Chapter 3: Chapter 2: 2nd Austrian Army

Pilsen, Bohemia, Austrian Empire

September 12, 1897

An old military man is reading a letter inside a military barracks of the 2^nd Austrian Army base in Austria Bohemia. This person is Duke Kristoph of Austria, Duke of Wurttemberg, the father of Karl Alexander of Austria, and the Army Commander of the 2^nd Austrian Army.

After reading the letter, the face of Duke Kristoph becomes ugly and grim, and just can’t believe what he just read. The absurdity of a rebellion and invasion of the Ottomans seems impossible to happen.

But after a few minutes of analyzing the letter and the current situation, he returned to being calm and understanding how possible the content in the letter was that it will likely happen in the near future.

He always viewed the Hungarian region as a powder keg of the Empire, a large part of the empire where the Empire can’t collect any taxes, in the sense it is like a different country due to having border tariffs and Hungarian nobles had a large autonomy within the region. Other regions in the Empire are already integrated like Bohemia, Carniola, and Croatia and while others are continuously and rapidly integrating with Austria. The current emperor is pursuing internal and economic development through integration, to unite the people through culture and language, for decades the empire has succeeded in making the other regions to be influenced by the Austrian culture and language through arts, culture, and education.

But these actions only gained enmity from the Hungarian nobles who sees these actions as a threat to Hungary, thus complaints and protests are sent to the emperor but still, the orders are not retracted. Because of these, some Hungarian nobles are moving in the dark and conspiring against something.

It is only due to the Russo-Prussian where the region is severely weakened due to most parts of the battles and destruction that occurred in these areas in the Empire that such plans are halted and stopped. But a few decades have already passed and the region started to revitalize in agriculture. The region also prefers farming and agriculture, so there is barely any industrialization in the region, serfs are still not free in this region due to the need for manpower for agriculture and the development and integration implemented thus started to become a threat to them.

Because of this, after the Russo-Prussian war, there were two major Hungarian revolutions led by the Hungarian nobles and liberals to gain rights and autonomy. Their revolt was able to gain small achievements but still for the Hungarians, it is not enough and a new revolution is brewing in the center of the Empire.

And the ones who are secretly funding the Hungarians are the Ottomans, they planned to capitalize when Austria is in disarray due to the rebellion to invade. With their well-equipped and well-trained military, the Ottomans would swallow southern and eastern parts of the empire.

Understanding the contents of the letter, he immediately called the officers in the 2^nd Austrian Army. After the defeat of Austria during the Russo-Prussian War, the winning side imposes a limitation on the army size to 250,000 men for Austria while 800,000 for Russia. The officers feel the disgrace and humiliation of the defeat and want to regain the past glory of the imperial army.

After all the officers are present in front of him, the duke ordered the officers for a secret full training exercise and also secretly equipped the soldiers with the weapons sent by the Crown Prince. These shocked the officers, for an order from the young Crown Prince was sent bypassing the Austrian Government in Vienna and it also signals that the young monarch is dissatisfied with the Austrian Government and starting to retake the power that they lost after the Russo-Prussian war.

These orders also make the officers happy, for decades the military is disregarded by the government. Corruption and fracture fractions plagued the Empire. The soldiers are ill-equipped and ill-trained and the wide borders of the Empire are in danger.

Currently, the Austrian Empire has five armies. The 1^st Austrian Army in the Italian part of the Empire with 60,000 troops in 3 divisions, the 2^nd Austrian Army in Bohemia with 60,000 troops in 3 divisions, the 3^rd Austrian Army in Galicia with 40,000 troops in 2 divisions, the 4^th Austrian Army in Croatia with 40,000 troops in 2 divisions and the 5^th Austrian Army in Transylvania with 50,000 troops in 3 divisions.

The five armies seem formidable and large on paper but the borders it needs to protect are wide, but the army is scattered across the empire, the soldiers even act as the police and garrison forces further thinning the concentration of forces. There were also three large powers are at the borders – the German Empire, Russian Empire, and the Ottoman Empire. After the Russo-Prussian war, the Austrian Empire is labeled as the sick man of Europe.

