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Legalizing the Collapse of Austria-Hungary at the Paris Peace Conference

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 February 2009

Victor S. Mamatey
Victor S. Mamatey
Affiliation:
University of Georgia
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Extract

In its final phases, World War I was a revolutionary war. When it ended, several of the belligerents, on both sides of the front lines, had been swept or were about to be swept by revolutions. Among them was the Austro-Hungarian monarchy. When the Allied Powers signed an armistice with Austria-Hungary in the Villa Giusti near Padua on November 3, 1918, the empire was in the process of dissolution. National committees, councils, and assemblies had sprung up all over the multinational Habsburg empire and declared the independence of the peoples whom they claimed to represent. Encountering little resistance from the imperial bureaucracy, they formed nuclei governments of the Successor States.

Type
The Disintegration of the Monarchy
Information
Austrian History Yearbook , Volume 3 , Issue 3 , January 1967 , pp. 206 - 237
Copyright
Copyright © Center for Austrian Studies, University of Minnesota 1967

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References

1 The literature on the dissolution of Austria-Hungary is very extensive. Here suffice it to cite Nowak, Karl F., The Collapse of Central Europe (London: K. Paul, Trench, Trubner and Co., 1924)Google Scholar; von Horstenau, Edmund Glaise, The Collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire (London: E. P. Dutton and Co., 1930)Google Scholar; and Opočensky, Jan, The Collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy and the Rise of the Czechoslovak State (Prague: Orbis, 1928)Google Scholar. For a fresher view, see Zeman, Z. A. B., The Break-up of the Habsburg Empire, 1914–1918 (London: Oxford University Press, 1961)Google Scholar; and Plaschka, Richard G., Cattaro-Prag: Revolte und Revolution (Graz: H. Böhlau, 1963)Google Scholar.

2 Scott, James Brown (ed.), Official Statements of War Aims and Peace Proposals, December 1916 to November 1918 (Washington, D. C: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1921), p. 472Google Scholar.

3 Károlyi, Michael, Memoirs: Faith without Illusion (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1957), pp. 130–137Google Scholar.

4 Scott, Official Statements of War Aims and Peace Proposals, pp. 488–490; Deák, Francis, Hungary at the Paris Peace Conference (New York: Columbia University Press, 1942), Doc. No. 2, pp. 359–361Google Scholar.

5 Marstbn, Frank Swain, The Peace Conference of 1919: Organization and Procedure (London: Oxford University Press, 1944), pp. 54–68Google Scholar.

6 Baker, Ray Stannard, Woodrow Wilson: Life and Letters (8 vols., Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday, Page, 1927–39), Vol. VIII, pp. 541–542 and 547–548Google Scholar.

7 U. S. Department of State, Papers relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States: The Paris Peace Conference, 1919 (13 vols., Washington, D. C: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1942–1947)Google Scholar(hereafter cited as “U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference”), Vol. III, pp. 469–542Google Scholar.

8 Marston, The Paris Conference of 1919, pp. 163–164.

9 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. III, pp. 773–779 and 780–782; Komarnicki, Titus, Rebirth of the Polish Republic, 1914–1920 (London: W. Heinemann, 1957), p. 326Google Scholar.

10 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. III, pp. 782–784; Komarnicki, Rebirth of the Polish Republic, pp. 355–361; Perman, Dagmar, The Shaping of the Czechoslovak State, 1914–1920 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1962), pp. 97–120Google Scholar; Wandycz, Piotr S., France and her Eastern Allies, 1919–1925 (Minneapolis, Minn.: University of Minnesota Press, 1962), pp. 75–86Google Scholar.

11 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. III, pp. 822–829; Spector, David Sherman, Rumania at the Paris Peace Conference (New York: Bookman Associates, 1962), pp. 86–89Google Scholar; Lederer, Ivo J., Yugoslavia at the Paris Peace Conference (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1963), pp. 143–144Google Scholar.

