Blood, Iron and Diplomacy and the Unification of Germany

When we left the Germanic Franks in the 9^th century, they were divvying up Charlemagne’s empire between West Francia (France) and East Francia (northern Germany).  (See: Who Are the Franks?)  These realms may have shared Frankish fathers, but they were by no means the same.  The Franks soon lost East Francia to Saxon rulers.  East Francia broke into a patchwork of German states as France evolved toward a unified king.  The Holy Roman Empire emerged in central and northern Europe.  The division was not just political, Charlemagne’s former eastern empire retained Germanic language and culture while France developed its own language and customs.  The Protestant Reformation further divided northern German principalities from Catholic France and the Holy Roman Empire.  The Protestant Reformation, Natural Law and America

In the 1640s, the Holy Roman Empire dissolved into small German states and the Austro-Hungarian Empire.  For centuries, the French, Austrians and Russians dominated German states.  That began to change in the early 19^th century.  As Napoleon rose in France, Germanic Prussia emerged as a powerful military state.  The Prussians played a leading role in the coalitions that finally defeated Napoleon in 1815.  That same year saw the birth of Europe’s 19th century version of Niccolo Machiavelli, Otto von Bismarck.

Born into an aristocratic Prussian family, Bismarck received a very good education majoring in law.  At 32, Bismarck entered the Prussian parliament quickly gaining prominence for his persuasive oratorical skills.  As Bismarck’s influence grew, so did a sentiment for unification among individual German states.  He initially opposed a union which might dilute Prussian autonomy, but gradually changed his mind as it became apparent Prussia could not withstand outside interference alone.  Bismarck shifted the tone of his speeches eloquently arguing for the divine right Prussian kings to lead of a unified Germany.

In 1861, Wilhelm I ascended the Prussian throne.  Wilhelm backed Bismarck’s initiatives but the Germans faced daunting challenges.  First Bismarck called for a parliament of German states to establish a loose German Confederation dominated by Prussia.  Bismarck laid out the next stage of his plans in his most famous parliamentary address, the “Blood and Iron” Speech:

Prussia must concentrate and maintain its power for the favorable moment which has already slipped by several times. Prussia’s boundaries  . . .  are not favorable to a healthy state life. The great questions of the time will not be resolved by speeches and majority decisions . . . but by iron and blood.

The Austrians and French opposed German unification as a threat to their dominance in central Europe.  In 1864, Bismarck convinced Austria to enter into an alliance to wrest two Germanic states, Schleswig and Holstein, from Danish control.  The Austro-Prussian coalition easily defeated the Danes.  However, the Austrians claimed Schleswig and Holstein while Bismarck demanded their annexation to the German Confederation.

By 1866, war erupted between the Prussians and Austria over Schleswig and Holstein.  Though Catholic Austria had the allegiance of Catholic southern German states, the Prussian Army utilized modern armaments and superior management of railroads to defeat the Austrians in six weeks.  Not only did the Prussians gain Schleswig and Holstein, they also gained permanent control of the southern German states.  The victory in the Austro-Prussian War allowed Bismarck to forge the North German Confederation.  In 1860, the Prussian population stood at about 24 million.  By 1870 with the addition of the new German states, the North German Confederation rose to 41 million.  The German population outnumbered France (37 million), Austria (35 million) and Britain (31 million).

Breaking free of France became the next priority.  Bismarck engineered a diplomatic crisis over the succession of the Spanish throne to goad the French into declaring war on Prussia.  The Franco-Prussian War of 1870 was a disaster for the French.  The Prussians quickly massed an army of 380,000.  Using railroads, the Prussians moved into France before the French could raise their army.  The Prussians inflicted a series of defeats on the outnumbered French culminating in the capture of Paris in January of 1871.  The Germans annexed the heavily industrialized region of Alsace Lorraine as part of peace terms imposed on France.  Humiliated, the French bore a continuing grudge against the Germans over the one-sided Franco-Prussian War and the loss of Alsace Lorraine.

With the defeat of France, Wilhelm I declared the establishment of a German Empire.  Bismarck became Chancellor (prime minister) and remained in this position as undisputed leader for the next 20 years.  Surprisingly, the same man who delivered the “Blood and Iron” Speech recognized that war could ruin everything he had built.  Learning an important lesson from Napoleon, Bismarck never tried to subjugate the rest of Europe.  He stifled the role of the military in making policy and instead sought to make Germany a dominant power through economic growth and trade while developing a network of alliances to prevent further war.

Because of French anger over the Franco-Prussian War, Bismarck focused on isolating France.  He entered into a defensive alliance with Austria-Hungary, Italy and Russia.  Bismarck eschewed the development of a navy, limiting colonial expansion to convince the British that Germany was no threat to their empire.  Alliances became a bulwark to prevent a combination of France, Britain, Russia, and/or Austria against the Germans.  If France attacked Germany, it would only have the support of Britain and its relatively small army.

By the 1880s, tensions rose between Austria-Hungary, Russia and the Ottoman Empire over hegemony in the Balkans.  Bismarck kept Germany out these disputes predicting: “One day the great European War will come out of some damned foolish thing in the Balkans.”  The decade would be one of great change for Germany.  Kaiser Wilhelm I died in 1888 to be eventually succeeded by Wilhelm II (Wilhelm I’s original successor Fredrich III lived less than a year into his reign).   The new emperor was arrogant, independent and exceedingly patriotic.  Wilhelm II favored more aggressive expansion over Bismarck’s careful maintenance of a balance of power.  Within two years, Wilhelm II forced Bismarck to resign.  Bismarck made a prescient prophesy on Wilhelm II’s aggressive foreign policy: “Jena [defeat] came twenty years after the death of Frederick the Great; the crash will come twenty years after my departure if things go on like this.”

Wilhelm II foolishly ignored Bismarck’s warnings about the Balkans and failed to respect the power of his European rivals.  Immediately after forcing Bismarck’s resignation, Wilhelm II’s confrontational foreign policy caused Russia to cancel its defensive pact with Germany.  He later embroiled Germany in the Balkan dispute over the assassination of Austrian Duke Franz Ferdinand in Serbia in 1914.  Wilhelm issued the infamous “blank check” promising German support for any action the Austro-Hungarians chose which sparked World War I.  Germany suddenly faced the very two front war Bismarck predicted would cause its downfall in World War I.

In 1862, Germany was the weakest of the major European powers.  By the time Bismarck left office in 1890, the German Empire was the largest European nation with one of the most vibrant economies.  Bismarck never wanted to conquer Europe.  He recognized that Germany’s best chance for sustained success was to establish independence and become an economic power through trade.  Wilhelm II’s vanity and arrogance and Adolf Hitler’s megalomania and racism sidetracked Bismarck’s vision.  However, today’s Germany has finally evolved into something Bismarck would recognize as success.