How would France have been different if, the victorious anti-Napoleon coalition imposed Treaty of Versailles-type terms on France? Would there have been a Second French Empire if France would have been left weak?
Anti-Napoleon Coalition imposes Treaty of Versailles-esque terms on France
- Thread starter Montgomerie Ward
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FasterThanRaito
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You can expect a shitstorm a decade or three down the line when the French rise up against anti-republicanism and monarchial tyranny.
Well, if one starts thinking with the Napoleonic Empire, then the OTL was much, much worse than the Treaty of Versailles.
I guess the Brits would be unchallenged in taking pretty much all of France's colonies as 'mandates'.
FasterThanRaito
Kicked
In Versailles, Germany had to give up important chunks of territory that they already had pre-war.
In Vienna, France got to keep all of their pre-wars territory (not counting colonies).
Lycaon pictus
Donor
The trouble is, the anti-Napoleon coalition was literally just that. Without Napoleon and his ambitions, and without French republicanism, Britain, Austria, Prussia and Russia had no reason to be allies… and each of them wanted a strong France as a potential ally against one of the others.
If they had decided to cut France down to size, it would definitely have undercut the Bourbon Restoration. It would have created the popular impression that King Louis didn't care what happened to the nation as long as he could claim to be in charge while it happened.
If they had decided to cut France down to size, it would definitely have undercut the Bourbon Restoration. It would have created the popular impression that King Louis didn't care what happened to the nation as long as he could claim to be in charge while it happened.
Yes. The deal for Napoleon's first abdication was VERY lenient to France. They got to keep the 1792 borders, all their colonies (except the parts Napoleon had sold off) and much of the loot/art they had stolen from other countries. Almost all of Napoleon's marshals also stayed in power and in the army.
And then after the 100 Days, they complained when the Allies said the heck with that and returned to the old regime borders.
Let's add it to make it more interesting - what if the Bourbons, with the Allies' at the back and calling the shots, purge the Revolutionary Army once and for all. ALL the marshals who went over to Napoleon are not only cashiered but exiled for life or sent to penal colonies (unlike in OTL where Ney and de la Bedoyere were shot but the rest eventually pardoned and many played a part in the revolutions of 1830 and 1848). The Army is majorly overhauled and anyone who doesn't like is sent to Cayenne or the Caribbean.
In essence, instead of a White Terror we got a judicial purging of all major Napoleonic players from the country, minus the killing. Also the remaining regicides finally have fate catch up to them - men like Fouche or Carnot, rather than constantly being around to cause trouble or just disposed of.
Buffer states are created - perhaps an early Belgium, or an independent Grand Duchy of Alsace-Lorraine (the German-speaking parts) for Archduke Charles, independent Kingdom of Corsica (perhaps as a sop to Marie Louise instead of Parma or possibly given to Eugene who even the allies liked), an early Saarland, or independent French-speaking Savoy (which may cause butterflies for the unification of Italy) - all to make clear where France's borders lie. And outside of Nap II (protected by his grandfather and raised in Austria), all the Bonapartes exiled from Europe for good (not taking up comfortable residence in Rome as in OTL). Maybe they can go live in St. Helena with you know who or maybe America. This makes the likelihood of Nap III coming to power (and intriguing before that) less likely.
Crippling France's economy is not a good idea for anyone. Crippling it as a war-making machine, with the generals and officers and revolutionaries hanging around to use it should be the goal. Actually all you need is a more vengeful Alexander I of Russia. The Prussians, Spanish, Austrians, Savoys were more than willing take their piece of flesh if he had said the OK.
That's probably the big problem here. Britain is the only one that actually gets any benefit out of being harsh. What can the congress actually demand here?
Sure, Spain has like a 50 year old claim on Roussillon, but nobody liked Spain after they sided with the revolution in the first place.
Long-term indemnities aren't too economical, since nobody want's to have to keep occupying troops around to make sure France actually pays it. Any monetary repayments would have to be made or looted immediately, which wouldn't be too much trouble for France to recover from.
And France doesn't exactly have much land to give. Britain staked claims on all the colonies already, and because Britain hates to share it would rather give them back to France than let any of the other coalition members have them. And then none of the major powers actually has a border with France. What use is Russia going to have for a Russian Shore in Normandy?
And limited military obligations are too hard to enforce in this time period.
So the question really is, besides Britain calling dibs on all the assorted islands, what can the Vienna Congress actually demand if they want to be harsher?
I'm discounting the idea of razing the country, or burning Paris, or herding all the livestock and horses west so France can't have cavalry anymore.
This thread, with roughly the same OP, may interests you
Allow me to crosspost.
