Germany exists. But it has existed for only around 150 years. Before then it was a collection of hundreds of smaller states.
So in this video I will explain how Germany. Will. Be.
United. Chapter 1: The Fall of the Holy Roman Empire Modern German culture was created by German-speakers who lived under the Roman Empire between the rivers Rhine and Elbe. They mixed the ancient Germanic and Roman cultures to create a new German culture.
Look at this map: Over the centuries these Germans spread out across Central Europe. Spreading all the way from Belgium and Luxembourg in the west to Poland and Königsberg in the east. And from Denmark in the north to Italy in the south.
But while the Germans controlled a lot of territory, they were not united in a single country. Instead the Germans created hundreds of smaller city-states, kingdoms, and empires. And these smaller states saw a lot of advantages in working together.
And in the 9th and 10th centuries various of these German-speaking people united under the Holy Roman Empire. This empire also included people who were not German, such as the Dutch, Poles, and Italians, but the Germans were always in the majority. But the HRE was not a centralized state like the Chinese or Regular Roman Empire with the emperor and his court ruling the empire directly.
But instead each ruler within the HRE was largely independent: they had their own armies, their own foreign policy, and their own economic policies. As the result the German-speaking people did not see themselves as German just because they spoke the same language. They instead saw themselves as as Bohemians, Holsteinian, or Austrian.
To give an example: I speak German. I’ve lived in Berlin. But I don’t consider myself German und ich bin kein Berliner!
(I am not a Berliner) [AUDIO NOTE] Over time the Holy Roman Empire was ruled more and more by the house of Habsburgs. The habsburgs controlled the Duchy of Austria. The ruler of the Habsburgs was usually also the Holy Roman Emperor.
And with this power the Austrians grew from the Duchy of Austria into the Empire of Austria by the 19th century. From around the 16th century onward the Austrians tried to centralize the government. This would mean more power for Austria and the Austrian empire and less power for the other German-speaking states.
This would mean that all the German armies would be united into a single German army, individual states stop going to war with each other, and the government could focus on large-scale infrastructure projects. As a result the country as a whole becomes stronger. A lot of countries in Europe went through this process after the Middle Ages and a lot of countries in Europe became stronger because of it.
But whenever the Austrians tried to centralize the Holy Roman Empire the German states would rebel. And other countries did not want a powerful Germany because it could be a threat to those other countries. While the leaders of those states did not want to hand over power.
As a result the Holy Roman Empire remained fragmented and weak. While the other states of Europe became more centralized and more powerful. And by the 18th century the most centralized and most powerful country in Europe was France.
France had become so centralized that the emperor controlled the entire government. And he managed that government so poorly that the French started a revolution: The French Revolution. This revolution eventually led to Napoleon becoming the emperor of France in 1804.
And Napoleon went to war with basically all of Europe. And in just 2 years Napoleon had defeated Austria and had conquered the HRE. But Napoleon was used to ruling an empire where the emperor had all the power.
In order to control all the 100s of small German states he would need to reform them into a much more centralized government similar to France. And so in 1806 Napoleon dissolved the Holy Roman Empire and created a new state: the Confederation of the Rhine. Which eventually controlled all of this territory you see on screen right now.
Austria would lose its control over the German states. And lastly the Kingdom of Prussia was considered too strong to be added to the Confederation and became its own independent country. Chapter 2: The German Confederacy As Abba has taught us: “At Waterloo, Napoleon did surrender”.
But while Waterloo is where Napoleon was defeated, there was another battle where the Germans liberated themselves from French rule. After the Germans were defeated by Napoleon, they rebuilt their armies to be larger, better trained, and better armed. And in 1813 they defeated the French army at the battle of Leipzig, where over half a million soldiers fought in the largest European battle before WW1.
This was a major milestone for German unification. Because from all over the German states soldiers banded together, not to fight each other, but to fight a common enemy. And after Napoleon surrendered a new European peace was established by the great powers of Europe.
The 4 Great Powers were: The British Empire, the Russian Empire, the Austrian Empire, and the French Empire. Despite France’s defeat, it was still one of the most powerful empires in the world… Afterall, that’s why it took so long to defeat Napoleon. In this new Europe the continent was divided into 4 spheres of influence plus some neutral countries like Switzerland or Denmark.
