What if Switzerland decided to expand?

I think people are missing the fundamental cause of the rise of the Swiss - they were an alliance, or small series of alliances, between small states threatened by the encroachments of the Hapsburgs in their area. They were fighting for their political independence. If you, say, have the Austrians remain the dominant power of the Swiss cantons, you have immediately effectively eliminated the very Swiss raison d'etre. If the Swiss are under Austrian governance, they have no cause to expand. The Austrians were unconcerned about annexing vast swathes of the area of Switzerland, they were just trying to tie the Swiss down and force them to acknowledge the Hapsburgs as the local hegemon. In this scenario, you just paint about half of the Swiss Confederacy Austria white in maps of 1700-1800 and call the rest "petty states of the Empire". That's all that will happen. To look at the other extreme - that the Swiss go on an annexation fest - well...I'm not sure why they would. When the Swiss finally expelled the Austrians from the area of their Confederacy, their only expansion was a little bit of politicking, inviting local powers such as Mullhousen to join them for political and military security, as they feared the Austrians would return. Sure, their military became a fearsome force, but they didn't have the capacity for expansion. Their military was too small and they had no claim to areas outside of the Alpine regions where they expanded to the limits of anyway. There's a reason the Swiss became mercenaries - they had achieved their aims and thus were willing to let others employ their services as they didn't feel the need any more to use their own troops as a protective force. On top of this, they really never had the manpower to wage more campaigns. The flatlands which border their lands didn't feel any kinship with the Swiss as they hadn't had the same struggle for dominance with the Hapsburgs either, so there would be few recruits there. Indeed, the Swiss could become the very "Hapsburg" oppressors to their conquered lands that the Austrians were to them, forcing them to fight wars to keep their own lands - the Swiss were for a long time really quite harsh and domineering over the cantons which were called Territories, denying them many rights and treating the citizens there as second class humans. Really, I'm just not sure that the Swiss wanted to, had any cause for, or could pull off further expansion.
 
The biggest Switzerland I can envision rules over her present territory plus: Val Passiria (Merano), Valtellina, Luino, Ossola and Valle d'Aosta in OTL Italy, Savoy, Bress, Franche-Comté, most of Alsace in OTL France, parts of Baden-Wuerttemberg in OTL Germany, Vorarlberg and bits of Tyrol in OTL Austria plus Liechtenstein.
 
Maybe go way, way earlier. Have the Austrians remain the governing power of the Swiss cantons, and expand northwest and maybe a bit south (Alps, Swabia, Northern Italy) rather than czechwards (Bohemia) and eastwards (Hungary). Though not "Switzerland" per se, you'd have an Austria centred on its Swiss and Swabian territories. Close enough.
No. Just no.

That's not the expansion of Switzerland, it's more Hapsburg power. As Falastur said, it's not the real Switzerland because it goes against everything that OTL Switzerland had as a reason for existing.

Your scenario is like having the British win the ARW, going on and conquering most of the world, and then calling it Ameriwank. The only thing it has in common is the geography, it has little to no connection to the philosophy or spirit that created the real nation, and thus is not that nation. A Switzerland united and expanding under the Hapsburgs is not Switzerland, it is Austria. Don't bother arguing otherwise.

EDIT:Holy crap, I sounded really self-righteous there didn't I? Need to reign that in a little...
 
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