An Cosantóir

An Cosantóir July/August 2014 www.dfmagazine.ie 28 | the July Ultimatum, which demanded, among other things, the removal of named persons from their positions in the Serb government and military, the suppression of anti-Austrian groups and propaganda, and the participation of Austrian police in investigations in Serbia. The ultimatum was delivered on July 23rd with Serbia given until July 25th to comply. Despite the harshness of the demands, Serbia announced that they would accede to all except allowing Austrian police to operate on Serbian territory, which they felt represented an unacceptable affront to their national sovereignty. Throughout the July Crisis opinion differed on what was at stake. The Austrians believed the conflict could be confined to a local war, although István Tisza, the Prime Minister of the Hungarian element of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, advocat- ed strongly for a peaceful settlement as he feared, rightly, that it would lead to a general European war. The Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Sazanov, accused Vienna of making demands it knew could not be accepted in order to force a war, warning the Austrian ambassador: "you are setting fire to Europe." In Berlin, while it was believed the war might remain localised, many saw it as the best opportunity for Germany to fight the inevitable general war they thought was coming, since both its major opponents, France and Russia, were relatively weak militarily at the time, and Berlin also believed Britain could be kept out the conflict. Austria-Hungary rejected Serbia's compromise offer and declared war on July 28th. This action caused a domino effect, with Russia immediately beginning mobilisation, followed by German declarations of war against Russia (August 1st) and France (August 3rd), and Britain's declaration of war against Germany (September 4th) as a result of the latter's invasion of neutral Belgium. As Europe stumbled towards war the British Foreign Secretary, Sir Edward Grey, watch- ing lamplighters at work in London, declared presciently: "The lamps are going out all over Europe. We shall not see them lit again in our time." G erman plans for a general European war were based on those developed by the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, Alfred Count von Schlieffen in the early 1900s. The Schlieffen Plan envisaged a war against both Russia and France and was intended to avoid fighting on two fronts by destroying the French army with massive, overwhelming force before turning its attention to the Russians in the East. In simple terms the plan could be viewed as a hammer, with the lighter handle defend- ing Germany's border with France, while the heavy head, comprising the bulk of the Ger- man armies, would swing down through Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg to encircle Paris and the French army. The plan's architect stressed the need to keep as far to the west as possible, exemplified by his instruction: "When you march into France, let the last man on the right brush the Channel with his sleeve." For the plan to work the head of the hammer had to swing with unstoppable force in order to achieve victory in France within weeks, so that surplus forces could be quickly transported to the east, using Germany's highly efficient railways, in time to face the Russians. The importance of this element of the plan was stressed by von Schlieffen, whose last words in 1913 are reputed to have been: "Re- member, keep the right wing very strong." H owever, in 1906 von Schlieffen's successor, von Moltke, had modi- fied the plan, leaving out the invasion of Holland and weakening the head of the hammer in order to strengthen the handle. As it turned out anyway, the strength of the German army never reached the levels laid down for the successful implementation of the original plan. The Schlieffen Plan was based on a number of assumptions: that Russia would take at least six weeks to mobilise, during which time France would The Schlieffen Plan 1914 Alfred von Schlieffen

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