Start 1861: I Just Inherited the Dutch Throne

The words of William IV just now made Defense Minister Fox immediately understand what His Majesty in front of him meant.

Fox soon left the palace.

Why did Prussia begin to rise into the powerful German Empire in the 1860s? "

William IV understood this issue very well.

In January 1862, the first thing Bismarck did when he took office as Prime Minister of Prussia was to issue a declaration of war to the other 33 states and 4 free cities of the German Confederation (similar to the later European Union) in which Prussia was supplemented by Austria and dominated by Austria. : The current major political issues in Prussia cannot be solved by empty words and majority voting. They must be dealt with with iron and blood. The German Confederation did not rely on Prussian liberalism to expand its global status. Instead, it relied on its inability to fight to conquer the country, but what was the result? Did Bismarck achieve it?

In this regard, William IV knew that Bismarck was not well-known at the time, and his speech seemed a bit arrogant in the eyes of established powers such as Britain, France, Russia, and Austria. Other states under the German Confederation group listened. After hearing these words, I couldn't help but want to teach Bismarck a lesson, especially since the Austrian Empire, the leader of the group at that time, wanted to teach him how to behave.

But Bismarck used actions to give those who wanted to see his joke a hard slap: in only about eight years, Bismarck turned his ambitious words into reality.

Three years later, in 1865, the Danish cities of Schleswig and Holstein became Prussian.

Five years later, in 1867, Prussia launched a war against the other states of the German Confederation. The Kingdom of Hanover, the Kingdom of Bavaria and other powerful countries in the group fell one after another. Austria had no choice but to declare war on Prussia. However, Prussia had been waiting for this moment and brazenly launched a war against Austria. , and hit Vienna, the capital of the Austrian Empire. Austria was beaten to the capital in just seven weeks. Austria, the old one of the German Confederation, became a joke. Old Prussia came to power. In order for Prussia to withdraw its troops and cease the war, the Austrian Empire compromised and was driven out. German Confederation.

Starting in 1867, five years after Bismarck came to power, Prussia became the ruler of the German Confederation.

In 1870, under Bismarck's calculations, France launched the Franco-Prussian War in anger. Prussia took advantage of various advantages and finally reached Paris. This was the second time that the Prussian army ruled the capital of a European power after attacking Vienna in the Austrian Empire in 1867. Even this time Paris was also occupied, which was even worse than the attack outside Vienna. Suddenly the world was shocked and Britain was panicked. The complete rise of Bismarck and Prussia under his leadership to become the top power in Europe became a fact that everyone had to face.

For people who can cash in on their boasts, many people in the Netherlands have a very appropriate adjective - awesome-coaxing-coaxing.

Looking back, I have to lament that the rise of Bismarck and Germany is, in a sense, one of the more legendary stories of this century.

Before 1871, Germany was not a unified country, but was still fragmented. The German Confederation at that time was just a geographical term and was looked down upon by many European countries.

Bismarck's strong rise ended the centuries-old division of the German Confederation and achieved national unification in this region. Another achievement of Bismarck was to turn Prussia, which was not originally strong, into a country that was not outstanding in just twenty years starting from 1862. In less than a year, it has developed into the third largest industrial power after the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.

Since the German Confederation became the German Empire in 1871, the national power of the German Empire has continued to develop at a rapid rate. In just 10 years now, in 1881, the German Empire has emerged as a new generation of industrial power, with potential even surpassing that of the former European countries, the United Kingdom, and the United Kingdom. It ranks second in the world, above the two old industrial powers France and the emerging American Commonwealth, and below the Netherlands.

As of the end of 1880, the German Empire's industrial output accounted for 15% of the world's industrial output, while the Kingdom of the Netherlands accounted for 23% of the world's industrial output, the United Kingdom accounted for 17%, the United States accounted for 12%, and the divided French Second Empire + French Third The Republic totaled 8%, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire accounted for 5%. These six industrial powers alone accounted for 80% of the world's industrial output in 1880, and the remainder was the 20% of industrial output allocated to other countries.

The speed of Germany's rise can be said to be astonishing, so much so that Japan, which has carried out the Meiji Restoration in the Far East for the past ten years, has made the German Empire its first priority to learn from.

And Germany can be regarded as half the teacher of the Qing Dynasty.

Of course, Rome was not built in a day, and the rise of the German Empire certainly did not happen overnight.

In his previous life, William IV also wondered what were the reasons that enabled Prussia (later the German Empire) to rise into an industrial power in just over twenty years.

When he was chatting with members of the Dutch cabinet, several people discussed it and analyzed it.

The rise of the German Empire requires analysis of several aspects. First Germany took control of several industrial areas. For example, the first industrial area was the Silesia region, which was once controlled by the Habsburg dynasty of the Austrian Empire. In the 1840s, a war broke out between Prussia and Austria, and Prussia seized the Silesia region from Austria. . Austria was very worried about this, so in 1756, in the Far East, which was the mid-Qianlong-Long period, Austria united with the Russian Empire and France to start war against Prussia again. Prussia then allied with Britain to fight against the Franco-Russian-Austrian alliance. This is us The familiar 'Seven Years' War' lasted until 1763 and ended with the victory of the Anglo-Prussian alliance. Prussia defended the land in Silesia that it had previously captured.

Britain continued to support Prussia, making Prussia a thorn in the side of France, Russia and Austria. In order to obtain continuous benefits from Britain, Prussia was willing to be Britain's eyes in Europe.

One wish followed another. The British and Prussian royal families had a close relationship with the government. In the end, Queen Victoria's uncle had the British Crown Princess as his fiancée. However, the latter was short-lived. In order to maintain the Anglo-Prussian alliance, Queen Victoria's mother, who was widowed in Prussia at the time, married The London royal family, who became a member of the British royal family, soon gave birth to Queen Victoria, and in 1837, when the royal family had no male heirs in her 19-year-old generation, she became the Queen of England.

In 1756, a hundred years after the alliance between Britain and Prussia, the Kingdom of Prussia completed the unification of the German Confederation and established the German Empire. Therefore, most of Silesia continued to be ruled by the unified German Empire. Silesia is rich in resources and has a large amount of mineral resources, such as copper and iron.