The goal of these spheres of influence was to divide Europe up in such a way that each power was strong enough to defend itself, but not so strong that it could conquer one of the other powers. And each empire had enough power to satisfy their greed: The French Sphere of influence included Portugal, Spain, and Western Italy. Russia received Eastern Europe and the Balkans.
Great Britain received Ireland and control over the oceans. And Austria received Northern Italy, and the German-speaking lands. Austria was once again in charge of the German states.
And they needed some system to control them. And that new system was to unite all the Germans into a confederation of German states, called the German Confederation. As part of this confederation the German territories changed from this to this.
Reducing the amount of states to just 39, including Austria. Both Prussia and Austria owned territories outside of the German Confederation as well. And these territories did not necessarily have to follow the laws of the German Confederation.
Each state would still have a large amount of autonomy with their own armies, their own foreign policy, and their own economic policy. But there were a lot more limitations than under the HRE. For example, the German Confederation had a parliament in Frankfurt where representatives from all the states made laws which would affect all the states.
This leader of this parliament was always an Austrian, thereby putting Austria in charge of its government. The German Confederation included a defensive alliance. Meaning that an attack on one member was an attack on all members.
So if France invaded Prussia, then they would automatically declare war on all the states in the German Confederacy. But this also included rebellions. So if Bremen had a rebellion the other states would send in the army to put it down.
But at the same time, if Austria decided to attack another country then the rest of the German Confederacy did not have to join them. So while it provided Austria with a lot of protection, it did not provide them with an army to invade other countries with. As a result Europe became a lot safer because it became impossible to march an army from one side of the continent to the other without going to war with the German-speaking states.
Chapter 3: The Rise of German Nationalism But while Europe saw the German Confederation largely as a way to stabilize Europe and prevent countries like Russia, France, and Austria from going to war with each other, the Germans saw the Confederation as an insult. First of all, the Germans were there at Leipzig and Waterloo. Prussia had rebuilt its army and had a strong military.
And countries with strong military were treated as superpowers… But the 4 Great Powers had treated Prussia as a minor power, no better than Bavaria or the Netherlands. The German states were hoping to finally be free from foreign rule, but after the French were gone the Austrians marched right back in. The Germans generally felt like they were an occupied people.
For the second time in German history people started uniting against a common enemy: first it was the French and now it was the Austrians. And when a group of people unite in hatred over a common enemy, those people generally become nationalistic. But the German nationalists generally did not believe that they should unite under a single government, but that they should work together to gain their independence separately.
So instead of an independent Germany, there would be an independent Wurtemberg, independent Prussia, independent Bavaria, etc. But in this little spark of nationalism, the first ideas of German unity were created. Because the German states not only shared a similar language, but also a similar culture.
Someone living close to the Danish border might speak a different dialect than someone from the south in Bavaria. But these cultures started growing closer together at the start of the 19th century. For example, you might have heard of the Brothers Grimm.
They published a collection of German fairy tales between 1812-15. These were not new stories but rather popular stories that were known in most states. However, not all states shared the same stories.
By combining them into a single publication it was possible for a German living in one state to read their own folktales while also reading those of other German states. This helped to portray the Germans as being a single people. Today most Europeans don’t place a lot of value on fairy tales and mythology, however, in the 19th century such stories were a lot more popular and a lot more important.
These stories portrayed a German culture based on similar language, similar morals, and similar childhood experiences. With the common theme being obedience to authority. To give one example: Red Riding Hood was a story about a young girl who is told to go to her grandmother’s house, but disobeys her authority figure and talks to a wolf on the way there.
In the end the wolf kills her and her grandmother. The moral of the story is that ‘pretty young ladies’ should do as they are told. And there were many stories with a similar theme of doing as you’re rold.
This eventually transformed into the depiction of Germania, a female personification of Germany who was strong, broad-shoulders, and battle-ready. And slowly over time a German nationalist movement began to form across the German-speaking states. A nationalist movement that wanted the Germans to become independent.