It would have defeated the purpose of Congress of Vienna, that was about restoring pre-revolutionnary order. France was to be put back to his Ancien Régime borders in order to stress that and the victory of reactionary powers (Prussia, Russia, Austria) in Europe.
Furthermore in 1815, and critically after the 100 days, France wasn't really able to impose its terms, having irremediably lost but proven again that it could wage war relativly easily on its neighbours (even without real hope of definitive victory). At this point, it was about containing this potential.
Let's compare what's comparable : Vienna was clearly clement for France, not because of a particular liking of it or thanks to Talleyrand's skills (that certainly played), but because the goal of the Congress was to return to a pre-revolutionarry situation as much it was possible while containing France thanks to buffer kingdoms (Piemont, Netherlands) and close presence of great powers (Prussia) at their borders.
Another point making a Versailles comparison irrelevant, is that fact it was an ideological peace : Louis XVIII was seen as an ally that needed his lands backs to deal with the extinction of revolution. It wasn't a war/peace against France specifically, but a war against revolutionnary principles.
One could say, furthermore, that Vienna powers wanted to avoid radicalizing french population against Bourbons or the Congress too much, critically when there was a clear tendency to pro-monarchism after 1814, to prevent making it an endless nest of troubles.
As said above, it would require a real unities among Coalised. Britain wanted to keep a continental balance (crippling France would certainly have hugely damaged this), Prussia was a quite minor player (France was considered more powerful in defeat than Prussia in victory in 1814/1815), Russia and Austria wanted to prevent a Prussian takeover and Russia wanted to preserve a force in Western Europe in order to not let Britain play alone (as the relative willingness to see Louis XVIII intervening in Spain in 1820's points)
Allow me to crosspost.
It would have defeated the purpose of Congress of Vienna, that was about restoring pre-revolutionnary order. France was to be put back to his Ancien Régime borders in order to stress that and the victory of reactionary powers (Prussia, Russia, Austria) in Europe.
Furthermore in 1815, and critically after the 100 days, France wasn't really able to impose its terms, having irremediably lost but proven again that it could wage war relativly easily on its neighbours (even without real hope of definitive victory). At this point, it was about containing this potential.
Let's compare what's comparable : Vienna was clearly clement for France, not because of a particular liking of it or thanks to Talleyrand's skills (that certainly played), but because the goal of the Congress was to return to a pre-revolutionarry situation as much it was possible while containing France thanks to buffer kingdoms (Piemont, Netherlands) and close presence of great powers (Prussia) at their borders.
Another point making a Versailles comparison irrelevant, is that fact it was an ideological peace : Louis XVIII was seen as an ally that needed his lands backs to deal with the extinction of revolution. It wasn't a war/peace against France specifically, but a war against revolutionnary principles.
One could say, furthermore, that Vienna powers wanted to avoid radicalizing french population against Bourbons or the Congress too much, critically when there was a clear tendency to pro-monarchism after 1814, to prevent making it an endless nest of troubles.
As said above, it would require a real unities among Coalised. Britain wanted to keep a continental balance (crippling France would certainly have hugely damaged this), Prussia was a quite minor player (France was considered more powerful in defeat than Prussia in victory in 1814/1815), Russia and Austria wanted to prevent a Prussian takeover and Russia wanted to preserve a force in Western Europe in order to not let Britain play alone (as the relative willingness to see Louis XVIII intervening in Spain in 1820's points)
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AussieHawker
Banned
Before the war France looked something like this.
The territorial losses were at least Versailles-grade, and this doesn't even begin to go into the matter of the loss of France's sphere of influence in Europe.
That was land they conquered not pre war core territory.
Even as early as 1802, when France and Britain signed a peace, France had obtained the Rhineland, Belgium and areas on the Italian borderland. So I believe it was pre-war territory. What constitutes core territory is a debatable matter. If you go back far enough you'd find Germany (or its earlier incarnation Prussia) had conquered just about everything it lost at Versailles.
It was much less formal than an Europa Universalis game : by the early 1800, the french presence on the Rhine was quite established as being (as much it was forseeble) going to last, and officially considered so by multiple treaties.
Of course, it's a bit irrelevant giving the goal of the Congress was less to punish a still existing Napoleonic France, but to restore Bourbon France to its more or less original borders.
(Also, please don't quote pictures)
Reading the letters of Joseph Bonaparte and Napoleon (available on Google books) its pretty clear before the allies took Paris in 1814 and Nap still thought he had a chance that everything was about what the acceptable terms of peace would be - in their eyes any return of the pre-revolution borders would be acceptable, only in direst straights and then neither Bonaparte said it should be stuck too. It would be another Aimens peace - a brief respite until more war. The only peace Napoleon was willing to accept was the so-called "natural" borders one - the Pyrenees, the Rhine, the Alps which would have let France keep the Left Rhine and Belgium and French Savoy. This was the deal the Allies had previously offered Napoleon in Frankfurt and he had flatly refused. Napoleon said he could make a permanent peace on those terms. But on the Ancien Regime borders - no. France would not stand for it.
