Austria – Great History

Hitler’s Pre-War Expansions

By 1938, Adolf Hitler had turned his attention toward Central Europe. His policy of uniting ethnic Germans within a “Greater Germany” had already been proclaimed for years, and Austria was a central target of this ambition.

Austrian Nationalist Chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg had attempted to preserve Austrian independence while easing tensions with Germany. When the two met in February 1938, Hitler made clear that Austria’s sovereignty was no longer acceptable.

What is all this nonsense about your independence? Whether Austria is independent or not is not the question. There’s only one thing to discuss. Do you want the Anschluss brought about with bloodshed or without?
Hitler speaking with Schuschnigg

Schuschnigg announced a referendum on independence for 13 March, believing that a majority of Austrians would reject union with Germany. In response, Hitler ordered military preparations and demanded Schuschnigg’s resignation. Under threat of invasion and without support from Britain or France, Schuschnigg stepped down, and German troops entered Austria unopposed.

A photo of German soldiers driving through the Austrian streets

Although the annexation was achieved through intimidation and political coercion, it was not imposed on an entirely unwilling population. Austrian Nazis had been active for years, and many Austrians welcomed German forces with public celebrations. Another referendum held in April 1938 reported that 99.7 percent of voters approved of union with Germany, but the vote was conducted under conditions of propaganda, intimidation, and the exclusion of Jewish voters and political opponents. While many Austrians opposed annexation, a significant proportion supported it, particularly among German nationalists and Nazi sympathisers.

The consequences were immediate. Austrian Jews and political opponents were subjected to public humiliation, violence, and dispossession, often carried out by Austrian civilians as well as German authorities. In the weeks following the annexation, hundreds of Austrian Jews committed suicide, fearing worse under Nazi rule. Austria’s independence was destroyed, and its population was absorbed into the structures of the Nazi state.

Czechoslovakia was a democratic state with a modern army and extensive border fortifications, particularly in the Sudetenland, a mountainous region inhabited largely by ethnic Germans and held much of Czechoslovkia’s industry. With Austria annexed, Germany now surrounded the state of Czechoslovakia on three sides, who had open intentions about wanting to take Czechoslovakian territory. It was allied to France and had an agreement with the Soviet Union, but geographic and political realities weakened these arrangements. Soviet assistance would have required passage through Poland or Romania, both hostile to communism, and France showed little willingness to fight without British support.

Hitler claimed that ethnic Germans in the Sudetenland were oppressed and demanded that the territory be transferred to Germany. While minority grievances existed, the demand went far beyond cultural rights and threatened Czechoslovakia’s territorial integrity and security. Czechoslovakia appealed to Britain and France for support. Instead, both powers sought to avoid war by encouraging territorial concessions.

However much we may sympathise with a small nation confronted by a big and powerful neighbour, we cannot, in all circumstances, undertake to involve the whole British Empire in war simply on her account. If we have to fight, it must be on larger issues than that. I am myself a man of peace to the depths of my soul. Armed conflict between nations is a nightmare to me. But if I were convinced that any nation had made up its mind to dominate the world by fear of its force, I should feel that it should be resisted. And that such a domination like the people who believe in liberty, would not be worth living. But war is a fearful thing, and we must be very clear before we embark on it, that it is really the great issues that are at stake, and that a call to risk everything in their defense, when all the consequences are weighed, is irresistible.
Chamberlain’s statement on Czechoslovakia

In September 1938, Britain and France convened a conference with Germany and Italy to resolve the crisis. Czechoslovak representatives were not invited to attend. At the conference, Germany was granted the Sudetenland in return for Hitler’s promise that he would make no further territorial claims in Europe. British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain returned home declaring that the agreement had secured “peace in our time.” The settlement dismantled Czechoslovakia’s defences and transferred major industrial resources to Germany.