And this nationalism went hand-in-hand with a new ideology: liberalism. Liberalism is the idea that a person should have as much personal liberty as possible. In the 19th century this meant a democratic government where men had the right to vote and a capitalist economy where men had the right to use their money how they wished.
And rich people generally love capitalism because it makes them even richer. And some of those rich people gave money to the nationalists to make the German states more open to trading with each other. Nationalists, liberals, and capitalists formed a broad alliance for German independence.
By 1832 the nationalist movement was so popular they began holding German festivals where they promoted a common German culture and held speeches on independence. In 1840 the nationalist movement gained popularity. Because in that year France demanded the German-speaking Rhine region be handed over to the French government and moved troops to the border.
The German Confederation resolved the Rhine Crisis peacefully, but it once again united the Germans against a common enemy. This gave the nationalists an important lesson: an easy way to make the Germans more nationalist is to find a common enemy. A strategy that might one day mean that the German States.
Will. Be. Independent.
Chapter 4: The Rise of Prussia The German Confederation consisted of 39 states. Of those states Prussia and Austria were by far the most powerful states. As a result this created a rivalry between the Austrians who ruled the Confederation and the Prussians who wanted to take control for themselves.
But neither were powerful enough to defeat the other side. As a result the Prussians and Austrians were forced to work together to keep the other 37 states in line. With Prussia being the junior partner.
But this would slowly change over the course of the 19th century. Because after Napoleon was defeated Prussia received all of these lands in the west. The reason was that Prussia had a powerful military.
France was the most likely country to invade. So by handing over a bunch of German territory close to the French border it would make it more difficult for France to invade. But they soon discovered that this region was rich in iron and coal.
And you can use iron, coal, and a few other materials to produce steel. And steel can in turn be used for almost anything: building houses, creating machines, or producing weapons. Prussia was able to use these new resources to start an industrial revolution before almost anybody else.
And when a country industrializes they become richer. And richer countries are able to spend more money on their military. But if a country is late to industrialisation, then in order to keep up they will need to spend a higher percentage of their economy on the army.
But if you spend more money on the army, you have less money to spend on industrialisation. As a result, the later a country industrialized, the more difficult it was to catch up with the other countries. But Prussia was lucky enough to be handed all the resources they needed to industrialize before the other German states and before the Austrian Empire.
But it was behind France and the United Kingdom. And in order to make up for this Prussia implemented a new economic policy. An economic policy that was so successful that today almost every country has it: compulsory education.
Because an educated person is able to learn more skills. And in general the more skilled you are, the more productive you are. And by having a whole bunch of skilled workers in an economy, the faster you can grow your economy.
As a result the average German worker was better educated, more productive, and earned more money than almost every other country in the world. The success of this policy resulted in other countries adopting this compulsory education. So if you’re in school right now, I want you to know: it’s all the fault of the Germans!
Don’t get angry at your teacher, get angry at the Germans! Chapter 5: The Prussian Customs Union [CUSTOMS UNION] But in order to create a large industry you need to have customers who are able to buy what you produce. Countries that have a large population are therefore able to industrialize a lot easier.
But most German states did not have a large population. And so they created something called a ‘Customs Union’. A customs union is an agreement whereby multiple countries have a single customs policy.
What this means is that these countries agree to lower or remove tariffs between each other while having the same tariff for goods from outside the Customs Union. To give a modern example, the European Union has a customs union. As a result I can export goods and services to other EU countries without having to pay extra taxes for doing business with another EU country.
But if you are outside the EU and want to sell to those same people, then you will have to pay an extra tax. This tax is the same for every EU country. So exporting to the Netherlands costs just as much in tariffs as exporting to Lithuania.
The first of these German customs unions was created by Prussia. In the beginning the Prussian customs union only included Prussia itself. That’s because a lot of Prussian territories each had their own tariffs and trade policy.
But when these lands were handed over to Prussia after the defeat of Napoleon, Prussia wanted to remove all internal trade barriers. And because trade was cheaper it meant that businesses could sell to more people. As a result a larger number of factories could be built, to produce a larger number of goods, that they could sell to a larger number of customers.