The German Empire has a large industrial base with a million army alone on the European continent and millions of reserve manpower. The Russian Empire has a large territory and millions of men can be conscripted in times of war. While the Ottoman Empire has started a regrowth in their territory by invading the Arab Peninsula, Iran, Tripolitania, and Egypt, on paper the Ottomans is seemed rising and stronger than Austria. France and United Kingdom can also raise a large army with their colonial possessions. Even the Nordic Union can raise a large army and has a powerful navy in its command.

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In order to respond to these threats, the Austrian Empire should expand the army and begin the rearmament of the army. But in order to achieve this, aside from facing the international backlash, the internal affairs of the Empire should be brought into order, and the duke understand these problems and was shocked that it is not the emperor who has made an action against these problems but the crown prince.

And this letter is the first step for the future of Austria and the officers follow it with glee. Today it is the 2^nd Austrian Army, tomorrow it would be the entire Austrian Army.

Days after, the army started to train with the new weapons, transitioning from Napoleonic Era tactics to a new and modern one with the new needle guns and artilleries.

** ** **

Pilsen, Bohemia, Austrian Empire

September 29, 1897

Outside from the military base of the 2^nd Austrian Army, a large contingent of army is coming to the base. This is a quarter of 1^st Austrian Imperial Guards numbering 2,500 from its total of 10,000 men. They served as the guards of the Habsburg and the most loyal to the Imperial Family and were not part of the 250,000 limitations of the treaty, so technically Austria can take this loophole to expand the army by expanding the imperial guards but the after the war of 1832, the emperor focused more on development and civil progress rather than militarization and martial progress.

These men we’re all sent in Bohemia as request of the Crown Prince for a training exercise together with the 2^nd Austrian Army. But these men would stay in Bohemia for a long time until the Crown Prince will return, becoming the loyal guards of the Crown Prince.

The duke can’t still believe on how the Crown Prince was able to convince the Emperor to send some of the Imperial Guards for a training. Also, the duration of the stay further shocked the duke, it might be months or years for these men to stay here to train, lessening the number of imperial guards in Vienna for the Emperor and the imperial family. But this further strengthen the resolve of the duke to develop and train these soldiers for the dreams and aspirations of the Crown Prince.

For the glory of the Habsburg and the Austrian Empire, the duke planned and prepared for the future. But he realized there is another paper inside the envelope and the duke immediately open and read it and is shocked on what is written in it, the contents in these letters shocked the duke so much that he rereads it to make sure he is not hallucinating. The contents in the paper is “to expand the Imperial Guards secretly into a division by recruiting secretly 15,000 more men and trained them secretly…” such orders could be seen as treason for making an order without the knowledge of the emperor, even it is from the crown prince.

Secretly arming and training the army without the direct order of the emperor can be already consider treasonous and yet the crown prince wants to expand the number of soldiers secretly, and in thousands which would be hard to conceal. Such actions can warrant a death sentence, even the imperial parliament can order it even they were part of the Habsburg family.

Note: A full regular division is 20,000 men while a full imperial guard division numbers 25,000 men

“This…” the duke is speechless. This is a very hard dilemma, he favors the orders of the crown prince but such actions warrant careful action and deliberation, if he consented, it needed a lot of careful actions and planning. Such massive recruitment should not be within Empire of Austria’s border, it is needed outside Europe if possible, or divide the recruitment across the globe so that it would not cause too much commotion and wariness from the other European powers especially the Ottomans who just annexed the entire Persian lands and Arabian Peninsula to the dismay of the French and British who are already wary of the alliance centered by the German Empire.

But the duke also realized the situation can be an opportunity for Austria to rise again, but the road will be hard and sacrifices would be made in the future. Such a future makes the duke full of anxiety, about how rocky would be the future and if there is even a future for Austria. Looking back on the letters sent to him, he sees a ray of hope from the crown prince, this finalize his decision to follow the orders of Archduke Justinian I, whatever might happen in the future, for the duke it would be better to die fighting than waiting for the empire to fizzle out in history.