July 1914: Countdown to War

by Sean McMeekin

  Sazonov’s own warning arrived sooner than this—it was deciphered by the Russian embassy in Vienna at three PM on Thursday, 23 July—but not soon enough. With Shebeko out of town, the Russian chargé d’affaires rushed over to the Ballplatz in his stead to present Sazonov’s “anti-ultimatum ultimatum” to the Austrian foreign minister. Berchtold’s secretary, alas, brushed off the Russian, telling him the foreign minister was busy and could not see him that afternoon. Might the Russian come back at eleven the next morning?5

  The timing is suggestive. By eleven Friday morning, the ultimatum would have been delivered to Belgrade on schedule Thursday evening, and Europe’s governments would have been formally notified of it (the plan was to tell them at ten AM Friday). Berchtold may have told his staff not to allow any representatives from “hostile” powers to see him before Friday morning. Whether or not he knew how much the Russians knew, the excuse his secretary gave Shebeko’s chargé d’affaires was not entirely disingenuous: Berchtold was busy that fateful afternoon. The ultimatum time bomb was furiously ticking away, scheduled to detonate in Belgrade scarcely an hour after the Russian envoy arrived at the Ballplatz. The plan was for Minister Giesl to present it to the Serbian government between four and five PM, so as to ensure the deadline would expire by five PM on Saturday, 25 July, in time to allow Austria to begin mobilization by midnight. Giesl had therefore demanded an audience with Serbia’s prime minister at four thirty PM. Thursday morning, however, Berchtold had learned that the France would not lift anchor until eleven PM, nearly five hours later than expected.6 Even given the hour and a half time difference between Petersburg and Central Europe, this meant that, if Giesl turned over the note at four thirty, it was almost certain that news of the démarche in Belgrade would reach Petersburg before Poincaré left Kronstadt at eleven, which might allow him to coordinate a response with Sazonov and the tsar. Learning this, Berchtold altered the schedule at the last minute, sending Giesl an urgent telegram to postpone delivery until six PM.7 Any later than this, and Conrad would be furious that the forty-eight-hour deadline would expire too late on Saturday evening for mobilization orders to go out overnight. It would be a close-run thing: even six might be too early to prevent news of the ultimatum from reaching Petersburg Thursday evening. Still, given the hour-and-a-half time difference (and the time needed for telegrams to be composed, encrypted, sent, and deciphered), the news would, Berchtold hoped, not reach the Russian capital until the farewell banquet had already begun on board the France.

  Adding to Berchtold’s headaches was a disquieting conversation he had with the chief of staff early Thursday afternoon. With the prospect of an actual war now staring him in the face within two days, the foreign minister was finally mulling over the worst-case scenarios he should have been thinking about before putting the ultimatum plan into action. What if, he asked Conrad, Serbia complied after the forty-eight-hour deadline had passed—that is, after Austrian mobilization had begun—but before hostilities had commenced? The chief of staff, unlike the foreign minister, had already considered this possibility, although he did not think it likely. If this transpired, a solution was simple: “Serbia will [be required to] pay the costs of [our] mobilization.” Conrad was taken aback, however, by Berchtold’s second question. For days the Ballplatz had been receiving disquieting reports from Rome suggesting that the Italians knew what Berchtold was up to. On 10 July, Italy’s foreign minister, Antonio di San Giuliano, had even named a quid pro quo for Austrian gains in a Balkan war: Vienna must surrender the entire Italian-speaking South Tyrol (including, not incidentally, Innichen, where Conrad had his country estate). The Germans had been warning Berchtold for weeks that he needed to nail down Italian support, or at least neutrality, but so far nothing had been done. Now, out of the blue, he asked Conrad: What if Italy intervenes against us? In that case, Conrad answered, Austria-Hungary, facing a two-front and possibly three-front war, “should not mobilize at all.”8 It was Berchtold’s job to ensure Italian neutrality. If he had not succeeded, it was rather late to be telling the army chief of staff.

