The War that Ended Peace

by Margaret MacMillan

  In addition to the Casablanca incident, the French were largely preoccupied by domestic issues, with a rise in working-class militancy and the growth on the right of a new aggressive nationalism. The last thing France wanted was to be drawn into a quarrel in the Balkans in which it had little interest. Like Britain, it also wished to see a stable Ottoman Empire and a peaceful Balkans. French investors held as much as 70–80 per cent of the combined debt of the Ottoman Empire, Serbia and Bulgaria.63 Nevertheless, although the Foreign Minister at the time, Stephen Pichon, disliked Russia and the Russian alliance, he recognised that France had little choice but to support its ally. So France denounced the annexation and supported Russia’s call for an international conference. Privately, the French let the Russians know that France expected to co-operate with Britain over the Straits and, as the crisis worsened, urged the Russians to be reasonable and find a peaceful solution.64

  In Constantinople, locals attacked Austrian-Hungarian businesses and set upon the Dual Monarchy’s citizens in the streets while the Ottoman government supported a boycott of trade with Austria-Hungary. The most furious reactions of all came, understandably, in Serbia. Huge demonstrations marched through the streets of Belgrade and a mob tried to smash the windows of the Austrian-Hungarian embassy. The crown prince said he, like all Serbs, was ready to die for a Greater Serbia. (He never got the chance; he was removed from the succession the following year when he kicked a servant to death in a fit of rage and died of old age in Tito’s Yugoslavia in 1972.) A new paramilitary group, Narodna Odbrana (National Defence), formed, which was to play an important part in politics in the next few years, and Serbian volunteers, with the connivance of the government, slipped over the borders into Bosnia-Herzegovina to stir up opposition to Austria-Hungary.65

  The Serbian government sent representatives around Europe to win over public opinion. It also demanded compensation although it had no good legal grounds for doing so. ‘Give us a pasture or mill’, the Serbian ambassador in London begged his counterpart from Austria-Hungary, ‘anything to mollify our country.’66 In fact Serbia asked for much more – the Sanjak of Novi Bazar – which would link it to Montenegro, or even the reversal of the annexation. Montenegro also asked for compensation, specifically the end to the conditions imposed on it by the settlement of 1878 which prevented it from such things as having a navy. Both Serbia and Montenegro also took steps to mobilise their armies and ordered new weapons from abroad.67 In an ominous foreshadowing of what was to come, Serbian officials talked about going to war if necessary. In late October, Nikola Pašić, who was to be Prime Minister in 1914, urged Russian leaders including the tsar himself and his ministers as well as prominent Panslavists to stand firm against Austria-Hungary, come what may. In a conversation with Izvolsky, he implied that Serbia might have to act alone, ‘if it is a question of the existence, the honour, and the dignity of the people’.68

  Izvolsky, who only a few weeks before had been preening himself on his successful negotiations with Austria-Hungary, was dismayed at the international reaction and, so he said, furious with Aehrenthal for a premature annexation before Russia could get its own demands in order. The Russian went, said Berchtold unkindly, from being a flamboyant peacock to a rampaging turkey.69 Aehrenthal, who had got what he wanted and who was assured of German support, was unconcerned. When Izvolsky blustered about betrayal, Aehrenthal simply threatened to release their previous secret communications and his own version of the deal at Buchlau which would undermine Izvolsky’s claims to be surprised. He adamantly refused to hold the international conference Izvolsky now insisted upon or to give compensation to the Ottoman Empire, much less to Serbia or Montenegro, whatever the two Balkan states said or did.

  Conrad, who had strongly supported the annexation, urged his government to take the opportunity to wage a preventive war on Serbia and Montenegro; Italy too if it showed signs of intervening. He promised that he could defeat all three handily. Austria-Hungary could put over 700,000 men in the field along its southern borders while Serbia had at most 160,000 men, Montenegro a mere 43,000, and Italy, which was highly unlikely to fight, 417,000. What is more, Austria-Hungary’s equipment and training was much superior to that of its enemies.70 Once Serbia had been defeated, it should be incorporated into the empire. That last was too much for Aehrenthal, who understood the political difficulties; the most he would do to Serbia would be force it into a customs union. While he preferred the cheaper route of diplomacy to settle the crisis, he certainly did not rule out war.71 ‘Perhaps’, he wrote to Franz Ferdinand near the start of the crisis, ‘conflict between us and Serbia in the course of the next few months is unavoidable, and as soon as this is clear, I favour demonizing Serbia with all energy possible.’72

