WI: WW1 happened in the 1860s/1870s over German unification?

[Disraeli2004]

‘The Balkans aren't worth the life of a single Pomeranian grenadier!’- Otto Von Bismarck, 1866.

Chapter One of the European Tragedy: The Treaty of Prague.

The War with Austria in known as Prussia as the ‘Kriegsprobe’ (War rehearsal) was swift and seemingly decisive, much in contrast of the conflict to come. Engineered by Otto Von Bismarck, this war was intended to drive out Austrian influence in Germany, to make sure that Prussia is not incorporated into some Greater German State. If German unity was to be inevitable, it must unite under Prussia, and not Austria; this war would pave the way for that, whilst making a ‘Kleindeutschland’, where Prussia- and more broadly Prussian Junkers- could dominate, possible. And at first it seemed as if the gamble worked. Although most of the German Confederation lined up against Prussia, Bismarck’s skilful diplomacy kept foreign powers out of the struggle. Prussia’s efficient and disciplined troops crushed the Austrians, already weakened by the 1859, decisively at Sadowa. But it was after that success, only 3 weeks into the war, that ruptures began to emerge.

The fruits of victory were showered too fast onto Prussia. The victory at Konnigratz opened the door to the occupation of Vienna, and after all they’d only been at war three weeks. But Bismarck already agitated for a ceasefire. The terms of this ceasefire would see Venetia ceded to Italy and Austria kicked out of German affairs entirely, but not a foot of territory would be taken from the Hapsburgs. The military and monarchical authorities both questioned this; why should Prussia respond to complete victory with such a tepid peace? Moltke was strongly against it and urged the King to continue on his advance. Bismarck implored, pleaded and supplicated; breaking down into tears and smashing objects in the room, Bismarck insisted that the King would be responsible for a horrible and bloody escalation of the war if he was to continue to advance. In what many consider to be the turning points of Prussia’s fortunate, Wilhelm I did not listen. “Any peace with the Austrians must constitute a victor’s peace, not this strange political concoction. It is insulting to Prussian honour to accept otherwise.”. Thus Moltke won out and Prussia pushed for an annexationist war against Austria and decided to continue onto Vienna, much to the incredulity of the French. Bismarck, traumatised and distraught that Wilhelm I had destroyed his intricate plans, was forced to resign. The war continued.

the war lasted only a month longer, but it set in motion a horrible chain of events. Wilhelm I got his little occupation of Vienna; the Austrians couldn’t muster enough troops to defend the city. The Prussian march through the city, memorably photograph, was to provide a permeant scar on the honour of the Austrian state. The peace treaty was harsh, both to German states that had so fatefully sided with the Austrians and to oppose Prussian expansion. Saxony and Hanover were annexed into the Kingdom of Prussia, along with Hesse-Kassel, Hesse-Darmstadt, Nassau, Saxe-Meiningen, Frankfurt, Reuss-Greiz, and Holstein. States that backed Prussia were forced into the “North German Confederation”. The South was left broadly alone. Prussia also annexed the “Saxon Corridor from Austria- a strip of territory running across Bohemia which included the town of Karslbad and Austrian Silesia. These are annexed into Prussia as the province of "New Silesia"- harking back to the days of Fredrick the Great. Venetia and some of Istria are lost to Italy.

This Treaty caused international outcry. This railroading of tradition and vast annexations suddenly meant that the “lesser Global power” was a threat to national security for the Great Powers, especially France. France was promised a part of the Rhineland which she never received and was infuriated at this vast expansion of Prussian power; although the French army was too weak to intervene in 1866, a series of reforms initiated in 1867 onwards began to stabilise and modernise the army. The Austrian emperor, Franz Joseph, was force to sign the compromise of 1867 under domestic pressure, turning his empire into a dual monarchy. The British were worried by this upstart power too and concerned at the annexation of Hanover. Only Russia seemed to take Prussia’s side; although there were Pan-Slavic objections to this strong German power, their co-operation over Poland had conviced the Tsar that they were a better partner that the Hapsburgs, who had betrayed them in the course of the Crimean War. Moreover the Tsar was more preoccupied with the Balkans that Central Europe, and he knew a weakened Austria would give him a free hand in the Balkans. Prussia and Russia continued to work constructively.

By 1869 the French and Austrians have agreed a mutual defence pact, clearly pointing the empires towards war. The French are dead set on containing Prussia; the domestic troubles convincing Napoleon III that he needs a foreign enemy. The situation in Austria is more complex. The Hungarians lobby against war, but German liberals, who are concerned about the triumph of an illiberal Prussia, and aggravate nationalist minority who want to row back the 1867 compromise and rectify national honur after the humiliation of 1867. It’s a hard decision for Franz Joseph, but the pro-war lobby wins out. The territorial loses are too hard to bare; they will be rectified. The large indemnity payment is also causing economic suffering, fuelling worries about a revolutionary collapse of the empire; the common enemy, Prussia, is needed to bring Austria together.

The Spark for the war comes from Negotations that attempted to form the German Empire in 1870. The background to the Bavarian crisis was the Spanish Crisis, where a Prussia Hohenzollern was nearly crowned King of Spain, before backing down in the face of French pressure. Tensions were still simmering because Wilhelm I had not given a personal guarantee that he'd never endorse a Hohenzollern candidacy again, but the crisis humiliated Prussia. National opinion with Prussia was outraged. As Moltke commented wryly: "How could a nation that could defeat the Austrian Empire in 6 weeks back down to a Napoleon doppelganger's every little demand?". Wilhelm I was growing increasingly frustrated with the Franco-Austrian demands. And this brings us back to the Negotations with the Southern German states. France made it very clear during 1866 that annexations of these states would lead to war, and thus they were not incorporated into the North German Confederation. But Wilhelm I, needing a victory after the Spanish humilliation, re-opened the issue. A communique sent on the 12th September 1870 to Bavaria and the other Southern German states offered some autonomy (greater than the Northern members) if they'd agree to be part of the German Empire. However, France stepped in. France stated that they were willing to guarantee the independence of the South German states, with Austria adding that "The Austrian government, which has always shared a spiritual connection with fellow Southern German states, stands wholeheartedly in defence of Catholic Germany in response to Northern Prussian aggression". As a result, each of the states rejected membership. This was too much for Prussia. Wilhelm I summed the situation up.

"Gentlemen, I will be cowed by the Bonaparte family no longer. For all of my childhood, the French rampaged through our homeland, took our resources and starved us dry. But Prussian honour and ingenuity won the day at the miraculous victories at Leipzig and Waterloo. It was because the German people united together against common aggression, and I believe that spirit still exists. The German people will rise to this challenge. We will not accept Bonaparte's dictat."

Thus, after the failure of Negotations at London, Wilhelm I sent troops to occupy Munich, overwhelming the Bavarian forces, helped along by popular support. France declared this an attack upon her people and declared war on the 4th October 1870. Austria followed on the 7th October, saying that it would 'defend to the death the kinsmen of the Austrians', despite Hungarian opposition. The Great European War had begun.

 

[Disraeli2004]

PART 2:

“The power of the joint blow will end this silly idea of German Unification”- Napoleon III

The Reaction:

Robbed of their chief diplomatic asset, Bismarck, the Prussians found themselves facing a war on two fronts; although Austria was weakened, France was the primary continental power in Europe and it was clear they were facing an uphill struggle. The crisis was however expedient in rallying German opinion around Prussia through the threat of French invasion and the betrayal of the Austrians. This is reflected on a speech given by Wilhelm I to the North German Parliament three weeks after the war began:

“There is no doubt that the Austrians have played the key role in the majority of the winding course of German history. But here the Hapsburgs menace has shown his true colours. Austria has sold its German soul to the common enemy of the Germans, to stop Germans uniting under one government and one system. This they have been trying to do unaltered since Napoleon. But there is hope for the German people. I know, as I have known before, the striking ingenuity and resilience of the Germans. We resisted the French for a brutal 20 years, to come out victorious despite the gross disadvantages. This, by the grace of grace, will be the spirit that will carry us forward to the great battlefields that now have to follow this act of aggression committed by the French. For God and the fatherland, all Germans will resist foreign malice, resist the marauding armies of Napoleon, and resist tyranny and despotism. Because the emperor, cowering in his capital, does not know this. The spirit of Germany will never be broken”.

This speech, widely publicised, was a rallying call. The government of North Germany was soon inundated with soldiers wishing to enlist, even from previously sceptical Hanoverians, Saxons and even New Silesians, although some began to use the war to co-ordinate regionalist resistance, especially in Hanover. The speech outraged Junkers and worried members of the government, though. Prussian identity seemed to melt under the heat of national patriotism, and Junkers fretted that their rights and privileges would be subsumed under a Greater German feeling in the case of victory. But the war was a Godsend for the struggling Prussian apparatus in their conquests, and German public opinion was firmly behind them.

