Balance of Power

Europe and the Balance of Power, Part V, 1851-1871

With unrest percolating through Europe just below the surface, not even the Great Powers are immune to the effects. At the same time, economic futures are up. French trade with the Republics of Texas, Río Grande and Yucatán, joined by the new Republic of Alta California filters into the Republic of Baden, the Rhineland Republic and the Republic of Hesse. Tens of thousands of Germans, Italians, Spanish and others emigrate to the New World and head to the North American republics as well as the Argentine Confederation, Uruguay, Riograndense and Gran Peru in South America seeking land or fortune.

In May of 1852, the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha puts in place a new constitution based on the failed Frankfurt attempts of the now defunct Germanic Confederation to try and quiet the protests in his country. In November, President Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte stages a coup in France and proclaims himself Emperor Napoleon III on the promise to maintain universal male suffrage which the republican government had tried to take away.

In meetings with George Seymour, British ambassador to Russia, on the Sikh Empire and its ongoing conflicts with the British India Company possibly upsetting the Buffer Agreement of November 1842, Tsar Nicholas II tells Seymour that while he is not looking to expand Imperial Russia he feels compelled to protect the Orthodox Christians who live in the Ottoman Empire. For Russia’ continued participation the agreement, as well as Russia’s past influence on the European continent, he requires their support. When conflict finally breaks out as the Russian and Ottoman Empires declare war on each other, Britain and Austria convene a new Vienna Congress to which the Ottomans are invited and present terms of agreement for the two. Nicholas II agrees, but Sultan Abdülmecid rejects them outright. Prussia backs Russia’s position but still helps Britain craft new terms though the Russians and Ottomans simply cannot agree on the same ones. When the talks fail, France demands that Russia withdraw from Wallachia and Moldavia. Austria, with its Slavic and Roumanian minorities is nervous about Russian designs in the Balkans and how that would affect its fragile stability, allies with France and the Ottomans.

When Russia ignores the ultimatum, France and Austria both declare war on Russia. Britain, in spite of its relationship with Russia in Asia, does not really want to see the Russian Navy gain access to the Mediterranean Sea so is forced to stay neutral in the Euxine War. Prussia, believing that the rejection of the amendments does not justify abandoning the diplomatic process and works with Britain in what comes to be called "telegraph diplomacy" to try and resolve the conflict. As French and Ottoman ships and troops invade the Crimean peninsula and lay siege to the port of Sevastopol and under pressure from the Austrian army, Russia withdraws from the Danubian principalities in order to defend its Black Sea assets. The Austrian army follows the retreating Russians and occupies Bessarabia and Budjak. Austria’s army, after reforms along the French lines since Radetzky’s success at putting down the Hungarian revolution, does well against a Russian army superior in numbers but lacking in training and logistical ability. This forces Russia to split its attention, enhancing its weaknesses in both theatres of combat. The Euxine War, while helping to place the French Empire in a preeminent position on the continent, merely papers over Austria’s own instability for the time being.

When the Treaty of Paris is signed in May of 1856 to end the Euxine War, Russia is forced to cede Bessarabia and Budjak to the Ottoman Empire. Bessarabia (with Budjak), Moldavia and Wallachia are placed under the supervision of the Great Powers though nominally they remain part of the Ottoman Empire as the Danubian Principalities. While Russia’s merchant ships are allowed passage through the straits, the Black Sea is demilitarised.

After electoral fraud by Governor Nicolae Vogoride in Moldavia in 1857, the Great Powers decide to let the three Danubian Principalities elect diets to create new constitutions and elect princes. Union of the three was proposed by France but rejected by everyone else, especially the Russians and Austrians. Because of a loophole in the allowed constitutions that did not specify the offices must all be held by different people, Alexander John of Cuza is successively elected as prince by the diets of Moldavia, Bessarabia, and Wallachia in January and February of 1859. In 1862 the three thrones are officially merged into one as the United Principalities of the Danube. Alexander John institutes many reforms, including criminal and civil codes based on the French as well as universal male suffrage and land reform giving peasants title to the land they worked. Reaction against him by the diet under the influence of former landowners forces him to abdicate and Charles of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen is accepted by the Great Powers as the compromise candidate. Carol, as he becomes known, is able to introduce a new constitution and renames the union as the Principality of Roumania but realigns the system along censitary rather than universal suffrage as an accommodation to landowners and continues to walk the line between them and republican sentiment blocking universal acceptance of his rule.