As a result Prussian economy flourished. 3 years later in 1821 the Duchy of Anhalt joined the Prussian customs union and in 1826 Macklenburg-Schwerin joined. Making it an international customs union stead of a purely Prussian customs union.
These 2 states were relatively small but thanks to their access to the Prussian market they could develop their own industry. Those states focussed on producing things they were good at making themselves, sell those goods to other states, and then important everything they didn’t make themselves. Prussia wanted more states to join their customs union in order to increase trade.
They were already trading with other smaller states who were not part of the union but they had to pay tariffs. So Prussia decided to start a trade war by raising the tariffs of the customs union. States who relied on trade with Prussia suddenly had to pay a lot more money for that trade.
And those smaller states couldn’t afford to reduce commerce with their largest trading partner. In order to keep their industry, they needed to keep trading with Prussia. And so various states decided to join the customs union just so they could hold on to the trade they already had.
And once inside the union, their industry would grow as they had better access to the Prussian market. And the more states that joined the customs union, the more difficult it was to trade for those other states outside the Prussian Customs Union. And as a result more and more states were forced to join.
And the more states that joined the union the more its members could trade with each other. There were some attempts at creating competing organizations, but the Prussian market was simply so big that they couldn’t compete. So in 1833 all the German custom unions joined together into a single customs union called the ‘Zollverein’.
Which is simply the German word for Customs Union. States still outside the Zollverein joined one by one, either willingly or through military force. And by 1866 every German-speaking state was part of the Zollverein.
As a result the customs union became more and more integrated into the German Confederation… with one except: Austria was not allowed to join. And the more the German states worked together in the Zollverein, the more they were excluding Austria, and the more independent the German economies became. For example, in 1838 they standardized the conversion of currencies between the German states.
Thereby making it easier to exchange money and buy goods in other countries. This in turn meant that the government needed to expand to manage the currency conversions. And so over time the Zollverein expanded and took more control over the economies of the individual states.
And so the customs union would become the foundation for future political, military, and economic integration between the German states… if this sounds at all familiar to you, yes this is exactly what the EU is doing today… Or at least, are trying to do. Chapter 6: The German Economy For thousands of years the fastest form of transport was a horse or a sailing ship. But with industrialisation came new types of transportation.
And 3 of them were very important for the German economy and German nationalism. Because I am Dutch, the first mode of transportation we will discuss is canals. Before the industrial revolution ships had to be dragged with men and horses through canals.
But with the steam engine ships could travel through canals on their own. This made trade a lot easier. And the German states began connecting the German rivers together with Canals in the 1820s, connecting the Danube, Weser, and Elbe rivers.
It became possible for a ship to travel from Berlin all the way to the Rhine region without traveling via the sea. By 1846 180 steam ships traveled German rivers and canals. The second innovation was the macadam road.
Up until now building a road required skilled laborers carefully putting stones together to form a road. But the macadam road was MUCH easier to build: you dug out some ground, poured stones into it, then crushed the stones into small rocks and dust, and then filled it up with cement. Suddenly roads could be built easily with a large amount of unskilled labour.
And the Germans went on a road building spree. And lastly are trains. Trains allow a large amount of goods to be transported quickly between 2 major centers of trade.
As more states joined the Zolverein, more industry was built, and more major centers of trades were created. While a country like Austria or the United Kingdom had a large capital with a couple of smaller cities, Germany was a collection of medium-sized cities. Each of these cities was a center of trade.
As a result rail lines could connect dozens of cities together to form an interconnected railroad going across Germany. The first German rail line was built in 1835 and 30 years later the majority of the German Confederation’s citizens were connected via trains. As a result of these 3 infrastructure developments the German Confederation’s economy grew faster than those of almost any other region in the world.
And by the 1860s the average German was just as rich as the average French or British person… Until they would eventually surpass everybody else in Europe. This interconnectivity was great for trade but also for tourism. Someone from Prussia could visit Bremen while someone from Oldenburg could visit Bavaria.
Normally tourism is difficult because people speak different languages. For example, today if you don’t speak English or the local language then traveling is incredibly difficult, even with travel agencies. But it might come as a shock that the German-speaking people all spoke German.
