Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

[Attrition]

~~~~~The German general staff hoped for victory in the west within six weeks.~~~~~

Really? How is the tradition of playing military campaigns by ear to be reconciled with a timetable?

[glenn239]

As they expected Russia to mobilise if Austria went to war with Serbia, and never made Russia aware of this 'doctrine' that even the leaders in Germany did not agree on until the last two days of the crisis, Russia can hardly be blamed for crossing a line nmobody had told them existed.

I'm not interested in another installment of the never ending debate of Russian mobilization. The fact is that Germany considered this an act of war and structured its July policy around it, and declared war only after it was ordered and the Russians refused to rescind it.

The policy of the Central Powers was for war, war on the best terms they could get, but war in all cases, as Berchtold said, a diplomatic victory would be worse than a military defeat!

The CP policy was for a 3rd Balkans War if possible. A diplomatic 'victory' of the 1909 sort was what Berchtold was referring to as useless, so the diplomatic conditions he set out for Serbia in the note were much stiffer than those of 1909.

As Bethmann stated to Reizler that his hope was for Russia to react and then not be supported by Britain or France, which in turn would lead to Russia walking away from the Entente, making her ripe for luring into a German alliance, I think the description 'shatter' quite appropriate. You may well live in La La Land, but we can always put our respective views up for a popular vote to see who does live in a state of delusion? Up to you.

The objective of the July 1914 policy was a localised Austro-Serbian war without Great Power intervention. Whether this could strip Russia from its alliance with France was up to Russia to decide, so could not form the basis of a German plan of action. In terms of Bethmann's political objectives, when faced with the prospect of Russian mobilization he attempted to implement 'Halt in Belgrade', which may have averted the Russian move and defused the crisis into a more localised version of a localised war, but Halt in Belgrade would have left the Serbian army intact, so would not have served any policy to sunder the Entente.

Rather curious you wished to bring up my position here as I have not used my status to dictate anything about the discussion.
I guess a lot depends on who exactly you class as 'Germany' and who inside Germany may have wanted to put out a false narrative that could lead to Apis believing Franz-Ferdinand was leading the war party. It doesnt need a head of state to be involved to have someone act.

It's a tinfoil hat theory.

Really? Slobodan has already mentioned it was brought up at the time of his arrest, and that it also seems to have been mentioned at another time too.

Slobodan has plenty of quotes of other people putting unverified words into Apis's mouth after he was dead, sure. But what actually happened in May-June 1914? That's more uncertain. In terms of what Apis was forced to say, "after his arrest", remember that Apis was arrested on false charges in a nonsense plot to murder the king. The purpose of this garbage accusation was to murder Apis after getting a nonsense confession. Looks to me like a classic frame up job - kill the patsie then you can say whatever you want. What other conclusion can be reached as most likely but a frame-up job to be implemented over Apis's dead body, so that the truth couldn't get in the way of making Yugoslavia? Do you think Slobodan parading endless variations of marginal theories to great fanfare causes anyone to take their eye off the ball?

[glenn239]

As I had promised to find this particular quote for someone, here is the most egregious case of lying I am aware of on this site, the poster himself even adding nice colours so the lie stands out even more, a very clear case of editing history in order to make a case for personal bias being factual. Given he had also posted the full quote without the additions, it was certainly not a case of a mistake, and no source was ever provided despite the promise of 'sources 'til the cows come home' - they are at present twelve years late for milking!

"I am authorised to give an assurance that if the German fleet comes into the Channel or through the North Sea to undertake hostile operations against the French coasts or shipping, the British fleet will give all the protection in its power. If they come out we shall behave as though we are at war.This assurance is, of course, subject to the policy of his Majesty's Government receiving the support of Parliament, and must not be taken as binding his Majesty's Government to take any action until the above contingency of action by the German fleet takes place."

