Rudolf, graf Montecuccoli degli Erri was chief of the Austro-Hungarian Navy from 1904 to 1913 and largely responsible for the modernization of the fleet before the First World War.
Background
Montecuccoli was born in Modena in 1843, a descendant of the famous imperial Feldmarschall, Raimondo Montecuccoli (1609–1680). Raimondo Montecuccoli's only son died in 1698, but the title of count descended through his daughters to two lines, Austrian and Modenese.
When Rudolf Graf Montecuccoli was born, Modena was still an Austrian Habsburg possession, ruled by the house of Austria-Este. During the 1859 Italian campaign, however, the last Habsburg Duke of Modena, Francesco V, fled to Austria following the Austrian defeat at Magenta (4 June). Italian patriots seized control, demanding union with the Kingdom of Sardinia. This was confirmed by plebiscite in March 1860, and at the age of 17 Montecuccoli saw his birthplace and ancestral home pass under what he considered a foreign sovereignty. (A year later, Modena became part of the Kingdom of Italy.)
Education
Educated as a naval officer, Montecuccoli was little known outside the Austro-Hungarian naval establishment before his appointment as Marinekommandant (Navy Commander) and Chef der Marinesektion (Chief of the Naval Section of the War Ministry in October 1904, upon the resignation of Hermann von Spaun.
Career
Montecuccoli took part in the naval battle at Lissa on the frigate Adria in 1866, but was retired for the next two years in the wake of Austria's defeat at the hands of Prussia. After reinstatement in 1869 Montecuccoli served in various capacities on a variety of warships and visited Spain, Ceylon, and East Africa. In July 1900 Monte, as he was commonly called, was placed in charge of three Austro-Hungarian cruisers dispatched to China as a result of the so-called Boxer Rebellion. Upon his return the following year Montecuccoli was appointed president of the Military Technical Comité, and two years later to the head of the Naval Section in the War Ministry. On October 5, 1904, Monte was proclaimed commander of the navy and chief of the Naval Section.
In perhaps his most famous memorandum on July 6, 1905, Montecuccoli pointed to Italy as the Dual Monarchy's foremost naval opponent. He arranged several visits to Trieste, Pola, and Fiume by Reichsrat deputies in order to convince them of the need for naval expansion. At first Montecuccoli was content with building three ships of the Radetzky class for the battle fleet, but in 1909 he flatly demanded 150 million Austrian crowns in order to lay down four new dreadnoughts an announcement that precipitated the great naval scare of 1909/1910. Over the next two years Monte managed to wring from the Reichsrat 312 and 426 million crowns per annum for the construction of a fleet consisting of sixteen battleships, twelve cruisers, twenty-four destroyers, seventy-two torpedo-boats, and twelve submarines.
Montecuccoli was regarded as a stern taskmaster, earning the nicknames Iron Count and later Iron Admiral. His career spanned an exciting era in naval development: as a cadet he had been taught that ships had to be built of wood as steel could not possibly float; as admiral he attended the launching of Austria-Hungary's first dreadnought, the Viribus Unitis (1912-1914). On March 1, 1913, at the age of seventy, Montecuccoli retired to make room for younger men; Admiral Anton von Haus succeeded him. In retirement, Monte turned down an offer of the title of prince, and in 1917 he advised Emperor Charles to entrust command of the fleet to Rear Admiral Miklos Horthy. Montecuccoli died on May 16,1922, at Baden, near Vienna. He can rightly be regarded as the father of the modern Austro-Hungarian navy.