And while there are different dialects, most of them can understand each other. And so people started talking to each other, doing business with each other, and learning about each other. This helped with the development of the economy and technology.
But it also helped the development of nationalism. Because if you can talk to other people and it turns out you agree on a lot of things, you start feeling like you’re part of the same ‘group of people’. And slowly the national identities of the individual states were replaced with the identities of a common German identity.
Chapter 7: Realpolitik (1848-1860S) By now it’s 1848. Industrialisation is in full swing, the German-speaking people are feeling more and more German, and the individual states are more connected than ever before. And people who become more nationalist, live in cramped cities, and can easily spread their ideas to like-minded people generally start a revolution.
And 1848 was one of the largest series of revolutions Europe has ever seen. All over Europe people demanded political reform. And these revolutions were particularly strong in the German-speaking states.
In those states the German people began demanding independence. But in order to be an independent country in 1848 you needed to be a powerful nation. But states such as Oldenburg were so small and weak that as soon as they’d become independent another nation could just try to take them over again.
But what if all the German states combined together into a single giant state? A German state that combined the economic and military might of the entire German Confederation (minus Austria). A German nation so powerful it could stand up to great powers like France, Russia, and Austria.
And these 1848 revolutions had some successes in the German states: the people demanded a common German constitution, they demanded the right to vote for the state parliaments, and even dissolved the German Confederation. But their success was short-lived, though. That’s because the German nationalists couldn’t agree on how this new united Germany should look: how much power should the central government have?
should it be a democracy? should it be an empire? And as a result the Germans failed to create a united German after the 1848 revolution.
But you might be wondering: why wasn’t Austria putting down these revolutions. Well, the Austrian Empire contained a lot of different people. Austrians only lived in the territory of Austria.
The rest of their empire was inhabited by Hungarians, Croats, Poles, Ukrainians, and many more. During the 1848 revolution the Hungarians started a war of independence which the Austrians almost lost and had to ask Russia for help. On top of that were the Austrian vassal states in Italy who were also starting a revolution for independence.
And on top of all those issues there were the Germans. The Austrian Empire ruled over a large number of peoples. And when nationalism became popular in the 19th century all those peoples wanted an independent country.
And Austria was too weak to control all of them. But over time Austria slowly took back control over its own territory and those of its vassals: in Italy they defeated Italian nationalists with the help of France. In the Austrian Empire they defeated the Hungarians with the help of Russia.
And in the German Confederation they took back control with the help of Prussia: While the nationalists were divided the Prussian and Austrian armies put down rebellions across the German-speaking lands. And in 1850 the German Confederation was restored. But this revolution showed the weakness of Austria: they had 3 rebellions and needed help with each of them.
Apparently Austria was no longer the major power it was after the Napoleonic Wars. This taught the nationalists a valuable lesson: Even if they declared independence, Austria could ask help from their allies to crush a second German revolution. And in 1850 the nationalists collected the lessons they learned and published it in a book called: The Principles of Practical Politics.
With ‘Practical Politics’ being called ‘Realpolitik’ in German. And Germany is using Realpolitik all the way into the 21st century. In this book the nationalists concluded that revolutions were not a good way to gain independence because the leaders of the German states would fight against said independence.
This is why Prussia helped Austria to crush the German revolutions: the leaders of Prussia were afraid the nationalists would remove them from power. And so this book advocated cooperating with the ruling elites. that by working together it was possible to gradually reform the German Confederacy and the German states.
Turning the nationalist movement from a liberal, capitalist, and democratic movement into a conservative imperial movement with a couple of liberal ideas. And this tactic was incredibly successful in Prussia. Because the Prussian elites were willing to work together with German nationalists, in order to create a united German state under Prussian leadership.
By working together the nationalists and Prussian leaders would be able to combine German nationalism, the German customs Union, and the German armies to create a powerful independent united Germany. But there was still 1 big issue: even if the Germans declared independence, they still wouldn’t be strong enough to stand up against the combined power of Austria, France, and Russia. So Prussia’s next task was to make sure none of the other great powers would come to the aid of Austria, if Austria and Prussia ever went to war with each other.
