Karl H. von Wiegand to Colonel House

Apropos of the impression very general here that Czernin's speech and subsequent "peace feelers" are signs of a break of between Austria and Germany and a possible rupture of that alliance.

You undoubtedly are far better informed than I can be and I do not wish you to think that I desire to impose my views on you. I will however, take the liberty of placing any knowledge I have at the disposal of the President and yourself for whatever light it may throw on the situation for you.

While Berlin is not wholly in sympathy with Vienna and looks askance at Czernins very evident aims to be spokesman for the Central Powers, it can safely be assumed that he is taking no step without the full knowledge and acquiescence even though that be a very reluctant acquiescence, of Berlin.

My conviction of that is based on the following, which I think will show the President and yourself, that Vienna is following a well thought out and long planned move.

In October and November 1916, I had a number of long talks with Baron Burian, then foreign minister, in Vienna. I had on a number of occasions at the request of Penfield, acted as a sort of "feeler" between him and Burian, especially in the matter of the appointment of Tarnowski as ambassador to Washington.Burian found the greatest satisfaction that the intense hatred, bitterness and animosity throughout the world generally against Germany did not include Austria-Hungary. In Paris, in London and in America, he said, there was little or no feeling against Austria. This, he declared, would in time probably bring about a state of affairs that would make it both possible and logical for Austria to offer her mediating services to Berlin and to become the spokesman in peace for the Central Powers. Burian declared that Austria's only real enemy was Italy. The Foreign Minister went into interesting details motivating his views that Vienna would have to become the mediating factor between Germany and the world. On the one side, he said, Austria would have to bring all her pressure to bear in Berlin for modification of peace views which undoubtedly would be more stiff than Austria's and on the other hand would be in position also to "reason with the Allies".Burian even then recognized that any peace move which had anything like a stamp of "made in Germany" on it, would not receive much consideration "not even the consideration they might merit", he added.Count Tisza, the Premier of Hungary, expressed the same views to me in Budapest. He even went farther. Count Andrassy, at that time candidate for foreign minister, also expressed to me similar views. On the day that Emperor Francis Joseph was buried laid away, I had an hours talk with Dr. Koerber, then Premier of Austria. Strangely enough Koerber also told me the time would come that "Austria will have to step out and take a more prominent part in dealing with the Allies in view of the hatred increasingly engendered everywhere by Germany". He wanted particularly to know how the American people felt toward Austria.

Both Burian and Koerber foresaw that such a move on the part of Austria would immediately be interpreted as a desire of Austria to break away from Germany. Burian said that was the one disquieting factor, especially that the German people might interpret such a step wrongly.

Following that Count Colleredo-Mansfeld, whose wife is a daughter of the New York Banker and yachtsman, Mr. Iselin, several times discussed that question with me. Colleredo-Mansfeld is now Czernin's right hand man.

In March of last year, Count Szechenyi, the Austrian Minister at Copemhagen, told me that Czernin would like to make a move for peace but found opposition at Berlin. Szecehnyi was anxious that I should go to Vienna and have a talk with Czernin. He obtained from Czernin an invitation for me to come there together with a pass. In view of what appeared to be the certainty of Congress declaring war, I did not go and did not cable for your views, which I would have done before deciding.

I have mentioned these matters to you simply to show you that Vienna has had this move long planned out, in case you should be in doubt about that. Vienna did not win even a reluctant consent from Berlin until late last Summer. Berlin never has been and is not today sympathetic to Vienna becoming too prominent in dealing for the Central Powers. For a time there was some thing like a tentative proposition that Vienna should handle the negotiations for peace in the East and Berlin be left a free hand with the full support of Vienna, for making peace in the West. No agreement upon that, however, was reached according to my latest information before I left there.Unfortunately the Versailles conference decision will counter with the President's message in Germany. Our press generally is laying too much emphasis and hope upon revolution Austria and in Germany. We may count with much pressure from the people in Germany upon their government but it would be deceiving ourselves to reckon with a German revolution in the near future.Hindenburg once remarked to me "They have been talking revolution in Russia ever since the war began. I dont believe there will be revolution until after the war is ended. In any event it forms no part of my plan. If revolution comes in Russia so much the better for us. If there is no revolution, I will not be disappointed and it will not have altered or affected my plans".

From the first day of the war England gambled upon revolt in Germany. That was England's great mistake.