Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 404, June, 1849

by Various

The elements of discord, although they were such as enabled agitators to raise a part of the Sclaves against the Hungarians, when it was resolved to retract the concessions that had been made to them, would hardly have been found available for that purpose, had not the instigators of the revolt acted in the name of the King of Hungary, and of more than one imperial government; nor even then, perhaps, had they not been enabled to dispose of the resources of the military frontier. Now that the Hungarians have obtained important successes, it is probable that the Sclaves will all join them. The movement of these tribes against the Hungarians, which was caused by other influences in addition to that of Austria, has thus tended to lead the imperial government into hostility with Hungary, without contributing much to its strength.

When the Austrian government resolved to subjugate Hungary, it was presumed that they undertook the conquest of that country relying on their own resources. But the success of the enterprise was so doubtful, and a failure so hazardous to the empire, that we never could believe it possible that it had been undertaken without an assurance of support. It is true that the imperial government might at that time have expected an adjustment of their differences with Sardinia; but Venice still held out, peace with Sardinia had not been concluded, the state of Italy was daily becoming more alarming, and the Austrian cabinet knew that they could maintain their hold of Lombardy, and reduce Venice, only by means of a powerful army. They were aware that the condition of Galicia, and even of Bohemia, was precarious, and that neither could safely be denuded of troops. The state of affairs in Germany was not such as to give them confidence, still less to promise them support; and the attitude they assumed towards the assembly at Frankfort, though not unworthy of the ancient dignity of Austria, was not calculated to diminish her anxiety. Even in the Hereditary States all was not secure. They were aware that old sentiments and feelings had been shaken and disturbed; that, although order had for the time been restored, by the fidelity and courage of the army, men's minds were still unsettled; and that, both in the capital and in the provinces, there were factions whose sympathies were not with the imperial government, and which, in case of disasters, might again become formidable. The capital alone required a garrison of twenty thousand men, to keep it in subjection—to preserve its tranquillity. Putting aside, therefore, every consideration as to the justice of the war, and looking merely to its probable consequences, it is obvious that, without such a preponderance of power and resources as would not only insure success, but insure it at once—by one effort—it would have been madness in Austria, for the purpose of forcing her constitution upon the Hungarians, to engage in a contest in which she staked her power—her existence—and which could not fail to be dangerous to her if it became protracted.

Let us then examine the resources of both parties, and see what was the preponderance on the side of Austria, which would justify her in undertaking so hazardous an enterprise, on the supposition that she relied solely on her own resources.

The Austrian empire contains a population of 36,000,000; of these about 7,000,000 are Germans—about 15,500,000 are Sclaves,—nearly 8,000,000 are of Italian and Dacian races, and about 5,600,000 of Asiatic races, including 5,000,000 of Majjars. If from these 36,000,000 we deduct the population of Hungary, 14,000,000, of Lombardy and Venice, 4,876,000—or, together, nearly 19,000,000, hostile to Austria—and the population of Galicia, 4,980,000, which did not contribute to her strength, to say nothing of Bohemia or Vienna, or Crakow, there will remain to Austria, to carry on the war, only 12,144,000. But, as probably two millions of the Sclaves and other tribes of Hungary, including the military frontier, may have been reckoned as on her side, that number may be deducted from Hungary and added to Austria. There will then remain to Hungary a population of 12,000,000, concentrated in their own country for its defence, and to Austria about 14,000,000, whose military resources must be distributed over her whole dominions—from the frontiers of Russia to those of Sardinia, from the frontiers of Prussia to the confines of Turkey—to re-establish her authority in Lombardy, to reduce Venice to submission, to hold the Sardinians and the Italian republicans in check, to control and overawe Galicia and Crakow, to garrison Vienna and maintain tranquillity at home, and, finally, to conquer 12,000,000 of Hungarians. It is true she had a noble army, and Hungary then had almost none, except such levies as she had hastily raised, and which were as yet without skilful commanders. But Austria knew by experience the difficulties and hazards of a war in Hungary. Her government must have known the resources of the country, the courage and patriotism of its inhabitants, and the success that had attended their resistance to her forces on more than one former occasion. Surrounded by difficulties at home, in Italy, and in Germany, with full one half of the population of the empire hostile to the government, she was undertaking an enterprise which her forces, in circumstances far more favourable to success, had repeatedly failed to accomplish.

