Ok with Nicholas on the throne its sorta out there but w/e. WI when Hungary revolts against Austria in 1848, Russia decides to just sit it out and let Austria take care of it them selves. So what happens?
Well, the whole reason Russia was in Hungary was because the Austrians asked them to. So, you need to address how Austria is going to avoid needing Russian help.
Well, the whole reason Russia was in Hungary was because the Austrians asked them to. So, you need to address how Austria is going to avoid needing Russian help.
Austria was already close to crushing Hungary on its own: after a few months the Hungarian rebels were reduced to a few strongholds in the eastern borderlands. The Russian intervention was just icing on the cake and a way for the rebels to save face because now did not have to surrender to the Austrians.
In fact, the Russian intervention was pretty lacklustre as it was, they only suffered a few hundred combat casualties (the Austrians and Hungarians each roughly 50,000) with an additional few thousands caused by a cholera epidemic.
I agree that if one wants to rid Europe of the Habsburgin 1848, a second PoD besides no Russian intervention may be necessary to make the Empire collapse. IIRC, the Hungarian diet could withdraw its troops from the army earlier, causing Radetsky to lose the war in italy. This ought to make the whole house of cards go tumbling.
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If the end justifies the means, you just got a scenario pretty much identical to Ich bin ein Frankfurter.First of all, given the Russian mentality of the time, this event is only plausible if either we assume a PoD that keeps Russia badly distracted during 1848 (e.g. a rebellion in Poland, Finland, a serf insurrection, the tsar bedridden by a crippling illness, a war with Sweden, Turkey, or Persia) or we radically change the personality of tsar Nicholas I. However, such a PoD is perfectly feasible.
Overextended Habsburg regime badly loses the two-front war with Hungary and Savoy, and collapses, with liberals making a victorious comeback in Vienna. Seeing the downfall of the Habsburg as a sign from Heaven, the King of Prussia reluctantly swallows his legitimist qualms and accepts the Imperial crown of Germany from the Frankfurt Assembly. Liberal revolutionaries in Vienna plead to join the newborn empire. Prussian troops "persuade" the Czech to join the Empire as well. Savoy kicks the Habsburg remnants out of Lombardy, Venetia, Trento, Gorizia, Istria, Dalmatia and annexes them. The resulting wave of nationalist entusiasm quickly topples the reactionary regimes of the other Italian states and Italy is unified under a federal constitutional monarchy much akin the German one. With German and Italian support, Hungary is able to establish its control over Croatia, but it is forced to concede it federal autonomy. Other minorities in the Kingdom of hungary are not so lucky, since the Magyars ruthlessly reaffirm their supremacy. Krakow and Galicia are ceded to Russia in order to appease it.
France gnashes its teeth, but it is powerless to do anything during the critical vulnerability window of the new states, since it is in the throes of its own revolution. Britain does not really care, it is focused on building its own empire, and it can do business with liberal Germany, Italy, and Hungary; besides, the liberal revolutions carry the sympathy of the British public. After the dust is settled, and Russia is recovered from whatever kept it busy, it realizes that it can do business with the new moderate liberal-conservative states just like it did with Austria, and they are not a radical Jacobin comeback by any means. France might try to reverse the outcome of the revolution by force in the next few years, a la 1870, but it does, it is going to suffer an embarassing stalemate at best, a 1815/1870-like kickdown at worse, since Britain and Russia are not going to be interested. Just as likely, it reluctantly accepts the inevitable. A quick war occurs between Denmark and the newborn German state, whcih results into Germany grabbing Schleswig-Holstein. If Sweden gives support to Denmark, this does not change the outcome of the war, but it inspires the unification of Scandinavia in the coming years.
The aborning colonial scramble for East Asia, and after the 1860s, for Africa becomes all the more frenzied since there are four main contenders (Britain, France, Germany, and Italy) from the start. Germany, Italy, and Hungary are natural allies, similar liberal-conservative constitutional monarchies with no outstanding geopolitical conflicts and complementary strategic and economic setups, and form a stable irontight Triple Alliance. France and Russia shall sooner or later pulled together to withstand the might of the CP block. Britain remains in splendid isolation for a long while, then joins the CP block out of mutual interest to keep Russia at bay. A more liberal Germany, especially if it finds itself early on in detente with Britain, is not likely going to pursue the naval buildupcraze that fatally aliened the British IOTL. Industrialization in Germany and much more so Italy is substantially accelerated in comparison to OTL by earlier national unifications. WWI either does not happen because the CP block looks too strong, or, if France and Russia ever get a kamikaze nationalist overconfidence phase (possible if they, accurately or not, assume that Britain is going to be neutral), ends in a crushing Entente defeat. You may insert your clichè Fascist/Communist Russia, with nasty revanchist French sidekick, and possibly opportunist Japan/China, causing WWII a couple decades later if you wish.