Neville Chamberlain waving the agreement

The loss of the Sudetenland left Czechoslovakia strategically and politically crippled. Hungary seized southern Slovak territories soon afterward, while Germany supported a separatist movement in Slovakia that resulted in the creation of a dependent Slovak state under German influence. In March 1939, German forces occupied the remaining Czech lands and transformed them into the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. This action demonstrated that Hitler’s promises at Munich had been tactical rather than sincere, and that his objectives extended beyond the unification of German-speaking populations.

At the same time, Germany exerted pressure on Lithuania over the Memel region, a small territory with a German-speaking population that had been detached from Germany after the First World War. In March 1939, Germany issued an ultimatum demanding its return. Lithuania, diplomatically isolated and facing overwhelming military superiority, ceded the territory without resistance.

The Basics of Trench Warfare

Initially, many trenches of World War 1 were glorified foxholes. But once the war began to set in, these trenches became more complex and became a vast system behind the front lines, including reserve trenches, dugouts and medical areas behind the trenches.

Trench warfare would tend to be very repetitive in nature. A battle would start with a large artillery bombardment from one side against the other. Many of these artillery barrages would cause Shell Shock or, as modern physcologists have called it, PTSD.

A British soldier suffering from Shell Shock

Then waves of troops would come over through an area called No Mans Land, the term for the empty land between the two trenches, which was often ravished by craters, barbed wire and dead trees. The guns from the defending side would open fire, usually massacring the wave. They offending side would then usually send wave after wave until they either gave up or captured the trench. Tens of thousands of lives would be lost, only to gain a few metres of land.

The trenches were often very crudely designed, as many suspected the war would not be long. Many had open mud on the floor, which would mean diseases such as trench foot would be spread. Rats were common place as well. However, the German trenches were considered to be more sturdy, being deeper and wider than the Allied trenches, allowing for better movement and cover. German trenches averaged around 12 feet in depth, whilst British ones averaged around 6 or 7 feet deep.

A drawing of a German Trench from a book

For when artillery fire came, bunkers were dug in, with the German ones being characterised as a lot more homely and comfortable.

By 1915, the true nature of the war began to set in and the trench fixtures became a lot more permanent. Machine gun turrets were set up and, eventually, the German’s began using the new weapon, chlorine gas. Poison gas was a key element of the war, despite it being illegal. Both sides would use this weapon on each other. Many died due to gas attacks and those who survived suffered later in life.

German Soldiers releasing some mustard gas

The Initial Eastern Offensive

The Russian Army had now fully mobilised, a lot earlier than Germany had expected. Now half their army was trapped in trenches in France whilst the other half dealt with the Russians. The Russian troops made an advance into Prussia but were swiftly crushed at Tannenberg, where 90,000 Russian troops were taken prisoner and an entire army was wiped out. Another victory at Masurian Lakes forces the Russians out of the region.

Further south, the conflict between Austria-Hungary and Serbia was going bad for Austria-Hungary due to a humiliating loss at the Battle of Cer. An offensive against Russia also fails and the Austro-Hungarians are pushed back, with a siege on Przemysl beginning not long after. The Germans, in an effort to distract the Russian forces, engaged in a series of battles at Lodz in modern day Poland.

Eventually, the Ottoman Empire, a large Middle Eastern Empire spanning Turkey, Jordan, Palestine, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and parts of Saudi Arabia, join the fighting on the side of Germany and Austria-Hungary, by sending some ships into the Black Sea, launching naval bombardments on the naval bases of Odessa and Sevastopol, while engaging with ground units on the Georgian border. Due to the vast length and low density of the line, trench warfare never set in like it did on the western front.

The Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand

In the early 20th Century, Europe began to split into two factions. France, The United Kingdom and Russia formed the Triple Entente. France wanted the region of Alsace Lorraine back, a wooded area that had been taken by Germany. Britain feared the size of Germany’s navy and were worried it could possibly rival the famous Royal Navy, which had ruled the waves for centuries. But all 3 countries feared the possible expansion of the German Empire, lead by Kaiser Wilhelm

Germany, the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Italy formed the Triple Alliance. Germany was fearing an all on attack, so made an alliance with Austria-Hungary, a vast yet fragile empire in the Balkan Sates that was nearing the brink of collapse. Italy wanted to reassert it’s old Roman claims, even if it meant at France’s expense. Tension began to rise and all Europe needed was one little push.

A map of Europe in 1914

June 28th, 1914. Heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Archduke Franz Ferdinand was coming to visit Sarajevo in Bosnia with his pregnant wife, Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg. A Bosnian terrorist organisation backed by the Serbian Government called the Black Hand decided to act. There were 6 people assigned to assassinate the Archduke as he drove on his motorcade to Sarajevo City Hall.

Muhamed Mehmedbašić
Vaso Čubrilović
Nedeljko Čabrinović
Cvjetko Popović
Trifko Grabež
Gavrilo Princip

These six men were coordinated by Danilo Ilić. Every assassin would be armed with a pistol, a bomb and a cyanide pill. Before the Archduke even got into town, things began to go awry. They were worried the weapons would not get there in time, as they were being smuggled in a sugar shipment to the city. However, the problem was they thought they sent the sugar to the wrong place. Eventually, the weapons did arrive in time.

A modern day map of the river in Sarajevo (Google Maps)

Eventually, the Archduke arrived in the town in an open top car. As he drove down Obala Kulina bana, the street leading up to the City Hall in the third car of a six car motorcade, two of the assassins, Muhamed and Vaso, were stationed next to each other on the side of the street furthest from the Milijacka River and Nedeljko was on the river side of the street. The Archduke passes Muhamed and Vaso. For some unkown reason, Muhamed, who the Archduke is first to pass, does nothing. Many historians suspect it was due to nerves. Vaso, possibly because Muhamed didn’t act, also does nothing.

Eventually, Nedeljko, steps out into the street, throwing a bomb at the Archduke’s car. However, the bomb bounced off the car, rolled into the street and exploded the car behind the Archduke, injuring the guards inside. Realising the plan had failed, Nedeljko takes the cyanide pill and leaps into the river in an effort to drown himself. However, not only was the cyanide pill out of date, the river was also in a dry season. So Nedeljko was now vomiting in knee deep water having just broken his legs from jumping off the bridge. The crowd, mad at the attempt on the Archduke’s life, swarmed him and nearly beat this vomiting crippled man to death, before the police stepped in.

The other 3 assassins, whose whereabouts were unknown during all this, scrammed. Gavrilo decided to make a stop at a local sandwich shop on the corner of Obala Kulina bana and Zelenih berekti. Meanwhile, the motorcade races down to the City Hall, where the Archduke was supposed to make a speech. He burst in, halfway through the mayor’s speech, interrupting him saying:

Mr Mayor, I came here to visit and I am greeted with bombs. It is outrageous.
Archduke Franz Ferdinand upon walking into City Hall

When he wanted to give his speech, he discovered that the speech had been left in the car that had just blown up, so someone was sent back to retrieve the speech, now covered in blood, and hand it to the Archduke. After the speech, the Archduke and a security team decided what to do next, who eventually decided to go back the way they came towards the hospital to see if the guards were doing alright. They all agreed upon this plan, got in their cars and drove away.

The Archduke was now sat in the back right seat of his car, with Sophie on the back left seat and a guard hanging onto the left side. However, for some unholy reason, everyone neglected to tell the drivers, so they continued on the scheduled route up to the museum, which would involve a right turn onto Zelenih berekti. Just outside the sandwich shop, the guard noticed that they had made a wrong turn. Back in these days, there was no reverse on cars so the driver had to get out of the car and push. Around this time, Gavrilo left the shop and noticed his target stopped right in front of him, with his only guard on the other side of the car. Gavrilo took his chance and, with his pistol, shot the Archduke dead. The guard prepped to return fire and Gavrilo shot at him. However, Sophie, who was tending to her husband, got in the way and was shot instead.