In Austria, the situation was much different. Revanchists as well as German liberals, unwilling to give up the dream of unifying Germany under Austria, agitated constantly for war after the humilliations of Prague. Disgruntled Austrian citizens had blamed the Prussian indemnity extracted as a result of the Peace of Prague for the increase in the burden of taxation, and the predominantly German circle wished to used the war as an opportunity to walk back on the Compromise of 1867 and re-establish Austrian hegemony within the whole empire. However, the optics were not good for many Germans; why was Austria intervening against the national cause? The Hungarians also were extremely dissatisfied, fearing the war was a pretext to roll back the 1867 compromise. Franz Jospeh offered his personal reassurances that under no account would he row back the compromise, although many Hungarians remained susipicous. Low level resistance cropped up in Hungary and among some German groups, especially those being conscripted.

Neither Russia nor Britain joined immediately. Britain was unhappy about the potential for further Prussian expansion but was unwilling to intervene to help the French just yet. Gladstone wanted to avoid if at all possible foreign conflict. Russia was watching closely and preparing for intervention. Napoleon III, who had usurped the title of defender of Christians in the Balkans was loathed and the Austrian betrayal in Crimea not forgotten. A French-Austrian victory would bring a very real threat closer to Russian borders, but pan-Slavist opinion was turned very much against a German state. Bismarck emerged from political disgrace to be sent a special envoy to Russia and negotiations for a Prusso-Russian alliance began in earnest. But much was now resting on the Prussian military plan- known secretly as Operation Black Eagle, to knock Austria out of the war. Now it was over to Moltke.

 

[Disraeli2004]

Part 3: Moltke's Plan (NEW!)

The odds where against Prussia. The government had the good sense to realise that continuning looses would mean that more and more powers would pick over the Prussian corprse. A bold plan was hatched.

Austria was much weakened by her defeat in 1866. As much as they had attempted to revoer in 4 years, the defeats to France in 1859 and more decisively to Prussia in 1866 meant the Austrian army was nowhere near the strength of the French.

But time was the enemy. Every month Austria remained in the war, the stronger relatively they would get. They would become more and more of a hindrance.

A bold plan was hatched. Moltke would use most of his troops to march on Vienna and knock Austria out of the war, as they would be forced to sue for peace. It would certainly have the benefit of a significant degree of surprise. It was expected that the Prussians would mobilse defensively against the French. The Austrians, therefore, would be caught totally off guard. With the Austrians dealt with in the South, all the forces could be dealt with against Napoleon. In the meantime, the Prussians would occupy Baden and pressure Bavaria and others to join the war to help against the French, but try and hold a defensive line until the freed up forces arrived. If necessary, supplementary advances would be made towards Budapest, perhaps to inspire revolt.

It would be an almighty gamble with bad optics; a defensive war looks immediately like an invasion.

But the King was willing, fatefully, to roll the dice.

 

[Disraeli2004]

Chapter 4: Triumph and Disaster.

'Those Prussians and Austrians! When are they going to get over the seizure of Silesia? I didn't think diplomacy was so much like a children's playground!'- Benjamin Disraeli

Napoleon III expected a decisive French confrontation on the border. When he heard the news that the Prussian army was mainly marching towards Austria, he burst out laughing and split his coffee over his trousers. He shouldn't have been so happy.

Emperor Franz Joseph wasn't nearly so jubilant. He had overseen, carefully, preparations to seize New Silesia and re-take Karlsbad, applying himself with the usual diligence. The news of a full-blown attack on his country wasn't so welcome. He put on a brave face, but expressed grave doubts about what this meant. 'This may have been a mistake', he said, 'But I hope it's a mistake that doesn't destroy my country entirely.

The Prussian army advanced quickly. The Austrians had been denied the strategic mountain passes on account of their loses in 1866 and the element of surprise was nearly swift and decisive. The Prussians struck deep before the Austrians had fully mobilised, blitzing through remaining fortifications. The Prussians assembled their forces on the outskirts of Prague and attempted to engage the Austrians in a decisive battle. After some minor skirmishes, the Austrians decided instead to abandoned the city until they could fully mobilise and fled south towards Vienna. Prague fell just 8 days after on the 15th October, as the Prussians marched through the city for the second time in the week. The news was a huge boon for the Prussians and jingoism increased on every side. An intended consequence of this apparently vast success was an unfortunate increase of pan-nationalism. Although Prussia still committed herself to a kleindeutschland solution, in which the Austrians maintained a chunk of German territory, the two wars with Austria had convinced many German thinkers that this was the true moment of unification, exciting many liberals. The so called 'October-manifesto' was circulated widely and caused a stir, which declared:

'By the grace of God, Prussia will defeat this traitorous Habspburg menace and the evil spectre of French encroachments. This October is the true hour of German reckoning! We will end the German question, and by God, Germania will triumph! No peace can be acceptable unless both than Habspburg and Bonapartist fiends are vaniqushed and the great King of the Prussians becomes ruler of all Germans!'

The British, Russians and Americans saw the war differently as a result of the invasion of Austrian. Disraeli blasted the 'Prussian menace' and grilled PM Gladstone about his plans. It rather looked like this war was offensive, and not defensive.


In the West, the plans had not gone as expected. Although the small Prussian contingent marched on Freiburg, the retreating Badenese troops met up with a larger French contingent and began to push the invaders back. The Battle of Freiburg (October 14th 1870), the first major battle, saw 5,000 Prussians clash with nearly 9,000 Frenchmen on the outskirts of the city as the Prussians attempted to advance. The French triumphed over the 2 day battle, but the Prussians were able to retreat inside the city, marking the start of the siege of Freiburg. Elsewhere, the outnumbered Prussians were defeated, but not decisively. At the battle of Saarbrucken, the French drove the Prussians out and advanced towards the Rhineland. The French advance, although contained, was still dangerous and the troop numbers strained. Without more re-inforcements, generals warned of the 'repeat of the mistake of 1806' and wholesale French occupation of the Rhineland. Reluctantly, Moltke shifted some troops from the Austrian to the French front.

The Austrians needed action to prevent a second defeat- and fast. The plan began desperate. The first plank was an attempt to incite revolt against Prussian troops in Bohemia. The Emperor issued what is known as the 'October decree', which proclaimed:

'I hereby grant, within my Kingdom, autonomy for Bohemia. The Three Crowns of my empire will be separate and autonomous. Henceforth, there shall be full freedom for the people of Bohemia. This is your choice. Tortue and slavery under Prussia, or freedom under my empire'.\

Hungarians were incandescent as they were levelled to the same level as Bohemia, but the sense of emergency prevented uprising in Hungary. The decree worked. The 'Committee for the liberation of Bohemia' was formed in Prague and a provisional army formed. Huge protests erupted in Prague as the Austrians smuggled arms across the border. The protest, scheduled from the 29th of October, had 15,000 march against the Prussians and demand to be returned to the Austrians. Scuffles broke out with the thinly spread Prussian forces (many had gone southwards to Vienna) which escalated to open warfare. On the 30th October, the Prussians fired on a contingent of peaceful protestors, driving more and more to the streets, marking the beginning of the Bohemian revolt. The growing state of insurrection meant Prussians troops had to be called back from the outskirts of Vienna, slowing the advance drastically. It also turned public opinion. Even Gladstone remarked privately:

'I cannot help but contrast the brutishness and thuggery of the Prussian army with that extradorinaiy bravery of the Bohemians.

By late November, 110,000 Prussian troops had assembled on the outskirts of Vienna near Krems. The Austrians had slowly increased their numbers to 130,000. The Prussians engaged the Austrians on December 4th 1870, sparking the Battle for Vienna. The fighting was tough, and at times close, but the Prussians were undersupplied as their supply lines were harassed by Bohemian partisans and demoralised from insurrection. The Prussians lost the battle, retreating back across into Bohemia and losing 20,000 men to Austria's 15,000. The Prussian war machine had been ground to a halt. But it was wounded, but by no means finished.

This marked the start of a long struggle and then end of the more limited war. The stalemate provided the impoteous for escalation.

 

[Disraeli2004]

"I cannot allow that Bonaparte to dominate Germany again, and to do otherwise would be a betrayal of the Russian Empire"- Tsar Alexander II

1872. The frontlines have remained broadly static. France remains encroaching on the Rhineland, but has failed to secure a decisive victory. The Prussian lines still broadly hold. The Prussians had also been baulked in their attempt to knock Austria out of the war after the decisive failure of the Vienna campaign in 1870, but the failure of the counteroffensive meant that Prussia remains in control of Prague and still threatens Berlin. The necessity of moving troops to defend against the French encroachment has meant the possibilities of an offensive against Austria had all but evaporated by the spring of 1872..

Prussia is now feeling the weight of an apparently failed gamble closing in on the nation. Without outside intervention, it looked unlikely that they would be able to strike an offensive blow to knock either of the combatants out of the war. Morale at home is also fast disappearing. The war has lost much of its patriotic fervour- the King's failure to endorse the GroBdeutschland solution, a solution advocated by the German National Convention, set up on the outbreak of the war, has meant the war has increasingly felt less like a struggle for German independence and more a petty imperial squabble. What's worse is the rapid increase in military organisation and equipment- the Prussians had enjoyed a large advantage against the disorganised French and Austrian troops, but as the war progressed rapid military reform was undertaken in both countries. The Prussians looked set to lose this conflict.

