Poland in 7 Years War

Anyone have an idea why Poland hadn't joined the 7 Years War?

Their elected King, Augustus III, had his Electorate of Saxony taken during a Prussian sneak attack (which started the war and outraged all of Europe).

The dysfunctional and divided government of Poland was basically a puppet of Russia and Austria (edit, accidently said Prussia)
, whom were Saxony's/Augustus III's allies.

Any ideas why Poland sat out a war where everyone around them was fighting on behalf of their King?:confused:

Thanks for any opinions/ideas/info.
 
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Hadn't the Commonwealth devolved to the state of local autonomous noble rule? The first partition isn't too far away at this point.
 
Anyone have an idea why Poland hadn't joined the 7 Years War?

Their elected King, Augustus III, had his Electorate of Saxony taken during a Prussian sneak attack (which started the war and outraged all of Europe).

The dysfunctional and divided government of Poland was basically a puppet of Russia and Prussia, whom were Saxony's/Augustus III's allies.

Any ideas why Poland sat out a war where everyone around them was fighting on behalf of their King?:confused:

Thanks for any opinions/ideas/info.

Yeh, the Sejm was at that point totally independent of monarchical whims. If August had gone to them and asked them to die for a state they were in temporary personal union with, the szlachta would automatically told him to piss off in no uncertain terms. Plus, there was the liberum veto, which meant that even if August had somehow convinced everybody to side with him, Frederick the Great would only need to bribe one member of the Sejm to defeat the proposal. It wasn't worth the effort, especially as August only really saw Poland as a supplier of free taxes.
 
Hadn't the Commonwealth devolved to the state of local autonomous noble rule? The first partition isn't too far away at this point.


True, but I'm trying to avoid that. If Prussia gets dismembered, I'm thinking the Partitions don't happen as on Prussia and to an extent Russia were initially in favor.

With Prussia out of the way, I doubt Austria would allow Russia any further inroads on their own. Frederick was the real driver.

If anything, I'm thinking Russia takes East Prussia in the "Partitian" of Frederick's Empire and then trades it for the contiguous Duchy of Courland (from their Polish Puppet state).

This would make the Commonwealth no longer an dysfunctional Polish Catholic/Belarus-Ukrainian Orthodox state but a dysfunctional Polish Catholic/Belarus-Ukrainian Orthodox/German Lutheran state.

I'm thnking this might leading to a Commonwealth Civil War with interesting results (maybe Russia tries to Conquer Belarus and a rejuvinated Poland/Prussia with Austrian support attempts to forge a true nation.

What do you think?

:confused:
 
@ Uhura's Mazda: it also granted Augustus the rank of king, which meant that he won't be outranked by other electors (Brandenburg (Prussia), Hanover (Great Britain) etc.) with a royal crown.
 
In this point Frederick the Great is treating the Poles in Silesia badly, Augustus the Strong might use that as an excuse to liberate Silesia and East Prussia.
 
That is a very anachronistic line of thinking, and also not particularly true compared to any other nation or ruler of the era.

The only one who wanted to do that is Jan III Sobieski in OTL - which he does in one of my scenarios, perhaps that is impossible for Augustus the Strong to do or think in that way.
 
That is a very anachronistic line of thinking, and also not particularly true compared to any other nation or ruler of the era.
But still, Silesia separates Saxony from Poland, so for ruler of both it would be an attractive gain. Though August would rather add it to Saxony than Poland.
 
Note that in 1756, the Elector of Saxony ordered his Army to take a stand on high ground and wait for Austrian/HRE reinforcements. Maria Theresa's generals took so long that the Elector's army was starved out.

In fact, he had been encouraged to march his defeated army to Bohemia or Poland. Instead it fell into Prussian hands (though many soldiers promptly deserted) and were forcibly added to the Prussian Army.

what if, the Elector marched 15,000 men or so from Saxony, through Bohemia, to Poland.

If there was 15,000 armed Saxons in Warsaw, would that change the game for the Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth?

Any takers?
 
With Prussia out of the way, I doubt Austria would allow Russia any further inroads on their own. Frederick was the real driver.

Austria doesn't have the strength to stop Russia on her own. Poland was widely considered a Russian puppet state, and it was only the emerging strength of Prussia that stopped that. With Prussia dismembered, Russia will continue to gradually annex Poland. The only reason Russia won't take a slab of territory outright is because it undermines her (likely successful in TTL) attempts to to take the whole place.