  All that winter of 1908–9, said a member of the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, it felt as though they were on the brink of war.73 Conrad prevailed upon the government to step up war preparations: he ordered new armaments, moved forces into Bosnia-Herzegovina, and delayed demobilising conscripts whose terms were up. He also increased his forces on Austria-Hungary’s frontier with Serbia and made preparations to mobilise forces in Galicia near the border with Russia.74 Franz Ferdinand, for all his hatred of the ‘Balkan curs’, acted as a brake on Conrad’s headlong dash towards war. Austria-Hungary, he argued to Aehrenthal, had much to lose by going to war. ‘Please restrain Conrad’, the archduke wrote to Conrad’s adjutant, ‘he must stop this warmongering. It would be tempting to strike down the Serbians … but what use are such cheap laurels when we might risk the impossible war on three fronts? Then it would be the end of the song.’75 Unfortunately, when another crisis broke out in the Balkans in 1914, Franz Ferdinand was no longer there to advocate restraint.

  While Aehrenthal was enjoying the success of his annexation, Izvolsky, who was in Paris when the news broke, continued his increasingly desperate trip around Europe’s capital cities to try to gain support at the very least for an international conference. (Bülow said maliciously that he really delayed his return to St Petersburg because the pretty and extravagant Madame Izvolsky wanted to do her Christmas shopping.)76 Russia’s own allies would do little but offer to help broker an end to the crisis. When the Russians asked Grey point blank that November what Great Britain would do if Russia went to war with Austria-Hungary over the Balkans, he temporised: ‘so much depended upon how the quarrel arose, and who was the aggressor’. Privately, however, Grey told his close colleagues ‘it would be very difficult for England to keep out of it’.77 In Berlin Bülow was sympathetic (he had not completely given up hope of winning Russia back) but told Izvolsky Germany could do nothing. The Germans knew that Russia’s financial situation was bad and calculated, rightly, that Russia was in no position to fight. The Kaiser happily wrote ‘Bluff’ on the memorandums that came across his desk saying that Izvolsky was threatening war.78 When Izvolsky arrived back in St Petersburg at the start of November, Berchtold found him a broken man. ‘He lay limp on his armchair. His eyes were dull, his voice raw, his speech like that of a dying man.’79 Izvolsky had good reason to feel depressed; Russia had been made to look weak and isolated abroad and his own position had been seriously damaged. Izvolsky’s own colleagues led by Stolypin made it clear that he could no longer have a free hand in foreign policy but must consult the Council of Ministers. To make matters worse, it turned out that neither he nor anyone in the Russian Foreign Office knew, as Aehrenthal was delighted to point out, that Russia had agreed a couple times in the 1870s and 1880s not to oppose the annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina. ‘You will understand’, the tsar wrote to his mother, ‘what an unpleasant surprise this is, and what an embarrassing position we are in.’80

  The onset of winter in the Balkans made war unlikely until the following March but intense diplomatic activity continued. While Britain, France and Russia still insisted publicly on a conference, Britain was in fact prepared to see bilateral agreements. It took the lead in brokering a settlement between Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire wher
e the Ottomans would recognise Bulgaria’s independence in return for compensation to cover such things as railways which had been built with Ottoman funds. Although Tsar Ferdinand (as he now was) had promised to be as meek as a lamb, he refused to pay the amount the Ottomans demanded and threatened war on the Ottoman Empire. The British persuaded the Russians to provide the necessary funds. An agreement was reached in principle in December 1908 but haggling over details went on until the following April.81

  By the start of 1909, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire had also worked out a settlement whereby the former paid the latter an indemnity in return for recognition of the annexation. Here Britain intervened on the side of the Ottoman Empire, to get a substantial settlement for it. This served to persuade opinion in Austria-Hungary that Britain was its determined enemy, even, so Aehrenthal believed, to the point of using the Balkan troubles to have a general European war so that Britain could deal with the German navy. ‘If England hopes to break us’, he exclaimed to Friedjung, ‘then they will find in me a spirited opponent, who won’t make victory easy for them.’82 In both countries the press joined in enthusiastically to attack the other. What had been a friendship of long standing throughout the nineteenth century between Britain and Austria-Hungary slid into the past as the dividing lines in Europe became more clearly drawn.