Additions to the HoC in red.
Ommissions in blue.

http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... 5#p1406065

If I had been staff member at the time such a case of outright altering a quote, easily checked in Hansard, would lead to a ban from the site. As it is the post is locked to prevent alteration so it can stand as a mark of shame for all to see.

Dunno. The blue isn't what's in the original BD. The French version on 2nd August matches the British version and does not contain the blue text. The French account of what Grey said from August 3rd is from French Yellow Book, no. 143,

" In case the German fleet came into the Channel or entered the North Sea in order to go round l the British Isles with the object of attacking the French coasts or the French navy and of harassing French merchant shipping, the British fleet would intervene in order to give to French.shipping its complete protection, in such a way that from that moment Great Britain and Germany would be in a state of war."

More like the missing blue text in editorial tone, but still not the same. The poster did not explain his source and the phrase appears nowhere on Google except Axis History Forum. (Edit - the poster did explain himself, I just missed it. He said that the blue text was said over the phone and his proof was the 3rd August telegram, no. 143. This has to be wrong as Grey did not say the 3rd August stuff until 3rd August, (the 2 August French report is like the 2 August British report, not the 3 August French report).

In terms of the support of Parliament, another French document (no. 145) is interesting,

The House will this evening vote the credit which is asked for; from this moment its support is secured to the policy of the Government

This suggests that what Grey meant on 2 August by the support of Parliament was not a vote in Parliament on the policy itself, but rather the voting of the requested war funds.

[Slobodan Cekic]

If you listen to an 'Serbien muß Sterbien" kind of the CPs proponent talking about Serbs and their dangerous attitude to to Austria-Hungary at the XX century beginning, you can almost imagine the hundreds of thousands of Serbs with turbans and tons of coffee and tobacco, camping below the Vienna city walls and smoking so heavily during the city-siege, that the clouds of the gray tobacco smoke were enough of a danger for the survival of the Viennese peaceful citizenry already.

But the things have been exactly the other way around, though. It has been Austria, a great power, camping and maneuvering on the borders of it's small neighbor, although I cannot say whether they smoked anything and what. Austria did not like Serbia for giving a bad example to their Slavic citizens - it was independent.

Here is how the historian Dusan Batakovic puts it:

"The main threat to Serbia’s very existence was multinational Austria-Hungary, which thwarted Belgrade’s aspirations at every turn. The Tariff
War (1906–1911), the annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina (1908), and the coercing of Serbia to cede her territorial gains in northern Albania (1912–1913) were but episodes of this fixed policy."

Austrians did not need an independent Slavic country in their neighborhood, because the Czechs, Poles or Austrian Serbs could start getting ideas. The best thing Serbia could do to suit the AH wishes was to dissolve into thin air; second best was to wilt until the first best finally happens.

Serbia was an Austrian vassal state in the second half of the XIX century, and despite, or maybe just because of her faithful following of the Austrian directives, experienced a period of economic, general and national stagnation, which started looking dangerous even for the survival of the country.

As the Austrians understood that Peter Karadjordjevic, who promised them his undying loyalty in exchange for the support of his coming to the Throne in 1903, is in actuality a liberal looking for support in France and Russia, the trouble began. That happened really fast, as the French won the competition to deliver the cannon to Serbs a couple of years later. French Schneider was simply better, but AH was not accustomed to losing competitions in Serbia.

After that, customs wars, war threats, manoeuvres, everything but a kitchen sink, and after the I Balkan war, the kitchen sink as well.
It is always astounding to me, that this attitude seems to be such an undying one by some admirers of the great empire. Are they ever going to be capable of forgiving the Serbs that their Empire dissolved, I ask myself?

[Slobodan Cekic]

