Austro-Hungarian military mission in Persia

One Colonel Adalbert Schönowsky von Schönwies as Head of Mission departed with 30 other officers for Tehran on 29 October 1878. On 12 November 1878, the mission had arrived in Tarnopol, where retired military band Julius Gebauer with the instruments, which he had bought in Vienna for a Persian military band, joined the mission. The 14 participants of the mission then traveled with a luggage of 2.4 tons by train to Odessa, by ship to Poti, again by train to Tbilisi, from there to Baku and via the Caspian Sea to Rasht. [2] The Mission arrived in Tehran in January 1879. The mission was accompanied by Albert Joseph Gasteiger Freiherr von Ravenstein und Kobach, who had already served several years in Persia. The objective of the mission was to reorganize the Persian army on the model of the imperial Austrian army. The first thing to be established was a corps of 7,000 men, including a musical procession. The training of the soldiers would be completed by March 1881. The Austrians were able to achieve that the Persian soldiers of the Corps were better paid than the rest of the soldiers, and that the payment was paid regularly. Despite attacks by the clergy against the infidel, the corps was formed, and soon a corps spirit grew on the soldiers and seemed to make the training a success. On 22 May 1879, Naser al-Din Shah visited and took a look for the first time at the corps set up by the Austro-Hungarian military mission corps. He was greeted with a Radetzky March, took a parade and visited the barracks of Abd ol-Azim, which he had obviously never seen in such a clean condition. The good mood of the Austrian officers, however, was marred by the fact that in May 1879 Russian officers arrived to establish a Persian Cossack Brigade. In the end the Persian Cossack Brigade outstripped the Austrians Corps and later formed the nucleus of the Imperial Iranian Army. Even though it looked like a success of the Austro-Hungarian military mission. At the end of July 1879, the corps had 90 officers and 1,400 men and in January 1880, the Head of Mission and Schönowsky were dismissed by Colonel Schemel v. Kühnritt, a former commander of the regiment No. 2 of Hussars "Friedrich Leopold of Prussia". In May the corps was composed of 2000 men, who were equipped with Austrian uniforms and weapons. In April 1880, there were already 260 officers and 6,000 men who served in the Austrian Corps service.

The plans for the Persian army was to have a corps with the total strength of 7,000 men, organized as follows: [3]

• 6 infantry battalions, each with 800 men
• 1 battalion of 800 men with hunters
• 3 batteries (artillery) with 200 men
• 1 Pioneers with 200 men
• 3 Music Band with 50 men

In Bremerhaven, a warship was ordered with 6 guns and baptized "Persepolis". Naser al-Din Shah could control the Persian Gulf with it. The ship was to sail with a German team to the Persian Gulf. A military academy was founded in Tehran in 1885, which Austrian officers stationed in the Persian army taught there in addition to their military service duties. In 1886 Persian cadets sent to Vienna for further studies and Naser al-Din Shah asked Emperor Franz Josef for additional support in the army reform in 1887. An Austrian general was to go to Persia, inspect the troops and lead an Austrian military mission with the rank of Persian Defense Minister. Franz-Josef refused, fearing problems with Russia. But he sent General von Thömmel as ambassador to Tehran. After a brief inspection of the situation, it became clear that there would be little return for the military support Austria was to provide. Also, Persia began to lose its importance from a strategic military point of view. Thus, the first official Austrian military involvement in Persia was terminated. Even under Muzaffar al-Din Shah, the successor of Naser al-Din Shah, Austrian officers were hired as instructors. On 7 August 1906 he met Captain Artur Kostersitz von Marenhorst and Major Conrad Emil Padowetz in Tehran. Padowetz left Tehran for two years and went as honorary consul to Geneva. Kostersitz, the last Austrian officer in the Persian service, was Head of the Military Academy until its closure in 1911. The graduates were taken to the newly founded Persian Gendarmerie in 1911. Kostersitz remained in Tehran until shortly before the outbreak of the First World War.

At this time, the Persian army had nominally 72 infantry regiments, each with 600 men, recruits came exclusively from rural areas, as the inhabitants of the towns were exempted from military service. According to the National Defence Act each village was required to provide a certain number of soldiers. Conscription lasted between five and twenty years. The conscripts were in the army, however after a few months of basic training left it by paying of a bribe to the regimental commander for an indefinite period. Those who could afford no money worked, by the way, in order to earn an income. The soldiers received neither payment nor food. New uniforms were issued only every two to three years. The weapons were stored in arsenals and issued only to military exercises. Many soldiers had not fired a single shot as there was rarely target practice. A so-called military training took place more than twice a week. The officers of the army were usually landowners. Many of them had this position only because of their social status. The officers often had no military or other kinds of training. Most of them could not read or write. Some officers incidentally operated shops in the bazaar, to supplement their income. In a garrison from 100 to 500 soldiers were stationed. The Ministry of War sent inspectors twice a year in the garrisons, to verify the number of switches on the payment lists soldiers. When an inspection was announced, all standing on the payment list soldiers were called at short notice. To replace losses for the inspection day, laborers were hired, which is decked out with guns and uniforms lined up along with the regular soldiers in the ranks. The inspectors confirmed usually the presence of all listed men. Besides the infantry, there was an artillery consisting of 16 units. They had 60 Uchatius heavy guns produced in Austria and 30 Schneider-Creusot quick guns, although they were stored for up to a few guns in the arsenal, as it could serve no one. Some guns were loaned to the Gendarmerie. The artillery did not have their own horses. If an artillery exercise in Tehran was scheduled horses were borrowed from the hackney. [4] In the condition described by Hassan Arfa, the Persian army was ultimately not ready to fight. Even in the conflicts between the central government in Tehran and separatist movements in the west and north of the country erupting after the First World War, the army played no significant role. The defeat of the separatist movement has been made on the merits of the Persian Cossacks led by Reza Khan. The Persian army remained unchanged, with only minor reforms in the uniforms which some generals wore until after the end of World War I and the yellow paint of the Persian army barracks, until its dissolution by the measures implemented by Reza Khan, later Reza Shah Pahlavi, in 1921.

As the only member of the first Austro-Hungarian military mission of 1879 military bandmaster Julius Gebauer remained until his death in Tehran. On his grave in Doulab cemetery in Tehran reads: "Here lies Julius Gebauer, general and musical director, born 18 March 1846, died on 9 July 1895 [5] "