The first time that became immediately apparent was in the Battle of Linz, which was fought between the Prussian and Austrian forces in early March. The attempt by the Prussian forces was to break through the Austrian defences that surrounded Linz, which was broadly successful, but on a battle on March 14th the Prussian contingent was defeated, and outnumbered, by Austrian forces descending the city. Military analysts suggested that this was the last time the Prussians could have hoped to unilaterally break through the Austrian defences. The defeat was followed by a resumption of the offense in the West by French forces, which was broadly held off- but the French were now advancing in sight of Trier, allowing them access to a much broader part of the Rhineland.

This prompted a much more serious discussion of the war amongst the Russian high command. It looked increasingly likely that the Prussian army would be unable to maintain a defensive posture for a significant period of time without defeat, although the army was still very much still in tact. And what would a Franco-Austrian victory look like? Here opinion was divided at court between the aggressively anti-German camp and the so called "pragmatists". The pragmatists very much fretted about a Franco-Austrian victory. It would cement Napoleon III's status as hegemon of the continent, after successful interventions in European affairs in Crimea, Northern Italy and now Germany, and re-introduce French influence to the Rhineland and Germany. This expansion in French influence not only re-awakened the Napoleonic demons of the earlier 19th century, but also presented a real, tangible threat- Napoleon III had ripped away the title of "defender of the Christians" in the Balkans from the Tsar only 20 years before, and Crimea was for from forgiven. The expansion in Austrian influence was also not welcome- relationships had been tense ever since the "Crimean betrayal" in which Austria had abandoned their commitment to Russia, despite Russia playing a decisive role in keeping the Austrian Empire together in 1848-49, and still would frustrate Russian ambitions in the Balkans, where the two powers were at loggerheads. A drastic expansion in French and Austria influence would, therefore, significantly weaken the Russian position. The Pragmatists therefore favoured a swift and decisive intervention to protect the Russian standing, on the Prussian side. This wasn't outlandish. After the collapse of the "Holy Alliance" with Austria, Russia and Prussia had remained on distinctly good terms. Prussia had even provided diplomatic support for Russia when they crushed the January Uprising of 1863 in Poland, despite international condemnation. Bismarck, the former chancellor, had made particular efforts on this front and had served as ambassador to Russia. At this point, the war was still a close run thing, although France and Austria would gain the upper hand soon if no action was taken. Given Prussia needed the intervention, they could negotiate a very favourable settlement with the Prussians- and thus greatly expand their power whilst keeping a lid on Prussian power. By intervening decisively on the side of the Prussians, the Russian Empire could also bolster her prestige after the continued humilliation after Crimea and restore her degraded international standing- something that would help in terms of projecting power in the Balkans and advancing their mission. Victory would mean a significantly more free hand in the Balkans, a humbling of Napoleon III, who would n longer be able to frustrate Russian ambitions, and perhaps even a slice of Galicia. And given the close nature of the war, that victory looked very attainable if they intervened.

They were opposed by a significant peace and anti-Prussian lobby within the Russian government. It was argued at the time that helping Prussian attain German unity would inevitably create a large and hostile state that would oppose the pan-Slavist objectives. The slogan often used was "Fighting Prussia's war is a betrayal of the Slavic Peoples!'. This, alongside concerns about the military readiness of the Russian government, pushed the Tsar in the neutrality directions- it would be a relief to see the humbling of Prussian influence. But the events of March began to change the calculations in Petreograd. With Prussia significantly humbled, Russia could attain a signficantly higher price for entry into the war- specifically in terms of the Balkans and spheres of influence in a humbled Austria. It was also clear that not taking action at this point would result in a signifcant Franco-Austrian victory. The French Foreign Minister, Émile Ollivier, wrote a letter to Napoleon III warning of the danger of Russian intervention, suggesting 'It seems evident to me that unless we can give Russia significant and sizeable guarantees over her security, they will lose patience with us entirely'. Napoleon III ignored this, clinging to his personal hatred and distrust of the Tsar.

The eventual pact between Prussia and Russia was formalised between March and April. The Russian party was particularly keen that Austria was not dismembered in the aftermath of the war to serve as a bulwark against Prussian influence. Bismarck was removed from retirement and took up his post as special envoy to Russia to negotiate the settlement. The Secret Protocol of the Konigsberg was signed on May 9th 1872 between the Prussian and Russian governments. The secret terms agreed on the framework of the peace. I have condensed them as follows:

a. Prussia's annexation of Bohemia is confirmed, as well as the proclamation of the German Empire over the remaining German states, not including Austria. The annexation of Strasbourg by Prussia was also anticipated. In return, Russia will receive Galicia.
b. The Austrian Empire shall remain in tact. However, areas of political and economic spheres of influence would be set up. Areas lying within the Hungarian sector would fall within the Russian sphere of influence, and states lying within the Austrian sector will lie within Prussia's sphere of influence.
c. Prussia will formally declare that it will not intervene in any further conflicts in the Balkan region, and provide diplomatic support for special Russian rights in Ottoman Europe and the straights.
d. France will renounce titles of protector of the faith in the Balkans and formally hand them over to the Tsar.
e. Russia would occupy Hungary for 10 years, and Prussia would occupy Austria for 10 years.
f. A mutual defence pact against the British would be signed and announced after the conclusion of the war.

The significant climbdown for the Prussians was the renouncing of the GroBdeutschland solution- something with an immense weight of public support behind it- but Wilhelm considered the secret treaty a success. And thus, the stage was set for Russian interference in the war.

 

[Disraeli2004]

"If that Mr Disraeli had his way, shamefully followed by members of my own party, I would be sending a generation of British servicemen to be slaughtered. And for what? To prop up the inhumanity of the Ottoman governments and save the ramshackle Habsburg empire. How that man can advocate for something like that and keep his conscience clear must remain a mystery to me"- Expert from Gladstone's Diaries, July 3rd 1872

By May 1872, all necessary preparations and been made for the Russian Empire to enter the war. There had been a certain amount of scrambling in Moscow in order to find a pretext to justify a war for honour and conquest that would, to a certain extent, satisfy international opinion. They found this in the form of what is to be known as Stuttgart rising, which was a military confrontation between the occupying French forces and a new force, the so-called Unified German Resistance (Einheitlicher deutscher Widerstand, more commonly known as the EDW in Germany)- this paramilitary organisation had close affiliations and links to the Prussian governments and had become operational in January, and had carried out small raids and attacks to cut off supplies to the invading French army in the Rhineland. French forces clashed with the EDW around Stuttgart starting in late March but by early May the French armies had broadly repulsed the forces and had full control and occupation in the city. In order to ward off further attacks, the government ordered limited destruction of some residential and commercial areas of Stuttgart, and pillaged paintings from the galleries. The destruction was a serious tactical mistake for the French government, not just because of the wave of outrage in unleashed in the German world (the underground pan-German chronicle in Austria unleashed a paper with the headline "The betrayal of the German world by our emperor- blind eye turned to horrors in Stuttgart), bolstering faltering Prussian morale and decimating Austrian morale, it changed the whole narrative of the war. Gladstone got up at the dispatch box and urged "The French government to cease and desist violence against innocent German civilians who should play not part in this war". Tsar Alexander latched onto this as an opportunity to declare war. He announced: "This man, Napoleon III, is unleashing a level of horror on Europe comparable to his uncle and Louis XIV. How this man can be named "protector" of the Christian faith across the Balkans is an insult to the most basic principles of morality and Christendom itself". The rhetoric was increasingly jingoistic and to most observers by early May it looked increasingly likely war was coming.

Most observers in Britain were now increasingly alarmed by the prospect of a Russian-Prussian alliance. The Foreign Office sent increasingly alarmist memos to the government. In them, they made facts clear. One, that Russia was motivated primarily by unpicking the Crimean settlement and expansion of power in the Balkans. Two, if Russia intervened the victory of Prussia and Russia was almost certain- this is because both that Prussia had defied expectations to rebuff most French invasion attempts and held the line both in Austria and Prussia, although manpower was no depleting,, and that Austria was still chronically weakened by the earlier offensives and the long aftermath of the rout of 1866. The only way a Russian intervention could be counterbalanced was an Ottoman-British offensive in the Balkans against Russia, and without that Russian-Prussian victory was almost certain. Analysists and growing factions within both Liberal and Conservative Parties pointed out that the collapse of Austria (or the reduction of Austria to a joint vassal) and the humbling of France would leave Britain truly alone in protecting the crumbling Ottoman Empire from Russian encroachment- meaning Russians ships would quickly reach the Mediterranean, and Russia would be restored as a pre-eminent continental power, which threatened in turn British interests in the near-East, including the wealthy trading posts in India. The solution that the pro-intervention lobby gave to this was simple: announce to Russia if they declared war on France, Britain would declare war on Russia. If intervention was successfully prevented through this, Prussia would ultimately fail in their objectives, restoring continental balance- and British power and leverage could be utilised to convince France and Austria to adopt a lenient peace settlement.

