Abstract:
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This book challenges the commonly accepted claims of German memoirists that the significant weaknesses of Germany's ally, Austria-Hungary, were unknown to German military and political leaders before the war. Through an analysis of evidence from German military attach�s, the author forces a reevaluation of the German position leading up to World War I.
Review: The role of military attaches has been a greatly neglected subject for research, Alfred Vagts' classic overview having been published as long ago as 1967. Fortunately, this is now changing. Timothy Hadley gives us a welcome and detailed analysis of the work of German military attaches in Vienna set in the context of wider European military diplomacy and intelligence gathering. Based on a formidable range of primary sources, it is a sobering assessment of how much the Germans knew-and chose to ignore-about Austro-Hungarian military capabilities, not least in the July Crisis of 1914. -- Ian Beckett, University of Kent Exhaustively researched and clearly written, this monograph presents a detailed account of the comprehensive information German attaches in Austria Hungary provided on the Habsburg army's institutional and cultural shortcomings-and of the ignoring of that information in Berlin. It makes a correspondingly persuasive case that frank communication and focused financial assistance could have significantly improved Habsburg military effectiveness before 1914. -- Dennis Showalter, Colorado College Hadley's account, based on a rich trawl in both archival and secondary sources, perceptively analyzes the bewildering confusion inherent in the ultimately fatal Dual Alliance of the German and Austro-Hungarian empires. Berlin's decision to rely militarily on Vienna, dissected here in clear detail, is simply astounding. -- Lamar Cecil, Washington and Lee University
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