How to engineer the First LEague of Armed Neutrality into the American Revolution?

You read the question. I am trying to figure out a way to make Catherine the Great's First League of Armed Neutrality declare war on Great Britain, preferably due to the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War, when the Republic of the Netherlands supposedly was a neutral power.
 
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It appeared that Empress Catharine was quite reluctant to go to war with Great Britain, which explains why the League did nothing when the Royal Navy started bulldozing what remained of the Dutch one.

However, is it possible for Russia to find herself compelled to follow through with her obligations if either Sweden or Denmark (the first two nations to join Catharine after she founded the League) were to find that Great Britain has declared war against her?
 
Plausibility Check

So, Plausibility Check:

Early 1780: Henry Laurens and William Lee manages to negotiate Dutch and Swedish support for the American rebels. Drafts for future treaties are made by William Lee.

11 March 1780: Catharine II "the Great" declares armed neutrality for Russia as far as the American Revolutionary War is concerned, this after the British Royal Navy has begun capturing Russian ships bound for the American colonies searching for contraband.

The Summer of 1780: Sweden and Denmark joins the League of Armed Neutrality. For Sweden's part, the Royal Navy has attacked twenty Swedish merchant vessels.

September 1780: Henry Laurens is captured by the British off the banks of Newfoundland. The drafts for treaties with the Netherlands and Sweden are discovered.

December 1780: The Dutch join the League of Armed Neutrality. The British declare war on Sweden and the Netherlands.

With war declared on both Sweden and the Netherlands and Denmark and Russia being the only other nations in the League at this point, Catharine II has no choice but to declare war on Britain: Not declaring war would alienate the Danish, who would be very skeptical as to what the League actually stands for if it will not protect her close neighbour Sweden and fear it to be next. It would also be a grand embarrassment for Catharine on the European stage after the League having received so much praise at the many European courts if she suddenly makes a U-turn and goes "nevermind." The entire thing creates a much greater war in the European theatre regarding neutral powers maritime rights of commerce.
 
If the Swedes have agreed to be allies for the Americans, why are they joining the League of Armed Neutrality?

That bit feels forced.

Not to mention that I'm not entirely sure that the Danes would mind Sweden being beaten up. National rivalries and all.
 
If the Swedes have agreed to be allies for the Americans, why are they joining the League of Armed Neutrality?

That bit feels forced.

Not to mention that I'm not entirely sure that the Danes would mind Sweden being beaten up. National rivalries and all.

Sorry, it shouldn't be support for the war there, but negotiate a treaty for commerce and recognizing the Continental Congress!* :eek:

Sweden (and Denmark) depends on maritime trade for their prosperity, and to have their sea-faring vessels constantly intercepted by the British and their goods confiscated really isn't in either country's interest.

Additionally, neither the Swedish nor the Danish navy can give the United Kingdom a fair match at sea. This is the year 1780, after all, not 1015. Only with the backing of Russia can they feel secure. And while there is some rivalry between the two nations, they are also on the European playing-fields small nations. So, if both Sweden and Denmark joins a league for protection under Russia, the United Kingdom declares war on Sweden and Russia goes "meh, can't be arsed to help" Denmark's reaction won't be one of schadenfreude as much as it will be concern over why they should believe that Russia will honour her obligations to Denmark when Russia couldn't be arsed to honour her obligations to either Sweden or the Netherlands.

Plus, this will all be embarrassing for Russia, since Catharine's grand project turned into little more than a damp squib. Diplomatically clumpsy cowards isn't exactly how Russia wants to be seen in Vienna, Berlin, Paris and London.
 
Sorry, it shouldn't be support for the war there, but negotiate a treaty for commerce and recognizing the Continental Congress!* :eek:

Sweden (and Denmark) depends on maritime trade for their prosperity, and to have their sea-faring vessels constantly intercepted by the British and their goods confiscated really isn't in either country's interest.

Ah, much clearer. But its very much in Denmark's best interest for Sweden to be weaker.

Additionally, neither the Swedish nor the Danish navy can give the United Kingdom a fair match at sea. This is the year 1780, after all, not 1015. Only with the backing of Russia can they feel secure. And while there is some rivalry between the two nations, they are also on the European playing-fields small nations. So, if both Sweden and Denmark joins a league for protection under Russia, the United Kingdom declares war on Sweden and Russia goes "meh, can't be arsed to help" Denmark's reaction won't be one of schadenfreude as much as it will be concern over why they should believe that Russia will honour her obligations to Denmark when Russia couldn't be arsed to honour her obligations to either Sweden or the Netherlands.

Plus, this will all be embarrassing for Russia, since Catharine's grand project turned into little more than a damp squib. Diplomatically clumpsy cowards isn't exactly how Russia wants to be seen in Vienna, Berlin, Paris and London.
True. But the Danes might well see a silver lining rather than utter disaster - they're not the ones who are going beyond merely "don't mess with us" neutral status, so if the Swedes are (or appear to) . . .

