Germany does not seek survival

Guderian became more and more excited as he spoke: "The key to the success of the Po River operation does not lie in how quickly we can cross the Tyrol Mountains, but in how quickly we can fight our way from Arceiro to Vicenza, Padua, and all the way to the north bank of the Po River."

Faust listened to Guderian's explanation and felt as if he was dreaming of the Ardennes Forest in 1940.

He took Guderian out of the villa. As soon as they left the cabin, Faust exclaimed in praise of the magnificent snowy mountain scenery of Tyrol.

Guderian scooped up a handful of falling snow and tossed it into the air: "Using my plan, the German army will reach the north bank of the Po River much faster than the Italians can establish a second line of defense on the north bank of the Po River."

Faust had begun to carefully read the revised version of Guderian's Po Plan No. 17. The more he read, the more he was amazed at Guderian's superior military innovation ideas.

It seems that the title of "Father of Blitzkrieg" is not undeserved, nor is it due to the person.

Guderian added, "According to my research and statistics, the three German Jäger Regiments have hundreds of these critical vehicles available. If we draw on them from other units and utilize the Austro-Hungarian Empire's existing transportation, it's entirely possible to achieve a high-speed breakthrough that the Italians couldn't have anticipated."

Faust pondered, "Neither the Western Front nor the Eastern Front adopted this strategy. The method you describe makes it difficult to carry heavy artillery. Without heavy artillery, even with high mobility, it would be difficult to penetrate the mixed defenses composed of concrete bunkers, barbed wire, and minefields."

Guderian had a sharp smile on his face:

"We can combine infiltration and assault tactics. The infantry will not aim to capture positions, but to penetrate the enemy's defenses. Moreover, Italians, I have fully learned the Italian army's combat methods from the Austrians. The Italian army is particularly worried about the enemy appearing in their rear. Once this happens, the Italian army will easily feel that they are surrounded, and morale will quickly collapse. There is no need to attack their hard-held positions. The Italians will surrender on their own."

Faust touched the blue stubble on his lips. During this period, Faust was very busy. In addition to military affairs, the Cheka was purging the aristocratic officers in the 11th Army, and Faust also had to intervene in the management of some strategically important civil affairs in Tyrol.

The National Socialists had enough talents in the military and civilian affairs, but too few in the civil affairs, which troubled Faust a lot.

Faust had to meet too many people every day in his headquarters in Innsbruck. Although he had asked Marshal Conrad to find a way to coax Princess Agnes back to Vienna, Faust was afraid that this annoying little princess would come to him again, so he left Innsbruck and moved to this small mountain building in the suburbs to stay for a few days.

"According to your Plan 17, this operation is still unprecedentedly bold, and the risks we are taking are particularly great."

Faust placed his hand on the iron railing in front of the villa courtyard and looked into the distance. The scenery of Tyrol was particularly beautiful, and the suburbs of Innsbruck, with its mountains and rivers, were the kind of beautiful scenery that could easily calm people down.

Guderian added: "Successful combat requires taking risks. The core qualities of a soldier are boldness and carefulness. Neither is indispensable."

Faust pondered for a moment and said, "We truly don't have a complete grasp of the situation. With someone like you making such an unconventional military deployment, the scales of victory should definitely tilt in our favor."

Outside the villa, at this time, Faust also vaguely saw the shadows of several cars. Hitler, Tito, Rommel and Kesselring all came to find Faust in cars.

The mountain wind was strong, and everyone brought Faust a lot of good news:

The takeover of some grassroots governments did indeed present a significant shortage of cadres, but the German army's officers and soldiers were highly educated. Officers, needless to say, and ordinary soldiers almost all had at least an elementary school education, and many had also attended vocational high schools and liberal arts high schools. Even if their majors were not suitable, they could still be used for the time being.

The Cheka's operations have made great progress. Seventy percent of the personnel on the purge list drawn up by Faust have been expelled from the 11th Army.

Hitler had extra good news.

Previously, many Austrian officers had used some illegal means to complete the task of finding absent soldiers, and the relationship between these officers and the deserters they found was particularly tense.

The Cheka settled scores later and publicly tried a number of officers in field courts, punishing many Austrian officers who liked to bully or even beat grassroots soldiers. Well, Hungarians made up the majority among them, even more than the Germans.

After this purge, many absent soldiers who returned to the army were appeased and no longer ran away or deserted.

Ultimately, not every soldier deserted their service. There were two main reasons for leaving the army:

First, they were not paid enough. Not only were their salaries in arrears, but the food quota was often in short supply. Second, they were wronged. Some aristocratic officers in the army were arrogant and would beat and scold soldiers of working-class and peasant origins at will. It was okay in the short term, but who could tolerate it in the long run?

