War Aims and Decision-Making in Austria-Hungary

Abstract

War-aims formation in Austria-Hungary is closely tied to the intricacies of its internal decision-making structure. Although all states have complex civil-military relations and political hierarchies, Austria-Hungary’s decisionmaking structure stands apart. This is due to the fact that Austria-Hungary as its name suggests, was not a unitary nation-state. Rather, it was a multiethnic monarchy of 53 million people speaking twelve official languages, the second largest country in Europe by territory and third by population, and united only by the scepter of a Habsburg emperor. The Monarchy was a set of contradictions and tensions as this ancient and deeply conservative royal institution entered into the modern world. The most obvious division was between Austria and Hungary. Following the ‘Compromise’ or more accurately Equalization (Ausgleich-Kiegyezés) in 1867, the Austrian Empire was reorganized into two halves, the self-governing Austrian and Hungarian portions. Until 1918, the state lived two separate political lives based in Vienna and Budapest, with two entirely separate governments, parliaments, prime ministers, and civilian bureaucracies controlling all domestic matters in the two halves of the Monarchy. Some areas, however, remained under the direct control of the Emperor. The Common Ministries of Foreign Affairs, War, and Finance, as well as the Austro-Hungarian Army and Navy, taken together constituted the core of the central government and in this deeply conservative state were directly appointed by the Emperor.