Conrad Von Hetzendorf: The General Who Demanded War on Serbia 25 Times in a Year
Since January 1913 until June 1914 (i.e. before the Sarajevo assassination ) he formally demanded 25 times permission to attack Serbia and thus confirm the monarchy as a superpower, in order to prevent the disintegration of Monarchy [...]
Count Franz Conrad von Hotzendorf (1852-1925), Chief of the General Staff of the Austro-Hungarian Army at the outbreak of the First World War. Seen here with his Chief of Staff, General Muller. Date: circa 1914
In time when (on the occasion of the 100th anniversary since WWI ended) we face almost daily attempts to reinterpret and revision the role of Serbia in the outbreak of the Great War, all in order to push aside well established facts of who and what for the war started, it is Her majesty history that reminds us of Chief of staff of the Austro-Hungarian army, who was obsessed with the idea that the Austro-Hungarian empire can be preserved only if it attacks and conquers Serbia .
Relations between Serbia and Austro-Hungary were tense from the moment when the Congress of Berlin granted the black – Yellow empire the right to perform the occupation of Serbian land of Bosnia and Herzegovina ( 1878). , but only since the beginning of the 20th century we can speak of very bad relations between the two countries, which were on the brink of war, and often ‘spiced up’ with threats and war mobilizations.
The situation rapidly deteriorated after the Monarchy annexed Bosnia-Herzegovina ( 1908-1909 ), but also after the unhidden attitude, the Monarchy had: when it comes to Balkans and Serbs it won’t finish with Bosnia. The first military recruitment for war on Serbia Austria-Hungary performed in spring 1909, and another one in winter 1912, April 1913. and again in the fall.
Conrad von Hetzendorf: “Austria should make war on Serbia!” The general who formally demanded 25 times permission to attack Serbia in a year
Credits for this demonstration of force go to Chief of Staff of Austro-Hungarian army Conrad von Hetzendorf (General Count Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf ( 1852-1925). Since January 1913 until June 1914 (ie before the Sarajevo assassination ) he formally demanded 25 times permission to attack Serbia and thus confirm the monarchy as a superpower, in order to prevent the disintegration of Monarchy.Fon Hetzendorf was a favourite officer of Archduke Franz Ferdinand; he personally promoted him to Chief of staff. Conrad regularly proposed so-called ‘ preventative ‘ or surprise wars directed against the supposed enemies of the Austro – Hungarian monarchy, rarely Italy and permanently Serbia. To get the idea of what kind of man the Chief of Staff General Count Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf was, let’s take a look where it’s been evidenced and described – Rebecca West and her book ‘Black Lamb and Grey Falcon’.
”Conrad was a man without reason and grace, who saw himself as a great soldier and statesman, so he considered he’s capable of making plans for the country’s foreign policy. Konrad was obsessed with the idea that it must preserve Austria-Hungary by taking offensive action against Serbia“, Rebecca West writes.
Some other history books suggest that Chief of Staff of the Austrian army Conrad von Hötzendorf had a strange emotional relationship he was hoping to get regularized by returning to Austria as a war hero. But the new book “Sleepwalkers,” by Christopher Clark, a very elaborated account of prewar history, tells the whole story:
“It started with a dinner party in 1907. Conrad was seated next to someone’s wife. He was at that time about 55 years old. His wife had died in 1905, resulting in severe depression. Apparently, he enjoyed the conversation, because a week later he presented himself at the lady ’s home and announced that he intended to marry her. She replied that she had seven commitments — e.g., a husband and six children. He said if she didn’t give him hope, if she refused him utterly, he would resign his job and retire from public life and never be seen again.
They compromised. She would continue as she was but consider a change if things changed in the future. In fact, they did start an affair sometime later. He wanted her to divorce, however and thought that returning as a war hero might regularize this situation, in some way, so a divorce would be socially acceptable. “
But there’s more about it – the 3000 letters he wrote to the woman! After his death in 1915 at age 73, and completely unbeknown to his lover, some 3000 letters addressed to her were found in his apartment. Some were 60 pages long; sometimes he wrote several times a day. The author of “Sleepwalkers” says they were ”repetitive, obsessive claims of adoration forever, over and over, with emphasis on his depression and despair and dependency on her for any relief from all this.” Repetitive and obsessive also were Conrad’s continual calls for war against Serbia. Conrad called for preventive war against Serbia 25 times in 1913 alone. Emperor Josef fired him for this strange obsession during 1911, because he constantly badgered the foreign minister Aehrenthal about making war on Serbia. He was very proud of never deviating and always started his letters with the claim that he never changed his mind — Austria should make war on Serbia!
