The German demands as to extension of the period of occupation for five to six years after the general peace likewise played a great part at several stages of the negotiations, and were from the first stoutly opposed by Austria-Hungary.  We endeavoured to bring about an arrangement by which, on the conclusion of peace, Roumania should have all legislative and executive power restored, being subject only to a certain right of control in respect of a limited number of points, but not beyond the general peace.  In support of this proposal the Foreign Minister pointed out in particular that the establishment of a Roumanian Ministry amicably disposed towards ourselves would be an impossibility (the Averescu Ministry was then still in power) if we were to hold Roumania permanently under our yoke.  We should far rather use every endeavour to obtain what could be obtained from Roumania through the medium of such politicians in that country as were disposed to follow a policy of friendly relations with the Central Powers.  The main object of our policy to get such men into power in Roumania, and enable them to remain in the Government, would be rendered unattainable if too severe measures were adopted.  We might gain something thereby for a few years, but it would mean losing everything in the future.  And we succeeded also in convincing the German Secretary of State, Kuehlmann, of the inadvisability of the demands in respect of occupation, which were particularly voiced by the German Army Council.  As a matter of fact, after the retirement of Averescu, Marghiloman declared that these demands would make it impossible for him to form a Cabinet at all.  And when he had been informed, from German sources, that the German Supreme Army Command insisted on these terms, he only agreed to form a Cabinet on the assurance of the Austrian Foreign Minister that a solution of the occupation problem would be found.  In this question also we did ultimately succeed in coming to agreement with Roumania.

One of the decisive points in the conclusion of peace with Roumania was, finally, the cession of the Dobrudsha, on which Bulgaria insisted with such violence that it was impossible to avoid it.  The ultimatum which preceded the preliminary Treaty of Buftea had also to be altered chiefly on the Dobrudsha question, as Bulgaria was already talking of the ingratitude of the Central Powers, of how Bulgaria had been disillusioned, and of the evil effects this disillusionment would have on the subsequent conduct of the war.  All that Count Czernin could do was to obtain a guarantee that Roumania, in case of cession of the Dobrudsha, should at least be granted a sure way to the harbour of Kustendje.  In the main the Dobrudsha question was decided at Buftea.  When, later, Bulgaria expressed a desire to interpret the wording of the preliminary treaty by which the Dobrudsha “as far as the Danube” was to be given up in such a sense as to embrace the whole of the territory up