Austria-Hungary. Lumpen, colorless, and stiff, the heir to the Dual Monarchy was everything that the Kaiser was not. Their helmets bespoke their characters—Wilhelm’s a froth of white plumes, respondent to the slightest breeze, the archduke’s a stolid cylinder. The two men were, however, close friends, vacationing frequently in each other’s hunting lodges, and discussing questions of offense and defense against the Slav. It was a question which of them was the more obsessive on that subject.
Their shared neurosis was nothing compared to that of Franz Ferdinand’s protégé, marching a few steps behind them: General Franz Conrad von Hötzendorff, the Austro-Hungarian chief of staff. Conrad’s anti-Slavism focused on Serbia, the most restive of the Balkan states crowding the Austrianborder. That landlocked nation had already triggered two wars, each nominally against Turkey but strategically threatening its northern neighbor. Its aim was a southern Slav federation, a
Yugoslavia
strong enough to resist pan-Germanism.
Now, even as Leipzig celebrated the superiority of all things Teutonic, the archduke and general had disturbing news for Wilhelm. A third Balkan war was imminent. Serbia had sent troops into Albania in an attempt to gain access to the Adriatic Sea. The Austrian government was alarmed at this development, which compromised its whole wall of security against two hostile empires—the Ottoman in the south, the Russian in the east. As a result, Vienna had sent a peremptory note to Belgrade: if Serbia did not withdraw from Albania by 26 October, it would be obliterated.
By the time this ultimatum was headlinedin tomorrow’s European papers (sharing space, no doubt, with the dedication of the
Volkerschlacht
monument), six days would be left. That was hardly enough time for Serbia to comply, let alone hope that nations dreading a more general war might intervene. As every half-educated burgher living west of the steppes knew, Russia was Serbia’s most reflexive ally, and would not tolerate any further Austrian aggrandizement in the Balkans. The annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1908 had been provocation enough.
Wilhelm had not welcomed that particular move. But recently he had shown signs of conversion to the Austrian way of thinking.
His
particular phobia was against the Eastern Slavs: the Ukrainians, Belarusians, Russians, and even Poles who for fourteen centuries had menaced Prussia across its erasable slate of a border—the
plattland
that any tourist could see from the monument’s observation deck, fading into the enormous distance. A thousand years before, Leipzig had been a Slav settlement. Those sentinels bespoke the granite determination of Teutons that it would never be so again.
“
Ich
gehe mit Euch,
” the Kaiser said privately to Conrad. “I am with you. The other powers are not ready; they will attempt nothing against it. In a couple of days you would be at Belgrade.”
Franz Ferdinand jealously observed the intimacy developing between Wilhelm and his general, and returned to Vienna that evening in something of a huff.
LEFT ALONE TO STAND against the gray Saxon sky in the days following, after the tents and platforms and bunting had been cleared away, the Leipzig memorial became an iconic shape, inspiring to Germans, Austrians, and Reichslanders, ludicrously overwrought to citizens of other countries.French comments had been especially scathing. It was not only the largest such pile since the days of Ancient Egypt, it was something new in its
völkisch
, ethnic quality, appealingless to memory of a particular battle than to the aspirations of a people who felt that their time for dominance had come.
An eruptive bigness, as of lava rising, seethed beneath the vineyards and farms and spotless towns of the Fatherland. Since the Franco-Prussian War, the population had burgeoned to sixty-eight million, twenty-nine million more than that of France. Its notable feature was a huge new middle
Their shared neurosis was nothing compared to that of Franz Ferdinand’s protégé, marching a few steps behind them: General Franz Conrad von Hötzendorff, the Austro-Hungarian chief of staff. Conrad’s anti-Slavism focused on Serbia, the most restive of the Balkan states crowding the Austrianborder. That landlocked nation had already triggered two wars, each nominally against Turkey but strategically threatening its northern neighbor. Its aim was a southern Slav federation, a
Yugoslavia
strong enough to resist pan-Germanism.
Now, even as Leipzig celebrated the superiority of all things Teutonic, the archduke and general had disturbing news for Wilhelm. A third Balkan war was imminent. Serbia had sent troops into Albania in an attempt to gain access to the Adriatic Sea. The Austrian government was alarmed at this development, which compromised its whole wall of security against two hostile empires—the Ottoman in the south, the Russian in the east. As a result, Vienna had sent a peremptory note to Belgrade: if Serbia did not withdraw from Albania by 26 October, it would be obliterated.
By the time this ultimatum was headlinedin tomorrow’s European papers (sharing space, no doubt, with the dedication of the
Volkerschlacht
monument), six days would be left. That was hardly enough time for Serbia to comply, let alone hope that nations dreading a more general war might intervene. As every half-educated burgher living west of the steppes knew, Russia was Serbia’s most reflexive ally, and would not tolerate any further Austrian aggrandizement in the Balkans. The annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1908 had been provocation enough.
Wilhelm had not welcomed that particular move. But recently he had shown signs of conversion to the Austrian way of thinking.
His
particular phobia was against the Eastern Slavs: the Ukrainians, Belarusians, Russians, and even Poles who for fourteen centuries had menaced Prussia across its erasable slate of a border—the
plattland
that any tourist could see from the monument’s observation deck, fading into the enormous distance. A thousand years before, Leipzig had been a Slav settlement. Those sentinels bespoke the granite determination of Teutons that it would never be so again.
“
Ich
gehe mit Euch,
” the Kaiser said privately to Conrad. “I am with you. The other powers are not ready; they will attempt nothing against it. In a couple of days you would be at Belgrade.”
Franz Ferdinand jealously observed the intimacy developing between Wilhelm and his general, and returned to Vienna that evening in something of a huff.
LEFT ALONE TO STAND against the gray Saxon sky in the days following, after the tents and platforms and bunting had been cleared away, the Leipzig memorial became an iconic shape, inspiring to Germans, Austrians, and Reichslanders, ludicrously overwrought to citizens of other countries.French comments had been especially scathing. It was not only the largest such pile since the days of Ancient Egypt, it was something new in its
völkisch
, ethnic quality, appealingless to memory of a particular battle than to the aspirations of a people who felt that their time for dominance had come.
An eruptive bigness, as of lava rising, seethed beneath the vineyards and farms and spotless towns of the Fatherland. Since the Franco-Prussian War, the population had burgeoned to sixty-eight million, twenty-nine million more than that of France. Its notable feature was a huge new middle
Similar Books
