884 Cm. 22 • Thl Great War
within forty-eight hours. Grey, the British foreign secretary, called the ulti
matum “the most formidable document ever presented by one independent
state to another.”
The Serb government was in a no-win situation. Serbia’s small army was
no match for that of Austria-Hungary. Its options were either to capitulate
completely to the ultimatum and suffer a humiliating diplomatic defeat,
or, as one official put it, to die fighting. This made Serbia almost totally
dependent upon Russian intervention.
The ultimatum sent shock waves through the capitals of Europe. Upon
learning its contents, Sazonov exclaimed, “It’s the European War!” He
blamed Germany, claiming that the ultimatum was part of a German plan
to keep Russia from reaching Constantinople. Some of Tsar Nicholas ll’s
advisers saw war as a means of rallying the support of the Russian Empire
behind the tsar. Yet others remembered Russia’s disastrous defeat in the
Russo-Japanese War, which had contributed to the outbreak of the Revo
lution of 1905 (see Chapter 18). Sazonov’s first concern was to mobilize
French support against Austria-Hungary, believing that a united show of
strength would force the Central European allies to back down. From the
Russian point of view', if Austro-Hungarian influence expanded in the
Balkans, German influence would soon be manifest in the straits, because
a coup in Turkey in 1913 had brought the Ottoman Empire even closer to
Germany. French President Raymond Poincare’s state visit to Saint Peters
burg from July 20 to July 23 seemed to indicate that France would stand by
Russia, and Sazonov received quick assurance from the French ambas
sador of full French support.
On July 25, 1914, two days after the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum, the
tsar placed the Russian army on alert, a stage that would normally precede
mobilization. Such a step was fraught with consequences for the military
planners of each power. Mobilization meant preparing an army for war, call
ing up reserves, declaring martial law' in frontier areas, readying the railways
for hauling troops and supplies, and accelerating the production of muni
tions. In these circumstances, a Russian decision to mobilize would be tan
tamount to an act of war in the eyes of German military planners.
The Schlieffen PlanGermany’s plan for war against France had been drawn up in 1905 by
Count Alfred von Schlieffen (1833-1913), a former chief of the German
general staff. Based on the assumption that it would take Russia, France’s
ally, several w'eeks to prepare its armies to fight, the Schlieffen Plan called
for the German armies to use a lightning attack to knock the French out of
the w'ar. Then the German forces w'ould be able to confront the Russian
army attacking in the east. The German attack on France w'ould require its
forces to violate Belgian neutrality in order to bypass the sturdy fortifica
tions the French had constructed on their eastern frontier after the