Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf, as chief of the Austro-Hungarian general staff, was the foremost proponent of preventive war as the means of solving both the foreign and domestic problems of the multinational Habsburg Monarchy in one grand action. The combination of Conrad's insistence on war and Serbia's official, and frequently reckless unofficial, nationalist policies set the stage for the outbreak of a Balkan conflict that would shake Europe to its very foundations and change the world forever.