~~~~~The German general staff hoped for victory in the west within six weeks.~~~~~

Really? How is the tradition of playing military campaigns by ear to be reconciled with a timetable?

I do not understand what you mean. Helmuth von Moltke had a nervous breakdown as it got clear to him the Schlieffen had failed.
I would say he had hoped it works, and very much, at that.

I cannot see what the article author said wrongly.

Moltke had not all the time of the world to hack at the Schlieffen, and you know that.

[glenn239]

I do not understand what you mean. Helmuth von Moltke had a nervous breakdown as it got clear to him the Schlieffen had failed.
I would say he had hoped it works, and very much, at that.

Actually Moltke had a meltdown on 1 August, before the war even began. This suggests to me that Moltke was prone to nervous collapses. When he broke down in September 1914, do rest assured he did not bring the rest of the army with him. Niether Falkenhayn, Hindenburg, nor Ludendorff believed the situation so dire, and the war continued after Moltke's resignation.

[Terry Duncan]

I'm not interested in another installment of the never ending debate of Russian mobilization. The fact is that Germany considered this an act of war and structured its July policy around it, and declared war only after it was ordered and the Russians refused to rescind it.

Never mind. Germany acted as it did and is thus responsible in a very large share for the war, which of course is something most people other than yourself agree with, whilst you seem to always be trying to undrestate the German responsibility whilst finding ways to blame others. As to telling Russia to cease mobilising, they must have known it was impossible to do, as they refused to stop their own for exactly the same reasons Sazonov states only a couple of days later. Somehow Russia was expected to do in twelve hours something Germany knew would take a minimum of forty eight to do anything, and stated was totally impossible for them to do under any time scale! Hypocritical nonsense.

The CP policy was for a 3rd Balkans War if possible.

And a General War if they couldnt have a local war entirely on their terms, something they felt so unlikely to start with that they had to issue the blank cheque in the first place!

A diplomatic 'victory' of the 1909 sort was what Berchtold was referring to as useless, so the diplomatic conditions he set out for Serbia in the note were much stiffer than those of 1909.

Strange, Berchtold should have noticed you hiding in the waste basket when he stated his thoughts, he seemed to specify the solution to the recent Balkan Wars was his objection as Austria did not approve of the peace settlement terms as Serbia came off well from them. Amusing you know better what Berchtold meant than he did himself, presumably we can dispense with all of the things Berchtold said and come to you for direct interpretations from now on, relying on the minutes you took from your hiding place?

The objective of the July 1914 policy was a localised Austro-Serbian war without Great Power intervention. Whether this could strip Russia from its alliance with France was up to Russia to decide, so could not form the basis of a German plan of action.

Strange Bethmann felt able to state that was his purpose behind his policy then! Not only do you override Berchtolds own words, but now you override Bethmann's too! Maybe Berchtold should have said 'Who rules in Berlin? Bethmann, Moltke, or Glenn?'

In terms of Bethmann's political objectives, when faced with the prospect of Russian mobilization he attempted to implement 'Halt in Belgrade', which may have averted the Russian move and defused the crisis into a more localised version of a localised war, but Halt in Belgrade would have left the Serbian army intact, so would not have served any policy to sunder the Entente.

Bethmann's first attempt at Halt in Belgrade, the one when Russia was obviously going to intervene, was to totally re-write the Kaisers original proposal to mean the Note had to be accepted in full, plus Belgrade be occupied, whilst it was only with the acceptance Britain was also going to intervene that he decided to moderate his policy. The first part of this action would have led to Britain and France to not support Russia in Bethmann's mind, thus being a continuation of his original policy. The latter moderation was only when he realised he had lost control of the situation and Berchtold was determined to cash the cheque Bethmann had been so stupid to have issued without conditions in the first place.

Incidently, Halt in Belgrade was impossible from an Austrian point of view as they had no troops able to occupy Belgrade, they were all mustered on the western frontier instead due to the Austrian mobilisation plan!

It's a tinfoil hat theory.

Which still doesnt explain why you thought my position as staff was of any importance at all to the discussion?