Its a fair point, just my thoughts there. But Russia's interests don't justify making this up only to abandon this when Britain inevitably disapproves, as you said.

Still, I think if Britain has reason to believe that - meaning Russia has made it clear this is an issue - Britain also has reason to AVOID war with the League, because the RN is stretched thin as is. It's not going to be making new enemies heedlessly.
 
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How significant was Danish/Swedish/Russian trade with the thirteen colonies, anyhow?

Almost nonexistant.

Legally all trade with the colonies had to travel on british ships, colonial ones usually counted as british. Then, any exports to the continent had to be transshipped at a british port.

Was there smuggling? Of course there was. But it mostly involved colonial ships trading in the caribbean, an i suspect french and spanish ships slipping into colonial coastal ports.

But the colonials had the right to be in the caribbean, so it was easy to sneak over to a ,,wrong,, island. And the french and spanish had lots of ships around.

!,,honest, gov, we was blown off course, and had to put in here for repairs!,,

Danish and swedish ships didnt have any excuse to be there and not only is the problem even worse for russia, but she has almost nothing to trade. Foodstuffs, furs, timber, raw materials .. both russia and the colonies produced those.
 
Almost nonexistant.

Legally all trade with the colonies had to travel on british ships, colonial ones usually counted as british. Then, any exports to the continent had to be transshipped at a british port.

...

Danish and swedish ships didnt have any excuse to be there and not only is the problem even worse for russia, but she has almost nothing to trade. Foodstuffs, furs, timber, raw materials .. both russia and the colonies produced those.

Well, during the revolution there was notable Scandinavian-American trade, with American ships frequenting ports such as Marstrand.

Of course, what really infuriated the British wasn't the trade with the colonies as much as it was trade with France and Spain. The British would define timbers and naval stores used for ship construction as "contraband" and then use this as an excuse to raid ships carrying such goods. The Baltic region had quite a lot of this, and being informed that their primary export suddenly suddenly constituted a breach of neutrality and that the British had the right to raid and confiscate ships from these nations' peaceful merchant navies didn't sit particularly well with any of the Baltic countries.
 
Still, I think if Britain has reason to believe that - meaning Russia has made it clear this is an issue - Britain also has reason to AVOID war with the League, because the RN is stretched thin as is. It's not going to be making new enemies heedlessly.

I don't know. They did end up at war with their traditional allies, the Dutch.
 
My understanding was the League was set up for precisly the reason to AVOID haveing to declare war on UK or France during their little spats.

Given this it would take a massive error of judgement on the part of the British to force Russia's (etc.) hand and turn them to French allies. I would have thought that nothing short of blockading a "home" port to turn this round.

A worse case senario may be like the American neutrality at the start of WWII, i.e. the league members supplying the US with supplies as the US would through lease lend 160 years later.
 
My understanding was the League was set up for precisly the reason to AVOID haveing to declare war on UK or France during their little spats.

Well, strictly speaking, it wasn't set up to avoid forcing them to declare war on the United Kingdom, it was set up to force the United Kingdom to avoid declaring war on them.

One does not simply defeat the Royal Navy. ;)

Given this it would take a massive error of judgement on the part of the British to force Russia's (etc.) hand and turn them to French allies. I would have thought that nothing short of blockading a "home" port to turn this round.

Well, Britain did make a very questionable judgement in OTL when they declared war on the Netherlands after the Netherlands had joined the league, playing on the gambit that Catharine the Great wouldn't really be bothered to help the Netherlands. And the gambit worked. That's why there was the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War, and no War of Neutral Commerce.
 
Well, during the revolution there was notable Scandinavian-American trade, with American ships frequenting ports such as Marstrand.

.

But, by your words, that was DURING the revolution, when the colonists wete actively fighting british rules, not just ..circumventing them.

So youd first have to get the americans to start the trade and then have the league decide it was worth going to war over. No?
 
But, by your words, that was DURING the revolution, when the colonists wete actively fighting british rules, not just ..circumventing them.

So youd first have to get the americans to start the trade and then have the league decide it was worth going to war over. No?

I don't quite get it.

The Swedes were accepting American ships into their harbour throughout the American Revolution, that is an historic fact.

What I'm proposing here is simply that the Swedes and Americans works out a draft for a treaty on trade (like the Americans and the Dutch did) and that Britain gambits that Russia won't go to war despite Sweden being a member of the League (like the Dutch were, and like the British did).
 
So youd first have to get the americans to start the trade and then have the league decide it was worth going to war over. No?

The League might be pushed into war by continued British intransigence; the Austrians only joined the League because their ships were continuously seized by the British in the Mediterranean.

BTW, the League was pretty much designed to pressure Britain.
 
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