organizations in organizing our own Medical Corps. After the Armistice he was attached to the American Delegation in Paris which sent him, with Mr. Creel, to report upon Central Europe. By that time I was already President of the Republic and agreed that Prague should be the centre of this service.
As I have said, our Secret Service in America contributed largely to win for our cause, at an early stage, effective sympathies in official and, precisely, in the most authoritative quarters. Voska was in a position to report upon our work in Europe, and upon my plans, both to Colonel House and to the leading members of the American Government, including President Wilson himself.
The Breaking up of Austria-Hungary.
In America, as elsewhere, it was hard to convince people that it would be necessary to break up Austria-Hungary. Unlike Berlin, Vienna was not an object of immediate political enmity. As the French, the British and the Americans were fighting only against the Germans, there was not in the West the same direct hostility towards Austria as towards Germany. The Austrian front ran against Russia and Italy, yet even in those countries there were influential pro-Austrians. Austria was generally looked upon as a counterpoise to Germany, as a necessary organization of small peoples and odds and ends of peoples, and as a safeguard against “Balkanization.” Palacky’s original saying that if Austria had not existed she would have had to be invented, represented a view widespread among the Allies. The Allied Governments were influenced also by Austrian and Hungarian diplomatists; and in the Allied diplomatic services there were not a few pro-Austrians who had served in Vienna, some of them having family connexions with the Austrian and particularly with the Magyar aristocracy.
Besides, Austria had borne herself otherwise than Germany from the first. She had only declared war directly upon Serbia, Russia and Belgium, and had let the other States declare war upon her. Not even against Italy had she declared war. In this respect Germany was more definite and downright. True, the Austrian tactics presently proved disadvantageous and caused tension with Germany, as when, in February 1917, the Emperor Charles refused to break off relations with America at the behest of the Emperor William.