Slobodan has plenty of quotes of other people putting unverified words into Apis's mouth after he was dead, sure. But what actually happened in May-June 1914? That's more uncertain. In terms of what Apis was forced to say, "after his arrest", remember that Apis was arrested on false charges in a nonsense plot to murder the king. The purpose of this garbage accusation was to murder Apis after getting a nonsense confession. Looks to me like a classic frame up job - kill the patsie then you can say whatever you want. What other conclusion can be reached as most likely but a frame-up job to be implemented over Apis's dead body, so that the truth couldn't get in the way of making Yugoslavia? Do you think Slobodan parading endless variations of marginal theories to great fanfare causes anyone to take their eye off the ball?

Your efforts to divert here do nothing to distract from the fact that Princip and Co all stated to the Austrians that they had believed Franz-Ferdinand to be leading the war party when they came up with their plot in the first place, and that this matches the belief of Apis, who they never met. Strange so many people thought the same way, and they were not alone in Serbia or Austria it seems.

As to tin foil hat theories, how about the one where Berchtold and Bethmann didnt know what they meant to achieve or what diplomatic results were unacceptable to them? Someone here seems to give that 'theory' rather a lot of time!

[Terry Duncan]

Dunno. The blue isn't what's in the original BD. The French version on 2nd August matches the British version and does not contain the blue text.

Of course it doesnt, Hansard doesnt mention the blue text either (it was a statement in the Commons after all), Chronos20th made it up and tried to pass it off as 'inside information' like he did with so many of his inventions, and then vanished for a while when asked to support his claims with sources!

[Terry Duncan]

I do not understand what you mean. Helmuth von Moltke had a nervous breakdown as it got clear to him the Schlieffen had failed.
I would say he had hoped it works, and very much, at that.

Actually Moltke had a meltdown on 1 August, before the war even began. This suggests to me that Moltke was prone to nervous collapses. When he broke down in September 1914, do rest assured he did not bring the rest of the army with him. Niether Falkenhayn, Hindenburg, nor Ludendorff believed the situation so dire, and the war continued after Moltke's resignation.

Moltke the Younger's prediction that 'we have lost the war' matched perfectly with the verdict of Moltke the Elder and the GGS that Germany could not possibly win a long war scenario where Britain was involved, and even one without British involvement was unlikely to see Germany win a long war scenario. The war continued because once started, nobody knew or had the ability to turn it off again.

[Slobodan Cekic]

A quote from another Batakovic's paper: ('Storm over Serbia - the rivalry between civillian and military authorities 1911-1914)

Te relationship between Apis and the Young Bosnians during their stay in Belgrade has remained unclear. Apis seems to have never met the future assassins, and his support for their plans was probably more theoretical than practical. Had Apis really wanted them to proceed with the assassination, he would have probably given them the necessary instructions himself. Despite having been urged by Apis’ s emissaries to abort their mission, the Young Bosnians, true to their revolutionary outlook, remained determined to murder the Archduke in order to demonstrate their opposition to the colonial rule of Austria-Hungary in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Apis later confided, with considerable discomfort, to his close friend, Antonije Antić, that he had been unaware of the Young Bosnians’ determination to carry out the assassination and explained that he had only wanted them to frighten the Archduke.130 The controversy, however, continues. To a great extent, it is the murky role of other officials, former members of the defunct Black Hand, whose assistance to the Young Bosnians was instrumental, that accounts for the controversy. In contrast to Apis, his right-hand associate Vojislav Tankosić stated after his arrest that the assassination had been carried out as an act “against Pašić”, which firmly places the whole issue into the context of military-civilian rivalry in Serbia.131 Austria-Hungary’s reaction which eventually led to the Great War was a prelude to the long-planned war against Serbia.

Storm_over_Serbia_the_rivalry_between_ci.pdf

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[Attrition]

I do not understand what you mean. Helmuth von Moltke had a nervous breakdown as it got clear to him the Schlieffen had failed.
I would say he had hoped it works, and very much, at that.

Actually Moltke had a meltdown on 1 August, before the war even began. This suggests to me that Moltke was prone to nervous collapses. When he broke down in September 1914, do rest assured he did not bring the rest of the army with him. Niether Falkenhayn, Hindenburg, nor Ludendorff believed the situation so dire, and the war continued after Moltke's resignation.

