Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary, also referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire or the Dual Monarchy, was a multi-national constitutional monarchy in Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. A military and diplomatic alliance, it consisted of two sovereign states with a single monarch who was titled both the Emperor of Austria and the Apostolic King of Hungary. Austria-Hungary constituted the last phase in the constitutional evolution of the Habsburg monarchy: it was formed with the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867 in the aftermath of the Austro-Prussian War, following wars of independence by Hungary in opposition to Habsburg rule. It was dissolved shortly after Hungary terminated the union with Austria in 1918 at the end of World War I.
Austria-Hungary was one of Europe's major powers, and was the second-largest country in Europe in area and the third-most populous, while being among the 10 most populous countries worldwide. The Empire built up the fourth-largest machine-building industry in the world. With the exception of the territory of the Bosnian Condominium, the Empire of Austria and the Kingdom of Hungary were separate sovereign countries in international law.
At its core was the dual monarchy, which was a real union between Cisleithania, the northern and western parts of the former Austrian Empire, and Transleithania, which corresponded to the medieval territories of the Kingdom of Hungary. Following the 1867 reforms, the Austrian and Hungarian states were co-equal in power. The two countries conducted unified diplomatic and defence policies. For these purposes, "common" ministries of foreign affairs and defence were maintained under the monarch's direct authority, as was a third finance ministry responsible only for financing the two "common" portfolios. A third component of the union was the Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia, an autonomous region under the Hungarian crown, which negotiated the Croatian–Hungarian Settlement in 1868. After 1878, Bosnia and Herzegovina came under Austro-Hungarian joint military and civilian rule until it was fully annexed in 1908, provoking the Bosnian crisis.
Austria-Hungary was one of the Central Powers in World War I, which began with an Austro-Hungarian war declaration on the Kingdom of Serbia on 28 July 1914. It was already effectively dissolved by the time the military authorities signed the armistice of Villa Giusti on 3 November 1918. The Kingdom of Hungary and the First Austrian Republic were treated as its successors de jure, whereas the independence of the First Czechoslovak Republic, the Second Polish Republic, and the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, respectively, and most of the territorial demands of the Kingdom of Romania and the Kingdom of Italy were also recognized by the victorious powers in 1920.
Name and terminology
The realm's official name was the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, though in international relations Austria–Hungary was used. The Austrians also used the names k. u. k. Monarchie and Danubian Monarchy or Dual Monarchy and The Double Eagle, but none of these became widespread either in Hungary or elsewhere.The realm's full name used in internal administration was The Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of St. Stephen.
- German: Die im Reichsrat vertretenen Königreiche und Länder und die Länder der Heiligen Ungarischen Stephanskrone
- Hungarian: A Birodalmi Tanácsban képviselt királyságok és országok és a Magyar Szent Korona országai
- k. u. k. was the label for institutions common to both parts of the monarchy, e.g., the k.u.k. Kriegsmarine and, during the war, the k.u.k. Armee. The common army changed its label from k.k. to k.u.k. only in 1889 at the request of the Hungarian government.
- K. k. or Imperial-Royal was the term for institutions of Cisleithania ; "royal" in this label referred to the Crown of Bohemia.
- K. u. or M. k. referred to Transleithania, the lands of the Hungarian crown. In the Kingdom of Croatia and Slavonia, the autonomous institutions used k. , since according to the Croatian–Hungarian Settlement, the only official language in Croatia and Slavonia was Croatian, and the institutions were "only" Croatian.
History
Background and establishment
Following Hungary's defeat against the Ottoman Empire in the Battle of Mohács of 1526, the Habsburg Empire became more involved in the Kingdom of Hungary, and subsequently assumed the Hungarian throne. However, as the Ottomans expanded further into Hungary, the Habsburgs came to control only a small north-western portion of the former kingdom's territory. Eventually, following the Treaty of Passarowitz in 1718, all former territories of the Hungarian kingdom were ceded from the Ottomans to the Habsburgs. In the revolutions of 1848, the Kingdom of Hungary called for greater self-government and later even independence from the Austrian Empire. The ensuing Hungarian Revolution of 1848 was crushed by the Austrian military with Russian military assistance, and the level of autonomy that the Hungarian state had enjoyed was replaced with absolutist rule from Vienna. This further increased Hungarian resentment of the Habsburg dominion.In the 1860s, the Empire faced two severe defeats: its loss in the Second Italian War of Independence broke its dominion over a large part of Northern Italy while defeat in the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 led to the dissolution of the German Confederation and the exclusion of Austria from German affairs. These twin defeats gave the Hungarians the opportunity to remove the shackles of absolutist rule.