12 von Triepel, Heinrich (ed.), Nouveau recueil général de traités, 3rd ser. (19 vols., Leipzig: Dietrich, 1909–1929), Vol. X, pp. 342–345Google Scholar. Apart from President Wilson's refusal to recognize any of the Allied secret treaties, the validity of Rumania's secret treaty with the Allies, concluded at Bucharest on August 17, 1916, was put in doubt by the fact that Rumania concluded a separate peace with the Central Powers at Bucharest on May 7, 1918, despite a specific provision (Article 5) in the Treaty of Bucharest of 1916 against such a contingency. Brătianu countered this argument by pointing out that Rumania had reentered the war on the Allied side on November 10, 1918; that the Allied Powers had declared the Peace of Bucharest of 1918 null and void; that the Rumanian parliament had never ratified this peace treaty; and that, consequently, this treaty had never existed from a legal point of view. At the peace conference the Allied Powers never ruled on the validity of the Treaty of Bucharest, but, ostrich-fashion, pretended not to know anything about it.

13 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. III, pp. 840–855; Spector, Rumania at the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 90–94.

14 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. III, pp. 877–887; Perman, The Shaping of the Czechoslovak State, pp. 125–131.

15 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. IV, pp. 45–53; Lederer, Yugoslavia at the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 157–158.

16 Albrecht-Carrié, René, Italy at the Paris Peace Conference (New York: Columbia University Press, 1938), Doc. No. 3, pp. 334–349Google Scholar.

17 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. IV, pp. 321–325; Albrecht-Carrié, Italy at the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 116–117.

18 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. IV, p. 321.

19 Ibid., Vol. Ill, p. 862.

20 Nicolson, Harold, Peacemaking 1919 (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1965), pp. 32–33Google Scholar.

21 Mantoux, Paul, Les déliberations du Conseil des Quatre, 24 mars-28 juin 1919 (2 vols., Paris: Editions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1955), Vol. II, p. 351Google Scholar.

22 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. IV, pp. 413–419.

23 Ibid., pp. 543–547 and 679; Perman, The Shaping of the Czechoslovak State, pp. 153–154.

24 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. IV, pp. 672–675 and 679–684; Spector, Rumania at the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 120–129; Lederer, Yugoslavia at the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 172–182.

25 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. VI, pp. 303–304.

26 Ibid., Vol. IV, pp. 610–611.

27 Ibid., Vol. V, pp. 476–477.

28 Ibid., Vol. IV, p. 679.

29 Ibid., pp. 672–674.

30 As early as November 23, 1918, President Wilson indicated in a conversation with Count Macchi di Cellere, the Italian ambassador in Washington, that he would not oppose the Italian demand for a frontier with Austria at the Brenner Pass. See Mamatey, Victor S., The United States and East Central Europe, 1914–1918: a Study in Wilsonian Diplomacy and Propaganda (Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1957), pp. 369–371Google Scholar. He confirmed this promise in a conversation with Premier Orlando on January 31, 1919 (see Albrecht-Carrié, Italy at the Paris Peace Conference, p. 104) and formally agreed to it in a meeting of the Council of Four on May 29, 1919 (see U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. VI, pp. 105–106).

31 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. VI, pp. 675–676.

32 Ibid, Vol. V, pp. 392–393.

33 Nicolson, Peacemaking, p. 327.

34 Nina, Almond and Lutz, Ralph H. (eds.), The Treaty of St. Germain (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1935), pp. 157–165Google Scholar.

35 Strong, David F., Austria, October 1918-March 1919: Transition from Empire to Republic (New York: Columbia University Press, 1939), p. 117Google Scholar.

36 Almond and Lutz, The Treaty of St. Germain, pp. 61–64.

37 Ibid., pp. 204–209.

38 Ibid., pp. 165–177.

39 Ibid., pp. 215–221.

40 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. VI, pp. 585–586.

41 Ibid., Vol. VII, pp. 97–100.

42 Ibid., Vol. IV, pp. 504–505 and 674–675.

43 For a text of the Treaty of St. Germain, see Temperley, H. W. V. (ed.), A History of the Peace Conference of Paris (6 vols., London: H. Frowde and Hodder & Stoughton, 1920–1924), Vol. V, pp. 173–304Google Scholar.

44 For the texts of the minorities treaties, see Ibid., pp. 437–470.

45 Low, Alfred D., The Soviet Hungarian Republic and the Paris Peace Conference. In Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, new ser., Vol. LIII, Pt. 10 (Philadelphia, Pa.: American Philosophical Society, 1963), pp. 52–55Google Scholar; Deák, Hungary at the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 61–63.

46 Low, The Soviet Hungarian Republic and the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 46–47 and 73–82.

47 U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. VI, pp. 412–413; Deák, Hungary at the Paris Peace Conference, Doc. No. 19, pp. 461–466.

