BadLogic, those are some excellent points. I will try to address them.
To my knowledge the Entente in 1914 did not attempt to make their situation look more intimidating to the Germans and Austro-Hungarians than it actually was, as was done with Bismarck's attempted proposal of Italy entering into an anti-French alliance. So there is that difference at least, although this will doubtless then devolve into an argument over Russian mobilizations that I could not care less about, since arguing about who started WW1 looks like a Wiking-ObsessedNuker debate; doubtless interesting, but why is this the 134th time it is being discussed?
True, but the Great Powers that comprised the Entente were demonstrably powerful and long-established, while the emerging Germany absolutely had to use bluff and playing one Power off against another in order to establish itself and it's interests (even the reasonable ones; not all German interests were, of course, reasonable).
I can't imagine arguing over Russian mobilization; it was clearly a factor and deserves critical inspection as such, but it wasn't the only factor.
Prussia annexed in 1866 Hannover, part of Hesse-Darmstadt, Nassau, Hesse, and Frankfurt, as well as ultimately in addition annexing Alsace-Lorraine. There is also the territory annexed in Schleswig-Holstien. France did have territorial ambitions, it is true, but Prussians annexed four nations and territories from several others; that is hardly the work of a shrinking violet who had no territorial ambitions of their own and merely passively defended themselves against others throwing themselves against them…
Nor do I argue that Prussia was a shrinking violet. But then, why were areas of Germany occupied by other nations? As a result of war. How did France or Great Britain or Russia first consolidate into nations, and then become Great Powers? By annexing other polities. Unification of Germany was going to require some strong-arming, given the history of the region, but it was nothing that everybody else hadn't done, or was willing to do again (especially against non-European peoples, of course, but it's still aggressive expansion).
Edit: You might've noted, in the source you've been quoting from, this passage: "Most of the states taken in 1866 had willingly voted themselves out of existence. Such was the emotive power of German nationalism." So it would not be too compelling to suggest that Prussia engaged in extreme coercive ambition in at least these cases.
Furthermore, if we are to conclude that the German issue being settled by Bismarck was justified because the arrangements set up were unstable and conflict inducing, the same logic could be easily applied to justify Napoleon III's interventions in Italy. Unlike in Germany, in Italy Austrian domination over the country did produce a major war, in 1848, and additional bloody fighting in 1830 and 1820. Furthermore, Austria and Prussia were both at the Congress of Vienna; it is hardly as if the soldiers of France, Russia, and Britain marched in and made the Germans adopt the set up they did.
I figure a people such as the Germans (or the French, etc) have a certain right to try to create a unified nation -- but doing so will inevitably create temporary instability. Whether that instability lasts and leads to war depends partly upon the other nations' response (which, in the case of 19th century Europe, was not all that good, though it was predictable given the character of European Great Power politics established by France, Britain, etc). The consolidation process progresses as circumstances permit. I think it silly to think that the conditions created by the Congress of Vienna could, or should, be frozen in time forever. More on the Congress of Vienna in my next point.
Napoleon intervening in Italy was not the problem: the problem is that France had territorial goals in mind (the "price" of French assistance). This cannot even be explained by nation-forming; this is simple aggressive aggrandizement.
The Austro-Prussian war meanwhile started over the superb casus beli of the Austrians bringing the administration of Schleswig Holstein to the German Confederation's Court; if Prussia could find that as being a suitable casus beli, then it isn't like France claiming that they were denied territory promised to them is that much worse.
That perhaps was the immediate casus belli. The root cause was the insistence of the other Great Powers that both Prussia and Austria had to be included in the same German confederation, as established at the Congress of Vienna. This measure would, of course, help keep the German polities disunited (probably its intent), but it also created conditions (two heads in one body) that were very very likely to eventually lead to war.
Now, Prussia and Austria hadn't demanded those terms, nor were they realistically able to resist them (in the face of the other Powers). But France certainly had the choice of whether to attempt aggressive expansion at her neighbors' expense, and then going all foot-stamping angry when balked.
I'd also say that the threat of an alliance with Italy directed against France, as well as bringing in the Southern German states into Prussia, and thus assuming a position of superiority and geographic advantage against France, would constitute a serious threat to French vital interests. The results of such policies would have left the French without significant allies except possibly the already-brutally-beaten Austria, facing a two-front war against one state with a significantly larger industry and a similar and faster growing population, and… ahem, Italy. What French leader wouldn't express concern over such developments, and view them as a potential threat to French "vital interests"?
Yet by your same argument, the existence of the Franco-Russian Entente was a serious threat to Germany's vital interests. Was Germany therefore justified in seeking war to redress the situation? It gets a bit sticky, here; trying to decide what constitutes a threat justifying preventive war may require a long conversation.
My argument would be that a
potential alliance with Italy, which might lead to a
possible war at some point in the future, is a great reason for feeling threatened. But maybe not a great justification for immediately invading one's neighbor.
Further, must we assume that nations should strive to remain
weaker than their neighbors, in order to avoid giving an excuse for war? That seems silly. By that argument, the German people should've said "Gee, we'd like to unify, but that would be unethical because we might become stronger than France". Anyway, who made
France's sense of dominance the rightful condition of Europe, that must be maintained?