But Gladstone refused to adopt this strategy. The first reason of the high nature of risk that was involve- if the game of high-stakes diplomacy backfired, Britain would find herself embroiled in a difficult war against the Russians and Prussians that she would be far from guaranteed to win. The potential for this heinous bloodshed meant that a lot of liberal politicians baulked at the idea of intervention. And Gladstone did not find the prospect of intervention acceptable. He could not see, simply put, the moral case. Gladstone thought little of the reactionary, ramshackle Austrian Empire and thought little of the need to prop it up. Napoleon's atrocities in Germany, as he saw them, did not make him a credible partner or ally, and he felt a moral obligation 'to protect the families of those poor Rhenish civilians', and Napoleon's lofty ambitions in Germany meant Britain would have to contend with an ascendant France again, which was not a recipe for long-term peace. And most importantly, Gladstone did not share the fanaticism of his predecessors about preventing the decline of the Ottoman Empire. Gladstone saw the Ottoman system as corrupt and based on the fundamentally immoral system of religious oppression, and had watched Anglo-French reform initiatives flounder. Waving goodbye to Ottoman control there would, therefore, be an inherent moral good for the Christian world. Gladstone therefore did work to prevent Russian intervention, but stopped short of promising that Britain would go to war. He also pushed for the idea of an international conference. Both sides, fearing British intervention, decided to take up the offer. And thus the stage was set for the London Conference, held on May 8th 1872.

 

[Disraeli2004]

Part 7- Failure of the London Conference

I may have my criticisms of Mr Gladstone, but I will say this. He will go down in the history books for this settlement. Never in the history of mankind has a leader of a great nation gone into negotiations, folded on all of his demands and failed in every objectives, but still has the tenacity to walk out and claim that it was a triumph.’- Benjamin Disraeli, 24th May 1872

Gladstone's ambitious attempt to end the war ended in failure. But many historians have noted that his objectives were far more limited than ending the war entirely, and he succeeded in a sense from extracting Britain from the war. It may first help to start with the principle objectives of Gladstone's little conference in London. The first, and most achievable, was the ending of what he saw as atrocities in Germany and Bohemia committed by French and Prussian forces. This he saw as the 'urging and pressing humanitarian need to alleviate suffering of citizens'. The second, and one that Gladstone was less focused on, was the need to prevent Russian influence. Whilst Disraeli and other hawks from both sides of the aisle saw this as the most important, this was rather secondary in Gladstone's thinking. Although he acknowledged the potential damages from an Russo-Prussian victory, he was ambivalent at the idea of a victory. Gladstone stated privately that 'It should not be the policy to prop up the saccrelidgous and corrupt Ottoman control in the Balkans over some potential Russian encroachment', and many of the pan-German associations were moulded in the liberal nationalist traditions, although they sat uneasily with the Prussian conservativism. So whilst Gladstone did recognise the need to contain Russia and prevent intervention, his objections were that primarily it had the capacity to prolong the war, and not because he feared Russian encroachment. The third, and more lofty aim, was to end the war entirely, which Gladstone prioritised by seemed a remote possibility, was the end of the war entirely. After all, the war looked like a stalemate, and had done for quite a while. It was clear that the French government, with Russian intervention now threatened, could not knock Prussia out of the war, seize territories it wanted or prevent the unification of Germany at the same time. It was also clear to the Prussians were uneasy with the idea of Russian subservience and increased presence should be avoided, or at least mitigated. And the Austrians were desperate to get out of the war on account of increasing levels of Hungarian dissent and a decaying domestic situation. Peace, therefore, did not look entirely unattainable, as some historians have claimed, at this juncture.

But there was a myriad of difficulties. The most obvious of which was the objections of the French. Napoleon III's regime was increasingly crumbling as the domestic situation tightened. The empire was already in trouble before the onset of the war, requiring a set of reforms known collectively as the liberal empire, and the war was seen s a high command as a remedy to the opposition posed by the increasing weakness of this system. As part of the propoganda effort, the focus of the war was placed on defeating the 'Prussian menace'. Newspapers churned out headlines with news of Prussian atrocities and condemnation of the 'pattern of militarism' that defined the Prussian state. Vast portions of school lessons were redirected to instil anti-Prussian propoganda, with excessive focus placed on 'the suffering of the people of Silesia'. The government had also encouraged pamphlets to be distributed, claiming that the Kaiser wanted to annex vast swathes of the East of the country. This meant that the very survival of the regime was staked upon the need to defend against the unification of Germany. By trading away that concession, he would be jeopardising, probably fatally, the security of his regime. The relatively poor performance of the army was also blamed not only on the corrupt generals but the corruption at the very heart of the French government, and to salvage his reputation Napoleon desperately needed to prevent German unification, and conceding it was quit e out of the question. Conversely the Prussians were unwilling to give up the prospect of unification of Germany under their balanced, even if they maintained a strong sphere of influence there, because of the multitude of pan-Germanic sentiment unleashed by the war. The government would already struggle to persuade the vocal elements to give up the annexation of Austria, but the sacrifice of the German project would be seen as an outrageous perfidy, especially now victory was apparently in sight. Whilst Gladstone and the British attempted to find some compromise, where the German Empire remained in place but Prussia relaxed domestic controls over the South, both France and Prussia found this proposal unappealing, France because it did not meet the needs of her security (which was mainly about preventing a strong unified German army from ever threatening French security again and any kind of concession in this sought would incite domestic wrath in Prussia. Prussia also refused a “Demilitarized Zone” proposal designed to shore up French security. The talks, therefore, of continental peace floundered.

But even with this failure, the other objectives of the conference were significantly more achievable. The focus of the conference turned to the question of Russian intervention. Gladstone sought to avoid Russian intervention in a two pronged strategy- first, by removing their casus belli and secondly by threatening British intervention. Gladstone had success in the first area. Eager not to alienate Gladstone, the French agreed to ratify a protocol outlawing attacks on civilians and allowing for British organisations to survey the Rhineland and British charity workers to enter there, creating the International Rhenish Force (IRF) to help keep the peace in the area. A more general treaty, called the London Protocol, was signed by all great powers, committed all powers to renouncing warfare against the civilians and excessive force in combat, as well as setting up a consultatary international body in Geneva to assess potential breaches of this convention. But although this allayed much of Gladstone’s concerns, it was not enough to prevent Russian intervention. The Russians stressed the fact that France, who had so recently committed atrocities in the Rhineland, could not be trusted to run the Rhineland: the Russian emissary espoused to Gladstone ‘How can a nation that has demonstrated it’s violent contempt against the German people be trusted to run one of her most populated reigons?’. Russia therefore demanded that France vacate the Rhineland; a demand France couldn’t accept without a more general peace settlement. Prussia also played on the nationalist sympathies of Gladstone, and stressed the national self-determination of the people of the Rhineland. The Prussians proposed a Rhenish referendum between German and French control, something the French would have to reject, to paint Napoleon III as an illiberal aggressor. These continual delaying tactics by the Prussian and Russian delegation meant the conference came to an increasing impasse about how intervention could be avoided.

Gladstone therefore had to rely more heavily on threatening intervention. However, the Russians had come to the conclusion that this was not a credible threat. Not only did the vacillating impression that Gladstone left on the conference meant that these threats looked increasingly like a bluff, the internal tumult in Britain, in which Gladstone had staked much of his political reputation on keeping Britain at peace, meant a u-turn on this issue could be very damaging to his reputation. Not only that, his reluctance to help the Ottomans and his condemnation of the Ottoman system meant that Gladstone would not be able to recruit any new allies. During the conference, Gladstone reached out to the Porte to request a joint blow through the Dardanelles in the event of war and Ottoman help. The Porte flatly rejected, because they saw Gladstone as deeply untrustworthy and hostile to the Empire, aspiring for her dissolution, who could not be trusted to hold up his guarantees or negotiate a favourable peace.

As negotiations continued to stall in London, Gladstone was presented with a clear choice about courses of action. It was clear that Russia was going to intervene in the war. One option was intervention on the side of the Franco-Austrian alliance. But doing this would not only be costly in terms of lives and resources, especially given that this war would be protracted, it may in fact be pointless- it was far from clear, without Ottoman support, what Britain could meaningfully do to halt the Russians, and Austria would swiftly collapse, leaving the British fighting a nasty land war on behalf of the French emperor in France that they may well lose. The second option was to intervene on the side of the Prusso-Russian alliance- this was quite out of the question, not least because of the massive Russophobia back home in parliament, and doing this would be political suicide for Gladstone. But the third option was neutrality. Critics panned this option as a shameful abdication of British leadership that deprived the British a seat in the voice of Europe, and would allow an insurgent Russia to continue to role back the result of the Crimean conflict and even threatened British possessions in India. But it was the option that preserved British lives, and Britain could still act as a useful arbiter of the conflict.