  Conrad would have been even more worried had he or Berchtold known that news of the ultimatum had leaked not only to the British, French, Italians, and Russians but to Belgrade. Back on Wednesday, 15 July, the first serious warning from the Serbian minister at Vienna of impending diplomatic action had reached Belgrade. On Friday, 17 July, the Serbian minister in London informed his government that “the way is being prepared for diplomatic pressure upon Serbia which may develop into an armed attack.” Prime Minister Pašić was sufficiently alarmed by this news that, later that day, he had informed the Austrian minister Giesl, “in unofficial conversation,” that “the Serbian Government are prepared to comply at once with any request for police investigation and to take any other measure compatible with dignity and independence of State.” However, Pašić had also informed Britain’s minister to Belgrade (although not Giesl), in a manner that suggested he had excellent intelligence on Austrian intentions, that “a demand on the part of Austro-Hungarian Government for appointment of a mixed commission of inquiry, for suppression of nationalist societies and for censorship of press, could not be acceded to, since it would imply foreign intervention in domestic affairs and legislation.”9

  Compounding the unfavorable augurs for the Austrians, Giesl, on demanding an audience with Pašić to deliver his ultimatum Thursday evening, 23 July, learned that the prime minister was not even in town; he was at Nish, campaigning for reelection. Had the Serbians not known what was coming, Pašić’s absence would have been unremarkable. Because they did, however, there may have been gamesmanship involved. The Austrians were half-expecting Pašić to resign as soon as he saw the text of the ultimatum, so as to avoid the opprobrium of having to comply with it. To forestall this possibility, Berchtold had instructed Giesl, in the case of such a resignation, to deny its relevance vis-à-vis the ultimatum period on the grounds that “it is well-known that a Government after resigning still has entire responsibility for the conduct of affairs until the formation of a new Ministry.” The Austrians were not about to let Pašić wiggle out of replying to their ultimatum. Pašić, for his part, was just as keen to wiggle out. As if anticipating imminent action from Austria, on Wednesday, 22 July, Pašić had expressly deputized Serbia’s little-known finance minister, Dr. Laza Paĉu, to act on his behalf while he was outside Belgrade the next few days. When Paĉu, after receiving Giesl’s demand Thursday morning for an urgent audience that night, asked the prime minister to return to Belgrade, Pašić refused and ordered the finance minister to “receive him in my place.”10

  By the time Giesl arrived at the Serbian foreign ministry shortly before six PM on Thursday, 23 July, the Austrian ultimatum to Serbia was the worst-kept secret in Europe. True, only the Austrians and Germans had seen the actual text of the note Giesl now carried with him in a sealed envelope. But the Serbs—like the Russians, French, British, and Italians—were in no doubt that it was coming and that the terms would be so harsh as to make their acceptance difficult, if not impossible. Berchtold may not have known how badly his plans had leaked to the chancelleries of Europe, which could only ruin his hope of a localized Balkan fait accompli. Or he may not have wanted to know. Gazing into the abyss of a broader war that might ensue from his failed diplomatic gambit, Berchtold jumped right in.

  When Giesl arrived, he was unpleasantly surprised to learn that Paĉu, cynically deputized as head of Serbia’s government, did not speak a word of French, the language in which the “note with a time limit” was written. Luckily, the Serbian foreign ministry did have at least one man on hand, Secretary General Slavko Gruić, who could translate the conversation, if not also provide an instantaneous translation of the note for the benefit of the acting head of Serbia’s government. Wasting little time, Giesl displayed a copy of the ultimatum, a two-page annex, and a brief letter addressing Paĉu as a representative of Prime Minister Pašić. He informed the finance minister that the time limit would expire at
six PM on Saturday, 25 July, and that if a satisfactory reply were not received by then, he would leave Belgrade with the entire staff of his legation. Paĉu scarcely needed an interpreter to figure out what this meant: war.

  Still, there was no reason for the Serb to acknowledge that he understood this. Showing that there was method to Pašić’s absence, Paĉu refused to take the documents in hand, objecting that he was unqualified to receive the Austrian note on Serbia’s behalf. Without even glancing at the ultimatum (which he could not have read anyway), the acting prime minister protested to Giesl that, because “there were elections on and many of the ministers were absent, he was afraid that it would be physically impossible to convene a full cabinet meeting in time to decide on a matter of such evident importance.” Giesl, expecting just such an excuse, replied that “the return of the ministers [to Belgrade] in the age of railways, telegraph, and telephone in a land the size [of Serbia] could only be a matter of a few hours.” He reminded Paĉu that he had given many hours’ notice of the current meeting and that it was Pašić’s own choice not to return to Belgrade, as he easily could have. The issue of cabinet meetings and their convocation was, moreover, “a private matter for the Serbian government in which he [Giesl] had nothing to say.”11

