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15.
World War I
On
June 28, 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife were
assassinated by a conspirator in Sarajevo. This initiated
World War I. It is not necessary to go into the details of
this war, except three particularities that seem worth
mentioning: (1) Contrary to expectation, it did not become a
short, refreshingly cheerful war. Sudetengerman troops were
engaged on all fronts suffering enormous losses. They believed
they were serving the German cause when they fought for
Austria and the kaiser. The Czechs went into the war without
enthusiasm, remained in wait and feared German supremacy in
Austria in case of a German victory. This again revived the
tragedy of national discord in the Sudetenlands. The Germans
battled on the side of Germans, but the Czechs, so to speak,
against their Slavic brethren. (2) Kaiser Franz Josef died in
November 1916. His successor, the 29-year-old Karl was not
sufficiently prepared for governmental office, and
inexperienced as he was, he blundered in domestic as much as
in foreign policy. (3) Towards the end of the war, a terrible
famine developed in the Sudetenlands while Methods and
experience for governmental control of food distribution did
not exist. Here again the Austro-Hungarian duality generated
catastrophic developments. Rich Hungary withheld supplies or
sold them only in exchange for political concessions. In
Bohemia, Czech nationalism and sabotage against the state as
well as profit-mongering by prosperous Czech farmers enhanced
the misery. The government was too weak to intervene. One
cannot fully comprehend the catastrophe of 1918 when not
considering that it befell a totally emaciated country.
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