Technology reinforced personal impressions. From the beginning of their alliance both France and Russia had been concerned with the problem of maintaining direct, secure communications during a crisis. Everything from cables to carrier pigeons had been considered, tested, and rejected as too slow, or too random, or too vulnerable. The development of radio appeared to solve the problem. In 1907 and again in 1909 the French pushed for the establishment of radio links. By 1912 the Russians had constructed a major—for the times—communications station in the White Russian town of Bobruisk. From there daily communications were possible to Paris, where the practical French utilized the Eiffel Tower for transmission and reception.
The Germans were reasonably quick to respond. By 1913 the senior intelligence officer of I Corps in Königsberg was utilizing the garrison’s own powerful radios to intercept Russian dispatches. By calling on reserve officers and utilizing civilian professors from the university who were experts in Russian language and culture or skilled mathematicians, he had made significant progress deciphering codes and understanding transmission patterns. The traffic had been growing steadily and ominously heavier when, during the night of July 24/25, Königsberg’s operations picked up a lengthy coded exchange between Bobriusk and the Eiffel Tower. Its import seemed all too clear the next day, with the news of Russia’s projected partial mobilization.76
IV
Sazonov had forty-eight hours’ time between Serbia’s rejection of the ultimatum and Austria’s declaration of war. As the sands ran out he found it easier to continue a long tradition of Habsburg-bashing, easier to accuse Austria of deliberately setting Europe on fire, easier to boast of the Austrian ambassador being “gentle as a lamb” in discussing the crisis than to appraise Russia’s interests and opportunities, much less Serbia’s guilt or Austria’s determination. On July 28, as Austrian warships and artillery opened fire on Belgrade, Sazonov implemented the partial mobilization approved four days earlier.
The foreign minister continued to insist that this mobilization did not mean war, that Russia did not have to attack Austria and had no intention of attacking Germany. But Berlin was not the only European capital where it was legitimate to ask whether the politicians or the generals ruled. Chief of staff N. N. Yanushkevitch informed not merely the four districts Sazonov authorized, but every military district in the empire, that July 30 was to be the first day of a general mobilization.77
Russia’s alleged inability to risk partial mobilization in view of the clumsiness of her military system has by this time been thoroughly exposed as a red herring. Russia was in fact better able than any of the continental powers to call up only part of her huge forces. Her general staff, however, had never taken this alternative seriously. In operational terms Russian generals had no faith in Serbia’s ability to withstand unaided the army of a great power. As early as November, 1912, a conference of chiefs of staff of the military districts had warned of the risks should Russia delay entry into an Austro-Serbian conflict and recommended mobilization as soon as Austria acted. The size of the Russian Empire, its low population density, its inefficient bureaucracy, continued to make mobilization a difficult process even after the recent reforms. It was further complicated by the fact that, unlike circumstances elsewhere in Europe, a large number of the army’s active formations were stationed away from major population centers. Nor could the Russian railway network support the heavy traffic of its French or German counterparts. Individual lines were often lightly built and poorly maintained. Water tanks, fuel supplies, and maintenance facilities were calculated for limited traffic. So were repair gangs and train crews. It was neither insouciance nor warmongering that led the chief of the general staff’s mobilization section to describe a general war as “settled” as early as July 26. From his perspective, anything else was an unconscionable risk.78
On the same day the French military attaché, General Laguiche, informed his war ministry that Sukhomlinov, while repeating Russia’s intention to avoid overt measures that might be interpreted as directed against Germany, confirmed the mobilization of the four southern districts. At the same time the military districts of Moscow, Kiev, and St. Petersburg—those closest to the German frontier—had been secretly put under orders to prepare for the contingency of war.
The possibility of French intervention to stop the process was diminished by continuing domestic pressure to modify the Three Years’ Law. The government was correspondingly unwilling to weaken its Russian alliance. To get along it seemed desirable to go along. At the prompting of Joffre, War Minister Adolphe Messimy instructed Laguiche on July 27 to urge an invasion of East Prussia as soon as possible. The next day, Joffre and Messimy insisted to the Russian military attaché that France was fully prepared to fulfill her alliance obligations. In St. Petersburg, French Ambassador Maurice Palèologue made the same point to Sazonov, and to anyone else willing to listen. His encouragement was unofficial, but in the current supercharged atmosphere no one was asking awkward questions.79
Russian premobilization measures were reported to Berlin almost as soon as they began. German intelligence officers sought the whereabouts of any Russian units observed away from their normal stations. They increased the number of “tension travellers,” civilians and reserve officers legally dispatched across the border under various pretenses to observe possible war preparations. Königsberg described empty freight trains being transferred to the interior out of harm’s way, and troops moving by rail in the direction of a major junction. Other Russian units were leaving their maneuver grounds with unusual haste. Franco-Russian radio traffic, all in code, remained heavy. By the afternoon of the 27th, intelligence officers in Berlin were convinced that Russia had implemented, not merely announced, her premobilization program.
Through the next day reports of troop movements, of concentrations of rolling stock, of security guards posted on railway lines, bridges, and water towers, continued to pour in. The paramilitary frontier guard was in some areas being reinforced by army troops. Agents in place were reporting the calling up of reservists and the purchasing of horses. Radio traffic between Paris and Bobriusk was increasing. Everything known to date fit German information and German assumptions about Russia’s war plans.80
The relatively weak forces allotted to Germany’s eastern theater could not have been far from Moltke’s thoughts when he compiled his “Evaluation of the Political Situation” on July 28. The memorandum is dominated by fear of a Russia the chief of staff saw as pursuing the politics of brinkmanship. She was advancing her own preparations to the point where her armies could cross the frontier within a few days of mobilization, but stopping short of issuing the final orders in an effort to force her enemies, Germany and Austria, into mobilizing first. This in turn would act as a casus foederis for France, perhaps for England as well.81
Intelligence reports, submitted through July 29 and summarized at 4:00 p.m., described the Russian preparations to date as “passive.” The deployment of troops on the frontier and along the railways had been followed neither by a general call-up of reservists, even in the border districts, nor by mobilization orders. At 5:25 p.m., however, a telegram from the German consul in Moscow quoted “a very good source” that Russian mobilization was set for the next day.82 From a military perspective Germany seemed to face a choice between abandoning the Schlieffen Plan with its western focus and exposing Germany’s eastern provinces fully to the Russian steamroller. Even the most pessimistic general staff calculations of the prospects for a successful delaying action in the east had not been based on the kinds of hammer blows the Russians could throw if allowed to mobilize and concentrate undisturbed.