Reviewing the whole of these considerations, therefore, we hold it to be quite incredible that the Austrian government, having the alternative of restoring peace, by permitting the King of Hungary to fulfil his engagements to his subjects, could have preferred a war for the subjugation of Hungary, if she had relied solely on her own resources, or followed only her own impulses and the dictates of her own interest. We cannot doubt that she was assured of foreign aid—that her resolution to make war upon Hungary, rather than keep faith with her, was adopted in concert with the power by which that aid was to be furnished. If this inference be just, we may find in that concert a reason for the extraordinary accumulation of Russian troops in Wallachia and Moldavia, which appeared to threaten the Ottoman Porte, but which also threatened Hungary, where the only corps that has been actively employed found occupation. The feeling of Germany made it unsafe to bring Russian troops into Austria; but the massing of Russian troops in the Danubian principalities of Turkey excited no jealousy in Germany. Austria, too, shrinking instinctively from the perils of Russian intervention, while in reliance on that support she pursued a bold and hazardous policy, with a confidence which otherwise would have been unintelligible and misplaced, hoped perhaps to escape the danger of having recourse to the aid on which she relied.

Having employed all her disposable means in the war, Austria now maintains it at a disadvantage, for her own defence. Her armies have been defeated, her resources exhausted or crippled, her capital is in danger, and she must either concede the demands of the Hungarians, or call in the armies of Russia to protect her government and enforce her policy. What the demands of the Hungarians may now be, we know not; but if they have wisdom equal to the courage and energy they have displayed, they will be contented with the restitution of their legal rights, which Austria may grant without dishonour, because in honour and good faith they ought never to have been rejected. If they are wise as they are brave, the Hungarians will seek to restore unity and peace to the empire with which their lot has been cast—whose weakness cannot be their strength—whose independence is necessary to their own security. That the intervention of Russia would be fatal to the Austrian empire, to its dignity, its power, its capacity to fulfil the conditions of its existence as a great independent state—the guardian of eastern Europe—is, we think, unquestionable. Attributing no interested design to Russia—assuming that she desires nothing so much as the strength and stability of the Austrian empire—we cannot doubt that the re-establishment and maintenance of the imperial government's authority by the military force of Russia, were it the best government that ever existed, would desecrate, in the heart of every German, the throne of the Kaiser, and cover it with dust and ashes. In a contest between the Russians and the Hungarians, the sympathy of all Germany, of all western Europe, would be with the Majjars. Half the Emperor of Austria's own heart would be on the side of the loyal nation to which his house owes so large a debt of gratitude; who, he must be aware, have been alienated only by the errors and the injustice of his advisers, and who, if they are sacrificed, will not, and cannot be sacrificed to his interests. Hungary was perfectly satisfied with her constitution and her government, as established by the laws of April 1848. She was loyal to her king, and careful of the honour of Austria, which she sent her best troops to defend in another country; her crimes have been her attachment to established institutions, and the courage and patriotism with which she has defended them. This is not the spirit which it can ever be the interest of a sovereign to extinguish in his own subjects. The desire to overturn established institutions is the very evil which the Emperors of Austria and Russia profess to combat, and their first efforts are to be directed against the only Christian nation between the frontiers of Belgium and Russia—between Denmark and Malta, which was satisfied with its institutions and government, and determined to maintain them.

If Russia engages seriously in the war, she will put forth her whole strength, and Hungary may probably be overpowered; but can she forget her wrongs or her successes?—will she ever again give her affection to the man who, claiming her crown as his hereditary right, has crushed her under the foot of a foreign enemy? If anything can extinguish loyalty in the heart of a Hungarian, the attempt of the Emperor to put the Muscovite's foot upon his neck will accomplish it. We can imagine no degradation more deeply revolting to the proud Majjar, or more likely to make him sum up all reasoning upon the subject with the desperate resolution to sell his life as dearly as he can. There is therefore much reason to fear lest a people, who but a few weeks ago were certainly as firmly attached to monarchy as any people in Europe, not excepting either the Spaniards or ourselves, should be driven by the course Austria has pursued, and especially by the intervention of Russia, to renounce their loyalty and consort with the enemies of monarchy. Their struggle is now for life or death—it ceases to be a domestic quarrel from the moment Russia engages in it; and Hungary must seek such support as she can find. Austria has done everything she could to convert the quarrel into a war of opinion, by representing it and treating it as such; and now that she has brought to her aid the great exemplar and champion of absolute monarchy, it is not impossible that she may succeed.