If anything, I'm thinking Russia takes East Prussia in the "Partitian" of Frederick's Empire and then trades it for the contiguous Duchy of Courland (from their Polish Puppet state).

This would make the Commonwealth no longer an dysfunctional Polish Catholic/Belarus-Ukrainian Orthodox state but a dysfunctional Polish Catholic/Belarus-Ukrainian Orthodox/German Lutheran state.

I doubt this trade will happen. There are two reasons why contiguity is important to a country: (1) you want to have a strong enough central territory to form a stable state or (2) you feel your outlying territory is hard to defend. Neither situation exists in this case because Russia already has (1) and Poland is weak enough that Russia can march troops more or less at will through her territory. In fact, considering Russia wants to absorb Poland,
having territory on both sides of the Kingdom is a bonus here.

I'm thnking this might leading to a Commonwealth Civil War with interesting results (maybe Russia tries to Conquer Belarus and a rejuvinated Poland/Prussia with Austrian support attempts to forge a true nation.

If Austria is foolish enough to get involved in such a war they're going to lose. She can not take Russia on her own, and the only other sizable ally out there is France, who is on good terms with Russia. Even if Vienna manages to split that alliance, it will likely result in the Brits coming in on the Russian side and occupying France's attention elsewhere.
 
Austria doesn't have the strength to stop Russia on her own. Poland was widely considered a Russian puppet state, and it was only the emerging strength of Prussia that stopped that. With Prussia dismembered, Russia will continue to gradually annex Poland. The only reason Russia won't take a slab of territory outright is because it undermines her (likely successful in TTL) attempts to to take the whole place.



I doubt this trade will happen. There are two reasons why contiguity is important to a country: (1) you want to have a strong enough central territory to form a stable state or (2) you feel your outlying territory is hard to defend. Neither situation exists in this case because Russia already has (1) and Poland is weak enough that Russia can march troops more or less at will through her territory. In fact, considering Russia wants to absorb Poland,
having territory on both sides of the Kingdom is a bonus here.



If Austria is foolish enough to get involved in such a war they're going to lose. She can not take Russia on her own, and the only other sizable ally out there is France, who is on good terms with Russia. Even if Vienna manages to split that alliance, it will likely result in the Brits coming in on the Russian side and occupying France's attention elsewhere.

Note that, if Russia were to attack Poland, Poland would not be on its own. Poland, Austria (with Silesia assuming a victory over Prussia) and Saxony would be allied in trying to stop them. This does not account for the Ottoman.

I'm not sure if France would get involved either way as I can't see how it a Russian Poland would serve thier interests.
 

Poland-Lithuania was too tolerant, and East Prussia's Germans too few in number, to make the annexation a potential cause for civil war, nevermind a Poland-Prussia forming. I generally find the notion of a "Poland-Prussia" forming under any circumstances to be far-fetched. However, due to the tendencies towards reform prevalent in Poland a conflict between Poland-Lithiania and Russia in the near future is extremely likely and could well originate as a civil war. This would have been impossible for Russia to accept, as it could only maintain its control over Poland-Lithuania by keeping it in a state of near-anarchy.
 
Poland-Lithuania was too tolerant, and East Prussia's Germans too few in number, to make the annexation a potential cause for civil war, nevermind a Poland-Prussia forming. I generally find the notion of a "Poland-Prussia" forming under any circumstances to be far-fetched. However, due to the tendencies towards reform prevalent in Poland a conflict between Poland-Lithiania and Russia in the near future is extremely likely and could well originate as a civil war. This would have been impossible for Russia to accept, as it could only maintain its control over Poland-Lithuania by keeping it in a state of near-anarchy.

Interesting thoughts.

Perhaps adding the Duchy back to the Commonwealth (where it once was a fief) may not start a full on civil war. But it may add another log to the pile.

I'm not sure I would refer to the Commonwealth as "tolerant". Polish Catholics were working hard to dominate the Eastern Orthodox factions and Jews weren't treated well in this era either. East Prussia's addition (would the predominantly Catholic diet accept Protestant nobility among their ranks? they seldom did the Orthodox) would cause more problems and elicit sympathy from Protestant nations whom were otherwise indifferent.
 
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