Panoramic view of Budapest on the Danube River. The hill(s) of Buda are on the left, and Pest is on the right. Prominent buildings include Parliament and St. Stephen's Cathedral.
Budapest látképeAnsicht von BudapestView of Budapest
Budapest, capital of Hungary and seat of the Hungarian government of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, was threatened in late 1914 as the Russians captured much of Galicia and threatened to cross the Carpathian Mountains. With German support, Austria-Hungary stopped the Russian advance in December 1914, but fighting continued through January and February, sometimes in waist deep snow with many lost to exposure. Austria-Hungary suffered nearly 800,000 casualties in the fighting. It wasn't until April and May 1915, first with the addition a German corps, then with the Gorlice-Tarnow Offensive, that the Russians were finally stopped.Hungarians were calling their own separate army by December 1917. Meeting with Emperor Karl and the Empire's military leaders, Szurmay, Minister for the Honvéd, Hungary's territorial or national guard, claimed all parties in Budapest were 'united on the issue of a Hungarian army'.In January 1918, as peace negotiations with the Russians dragged on, a crowd in Budapest attacked the German Consulate, breaking its windows.In Austria-Hungary's final offensive, the Second Battle of the Piave, many of the casualties were Hungarians, increasing calls to bring them home.Bulgaria signed an armistice on September 29 as its allies evacuated Serbia. By November the Allied armies were in Belgrade, on the Danube with Austria-Hungary before them. There were strikes and food riots in Budapest where the government ignored orders from Vienna. On October 21, as the Parliament of Lower Austria voted to create a German-Austrian state, the Hungarian Independent and '48er Party demanded the 1867 Compromise be terminated. Hungarian units on the Italian front left for home.
Budapest is a city in Austria-Hungary.