On May 21st, the Congress dissolved, producing the London Protocol and various arrangements about humanitarian aid. Gladstone decried the conference a success, much to the uproar of the opposition back home, saying that ‘I have extracted Britain from a war, in which the soil would have been soaked with blood for causes so far removed from our own security, and saved the Rhenish from the hideous tide of war that they are being engulfed’. But Gladstone’s reputation, and the failure to prevent the expansion of Russia, meant his personal reputation never recovered from this utter humiliation. Britain suddenly looked like it had abdicated it’s position in upholding the balance of power in Europe, ushering in a new, more uncertain, age of diplomacy.

 

[Disraeli2004]

Part 8- The End of the War

"It is my sincere belief that with this decisive strike on the Habspurg Empire, not only have we saved the situation of Europe as a whole, we have re-captured the honour, prosperity and glory of the Russian motherland."- Tsar Alexander II

With the failure of the London conference, Russian intervention was now almost guaranteed. On May 23rd Russian troops announced their intention to declare war on the French Empire, promoting the Austrian Empire to declare war on the Austrian Empire as they were bound by treaty on May 24th. The Russian army had improved significantly as a result of the reforms instituted after the Crimean disaster of 1853-1856 and therefore had little trouble destroying the battered Austrian army. The Austrian Army had been weakened by a series of successive defeats, first to France in 1859 then to Prussia in 1866, and barely managed to hold off a second Prussian invasion attempt in 1870 to great damage of their army. Many of thre soldiers, both on the German, Hungarian and Slavic sides of their empire, were disloyal and mutanies were common. Prussia, in a risky move designed to knock Austria out of the war, moved troops from the Western Front to the East and began what is called the second Vienna offensive. The Austrians were now truly overwhelmed. Within a month the entirety of Galicia had been captured by Russian forces and Limberg had fallen to Russian troops. The focus of the Russian army now turned to capturing Budapest. As the situation became increasingly grim for the Austrians, panic set in at the capital. If the Russians captured Budapest, the empire would most likely collapse and a puppet regime in Hungary could be set up- if the Prussians captured Vienna, the annexation of the remaining Austrian territories could bring an end to the war. The situation was not helped by the sudden entry of Italy into the war. Italy had taken a neutral stance during the war, but the evacuation of French troops from Rome led to the seizure of Rome by the Italian army, which raised tensions with France. Italy also held territorial claims to North Tyrol and Dalmatia and eyed the port of Trieste. Thus as it was clear the Austrian army was in a serious state of collapse Italy launched a surprise attack, quickly overwhelming the scant Austrian garrisons stationed there- the French, realising the writing on the wall for their Austrian allies now defending against a tripartite attack, did not bother to make themselves another enemy and did not uphold their defensive pact with Austria and refused to attack Italy. The Austrians now scrambled to sue for peace as quickly as they could with the Prussians and Austrians. After all, the Prussian move eastward had put the Western situation in increasing jepordy- Napoleon III had broken through the trenches on June 5th and now threatened the industrial and vital Ruhr valley region, and it was imperative that the Prusso-Russian forces be turned to the West as quickly as was possible. In a secret protocol, the Austrians admitted to an almost unconditional surrender- Russian forces would march through Budapest and Prussian forces through Vienna, and significant territorial loses would be exacted, from Bohemia to Galicia, and the Austrian Empire would lose much of her autonomy on foreign policy in exchange for Prussia and Russia keeping the Austro-Hungarian Empire in tact. Given the growing calls and marches for independence in Budapest and the pan-German rallies in Vienna, the Austrian government had little choice but to accept as the military and domestic situation deteriorated rapidly. The Prussian government, as agreed in the secret protocol with Russia, held off from pushing for annexation- although the armistice protocol for Austria remained secret for now and would be formalised at a later peace conference. Francis Joseph took the 'poisoned chalice' on July 24th, 1872 and signed the armistice and Russian and Prussians occupied Vienna and Budapest. Most assumed the Hasbpburg empire dead; nationalist movements swiftly took control and what remained of the army struggle to suppress moves for Illyrian, Hungarian and Slovak independence across the empire.

France's position therefore became increasingly dire. Although it had enjoyed increasing success against the deflated Prussian army, breaking through the trenches earlier that year and expanding their hold on the Rhineland, threatening the ports in the North West and beginning to close into the north west. As the reality of the Austrian collapse dawned upon Napoleon III, he ordered a desperate push to capture Dortmund. It looked very much in the early stages like he might proceed and deal a severe blow to the Prussians, forcing them to the negotiating table, but the rapid return from the East helped Prussian defences and the line held. As Russian forces streamed through Prussia, Napoleon III quickly found himself outnumbered. The Russian and Prussian command planned what was dubbed the September Offensive, a universal push along the frontline designed to drive France back to Alsace Lorraine, by pushing from the North and East of the French positions on the Rhineland. After months of fighting an increasingly frenzied offensive, and with victory now a remote prospect, the French morale plummeted. Napoleon III's attempts to rally his soldiers fell on deaf ears, and the Empire came into sudden jepodary. The French Army, outnumbered and exhausted, collapsed with terrifying speed, and the frenzied evacuation of French west only had limited success, with hundreds of thousands captured. The French attempted to put up a defence near Cologne, but the Battle of Cologne turned into a rout and worsened the strategic situation. By mid November the Prussians had re-captured nearly all of the Rhineland and now looked to take the offensive back into France. Napoleon III returned from the frontlines to Paris to give a speech to rally the nations and call for unity in beating back the invaders- but his regime was collapsing around him. The war was seen as proof of the parastic elitism, as well as endemic imcompetence, of the empire. As reports grew worse by the day, the protests grew calling for the abdication of Napoleon. Major protests on November 19th turned into open rioting, starting what are known as the November days. At this sight Napoleon III panicked. He realised that keeping the army tied up in fighting the Prussians would lead to his own deposition- and perhaps even execution- and his only hope, to preserve his empire any longer, was to cut his loses and accept a humiliation peace. As Prussian forces began to surround Strasbourg, Napoleon III wrote to Kaiser Wilhelm I for an armistice, with arbitration performed by England, in an almost unconditional surrender- the details of the peace were to be agreed upon later at the peace conference, and Napoleon III desperately needed his soldiers- he provisionally agreed a large reparation payment, recognition of the conquests of the German Empire, and the abdication of his religious rights in the Holy sites of the Middle East won in the Crimean War. On November 27th 1872 the guns ceased for the first time in two years. The war was over.

The war, fought for a horrific two years, claimed hundreds of thousands of lives, eventually toppled Napoleon III and the Bonaparte's forever and re-made the map of Europe. The Concert of Europe had descended into a nightmare cacophony, and the balance of power had been ripped up beyond repair, with terrifying consequences in years to come. It was a war, as historians had noted, that came from the hubris, greed and ambitions of the rulers of Europe against the better advice of their ministers. The price for their mistakes was to be paid by the blood of their soldiers, not only in this war but in years to come.

 

[Disraeli2004]

"Napoleon I conqueared the world. Napoleon III was conquered by the world"- Prince Bismarck

Part 9- Revolution in France

Napoleon III hoped that the tentative peace that he had achieved would enable him to recall soldiers in order to crush the dissenters at home, and that the peace would bring some relative stability to France and save his regime. However, the situation had deteriorated to the point at which Napoleon III could no longer control the course of events. Discontent with the absolutist regime had been simmering for years. Napoleon III was seen as the figurehead of a corrupt status quo, endemic to the system, built of imperial greed and willing to risk French lives. Napoleon's gamble to boost his prestige at home, embarking on the Franco-Prussian war, had ended in disaster, and thousands upon thousands of French lives had been wasted as the domestic situation and the economy deteriorated. The failures in war were blamed on a corrupt and useless military and political elite, and the shortages in food that had become commonplace during 1872 only added to the growing sense of revolution and discontent. The news of the collapse of the French army throughout November proved too much for most Parisians, as the war that had consumed so many lives had been lost, because, as many saw it, of the bumbling and corrupt incompetence of French officials. Napoleon III suing for peace was also seen as a treacherous move, designed so that he could use his army against his own people and the enemy. Many feared to what extent Napoleon III was willing to sell out his country in order to preserve his regime. Napoleon III also lacked the energy to vigorously shape the narrative or defend himself. Napoleon III had been in significantly declining, on account of kidney diseases and goat, and he had been plunged into a state of despair as his war collapsed around him. As the tensions and riots on the streets grew more and more pronounced, Napoleon III decided to attempt to escape to a small estate near Caen in order to re-group and escape the Parisian mob until his army arrived- Napoleon had watched in 1848 as Louis Phillipe had failed to escape from revolutionary Paris, forcing him to capitulate. However, this flight was a strategic misjudgement. Not only was it instantly compared with the flight to Vaneeress that doomed Louis XVI, and seen as an abdication of responsibility. It also induced panic, as it seemed to confirm that Napoleon III was going to use military coercion to crush dissent within the capital. A day after the announcement of the flight, armed mobs seized key governmental buildings around the capital and a provisional revolutionary government was proclaimed. The news of the fall of Paris was combined with news of widespread mutinies within the army- the soldiers believed that they had been sold out by the imperial authorities, and Napoleon III would find crushing the revolution with the remains of his decimated army impossible. Collapsing in senile despair, Napoleon III agreed to abdicate the throne on December 6th, 1872, bringing to an end over twenty years of rule. On the same day Leon Gambetta, a French statesman who had often championed the causes of the lower classes, proclaimed the Third Republic at the Hotel de Ville. His reign, marred by corruption and defeat abroad, both in Mexico and in Europe, is regarded as a sad chapter in French history, and one that is forever unfavourably compared with the conquests of his uncle.

