Mitteilungen des Österreichischen Staatsarchivs 52. (2007)
FRIED, Marvin Benjamin: Feldmarschall Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf: A Memoir Analysis
Marvin Fried Hungary could have come apart peacefully. This, however, was not possible because of federalism and parliamentarianism. Conrad states that federalism “would have loosened the Empire to the point that breakup would have been the inevitable result.”46 Likewise, parliamentarianism was the “ground on which the disintegration of the Habsburg Monarchy began.”47 Thus he accuses the masses of a “natural flow” leading inevitably to what occurred in the Great War, because masses follow an “inner law”48 of social Darwinism. In Conrad’s opinion, only centralism, and as we will see of an almost fascist nature, is “the only form in which it seemed possible to maintain the Empire.”49 Finally Conrad comes to the greatest of his irritations, the “foreign nationals”50 of Austria-Hungary, so all non-Germanic citizens. Conrad again mentions a disclaimer that he “viewed the entire territory [of Austria-Hungary] identically as his fatherland,”51 but wastes no time in identifying by name the “corroding powers within: Czechs, Italians, Poles, Romanians, Serbs, Magyars, [...] priests, agitators, the press, [and] social democrats.”52 The “foreign nationals” had “turned their backs”53 on Austria-Hungary and were “deprecatory, alien, and even hostile towards us Germans.”54 Conrad thus blames all non-German nationalities for the fall of the empire, although with the exception of the Magyars (Hungarians) none had any real control of the government or military. He is nonetheless particularly angry with the Magyars, accusing them of having “done everything to damage Austria-Hungary’s armed forces,”55 and also being equally responsible for the outbreak of the war. He accuses Hungary of having been a model for other nationalities’ “independence efforts”56 and that the Dualism of 1867 was a formation of “Magyar overestimation.”57 But having succeeded at creating Dualism, Conrad accuses the Hungarians of the “suppression of non-Magyars”58 and of “magyarization and decimation of the non-Magyars,”59 such as the “abuse of Croatia.”60 Whether or not 46 Conrad von Hötzendorf, Franz: Private Aufzeichnungen, Pg. 132. 47 Ibid, Pg. 171. 48 Ibid, Pg. 220. 49 Ibid, Pg. 134. 50 Ibid, Pg. 102. 51 Ibid, Pg. 77. 52 Ibid, Pg. 91. 53 Ibid, Pg. 102. 54 Ibid, Pg. 175. 55 Ibid, Pg. 145. 56 Ibid, Pg. 131. 57 Ibid, Pg. 131. 58 Ibid, Pg. 132. 59 Ibid, Pg. 133. 60 Ibid, Pg. 132. 232
