she was the most powerful. With the Czecho-Slovaks and the Yugo-Slavs she completely blocked the road of the Germans and Magyars towards the East.
The Pan-German plan was therefore essentially founded on the crushing of Serbia, the humiliation of Italy, and the complete annihilation of the national aspirations and hopes of the oppressed nations of Austria-Hungary, above all of the Czecho-Slovaks. No more odious or cynical enterprise against human liberty was ever conceived.
All these calculations presuppose the existence of Austria-Hungary. Turkey is too unstable to exist alone. The Germans have undertaken to take care of her. The road between Berlin and Constantinople had to be defended by faithful watch-dogs: this duty was to be confided to the Germans and Magyars of Austria-Hungary and to the Bulgarians in the Balkans. The customs union of Central Europe was destined to put the economic exploitation of these vast territories into the hands of Germany, and so render the Germans absolute masters of Central Europe. Germany cannot dispense with Austria-Hungary, which plays an essential part in the realisation of her elaborate plan, not only from the military point of view, with her support of fifty-one millions of inhabitants and nearly six millions of soldiers and the resources of a vast country, but principally
