Maximilian Maria Karl Desiderius Graf von Montgelas /23 May 1860 in Saint Petersburg – 4 February 1938 in Munich/ was a Bavarian infantry general and German politician and historian from the Montgelas family.
Max Graf Montgelas was born in St. Petersburg, Russia as the son of Bavarian diplomat Ludwig von Montgelas. His grandfather, also named Maximilian, served as Bavaria's Foreign Affairs Minister (Bavarian Head of Staff) from 1799 to 1817. Montgelas joined the Infantry Regiment of the Bavarian Army as an ensign in 1879. The following year he was promoted to second lieutenant. In 1887 he became personal adjutant to Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria. From 1888 to 1891 Montgelas attended the Bavarian War Academy, which qualified him for the General Staff, the Higher Adjutantship and the teaching profession.
In 1900, Montgelas took part in the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion in China as a major and commander of the 2nd Battalion of the 4th East Asian Infantry Regiment. He then served as German military attaché in Beijing for three years. After returning to Bavaria, Montgelas was appointed lieutenant colonel in the central office of the General Staff and in 1905 was appointed chief of the general staff of the IIIrd Army Corps in Nuremberg.
Upon returning to Nürnberg, von Montgelas worked as Chief of Staff at General von und zu der Tann-Rathsamhausen's III. Armee-Korps headquarters. He was promoted to Generalleutnant on 25.05.1911 conferring him the title of Exzellenz (Excellency.) Montgelas functioned as Senior Quarter-Master General (Oberquartiermeister) at Imperial Germany's Great General Staff Headquarters in Berlin from 1910 through 1912, before being selected to replace Ritter von Fasbender as Bavaria's 4. Infanterie-Division commander. He nonetheless continued to remain a key advisor to Chief of General Staff Helmuth von Moltke. After the Great War broke out, Montgelas was a very outspoken critic of Germany's incursion on Belgian neutrality, and in 1915 succumbed to pressure from his chain of command to retire from active military service.
Instead of returning to Bavaria, Graf von Montgelas immigrated to Switzerland for the remainder of the War and became an ardent pacifist. After the Armistice, Montgelas became part of the so-called Committee of Four, including Albrecht Mendelssohn Batholdy, Hans Delbrück, and Max Weber. The group formulated a response which brought into question the victorious Allies' accusation of Germany being solely responsible for initiating the War. The War Guilt thesis became a central point of Montgelas' research as a military historian. Published works included the Kausky Documents and The Case for the Central Powers: An Impeachment of the Versailles Verdict. General von Montgelas passed away in Munich in 1938.