There is the historical evidence of what the French leadership did without Napoleon III to consider however. In the periods of 1815-1848 the French did fight a number of wars... (snip) ...one of which was a response to another nation's aggression, a second which secured the independence of Greece, and a third which was called upon by the Spanish ultra-royalists to suppress the liberalists, then I think that calling French policy in action in the 1815-1848 period aggressive would be rather of a stretch. And yet surely, there must have been some of the inklings of the Second Empire's politics; the 2nd Empire incorporated new factors of course, but it was not entirely removed from the milieu of French history of the preceding part of the century. Therefor, if we use that as a base, there must have been something new about the figure of Napoleon III that would have changed the nature of French foreign policy.
Not really. In fact, it is only reasonable to expect that, following the exhausting beat-down that France endured at the end of Napoleon I's wars, France would be temporarily unwilling to try again. And then, given the long, long history of glorious French dominance and expansion (from which factor the 2nd Empire could not be "entirely removed"), it would not be surprising if, after a few decades, she started feeling the urge to again take up her 'historic mission'. I contend that this would not depend on the rise of any given ruler; if Napoleon III hadn't gained power and made the attempt, within a very few years somebody else would have.
Fortunately, before she could be encouraged by successes, Prussia put a brake on her efforts.
Napoleon III was in addition elected on a variety of merits. National grandeur was one of them, but there was also the all-important factor of name recognition (vital in the rural areas), support from a variety of important personages, conservative religious positions, family, property, social order, paired with progressive/populist economic policies and an innovative election campaign. Its a winning combination; I'm sure that there was probably mentions about the grandeur of France, but just the internal matters and his election campaign would have sufficed on its own. Saying that the French only elected Napoleon III because they thought that he would conduct an adventurous foreign policy is either selling them too short or too high; elections that spin upon foreign policy are few and far between, and domestic concerns are generally far more important.
What did his name-recognition bring to mind for French voters? What expectations would it arouse? What did those "important personages" expect from Louis if he got elected? Even these factors could easily be support for the argument that Louis was elected with an expectation that he would restore France to aggressive dominance.
I agree that his espousal of liberal
internal policies was a factor, too.
Furthermore, while it is true that there were those who cried for offensive operations, even during the declaration of war itself there were plenty who commented adversely upon it. To reuse my previously cited source;
Every man in the legislative body rose except the sixteen “irreconciliable republicans,” who had fillibus- tered the chief minister earlier and now remained stubbornly seated around their party leader, Le ́on Gambetta. Before war had even been declared, cracks were opening in the French nation.
The situation was painful for Ollivier; he was a former friend and ally of the very politicians who were now defying him. He was a former ad- versary of the eighty diehard Bonapartists or “mamelukes” on the far right, who now rather embarrassingly rallied to Ollivier, demanding that Gambetta and the others stand and show respect for the emperor and the army. Gambetta and the sixteen remained seated, one of them shouting: “we would be the first to stand for a national war in defense of our homeland. We will not stand for an aggressive, dynastic war!” To Ollivier’s chagrin, this logic quickly spread to the center benches, where moderate liberals, willing to work with the emperor if he liberalized and avoided adventures, listened carefully to the fencing between the republicans and the mamelukes.
The source from which you quote also makes plain that these were a minority; that the moderate liberals only "listened carefully to the fencing" but didn't join in opposition to the war, indeed that "France's liberal doyen", Adolphe Thiers, supported war but only objected that "
this occasion is detestably badly chosen"; that the Right responded with "thunderous ovations" when Ollivier said "We accept it [war] with a light heart".
So yes, it is certainly relevant to show that there were objections to going to war on at least
this occasion and pretext; but I think it important to also recognize that the Republicans who did so were in a distinct minority.
Finally, I'd take the British and their policies vis a vis the French with a grain of salt. The British were still expressing concerns that France would be a hegemonic force in Europe in the 1920s and 30s when the French had a population barely two thirds of Germany and an industry a third of the size, plus of course Italy and the Soviet Union around as other factors. The British always were frightened over somebody; what other nation could produce the troves of invasion literature when they had the world's strongest navy and their rivals hated each other far more than they hated them? France happened to have at the time seemingly the strongest position in Europe, naturally the British expressed concerns over that, as they did with everyone.
The British were certainly paranoid, and often had a Chicken-Little view of things. On the other hand, paranoia is only an illness if the other guy is
not out to get you.
With regard to France, they were partly correct:
Even in the 1920's, France had the potential to establish something of a hegemony over Western Europe... as long as Germany was kept neutered and the USSR didn't venture too far from home. Who was to stop them? Spain? Nope. Britain? Not by herself. Belgium? Merely the first likely victim. The Dutch? No chance. Italy? Much weaker than France.
Where Britain's leaders erred was in failing to see that, after 1815 and 1870 and WW1, France was
finally relinquishing her traditions of dominance and aggression. Note that Prussia and (later) Germany played crucial roles in all three of those conflicts...