Gambetta's provisional government still faced difficulties. Although Gambetta championed the working classes, radical working class feeling on the streets was still present and the government had little army to defend themselves with or assert themselves. This was compounded by strong reactionary opposition, mainly in the form of the monarchists, who distrusted Gambetta's left republican stance. The collapse of the army through the twin blows of the Prussian invasion and the French mutinies had weakened the French position further, and made the possibility of re-opening the war for a populist defence of the fatherland quite impossible. Gambetta's government would still have to submit to the peace Negotations scheduled for that January- an agreement to engage in these negotiations was followed by swift recognition by the great powers of his government, securing her short term stability. But Gambetta could already see the writing on the wall for the regime- these peace negotiations would likely torpedo his popularity at home, and lead to significant electoral victories for the monarchist forces organising for the elections in February. Gambetta thus found himself only in loose control of a country in a thoroughly uneviable condition, with little long term hopes for his success.

 

[Disraeli2004]

Part 10- The Second Treaty of Prague

I shall go down as a failed monarch. Venetia, Lombardy, Prague, Galicia, the Bukovina... the list of territories I have lost is countless. I took over duties from poor Ferdinand, but I cannot help feeling that even he in his madness would have not brought this disaster upon the Austrian people- Franz Joseph (private remarks)

The war in Europe was over, and the victors had a lot of matters to discuss upon the defeat of France and Austria. Of the two defeated powers, Austria received almost no representation at the conference, held in Prague in December 1872 and January 1873. Most of the matters relating to the defeat of Austria had been secretly agreed between the Russian Empire and the German Empire prior to the conference in a series of secret protocols. The general thrust of these agreements was that the German annexation of Bohemia would be to be confirmed (although the London conference had seen Prussia pledge autonomy in the province), and in compensation Russia would receive Galicia. The Russian Empire was to have a sphere of influence over Hungary, which included the right to garrison troops and economic concessions and political influence, and Austria joining Germany's sphere of influence (although not being annexed), with the rights of garrison and economic concessions reflected. The powers of the Hungarian legislature would further increase, although Francis Joseph would remain emperor of both his realms, such control was limited to free trade between the two areas and foreign policy autonomy. Such foreign policy autonomy, however, was severely compromised; the foreign policy at Budapest was inevitably tied up with the heavy Russian influence there and likewise with Germany at Vienna, and Franz Joseph was forced to sign a humiliating treaty forbidding any further Austrian interference in the Balkans. Given how close the empire was to total implosion, the empire now had to rely exclusively on their foreign sponsors to keep itself alive. Austria-Hungary was no longer a great power in any sense of the word, some 7 centuries after the rise of the Hapsburgs.

The delegates, however, did fight over the precise nature of the territorial sentiment. Crushing losses on the Austrian half of the Empire were already agreed before the conference. The German Empire had proclaimed an annexation of the whole of Bohemia, not just the "New Silesia" area taken in the First Treaty of Prague, at the beginning of the war, and this annexation was confirmed. Russia, to maintain some sort of balance of power, had demanded Galicia in these secret treaties- that too was confirmed. Both of these annexations were in the long run not beneficial for the occupying powers- for Germany, it brought in a new and heightened problem of Czech resistance to the state, and for Russia, it compounded their existing problems with Polish resistance to occupation that had been ongoing since the construction of Congress Poland under Russian rule in 1815. But the late entrance of Italy compounded the tensions at the conference. The secret treaties had not planned to give away much more of the Austrian sector, given the crushing territorial loses, to make the German influence in the remaining parts of the empire still significant. But the late entry of Italy into the war had upended that, as they were now in occupation of the city of Trieste, the Tyrol and the Dalmatian cost. Irredentists in Rome demanded that they must keep full possession. With Russo-German tension already rising, Russia pushed for a generous compensation of Italy, being given all of North Tyrol, the port of Trieste and the Dalmatian coast, whereas Germany sought to limit Italy's gains to small gains in Istria, to maintain the Austrian influence over the crumbling empire and to keep the wealthy ports of Dalmatia under their sphere of influence. When the conference was increasingly deadlocked, some German and Italian diplomats began pushing for a joint partition of the Austrian section, in which Germany annexed the remnants of Austria in return for a full recognition of the Italian claims. This horrified the Russian diplomats, who had joined the war on the express understanding that this would not occur to preserve the Habsburg empire as a malleable bulwark against further German encroachment, and bitter disputes broke out. After days of fractious exchange, an understanding was reached in which Italy could annex Northern Tyrol, Istria and the city of Trieste (which was declared open to foreign shipping), and have some naval rights in Dalmatia without annexing the province. The net effect of this is that Hungary made no territorial concession, whereas Austria was crushed and decimated- rebalancing the empire around the Hungarian half and vastly increasing the influence of Hungary within it.

The settlement with France revolved around whether the treaty would be accepted. There were fairly few diagreements in the settlement with France. Germany pushed for a modest annexations in the former French provinces of Alsace and Lorraine- including the cities of Strasbourg and Metz, and France had to recognise the unification of Germany. France would renounce her title as protector of Christians in the Balkans and formally recognise Russia in that role, and disavow any intervention in the Balkans- a huge loss of prestige. A reparation payment would be exacted, to be payed in instalments over ten years to the Russian and Prussian government, with an occupation force in Northern France there to ensure it's payment. Gambetta, however, would not accept these terms. The demands for territorial compensation and the crushing humilliation caused uproar at home and demands to resist the occupation. France was not in a position to enforce her protests. When Gambetta continued to obstruct, the French and Russian armies mobilised- the French army was not in a position, after 3 years of war, to resist the demands and backed down with a minor adjustment to reparations, to huge uproar at home. The treaty was eventually signed in a small ceremony in Prague on the 21st February, 1871, bringing to a formal end the most deadly and broad conflict since the end of the Napoleonic Wars.

The reaction to the treaty was overwhelmingly negative. Pan-German newspapers were outraged that Germany did not commit herself to an annexation of Austria, and saw it as a heartless sellout to the Russian government, fuelling violent reactions at home and stirring up vast anti-Russian sentiment. The French and Austrians saw the treaty as an intolerable humilliation, and in Austria that was accompanied by disappointment that free determination of peoples had not been accomplished, leaving Hungary still not technically independent and denying an Austrian union with Germany. Only in Russia was the reaction mainly positive; pan-Slavist activists at home were pleased at the free hand Russia had gained, although the reaction in Galicia, a newly annexed province of the Russian Empire, was particularly violent. Much of Galician identity had been around loyalty to the Austrian state (Galician peasants had crushed an attempted insurrection in 1846), and the legacy of Joseph II meant many in Galicia saw the emperor as a fundamentally benevolent figure who would fight for their lives. The replacement of the emperor of Austria with the emperor of Russia caused fear, panic and anger within Galicia, leading to insurrection that would continue in years to come.

The treaty remains one of the most defining documents of international history. Despite Germany's dissatisfaction, this process confirmed the unification of Germany into a single state (underway in a series of conflicts from 1864) under Prussian control, and transformed the geopolitical landscape of Europe by confirming the existence of a central European hegemon in the form of the greater German state. The treaty also confirmed the end of the containment of Russia after their defeat in Crimea in 1853-1856, leading to a series of geopolitical changes in the Balkans, a remarkable turnaround for a nation so comprehensively defeated. Although this treaty would not be particularly stable, especially in regards to the unworkable compromise of the 'spheres of influence' in Austria, it went down in history as one of the most significant diplomatic documents since the congress of Vienna. Historians have also pointed to the treaty as a key moment in the decline in British, French and Ottoman influence on the world stage.

Map of Europe, February 21st 1873

 

[Disraeli2004]

Exams of an Alternate Future:

(Author's note- this is meant to be a fun interlude, given we've hit 10 chapters)

Module: The Wars of German Unification, 1864-1873.

Describe the Provisions of the Treaty of the Second Treaty of Prague (5)

The Second Treaty of Prague mandated France give up territories in Alsace-Lorraine and pay a reparation payment to the Prussian and Russian state. Russia gained Galicia and the Buknovia from Austria and Germany gained the rest of Bohemia. Italy also made minor gains on the Adriatic.

Mark: 3/5- Lacks detail about Italian acquisitions, and fails to mention the reversal of the Treaty of London or the confirmatioon by both France and Austria that they would not intervene in Balkan affairs.

Explain Russia's decision to intervene on the side of the Prussians (7)

Firstly, Russia wanted territorial gains and acquisitions, particularly in Poland, for the Austrian state, and they were rivals in the Balkans. Secondly, the state wanted a strong German ally and state to stand up to the Austrians and were still bitter and resentful about their loss in the Crimean war, and wanted to expand their own power in the Balkans. Thirdly, the Russians saw that the Prussians were about to win the war, and thus wanted to take some territory to maintain the balance of power. The Russians also saw a Prussian victory as a way to block out or counterweight the influence of the British.