A painting of the Archduke’s assassination

Gavrilo Princip, who was only 19 at the time, was arrested and put on trial. He was too young to be executed so was sentenced to solitary confinement in the Small Fortress, a prison complex in Terezin. He spoke to a psychiatrist, to whom he said that World War 1 would’ve started with or without the assassination. He did not feel responsible for the starting of the war but he did feel awful for killing Sophie. Princip died of tuberculosis on April 28th, 1918, weighing only 40kg (88lb) due to malnutrition inside the prison.

This one event set off a chain reaction. Austria-Hungary, believing Serbia to be behind the attack, declared war on them. Serbia was allies with Russia, so they declared war on Austria-Hungary. Germany joined in on the fighting against the two nations, with France joining the fight not long after that, beginning World War 1. The UK decided to stay out of it for the meantime. However, that was to change very soon.

Hitler’s Early Life

Adolf Hitler was born in Braunau am Inn, a northern area in modern day Austria, which was formerly a part of the vast but fragile Austro-Hungarian Empire, in 1889. His father, Alois Hitler, was abusive to the young boy, often exacting punishments via physical abuse, whilst his mother, Klara Polz, who was also his Father’s cousin, was very doting and the young Hitler grew very fond of his mother.

Whilst he was often described as a confident young man in his early youth, his personality changed when his younger brother, Edmund, passed away from the measles when Hitler was 11, turning him into a more detached and depressed young teen, who’d often argue with his father and teachers. Only three years later, his father would pass away from a lung hemorrhage. Not long afterwards, his grades started to decline, with him barely passing his final exams.

At the age of 18, he had a sad goodbye to his mother, before moving to Vienna to take an entrance exam to the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. After being rejected not once but twice, he had to return home to Linz, after learning that his mother was dying of breast cancer. She passed away at the age of 47, when Hitler was 18. The family doctor, Eduard Bloch, said that he had never seen someone so distraught as Hitler was at his mother’s death.

Aimless, Hitler slept on the streets of Vienna, selling paintings of Vienna’s sights in order to pay for food and alike. Whilst his former roommate in Vienna, August Kubisek, often described Hitler as rather outgoing, despite a general disinterest in pursuing women romantically, passionate in politics and the arts, a fan of the opera and somewhat Catholic in his beliefs, Hitler abruptly left the apartment they lived in shortly after his mother died and left no note indicating where he was going to. Likely because he was going nowhere.

Whilst he was often friendly towards Jewish individuals who expressed their religion in a more subtle way, that attitude began to slowly change over his time on the streets. Whilst the soup kitchen he spent most of his time in was largely a Jewish community, the middle class of the city found antisemitism to be fashionable. Karl Lueger, mayor of Vienna from 1897 till his death in 1910, ran on a populist platform and largely campaigned in favour of antisemitism, a politician who Hitler openly admired. It is also around this time that Hitler noticed a different attitude he had towards Jewish people.

Once, when passing through the inner City, I suddenly encountered a phenomenon in a long caftan and wearing black side-locks. My first thought was: Is this a Jew? They certainly did not have this appearance in Linz. I watched the man stealthily and cautiously; but the longer I gazed at the strange countenance and examined it feature by feature, the more the question shaped itself in my brain: Is this a German?
Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf

Antisemitic pamphlets were also commonplace around Vienna. Having developed these racist sentiments, he came to despise the multicultural Austro-Hungarian Empire, so moved to Germany by late 1913. Accused of draft dodging, Hitler wrote a letter to the Austro-Hungarian police, fearing arrest if he didn’t. Admiring his tone, the police let him go and the matter was largely dropped altogether. Only a few months later, war broke out.

