Mitteilungen des Österreichischen Staatsarchivs 52. (2007)

FRIED, Marvin Benjamin: Feldmarschall Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf: A Memoir Analysis

ground.”156 But wherein exactly lie the differences between the “at a low level standing eastern peoples”157 as opposed to the “high western culture”158? Conrad does not answer this question, but insists that it was the Monarchy’s “historic mission”159 to “defend the western culture against the inundation by the Hordes4 of the East.”160 While it is true that the eastern European peoples were less advanced at the time, it is also clear that pure racism flows from these lines. Much like the imperial Russian and later Soviet political aims, while different in name, were in fact largely identical, the WWI-era German and Austrian racism against Slavs is translated into the hatred of Bolshevism by the Nazis and is, from the Austrian side, very clearly expressed by Conrad. He awaited the “collapse of Europe”161 as a result of the “awakening of the Asian nations,”162 feeling this would be the same as an “awakening of the black race in America.”163 He specifically identifies Austria- Hungary and Germany as a “protective barrier” or “defensive shield”164 against Asian culture, which he deems “an unhealthy half-culture.”165 He views “Central Europe [Mitteleuropa]”166 as the “cultured humanity [Kulturmenschheit]”167 in which the “Germanic-Roman”168 fights the eastern “Russian-Mongolian-Tartar.”169 Interestingly, while no European peoples except the Finns, Estonians, and the Hungarians have an ethnic heritage traceable to the nomadic Mongolians, all of the Great Powers except the Russians identified each other as ‘Hun’ or sub-cultured in an effort to discredit them. So, too, Comad argues that the peoples of the East are culturally inferior and that the “Nations that are the carriers of high culture”170 should be allowed to, if necessary by force, control the ‘inferior’ nations of the east. It is a very small step from “nations of low culture” to ‘subhuman,’ and, as we will see, Comad eventually comes extremely close to the Nazi ‘Übermensch [superhuman]’ concept, stopping just short of stating it outright. This is probably less

Feldmarschall Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf

156 Conrad von Hötzendorf, Franz: Private Aufzeichnungen, Pg. 158.

157 Ibid, Pg. 69.

158 Ibid, Pg. 69.

159 Ibid, Pg. 157.

160 Ibid, Pg. 157.

161 Ibid, Pg. 151.

162 Ibid, Pg. 151.

163 Ibid, Pg. 151.

164 For example on lb id, Pg. 82and212.

165 Ibid, Pg. 212.

166 Ibid, Pg. 201,212.

167 Ibid, Pg. 219.

168 Ibid, Pg. 163.

169 Ibid, Pg. 163.

170 Ibid, Pg. 219.

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