The major decisions 1867–1895 were made by Archduke Albrecht, Duke of Teschen, who was the cousin of the Emperor Franz Joseph and his leading advisor in military affairs.

By contrast, the main enemies Russia and Serbia had engaged in large scale warfare in the decade before the First World War.

When troops under the command of Josip Filipović and Stjepan Jovanović entered the provinces expecting little or no resistance, they were met with ferocious opposition from elements of both Muslim and Orthodox populations there.

Austro-Hungarian casualties amounted to over 5,000 and the unexpected violence of the campaign led to recriminations between commanders and political leaders.

Of the pre–World War military forces of the major European powers, the Austro-Hungarian army was almost alone in its regular promotion of Jews to positions of command.

[13] While the Jewish population of the lands of the Dual Monarchy 4.4% including Bosnia and Herzegovina), Jews made up nearly 18% of the reserve officer corps.

[12] There were no official barriers to military service for Jews, but in later years this tolerance eroded to some extent, as important figures such as Conrad von Hötzendorf and Archduke Franz Ferdinand sometimes expressed anti-Jewish sentiments.

Likewise the lack of mutual intelligibility between speakers of Hungarian and German led to a feeling of resentment by many non-Austrian soldiers.

The delivery of orders was particularly ineffective, and the bureaucratic and dysfunctional system led to individual ethnic units becoming isolated from the overall high command.

[15] This in turn led to ethnic tensions and political violence in the empire, as such language battalions began instigating mutinies and revolts against the Austrian commanders, whom they saw as out of touch.

The battalions' use of languages that were not understood by the Austrian commanders also led to it being extremely difficult to impossible to discover attempts at desertion or revolt.

[16] Following the 1867 constitutional arrangements, the Reichsrat was dominated by German Liberals, who generally regarded the army as a relic of feudalism.

In 1867 the military budget accounted for about 25% of all government spending, but the economic crash of 1873 hit Austria-Hungary hard and foreign observers questioned whether the Dual Monarchy could manage a major war without subsidies.

Attempts to increase the yearly intake of recruits were proposed but repeatedly blocked by officials in Budapest until an agreement was reached in 1912.

While balloon detachments had been established in 1893, they were mostly assigned to the fortress artillery, except for a brief period from 1909 to 1911 when they were under command of the multifaceted Verkehrs Brigade.

The general peacetime order of battle of the Common Army included: The Austrian part of the monarchy (officially called Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council, unofficially and for short Cisleithania) had its own government.

In peacetime it had complete authority and responsibility for the Imperial-Royal Landwehr and its: The Hungarian part of the monarchy (officially called Lands of the Crown of Saint Stephen, unofficially and for short Transleithania) also had its own government.

In peacetime it had complete authority and responsibility for the: Official designations were as follows: After war was declared, 3.35 million men (including the first call-up of the reserves and the 1914 recruits) gathered for action.

Conrad favored an aggressive foreign policy and advocated the use of military action to solve Austria-Hungary's territorial disputes with Italy and Serbia.

[21] Archduke Friedrich, Duke of Teschen was appointed Supreme Commander of the Austro-Hungarian army by Franz Joseph on July 11, 1914.