THE POSITION OF AUSTRIA.
RCENT events have given a retrospective importance to the efforts made by Austria a week or so back to induce the Entente Powers to open up negotiations for peace. The concise answer of President Wilson disposed of this Austrian venture in the best of all manners. But in the light of what has since happened we are justified in suspecting that the Austrian move was promoted by a fore- knowledge of the coming events in Bulgaria. At any rate, Austrian reasons for a peace by compromise are obviously strengthened by the falling out of Bulgaria. Sooner or later, and probably sooner rather than later, Turkey will be compelled to follow Bulgaria's example, and the two Central Empires will then be left alone with practically the whole world against them. Defeat for them is certain, and defeat not only means the complete failure of Pan-German schemes of world- dominion, but it also means the destruction of the German- Magyar hegemony over the subject races which make up the larger half of the present Austrian: Empire. It is unnecessary to press further Austria's special interests in obtaining a peace by compromise.
The curious fact is that Pacificists in this country, who eagerly jumped at Count Burian's olive-branch as they called it, are apparently still unable to understand that the Austrian move was necessarily made with the assent and approval of the German Government. They are so eager to get peace at any price that they either allow themselves to be deluded on such a fundamental issue as this, or else they dishonestly—we must use the word bluntly—delude their readers. This point is dealt with in a well-informed article in the New Europe for September 26th. Particularly impressive are the indications there given that the famous letter of the Emperor Karl to Prince Sixtus had received in advance the imprimatur of Berlin. An extract is taken from an article in the Kaiholiseke Volksbund fiir Oesterreich which says categorically :— "To-day it is established that all Austria-Hungary's peace steps, especially those with which Prince Sixtus was entrusted, not only took place under the direction of the responsible Minister, Count Czemin, but were likewise known to Germany. . . . It was Count Czernin too who, not without consultation with Germany, direoted the Emperor's choice towards the two Bourbon princes in Belgium, and especially Prince Sixtus."
The New Europe adds a footnote stating that the view expressed in this quotation is reproduced and endorsed by the Iiiilnische Volkszeitwng. Thus in the one case where all the external appearances suggested that Austria was acting independently, Austrian and German newspapers now assert that Austria was acting with the full knowledge of Germany.
An elementary examination of the Austrian situation by itself suffices to prove that Austria dare not, and cannot, act independently of Germany. The Austrian Empire is essentially a dynasty, and that dynasty is supported and maintained by the Austro-German element in the Austrian half of the Empire and the Magyar element in the Hungarian (half. These two elements each exercise a predominance amounting in many cases to an absolute tyranny over the subordinate races of the Empire, estimated to number three-fifths of the total population. The Austro-Germans and Magyars could not possibly continue to maintain their snde if they had not the support of Germany behind them, and therefore it is absolutely certain that Austria as a unit will do nothing without the permission of Germany. Consequently all suggestions for a separate -peace with Austria as a unit are necessarily futile, for Germany will not permit Austria to make peace except on terms satisfactory to the German Empire. This does not, of course, mean that Germany is not willing to use Austria as a oat's-paw. On the contrary, she has much to gain by so doing. The Emperor Karl's letter to Prince Sixtus was an extremely clever German device for driving a wedge between the Allies by suggesting to the French that they might win back Alsace -and Lorraine by making a separate peace, for that is what the offer amounted to. If the French Government had been foolish enough to be tempted by this crafty suggestion, serious suspicions would have been created between the Dntertte Powers, and when these had gone far enough to suit Germany's purpose she would coolly have pointed out that Austria's offer did not bind her.
The later Austrian offer was probably intended to appeal Imainly to the -unreasoning sentimentality of the Pantheist celements in the Allied countries. It was assumed, quite rightly as the events proved, that a number of Pacificists, especially in England, would at once urge that here was an opportunity for an honourable peace which a wicked Government or a league of wicked Governments were throwing away. Yet if the broad facts about the Austrian Empire be kept in mind, it is clear that to accept any separate offer from the Austrian Government must mean the denial of the very ideals which the Pacificists themselves on other occasions are so fond of assert- ing—namely, the ideal of self-determination and. the ideal of freedom for subject races. Before the present war broke out it would have been legitimate for an English or French lover of peace to say that it was no part of his business to provoke war in order to liberate the subject races of Austria. But from the moment that the world was plunged into a great war in which the issue of freedom for these subject races forms an important factor, persons who profess to love freedom as well as peace are under a moral obligation not to advocate a type of peace that would prevent freedom. Any peace made with Austria as a .separate unit is a peace of this type, for it implies of necessity the continuance of the Austro-Magyar dominion over the subject races of Austria.
If, in fact, we are -to seek freedom for the world as well as peace, we must begin by realizing that the break-up of the Austrian Empire is one of the essential preludes to peace. Already there are happily signs that this prelude is in sight. The Austrian papers themselves attribute the Piave disaster to the treachery of Czecho-Siovak and Yugo-Slav soldiers in the Austrian Army. More important still is the evidence fur- nished by the Czecho-Slovaks in Russia, who deliberately deserted from the Austrian armies in the earlier stages of the war, and formed themselves into new armies in Russia, there to fight for their national ideal against the Austrian and the German Empires. The marvellous way in which these scat- tered soldiers have organized themselves is one of the finest proofs that could be given of their capacity for self-qovern- ment. The case of the Yugo-Slays, though less dramatic, is of daily increasing importance. The Italian Government, after long hesitation, have announced to the world their recognition of the separate Yugo-Slav nationality, and this announcement should quickly be endorsed by the rest of the Entente Powers. Thus out of the dominions of the Austrian Empire two new nationalities, doubtless still in embryo, are being created. In face of such a striking fact it is melancholy to have to record that a group of writers in this country, who have in the past constantly posed as the special advocates of freedom, should be doing their best to prevent the realization of the ideals of liberty of these two nationalities. What will happen to Austria when the Czecho-Slovaks have won their independence in Bohemia and Moravia ; when the Yugo-Slays have created a Federation including Serbia, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Dalmatia, Croatia, and Slavonia ; and when in addition the Rumanian districts of Hungary have been united with the kingdom of Rumania, and the Italian districts of Austria with the kingdom of Italy, is a problem with which for the present we need not concern ourselves. It may be that the German districts of Austria would then .voluntarily join the German Empire, and that Hungary would proceed to establish itself as an entirely independent State. But whatever may follow the dissolution of the Austrian Empire, the point to be pressed now is that Austria as a unit cannot come out of the war ; she must con- tinue fighting as the subordinate of Germany until she breaks in pieces.
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