear it down. But the result was that he failed to recognise opportunities for breakthrough when they presented themselves. On 10 August 1916 the Italians at last captured Gorizia, on the eastern bank of the Isonzo, and in the same month a year later, in the eleventh battle, Cadorna gained control of the Bainsizza plateau, but in both cases reckless disregard for casualties was accompanied by operational caution. In twenty-seven months' fighting and eleven battles, the Italians had advanced less than seven miles, a third of the way to their stated preliminary objective, Trieste.37 Cadorna addresses his troops in a style more suggestive of a political dictator than a general. He himself had never seen combat, and his pre-war tactical writings praised the effects of shock over firepower

Italian casualties in the eleventh battle of the Isonzo were 166,000, 25 per cent greater than those of Nivelle on the Aisne. In the month of the battle, August, 5,471 soldiers deserted, as opposed to 2,137 in April. The Ravenna Brigade had mutinied in March and the Catanzaro Brigade in July.38 Even Cadorna recognised that his army needed time to rest and recuperate. But it did little to prepare its defences in depth, keeping its gun line well forward as though simply allowing the winter to pa.s.s before resuming the offensive. The Central Powers had no intention of waiting for what could be a devastating blow, and Germany transported seven divisions to reinforce the Austrians on the upper Isonzo. On 24 October, after a short but intense bombardment which targeted the Italian batteries, the German and Austrian infantry achieved a complete breakthrough. 'The farther we penetrated into the hostile zone of defence', wrote Lieutenant Erwin Rommel, 'the less prepared were the garrisons for our arrival, and the easier the fighting. I did not worry about contact to right or left. Six companies of the Wurttemberg Mountain Battalion were able to protect their own flanks. The attack order stated: "Without limiting the day's activities in s.p.a.ce or time, continue the advance to the west, knowing that we have strong reserves near and behind us".' Even Cadorna recognised that his army needed time to rest and recuperate. But it did little to prepare its defences in depth, keeping its gun line well forward as though simply allowing the winter to pa.s.s before resuming the offensive. The Central Powers had no intention of waiting for what could be a devastating blow, and Germany transported seven divisions to reinforce the Austrians on the upper Isonzo. On 24 October, after a short but intense bombardment which targeted the Italian batteries, the German and Austrian infantry achieved a complete breakthrough. 'The farther we penetrated into the hostile zone of defence', wrote Lieutenant Erwin Rommel, 'the less prepared were the garrisons for our arrival, and the easier the fighting. I did not worry about contact to right or left. Six companies of the Wurttemberg Mountain Battalion were able to protect their own flanks. The attack order stated: "Without limiting the day's activities in s.p.a.ce or time, continue the advance to the west, knowing that we have strong reserves near and behind us".'39 By mid-November the Germans and Austrians had driven the Italians back sixty miles to the River Piave. By following the valley floors, they had sustained the momentum of their advance until logistics and command confusion slowed it. Italian losses totalled almost 700,000, of whom only 40,000 were killed and wounded; 280,000 had been captured, many of them as intact units, and about 350,000 had deserted. Cadorna attributed his defeat not to tactical incompetence but to anti-militarism and defeatism in Italy as a whole. A year before, Senator Camporeale had reported after a visit to the south of the country that 'more than half the land is uncultivated and with us poverty and rebellion and revolt are synonymous ... [The countryside] is swarming with thousands - 20 to 30 thousand - deserters'.40 There were about 100,000 deserters at large before the disaster of Caporetto (as the Italians called the battle; it was Karfreit to the Germans); peasants were ready to give the stragglers protection and to use their labour. The possibility of military collapse leading to revolution seemed real enough. There were about 100,000 deserters at large before the disaster of Caporetto (as the Italians called the battle; it was Karfreit to the Germans); peasants were ready to give the stragglers protection and to use their labour. The possibility of military collapse leading to revolution seemed real enough.

Violent protest peaked in May 1917, especially in Milan. In August, outbursts over bread shortages in Turin developed into anti-war demonstrations, and the army killed 41 and wounded about 200 more in restoring order. Women were at the forefront of these riots. By the end of the war they formed 21 per cent of the workforce but in 1917 they were 64 per cent of those striking, evidence of the anxiety about food but also of working-cla.s.s solidarity. They struck because the penalties for them were lighter than for men, who were more subject to military discipline, and they linked the old patterns of rural, peasant protest with the first generation of urban workers in new industries. Although the number of individual strikes fell in 1917 as against 1915 and 1916, those which occurred were bigger in scale.

But the revolutionary moment did not become revolution. Caporetto played its part: it turned an offensive war into a defensive one. Its nationalist imperative also consolidated liberalism. On 30 October Vittorio Orlando, a defender of civil liberties, formed a coalition government, but one which used its mandate to be firm in its suppression of defeatism. Cadorna, having refused to resign even at the behest of the King, was dismissed and replaced by Armando Diaz. Diaz was the Petain of Italy: he cared for his men, extending leave, improving rations, rethinking tactics and eschewing reckless offensive action. On 15 December a war council was finally established. But even before Caporetto much was already in place. Italy had enough food to feed itself, and the ration card became (as it became in Britain) the symbol of equality of distribution and sacrifice. The Mobilitazione Industriale, the army-organised agency for the management of war industry, which controlled 903,250 workers and 1,976 firms by the war's end, was elevated to a full ministry in July 1917. Its chief, General Alfredo Dallolio, believed that better real wages and improved conditions of employment would dampen radicalism, and used his power to curb the powers of employers as well as to regiment the employees.

The boundaries of the state were thereby extended, but as in Britain and France they were seen as temporary interventions designed to protect the liberal nation, not subvert it. Moreover, by the end of the year government in all three nations was firmly vested in the hands of civilian politicians, not of soldiers. In Britain Haig's standing slumped in the aftermath of Pa.s.schendaele. Lloyd George now possessed the political authority to remove him, if he could find a credible alternative. He could not, but he was able to ensure the replacement of Haig's directors of intelligence and of operations. In February 1918, the prime minister exploited the latent split between Haig and Robertson to oust the latter. The new Chief of the Imperial General Staff was General Sir Henry Wilson, an Irish unionist and a man whose love of intrigue was so great that the sight of a politician was said to induce in him a state of s.e.xual excitement. Haig both distrusted and disliked him.

