In this Memorandum, as in the report referring to
Konopischt, the Rumanian question stands in the
foreground. The Serbian question is hardly touched. Not
by any means because the enmity of Austria towards
Serbia was less, but no doubt because she came up
against no hindrance in Berlin, while the German
Government was insisting on a friendly understanding
with Rumania. Austria, on the other hand, wishes to
give up the policy of “calm attention and friendly
representations” towards Serbia and Rumania, and
likewise towards Russia.
This State, the Memorandum continues, constituted a danger not merely to the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, but also to Germany. Russia and her ally, France, were striving “to break the military superiority of the two Empires by auxiliary troops from the direction of the Balkans,” and to carry out Russia's policy of expansion in opposition to German interests.
“For these reasons the directors of the foreign policy of Austria-Hungary are convinced that it is to the common interest of the Monarchy, and no less to that of Germany in the present stage of the Balkan Crisis, to oppose in good time and with energy a development planned and fostered by Russia which later on it would perhaps be impossible to check.” (Reprinted in the White Book on “The Responsibility of the Originators of the War,” of June, 1919, page 68.)
This Memorandum can hardly mean anything else than, in the language of diplomacy, the demand for a preventive war against the empire of the Tsar.
This dangerous document was just ready when the catastrophe of Serajevo occurred.
