The War Court and Lap Pillow, Austria's Mandate of Heaven

In fact, there was another reason for transferring Count Latour away from Vienna. In order to cope with the upcoming war, Franz prepared to take the opportunity to establish a general staff.

At this time, the Austrian Empire was still in an era where the emperor and the minister of war thought about how to command and command; the generals on the front line were responsible for military, logistics, and finance. While marching and fighting, they had to spend a lot of energy paying attention to trivial matters.

The military qualities of the emperor, war ministers, and generals were uneven. Because of this, enemy countries could often create miracles when fighting Austria.

Even if a few generals achieve victory in some areas, they are rarely able to turn this advantage into victory.

There were actually other reasons for establishing the General Staff, but they were not immediately apparent.

For example, the conscription system and the selection of generals will soon fall behind the times, and the scale of future wars will become larger and larger.

The military recruitment system will place a heavy economic burden on the country. Relatively speaking, conscripts influenced by nationalism and nationalism are cheaper and have higher enthusiasm, which is the so-called subjective initiative.

At the same time, it can also solve the problem of loyalty that has troubled rulers for thousands of years. The rebellion of these mercenaries who are paid to do things is not new.

And due to the advancement of weapons, the gap between so-called professional soldiers and conscripts on the frontal battlefield is narrowing.

Especially at this time, line pushing tactics are popular. Except for the rare strong army, generally speaking, whoever has more people wins, and whoever is bolder wins.

As for the selection of generals, Austrian officers at this time were usually hereditary.That's right!Austria does have military schools, but most of the students are nobles.

It was as difficult for civilians to enter military academies as to be admitted to the University of Vienna, the highest institution of learning in the Austrian Empire at that time.

However, behind this single-plank bridge is a narrower plank bridge. Most of the teachers in the military academy are also nobles.

They are not necessarily biased, but the families of nobles, especially military nobles, are often related to each other, so the children of those nobles are more likely to be taken care of.

Even if you cross this gap, there is still a chain bridge after the wooden plank bridge.

According to the Austrian Empire's officer promotion rules, officers with the rank of second lieutenant or below who want to be promoted must go to the battlefield and participate in three battles with the first platoon of soldiers.

Even if the children of many civilians graduate from military academies, they are usually only non-commissioned officers. If they start from the lowest level of corporal, then from corporal to second lieutenant, he will face the test of life and death nine times. It can be said to be a "narrow escape".

Children of nobles are usually already second lieutenants after graduating from military schools, and they can skip these tests completely.

This is just a microcosm of the shortcomings in the selection of generals in the Austrian Empire. There are even more terrifying ones: directly taking money to get the position.

For example, the famous General Fernand Lizzy, who joined the army as a general, fought countless defeats in his life, but could still hold the position of Commander-in-Chief of the Venetian Local Defense Force on an equal footing with Marshal Radetzky.

Although Franz has never been a soldier for a day, he still has the rank of colonel. This is a rank that many people cannot achieve even if they work hard throughout their lives.

In fact, if Franz really wanted to be a soldier, his military rank would depend entirely on his own imagination.

But this is also a big cake, because the relevant chain of interests can even extend to everyone in the entire country.

In addition to a separate general staff, Franz is also preparing to establish a dedicated logistics department, intelligence department, equipment department, and weapons development department.In the past, these were all under the unified control of the War Department. The top management usually had one person holding multiple positions, while the bottom level was too bloated. The result was management chaos. If there was a problem, it would not even be possible to find where the problem was.

In the past, except for military personnel who were good at command, other talents in the Ministry of War were often not valued, and logistics and weapons were outsourced to businessmen for a long time.

As you can imagine, the outsourcing businessmen only considered profits, so the Austrian army often ran out of food, medicine, and weapons and equipment in the past.

During the era of Queen Theresa, there were frequent supply problems for the Austrian army. The war lasted from summer to winter, but the boots missing from the military uniforms were never shipped.

The soldiers could only wrap their feet with rags and continue to fight in the ice and snow.

The reason turned out to be that due to the rise in war prices, outsourcing merchants were unwilling to bear losses and wanted to wait until prices fell to replenish their boots.

This businessman was also very knowledgeable, and even Prime Minister Kaunitz helped conceal it. In the end, the Queen only found out about it because she accidentally came into contact with a wounded soldier who had retreated from the front line.

The angry queen wanted to execute the bold businessman, but was blocked by almost the entire palace. In the end, she just asked him to make up the difference, and then replaced him with a more loyal and reliable outsourcing businessman.

Franz didn't want to make the same mistakes again, let alone be led by others. He needed a more reasonable logistics department.

In addition, the status of weapons developers in the Austrian Empire was very low. Vincent Augustine, the chief weapons designer mentioned many times in the previous article, did not reach the rank of general until his death.

Not only do weapons developers have a low status, their incomes are also low.For fear of weapons designers using their expertise to arbitrage from the state.

Therefore, the Austrian Empire prohibits weapon developers from participating in the manufacture of weapons, and the Austrian Empire will provide weapon design drawings to manufacturers.

As a result, the confidentiality of the Austrian Empire's military industry is almost zero, because enemy countries can easily buy the design drawings of Austrian weapons from middlemen at very low prices, and even those weapons designers are selling them themselves to make a living.

Because of this, the Austrian Empire has never been able to retain military scientific and technological talents. With low status, low income, and their own inventions not being valued, it is strange that some people can still enjoy it.

Franz felt that he must give him enough attention, and his status or income should at least satisfy his vanity in one aspect, so as to give people enough motivation and not exhaust the power of innovation.

Although Franz has the development trend of weapons in the next 100 years, they are the ones who actually create these weapons.

So Franz built his own arsenal, and those weapons designers could get a share of the weapons sold.

In addition, in order to encourage designers to develop new weapons, Franz also created many awards and support funds.

As the first Chief of General Staff, Franz felt that Archduke Karl should be appointed.Because the latter is a rare theorist and practitioner in Austria and even in the entire era.

What's even more commendable is that Archduke Karl is a member of the royal family, and because of his lofty status in the military, he can minimize the resistance to reform.

At this time, the General Staff will be superior to the Ministry of War. This is also the need of the war. After all, except for Archduke Albrecht, Marshal Radetzky and Heinau, Franz is not sure that anyone else has the qualifications to be a famous general. .