Amazingly, the Emperor rehired him after 18 months!! Austria must have had a severe shortage of trained people: the foreign minister Count Berchtold served only reluctantly.
In the first memorandum addressed to the Emperor Franz Jozef in 1907. (seven years before the WW I) Fon Hetzendorf wrote, that
“We have to take advantage of the first opportunity to attack before this most vulnerable opponent (Serbia) get enough arms which could result in the disintegration of the Monarchy.”
Only this sentence is sufficient counter-argument to those willing to (ab)use the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War in order to distort history. Because he called for the destruction of Serbia, rising Slavic state, almost a full decade before the Sarajevo assassination. He was obsessed with Serbia.
After the first memorandum ( 1907). within the next seven years, Austro-Hungarian Chief of General Staff ’s obsession with Serbia has grown into a mania. He wrote again and again and urged the emperor to attack Serbia. In the Memorandum dated 28. October in 1912. Fon Hetzendorf proposes that Serbia
“must lose its independence and has to be forced to hand over her fate to the Habsburgs. That’s the core of the Austrian solution for the Balkans.”
According to Fon Hetzendorf, Serbia should have been fragmented into Raška area (or Sandžak as Ottomans called it) and western Serbia that should belong to Austria; Nis and Pirot area to Bulgaria; and eastern parts of Serbia – between the Morava and Timok rivers – to Romania.
What’s amazing is the number of documents Fon Hetzendorf sent to the King, crown prince and the Austro-Hungarian government, which – without exception – were calling for an attack and destruction of Serbia.
Such behaviour of the first man in the Austro-Hungarian Army was in line with a long-standing policy of the Austrian Military party, informal and interest-based society which consisted of the Austro-Hungarian General Staff of the Army, the Christian Social Party, the radical wing of the Roman Catholic Church and the clique around Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
All this indicates that Fon Hetzendorf was much more of the Chief of Staff: he was a warmonger and one of the most responsible people for Europe and the world sliding into the Great War.
Origins of images: Facebook, Twitter, Wikimedia, Wikipedia, Flickr, Google, Imageinjection, Public Domain & Pinterest.
Read our Disclaimer/LegalStatement!
DonatetoSupportUs
We would like to ask you to consider a small donation to help our team keep working. We accept no advertising and rely only on you, our readers, to keep us digging the truth on history, global politics and international relations.
There have been at least two countries in Europe in recent history that undertook ‘anti-terrorist’ military operations against ‘separatists’, but got two very different reactions from the Western elite.The government of European country A launches what it calls an‘anti-terrorist’ military operation against ‘separatists’ in one part of the country. We see pictures on Western television of people’s homes being shelled and lots of people fleeing. The US and UK and other NATO powers fiercely condemn the actions of the government of country A and accuse it of carrying out ‘genocide’ and ’ethnic cleansing’ and say that there is an urgent ...
As Europe’s longest ruler, it is a surprise that Milo Djukanovic is only 58. He has served as prime minister or president of various iterations of Montenegro since 1991 – spanning the collapse of Yugoslavia and across and beyond independence of the nation in 2006.What is the secret to Mr Djukanovic’s success? The answer is depressingly predictable: clientelism and the buying – or, depending on your perspective, stealing – of power.The beauty of Montenegro hides this ugly truth. Most know it as a tourist idyll with pristine beaches, crystal lakes and picturesque mountains. But holidaymakers rarely realize they enter less ...
The U.S. Has Only Been At Peace For 21 Years Total Since Its BirthIn 2011, Danios wrote:Below, I have reproduced a year-by-year timeline of America’s wars, which reveals something quite interesting: since the United States was founded in 1776, she has been at war during 214 out of her 235 calendar years of existence. In other words, there were only 21 calendar years in which the U.S. did not wage any wars.To put this in perspective:* Pick any year since 1776 and there is about a 91% chance that America was involved in some war during that calendar year.* No U.S. president truly qualifies as a ...