In November the division in Paris, between those ready to explore options for peace and those determined not to, destroyed Painleve's government. France stood poised between pacifism and guerre a outrance. guerre a outrance. Poincare swallowed his personal dislike and asked the seventy-six-year-old Georges Clemenceau, radical and atheist, scourge of governments, to form a ministry. One of the new prime minister's first acts was to have Caillaux, the pacifist contender for the premiers.h.i.+p, arrested on charges of treason. France had one simple, single duty, he told the chamber in his first speech: 'to cleave to the soldier, to live, to suffer, to fight with him'. Clemenceau's government was the first in the war to coin the phrase 'total war', and it did so in reference to the need to mobilise all France's resources for its prosecution. This was more totalitarian than democratic. Although the new prime minister was of the left, as were most of his ministers, he drew his parliamentary support from the right and he infuriated the socialists. He ruled less through his ministers than through two personal cabinets, one military and one civil. When challenged in the chamber on 8 March 1918, he explained that as the head of a republican government he was called on to defend two doctrines: 'the first of these doctrines ... is the principle of liberty.... The second, in the current situation, is that we are at war, that it is necessary to wage war, to think only of war, that it is necessary to apply our minds to war and to sacrifice everything to the rules, which we shall put right in the future if we are able to succeed in securing the victory of France ... Today, our duty is to make war while maintaining the rights of the citizen, so safeguarding not one liberty but all liberties. So let us wage war.' Poincare swallowed his personal dislike and asked the seventy-six-year-old Georges Clemenceau, radical and atheist, scourge of governments, to form a ministry. One of the new prime minister's first acts was to have Caillaux, the pacifist contender for the premiers.h.i.+p, arrested on charges of treason. France had one simple, single duty, he told the chamber in his first speech: 'to cleave to the soldier, to live, to suffer, to fight with him'. Clemenceau's government was the first in the war to coin the phrase 'total war', and it did so in reference to the need to mobilise all France's resources for its prosecution. This was more totalitarian than democratic. Although the new prime minister was of the left, as were most of his ministers, he drew his parliamentary support from the right and he infuriated the socialists. He ruled less through his ministers than through two personal cabinets, one military and one civil. When challenged in the chamber on 8 March 1918, he explained that as the head of a republican government he was called on to defend two doctrines: 'the first of these doctrines ... is the principle of liberty.... The second, in the current situation, is that we are at war, that it is necessary to wage war, to think only of war, that it is necessary to apply our minds to war and to sacrifice everything to the rules, which we shall put right in the future if we are able to succeed in securing the victory of France ... Today, our duty is to make war while maintaining the rights of the citizen, so safeguarding not one liberty but all liberties. So let us wage war.'41 The aftermath of Caporetto Italian prisoners are collected at Udine

Clemenceau disagreed with Lansdowne: the war had first to be won before a lasting peace was possible. By the winter of 1917-18 most poilus poilus seemed to share his views. 'My war aims are these', wrote a soldier of the 272nd Regiment of Infantry at the end of 1917. 'I fight 1. because there is a war and I am a soldier, 2. because this war was inevitable, 3. because I do not want to become a Boche, 4. because they are in our country and we must make them leave or at least stop them getting any further, 5. because they must pay for the damage that they have done.' seemed to share his views. 'My war aims are these', wrote a soldier of the 272nd Regiment of Infantry at the end of 1917. 'I fight 1. because there is a war and I am a soldier, 2. because this war was inevitable, 3. because I do not want to become a Boche, 4. because they are in our country and we must make them leave or at least stop them getting any further, 5. because they must pay for the damage that they have done.'42 THE BOLSHEVIKS SEIZE POWER.

In neither France nor Italy had mutiny and desertion coalesced with protests and riots in the rear. Despite the fact that these were armies of citizens, made up of soldiers who yearned to go home and resume their peacetime pursuits, and despite the mechanisms of leave and mail that kept alive the links between front and rear, the consequences of grievances in one were kept separate from those in the other. That was not true for Russia.

'One cannot but notice, that in letters from the army as well as, mainly, in letters to the army, discontent arising from [the] internal political situation of the country is beginning to grow.'43 This report from the military censor in Petrograd was dated November 1916. In March 1917, the troops in the northern districts, including Petrograd, totalled 850,000. Under the influence of left Socialist Revolutionaries, they gave their primary loyalty not to the temporary commission set up by the Duma but to the Petrograd Soviet of Workers and Soldiers. On 14 March, the Soviet's Order Number 1 confirmed this arrangement, and required that all units form committees of elected representatives of the lower ranks. Order Number 1 did not of itself demand that officers be elected, but that was its outcome. Officers had to court popularity, and some of those who did not were lynched, while others were arrested. 'Between us and them is an impa.s.sable gulf', one officer wrote at the end of March. 'No matter how well they get on with individual officers, in their eyes we are all This report from the military censor in Petrograd was dated November 1916. In March 1917, the troops in the northern districts, including Petrograd, totalled 850,000. Under the influence of left Socialist Revolutionaries, they gave their primary loyalty not to the temporary commission set up by the Duma but to the Petrograd Soviet of Workers and Soldiers. On 14 March, the Soviet's Order Number 1 confirmed this arrangement, and required that all units form committees of elected representatives of the lower ranks. Order Number 1 did not of itself demand that officers be elected, but that was its outcome. Officers had to court popularity, and some of those who did not were lynched, while others were arrested. 'Between us and them is an impa.s.sable gulf', one officer wrote at the end of March. 'No matter how well they get on with individual officers, in their eyes we are all barins. barins. When we talk about the When we talk about the narod, narod, we mean the nation; when they talk about it, they understand it as meaning only the democratic lower cla.s.ses. In their eyes, what has occurred is not a political but a social revolution, which in their opinion they have won and we have lost.' we mean the nation; when they talk about it, they understand it as meaning only the democratic lower cla.s.ses. In their eyes, what has occurred is not a political but a social revolution, which in their opinion they have won and we have lost.'44 That revolution travelled along the railway lines to the front; it did not go from front to rear. It reached the combat zones furthest from Petrograd - Romania and the Caucasus - last. Although most Russian soldiers were fed up with the war, they were still committed to the defence of their country. Senior commanders recognised in March that the way to restore order was not to oppose the establishment of soldiers' committees but to endorse them - just as they had endorsed the fall of the Tsar - in the hope of then reuniting the army and the nation in the prosecution of the war. Aleksandr Kerensky, first as minister of war and then as head of the Provisional Government, supported their endeavours. He launched an offensive in July, which failed, and then appointed the youthful and heroic Lavr Kornilov commander-in-chief, with a mandate to restore discipline. But he now feared the threat of counter-revolution more than that of revolution. The Germans took Riga at the beginning of September, and when Kornilov began to push troops towards Petrograd for its defence they were seen to be the outriders for a counter-revolutionary coup, not the agents of the Provisional Government. Kerensky turned to the Petrograd Soviet and its militia, the Red Guard, under Leon Trotsky, to check Kornilov.

