Thus it happened that my government and I were constantly deceived by actions in Vienna, without being able to do anything against it, since from there we constantly received the hint: "If you make things hard for us, we shall leave you in the lurch; in other words, our army will no longer fight by your side." In view of our situation, such action on Austria's part had to be avoided in any way possible, both on military and political grounds. The defection of Hungary and Austria brought a crisis upon us. Had Emperor Charles kept control of his nerves for three weeks longer, many things would have turned out differently. But Andrassy--as he himself admitted--had been negotiating for a long time in Switzerland, behind our backs, with the Entente. Thus Emperor Charles believed that he would assure himself of good treatment at the hands of the Entente. After our failure of August 8th, General Ludendorff had declared that he could no longer guarantee a military victory. Therefore, the preparation of peace negotiations was necessary. Since diplomacy had not succeeded in initiating any promising negotiations and the military situation had become even worse in the meantime, on account of revolutionary agitation, Ludendorff, on the 29th of September, demanded that preparations be made for an armistice instead of for peace negotiations. MOVEMENT FOR ABDICATION At this critical time a strong movement began at home in favor of setting up a new government for the now necessary termination of the war. I could not ignore this movement, since the old government, during the seven weeks from August 8th to the end of September, had not managed to initiate peace negotiations offering any hope of success. Meanwhile, General von Gallwitz and General von Mudra, summoned from the front, appeared before me. They gave a picture of the inner situation of the army, laying due emphasis upon the great number of shirkers behind the front, the frequency of insubordination, the displaying of the red flag upon trains filled with soldiers returning from furloughs at home and other similar phenomena. The two generals considered that the principal cause of the bad conditions was to be sought in the unfavorable influence exerted upon the soldiers by the spirit predominating behind the front and in the general desire for ending the fighting and getting peace, which was spreading from the homeland along the lines of communication behind the front and was already becoming noticeable even among some of the troops at the front itself. The generals advanced the opinion that, owing to these reasons, the army must immediately be withdrawn behind the Antwerp-Meuse line.