As it happens France had to stand for it because Napoleon's hubris got the best of him. The terms of the Fountainbleu treaty must have seemed like a Versailles like insult to a country and army that for an entire generation had treated the rest of Europe like their chewtoy.
And so we got the Hundred Days and the Bourbons and the Allies didn't learn that the only way to prevent any future disturbances was to completely get rid of the Bonapartes from the Continent (not just Napoleon himself) and to permanently purge the army and civil service (with forced exile in necessary) so they wouldn't be a problem later (which they were).
I tend to agree, but it depends on the starting point of the conflict.
France had been in conflict with most of Europe, since the outbreak of the French revolution.
Also I wouldn't say Prussia was an earlier incarnation of Germany, it was a part of Germany, and a vital one for the ''reunification'' of the German lands, but it wasn't any more a predecessor than Bavaria or Austria.
As jb3 pointed out, Napoleon refused better terms, when he had the chance.
As for the German loses after Versailles, I'd say the perceived most of them more like how the French reacted on the treaty of Frankfurt, where France lost Alsace-Lorraine (territories, if you go back far enough once conquered by France).
Anyway Vienna could have been much harsher, if they decided to cut into the pre-revolutionary borders; which didn't do, for various reasons including that they didn't want to jeopardize the restoration.
Exactly. A harsher treaty enough to weaken or piss off France means a war between Russia/Prussia on one side against Austria/Britain. Russia wanted Poland and Prussia wanted Silesia. In this war, Russia and Prussia would be likely to win since their troops had been battle-tested as a result of the Napoleonic wars. In fact, such a war was about to happen if Napoleon had not escaped from Elba. So much for the idea on the forum that Napoleon was a evil monster that set fire to Europe and caused hundreds of deaths!
It was only when France threatened to join the Austria/Britain side that Russia/Prussia backed down. This is why Austria and Britain asked for leniency for France and why Britain returned most of the French overseas colonies they captured but kept the Dutch colonies they also captured despite the fact that the Netherlands made crucial contributions to the victory at Waterloo.
So, the Coalition did punish France as much as they could without weakening or pissing off France enough such that the latter could not be used as an ally in a future European war.
the Vienna Council was quite harsh ... just not towards France but rather those allied with France, say Denmark who first got bombed twice by Britain that didn't accept Danish wishes to become neutral, but took it as an alliance with France, then lost their whole navy, and then as cherry, stole the norwegian throne from Denmark and gave it to Sweden (against norwegian will, who would rather stay under Danish rule or it that wasn't possible under own rule) to went in on a Conquest war when Norway tried saying no.
So, as it's been said, the reason to just revert France to pre-1792 borders (and a few extras) was to:
1. keep the balance of powers in the continent
2. safeguard the position of the recently restored Bourbons
Now, what if...
France is even more punished in the overseas and is stripped out of everything. Surely this won't affect objective 1, France will still be strong enough to hold the balance of powers in the continent. With hindsight, how badly would it affect objective 2, though? IOTL they didn't last long...
1. keep the balance of powers in the continent
2. safeguard the position of the recently restored Bourbons
Now, what if...
France is even more punished in the overseas and is stripped out of everything. Surely this won't affect objective 1, France will still be strong enough to hold the balance of powers in the continent. With hindsight, how badly would it affect objective 2, though? IOTL they didn't last long...
1) The official point of the Congress of Vienna was to 'put everything back they way it was', and it was carried out fairly effectively. Prussia and Russia didn't get all of Saxony and Poland, for instance. But the united German and Italian states were split back up (not all the way), monarchies were restored everywhere they'd been removed, etc. Grabbing huge chunks of France would have been a very different CoV than OTL. Perhaps if Napoleon won Waterloo (but lost to the other armies moving in), giving the Prussians and Russians greater clout than Britain, you could get a different ethos to the CoV.
2) the CoV was convened for the victors to dictate to France results. Talleyrand pulled off a very, very clever move saying Bourbon France WAS one of the victors, against the Republican and Napoleonic forces. Keep Talleyrand at home, and France may well not be at the victor's table.
3) to Republicans or Bonapartists, replacing their beloved France by an incompetent Bourbon France WAS Versailles level nasty. Or near it.
To get that kind of attack on France the nation, you'd have to have Napoleon abdicate to a Republican government, say, which then fought the last several battles, and gained credibility as a competent regime. Then have that government refuse to accept the re-imposition of Bourbons.
How you'd get THAT, I'm sure I don't know.