AH Challenge: Franco-German Alliance in WWI

Whenever a WWI-AH is created, it is always assumed France and Germany are on opposite sides, and the alliances formulate from that.

Is there a way to have France and Germany be on the same side? (obviously, the cause of the war will have to be different in the alt-TL) If so, what would the alliance system look like?
 
This requires that Germany forms differently from OTL.

To get the same frontiers nevertheless, I'd propose that the Congress of Vienna establishes Alsace-Lorraine as an independent state within the German confederation. This should have only minor butterflies. Then a revolution happens in 1848, which brings a constitutional monarchy into power in Germany with the Prussian king as Emperor. Then-liberal Germany fights a short war with Austria, which gets helpü from the Russians and the British. France has problems on its own and cannot interfere. In the aftermath, Germany needs an alliance against absolutistic Austria and Russia, and France engages in colonial struggles with Britain, ending in a French-German bloc against Britain-Austria. Difficult to say where Russia lands in all this, but I'd rather see them with Germany and France.
 

yourworstnightmare

Banned
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Bismarck allows Prussia to annex parts of Bohemia after the war with Austria and is thus able to block the annexation of Alsace- Lorraine after the Franco- Prussian war. Austria become antagonistic towards Germany, while Franco- German relations slowly grow better since both feel threatened by the UK.
 
I agree, this requires a POD before 1870 to work out. Basically, the German unification must not be carried out on the back of a humiliated France.
 
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