Napoleon’s Crossing of the Alps

By 1800, Napoleon Bonaparte had established himself as First Consul of the French Republic, making himself functionally the autocratic head of state of a centralised republican government. Wielding his newfound and profound executive power, he pacified royalist rebels, established a new national bank to stabilise the economy, cracked down on banditry in the French countryside, reforms that were only exemplified by state owned newspapers. In what many describe as a benevolent dictatorship, Napoleon transformed France from the chaos of the early Republic into the stability of the Consulate. However, France’s foreign affairs position was nowhere near as good as its domestic one.

After Napoleon’s initial triumph in Northern Italy, the Second Coalition declared war on France. The powers of the Second Coalition sought to reverse French expansion across Europe, dismantle the satellite republics established during the Revolutionary Wars, and weaken France’s new republican regime. Specifically, Russian Field Marshal Alexander Suvorov had recaptured the Northern Italian territories that Napoleon had conquered in 1797, leaving French forces under the command of General André Masséna starving and in desperate need of supplies on the Mediterranean coast. When Tsar Paul I withdrew Russia from the coalition, it still left almost 100,000 Austrians in Northern Italy, under the Command of Field Marshal Michael von Melas.

Napoleon eventually rallied 60,000 reserve troops in order to liberate the French Forces at Genoa, reclaim Northern Italy and defeat the Austrians. A much more cautious man than Napoleon might have reinforced Masséna from the west, taking advantage of pre-existing friendly supply roots and would avoid a treacherous trek over the Alps. However, he believed that driving back enemy forces on his own supply depots could leave to a stalemate. So he took an incredibly bold plan. Though armies had crossed the Alps many times since antiquity, few had attempted to move a large force with artillery through such difficult terrain at speed and in secrecy. What it did require, however, was Masséna holding the line. By April, this was a very real fear that eventually materialised.

A map of French Positions by 1800 (Epic History, YouTube)

On April 6th, Melas launched a massive offensive against Masséna’s forces, which split his army in two and forced him to retreat into the city of Genoa, beginning a siege from both the land and sea. Fearing that the fall of Genoa would force him to be trapped between the mountains and the Austrian forces, Napoleon rallies his forces on May 6th to advance from Geneva across the Alps.

An army can pass always, and at any season, wherever two men can set their feet.
Napoleon, May 1800

The Alps are a great land to cross. At around 100 miles in width and peaks reaching over 14,000 feet, the Army of the Reserve, numbering roughly 40,000 men, crossed through several Alpine passes, with the main body using the Great St Bernard Pass, which has a peak of around 8,600 feet, a march that was led by General Jean Lannes on May 8th. Despite the spring season, the mountains were blanketed in thick snow and. To reduce the likelihood of an avalanche decimating the troops, they travelled at night and early morning. Despite the men considering mutiny due to the rough conditions, they eventually reached St Bernard Hospice, where food and rest was prepared.

An illustration of the hospice on the pass

Despite the brutal conditions, losses during the crossing were surprisingly light. Contrary to the propaganda of the era, Napoleon himself made the crossing on a sure-footed mule as opposed to a charger. Lannes’ advanced guard swept aside Austrian outposts and surprised an outpost at Châtillon. However, they encountered fierce opposition by Captain Josef Stockard von Bernkopf at Fort Bard.

Conditions in besieged Genoa became desperate, with food shortages reducing troops and civilians to eating horses and other animals as famine intensified. Not only that, but General Jean-de-Dieu Soult was badly wounded and captured by Austrian Forces. At Fort Bard, a small Austrian garrison temporarily blocked the French advance. Unable to quickly storm the fort, Napoleon ordered artillery dragged past the position at night with wheels wrapped to reduce noise. Lannes attacked the enemy at Ivrea before advancing on Romana. Napoleon rapidly entered Lombardy, seized Milan, and threatened Austrian communications, forcing Melas to abandon his wider strategic position and confront the French army. Napoleon had seized the strategic initiative, but Austria’s army remained intact. The campaign’s outcome would be decided weeks later on the plains near Marengo.