Faust also praised Hitler's enlightenment:

"You're right. The Cheka can't rely solely on violent deterrence. Special investigative units, field courts, harsh punishments, and even public executions are only temporary solutions, not the root cause. We can't improve the soldiers' treatment for the time being, but we must at least ensure that they no longer suffer injustices. We must control the behavior of officers and extend the consistent approach of the officers and soldiers of the Großdeutschland Regiment to the Austrian Army."

Faust patted Hitler on the shoulder and said, "The Cheka should also attach importance to the role of propaganda and education. I've seen some of the pamphlets and posters you produced, Adolf, and the rally speeches you're so good at. You need to make the soldiers understand that even if the Austro-Hungarian Empire is not worth defending, the Italians are not much stronger."

Finally, Faust turned to Rommel and Kesselring and raised the Guderian Plan in his hand:

"Captain Guderian has just devised a plan for an offensive similar to Cannae. Everyone can take a look at it and offer their opinions. We should also have a full democratic discussion on military matters, and then..."

"It won't be long before we reach the Po River for the winter."

===

The current book club group is 604857153. Faust and the National Socialist Party are about to arrive in the fateful year of 1918. A raging flood is imminent. In which direction will the great revolution surge? Book friends can join the group and share their opinions.

Yu Wen currently has two scripts for the future plot direction, and will make modifications based on everyone's opinions.

If you have any negative comments, please mention them. The current performance of this book is not very good. I also hope that book friends who like this book can help recommend it to their friends! Finally, it is a new month, and I am asking for recommendation votes and monthly tickets.

Chapter 108 Princess, Don't Go to the Basement

"The Eastern Siege of Petrograd has begun."

Before the arrival of November in the Russian calendar, Faust learned from Rundstedt, Sorge, Manstein... and other sources that the German army would launch a general offensive against Petrograd.

He was very worried that if the German army successfully captured Petrograd this time, the history of the October Revolution would probably change infinitely.

No matter how powerful Lenin was, it was impossible for him to plan an uprising in Petrograd under German occupation.

Even if the German army failed to capture Petrograd in the end, Faust had no idea which way history would turn just because of the impact this siege might have on the situation in the city!

"The troops of the Austrian Eleventh Army have been reorganized into five divisions after our training. Each division is currently fully staffed."

Hitler, who was in charge of Cheka affairs, held a thick stack of reports in his hand and placed them on Faust's desk. After the efforts of the little mustache man, he used both soft and hard tactics, and all kinds of methods that were acceptable and not acceptable were used together. The absenteeism and shortage of the Austrian army were indeed improved to a certain extent.

Originally, the 11th Army had seven divisions, each with a strength of only 5,000 people. Among these 5,000 people, there were also some soldiers who were scattered among the people and did not participate in training and combat.

Hitler used an iron fist to purge a large number of aristocratic officers and promoted many grassroots soldiers to officers. The seven divisions were reduced to five divisions, retaining only the five divisions with relatively long history in the Austrian Army. He tried his best to ensure that each division was fully staffed, so that the total strength of the 11th Army was increased from less than 40,000 to about 50,000.

Of the seven divisions of the 11th Army, Faust only retained the Austrian 3rd "Dalmatian" Mountain Division, the 11th Infantry Division, the 12th Territorial Division, the 22nd Territorial Defense Army Division, and the 2nd Cavalry Division, a total of five division numbers, including three infantry divisions, one cavalry division, and one mountain division.

The 3rd "Dalmatian" Mountain Division also received German-style hunting training. After the National Socialist Party's reorganization, its morale improved and its combat effectiveness naturally increased a lot.

In terms of weapons, Germany provided a lot of aid to the Austro-Hungarian Empire this time, including thousands of wagonloads of weapons, equipment, ammunition and supplies. Even an unpopular character like Marshal Conrad received a substantial replenishment.

The supply situation of the Austrian army improved greatly. After the seven divisions were reduced to five divisions, the number of soldiers in each Austrian division was increased, and the positions of officers who were just sitting there doing nothing were greatly reduced.

You must know that one of the serious problems in the late Austro-Hungarian Empire was that there were too many people and too few tasks. The phenomenon of redundant officials was really too serious. The 11th Infantry Division, which had the most serious problems in the 11th Army, had a total of only more than 1,700 front-line combat soldiers, but there were as many as 800 officers in positions that did not require participation in combat.

In addition, it is really shocking that there are only five divisions left in an army. Seven divisions can barely support the army's framework. If they are reduced to five divisions, there is no need for the 11th Army to exist.

However, Vienna still needed the 11th Army, a weak unit, to accommodate Marshal Conrad, so it was not easy to directly cancel the 11th Army's number.

This gave Faust another reason to strive for resources.