It was not only domestic events which separated the army's officers from their men. Kerensky hoped the war would unite the nation and the revolution, as it had done in France in 1792. But the decision of the All-Russian Conference of Soviets on 11 April to support a peace without annexations or indemnities made those who supported the war's continuation seem imperialist. Moreover, peace promised land reform and redistribution. Peasants wanted to be at home when that happened. The rise in desertions was not immediate, and its effects were more obvious on the lines of communication than in the trenches, but the process of disintegration, linking grievances at the front to concerns at home, was now under way.

German and Austro-Hungarian propaganda played on the worries about land redistribution. Thus the pressures on the Russian army came not just from the rear, but from the other side of the line as well. The spontaneous truce of Christmas 1914 on the western front had had its eastern-front counterpart, albeit at Easter and in every year up to and including 1917. OberOst now condoned such fraternisation. It was also supported by Russian revolutionaries, who hoped to spread the revolution westwards. German efforts to use revolution as a tool for the conduct of the war had not so far been particularly successful. The means they had used had been inadequate to the ends they had sought. Gun-running to Ireland had resulted in rebellion in 1916, and covert funding of pacifists and socialists had sown dissension in France in 1917. But in neither case had there been a popular response: the revolutionaries were themselves minor players. In Russia, too, the Bolsheviks were minor players, but in 1915 Alexander Helphand, code-named Parvus, a German agent whose business activities profited from the blockade-driven trade between Denmark and Germany, persuaded the German Foreign Ministry that they might engineer a ma.s.s strike in Russia. In March 1917, despite the obvious paradox and equally obvious dangers in Imperial Germany sponsoring Marxism, Arthur Zimmermann convinced the Kaiser and the army that the Bolsheviks' leader, Lenin, who was living in exile in Switzerland, should be smuggled back into Russia. On 16 April 1917 Lenin arrived in Petrograd at the Finland station, having crossed Germany in a 'sealed' train. This was one revolutionary effort which reaped spectacular returns, albeit in a situation where spontaneous revolution had already occurred.

On 15 July 1917 the Provisional Government in Russia collapsed, and the Bolsheviks tried to seize power in Petrograd Street fighting peaks on 17 July Kerensky took charge and Lenin went into hiding -for the moment.

In November 1917 the Bolsheviks, under Trotsky's direct leaders.h.i.+p but orchestrated by Lenin, seized power in Petrograd, toppling the Provisional Government. The All-Russian Congress of Soviets embraced a programme which differed little from earlier ideas - including land to the peasants, bread to the cities, workers' control of the factories, and complete democratisation of the army. But on the next day Lenin demanded an immediate armistice. Peace would provide the key to delivering bread and land.

The entire complexion of the war changed. A decade after the war had ended, Daniel Halevy's brother Elie, the great French historian of modern Britain, delivered the Rhodes lectures in Oxford. His subject, 'The World Crisis of 1914-18', was, he said, 'not only a war - the war of 1914 - but a revolution - the revolution of 1917'.45 The conflation of war and revolution had grave implications for the Entente at two levels. The first was military. Without an active eastern front, the basis of the alliance's strategy became meaningless. For the first time since August 1914 the Central Powers were free to concentrate all their efforts in the west. The second was political. Here was a new vision of the world order to challenge liberalism. The Bolsheviks pub-lished the secret agreements on war aims reached between the Entente powers: Britain, France and Italy stood convicted, it seemed, of annexationist ambitions comparable with those of the monster which they were pledged to extirpate, German militarism. Those who could envisage the war ending in the coming year could do so only on the basis of a German victory. The conflation of war and revolution had grave implications for the Entente at two levels. The first was military. Without an active eastern front, the basis of the alliance's strategy became meaningless. For the first time since August 1914 the Central Powers were free to concentrate all their efforts in the west. The second was political. Here was a new vision of the world order to challenge liberalism. The Bolsheviks pub-lished the secret agreements on war aims reached between the Entente powers: Britain, France and Italy stood convicted, it seemed, of annexationist ambitions comparable with those of the monster which they were pledged to extirpate, German militarism. Those who could envisage the war ending in the coming year could do so only on the basis of a German victory.

The Germans believed that the Russian army's collapse was due in large part to their fraternisation, as here in lithuania The Austro-Hungarians were not so successful when they tried the same with Italy.

9.

GERMANY'S LAST GAMBLE GERMANY BETWEEN MILITARISM AND LIBERALISM.