Moltke the Younger's prediction that 'we have lost the war' matched perfectly with the verdict of Moltke the Elder and the GGS that Germany could not possibly win a long war scenario where Britain was involved, and even one without British involvement was unlikely to see Germany win a long war scenario. The war continued because once started, nobody knew or had the ability to turn it off again.

I don't think they expected to win but to not lose....

[Slobodan Cekic]

What you asked for, Terry; This is another paper from Batakovic, dealing with the Salonika process. On the pdf page 16, (book page 287 ) is what you asked for, once more. The whole document below. My translation more exact, btw

"After having been tortured in the jail, Rade Malobabic, the alleged perpetrator of the failed attempt of assassination, admitted that he was only following the orders of Colonel Dragutin Dimitrijevic Apis, while Mehmedbasic, the alleged accomplice, courageously denied ail charges. After being "friendly" advised by Colonel Petar Zivkovic, his former friend and the informai head of the White Hand, Colonel Apis, accepted to submit a written statement on their previous cooperation. By this far-reaching statement Colonel Apis was hoping not only ta protect his long-time loyal followers, but also to provoke a withdrawal of the main charges against him at the Salonica trial.
"Feeling that Austria was planning a war with us, I thought that the disappearance of the Austrian Heir Apparent would weaken the power of military clique he headed, and thus the danger of war would be removed or postponed for a while. I engaged Malobabic to organize the assassination on the occasion of the announced arrivaI of Franz Ferdinand ta Sarajevo. 1 made up my mind about this only when Artamanov [The Russian Military Attaché in Serbia] assured me that Russia would not leave us without protection if we were attacked by Austria. On this occasion I did not mention my intention for the assassination, and my motive for asking his opinion about Russia's attitude was the possibility that Austria might become aware of our activities, and use this as a pretext to attack us."

The_Salonica_Trial_1917._Black_Hand_vs..pdf

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I am not posting these documents because I think I know exactly to what conclusion they may lead, regarding the subject; because I don't. You can take a look at them and think them over a bit if you wish. Am certain things 'll occur to you that would not have occurred to me.
I suspect Apis has not been telling the full truth to anyone, and that he was closest to it with his closest friends, like Antonije Antic. His way of thinking beats me, as well. I suppose the mentalities changed more than I thought in a full century since, and anyway, Apis was enigmatic even to his contemporaries.

[Slobodan Cekic]

I do not understand what you mean. Helmuth von Moltke had a nervous breakdown as it got clear to him the Schlieffen had failed.
I would say he had hoped it works, and very much, at that.

Actually Moltke had a meltdown on 1 August, before the war even began. This suggests to me that Moltke was prone to nervous collapses. When he broke down in September 1914, do rest assured he did not bring the rest of the army with him. Niether Falkenhayn, Hindenburg, nor Ludendorff believed the situation so dire, and the war continued after Moltke's resignation.

Moltke the Younger's prediction that 'we have lost the war' matched perfectly with the verdict of Moltke the Elder and the GGS that Germany could not possibly win a long war scenario where Britain was involved, and even one without British involvement was unlikely to see Germany win a long war scenario. The war continued because once started, nobody knew or had the ability to turn it off again.

I don't think they expected to win but to not lose....

Well, if I remember the prophetic words of Moltke about 'laceration and destruction of Europe'..who could say he has not lost, after such a war? I am just imagining a nuclear war, and a side or sides declaring anything, that they won, lost, have not lost, or whatever.

[Attrition]

Considering that Moltke the Elder predicted a war where the winner was nearly as prostrate as the loser, not losing is a result.

[Slobodan Cekic]

Considering that Moltke the Elder predicted a war where the winner was nearly as prostrate as the loser, not losing is a result.

I meant Moltke the younger's prophecy about destruction of Europe. The older one said, correct me if wrong, after 1871, no one is going to be able to start a war in Europe without losing it.