And so the Prussians decided to present themselves as a useful partner to the Great Powers of Europe. That way if the Germans or Prussians ever declare independence, those great powers would see them as a friend instead of a threat. And the first country they focussed on was Russia.
Russia had helped the Austrians put down the Hungarian revolution in 1849. 4 years later in 1853 the Russians went to war against the Ottoman Empire, France, and the United Kingdom in the Crimean War. Seeing as the Russians had helped the Austrians, they now asked the Austrians to help the Russians.
After the Italian, Hungarian, and German revolutions the Austrians were in no shape to fight anyone. So they ask the other German states for help. But remember, the German Confederation was a defensive alliance.
They did not have to send troops to Austria to then fight a war for Russia. And every single state refused. Austria did not want to risk a war with France and Great Britain if it did not have the support of the German Confederacy.
And so Austria did not support Russia. And as a result the 2 countries stopped being allies. After the Crimean War was over, the Prussians began presenting themselves to the Russians as a potential ally to replace Austria.
That if the Austrians couldn’t be relied on, they could rely on the Prussians instead. But Prussia’s army had only 150k soldiers. France had twice the soldiers and Russia had 7 times the soldiers.
If Prussia was going to present itself as a military ally, it needed to actually have a strong military others would want to ally themselves with. And so in the 1850s and 60s Prussia started an armament program: They increased the size of the army to 400. 000 soldiers by 1866, they developed better training, and they developed a new rifle that could shoot 5 times before reloading… instead of older weapons which could only shoot a single time before reloading.
And in 1863-64 Russia needed Prussian help. Because in those 2 years the Polish people started a revolution. At the time the Polish territory was largely controlled by Prussian and Russia.
And Polish people under Russian control started a revolution. And while the Prussians would not send troops to crush the rebellion, they did allow Russian troops to travel through Prussian territory in order to attack the Polish revolutionaries in the back. While the 2 weren’t allies, they were friends.
The second was the United Kingdom. In simple terms “Great Britain has had the same foreign policy for at least the last 500 years: To create a disunited Europe! In that cause [the British] fought with the Dutch against the Spanish, with the Germans against the French, with the French and Italians against the Germans, and with the French against the Germans and Italians.
Divide and rule, you see”. Great Britain feared that a united Germany would create new wars on the continent. However, the British military was mainly a naval power, meaning most of their power came from their fleets.
And so the British would largely remain on the sidelines and would not oppose German independence as long as Prussia did not upset the balance of power in Europe too much. And lastly was France. While Prussia was trying to unite the Germans in an independent Germany, south in Italy the Kingdom of Two Sicilies was trying to unite the Italians in an independent Italy.
And they were already receiving help from France. That’s because France and Austria had been enemies for centuries. You might have heard about the British and the French having a centuries long rivalry, well, the same was true for the Austrians and the French.
And France was okay with an independent Germany as long as the Prusisans promised that the Germans wouldn’t unite into a single country. If the Germans promised that independence meant that each state would become their own independent country then France would not oppose German independence. And Prussia promised that they would never ever unite the German-speaking people under a united Germany and that the independent German states would never invade France… And so by the 1860s the Prussians had gotten assurances from Great Britain, France, and Russia that they would not interfere in a German Revolution.
Chapter 8: Austria vs Prussia And while the Prussians had been busy making allies with the other Great Powers, they had also been busy making enemies with Austria. In the 1850 and 1860s Austria was in decline. In Italy they crushed a revolution in 1848.
But just 13 years later in 1861 they had lost most of Italy. In order to stop a further decline of the Austrian Empire they wanted more control over the German states. Their plan was the same as the Prussia: Unite the Germans in a single nation under their leadership.
And in order to accomplish this goal Austria would have to become more involved in German politics. Such as joining the Zolverein, the German Customs Union. But this brought 2 major issues: The first issue was that Austrian industry wasn’t as advanced as German industry.
And as a result an Austrian product was generally more expensive and of lower quality. If Austria joined the Zolverein then Austrian industries would get outcompeted by German industries. The second problem was the distribution of tariff income.
