AHC: Austria joins the German Empire

The POD would have to be much further back.

The Austro-Hungarian Empire was several hundred years old when Germany United. And even before unification Austria and Prussia didn't like each other much.

The only way I can see it happening is if you get rid of the Habsburg's, because if you keep them, I can't imagine that you don't end up with the Austrian Empire that we had OTL.
 
Hungary becomes independent during OTL revolutions, butterfly net with Germany going the same as OTL, Pro nationalist germanic revolution in Austria, and Ausria joins Germany following the franco prussian war?

Really far fetched
 
Hungary becomes independent during OTL revolutions, butterfly net with Germany going the same as OTL, Pro nationalist germanic revolution in Austria, and Ausria joins Germany following the franco prussian war?

Yeah, but how would a republican Austria fit into the monarchical German Empire?
 
Prussia is marginalized by a more successful Nordic or Polish Empire, Hungary splits so Austria rallies the Germanic states to Unification.
 
The POD would have to be much further back.

The Austro-Hungarian Empire was several hundred years old when Germany United. And even before unification Austria and Prussia didn't like each other much.

The only way I can see it happening is if you get rid of the Habsburg's, because if you keep them, I can't imagine that you don't end up with the Austrian Empire that we had OTL.
Complete and utter bollocks. Before WW2, Austrians always saw themselves as Germans, just in a country outside of Germany. The Austrian nation only started to develop after WW2, as a result of their attempt to distance themselves from the assumed 'German' national socialism, even though they had just as much part in the crimes of the Third Reich.

How about the reverse, the German Empire joins Austria? Wouldn't that work better?
That's just as ridiculous. Would you have Great Britain joining England? Or China joining Taiwan? Or, even funnier: The United States joining the Vermont Republic?
 
The most obvious POD is a very successful 1848 revolution: if the Habsburgs are in a worse position in late 1848 (say a better performance of the kingdom of Sardinia and the other Italian states earlier in the year, Pio IX not reneging on the liberal concessions and the Croats not saving the bacon of the Austrian emperor) Friedrich Wilhelm might not be so willing to refuse the imperial crown of Germany when the parliament of Frankfurt comes up with the offer. On a wave of nationalistic and liberal enthusiasm, Austria (and possibly Bohemia too) join the new constitutional empire.

May not be as easy as that, but I strongly believe that 1848 was truly a time of possibilities, when Europe might have chosen a very different path from OTL
 
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