  Gamely, Paĉu resisted even this barrage: he simply would not accept the ultimatum on behalf of Serbia’s government. After a long, uncomfortable pause, Giesl decided simply to leave it on the table, saying that Paĉu, and Serbia, “could do what they liked with it.” Giesl then turned and left. There was nothing more for him to do.12

  In this way the Austrians, after ruining the surprise of the ultimatum through careless leaks, botched its delivery, too. Having sniffed out the ultimatum early—as did all the other powers—Serbia’s government had nearly neutralized it on technical grounds. At the least, Pašić had deprived Giesl and Berchtold of the satisfaction of cornering him.

  Meanwhile, dropping his fool’s mask the moment Giesl left the room, Paĉu shared the contents of the ultimatum with two other ministers who had been hiding in the next room. They, in turn, passed on the news to friendly diplomats. Naturally, it was the Italians, kingpin gossips of European diplomacy, who had the story first—before passing it on to the Russians. At around nine (Russia time) Thursday evening, an attaché at the Italian embassy in Petersburg, having arrived late to the farewell banquet on board the France, quietly informed K. E. Bützow, acting head of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Near Eastern Department, that “Austria-Hungary has given a completely unacceptable ultimatum this day to Serbia.” Confirming the veracity of the Italian report, secretaries at Chorister’s Bridge received an urgent request almost simultaneously from Count Szapáry for an hour-long morning audience with Russia’s foreign minister.13 Berchtold was about to find out what Sazonov was made of.

  14

  Sazonov Strikes

  FRIDAY, 24 JULY

  NEWS OF THE AUSTRIAN ULTIMATUM reached Petersburg soon after Giesl presented it in Belgrade Thursday evening. Berchtold had delayed its delivery for as long as possible, but a bombshell of this kind was hard to suppress once it went off. Sazonov was too wrapped up in the diplomatic niceties of sending off Poincaré to be bothered with the news while still on board the France, but he was informed of the Italian attaché’s report about the delivery of an ultimatum to Serbia, and of the Austro-Hungarian ambassador’s demand for an urgent audience, before he turned in Thursday night. At seven AM, Schilling, Sazonov’s chief of staff, received further confirmation about the ultimatum in a telegram from the Russian consulate in Belgrade.1 By the time Sazonov arrived at the Foreign Ministry around ten AM on Friday, 24 July, he was primed and ready.

  “C’est la guerre Européenne!”—This means European war!—Sazonov exclaimed to Schilling as soon as he saw him. While his remark has become justly famous, it is usually mistaken for a spontaneous interjection, in reaction to shocking news (that is, his receipt of the Austrian ultimatum). It was far from this. Sazonov had known an ultimatum of some sort was coming for days, and he had learned of its actual delivery in Belgrade nearly ten hours before saying this. It is true that he had not seen the actual text of the Serbian ultimatum before it was delivered, but then neither had he seen it now: he uttered his bon mot about “European war” before, not after, Ambassador Szapáry arrived to present him the ultimatum. So if the remark is not apocryphal, it cannot have been spontaneous. It was closer to a declaration of policy.2

  This interpretation is buttressed by Szapáry’s report of his brief and fractious encounter with Russia’s foreign minister that morning. Nothing in Sazonov’s demeanor suggested surprise or shock. While the ambassador showed him the text of the ultimatum to Serbia, with accompanying commentary, Sazonov remained “quite calm.” The Russian objected firmly and unambiguously to two clauses of the ultimatum. The Serbs, he said, would never consent to the dissolution of Narodna Odbrana, nor could they allow the participation of Austrian agents in the investigation of the Sarajevo crime on Serbian territory. To Szapáry’s claim that Austria-Hungary, in making its demands to suppress terrorist agitation against the dual monarchy, “stood as one with all civilized nations,” Sazonov replied that “this was erroneous” (dies sei ein Irrtum). “You,” the Russian insisted, “are setting Europe ablaze.” With a level of conviction that took Szapáry aback, Russia’s foreign minister warned him “to consider the impression [the ultimatum] would make in Paris, London, and perhaps elsewhere,” where it would be “considered as unjustified aggression.” When the ambassador, desperate for a sign of goodwill, invoked that old theme the monarchical principle, Sazonov simply swatted it away: “the monarchical idea has nothing to do with this.”3 With these words, he concluded the audience, leaving Szapáry in no doubt where Russia stood.

