What if Frederick The Great gets his way on whom he is to marry and is wed to his choice: Maria Theresa of Hapsburg in 1735?
A united House of Hohenzollern-Habsburg in 1740 at the head of a united Brandenburg-Austria (backed by Frederick's Prussians and Maria Theresa's Bohemians, Hungarians and Croatians), with Frederick in command turned loose on the Holy Roman Empire with an Imperial Crown of a different kind in mind...
A joint soverignty of Kiaser and Kaiseress of a truly unified German Empire, over 100 years earlier than OTL? How does France react? Russia? Britain?
Could Frederick and Maria Theresa buy off the Hungarians, Bohemians, Croatians and Italy with formal recognition of independent sovereigns for their full support in a wars with France the other German states and Russia? A pact with the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth to secure their east flank against Russia? The German people: Could Frederick win "hearts and minds" with strong overtures of nationalism and a stable government with clear lines of succession?
Thoughts?