How could the Hapsburgs win the Swabian War?

So, the Swabian War breaks out in 1499, how could the Swiss be defeated by the armies of the Swabian League and Maximilian I, and how could this change the acceptance of the Reichreform and the Eidgenossenschaft?
 
I have tried searching for a thread about this but found none that favoured austria. I guess it's because everything worked against the habsburgs in that war. The biggest problem was of course that the swiss infantry was so damn good at fighting. The habsburgs enjoyed the support of the swabian league who supplied the landsknechts who hated the swiss mercenaries as they there constantly meeting on battlefields across europe. This support was only given when the swabian league didnt feel the habsburgs were not furthering their own goals instead of the empires. Wiki says that they only joined because they were afraid of the appeal of the eidgenossenschaft for their own subjects.


As you can see i have nothing but wikipedia to go on but i think if you change the outcome of some battles into a complete swiss defeat then maybe there could be a different outcome?
 
Maybe if Maximilian had simply employed the landsknechts as , mercenaries and not through the Swabian or if he had attacked through tthe Burgundian territories too to split the Confederacy's troops?
 
Maybe if Maximilian had simply employed the landsknechts as , mercenaries and not through the Swabian or if he had attacked through tthe Burgundian territories too to split the Confederacy's troops?

Sounds good

I read a little bit more on wikipedia, apparently there was alot of monatery support for the swiss from italians and french which only stopped arriving when the italians and french started warring and this was one of the reasons the swiss decided to negotiate. Maybe there could be less foreign support this time around?

Also these swiss were pretty brutal if they one a battle. They apparently chased the enemy down without quarter. Maybe if they lose a big fight they would be mercilessly slaughtered for prior battles like the battle of Hart?
 
Probably an important PoD for the Swabian War would be that right before the Battle of Schwaderloh, Count Wolfgang von Fürstenberg was able to stop his troops from raiding the Swiss towns and actually to keep the troops in line and ready for battle.

Since the battle was mostly lost because of the lack of preparation of Swabian pikemen when the Swiss emerged from the nearby woods, had they been prepared, and considering the numeric superiority and the support from several cannons gained from Lucerne's troops , they battle could have been a Swabian victory. And if they had won, they could have advanced south towards Frauenfeld, and after taking over it, they could have easily controlled the entire landgraviate of Thurgau, just as teh Confederacy had done for the last 30-40 years.

I don't have much knowledge of how could the Old Swiss Confederacy react to this, would they surrender after this or would it take to conquer Zurich or another member canton?
 
Yes this sounds like a good pod.

As you say it's hard to anticipate the reaction of the other cantons. The ultimate goal was probably for maximilian to make the accept the imperial tax and abolish many of the privileges they had been awarded by the luxembourg emperors . Would they accept those terms collectively if he captured one of the cantons or would he have to impose them on each one of them?
Also was he looking to take some cantons under direct control? Maybe that could be a quick gain for him but i really don't know enough.
 
He'd have liked to retake control over the Thurgau condominium, lost to the Swiss Confederacy only in 1460, and about the proper cantons, he'd have forced them to integrate into an Imperial circle, send troops for the Imperial Army and pay the new head tax, however the last part would probably have to be done by having troops as garrisons all over the territory.
 
This is probably the best case scenario. Im guessing the swiss would be very unruly though. Now what are the advantages of a more direct imperial rule of these lands. I seem to remember there being many important mountain passes that could probably be controlled now by the emperor instead of the local swiss. Maybe this would help alot in the italian wars.

We need probably also to concern us with how the famous swiss mercenaries will do if they lose the swabian war. Will they still be available for everyone to hire or maybe only the emperor? Maybe they will be as you said bound to the imperial army. This will seriously take away mercenaries that the french used in later battles such as in pavia.
 
I don't think their fame would be destroyed, they were and had been great soldiers even before the war , however the competence with the landsknechts would be a lot of harsher.

And yes, for the Italian Wars, a Hapsburg-controlled Alpine passes would make warfare a lot easier.
 
Obviously this different outcome would upset the development of switzerland. Would we see a swiss confederation at all or would it only consist of the old confederation do you think? Stranger borders will probably occur due to switzerland suddenly becoming a fair game for annexation.
 
well if they are forced to pay the head tax, it might well serve as an example for the rest of rebellious entities, and therefore, to further the cause of a slowly centralizing Hapsburg-dominated HRE. Actually that's one of my main 3 divergences for a TL I'm planning.
 
Sounds nice. I like habsburg timelines and i have always wandered how potentially valuable switzerland would be for them.
 
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