In theory, the global financial system is supposed to help every country gain. Mainstream teaching of international finance, trade and “foreign aid” (defined simply as any government credit) depicts an almost utopian system uplifting all countries, not stripping their assets and imposing austerity. The reality since World War I is that the United States has taken the lead in shaping the international financial system to promote gains for its own bankers, farm exporters, its oil and gas sector, and buyers of foreign resources – and most of all, to collect on debts owed to it.Each time this global system has ...
The missile attack on a US ship off the coast of Yemen was a major news event, but the subsequent follow up story, that it may never have happened, was either ignored by mainstream media or intentionally covered up. The whole thing has the same odor as the Gulf of Tonkin incident that never occurred.Does history repeat itself? Sure does seem like it. That is if you compare America’s entry into the Vietnam civil war, with America’s latest entry into the war in Yemen.Don’t be mistaken, we have been at war with Yemen for a year now. America sided with ...
June 5 marks the 50th anniversary of Israel’s Six-Day War of conquest. Any objective examination of that war, and the events leading to and following it, make clear that the dominant narrative in the United States is reality turned upside down. It is “fake news” that is perpetrated on the public by the corporate media continually, right up to the present day.The Six Day War began on June 5, 1967. Israel launched the war against Egypt, Syria and Jordan with what could correctly called a “sneak attack,” although it is never referred to that way here. In the vocabulary of ...
“ … war in our time is always indiscriminate, a war against innocents, a war against children.”(Howard Zinn, 1922-2010.)“All war represents a failure of diplomacy.” (Tony Benn, MP. 1925-2014.)“No country too poor, too small, too far away, not to be threat, a threat to the American way of life.” (William Blum, “Rogue State.”) The mention of one tiny country appears to strike at the rationality and sanity of those who should know far better. On Sunday, 6th August, for example, The Guardian headed an editorial: “The Guardian view on sanctions: an essential tool.” Clearly the average of five thousands souls a month, the majority ...
Imperialism and colonialismOne of the focal historical features of the western (West European) civilization was and is imperialistic colonization followed by the brutal social, economic, political, financial, etc. exploitation of the local peoples and their cultures.By some academic understanding and formal definition, imperialism is a process of extending a nation-state’s power by territorial occupation or by forming political, financial, economic, etc., hegemony (rule) over other people. In more simple words, imperialism is defined as the cases when one state (nation-state) controls the inhabitants and territory of another state (neighboring or overseas). In any case, the cardinal feature of imperialism is ...
Milo Djukanovic’s thirty-year-old authoritarian kleptocracy is killing Podgorica's Democratic efforts.Largely unnoticed in the wake of events in the Middle-East and the impeachment drama, another crisis is brewing in the Balkans. In Montenegro, thousands of people have been protesting a new law passed by the Montenegrin parliament and signed into effect by the country’s longtime strongman, Milo Djukanovic, which gives the government authority over properties that religious organizations in the country have been using for at least a century. Evidence of the problems the controversial new law creates can be seen in the widespread condemnation it has received from individuals such ...
As recounted in the unjustly neglected German television report “It Began with a Lie,” in April 1999, in the midst of NATO’s illegal bombing campaign against what had remained of Yugoslavia, then German Defense Minister Rudolf Scharping repeatedly accused the Serbian side of installing a Nazi-style “concentration camp” in the soccer stadium in Pristina, the capital of Serbia’s Kosovo and Metohija province. Pressed by the media for proof, Scharping offered “witness testimony” – which he never subsequently produced.A month earlier, just as the bombing had started, Scharping stated that “we never would have taken military action if there weren’t this ...
Just as the Republican convention demonized Hillary (“Lock Her Up”), so the Democrats are demonizing Donald Trump. They refuse to support any policy that he backs, even when he says something progressive.One might think that at least Bernie’s supporters would applaud Trump’s left-wing transformation of the old conservative, pro-corporate neocon Cheney-Bush core of the Republican Party. But nobody had a single good word to say about Trump’s assertions that he would wind down confrontation with Russia, reduce military spending on the grounds that NATO is obsolete, and oppose the TPP and TTIP as well as rewrite NAFTA’s terms.The Democrats are ...