On 3 March 1918, in Brest-Litovsk, the Russians signed a peace treaty with the Central Powers. In the north-west they lost Poland, Lithuania, and the Baltic states of Estonia, Livonia and Courland. Finland took the opportunity of the Bolshevik revolution to cede from Russia. To the south Ukraine did the same. In the Caucasus the Turks regained their pre-1878 frontiers. In all Russia lost a million square miles of territory, together with almost all its coal and oil, three-quarters of its iron ore, and about half its industry. About a third of its population, 55 million people, and the same proportion of its agriculture were also forfeit. Lenin, who was not present for the final meeting with the representatives of the Central Powers, described the settlement as 'that abyss of defeat, dismemberment, enslavement, and humiliation'. Three months of negotiation and renewed fighting had followed the Bolsheviks' initial request for an armistice, and Lenin knew that further discussion was pointless. He had no army to speak of and he had a civil war to contend with: his leverage was minimal. He could do nothing but bank on the hope that the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk would be overthrown by the spread of revolution abroad. 'You must sign this shameful peace', he told the Congress of Soviets, 'in order to save the world revolution, in order to hold fast to ... its only foothold - the Soviet Republic'.1 Two months later, on 7 May 1918, it was Romania's turn. Although largely overrun in the autumn and winter of 1916, Romania had stayed in the war in 1917, holding a territorial rump in Moldavia with the aid of Russian reinforcements. France had sent a military mission, and, while the Russian army disintegrated, the Romanian was rebuilt. In July and August 1917, it successfully held off Mackensen's army on the River Sereth, but its position was fatally compromised by the collapse of its princ.i.p.al ally. On 9 December 1917 it sought an armistice. The terms of the peace treaty were delivered as an ultimatum on 27 February 1918. 'It was a disaster', the head of the French mission, Henri Berthelot, reported in his final despatch to Paris. 'Since Romania was deprived of its frontiers, of Dobrudja, of the products of its soil, of its army, since it was going without doubt to undergo enemy occupation for an indefinite period, what difference was there between these conditions and those which Romania would have undergone after a last disastrous battle, where it would at least have salvaged honour?'2 Even the pro-German conservatives, including the prime minister who signed the treaty, Alexander Marghiloman, were staggered by the terms. The notion of a German-dominated customs union in Central Europe, adumbrated in 1915 in Friedrich Naumann's idea of Even the pro-German conservatives, including the prime minister who signed the treaty, Alexander Marghiloman, were staggered by the terms. The notion of a German-dominated customs union in Central Europe, adumbrated in 1915 in Friedrich Naumann's idea of Mitteleuropa, Mitteleuropa, had been militarised into a form of indirect annexation. Germany took no territory solely for itself. It gave Wallachia to Austria-Hungary and southern Dobrudja to Bulgaria; as it intended to dominate both its allies, the concession was notional. The direct evidence of Germany's mastery was economic. It took a ninety-nine-year lease on Romania's oil deposits; it a.s.sumed control of the railways and the navigation of the Danube; it shared Romania's agricultural surplus with Austria-Hungary, but it established a monopoly over Romanian trade through a customs union. had been militarised into a form of indirect annexation. Germany took no territory solely for itself. It gave Wallachia to Austria-Hungary and southern Dobrudja to Bulgaria; as it intended to dominate both its allies, the concession was notional. The direct evidence of Germany's mastery was economic. It took a ninety-nine-year lease on Romania's oil deposits; it a.s.sumed control of the railways and the navigation of the Danube; it shared Romania's agricultural surplus with Austria-Hungary, but it established a monopoly over Romanian trade through a customs union.

The bulk of Romania was overrun in a campaign of extraordinary speed, its northern thrust driving through the Transylvanian Alps, and both pincers having to cope with deteriorating weather. By July 1917 the German army has time to distribute cigarettes to gypsies working in the fields

The treaties of Brest-Litovsk and Bucharest defined what a German victory meant. 'For those who think Germany will be satisfied with a peace of conciliation', wrote a French gunner, the Russians' cowardice 'will have made them see what defeat would mean on our front. German militarism must be beaten for ever and that is what must reinvigorate us.'3 Russia and Romania were not the only losers at Brest-Litovsk and Bucharest. So, too, were advocates everywhere of a negotiated peace, and they included liberals in Germany. Russia and Romania were not the only losers at Brest-Litovsk and Bucharest. So, too, were advocates everywhere of a negotiated peace, and they included liberals in Germany.

On 19 July 1917 the Reichstag had pa.s.sed a resolution calling for a peace without annexations or indemnities. Its vocabulary deliberately invoked memories of the Kaiser's speech of 4 August 1914, suggesting that this was a defensive war, sustained by a domestic truce; it spoke of freedom of the seas, of the establishment of an international legal body, and of mutual understanding and economic cooperation. The work of a centre-left coalition, made up of the Catholic Centre Party, the Progressives and the Socialists, the peace resolution seemed to confirm the waxing strength of German liberalism. In his Easter message, the Kaiser had promised const.i.tutional reform at the end of the war: his terms had been vague, but he had at least accepted Bethmann Hollweg's determination that the Prussian upper house should be reformed and that the three-cla.s.s suffrage which guaranteed a conservative majority in the Prussian Diet should go.

The primary effect was to isolate the radical and revolutionary left. Germany, like other belligerents on both sides, experienced more strikes in 1917 than in the earlier years of the war - 561 as against 137 in 1915 and 240 in 1916. As elsewhere, too, falling real wages and food shortages, especially after the 'turnip' winter of 1916-17, were the princ.i.p.al explanations. But there were big variations in individual experiences. In all countries, both metal-workers and women proved vital to war production, and central to industrial unrest. In Germany female metal-workers' wages rose 324 per cent between 1914 and 1918. On the other hand, those on fixed incomes, civil servants and white-collar workers, the so-called 'Mittelstand', 'Mittelstand', found themselves losing status as well as earnings: in one a.s.sociation the average wage rose 18.2 per cent between the outbreak of the war and the end of 1917, while the cost of living soared 185 per cent. found themselves losing status as well as earnings: in one a.s.sociation the average wage rose 18.2 per cent between the outbreak of the war and the end of 1917, while the cost of living soared 185 per cent.4 The lower middle cla.s.s was therefore radicalised by the war as much as the skilled male or the unskilled female. In January and February 1917 strikers in the Ruhr and in Berlin, female metal-workers at their head, demanded food or more wages to buy food. 'Any other people on earth would rise against a Government that had reduced it to such misery', Ethel Cooper wrote on 11 February 1917. The lower middle cla.s.s was therefore radicalised by the war as much as the skilled male or the unskilled female. In January and February 1917 strikers in the Ruhr and in Berlin, female metal-workers at their head, demanded food or more wages to buy food. 'Any other people on earth would rise against a Government that had reduced it to such misery', Ethel Cooper wrote on 11 February 1917.5 Two months later strikers in her home town of Leipzig did call for political change. But the demands were for reform, not revolution: equal and universal suffrage, the removal of military controls on political discourse, and a peace without annexations. Two months later strikers in her home town of Leipzig did call for political change. But the demands were for reform, not revolution: equal and universal suffrage, the removal of military controls on political discourse, and a peace without annexations.

