The author is making his assumptions clear in the first chapter titled, “Facing a Serb Levée en Masse: The Habsburg Army and War on Civilians in 1914”. He concludes that looming fear of the so-called Komitadjis, special units in the Serbian army, trained for close combat and guerilla tactics, incited the harsh and brutal response of the Austro-Hungarian troops. In such way, Gumz does not accept the notion of the anti-Serbian inclinations of Austrian elites as a driving force behind the committed crimes. According to Gumz, the crimes were intended as a punishment for the Serbs who behaved themselves against the rules of war as they were imagined by the Habsburg officers. Here the author is largely influenced by the fear of the Serbian „irregulars“