In order to strengthen the framework of the 11th Army, Faust submitted a report to his superiors through the Berlin and Vienna routes, requesting that a batch of reinforcements be allocated to the 11th Army.

In Berlin, Faust already had quite a few connections. The left, center, and right factions of the German Social Democratic Party were all happy to win over Faust and do him a favor. The military dictator Ludendorff also appreciated Faust's recent performance. With a stroke of his pen, he directly transferred a German division to Faust and extracted the 40th Infantry Division from the original 14th Army of the German Army under General von Bülow and transferred it to the Tyrol region to cooperate with the Austrian 11th Army in the battle.

What about Vienna?

In Vienna, Faust only gained a lot of fans, but did not develop any reliable connections in the political and military circles.

Faust's only connection in Vienna is Princess Agnes.

He didn't want to lose face again and go to the little princess who had been severely punished by him. Besides, Faust didn't want the innocent and straightforward Princess Agnes to get involved in politics.

In Faust's memory, the Habsburg royal family of the Austro-Hungarian Empire seemed to have a much better end than the Romanov royal family of Tsarist Russia.

The last emperor, Charles I, and his brothers and sisters were not executed by the new government as was done in Russia.

This is because the rule of the Habsburg royal family was more relaxed, gentler, and more skillful than that of Tsarist Russia.

Within the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the most serious problem was not the oppression of the people by the government represented by the royal family, but the conflicts between different ethnic groups within the empire.

Those nations that were able to rise up against the emperor in the name of national liberation all wanted to oppress other nations: Hungarians bullied Slovaks, Poles bullied Ukrainians, Italians bullied Croats, and so on.

The Habsburg royal family became the only glue between the various ethnic groups, and this is not entirely an exaggeration.

The Habsburgs did care for their subjects of all races, at least in the royal provinces, where their power and wealth extended. For centuries, they were adept at using various languages ​​and absorbing various customs to facilitate their rule.

As the old Emperor Joseph claims, their love is cosmopolitan, impartial, self-serving, careless, and therefore in some way just right.

Vasily once told Faust: "The racial composition of our family is very complicated."

They could hardly be classified as any one ethnic group; at least, most people did not consider members of the Habsburg family to be Germans.

To some extent, therefore, the Habsburgs possessed a kind of inherited nationality, a clan unto themselves. Modern nationalism operates through the metaphor of family, asserting that fellow nationals are brothers and sisters who share a common homeland.

The Habsburg family, who are the most incompatible with modern nationalism, are the group that best fits this metaphor.

The most important slogan of the Habsburg royal family in the 20th century was "love". "Love" once created today's Habsburg Empire through marriage, but it is impossible for the Habsburg princess who is waiting to be married to do anything with "love" now.

Love can no longer expand the empire, but it may be able to maintain it.

Since its defeat on the battlefield by Italy and Prussia, the Habsburg dynasty has been in a weak position at the negotiating table, and the empire can only make concessions to one nation after another.

After being defeated by Italy in 1859, the empire could only issue the October Manifesto in 1860, announcing that certain powers were granted to certain provincial councils in the Habsburg royal provinces in order to appease the grievances of the traditional aristocratic ruling class of those ancient nations.

In 1866, after being defeated by Prussia, the Habsburgs had no choice but to reach a compromise with Hungary and establish a dual imperial system.

Can a multinational empire survive in a Europe populated by nation-states? If so, what are the founding principles of this multinational empire?

The first principle was to compromise with historic peoples by granting autonomy to those with large aristocrats and claiming traditional rights.

Shortly after the Habsburgs granted internal sovereignty to Hungary and its nobility, they also granted autonomy to the Polish nobility in Galicia.

The second principle is to support the peasant community to balance the nobles.

The Habsburgs abolished the remaining serfdom in 1848, and in 1867, they promulgated a constitution formally declaring the equality of all nations. Starting in 1879, the empire went a step further, gradually implementing equal voting rights for all adult men, and by the 1907 election, universal suffrage was finally achieved for all adult male citizens.

These practices were things that the Tsarist royal family had never done before. Although they were tactics used by the Habsburg royal family to maintain their rule, they did give the people more rights.

Perhaps for this reason, the Habsburg family did not suffer a brutal purge after the collapse of the empire in history.

Faust was a little worried that if because of him, Princess Agnes violated the Habsburg royal family's consistent political neutrality and became too deeply involved with the German army, it was unknown what kind of disaster would be brought to the little princess in the future.

Chapter 109: The Aborted October Revolution?

Princess Agnes was still young, and the rule of the Habsburg Empire had always been relatively relaxed, so perhaps she did not have much blood debt and hatred on her body.

But when the empire really collapses, whoever is more involved in politics will definitely suffer more reckoning from history and the people.

Faust felt that the love-brained little princess was really annoying. He didn't like little girls of fourteen or fifteen years old. But if he involved Princess Agnes because of his own needs, Faust would also feel a little guilty.