  The most difficult issue to settle in the aftermath of the annexation was the question of compensation for Serbia, complicated by the fact that Russia was backing Serbia’s demands and Germany was supporting Austria-Hungary. The most Aehrenthal was prepared to offer Serbia was some economic concessions such as access to a port on the Adriatic, but only if Serbia recognised the annexation and agreed to live on peaceful terms with Austria-Hungary. The Serbian government remained intransigent and, as spring melted the snows in the Balkans, the talk of war mounted again around Europe’s capitals. The German government, mindful of its own defeat in the earlier Morocco crisis, was standing firmly behind its ally. ‘This time’, said Kiderlen, the acting Foreign Secretary, ‘the others are about to cave in.’83 What was not known publicly at the time was that Germany gave Austria-Hungary an assurance that, if a war between it and Serbia led to Russian intervention, the terms of the Dual Alliance would come into force and Germany would come into the war on Austria-Hungary’s side. Germany was to make a similar promise in the crisis of 1914.

  In St Petersburg, Stolypin, who remained opposed to war, told the British ambassador at the start of March that Russian public opinion was so firmly in favour of support of Serbia that the government would not be able to resist coming to its defence: ‘Russia would have, in that case, to mobilise, and a general conflagration would then be imminent.’84 In Berlin, where the Daily Telegraph affair was creating its own crisis, the war party, which included high-ranking members of the military, saw a war as a chance for Germany to escape from its troubles, both those at home and abroad.85 The Kaiser, who was still recovering from his breakdown over the affair, was not enthusiastic about war but does not seem to have opposed it actively. He was much occupied, said a courtier, ‘with momentous questions as those of new kinds of chin straps, new fastenings for helmet chains, double seams on soldiers’ trousers, and frequent inspections of the Wardrobe.’86 In Vienna Aehrenthal talked matter-of-factly about war. ‘The Serbian scallywag wanted to steal apples from our garden and we have apprehended him and will only let him go if he promises lasting improvement.’87

  In the middle of March the Serbian government rejected Austria-Hungary’s offer in a note which the British found unnecessarily provocative. While Aehrenthal was drafting a reply, the German government decided to act. It sent what amounted to an ultimatum to St Petersburg to say that the Russian government must recognise the annexation. If Germany received ‘any evasive, conditional, or unclear response’, it would take that as a refusal on Russia’s part: ‘We would then withdraw and let events take their course.’88 On 23 March the Russian government which had already been told by the War Minister that its military could not hope to fight Austria-Hungary, capitulated.89 Serbia caved in a week later and sent a note to Vienna in which it promised to give up protesting the annexation, to step down its military preparations and disband the volunteer militias which had sprung up, and to live with Austria-Hungary ‘on terms of friendly and neighbourly relations’.90 In St Petersburg, Berchtold invited Izvolsky and Nicolson, the British ambassador, and their wives to a ‘fin-de-crisis’ dinner.91 The Kaiser sent the tsar an Easter egg with thanks for helping to preserve the peace.92 Some time later he told an audience in Vienna that he himself had kept the peace by standing should to shoulder with Franz Joseph like a knight in shining armour.93