Mark: 4/7- Some good reasons given, but no where near enough analytical depth of any of the claims- and some of the arguments you make are highly suspect, phrased sloppily or are factually incorrect- argument 3 is outright wrong, it was the opposite- the Prussians looked like they were about to lose the war, which would bring a strengthened Austria and France who threatened Russian interests in the near-East.

Austria lost crippling amounts of territory between 1859 to 1873, but did not entirely collapse at the Second Treaty of Prague. Why was this? (6)

Russia had set out a series of conditions for their intervention. Russia was fundamentally hostile to the idea of a great German state, as they recognised this would tip the balance of power against them in a way that threatened their own security. Thus, in a series of secret protocols, they demanded the German government leave a rump Austrian government, and instead a spheres of influence arrangement was drawn up- in which Germany had economic and military dominion over Austria and Russia over Hungary- but the much larger Hungarian state would now largely control the empire, giving Russia a perement ally to counterweight the German expansion.

Mark: 5/6- Good and well explained- could have also added there was fear in some corners of the Russian government about the fact that an independent Hungary would be hostile to Russian interests (fears based off the effects of the 1848 revolution as well as Romanians in Transylvania.

'Gladstone was right not to embroil Britain in a war they could not win in the London Conference'- To what extent do you agree with this view?

I completely agree with this view. Britain simply didn't have the manpower to stop the Prussian army, and naval raids wouldn't have changed the course of the war. Moreover, the existence of a German state was not a direct threat to British interests- such fears were whipped up by jingoists at home, like Disraeli, for cynical political purposes. British intervention also wouldn't have stopped the Russian intervention, which was bound to doom Austria and France, and picking a losing side would have hardly been beneficial, indeed humiliating, for Britain.

Mark: 4/10- Some good arguments but again nowhere near enough detail. Other side not considered at all, which has cost you marks- make sure to rebut the other side! A lot of claims aren't substaniuated- how would the threat of British intervention not stopped the Russians, for example?

16/28- Must Try Harder! Nowhere near enough detail or depth in most answers.

 

[Disraeli2004]

‘We have been borne down in a torrent of gin and beer’- William Ewart Gladstone

Part 11- Reactions and the Election of 1874.

The momentous second Treaty of Frankfurt had deeply mixed or negative reactions across most of Europe. The treaty was only broadly positively received across Russia, although there was some grumbling about the increase in the Polish populations. The treaty was seen as overcoming the unbearable humiliation of the Treaty of Paris in 1853, and Russia, by weighing in decisively on the side of the Prussian government, had shown that it was now a foremost global power again. Italy was also satisfied with the confirmation of its unification and the acquisition of former Austrian territorites, although some irredentists mumbled that the Dalmatian cost remained firmly in Austrian hands. The success against the Hapsburgs also had helped to stir in Russia within the empire growing pan-Slavist sentiment among its upper class, especially as the Empire began to contemplate the future of Hungary, still ruled de jure by the Austrian emperor but now practically independent from Vienna under Russian control. Reactions to the treaty were far less popular across most of Europe. In the newly-affirmed German Empire the treaty received a mixed reaction. Despite establishing the new German State as the pre-eminent power in Central Europe, confirming its unification and adding Bohemia to its borders, the treaty had under Russian and international pressure stopped short of absorbing the Austrian rump state into German borders, instead opting to maintain the Hapbsurg realm, although under economic and political domination of the new German state. After sparring with Austria twice in the past decade, powerful currents had emerged demanding a pan-German state, including a powerful pan-German league during the second war with Austria that drove propaganda for a regime that at times seemed to be faltering. The failure of the regime to deliver Pan-German unity triggered outrage from the nationalist sectors of German society and broad allegations of betrayal from the central government. This stirred nationalist fervour throughout the new German state, with powerful sectors of the population agitating for the annexation of Austria and a confrontation of Russian influence, which was perceived to be blocking the realisation of the pan-German state. Anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists also seized the moment to spread hatred, leading to a noticeable increase in anti-semitism, and anti-semitic organisations. The Pan-German Nationalist Party performed strongly at the Reichstag elections of 1873, winning 54 seats, although coming third behind Zentrum who won 64 seats and the National Liberal Party who won 98 seats. Strong resistance to Prussian rule continued in Bohemia, as authorities pondered how to implement- or whether to implement- the promised autonomy, as calls for Czech independence raged in Prague. The nationalists were in favour of total annexation with no autonomy, whereas more liberal voices were pushing for the granting of autonomy and recognition of Czech as a national language in the region. The situation in the former Austrian regions was volatile and in some cases violent. In Hungary, there was widespread popular outrage at the failure to achieve independence and agitation against the Russian troops who were stationed across the country. The Russian authorities stationed in the region had the task of coming up with a new consitution and governance system for the region, which preserved the emperor but placed control in the hands of Russian-backed Hungarian politicans. The agreement reached was that the Emperor could appoint the Prime Minister (but only with the consent, and in reality picked by, the Russian government. The parliamentary franchise would remain strictly limited and weighted by land, and the Prime minister didn’t have to have the confidence of the body. The Russians picked devout conservative Pal Sennyey to be the first Prime Minister on the 7th Septmber 1873. This offended the majority of the populace, both because it was clear domestic affairs had been shifted from the hands of the Austrian to Russian government, and that government had no intention of granting them democratic rights of affording them independence. Reaction to the news quickly turned the Hungarian people against their occupiers, leading to clashes in so-called ‘bloody September’, in which protestors demadning democracy, land reform and independence. 43 protesters and 11 Russian soldiers died in the fighting. The Russian government retaliated by re-imposing Marshall law around Bratislava and Budapest and delaying the return to civilian government. It would be the start of a relationship marred by violence and acrimony.

The prevailing French reaction to the treaty was widespread indignation and explosive anger. Gambetta’s decision to sign the treaty politically doomed him. The treaty, which signed away key border towns like Strasbourg, was seen as an unbearable betaryal. Riots across Paris in March forced Gambetta to resign, leading to a period of extended chaos throughout France. Wracked by economic devastation and political unrest, widespread anarchy and chaos ensued. Left-wing milita groups demanding the establishment of a commune across France seized control of much of the city, forcibly opposed by the army through months and days of bitter streetfighting and violence. The collapse of public order, especially with the unacceptable scenes across the capital,further convinced many Frenchmen that democracy would only lead to a continuation of the dangerous and violent state of unrest and acrimony across the country, and that any further equivocation would lead to a radical left wing government that most Frenchmen would abhor. This resulted in a large majority for the combined Monarchist forces- winning 68% of the popular vote and 439 seats to the Republicans 30% of the vote and 184 seats, with Bonapartists winning just 2% of the popular vote and 15 seats overall. Despite this, radical republicans topped the polls in Paris, continuning to fuel fears of further revolution. The monarchist forces also disagreed about the nature of the restoration, with significant splits about whether the monarchist restoration should go to Henry V, the Bonapartist heir, or to the House of Orleans. Given the pressing nature of the situtation, a compromise was reached- Henry V, who was childless, would become monarch under a constitutional monarchy with significant parliamentry power, but the line of succession would go to the House of Orleans. There were some worries about whether Henry V would accept, as he initially made untenable demands that the government could not fulfill, such as changing back the French flag, but the pressing nature of the situation as Paris continued to be gripped by lawlessness and milita activities, which had a danger with it of radical overthrow before he could accept, convinced him to accept the throne, with or without an altered flag. Thus on November 9th 1873 Henry V was crowned King of France, after a vote in the affirmative through the French legislature. His tenure would be marked on a focus on public order, but also a return to reaction that had marked previous Bourbon reigns.

