9781422286029

Prelude to a Catastrophe

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Austro-Hungarian officials had deliberately made the terms of the ulti- matum humiliating for Serbia. They wanted to ensure Serbia rejected the ultimatum. That way, they could say the Serbians were responsible for the coming war. To their surprise, though, Serbia accepted nearly all of the demands, and it signaled a willingness to work out what minor differences remained. Nevertheless, Austria-Hungary cut off diplomatic relations immediately after receiving Serbia’s response to the ultimatum. Kaiser Wilhelm thought Serbia’s acceptance of almost all of Austria- Hungary’s demands meant that “every cause for war has vanished.” Wilhelm decided to personally broker a peace deal. It would begin with Serbia agreeing to let Austro-Hungarian troops occupy Belgrade, the Serbian capital. On the morning of July 28, the Kaiser directed Foreign Minister Got- tlieb von Jagow to inform Austria-Hungary of his plan, and to instruct Germany’s ally not to declare war. But Jagow didn’t deliver Wilhelm’s message. He was, in fact, working behind the scenes to get Austria-Hungary to go to war immediately. Many historians believe that, by late July 1914, Germany’s military leaders had secretly decided to use the dispute between Austria-Hungary and Serbia to precipitate a wider European war. Moltke and his colleagues were convinced that Germany would eventually have to fight a war against Russia. Although Russia in 1914 was much less developed than Germany, it was industrializing rapidly. So the sooner a war was fought, the better Germany’s chances of winning. In any event, on the evening of July 28, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia. Two days later, Russia’s emperor, Tsar Nicholas II, issued a mobilization order. That meant the country’s reserve soldiers were to report to designated centers for possible military duty. Late at night on July 31, Germany demanded that Russia cancel its mobi- lization within 12 hours. Russia didn’t heed the ultimatum. On August 1, Germany declared war on Russia. That same day, France began mobilizing.