Elsewhere in Germany the strikes in April were not politicised, or at least not overtly so. In Berlin on the 16th 200,000 workers, half of them women, staged a one-day demonstration to demand food. The newspaper of the Social Democrats, Vorwarts, Vorwarts, denied the motivations were political. But the denial in itself carried a message. The Social Democrats had voted for war credits in 1914, and had embraced the idea that support for the state in its time of trial would be the path to political reform after the war was over. But for a party still const.i.tutionally committed to revolution a policy of reform carried penalties. Although the largest single grouping in the Reichstag, its individual members.h.i.+p had fallen from over a million in 1914 to a quarter of a million in 1917. A minority rejected the denied the motivations were political. But the denial in itself carried a message. The Social Democrats had voted for war credits in 1914, and had embraced the idea that support for the state in its time of trial would be the path to political reform after the war was over. But for a party still const.i.tutionally committed to revolution a policy of reform carried penalties. Although the largest single grouping in the Reichstag, its individual members.h.i.+p had fallen from over a million in 1914 to a quarter of a million in 1917. A minority rejected the Burgfrieden, Burgfrieden, the domestic truce between parties of August 1914, and in April 1917 broke away from the majority Socialists to create an Independent Socialist Party. The new grouping shaped the demands of the Leipzig strikers, which in themselves suggest that the Independent Socialists were not a major threat. They looked back to the original programme of the German Socialists, adopted at Erfurt in 1890, not forward, and they were still ready to support a defensive war. However, they did possess an inner core, the Spartacists, headed by Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg. In 1916, in Switzerland, Luxemburg, under the the domestic truce between parties of August 1914, and in April 1917 broke away from the majority Socialists to create an Independent Socialist Party. The new grouping shaped the demands of the Leipzig strikers, which in themselves suggest that the Independent Socialists were not a major threat. They looked back to the original programme of the German Socialists, adopted at Erfurt in 1890, not forward, and they were still ready to support a defensive war. However, they did possess an inner core, the Spartacists, headed by Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg. In 1916, in Switzerland, Luxemburg, under the nom de guerre nom de guerre of Junius, had published a refutation of the notion that the war was defensive for Germany. Its purposes were imperialist and capitalist: 'The cannon fodder inflated with patriotism and carried off in August and September 1914 now rots in Belgium, in the Vosges, in the Masurian swamps, creating fertile plains of death on which profits can grow' of Junius, had published a refutation of the notion that the war was defensive for Germany. Its purposes were imperialist and capitalist: 'The cannon fodder inflated with patriotism and carried off in August and September 1914 now rots in Belgium, in the Vosges, in the Masurian swamps, creating fertile plains of death on which profits can grow'6 She declared that social democracy had failed the working cla.s.s, and that only international cla.s.s action could bring peace. Inspired by the events in Russia, she and Liebknecht believed that a ma.s.s strike could be the trigger for revolution. She declared that social democracy had failed the working cla.s.s, and that only international cla.s.s action could bring peace. Inspired by the events in Russia, she and Liebknecht believed that a ma.s.s strike could be the trigger for revolution.

For Bethmann Hollweg, therefore, the message was clear: political reform would keep the majority Socialists tied to the state, would validate their position in the eyes of the working cla.s.s they aspired to represent, and would divide social and economic grievances from the idea of revolution. Wilhelm Groener, appointed to head the war office, or Kriegsamt, Kriegsamt, within the Prussian Ministry of War, was committed to a parallel and complementary set of ideas. He was the princ.i.p.al architect of the Auxiliary Service Law, a deal between army, industry and labour on the management of German manpower in the war. For the first time in Germany, the trade unions were given an acknowledged role in the arbitration of disputes. Between 1916 and 1918 trade-union members.h.i.+p, which had been savaged by the consequences of conscription, recovered: that of the metal-workers' union in upper Silesia increased 154 per cent in 1917 alone. within the Prussian Ministry of War, was committed to a parallel and complementary set of ideas. He was the princ.i.p.al architect of the Auxiliary Service Law, a deal between army, industry and labour on the management of German manpower in the war. For the first time in Germany, the trade unions were given an acknowledged role in the arbitration of disputes. Between 1916 and 1918 trade-union members.h.i.+p, which had been savaged by the consequences of conscription, recovered: that of the metal-workers' union in upper Silesia increased 154 per cent in 1917 alone.7 But for many German socialists the Auxiliary Service Law was not an important step towards workers' rights but another compromise which weakened them. Workers were restricted in their ability to move between jobs, while industrialists' profits were not controlled. Groener wished the army to be the neutral representative of the state, the embodiment in some senses of Walther Rathenau's corporatist dream, an amalgam of the best of capitalism and collectivism. But many of his military colleagues preferred to align the army more closely with the interests of the industrialists. The war aims programme, which aspired to secure for Germany the iron ore and coalfields of Belgium and of Longwy-Briey in France, was one manifestation of this alliance. Another, in October 1917, was the dismissal of Groener, who tried to control both wages and profits, as labour and industry exploited the Hindenburg programme for their respective advantage. But for many German socialists the Auxiliary Service Law was not an important step towards workers' rights but another compromise which weakened them. Workers were restricted in their ability to move between jobs, while industrialists' profits were not controlled. Groener wished the army to be the neutral representative of the state, the embodiment in some senses of Walther Rathenau's corporatist dream, an amalgam of the best of capitalism and collectivism. But many of his military colleagues preferred to align the army more closely with the interests of the industrialists. The war aims programme, which aspired to secure for Germany the iron ore and coalfields of Belgium and of Longwy-Briey in France, was one manifestation of this alliance. Another, in October 1917, was the dismissal of Groener, who tried to control both wages and profits, as labour and industry exploited the Hindenburg programme for their respective advantage.

The peace resolution and the emergence of a centre-left coalition may have weakened the right in parliamentary terms but it had not silenced its effectiveness outside the Reichstag. Here it had powerful allies in Hindenburg and Ludendorff. They, not the centre-left or Bethmann Hollweg, were the beneficiaries of the political crisis the peace resolution generated.