If the end justifies the means, you just got a scenario pretty much identical to Ich bin ein Frankfurter.
That would help, although the fact is that the Piedmontese were fighting a foolish war, from a military standpoint. They hadn't really had a choice: the revolution in Milan presented a very brief window of opportunity, and if they didn't take it, there would very likely be a revolution in Genoa (note how the Piedmontese radicals broke with the king after the August armistice).
But I think that if we have a greater state of confusion in the Danube part of the monarchy, a prompter and more determined effort by the Italians to press their initial advantage, and perhaps Radetzsky choking on a schnitzel, Piedmontese victory is just about plausible. The Austrians withdraw most of their field armies, their fortresses are besieged, the other regimes on the peninsula start going under, and at this point Britain would step in, since the Italians winning by themselves was our dream scenario. We'd mediate and give Lombardy-Venetia to the Piedmontese, and get the king's realist regime to chuck the claims made on South Tyrol by the Venetian republic.
It's doubtful whether this would in fact lead to Hungarian success. Nobody else wants this except the German revolutionaries, and by this point the first armistice has been signed in Schleswig, which began the reduction of Frankfurt to irrelevance. Britain doesn't: the point of booting the Austrians out of Italy was to make them an adequate bulwark against Russia (and likewise the Ottomans won't support the revolutionaries, although they're not very relevant at this point).
Russia obviously doesn't, although we can assume that something is preventing them from taking action (the intervention was a matter of interest, however, and indeed the Russians were perhaps keener on it than the Austrians: the Hungarians had Poles in their ranks, and the Russians had already used the revolutions there as an excuse to occupy Romania while nobody was watching).
The interesting thing here, though, is that the Prussians told Austria in May 1849 (when the Magyar revolutionaries had their second wind) that they would crush Hungary on her behalf if she admitted Prussian supremacy in the rest of Germany. The Austrians had no desire to do this and so called on Russia instead. If Russia is out of the picture for whatever reason and Austria is reeling from defeat in Italy, she might not be in a position to refuse the offer. Britain will likely accept it if we can get a satisfactory conclusion to the Schleswig affair, since Palmerston wants the Hungarians beaten as much as anyone and could probably convince himself that Germany was a distraction for the Hapsburgs just like Italy. There's not much the French can do. Lamartine had said he wasn't going to fight for Poland and lose Alsace: I doubt Napoleon will lose it for Hungary.
So, Kingdom of (Northern, for now) Italy, Kleindeutschland, majorly pissed Russia, and whoops, it's almost Crimean War time... this is an interesting scenario.
I was going to nominate it too...Which is a quite fine TL realization of the scenario,which I am rather fond of, so I nominated for the TA. Too bad the author got sever writer's block.
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True as well, and I see the problems with Italy getting South Tyrol, and economically all-important Trieste. But I see no problem, from British PoV, with Italy getting Trento and Gorizia. It makes Italy a more satisfied power.
True, although it must be remarked that Grossdeutchsland + Hungary + Italy can be an ever better anti-Russian bulwalk in the Balkans than Kleindeutchsland + Austria.
Indeed, but it is not too difficult to imagine something that is seriously holding Russia back in 1848.
It is an interesting scenario, although I prefer the Grossdeutchsland + Italy + Hungary unification, it neatly settles all the loose ends in central Europe and Italy for good. It requires a greater nationalist leap of insight from Prussian leadership, of course.
If the Savoy come back from the war with Lombardy, Veneto, Trento, and Gorizia in their pocket, the lifespan of the other Italian regimes can be counted in numbers, although if they are quick to swear loyalty to their new Savoy overlord, they may keep their thrones as dukes in the new Federal kingdom of Italy, a federal unification plan was much discussed before 1848, and there would be the german example. I doubt that the other Italian princes would grasp the opportunity, as a rule they were a reactionary, hidebound bunch of Habsburg toadies.