BooNZ
Banned
Did France show any interest in joining Bjorko?
Put it this way - the potential agreement was killed by including a requirement for French approval, which Russian and German diplomats knew would NEVER happen.
Did France show any interest in joining Bjorko?
All this takes is for the Germans to make the calculations that lead to Bjorko a year earlier
Or the Germans can decide that war with France, Russia and Britain is inevitable and allying with the Franco-Russian coalition to defeat Britain before fighting it out on the continent is the way to play
OTL the only reason Nicky [alone] would have entertained this fantasy is because Russia was already locked in a war with Japan that was not going as expected and Russia is getting no love from France, which is scared that any public displays of affection will incur the wrath of Britain. In 1903 the Russians have no incentive to flirt with the Germans, I mean its not as if the Russians need the input of Germany to crush a second rate Asian power... It would be like expecting SA to accept scrummaging advice from the Wallabies in 2014...
German diplomacy post Bismarck was predicated on an alliance between Germany and Britain being inevitable - the Germans were determined that they should extract a fair price from Britain for such an alliance. The rationale for this was that Britain had too many areas of disagreement with both France and Russia - that Britain jumped into bed with both was certainly not anticipated.
Further, in the first instance, France would never ally with Germany. The whole purpose of bankrolling Tsarist Russia was that France would have a crack at regaining A-L in the next war. Germany would not be giving France A-L to join the French-Russian alliance if it was expecting a Dowry from Britain for the same. In any case, what would Germany gain from a French-Russian alliance - the only beef with Britain was the Naval race and that was more of a courting ritual gone wrong.
1903? Björkö was signed in 1905, so a year earlier would make for 1904.
And yet by 1904 Britain had jumped into bed already with one of the two by signing the Entente Cordiale. By 1904 German diplomacy vis-à-vis Britain had clearly failed.
France does lose an ally if it stays neutral. It's uncertain if and when Britain will commit to a formal alliance to replace Russia. As for joining the war, France doesn't need to give Germany anything. It's a matter of deciding whether or not to uphold their pre-existing commitment to Russia. They don't need German permission for that. As to what Germany would gain from an alliance with Russia and France: Germany would become Russia's primary source of industrial goods, Germany can take over the British market share in France, and Germany will be the leading power of this new 'continental system' à la Napoleonic France a century earlier.
The nitrates provided from the coking process were generally not suitable for military purposes, so this remains an issue. However, that lack of any serious land conflict means that existing stocks would suffice. So the result is the same.
The Germans and the Russians traditionally enjoyed good terms, but Russia and A-H were on a collision course.
The Germans would have happily thrown the Russians under the bus during the Triple Intervention in favour of the British (based on reference material you have previously provided on the subject). The proposed 1904 agreement between Willy and Nicky was strongly opposed by both the German and Russian diplomatic departments, let alone the French. The Russians simply could not afford a formal alliance with Germany (literally).
The nitrates provided from the coking process were generally not suitable for military purposes, so this remains an issue. However, that lack of any serious land conflict means that existing stocks would suffice. So the result is the same.
Did France show any interest in joining Bjorko? Its not a question of Russia and Germany allowing them to join, it's whether they would accept such an offer and become allies with sworn enemy Germany against Britain, the country which historically saved France's life in 1914. If they do, they are leaving themselves completely open to being back stabbed by the Germans, only this time there won't be any BEF and no Miracle on the Marne. I will say though, that if we accept the premise that it is possible to trick France into going along with this, there certainly is a strong case to be made for it from the German point of view.
EDIT: perhaps someone might want to do a TL on this? It would be an interesting contrast to the one I'm doing.
The Dogger Bank incidident is a good one for expanding the conflict, but that just makes it a curbstomp if Britain comes in on the side of Japan.
I think the possibilities inherent in the Dogger Bank incident get overestimated on the forum. The incident would have made a decent excuse if Britain was already planning on making war on Russia, but an actual, honest to god casus belli? Remember that St. Petersburg acted very reasonably after the incident, accepted international arbitration and paying reparations. If Britain is gung ho for war despite the sensible attitude of the Tsar's government, this would in turn cause further problems, especially with the French and I think London knew this as well.
So in my view that the Dogger Bank incident actually leads to war between Britain and Russian means we need an earlier POD that makes one or the other ready to go to war against the other, and this in turn leading to either Russia not being ready consider any arbitration and reparations or Britain making unreasonable demands. As things stood, open war was in neither's interest and this was why it was avoided.
My bad, but the principle remains the same. Russia's position was deteriorating and there would have been proportionally less incentive reach an earlier agreement with Germany. In any case, Willy appeared to be one of the few enthusiastic supporters of the concept in either country.
The Germans didn't know yet that it had clearly failed. They lacked 20/20 hindsight. We now know that Britain becoming BFFs with Kaiser Bill's Germany is highly unlikely.Even ten years later, no-one was entirely convinced the British would actually join the war. The differences between Russia and Britain were also arguably more pronounced than France alone. If Germany thought its diplomacy vis-à-vis Britain had 'clearly failed' in 1904, why did it proceed in the same general direction for the best part of a decade?
You're right about France I suppose.So how does France get AL back? I stated that Germany would likely have to give the French AL before the French would consider such an alliance (i.e. is not going to happen). From what you are saying France loses both Russia as a primary market for its industrial goods (to Germany) and Germany also gets license to dump its industrial goods in France? Instead of signing up to such an alliance, France might as well formally surrender?
Well, now there are times of war...In times of war a German-Russia alliance is a royal wank, but in all other times those economies are starved of funds required for growth.
That doesn't add up. You said yourself "OTL the only reason Nicky [alone] would have entertained this fantasy is because Russia was already locked in a war with Japan that was not going as expected and Russia is getting no love from France, which is scared that any public displays of affection will incur the wrath of Britain. ..."
In 1904 the entire matter of the war with Japan not going as expected is still at play.
I think we agree, but then the point I was rebutting, which you made, does not reconcile. However, even with the benefit of hindsight, I still struggle to see any strategic barriers to a Anglo/German reconciliation, aside from comical sub-optimal diplomacy on both sides - not just Willy. As an aside, I apologise for ignoring the OP - i.e. focusing on the likelihood rather than outcomes...The Germans didn't know yet that it had clearly failed. They lacked 20/20 hindsight. We now know that Britain becoming BFFs with Kaiser Bill's Germany is highly unlikely.