When someone from outside the Zollverein wanted to trade with someone from inside the customs union, then they would have to pay an extra tax, a tariff. Tariffs were a major source of government income. But if you are a state surrounded by other members of the Zolverein then you can’t earn money from tariffs.
To make up for this, tariff income was distributed among all its members. But not every member received the same share of the income. Prussia took a much smaller portion of the tariffs and gave some of their tariff income to the smaller states.
This was essentially a bribe to keep the smaller members part of the union. And in order for a new state to join the Zolverein all its members had to agree. If just one state disagreed then they couldn’t join.
And all those smaller states wanted Austria to hand over a larger percentage of their tariff income just as Prussia was doing. So in order for Austria to join it would have to destroy some of its own industry AND hand over more taxes. But after the 1848 Revolutions the Austrian Empire was broke.
They couldn’t afford to lose more tax revenue. And so they were left out of the Zollverein. Austria then decided to try to become closer to Prussia.
Perhaps it was possible for Austria and Prussia to rule a new German Empire together. But Prussia did not want to share power. Austria would eventually recycle this idea with the Hungarians living in the Austrian Empire, forming the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Which we already made a video about, I will leave a link to that video at the end of this video. In the 1860s Austria tried a second time to join the Zolverein. And Prussia knew that if they kept saying ‘no’ to Austria that eventually it would result in war… And by now Prussia had become so strong and Austria so weak, that war was exactly what Prussia wanted.
And so they came up with a strategy that would make Austria incredibly angry: Prussia signed a free trade agreement with France in 1862. This meant that France could trade relatively freely with Prussia. And because Prussia was part of the customs union, it meant that France could trade relatively freely with the entire Zollverein.
This would do 2 things for the Prussians: the first is that French industry was more advanced than Austrian industry. And if Austria joined the Zollverein they would have to deal with competition from France, their age-old enemy. This would harm Austrian industry while benefiting French industry, meaning Austria would become dependent on France.
The second is that it turned the Germans into customers for France. If the German states declared independence, then Austria could not rely on France for support, because killing your customers is bad for business. With diplomacy failing, Austria decided to get closer with Prussia through war.
In 1863 the king of Denmark annexed the region of Schleswig-Holstein. This region was mostly inhabited by Germans. This is a bit complicated but Schleswig-Holstein was part of the German Confederation but under the protection of the Danish king.
By annexing this region, Denmark would annex a part of the German Confederation. If Austria let this happen it would signal to the world that even a small country like Denmark could take territory from the Austrian Empire. And so Austria called upon the German Confederation to liberate Schleswig-Holstein from Denmark.
In 1864 they won the war and the region was jointly occupied by Prussian and Austrian troops. So that meant there was now an Austrian army right next to Prussia. This was seen as a threat.
And so instead of brining the 2 countries closer together, it instead started a war. But Prussia would need an ally. And they found it in the Kingdom of Italy.
Because the Kingdom of Italy did not control all of Italy. Parts of Northern Italy were still in the hands of the Austrians. So Italy and Prussia signed a 3-month alliance on April 8th 1866.
and 2 months later on June 14th 1866 Prussia declared war against Austria. Austria was forced to split their army to fight both countries. While they managed to defeat the Italians, they could not defeat Prussia.
They were simply better organized, better trained, and better equipped. Austria tried looking for allies of their own but the other German states did not want to fight either the Austrian or Prussian armies and most of them decided to stay out of the fighting. The Russians were friends with Prussia, the French were trade partners with Prussia, and the British couldn’t help.
And after just 1 month and 8 days the Prussian army defeated the Austrian Empire on July 22nd 1866. As a result of the peace treaty Austria lost influence over the other German-speaking states and they would turn inward to focus on holding on to what was left. And Prussia was now the new dominant power in the German-speaking region of Europe.
Chapter 9: Germany. Will. Be.
United. After the defeat of Austria the Prussians reorganized the German Confederation into the North German Confederation. Under this new government Prussia annexed previously independent states, such as Frankfurt, Nassau, Schleswig-Holstein, and Hanover in order to connect the eastern and western regions together.