We have struck here like lightning […] the enemy can hardly believe it
Napoleon to Joseph Bonaparte, 24th May, 1800

An idealised portrait of Napoleon crossing the Alps in 1800

Napoleon’s First Italian Campaign

After the Siege of Toulon, and a subsequent crushing of a Parisian Royalist uprising, Napoleon had managed to land himself the rank of Major General, one of the highest ranks in the French Revolutionary Army. He was assigned his own army and decided that, in order to rise the social hierarchy, he needed a woman. Despite many women finding him creepy and disgusting, he managed to marry Josephine de Beauharnais, an older widow with two children and a rather promiscuous background, on March 9th, 1796. Only two days later, the French Government ordered an all out offensive against Austria. Napoleon was assigned to a southern campaign through Italy as more of a distraction away from Jean-Baptiste Jourdan and Jean Victor Marie Moreau. This would be his first major campaign, and it would be the first of many successes for Napoleon, at only 28-years-old.

You to whom nature has given spirit, sweetness, and beauty, you who alone can move and rule my heart, you who know all too well the absolute empire you exercise over it!
A letter Napoleon sent to Josephine in Februrary of 1797, during the Italian Campaign

The army assigned to him was demoralised, underpaid and in desperate need of equipment. However, Napoleon lifted their spirits with inspirational speeches, something that would become a staple of his career to come. Severely outnumbered, he would split his enemies into two and take them on separately, which would later become the iconic Napoleon strategy of dividing and conquering. Using this strategy, Sardinia was knocked out of the war and the Austrians were sent running. During the Austrian retreat, Napoleon was in the fray himself at the famous Battle of Lodi, aiming cannons and getting covered in mud, earning the respect of his men, to such an extent to the point where he ordered an almost suicidal charge over a river, they followed and succeeded.

Napoleon swept through Northern Italy, being welcomed in town after town with open arms, believing them to liberating the people from their Austrian oppressors. However, Napoleon would plunder towns and send riches back to France. It is estimated that Napoleon collected 45 million Francs in money, 12 million Francs worth of jewellery and precious metals, as well as an additional 300 art pieces, such as sculptures and paintings. He also used some of the money he plundered to pay his men, some of the first real money they had seen in ages.

During the campaign, Napoleon also became more influential in French politics. He created two newspapers, one for circulation amongst soldiers and the other for the French populous. Recognising his ambition, French Royalists warned that Napoleon may be on the path to becoming a dictator. In response, Napoleon sent General Charles-Pierre Augereau to Paris to support a coup that purged royalists from legislative councils. This meant that Paul Barras, one of the Directors of the Executive Branch of the French Government, had a firm grip on power but was now more dependent on Napoleon.

Whilst the northern front was at a stalemate, Napoleon began making a bee-line straight for Vienna. Archduke Charles, Duke of Teschen, had to withdraw forces to Vienna, despite gaining a successful victory against the northern forces, due to Napoleon’s assault. After losing to Napoleon at the Battle of Tarvis, the Austrian government sued for peace when they learnt that Napoleon had arrived at Leoben, a city just 100km (62 miles) away from Vienna. With Napoleon overseeing negotiations himself, Austria allowed France to take control of much of Northern Italy as well as the low countries. He managed the establishment of many Sister Republics for the French Republic, of which he wrote constitutions and organised governments. Napoleon’s first success had been a great one, and it was only the beginning of his military career.

From that moment, I foresaw what I might be. Already I felt the earth flee from beneath me, as if I were being carried into the sky.
Napoleon after his victory at the Battle of Lodi

Casualties

First French Republic – 45,000 killed, captured or wounded
Coalition Forces (Sardinia, Habsburg Empire, Papal States, Venice) – 27,000 killed, 160,000 captured