as the leader of the Confederation. The rivalry between Austria and Prussia
ended in 1866, when after Austria's defeat the clever diplomacy of Bismarck
turned the rivalry between Austria and Prussia into friendship. Since the
Germans in Austria began to feel their impotence in the face of the growing
Slav power, a year later the centralising efforts of the Habsburgs were
finally embodied in the system of dualism which gave over the Slavs and
Italians in Austria to German hegemony and the Slavs and Rumanians in
Hungary to Magyar tyranny. For the support of this hegemony the Austrian
Germans and Magyars, whose ambitions are identical with those of Germany,
were entirely dependent on Berlin. Thus Austria-Hungary became inevitably
Germany's partner and vanguard in the south-east. Finally, the present war
was started by the Germans and Magyars with the object of achieving the
ambitious plans preached and expounded by Pan-German writers for years
past. The Germans wanted at all costs to become the masters of Central
Europe, to build an empire from Berlin to Bagdad, and finally to strike for
world domination.

2. In this turn of events Magyar influence played a greater part than might
be thought. Already in 1848 Kossuth defined the Hungarian foreign policy as
follows:--

"The Magyar nation is bound to maintain the most cordial relations with
the free German nation and help it in safeguarding Western
civilisation."

And while the Hungarian Slavs were prohibited from attending the Pan-Slav
Congress held in Prague in 1848, the Magyars sent two delegates to
Frankfurt in order to give practical expression to the above Magyar policy.

The value of Hungary for the Pan-German plans has been expressed by