In the World War

by Graf Ottokar Theobald Otto Maria Czernin von und zu Chudenitz

The Russian Revolution placed us in an entirely new situation. After all, there was no doubt that the East presented an obvious possibility of concluding peace, and all our efforts were turned in that direction, for we were anxious to seize the first available moment to make peace with the Russian Revolutionary Party, a peace which the Tsar, faced by his coming downfall, had not been able to achieve.

If the spring of 1917 was noted for the beginning of the unrestricted U-boat warfare and all the hopes centred on its success and the altered situation anticipated on the part of the Germans, the summer of the same year proved that the proceeding did not fulfil all expectations, though causing great anxiety to England. At that time there were great fears in England as to whether, and how, the U-boat could be paralysed. No one in London knew whether the new means to counteract it would suffice before they had been tried, and it was only in the course of the summer that the success of the anti-submarine weapons and the convoy principle was confirmed.

In the early summer of 1917 very favourable news was received relative to English and French conditions. Information was sent from Madrid, which was always a reliable source, that some Spanish officers returning to Madrid from England reported that the situation there during the last few weeks had become very much worse, and that there was no longer any confidence in victory. The authorities seized all the provisions that arrived for the troops and the munition workers; potatoes and flour were not to be obtained by the poorer classes; the majority of sailors fit for service had been enrolled in the navy, so that only inefficient crews were left in the merchant service, and they were difficult to secure, owing to their dread of U-boats, and, therefore, many British merchantmen were lying idle, as there was no one to man them.

This was the tenor of the Spanish reports coming from different sources. Similar accounts, though in slightly different form, came from France. It was stated that in Paris great war-weariness was noticeable. All hope of definite victory was as good as given up; an end must certainly come before the beginning of winter, and many of the leading authorities were convinced that, if war were carried on into the winter, the result would be as in Russia—a revolution.

At the same time, news came from Constantinople that one of the enemy Powers in that quarter had made advances for a separate peace. The Turkish Government replied that they would not separate from their Allies, but were prepared to discuss a general peace on a basis of non-annexation. Talaat Pasha notified me at once of the request and his answer. Thereupon nothing more was heard from the enemy Power. At the same time news came from Roumania evincing great anxiety concerning the increasing break-up in Russia, and acknowledging that she considered the game was lost. The revolution and the collapse of the army in Russia still continued.

Taken altogether, the outlook presented a more hopeful picture for us, and justified the views of those who had always held that a little more "endurance"—to use a word since become ominous—would lead to a decision.

During a war every Minister of Foreign Affairs must attach an important and adequately estimated significance to confidential reports. The hermetic isolation which during the world war divided Europe into two separate worlds made this doubly urgent. But it is inevitable in regard to confidential reports that they must be accepted, for various reasons, with a certain amount of scepticism. Those persons who write and talk, not from any material, but from political interests, from political devotion and sympathy, are, from the nature of the case, above suspicion of reporting, for their own personal reasons, more optimistically than is justified. But they are apt to be deceived. Nations, too, are subject to feelings, and the feelings of the masses must not be taken as expressing the tendencies of the leading influences. France was tired of war, but how far the leading statesmen were influenced by that condition, not to be compared to our own war-weariness, was not proved.

In persons who make this métier their profession, the wish is often present, alongside the comprehensible mistakes they make, to give pleasure and satisfaction by their reports, and not run any risk of losing a lucrative post. I think it will be always well to estimate confidential reports, no matter from what source they proceed, as being 50 per cent. less optimistic than they appear. The more pessimistic opinion that prevailed in Vienna, compared with Berlin, was due, first and foremost, to the reliance placed on news coming from the enemy countries. Berlin, too, was quite certain that we were losing time, although Bethmann once thought fit in the Reichstag to assert the contrary; but the German military leaders and the politicians looked at the situation among our opponents differently from us.

When the Emperor William was at Laxenburg in the summer of 1917 he related to me some instances of the rapidly increasing food trouble in England, and was genuinely surprised when I replied that, though I was convinced that the U-boats were causing great distress, there was no question of a famine. I told the Emperor that the great problem was whether the U-boats would actually interfere with the transport of American troops, as the German military authorities asserted, or not, but counselled him not to accept as very serious facts a few passing incidents that might have occurred.

After the beginning of the unrestricted U-boat warfare, I repeat that many grave fears were entertained in England. It is a well-known fact. But it was a question of fears, not actualities. A person who knew how matters stood, and who came to me from a neutral country in the summer of 1917, said: "If the half only of the fears entertained in England be realised, then the war will be over in the autumn"; but a wide difference existed between London's fears and Berlin's hopes on the one hand, and subsequent events on the other, which had not been taken into account by German opinion.