  For all Germany’s firm stand, the crisis did cause concerns within the leadership over the country’s preparedness for a war. Bülow, who had initially been a strong supporter of Tirpitz and his naval programme, was already having trouble getting the Reichstag to approve the funds. And, as he said to Holstein shortly before the annexation: ‘We cannot weaken the army, for our destiny will be decided on land.’ During the crisis itself, he sceptically asked Tirpitz point blank whether the navy was capable of withstanding a British attack. The admiral fell back on his standard answer: ‘In a few years our fleet would be so strong that an attack on it even by Britain would mean a great military risk.’94 Before he was eased out of office in the summer of 1909, Bülow started to explore the possibilities of ending the naval race with Great Britain. His successor, Bethmann Hollweg, was very much of the same opinion and he found a receptive audience in Britain, where radicals in the Cabinet and Parliament, led by Lloyd George, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, were determined both to cut spending and lower tensions with Germany. Talks started in the autumn of 1909 and continued through to the summer of 1911, when a fresh crisis over Morocco put them on hold. How much chance they had of succeeding then or later is debatable. Tirpitz and the Kaiser, whose word in the end was final, were prepared to offer a slowdown in the rate of German building but only one which would still have left Germany with two big ships to every three of Britain’s, which was too close a margin to be acceptable to the British. And in return for slowing down its naval building, Germany would have expected a political settlement as well, with Britain promising to remain neutral if Germany got into a war with another European power. For the British, where suspicion of Germany was now deeply entrenched in the Foreign Office and in the minds of key members of the Cabinet, notably Grey himself, such a promise, which would have undermined if not destroyed the Triple Entente, was highly unlikely. What the British really wanted was an arms agreement which would let them cut naval expenditure significantly. Only after that were they prepared to talk about a political settlement. Although talks between the two sides started in the autumn of 1909, the German and British governments remained far apart and little progress had been made when another crisis in 1911, this one over Morocco again, put them on hold.

  Like the past Morocco crisis and the one to come, the Bosnian affair left its share of memories, often bitter ones, and seemed as well to offer lessons. Conrad was in despair at seeing the opportunity for a preventive war slip by. He wrote to a friend ‘with this resolution of the Balkan crisis a thousand hopes … are buried for me. I have also lost the joy in my profession, and thus lost that which has sustained me in all circumstances since the age of eleven.’95 He later wrote a long memorandum arguing that it would have been better to have dealt with Serbia militarily during the crisis and not to have postponed the inevitable conflict. In the future Austria-Hungary was going to face the choice of a war on several fronts or make ‘far-reaching concessions’ which might destroy it in any case. Conrad did find encouragement, however, in concluding that mobilisation together with the German ultimatum had worked to make Russia and Serbia back down. Aehrenthal concurred: ‘a text-book example of how success is only certain if the strength is there to get one’s own way …’96 Unwisely, he made little attempt to be magnanimous towards Russia, saying of Izvolsky: �
�These controversies with this blackhearted ape bore me and I have decided not to reach out to him.’97 Although Aehrenthal died of leukaemia in 1912, his anti-Serbian and anti-Russian views and his belief that Austria-Hungary must have an active foreign policy and, in particular, assert itself in the Balkans had a strong influence on a younger generation of diplomats, some of whom were going to play a key role in the events of 1914.98

  The Russians, for their part, had little desire to mend fences with Austria-Hungary or with Germany. Izvolsky, who was going to be eased out of office after a decent interval and sent to Paris as the Russian ambassador, blamed Aehrenthal for destroying the accord in the Balkans between their two countries and warned the German ambassador that their rivalry was now bound to end in conflict.99 After he received the German ultimatum, the tsar wrote to his mother: ‘It is quite true that the form and method of Germany’s action – I mean towards us – has simply been brutal and we won’t forget it.’ Germany, he went on, was trying again to separate Russia from its allies, France and Great Britain: ‘Such methods tend to bring about the opposite result.’100 The denouement of the Bosnian crisis was, said one deputy in the Duma, a ‘diplomatic Tsushima’ as bad in its own way as that appalling defeat in the Russo-Japanese War. The Duma promptly approved another increase in defence spending. Among the military there was increasing talk of getting ready for the next round with Austria-Hungary, which was sure to come in the next few years.101 Russians of all classes, wrote Nicolson to Grey, felt bitterly ashamed that they had abandoned their Slavic brothers: ‘Russia has suffered a deep humiliation and has renounced the traditional part which she had hitherto played in South-East Europe, and in the prosecution of which she had made so great sacrifices in the past.’102 Such memories had not faded six years later.103 ‘Are we going to unleash a world war’, Jaurès cried out to French journalists on the eve of the Great War, ‘because Izvolsky is still furious over Aehrenthal’s deception on the Bosnian affair?’104 The answer must surely be yes, in part, although there are many other links in the chain of events leading towards 1914.