Page 197 - Conflitti Militari e Popolazioni Civili - Tomo I

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tary Fund: one third in cash, the rest in allocations. In times of peace taxes had to be paid for
one third, in war they remained exempt from taxes anyway. However, they still had to pay
for their equipment, uniform and weapons.
Due to the recommendations of Sachsen-Hildburghausen the influence of the War Coun-
cil in Graz – it was finally abolished in 1743 – as well as of the Inner-Austrian estates was
eliminated, and the War Council in Vienna was henceforth responsible for the matters of the
whole Military Frontier. While the villages with the zadrugas still remained the administra-
tive basis of the Military Frontier system in most of the Military-Frontier territory, the func-
tion of knez was abolished in the course of these centralization measures, and the complete
legal, economic, and administrative powers passed over to the commanders of the individual
regimental districts; this was the end of the self-administration of the Walachians. 25
These reform measures along the Military Frontier were, however, interrupted by the
second Turkish War of Charles VI, and as the reform work was hardly taken up again, the
monarchy was shattered by the War of the Austrian Succession and the Silesian Wars with
campaigns against the Prussians, Bavarians, French and their allies. In the long run Maria
Theresa’s enemies could not put up much against the warriors of the Frontier regiments
fighting in Silesia, Saxony, Bavaria, the Rhine, the Netherlands and Italy – the “Croatian”
combatants created the image of a people who like no other had dedicated themselves to
26
the lives of fighters in the service of the monarch.
th
Since the middle of the 18 century the Ottoman Empire had no longer posed a real dan-
ger to the Habsburg monarchy, and the Military Frontier territory had enormously increased
due to the land gains in the course of the Turkish wars. This resulted in a flagrant dispropor-
tion between the existing defence power and a possible threat. Furthermore, the territory
did not produce any income, on the contrary: The administration and military organization
caused quite high expenses. After an attempt to partly reduce the Frontier territory had failed
due to the resistance of the Frontier men, who did not want to give up their privileges, the
Viennese court decided to finally bring the reforms requested by Sachsen-Hildburghausen to
completion by unifying the Military-Frontier organization, integrating the irregular troops
into the standing army of the empire and bringing about a total militarization of the Fron-
tier. The only aim of the reforms was, as the military historian and officer Wrede stated, “to
promote the further military uniform development of the Frontier countries and to create a
completely secluded soldier land”.
27
And this aim was achieved. The reforms in the decades around the middle of the 18 cen-
th
tury led to an enormous structural change which affected all social and economic institutions
at the Military Frontier. The hitherto sedentary Frontier man became a professional soldier,
who – serving in a big army – was engaged throughout Europe. The militarily reinforced
Frontier area became a territory which continued to accomplish security functions vis à vis

25 Amstadt, Die k. k. Militärgrenze, vol. 1, 163; http://www.kuk-wehrmacht.de/regiment/grenzer.html; Schin-
dler, Militärgrenzverwaltung, 27.
26 The people living in the Military Frontier area – Croats, Serbs, Albanians and some smaller ethnic groups,
Catholics and Orthodox – were summed up under the term “Croats” in those days. See the respective chapter
in Christopher Duffy, Sieben Jahre Krieg 1756 – 1763. Die Armee Maria Theresias, transl. by Claudia Rei-
chl-Ham, Vienna 2003, 327 – 345.
27 Wrede, Geschichte der K. u. K. Wehrmacht, vol. V, 227ff.