Russia comes forward to re-establish by force of arms the authority of a government which has been unable to protect itself against its own subjects; and, when re-established, she will have to maintain it. How long this military protection is to endure, after all armed opposition is put down, no man can pretend to foretell. It must depend upon events which are beyond the reach of human foresight. But a government that is dependent for its authority on a foreign power, must, in every sense of the term, cease to be an independent government. Is it under Russian protection that Austria is to preserve Lombardy, or to maintain her influence in Germany? Would the Sclavonic population of Austria continue to respect a German government protected by a nation of Sclaves—would they not rather feel that the real power was that of their own race? Would the Austrians forget the humiliation of Russian protection, or forgive the government that had sacrificed their independence? Dependent upon Russian protection, the Austrian government could no longer give security to Turkey, or counterbalance the weight with which the power of Russia, whatever may be the moderation of the reigning emperor, must continue to press upon the frontiers of weaker countries. In such a state of things, the relations of Austria to the rest of Europe would be changed—reversed. Instead of being the bulwark of Germany and the safeguard of Turkey against Russia, she would become the advanced post of Russia against both. Is it to bring her to this condition that she has allowed herself to be involved in the war with Hungary? Is it to arrive at this result that she will consent to prolong it?

Of the effect, in Germany, of the Russian intervention in Austria, it is almost superfluous to speak. The advance of Russian armies, simultaneously with the dissolution of more than one refractory assembly, has raised in the minds of men, already in a state of furious excitement, a suspicion that these events are not unconnected, and that the Emperor of Austria is not the only German sovereign who is in league with the Czar! The time has arrived when the question must be determined whether order or anarchy is to prevail; and we have no doubt that, in Germany as in France, the friends of order will speedily gain a complete ascendency—if there be no foreign, and above all, no Russian intervention. But to very many of the patriotic friends of order in Germany, Russian intervention in her affairs, or an appearance of concert between their own government and Russia for the purpose of influencing German interests, and suppressing German feelings, would be intolerable. There is reason to apprehend that a great body of true-hearted Germans, especially in the middle classes—whose power must, after all, decide the contest, and who desire social order and security under a constitutional monarchy—may fancy they see in the advance of Russian forces, at a moment when the sovereigns, supported by their armies, are making a stand against popular tyranny, cause to fear that even their constitutional freedom is in danger. We are satisfied that there are no reasonable grounds for such fears—that the other governments of Germany are too wise to follow the example of Austria in her conduct towards Hungary; but that example cannot fail to produce distrust in many minds already disposed to it; and popular movements are more influenced by passion than by reason.

It is impossible not to feel that Russia is about to occupy a new position in Europe, which, if no event occurs to obstruct her in her course, must greatly increase her influence and her power for good or for evil. She is to be the protector of Austria, not against foreign enemies, but against one of the nations of which that empire is composed. She is to re-establish and maintain, by military force, a government which has been unable to maintain itself against its internal enemies—a government which a nation of fourteen millions of people has rejected, fought, and beaten. A great power cannot interfere in the internal affairs of another state, to the extent of maintaining there by force of arms a government incapable of maintaining itself against the nation, without getting involved in the relations of the government it upholds, to an amount of which it is impossible to fix or to predict the limits, but of which the tendency has ever been, and must ever be, progressively to increase the power of the protecting over the protected government; and the single fact that the interests of Austria were in this manner inseparably bound up, for a time of indefinite duration, with those of Russia, would give to the great northern power a preponderance, both in Europe and in Asia, such as no hereditary monarchy has possessed in modern times.