Of course, according to Nechayev’s “Catechism of a Revolutionary”, the sixth point is:

"A revolutionary is harsh on himself and should be harsh on others as well. All tender and fragile feelings of family, friendship, love, gratitude, etc. should be suppressed by the calm passion of the single revolutionary cause. He has only one tenderness, one consolation, one reward and satisfaction - the success of the revolution. He should have only one thought and one goal day and night - ruthless destruction. He devotes himself to this goal calmly and tirelessly, and therefore should be ready to sacrifice himself and to destroy with his own hands everything that stands in the way of achieving this goal."

Furthermore, in Article 21 of the Revolutionary Catechism, the author Nechayev simply points out that revolutionaries should make use of women.

“Women are divided into three categories:

One type is people who are empty-hearted, dull-minded, and insensitive, and they should be exploited;

The other type consists of enthusiastic, loyal, and capable people, but they are not ours, because they have not yet been tempered to the point of having real, practical, revolutionary understanding without empty words; they should be pulled forward;

Only the last category, those who fully accept our program, can truly accept it."

Nechayev had close contacts with Bakunin, the founder of anarchism. His "Catechism of a Revolutionary" absorbed the principles of many secret societies of the Russian Transcaucasian mountain people. In addition to having a strong anarchist color, it also has a stronger terrorist color, so much so that later historians often believe that Nechayev is the originator of modern terrorism.

This set of things scared Marx at the time. At that time, Marx mistakenly thought that the author of "Questions and Answers on the Revolution" was Bakunin, and had a heated argument with Bakunin about this.

Lao Ma's evaluation of "Revolutionary Questions and Answers" is:

"... The Revolutionary Catechism carries to the highest degree the immoralities of the bourgeoisie, a revolutionary morality derived purely from Jesuit doctrine, which it merely exaggerates to absurd proportions, and replaces the holy Catholic, apostolic, Roman Church of the Jesuits with its own ultra-anarchist, destructive, holy revolutionary cause."

Marx could not have known that Nechayev's "Questions and Answers on the Revolution" would have a profound impact on Russia in the future, especially in the Transcaucasus region, where the people were already tough and assassinations were rampant. The moral values ​​of "Questions and Answers on the Revolution" could shape a great revolutionary with an indomitable will in the Caucasus Mountains.

Faust thought for a long time. Apart from the little princess, it seemed that the only connection he could use in Vienna was the Queen Mother?

Faust was not sure whether Queen Mother Josephine of Austria-Hungary was willing to help him.

He could only ask Vasily, a guard from the Habsburg royal family, to write a letter to the Empress Dowager in Vienna, asking her to help the poor 11th Army.

No matter what, a group army with only five divisions is too shabby.

In the Vienna court, the Austrians no longer promoted the idea that this war was a "new Thirty Years' War" or that it was imposed on the peace-loving Austro-Hungarian Empire by the gangs of Paris, London, and Petrograd.

Because Austrian officials were tired of fighting, they were now more worried that the country's power would fall into the hands of the German army.

The people of the Austro-Hungarian Empire had grown tired of the war even earlier. They no longer believed in propaganda, especially the politicians who fabricated it.

Even though the Allies had won many victories recently, the Austrians preferred to believe that "the Germans would consume metal, and we would consume lives." The Austro-Hungarian Empire had lost millions of people, and it was time to withdraw from the war.

The Vienna court was filled with calls for a ceasefire. The young Emperor Charles I had just met with several Croatian politicians, who all mentioned to Charles I the Fourteen Points recently proposed by US President Wilson.

"Your Majesty, the Allies do not demand the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. They only demand that it be reorganized based on the principle of national self-determination. Britain and France would still be very happy to see a reformed Austro-Hungarian Empire as a barrier to prevent the expansion of Germany or Russia after the war."

"Yes. If Your Majesty wants the Empire to withdraw, it must do so now. The Russians have been driven out of the battlefield. In other words, the opportunity cannot be lost."

In the reception room, Charles I remained hesitant and weak: "To withdraw from the war now would be tantamount to betraying Germany. Should we do this?"

Politicians from Croatia were impatient: "Your Majesty! Germany is taking over everything in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Our troops, our railways and roads, our munitions and factories will all become German property. If this continues, the country will no longer be a country, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire will become a servant of Germany."

After the meeting ended that day, Charles I had become inclined to make a separate peace. It was at this time that Queen Mother Josephine received the letter from Vasily.

After reading the letter, the elegant Queen Mother went to her son, Charles I, and asked, "Is Your Majesty preparing to make a private peace?"

Karl I was somewhat terrified when the Queen Mother revealed his secret thoughts: "Mother, the Empire really does not have the strength to continue fighting."