Origins of images: Facebook, Twitter, Wikimedia, Wikipedia, Flickr, Google, Imageinjection, Public Domain & Pinterest.Read our Disclaimer/Legal Statement!Donate to Support UsWe would like to ask you to consider a small donation to help our team keep working. We accept no advertising and rely only on you, our readers, to keep us digging the truth on history, global politics and international relations.[wpedon id="4696" align="left"]SaveSave
In 2003, America (and its lap-dog UK) invaded and destroyed Iraq on the basis of lies to the effect that the U.S. (and UK) regime were certain that Saddam Hussein had and was developing weapons of mass destruction. These U.S. allegations were based on provable falsehoods when they were stated and published, but the regime's 'news'-media refused to publish and demonstrate (or "expose") any of these lies. That's how bad the regime was (and its media's 'news' were) — this was virtually a total lock-down against truth, and for international conquest (in that case, of Iraq): it was mass-murder and ...
The stars came out in Hollywood on November 2nd, or at least some of them did. The gala event celebrated the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and raised funds to support its mission in Israel itself and on the occupied West Bank. The organization being fêted was the Friends of the Israel Defense Forces (FIDF), which has fourteen regional offices in the United States and operates under the slogan “Their job is to look after Israel. Our job is to look after them.” In attendance were Arnold Schwarzenegger and actor Gerald Butler. Entertainment was provided by the singer Seal.Hollywood Jewish royalty ...
Being attacked from two sides simultaneously (terrorism and Russian threat) Europe has to decide what to do first: to counter terrorism or increasing Russian might. Choosing the priority is the most difficult challenge for the European States today. But Europe should make choice because states' budgets are not bottomless.It is obvious, that as soon as the terrorism problem comes to the fore, NATO (first of all the US) diverts attention to other matters, such as the necessity to boost defence expenditures because of Russia, Syria, Afghanistan and other "annoying" countries.It can be easily explained by the burden the country has ...
“In the event of a nuclear war, there will be no chances, there will be no survivors – all will be obliterated… nuclear devastation is not science fiction – it is a matter of fact. The world now stands on the brink of the final abyss. Let us all resolve to take all possible practical steps to ensure that we do not, through our own folly, go over the edge.” Former First Sea Lord, Lord Louis Mountbatten (1900-1979) Strasbourg, 11 May 1979.”As US threats ratchet up towards North Korea, the latest hinging on the accusation that the country attempted a ...
The entire sand-castle (a product of Obama CIA Director John Brennan’s imagination) the “Russians hacked the election” is finally washing away with an incoming tide. How this plays out is anyone’s guess.The open question is, how the new information will be leveraged, if it were to actually break into the open widely, with the bad boy Trump essentially captured by the surreal evil that surrounds him. Other than pure evil (e.g. Mike Pence), only a narcissist or a fool would ever desire to be president of this particular USA republic. In ‘The Donald’, we have both.1 August 2017 an audio ...
The focal questions about war In dealing from both theoretical and practical points of view about war, at least six fundamental questions arise: 1) What is war?; 2) What types of war exist?; 3) Why do wars occur?; 4) What is the connection between war and justice?; 5) The question of war crimes?; and 6) Is it possible to replace war with the so-called “perpetual peace”?Probably, up to today, the most used and reliable understanding of war is its short but powerful definition by Carl von Clausewitz:“War is merely the continuation of politics by other means” [On War, 1832]. It can be ...
‘Blowing from a Gun’ depicted by Vasily Vereshchagin in his painting ‘Suppression of the Indian Revolt by the English’ on the rebellion of 1857. Queen Victoria’s agent bought this painting, in an attempt to suppress it. ‘Blowing from the Gun’ was a means of execution where the prisoner is tied to the muzzle of a cannon, which is then fired, popping the victim’s head about 15 meters (50 feet) into the air, apparently a sort of juvenile entertainment for the colonizers.Following colonization, along came ‘decolonization’ and what do you suppose happened with colonial borders? They mostly remained as laid down ...
In Kill Anything that Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam (Metropolitan Books. New York. 2013), Turse writes that the US military’s official position, and the popular understanding in the US, is that leadership “has never condoned wanton killing or disregard for human life.” (2) On the rare occasions when atrocities are brought to light, they are blamed on low-level individuals and are said to be aberrations having nothing to do with official policy. The My Lai massacre, for example, was blamed on Lieutenant William Calley, who is said to have gone “crazy” (4,5) – although he and his unit ...