48 Low, The Soviet Hungarian Republic and the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 70–71; Szepal, Arpad, Les 1SS jours de Béla Kun (Paris: A. Payard, 1959), p. 222Google Scholar; Tökes, Rudolf L., Béla Kun and the Hungarian Soviet Republic (New York: Praeger, 1967), pp. 189–192Google Scholar.

49 Spector, Rumania at the Paris Peace Conference, p. 157.

50 Low, The Soviet Hungarian Republic and the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 82–83; Szepal, Les 133 jours de Béla Kun, p. 242.

51 Spector, Rumania at the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 159–196.

52 Deá, , Hungary at the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 112–134; Admiral Nicholas Horthy, Memoirs (New York: R. Speller, 1957), pp. 99–103Google Scholar.

53 Horthy, Memoirs, pp. 104–108; Deák, Hungary at the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 165–166.

54 Deák, Hungary at the Paris Peace Conference, Doc. No. 44, pp. 539–549.

55 Ibid., pp. 253–264.

56 Ibid., Doc. No. 46, pp. 551–554. On newer evidence, Perman (see her The Shaping of the Czechoslovak State, p. 263 n.), however, attributes the covering letter to Italian, not French, influence.

57 The Allied Powers had awarded Burgenland to Austria outright. But irregular Hungarian forces, officially repudiated by the Hungarian government, refused to clear the territory around Sopron (Odenburg). On October 27, 1921, the Allied Powers yielded to the Hungarians, and under Italian mediation a plebiscite was arranged for the city of Sopron and a number of adjoining villages. On December 14–15, 1921, the plebiscite was held under international supervision. The Hungarians were in control, and the vote went in their favor. They retained Sopron, while the rest of Burgenland went to Austria. See Macartney, C. A., Hungary and her Successors: the Treaty of Trianon and its Consequences (London: Oxford University Press, 1937), pp. 54–60Google Scholar; and Wambaugh, Sarah, Plebiscites since the World War (2 vols., Washington, D. C: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1933), Vol. II, pp. 261–268Google Scholar.

58 For the text of the Treaty of Trianon, see Temperley, , A History of the Peace Conference of Paris, Vol. V, pp. 174–304Google Scholar.

59 Albrecht-Carrie, Italy at the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 298–309; Lederer, Yugoslavia at the Paris Peace Conference, pp. 276–312. For the text of the Treaty of Rapallo, see Temperley, , A History of the Peace Conference of Paris, Vol. V, pp. 428–432Google Scholar. In contrast to the Allied inability to solve the Italo-Yugoslav dispute, they successfully settled the Austro-Yugoslav boundary dispute. The Allied Powers had decided to hold a plebiscite in the Klagenfurt area. They divided the district into two parts: Zone A, the larger and more southern section, which was inhabited mostly by Slovenes; and Zone B, which contained the city of Klagenfurt, inhabited mainly by Germans. The plebiscite was to be held first in Zone A. If it went in favor of Yugoslavia, a plebiscite would follow in Zone B. If, on the other hand, the plebiscite in Zone A went in favor of Austria, none would be held in Zone B. Although preceded by much disorder, the plebiscite in Zone A was held in an orderly fashion on October 10, 1920. It went in favor of Austria. As a consequence, no plebiscite was held in Zone B. See Wambaugh, , Plebiscites since the World War, Vol. II, pp. 124–162Google Scholar.

60 On September 11, 1919, after the failure of Polish-Czechoslovak bilateral negotiations over Teschen, the Allied Powers decided to hold a plebiscite not only in Teschen but also in Orava and Spiš. It was, however, never held. Instead, on July 28, 1920, during the height of the Polish-Soviet War, the Allied Powers decided to partition each of the areas. Czechoslovakia was given most of the mines and an important railroad in Teschen, while the Poles received the town of Teschen and mainly undeveloped coal deposits. Portions of Orava and Spiš were awarded to Poland, although the final delimitation of the boundary did not take place until 1924. See Perman, The Shaping of the Czechoslovak State, pp. 244–257 and 270–272; and Komarnicki, Rebirth of the Polish Republic, pp. 365–366.

61 For the text of the Allied treaty with Poland, Czechoslovakia, Rumania, and Yugoslavia on the cost of liberation, see U. S. Department of State, The Paris Peace Conference, Vol. XIII, pp. 822–828Google Scholar.

62 For the Allied agreement with Italy on the cost of liberation, see Ibid., pp. 831–838.