Realizing the need to compromise with Hungary in order to retain its great power status, the central government in Vienna began negotiations with the Hungarian political leaders, led by Ferenc Deák. The Hungarians maintained that the April Laws were still valid, but conceded that under the Pragmatic Sanction of 1713, foreign affairs and defence were "common" to Austria and Hungary. On 20 March 1867, the newly re-established Hungarian parliament at Pest started to negotiate the new laws to be accepted on 30 March. However, Hungarian leaders received word that the Emperor's formal coronation as King of Hungary on 8 June had to have taken place in order for the laws to be enacted within the lands of the Holy Crown of Hungary. On 28 July, Franz Joseph, in his new capacity as King of Hungary, approved and promulgated the new laws, which officially gave birth to the Dual Monarchy.
1866–1878: Beyond Lesser Germany
The Austro-Prussian War was ended by the Peace of Prague which settled the "German question" in favor of a Lesser German Solution. Count Friedrich Ferdinand von Beust, who was the foreign minister from 1866 to 1871, hated the Prussian chancellor, Otto von Bismarck, who had repeatedly outmaneuvered him. Beust looked to France for avenging Austria's defeat and attempted to negotiate with Emperor Napoleon III of France and Italy for an anti-Prussian alliance, but no terms could be reached. The decisive victory of the Prusso-German armies in the Franco-Prussian war and the subsequent founding of the German Empire ended all hope of re-establishing Austrian influence in Germany, and Beust retired.After being forced out of Germany and Italy, the Dual Monarchy turned to the Balkans, which were in tumult as nationalistic movements were gaining strength and demanding independence. Both Russia and Austria–Hungary saw an opportunity to expand in this region. Russia took on the role of protector of Slavs and Orthodox Christians. Austria envisioned a multi-ethnic, religiously diverse empire under Vienna's control. Count Gyula Andrássy, a Hungarian who was Foreign Minister, made the centerpiece of his policy one of opposition to Russian expansion in the Balkans and blocking Serbian ambitions to dominate a new South Slav federation. He wanted Germany to ally with Austria, not Russia.
1877–1908: Congress of Berlin and Balkan instability
Russian Pan-Slavic organizations sent aid to the Balkan rebels and so pressured the tsar's government to declare war on the Ottoman Empire in 1877 in the name of protecting Orthodox Christians. Unable to mediate between the Ottoman Empire and Russia over the control of Serbia, Austria–Hungary declared neutrality when the conflict between the two powers escalated into a war. With help from Romania and Greece, Russia defeated the Ottomans and with the Treaty of San Stefano tried to create a large pro-Russian Bulgaria.This treaty sparked an international uproar that almost resulted in a general European war. Austria–Hungary and Britain feared that a large Bulgaria would become a Russian satellite that would enable the tsar to dominate the Balkans. British prime minister Benjamin Disraeli moved warships into position against Russia to halt the advance of Russian influence in the eastern Mediterranean so close to Britain's route through the Suez Canal. The Treaty of San Stefano was seen in Austria as much too favourable for Russia and its Orthodox-Slavic goals. At the Congress of Berlin in 1878 Gyula Andrássy, with British support, managed to force Russia to reduce its excessive demands in the Balkans. As a result, Greater Bulgaria was broken up and remained under nominal Ottoman control, Serbia, Montenegro and Romania became fully independent and Austria occupied the provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina, a predominantly Slavic area. The occupation required 150,000 troops and several weeks of fighting; the provinces were put under the administration of the Ministry of Finance. In that year, with Britain's support, Austria–Hungary stationed troops in Bosnia to prevent the Russians from expanding into nearby Serbia. In another measure to keep the Russians out of the Balkans, Austria–Hungary formed an alliance, the Mediterranean Entente, with Britain and Italy in 1887 and concluded mutual defence pacts with Germany in 1879 and Romania in 1883 against a possible Russian attack. Following the Congress of Berlin the European powers attempted to guarantee stability through a complex series of alliances and treaties.
Anxious about Balkan instability and Russian aggression, and to counter French interests in Europe, Austria–Hungary forged a defensive alliance with Germany in October 1879 and in May 1882. In October 1882 Italy joined this partnership in the Triple Alliance largely because of Italy's imperial rivalries with France. Tensions between Russia and Austria–Hungary remained high, so Bismarck replaced the League of the Three Emperors with the Reinsurance Treaty with Russia to keep the Habsburgs from recklessly starting a war over Pan-Slavism. The Sandžak-Raška / Novibazar region was under Austro-Hungarian occupation between 1878 and 1909, when it was returned to the Ottoman Empire, before being ultimately divided between kingdoms of Montenegro and Serbia.