Chapters

In summer 1914, probably no one in the Habsburg Monarchy could imagine what effects the coming war would have and what measure of suffering it would cause. And probably only very few thought that the “Gang nach Serbien” (the move to Serbia), as a retaliation campaign, would last more than four years, or that during this time, all in all, around eight or nine million men would be mobilised (the statistics diverge in the literature). They make up that anonymous and nameless collective whose everyday life on the fronts of the Austrian-Hungarian Monarchy has never received sufficient attention. Because until quite recently, with few exceptions, there has been only a laggard attempt to pose questions in Austrian historiography about the everyday experiences, awareness, sense of purpose and interpretations in particular of the normal trooper.

One of first momentous experiences for the recruits was saying farewell to their families and relatives at home-town railway stations throughout the Monarchy.
 

The First World War lasted four long years; it was not only a long war but it was also fought in very different theatres. For many soldiers of the Monarchy this meant moving around in unfamiliar lands and coming into contact with the resident population.
 

Provisioning on the front and at home was one of the central topics in the Feldpost (military postal service) correspondence of officers and troopers alike. It contains questions and worries about the adequate nourishment of the families at home, likewise recurring requests for food, tobacco, fresh underwear, warm clothes, boots and so forth. Meanwhile the letters were dominated by detailed descriptions of the daily bill o’ fare and the portions and rations. Above all, as the four war years wore on, the correspondence of the normal troopers increasingly featured descriptions of shortages, the poor quality of the food, and of hunger.
 

The appearance of Imperial-Royal soldiers radically changed shortly after the war broke out, most of all because of the shortage of suitable raw materials and the impractical uniforms worn until then.

To protect the troops against weather conditions and the foe, the aim was to build shelters that were as well-constructed and as practically appointed as possible. In practice, this ambition could be realised only with limitations; all depended on the scene of military operations and climatic/geographical conditions and whether the troops were moving, thus advancing or retreating, or were stationary in the “Stellungskrieg”, in trench warfare.
 

‘Everyday life’ on the front was structured into variously intensive intervals of time. There were periods marked by extremely strenuous activity and high-risk potential, but also times when the soldiers could experience “relative peace and quiet, and [even] relax.”

During the First World War the relationship between troopers and officers was marked by great class differences and the conflicts this generated. Within the ranks as well, tensions flared up time and again, often because of the predominant mix of nationalities in the Monarchy Army.

Violence and death were omnipresent on the fronts in the First World War, and the soldiers had to face this practically every day. The fear of being wounded and their own deaths was constantly present, as was the visual presence of death in the form of “fallen” enemy soldiers and their own comrades. Moreover, they were constantly confronted with violence and death in combat and the actual act of killing; such experiences were completely new and extremely dramatic for most of the recruits of 1914.

The modern weaponry available to the belligerents caused heavy casualties in offensive conducted by the Austro-Hungarian high command on the Russian and Serbian fronts in the first months of the war. There were no preparations at the front or behind the lines for the masses of wounded troops and officers.

Vienna had an impressive peacetime hospital infrastructure. For the countless wounded and sick soldiers, a quarter of a million of them, sent to Vienna, however, the capacities were woefully inadequate. To make matters worse, there was very soon a shortage of skilled doctors, many of whom had been conscripted into the army in spite of their importance as medical practitioners.

The great demand for beds made it necessary to set up a number of emergency or barrack hospitals. In spite of their name and makeshift character, they were modern and functional and designed to handle the constant flow of soldiers arriving from the front.

The University of Vienna, University of Technology and other institutions were converted to become temporary hospitals. Because of the reduction in the number of students, the teaching was not disrupted.

Artists’ associations and artists were also caught up in the war fervour and made themselves available to the fatherland. The Künstlerhaus and Secession were both converted into temporary hospitals, with the equipment and supplies coming to a large extent from private donations.

As soon as mobilisation started, there was a shortage of means of transport, most of which was requisitioned by the army. This problem also affected the transport of the sick in the city. Some hospitals had their own railway siding and in other cases trams were increasingly used.

The war offered some doctors a unique opportunity for large-scale testing of their theories and therapies, not all of which were particularly philanthropic and some of which were a torment for the patients. In view of the shortage of food in the hospitals, nutritionists in particular had a heyday.

The costs of a war cannot be raised by the normal financing mechanisms. Ultimately, every war is financed by making excessive use of the gross national product, and the weaker the basis of a country's economy, the greater the burden caused by the war.

During the First World War, the interaction of public debt, increasing money in circulation and a considerable rise in demand for armaments, together with the shortage of food supplies, rapidly led to inflation.

The primary means of raising funds is of relevance not only for the triggering of inflationary processes but also for the operation and long-term consequences of a war economy.

The rate of inflation in the war was huge: prices rose on average by 100 % per year, in other words in total by a factor of 16. Nevertheless, this age was not (yet) one of hyperinflation.

Blue- and white-collar workers suffered particularly under devaluation. The de facto disappearance of trade union lobbying as a result of the policy of ‘internal peace’ led, as with civil servants, to huge falls in real wages. It was only in 1917 that the condition of wage earners began to improve again.

At the end of the First World War, Austria was suffering not only from material exhaustion, but also from the ruin of state finances. Inflation continued. Ultimately, it was inflation that saved the new state from outright bankruptcy until 1922.

Georges Clemenceau’s famous statement, “Autriche c'est ce que reste” (“What’s left is Austria”) referred to the break-up of the Danube Monarchy at the end of the First World War. The sentence can also be interpreted to mean that the Monarchy's heritage included the debts to be paid by the Republic of Austria.

As a ‘site of memory’ the First World War was overlaid by the remembrance of the Second World War and the Holocaust in Austria, and in Germany too. In the cycle of years of celebration and remembrance the ‘8’ years (1918, 1938) always received more attention than the ‘lesser’ ‘4’ years (1914, 1934). In Austria’s historical memory the year 1918 marked less the end of the First World war than the end of the Monarchy, and this led to interminable discussions about the identity of the former world power which had become a small state as a result of the post-war treaties signed in the suburbs of Paris.