On 6 July 1917 Matthias Erzberger, the leader of the Catholic Centre Party, delivered a speech during the debate on the war credits for the coming year, in which he declared that 'all our calculations as regards the submarine war are false', that the idea of defensive war should be resuscitated, and that 'we must do everything possible to find a way which favours the conclusion of a peace this year'.8 Erzberger thus began the process that concluded with the Reichstag peace resolution. However, his victim was not the Pan-German League and its annexationist war aims, which he specifically mentioned, but the chancellor. Bethmann Hollweg was tired, committed to a policy of unrestricted submarine war in which he did not believe but which Erzberger among others had once advocated. 'My position does not matter', he said when he rose to reply on 9 July. 'I myself am convinced of my own limitations . . . I am considered weak because I seek to end the war. A leading statesman can receive support neither from the Left nor the Right in Germany.' Erzberger thus began the process that concluded with the Reichstag peace resolution. However, his victim was not the Pan-German League and its annexationist war aims, which he specifically mentioned, but the chancellor. Bethmann Hollweg was tired, committed to a policy of unrestricted submarine war in which he did not believe but which Erzberger among others had once advocated. 'My position does not matter', he said when he rose to reply on 9 July. 'I myself am convinced of my own limitations . . . I am considered weak because I seek to end the war. A leading statesman can receive support neither from the Left nor the Right in Germany.'9 But that was precisely the function of the chancellor in the Kaiser's eyes. Bethmann Hollweg resigned the following day, not because the army wanted him to go but because he could not manage the Reichstag. His policy of what he had called the 'diagonal' was no longer sustainable. In the minds of the centre and left the chancellor was now bracketed with the Pan-German League, and in the minds of the right and the army he was a reformer and liberal, insufficiently committed to the idea of a 'German peace'. The army's opportunity arose from its ability to strike out on a new diagonal of its own. Colonel Max Bauer, the army's most adroit intriguer, dined with Erzberger and Gustav Stresemann, leader of the National Liberals, and suggested that the chancellor had failed in his democratic duty by denying the Reichstag committee the opportunity to discuss the issues with the supreme command itself. The notion that Hindenburg and Ludendorff were the people's representatives was not as absurd as first appearances might suggest. Rathenau told Ludendorff that he was 'exercising an unconscious dictators.h.i.+p and that, if he were to appeal to his real power-base, he would have the support not only of parliament, but the whole of public opinion.'10 The rising talents in the war, such as Ludendorff and Groener, were not Junkers but bourgeois, and, although they had a traditional Prussian in Hindenburg at their head, even his authority rested on demagogic populism derived from the victory at Tannenberg. The rising talents in the war, such as Ludendorff and Groener, were not Junkers but bourgeois, and, although they had a traditional Prussian in Hindenburg at their head, even his authority rested on demagogic populism derived from the victory at Tannenberg.

On 12 July Bauer arranged a meeting between Crown Prince Wilhelm, the Kaiser's son, and selected representatives of the princ.i.p.al Reichstag parties. Bethmann Hollweg's fate was sealed and he resigned the next day. When the Reichstag formally adopted the peace resolution on 19 July, it did so not with the Kaiser's or the Reichstag's nominee installed as chancellor, but with the army's, Georg Michaelis. Political heavyweights were surprised and cynical: 'We have lost a statesman and have secured a functionary in his place', said a Social Democrat, Conrad Haussmann.11 But Michaelis was a man for his times, a bureaucrat who was popular because he had run the wheat administration effectively. 'In my opinion, this is the only organization which has completely fulfilled its responsibilities without mismanagement', wrote Richard Stumpf, a seaman. 'He is Germany's first bourgeois chancellor.' But Michaelis was a man for his times, a bureaucrat who was popular because he had run the wheat administration effectively. 'In my opinion, this is the only organization which has completely fulfilled its responsibilities without mismanagement', wrote Richard Stumpf, a seaman. 'He is Germany's first bourgeois chancellor.'12 Michaelis's response to the peace resolution was to accept it as 'he understood it'. Michaelis's response to the peace resolution was to accept it as 'he understood it'.

The army's presence in the chamber as Michaelis spoke was unmistakable, but the 'silent dictators.h.i.+p' was exactly that - silent. The army did not itself govern. Moreover, it was the navy which revealed the limits on military power in German politics. In August 1917 mutinies broke out on the capital s.h.i.+ps moored at Wilhelmshaven. The grievances were in part professional. Relations between officers and men were poor, the s.h.i.+ps had not put to sea since Jutland, and the crews were bored; those on U-boats, now fully engaged in the fighting, remained quiet. But the sailors also expressed themselves in terms similar to the workers with whom they consorted in their off-duty hours, complaining of war-weariness and poor food. The mutineers had made contact with the Independent Socialists, and Admiral Scheer - like Petain and Cadorna - was quick to detect an external conspiracy. Two of the mutineers were executed after a summary court martial. Michaelis seized the opportunity to castigate the Independent Socialists in the Reichstag, hoping thereby to drive a wedge between them and the centre-left coalition. He had miscalculated. The Reichstag rallied to the Independent Socialists, and Michaelis fell. His successor was appointed without the army being consulted. Georg von Hertling, a Bavarian Catholic, was no democrat, but he was a member of the Centre Party and was clear on his const.i.tutional responsibilities. He selected a Social Democrat, Friedrich von Payer, as his vice-chancellor and a liberal, Richard Kuhlmann, as his foreign secretary. In January 1918 he reminded Hindenburg that the general staff's role was advisory.13 Hertling's difficulty was that he was claiming a responsibility which he did not have the tools to exercise. Germany was fighting what Ludendorff in later life called a 'total war', but with the administrative structures of a small nineteenth-century state. It had no equivalent of Britain's Ministry of Munitions; the Prussian Ministry of War did duty as a Reich economics ministry; it never collected its various propaganda agencies into a ministry of information. Therefore the general staff expanded to fill the gaps, and took over functions for which its structures and att.i.tudes - geared to the conduct of war at operational level - were not fitted. By January 1918 2.3 million men had been released from military service for war production. But no checks were imposed to ensure that they were being efficiently used. Daimler, the manufacturer of automobiles and aero engines, employed 1.8 workers per machine in 1914, but 2.4 in 1918. At the beginning of 1917 the firm demanded a 50 per cent price increase after a year in which it had paid out a 35 per cent dividend and written off the entire book value of its plant.14 No body existed to take an overview, to balance competing priorities, or to link the military conduct of the war to its economic and social imperatives. No body existed to take an overview, to balance competing priorities, or to link the military conduct of the war to its economic and social imperatives.