The British reaction to the second treaty of Frankfurt was also overwhelmingly negative, partly because Britain was denied a voice in the negotiations and because it represented a triumph of Britain’s perceived enemies and the death of traditional British policy of attempting to maintain a balance of power within Europe, with Britain now powerless to stop a growing and expanding Russian Empire and a German Empire. To add insult to injury, the Russian government had revoked the clauses prohibiting a naval build up in the Black Sea in the Treaty of London, which revived fears of Russian control of the straits as well as anti-Russian sentiment. The serious failings of the Gladstone administration to negotatie a peace terms in the failed London Conference had also jepordised Britain’s international reputation as an arbiter of disputes. The result was a serious decline in Britain’s power and influence over European affairs, which produced outrage and indignation at home. This was happening concurrently with a weakening of the Liberal-Whig Conensus that had governed Britain since the corn laws. The Liberal Party had been increasingly demoralised and deflated not only as a result of foreign policy failures, but overplaying their hand domestically. The hated licensing act had helped Disraeli’s attempts to convert working class voters to the Conservative party, as well as the effect of new boundary and enfranchising laws that in fact provided benefit to the conservatives and the Home Rule League in Ireland (the secret ballot allowed tenants in Ireland to vote for the Home Rule League without fears of reprisals). The immediate trigger for the election was a fight over the Irish University system in 1873, seeking to establish secular universties, but was defeated by 3 votes due to opposition from the Catholic Church in Ireland. Gladstone sought to bolster his own power by re-taking the role of Chancellor and promising retrenchment, by drawing down military expenditure and expenditure on colonial expansion and abolishing income tax. To seek a renewed mandate for this bold plan, Gladstone called for snap elections to be held in February 1874. Gladstone had vastly overestimated his hand, not least because the Liberal apparatus was not ready for another election and couldn’t field candidates in over 100 constituencies, but also because he overestimated the popularity of his scheme to abolish income taxes- Disraeli and other conservatives lambasted the attempts at retrenchment as a continuation of the course of humiliation and declining influence that had been set in motion after Gladstone’s capitulation at the London conference. The campaign itself was nasty- Gladstone accused Disraeli of wanting to start wars across the continent, and Disraeli accused Gladstone of deliberate weakness and cowardice. The result was a miserable and historic defeat for the Liberals, ushering in the first conservative majority government since the collapse of Peel’s government due to the corn laws. The Conservatives won 367 seats to the Liberals 218 and the Home Rule’s 67, a majority of 82. The Result was particularly disasterous for the Liberals, who despite narrowly winning the popular vote lost over 160 seats, setting the clock back on generations of progress. Disraeli, who was in favour of a bolder stance of realpolitik and a shift to more directly confront Russian aspirations across the Balkans. Gladstone resigned as leader as the liberals in 1875 and returned to the opposition backbenches, his premiership torn down by a serious of miscalculations. The effects of a Disraeli premiership would become more apparent when conflict returned to the Balkans during his tenure.

 

[Disraeli2004]

Part 12- The Fragmentation of German Politics

The New German Empire is a paper tiger- it poses extraordinary threats from an outsiders' perspective, due to its raw strength and side- but is too wracked by international divisions to become a serious threat to our interests.- William E. Gladstone

Germany had, in the period of a decade, gone from being a loose confederation of associated states, with Austria and Prussia predominating, to a single state, and that transformation had been marked by bloody confrontation between Austria and Prussia in 1866 and between 1870 and 1872. The result of this was simultaneously the popularisation of 'pan-Germanism', the rise of militarism and nationalism across Germany, and a much sharper religious divide than before the conflict in 1866. The combination of the catholic alliance of Austria and France and the protestant-orthodox alliance of Prussia and Russia had sharpened religious divides- Austrian war propoganda in particular had painted the struggle as a struggle to preserve Catholicism from being submerged under a protestant dominated union. Attacks on protestants within the south and Catholics within the north became common- the Rhineland was nicknamed 'the bleeding Rhine' by some observers due to a flare-up in anti-Catholic violence by Prussian troops fighting the French there, and attacks on protestants in Austrian territories were ramped up by local catholic militias. This resurgence in secterian violence would dog attempts to construct a feasible union. After the war, the Prussian authorities found themselves in control of the southern South as well as Bohemia, an area that had posed a significant insurgency challenge during the war and desired independence.

In the settlement, the Prussian authorities decided to depose King Ludwig II and demote the status of Bavaria to a 'grand duchy' to try and reduce Bavarian autonomy, although he allowed Ludwig to remain in that position, as well as creating the Grand Duchy of Bohemia, under strict marital law by Prussian troops. The Emperor also sought conscious of the violence that had gripped the nation, to bring a more moderate tone and approach to politics, and to help with the integration of the new citizens into the state- this lay behind the appointment of Otto Graf Zu Stolberg-Wernigrode as Chancellor on March 8th 1873, a fresh and young face from Hanover who pledged to provide the unifying energies need to calm the forces unleash in wartime. Circumstances would not be so kind. The first sign of trouble would be the disastrous result of the first Reichstag elections done during the course of April 1873. The conservatives flopped to a humiliating third place, whilst Bohemian and Polish parties won hundreds of thousands of votes, the catholic party (Zentrum) established itself as the official opposition, and the liberals that demanded a sharp departure from the conservative consensus that had dominated Prussian politics won a clear plurality in parliament.

Results

Party	Votes	%	Seats
National Liberal Party	1,241,461​	28.83%​	110​
Centre Party (Zentrum)	812,141​	18.86%​	72​
Conservative Party	467,894​	10.87%​	42​
Pan-German nationalists	450,411​	10.46%​	40​
German Progress Party	342,841​	7.96%​	30​
Bohemian National Awakening	204,411​	4.75%​	18​
Polish Party	181,141​	4.21%​	16​
Social Democratic Workers' Party	151,423​	3.52%​	13​
German Hanoverian Party	51,841​	1.20%​	5​
Danish Party	26,311​	0.61%​	2​
German People's Party	19,411​	0.45%​	2​
Others	79,121​	1.84%​	7​
Invalid/blank votes	277,676​	–	–
Total	4,306,083​	100​	382​

The vacillating Stolberg had little chance of controlling this diffuse parliament or preventing the further radicalisation and fragmentation of the situation. Worse still, there was an imminent fiscal crisis on the horizon. Whilst growth in the first half of 1873 benefited from the resumption of peace and the expanded German customs union, concerns about the plans to pay down the vast debt accumulated over the course of a decade of on-and-off conflict began to mount. The plan put forward by the chancellor was rejected overwhelmingly by the chancellor amid stiff landed opposition, as well as causing a widespread backlash among the landed elites. As the summer dragged on into winter, it became increasingly clear that a major political fight over the debt plan reduction would occur and that no immediate fiscal solution would be present. Widespread panic among investors ensued and Germany became one of the first major economies to go into recession in late 1873, destroying the nascent recovery. Whilst the Bismarck precedent allowed for the collection of regular taxation, negotiations about how to raise taxes or cut spending to plug the emerging fiscal whole continued to collapse, spurring further downturns. This made for a difficult job for tax collectors across Germany, who were subject to violence and attacks. As the economic situation deteriorated further, the violence began to ratchet up. The residents of Bohemia, incandescent over the broad denial of autonomy given to the region, began to revolt against the German troops stationed there, with a ratcheting up of activity of the wartime Provisional Army of Bohemia (PAB) as thinkers in exile continued to pressure for the independence of the region. An attack on a German army barracks in Brno left 9 German soldiers dead on November 4th (marking the beginning of the Czech insurgency); the German government responded by massively tightening martial law. Widespread violence began to break out between the German inhabitants in Bohemia and the Czech inhabitants- widespread violence would claim in excess of 200 words and further galvanise German nationalism. Sectarian tensions began to erupt. A anti-government protest in Munich was fired on by panicked soldiers stationing there, killing 4- which prompted widespread indignation and fury in the Catholic world. Resulting sectarian tensions would lead to sporadic outbreaks of violence- Catholics would become even more disillusioned with the state and thought their fears that the new Germans state would be a greater protestant project were realised, and protestants became increasingly angry with the chancellor for failing to get a solid hold on the insurgency and increasingly intolerant of Catholics within their own communities. In the meantime, the deteriorating fiscal solutions It looked like that despite victory, Germany was hurtling towards crisis and towards the past. The winter of discontent in Germany from 1873 to 1874 reached its peak with a major terrorist attack in Prague on German headquarters. 4 Germans and 9 Czechs were later convicted of planting explosives in the headquarters, which detonated on January 14th 1874, causing 31 soldiers to lose their lives. The result was outrage and indignation across Germany- resulting in a terrible surge of both anti-Czech violence, anti-Semitic violence (2 of the attackers in the Prague Terrorist Attack were Jewish, and conspiracy theories spread rapidly). German atrocities and brutality committed during the occupation increased in the aftermath- attracting international negative attention, including the establishment of the Society for Czech Liberation (SCL) in both London, and most corrosively for German interests, across sections of Russian society. It looked like Germany was taking the express lane to fragmentation, isolation and financial crisis.

In the aftermath of the attack in Prague and the resulting chaos, Wilhelm I dismissed Stolberg in disgrace. Wilhelm I now faced a choice- cave to growing liberal pressure or try and re-assert conservative dominance. The first option seemed extremely threatening, because he feared that liberals would use the financial crisis as a lever for him to cede more authority. Few candidates volunteered given the grave state of affairs. The King, however, chose to appoint an old chancellor. Bismarck had been appointed in the backdrop of similar fiscal crisis and looming international isolation and had managed to steer the ship of state back on course, and fit the bill for being an ardent defender of conservative values and thought. There was an issue. Bismarck had been dismissed in disgrace in 1866 for opposing the King's plans to expand deeper into Austrian territories and had been in political exile of sorts, confined to being ambassador to Russia. But his proven record for turning around the country in moments of crisis meant the King was going to give Bismarck another punt. Bismarck became chancellor of the German Empire on February 17th 1874 amidst a backdrop of apparent disaster.

Authors N.B.- Sorry this instalment took so long- basically I've been very busy with starting a levels and coming out and stuff, so I haven't really had time- I'm in self-isolation now so I thought I'd post an update!