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The road to Armageddon: Central Powers at war
In this new mini-series, we examine the wartime record of Austria-Hungary, Ottoman Turkey, and Bulgaria. We begin with a ‘special’ centred on Austria-Hungary’s army, which struggled to make an impression against its Russian, Serbian, and Italian foes. In this first part, Graham Goodlad assesses the performance of the Habsburg army in the war that culminated in the empire’s collapse.
It is not surprising that, of the Central Powers who took part in the First World War, Imperial Germany has received the lion’s share of historical attention. Its armies fought from beginning to end of the conflict on both the Western and Eastern Fronts. Germany dwarfed its allies – the Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires and the Kingdom of Bulgaria – in terms of economic and military might. The three lesser powers suffered from major weaknesses in their high command and in industrial production, transport and communications.
These were not natural allies. Bulgaria gained autonomy from Ottoman rule in 1878, becoming formally independent in 1908. Austria-Hungary annexed the Ottoman
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