The princ.i.p.al casualty of the army's arrogation of power was not the Reichstag but the Kaiser. Increasingly redundant, he went for walks in the woods, played skat, skat, bickered with the Empress, and complained about his own irrelevance. 'Great indignation with the Kaiser who spends hours supervising the building of a fountain at Homburg, for which a war contractor has raised the money', wrote Georg von Muller in his diary on 7 August 1916. While his soldiers slogged it out at Verdun and on the Somme, 'He went for an excursion to Saalburg and Friedrichshof this afternoon and refused to read a report from Hindenburg on the situation on the Eastern Front because "he had no time"'. bickered with the Empress, and complained about his own irrelevance. 'Great indignation with the Kaiser who spends hours supervising the building of a fountain at Homburg, for which a war contractor has raised the money', wrote Georg von Muller in his diary on 7 August 1916. While his soldiers slogged it out at Verdun and on the Somme, 'He went for an excursion to Saalburg and Friedrichshof this afternoon and refused to read a report from Hindenburg on the situation on the Eastern Front because "he had no time"'.15 In the people's eyes, Hindenburg, not the Kaiser, became the supreme warlord. The princ.i.p.al political vehicle for this idea was the Fatherland Party, formally launched on 2 September 1917, the anniversary of Prussia's defeat of France at Sedan in 1870. The purpose of its founders, Wolfgang Kapp (an advocate of extreme war aims) and Tirpitz (now out of office), was to rekindle the 'spirit of 1914' by appealing for national unity in order to achieve a German victory. In reality, its supporters were conservative - schoolteachers, clergy and the professional middle cla.s.s conspicuous among them. Right-wing nationalism, with its anti-capitalist overtones and its rejection of const.i.tutional reform, was elided with calls for conquest. Its policies were in reality more divisive than unifying, but it could still claim 1.25 million members by 1918.

The army supported the Fatherland Party through its own press agency and through the censors.h.i.+p of the party's political opponents. Formally speaking, soldiers could not be members, but Ludendorff was very conscious that mechanisms like mail and leave meant they could not be insulated from the effects of war-weariness at home. He tightened postal censors.h.i.+p, and at the end of July set up an organisation for patriotic instruction, to remind the army what it was fighting for. French intelligence reported mutinies on the western front between May and August 1917, a phenomenon which may explain why Ludendorff did not exploit the disturbances in the French army. By September and October morale was very low, particularly on the Ypres sector, with cases of desertion reaching a peak not surpa.s.sed until the following August. 'There must be an end,' Hans Spiess wrote to his mother from the front on 16 August 1917, 'even the 30 Years [War] came to an end'. Dispirited soldiers could depress those at home. 'When you go on leave, leave the muck and melancholy in the trenches', a leaflet of December 1917 enjoined; 'bring them a pinch of fresh air from the front and the humour of the front line'.16 A German field post office on the Western Front, March 1918. Mail was both vital to the maintenance of morale and the princ.i.p.al conduit linking front and rear None the less, the German army did not tighten censors.h.i.+p of its post until 1917.

In September 1916 the Prussian war minister ordered all letters to be written exclusively in German. The easy scapegoats in the event of defeat or disobedience were the non-German nationalities. As early as November 1914 there were reports of Poles in the German army surrendering to the French with cries of 'Catholics! Poles! Friends!'17 In 1915 Danish soldiers were denied leave and had to serve for a year before being given civic rights. But the army's suspicions focused particularly on those from Alsace-Lorraine. A third of all orders concerning desertion were directed at them, a policy which might become a self-fulfilling prophecy. In 1915 Danish soldiers were denied leave and had to serve for a year before being given civic rights. But the army's suspicions focused particularly on those from Alsace-Lorraine. A third of all orders concerning desertion were directed at them, a policy which might become a self-fulfilling prophecy.18 Dominik Richert was in a unit ordered to go from the eastern front to the western at the beginning of 1917. All Alsatians (like Richert himself) and Lorrainers were told that they were to stay behind and be incorporated in other regiments. As they left their barracks on the morning of 2 January, calls of 'Vive la France!' and 'Vive l'Alsace!' rippled up and down the column. Dominik Richert was in a unit ordered to go from the eastern front to the western at the beginning of 1917. All Alsatians (like Richert himself) and Lorrainers were told that they were to stay behind and be incorporated in other regiments. As they left their barracks on the morning of 2 January, calls of 'Vive la France!' and 'Vive l'Alsace!' rippled up and down the column.19 GERMANY'S ALLIES UNDER STRAIN The nationality issue was even more emotive in the Austro-Hungarian army. In 1914 Czechs were blamed for the initial defeats in Serbia, earning a reputation which their brave conduct on the Italian front could not subsequently slough off. In Romanian units of the Honved, the Hungarian territorial army, 'A gulf of deadly hatred appeared between the officers and men', Octavian Tsluanu wrote. 'The Hungarian officers, mad to think that Roumania had not declared herself for them, vented their rage on our peasants. They knocked them about abominably, and boasted each night of their schemes of punishment.'20 But the most significant tensions were those between Magyars and Austrians. Conrad von Hotzendorff blamed the inadequacy of the army's budget on Budapest before the war broke out. He was therefore particularly irked when Hungary resisted the authority of the War Surveillance Office in 1914. With parliamentary government in Austria suspended, the focus of open debate and press criticism s.h.i.+fted to Budapest. Istvan Tisza, the Magyar prime minister, had good cause to be anxious: as the Russians fought to break through the Carpathians, Hungary was likely to be the first casualty of the army's incompetence. In 1916 Romania's declaration of war widened the gulf yet further, with Hungary blaming the Austro-Germans for Romania's decision and rightly fearful that chunks of Hungarian territory would be Bucharest's reward from the Entente. But the most significant tensions were those between Magyars and Austrians. Conrad von Hotzendorff blamed the inadequacy of the army's budget on Budapest before the war broke out. He was therefore particularly irked when Hungary resisted the authority of the War Surveillance Office in 1914. With parliamentary government in Austria suspended, the focus of open debate and press criticism s.h.i.+fted to Budapest. Istvan Tisza, the Magyar prime minister, had good cause to be anxious: as the Russians fought to break through the Carpathians, Hungary was likely to be the first casualty of the army's incompetence. In 1916 Romania's declaration of war widened the gulf yet further, with Hungary blaming the Austro-Germans for Romania's decision and rightly fearful that chunks of Hungarian territory would be Bucharest's reward from the Entente.