As things are progressing in Roumania, Europe and the world are shocked by the assassination of French Emperor Napoleon III and his wife, the Empress Eugénie, by a group of Italian insurgents known as the Carnbonari led by Felice Orsini who toss bombs into their carriage as they head to the opera on the evening of January 14th, 1858. The French Senate is informed and, as per the sénatus-consult of July 23rd, 1856, Jerôme Bonaparte, the Emperor’s uncle, is named Regent. He appoints his son, Napoleon-Joseph Charles Bonaparte, as president of the Senate and the Emperor’s half-brother, Charles de Morny, as president of both the Council of State and Corps Législatif. Eugène Rouher and Adolphe Billault are also named as Minister of Finance and Minister of State. Together, the five of them form the actual government and call out the Gendarmerie and the Army to forestall any potential revolution as news of assassination spreads across Paris, provoking riots. The French Republican cause is shattered, for even with killing of protesters by Gendarmerie at Palais Bourbon, uprising is successfully portrayed as rebels against the system of universal suffrage of the Empire, colluding with the Italians as well as disrespect for Imperial Prince who is now an orphan. The two Bonapartes and de Morny, no longer constrained by Napoleon III's desire to please his wife's Catholic Conservatism or his desire for glory, embark upon the liberalisation that they had long been urging him to do.

Strict censorship of French press since 1852 is relaxed on Prince Imperial's second birthday on March 16th to fan anti-Italian flames. Both houses of government are given expanded rights to debate, covered by press, but only Senate is allowed to amend laws. This starts a tradition of announcing new changes on Prince Imperial's birthday as well as progress towards a fully liberal constitutional monarchy. As a result of the relaxation of censorship, La Presse leaks information about a secret treaty between France and Piedmont-Sardinia that Napoleon III had been preparing to sign before his assassination. Regent Jérôme Bonaparte spins it as Napoleon III's well-known love for Italy from his younger days and uses it to increase anti-Italian sentiment and nationalist fervour. Conversely, Giuseppe Garibaldi and Giuseppe Mazzini of the Roman Republic stir up anti-Sardinian sentiment in Republics of Tuscany, and the Duchies of Modena and Parma by claiming that the Sardinians are trying to rebuild Napoleonic Italy as a puppet state of of France, using the leaks from La Presse, claiming that the Imperial Regency is still looking to support the Savoyards who are historically more French than Italian.

Unable to obtain French support for invading Lombardy-Venetia after Napoleon III's assassination, Sardinia invades Duchy of Parma and Duchy of Modena and Reggio on the 14th of June, 1859, Their ruling families, both Habsburg cadet branches, flee to Vienna. Austria gathers forces in Lombardy-Venetia and sends an ultimatum to Sardinia, supported by France, as the duchies were rules by. They pressure Sardinia to withdraw as the price for once again ensuring Austrian non-intervention beyond Lombardy and Venetia as in the previous decades. The two duchies become republics through the unrest and Austrian hands are tied by that same requirement of non-intervention supported by the other Great Powers. France wants influence, Prussia has its traditional contest with Austria, and Russia is still angered by the loss of Bessarabia. Four months later, Tuscany, Parma and Modena unite as the Cispadane Republic, citing mutual defence against the Kingdom of Sardinia. The former Legations of Romagna, Bologna and Ferrara break away from Roman Republic in a plebiscite over continuing concessions given to Pius IX by the Roman Republic and join the Cispadane Republic.

When Jerôme Bonaparte dies later that year, his son becomes Regent, the duc de Morny becomes the Senate president, and Rouher replaces de Morny in the Corps Législatif. One positive result of Napoleon III’s assassination had been a reversal of alienation between France and Britain. The Regency, while still looking for French opportunities, had reached out to Britain but been coolly received by then-Prime Minister the Earl of Aberdeen. When Viscount Palmerston becomes Prime Minister again the next year and reverses course on France, the two plus Russia form the informal “Coalition of Three Empires”.

On the 15th of November, 1863, Frederick VII, King of Denmark, dies and is succeeded by Christian August II of Augustenborg as Christian IX August, House of Slesvig-Holsten-Sonderborg-Augustenborg as per the agreements made after the Schleswig War in 1848. The next day, Christian IX August signs a constitution prepared by Frederick VII that alters the lines of succession for Schleswig, Holstein and Saxe-Lauenburg and makes the Danish Rigsdag sovereign over the local Diets. Prussia declares this a violation of the agreements of the Second London Conference. When Denmark refuses to revoke or modify the new constitution, Prussia declares war against Denmark over Holstein and Saxe-Lauenburg and invades the next February. Russia and France take the position that the protocols defined in 1848 were now invalid as they depended upon compensating economic loss to the now dissolved Germanic Confederation had Denmark removed Holstein and Saxe-Lauenburg from it. In a pincer movement, France invades Westphalia and Russia invades Posen with the British Navy bombarding the Prussian troops in Denmark.

Unable to handle a three-front war against three Great Powers, William of Prussia sues for peace and is forced to give up the Province of Westphalia which had been overrun by the superior French Imperial Army. Westphalia is turned into an independent state along the lines of the Danubian principalities. However, instead of electing a prince, the Westphalian Diet proposes a republican constitution influenced by the French codes in place under the Confederation of the Rhine earlier in the century. The Coalition of Empires dissolves the Diet and convenes a new one which quickly returns the same result with the added provision that Westphalia remain part of the Zollverein, the only existing remnant of the Germanic Confederation. France agrees to this, absolutist Russia disagrees and Britain casts the deciding vote in favour of a neutral Westphalia with a small army whose independence is guaranteed by France and Britain.