Then there were several smaller states which were part of the Confederation but were not under Prussian rule. And in the south were several independent states such as Bavaria and a few others. This new confederation combined the economies and militaries of the various states under a single government.
And because Prussia was by far the largest state, they controlled this North German Confederation government. This new government still gave a large degree of freedom to the individual states on how to manage their internal affairs. And the central government’s job consisted of foreign affairs, the military, and implementing legislation most states could agree on.
Prussia would spend the next 3 years consolidating the North German Confederation. In 1867 they made defense treaties with the southern states, essentially joining all the German-speaking states except Austria into a military alliance. they hoped that if the North German Confederation proved to be a success that the southern states would willingly join them in a united Germany.
And this plan was accelerated in 1869. In that year the queen of spain was overthrown. The Spanish elites elected to put a member of the Prussian royal house on the Spanish throne.
But Spain was in France’s sphere of influence. Losing Spain to the Prussians meant that France would have 2 German kings flanking them on either side. attacking from 2 sides is how Prussia defeated Austria and so France started to panic.
France demanded that the Prussian king publicly declare that he did not mean to insult France and that his family would forever renounce any claims to the Spanish throne. The Prussian king refused to accept French demands. The chancellor of Prussia, a man called Otto Von Bismarck, wrote a reply that could be interpreted in 2 ways.
In one interpretation the Prussian king politely refused, in the second interpretation the king aggressively dismissed the demand. They published a German version which sounded like a polite refusal. But when they translated the reply into French they made it seem like a harsh dismissal.
This made the French angry. And angry French people had successfully removed an emperor from power during the French Revolution and during the 1848 Revolution. And as you can imagine, the current French emperor had to find a way to make those angry French people happy again or else he might be next.
And his solution was to go to war with the North German Confederation on July 16th 1870. France was hoping for support from other European powers. But those European powers had also received the letter from the Prussian king.
And they had received the polite version. So when they saw the French declaring war over something as insignificant as a polite ‘no’, they were just left baffled by the French response. The way they saw it: Why should the rest of Europe have to go to war with the Germans just because the French have anger management issues?
And so France stood alone. The Germans on the other hand rose up in nationalist fervor. And from all over the German states soldiers boarded trains to defend the German homeland from a French invasion.
they were not fighting for Prussia or Wurtenburg or Bavaria. They were fighting for Germany. And thanks to the Zollverein and economic integration, soldiers from all over the North German Confederation and their allies could board a train heading directly for the frontline.
In fact, so many soldiers traveled by train that the Prussian army arrived at the frontline much faster than the French army. This gave the Prussians a massive advantage. And in just over 6 months the German armies had made it all the way to Paris, captured the French emperor, and defeated France… One of the world’s superpowers had just been defeated in just over 6 months… With their victory nobody would dare to attack the Germans for decades to come.
And the Germans were swept up in German nationalism: going from a collection of minor states, to the people who had just defeated one of the most powerful countries the world had ever seen. And so, in the palace of Versaille, a symbol of French superiority, the leaders of the German states proclaimed a new nation. A nation that would include all the German states Europe except Austria and Switzerland.
And this new country would be called the German Empire. After the German Empire was declared the southern German states were still officially independent. However, they adopted the German constitution on May 10th 1871 and joined the German Empire.
And on that date Germany. Had. Been.
United. The North German Constitution became the German Empire’s constitution. Germans got an imperial parliament that gave all male citizens who were 25 years and older the right to vote in direct elections.
And these elections were generally free from corruption, which could not be said for most other democracies at the time. The regional states maintained their own governments and still controlled large parts of the governance, such as economic policy. But instead of a national government, they were now a regional government.
With the central government taking over foreign policy and military policy. And if you want to know how Germany unified a second time, I have a video on screen right now about German Reunification. And if you’re curious what Italy was doing at the same time that Germany was unifying, then you can watch our video about Italian unification that you can click on screen right now.
And if you want to know what happened to Austria after losing the German states, you can watch our video on the Breakup of the Austro-Hungarian Empire on screen right now. This was Avery from History Scope, thank you for watching.
