"Have you decided?" At the Hofburg Imperial Palace in Vienna, Li Haidon, who had been designated as the crown prince by Emperor Franz, glanced at Foreign Minister Porchtot and Chief of the General Staff Condra, who were standing in front of him, and asked lightly.

For nearly a month after the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand and his wife in Sarajevo, he had been in Vienna, trying to prevent the war from happening. But to no avail, the militants in the Vienna government had the absolute upper hand, and the Serbian radicals gave them the best excuse, and the Austro-Hungarian rulers, who had coveted the Ottoman heritage in the Balkans for many years, could not contain the greed in their hearts. But they saw only weak Serbia and, possibly, Tsarist Russia, which was behind them.

After receiving assurances from the Kaiser, they were even more determined that the Russians would be dealt with by the Germans, and that Austria-Hungary would only have to deal with the Serbs.

But no one saw the British hiding in the rear, the Germans seemed to think that Britain would not declare war, the British used a vague expression to convince the Germans that Britain would not enter the war, as if the Germans only had to deal with the Russians and the French. If Wilhelm II had known what the British really thought, he would not have rashly declared war.

Nicholas II issued a general mobilization order only after receiving explicit support from the French and implicit assurances from the British, and in fact they wanted to abandon the Serbs at one point before that.

But the British assured the Russians at a critical moment that they would go to war.

But now, no one can see this, and now it's only July 23rd.

Porchtot took out the emperor's edict: Then let's fight!

Franz. Emperor Joseph did write that, with a hint of helplessness in his tone, and the emperor himself could not change the unanimous decision made by the top of the imperial government.

Heldon signed his name on the ultimatum to Serbia handed over by Porchtot, which was in fact a declaration of war, and it was impossible for the Serbs to accept the arbitrary arrest and trial of anti-Austrian militants by the Austro-Hungarian police, which undoubtedly completely undermined sovereignty.

The Serbian government could have prevented the assassination, but they did nothing. Remember that the "Black Shadows" had chopped their king to meat sauce in 1903, and that they had considerable influence in the government and the army, and that they allowed such an organization to exist in a violent and terrorist manner, and should have been punished.

"The Russians will definitely go to war, Kondra, please be ready." Helton did not forget to remind his chief of staff, but he could tell from the other party's eyes that the chief of the army staff did not take the advice of an admiral to the crown prince.

But the Serbs almost accepted the ultimatum, and the Russians initially decided to compromise, not sure if Britain would be on their side. Austria-Hungary imposed extremely harsh conditions on Serbia on 23 July, limiting it to a response within forty-eight hours. In order to endure humiliation, Serbia was forced to accept all the other conditions, except for one item in which Austria sent personnel to participate in the hunting and trial of the murderer.

At this critical moment, British Prime Minister Gray made clear assurances to Russian Foreign Minister Samzonov that the British would go all out on the side of the Russians, even at the cost of entering the war. During the day, King George V openly declared to the world: "We will do our best not to be drawn into war, but to ensure neutrality." ”

The reason why the Germans vouched for Austria-Hungary was that they mistakenly thought that Britain would stay out of the matter, and now the British seem to have no intention of getting involved in it, and they have been put into a pit by the British.

The Serbs began to harden after receiving Russian assurances, and on the morning of 28 July, Belgrade made it clear that Belgrade rejected the last note from Austria-Hungary, and at noon, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia.

The war began.

Heldon could only be a spectator, and although he became the crown prince, the emperor and the parliament did not give him the command of the army he wanted, and at most he could give the chief of the army staff, Condra, some suggestions.

He would rather become Chief of the Army General Staff, but this was impossible.

Kondra and the General Staff made the mistake of wishfully believing that the Russians would not go to war, concentrating their main forces on the Serbian border when planning the war.

But the Russians did not go as they wished, and after the Russians announced a general mobilization on 30 July, Condra hurriedly moved his army from the Danube side of the Austro-Serbian border to Galicia on the Austro-Russian border.

On 31 July, Berlin delivered ultimatums to Russia and France. In an ultimatum to Tsarist Russia, Germany demanded that Russia cancel its general mobilization order "within 12 hours of receiving the ultimatum". The ultimatum to France demanded that Paris declare within 18 hours that in the event of war between Russia and Germany, France would remain neutral, and if France remained neutral, it must surrender the fortifications of Turkey and Verdun to German occupation as a guarantee of neutrality, to be returned after the war was over. Russia did not want to answer at all, and France gave a brief reply: "We will act according to our own interests." ”

At this time, the Second German Reich had no choice.

On August 1, Germany declared war on Russia and the next day on France.

But on August 4, Britain suddenly declared war on Germany, dealing a blow to the Allies.

Kaiser Wilhelm II was almost knocked unconscious by this stick: Ah, ah, what's the matter, didn't you say that you want to be neutral?!

The next course was beyond the change.

One of the big mistakes made by the Germans was the wrong strategic direction, and they stuck to the Western Front as the main direction of attack, rather than concentrating on defeating the weaker Russians first. They spent a lot of time and effort on the Belgian fortress of Liège, but the French were able to calmly deploy their forces.

The outbreak of the war was followed by almost a chain of defeats: the German army was held back by the Belgians in Liège, the Russians moved with unexpected swiftness and defeated the German Eighth Army at the Battle of Compinan on the Eastern Front, and the Germans seemed to be about to lose all of East Prussia.

On the Austro-Russian border, Condra, despite the lack of troops on the front, rashly ordered an active attack on the Russians. After suffering an initial defeat, the Russians gradually gained a foothold, began to launch counterattacks, and gradually grasped the initiative on the battlefield.

Heldon could no longer control this, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire needed a victory to boost morale at home, otherwise the Imperial Army, which was already complicated, would quickly collapse because of these impending defeats.

He returned to Trieste.

The first conflict with Britain and France on the European battlefield took place at sea.

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