Food was the most emotive aspect of the problem. Austria-Hungary was predominantly agricultural without being agriculturally self-sufficient. The direct effects of the blockade were not great, but the war shut off the empire's two princ.i.p.al sources of supplementary food, Russia and Romania (which although still neutral in 1914 imposed an embargo). By 1917 Austria's own output of wheat had fallen to 47 per cent of its 1913 total, of rye to 43 per cent and of oats to 29 per cent. Hungary's production also fell, in large part for the same reasons - the loss of labour, fertilisers and horses - although not to the same extent; it was also hit by the conquest of Galicia. It therefore had less to market. In 1912 Hungary had supplied 85 per cent of Austria's wheat and cattle, but in 1914 Hungary closed its frontier with Austria and ceased to regard its food as a common resource, preferring to sell its surplus to Germany and to the army. By 1917 Austrian imports of cereals and flour from Hungary were 2.5 per cent of their 1913 total.21 Lack of animal fodder led to meat shortages, and by 1917 the most obvious manifestations of the food problem were two or three meatless days a week in big cities. The shortages were not as severe as in Germany, and in some respects Hungary was taking the blame for Austrian maladministration. Throughout the war Austria-Hungary maintained the fiction that its currency, the crown, was not losing its value, despite an increase in circulation of 1,400 per cent. Excessive liquidity meant that money was translated into goods as quickly as possible, so forcing up prices. They doubled every year, and yet wages remained constant until 1917, and had only risen by a maximum of 100 per cent by the war's end. Thus the problem was less the production of food than the ability to buy it. Hyperinflation encouraged producers to opt out of the cash economy, either h.o.a.rding or bartering. Those in the cities, and consequently furthest from the sources of production, were worst hit. The problems of the railways compounded urban food shortages. Suffering from poor maintenance and overstrain, the trains could not deliver to the cities. Austria's stock of cows fell only 18.4 per cent between 1910 and 1918, yet milk deliveries to Vienna declined 69 per cent.22 Finally, food supply was never brought under a single head. Austria-Hungary aped Rathenau's war raw-materials agencies, calling them 'centrals', but they established them for services as well as goods. The slaughter of an ox involved five centrals, those for leather, meat, bone, fat and procurement. In February 1917 a common food agency was established under General Ottokar Landwehr von Pragenau, but he lacked full executive powers, especially in Hungary. Finally, food supply was never brought under a single head. Austria-Hungary aped Rathenau's war raw-materials agencies, calling them 'centrals', but they established them for services as well as goods. The slaughter of an ox involved five centrals, those for leather, meat, bone, fat and procurement. In February 1917 a common food agency was established under General Ottokar Landwehr von Pragenau, but he lacked full executive powers, especially in Hungary.

Kaiser Karl's young family broke up the stuffiness of the Habsburg court, but the influence exercised over him by his French wife, Zita, gave rise to rumours of treason and betrayal

There was irony in this: Landwehr had been appointed by the Emperor precisely to get round the const.i.tutional trammels of the dual monarchy. Franz Josef died on 21 November 1916, and was succeeded by his great-nephew, Karl. Karl was aged twenty-nine, 'a sympathetic young man, who did not yet know how to begin what was right for him and who did not particularly seek to diminish his function as the fifth wheel'.23 None the less he a.s.sumed the supreme command of the army, and dismissed Conrad von Hotzendorff as chief of the general staff. His antipathy was as much personal as professional: Conrad had fulfilled his pre-war ambition by marrying Gina von Reininghaus and had installed her at headquarters, a bitter affront to a Catholic as devout as the new monarch. Karl hoped to remobilise the peoples of the empire through consensus, but instead gave them the opportunity to vent their differences. None the less he a.s.sumed the supreme command of the army, and dismissed Conrad von Hotzendorff as chief of the general staff. His antipathy was as much personal as professional: Conrad had fulfilled his pre-war ambition by marrying Gina von Reininghaus and had installed her at headquarters, a bitter affront to a Catholic as devout as the new monarch. Karl hoped to remobilise the peoples of the empire through consensus, but instead gave them the opportunity to vent their differences.

He was crowned King of Hungary, but refused to swear an oath of loyalty to the Austrian const.i.tution, so giving notice that he planned to put in hand the reforms that had been so long postponed. Liberalisation was their hallmark. Press censors.h.i.+p was eased, and the remit of the army in domestic affairs curtailed. However, for some this spelt laxity, not progress: Karl Sturgkh, Austria's prime minister, was a.s.sa.s.sinated on 21 October 1916 by Friedrich Adler, son of the socialists' leader, but Adler was never brought to trial. Sturgkh had opposed the convening of Austria's parliament, and the combination of his death and Karl's accession opened the door to its recall. In May 1917, Karl told it that its task was 'the free national and cultural development of equally privileged peoples'. 24 24 The empire was being pointed in the direction of federalism, but in conditions where political change would be hard to direct. The empire was being pointed in the direction of federalism, but in conditions where political change would be hard to direct.

Karl's reforms were also a direct challenge to Hungary. For a brief period Tisza had been able to pose as a liberal prime minister. The bluff had already been called by Mihaly Karolyi, who in the summer of 1916 had formed the Party of Independence and 1848. The compromise between Austria and Hungary was due for renewal in 1917, and the aim of the Karolyi party was complete autonomy. Its programme combined domestic reform - a widening of the franchise, and land redistribution - with calls for an investigation into the army and a peace without annexations or indemnities. Karolyi attracted the support of socialists and revolutionaries, and orchestrated major demonstrations in Budapest on 1 May 1917. None the less it was he, rather than Tisza, whom Karl consulted. The prime minister resigned on 23 May at Karl's request, and was succeeded by Moritz Esterhazy, who declared, 'I desire to work on democratic lines, but naturally democracy in Hungary can only be Hungarian democracy'.25 When, in December 1917, Austria and Hungary brokered a new deal, it was set to last not twenty years, as had been originally intended, but two. When, in December 1917, Austria and Hungary brokered a new deal, it was set to last not twenty years, as had been originally intended, but two.

Developments in the Habsburg Empire worried its German ally. The pursuit of political change required conditions of peace, not war. On 3 April Karl and his foreign minister, Ottokar Czernin, visited the Kaiser, ostensibly to complain about the declaration of unrestricted U-boat war, on which their German ally had - with predictable high-handedness - failed to consult them. Their real mission was to press the need for peace. Arz von Straussenburg, Conrad's successor as chief of the general staff, warned his German hosts that the empire could not last beyond the coming winter. Czernin was more alarmist: 'I'll tell you something', he said to Georg von Muller. 'Unless the war ends within three months the people will end it without their governments. I can't have a wager with you because should this happen it will be impossible to pay the debt.'26 Czernin's aim was to get Germany to accept the need for a negotiated peace rather than court revolution. In strategic terms, if not economic or social, Austria-Hungary's position was eminently satisfactory: Serbia had been crushed, Romania had been largely overrun, and the fall of the Tsar had put Russia on the back foot. Vienna had no immediate quarrel with Britain or