After the humiliating defeat in the Second Schleswig War, King William of Prussia appoints Helmuth von Moltke as the new Chief of Staff of the Prussian Army, and Albrecht von Roon as Minister of War. The increasingly liberal Landtag authorises funding for a proposed re-organisation of the army in light of the thrashing by France, but with restrictions on the King’s power to mobilise to prevent further humiliation. The King's ministers could not convince legislators to amend the restrictions, and the King was unwilling to make concessions. William threatens to abdicate in favour of his son Crown Prince Frederick William, who opposes his doing so, believing that Otto von Bismarck, an influential member of the Prussian upper House of Lords in the Landtag was the only politician capable of handling the crisis. However, William was ambivalent about appointing a person who demanded unfettered control over foreign affairs. It was in June, 1865, when the lower House of Deputies overwhelmingly a proposed budget, that William is persuaded to recall Bismarck to Prussia from his post as the ambassador to France on the advice of Roon. On 6 September 1865, William appoints Bismarck Minister President and Foreign Minister.


With France increasingly embroiled in Indochina as a result of the Regency trying to neuter the power of the Church by using it as an excuse for territorial gains in southeast Asia, as well as being stuck propping up the Mexican government of Benito Juarez in order to ensure debt repayment, the humiliation of Prussia and the growing precariousness of Austria’s rule over its territories will set the stage for the times to come.

Interesting complications. Prussia is far than OTL and has the complication of probable hostility between Bismarck and a more powerful liberal Parliament. However sounds like some impressive military reforms are going to occur while France seems to be getting its hands into too many pies. As such it could get overstretched and also see itself with a lack of foreign support. Can't really see Biamarck trying for a new war with Denmark yet but some agreement with Russia to secure the northern border then possibly conflict with Austria to gain dominance in Germany? Although whether it would be able to influence areas such as Westphalia without angering France and Britain? Can't really see an emergence of a dominant Prussia/Germany but suspect some attempt to improve Prussia's position in Germany seems very likely.

Good developments in the world. Not sure how long the good relations between Russia and Britain will last, especially with the latter's new friendship with Britain?

United Thuringian States.

Flag barry sable and or with base gules, a bend vert. Recalls the ancient Saxon coat of arms, with the red bar for the peoples of Germany after the official flag of the dissolved Germanic Confederation.

Yes, it recalls the coat of arms of Saxony and later the House of Wettin. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coat_of_arms_of_Saxony

So will we see more of Friedrich Oswald.

"The recent assassination of Napoleon III by members of the Carbonari, however, had caused a schism in Cispadanian politics. Felice Orsini and the other members of his crew had worn green, white and red tri-colour handkerchiefs in their jacket pockets based on the protest flags that had become popular in 1848 as the symbol for Italian unification. It had even been adopted as the national flag of the Republic of Tuscany. modified from the version suggested by the first Present, the former Duke Leopold II, that had contained the coat of arms of his duchy. Napoleon III had been seen as being pro-Italian unity and a man to be admired, thanks to his younger days as part of decentralised movement that killed him, but leaks from French newspaper La Presse had changed that. Leaflets from Rome and pamphlets from Florence were distributed across the central Italian peninsula that expounded on how the secret agreement between His Imperial Majesty and Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Sardinia, Count Cavour was a betrayal of republican ideals. It signalled, they said, that the Savoyards were just puppets of the French, indeed that they were actually more French than Italian.

"That the tri-colour was a popular symbol was undeniable, even to the Tuscans who were now slightly ashamed of it, and republican fervour called for the nation to be named the Cispadane Republic, after the previous country of that name from 1796 before the original Napoleon, now tarred by association, declared himself emperor. That the flag was a tri-band instead of a tri-colour yet contained the same three colours was seen as fortuitous during those first sessions of the new legislature. The deputies from Tuscany, with a decade of experience in the practicalities of democratic rule, were not particularly anti-imperialist having elected their old Duke as president of their republic not once but twice. They were inclined, though, to accept the Savoyard-expansionist claims of the pamphlets and did not want to once again bow to an unelected monarch. This shared sentiment is what brought the new nation together in the first place and they papered over any disagreements with proposals for the new three-banded flag of the Republic.

"If you've ever wondered why your conservative relatives from the northern parts of the country scoff at your political leanings as 'non è orizzontale', or why you both insult each other in jest as 'savoiardo', that is why."

-- excerpted from "Italia: Un ex e futuro nazione", and editorial in La Nazione, 3 September 1996.

Flag of the (new) Cispadane Republic from my "Balance of Power" ATL.

Well, let's just say that he started off as a reporter with leftist sentiments who became a prominent co-founder for a certain German philosophy that greatly affected later politics. ;-)