  Sazonov’s cool and calculated tone with the Austro-Hungarian ambassador suggests that he had already made up his mind on a policy line after learning the news from Belgrade Thursday night. As he had told Britain’s ambassador after getting wind of Berchtold’s plans the previous Saturday, if Austria delivered an ultimatum to Serbia, Russia “might be forced to take some precautionary military measure.” True to his word, scarcely had Szapáry left his office Friday morning at ten thirty AM than Sazonov summoned the Council of Ministers to meet at three PM, with urgent notice of required attendance sent to the chief of Army Staff, N. N. Yanushkevitch, and the naval minister, I. K. Grigorevich. Sazonov also ordered Yanushkevitch to make “all arrangements for putting the army on a war footing,” and to have a “partial mobilization” plan written up and ready for consideration by three PM.4 Sazonov then recalled all Foreign Ministry officials of the Diplomatic Chancellery and the Near East Section from leave, ordering them to report at once.

  Russia’s finance minister, Peter Bark, was the first to respond to Sazonov’s summons, arriving at Chorister’s Bridge at eleven AM. The foreign minister had stepped out, so Bark spoke to Schilling instead. “Was there any likelihood of war?” he asked. Schilling answered without hesitation that “Sazonov considered war unavoidable.” In view of this, Bark asked if he might be informed “whether . . . matters would move quickly since, in that case, I should have to take immediate steps to ensure the transfer of the Russian Treasury funds deposited in Berlin.” Again without hesitation, Schilling told Bark to do just this. Moving with almost Germanic speed (the finance minister, though Russian, had worked a long stint at the German House of Mendelssohn), Bark wired Berlin before the Council of Ministers convened, ordering his agents there to transfer balances held in German banks—100 million rubles’ worth in all, more than $20 billion in today’s terms—to Paris and Petersburg.5

  While Bark was repatriating Russian funds from Germany, Sazonov was discussing mobilization plans with the army chiefs. In late November 1912, as the First Balkan War was heating up, Sukhomlinov, the war minister, had drawn up a “partial mobilization plan” against Austria-Hungary alone, his idea being to threaten Vienna without alarming Germany into mobilizing on Austria�
��s behalf pursuant to her alliance obligations. A key corollary was that the Warsaw district—that is, Russian Poland—would not be mobilized, so as not to alarm the commanders of the German 8th Army in East Prussia. Just as he had later blocked the war party during the Liman von Sanders crisis in January 1914, chairman of the Council of Ministers Kokovtsov had vetoed Sukhomlinov’s “partial mobilization” plan in November 1912 on the grounds that “no matter what we chose to call the projected measures, a mobilization remained a mobilization, to be countered by our adversaries with actual war.”6 With the gun-shy Kokovtsov having been removed from the council in February 1914, Sazonov now was ready to try Sukhomlinov’s plan. Shortly after eleven AM on Friday, 24 July, he brought Yanushkevitch up to speed on the situation and asked him to draw up a partial mobilization directive. The chief of staff agreed.

  Yanushkevitch then summoned the chief of the Russian Army’s Mobilization Section, General Sergei Dobrorolskii, who arrived at headquarters just before noon. Showing that he had been thoroughly briefed by Sazonov on the diplomatic situation, Yanushkevitch informed Dobrorolskii that Russia would shortly announce publicly that it could not “remain indifferent” regarding Vienna’s “wholly unacceptable ultimatum” to Serbia. An even more aggressive, though less official, notice would also be posted in Russkii Invalid, the official newspaper of the Russian War Ministry, proclaiming that Russia would “not remain inactive if the dignity and the integrity of the Serbian people, our blood brothers, are threatened with danger.” “Have you everything ready for the proclamation of the mobilization of our army?” Yanushkevitch asked his mobilization chief. Dobrorolskii said yes. “In that case,” the chief of staff continued, “in an hour bring me all the documents relative to the preparing of our troops for war, which provide, in case of necessity, for proclaiming partial mobilization against Austria-Hungary alone. This mobilization must give no occasion to Germany to find any grounds of hostility to herself.”