Deleted member 1487
With a POD no earlier than 1900 have Germany and Russia ally and work together to break up the Habsburg empire for their own gain.
Last edited by a moderator:
AHC: Germany and Russia team up to dismantle Austria-Hungary
Successful 1848 liberal revolutions force the Hapsburgs into a weak constitutional leadership position in AH.
This butterflies the alliance of the three emperors away, and allows AH to drift into the France/UK camp
Prussia and Russia develop a stronger alliance system
Then the 1866 war between Prussia and Austria involves a Prussia-aligned Russia
The ensuring curb stomp forces a breakup of an already weakened AH
Deleted member 1487
That's what I get for posting before I had my coffee. Yes, I meant no earlier.
by that time A-H was already filled with german nationalists dreaming about breaking it up and anschluss. you just need an ethnic nationalist lead germany to get interested in it, to the south you have italy also interested in parts, further south there's serbia and romania. a problem would be russia - are they really interested in more unruly polish subjects?
Deleted member 1487
Were the Austrians that interested at the time? I know the German ruling class generally wasn't because they didn't want to annex more Catholics. Russia wanted to rip apart the Habsburg Empire because of Pan-Slavism and the desire to get not just the Poles, but the Ruthenians, Czechs, and everyone else in their sphere; it was also to remove a rival in the Balkans, so they could dominate the area and annex Istanbul/Constantinpol.
Well that makes it harder.
Splitting Austria-Hungary only weakens the German position. For example: Even only “losing” Galicia directly to the Russians would secure the Polish Salient and greatly endanger eastern Prussia (East/West Prussia; Posen; Brandenburg; Silesia) in case of a war.
And all the potential gains are not worth losing A-H as a loyal (dependent) ally.
You probably need an internal conflict, but most of those (czechs and hungarians) could probably be easily crushed by Germany helping out the Habsburgs.
And even if you split A-H most favourably for Germany (Austria, Czech lands, Mediterranean access [unlikely if Italy is to be retained as an ally]) you are left with the choice: Strong allied Hungary with the same problems as before or do you hope to drag Romania and “Yugoslavia” into your camp?
So I have trouble imagining a situation with a POD post 1900 where Germany would be willing to give up on A-H in favour of more minorities in Germany (Czechs) and a diplomatic “balkan-like” mess in southeastern Europe.
Splitting Austria-Hungary only weakens the German position. For example: Even only “losing” Galicia directly to the Russians would secure the Polish Salient and greatly endanger eastern Prussia (East/West Prussia; Posen; Brandenburg; Silesia) in case of a war.
And all the potential gains are not worth losing A-H as a loyal (dependent) ally.
You probably need an internal conflict, but most of those (czechs and hungarians) could probably be easily crushed by Germany helping out the Habsburgs.
And even if you split A-H most favourably for Germany (Austria, Czech lands, Mediterranean access [unlikely if Italy is to be retained as an ally]) you are left with the choice: Strong allied Hungary with the same problems as before or do you hope to drag Romania and “Yugoslavia” into your camp?
So I have trouble imagining a situation with a POD post 1900 where Germany would be willing to give up on A-H in favour of more minorities in Germany (Czechs) and a diplomatic “balkan-like” mess in southeastern Europe.
Austria-Hungary annexes Bosnia, despite German opposition.
Berlin starts to reconsider their commitments to Austria-Hungary, but nothing serious comes out of it, until few years later, when Austria-Hungary wants to invade Serbia or Romania over some minor squabble. Humiliated Austria-Hungary threatened by Russia backs down, and this greatly damages the prestige of country. When Franz Joseph dies, Franz Ferdinand, notoriously stubborn, tries to reform Empire to more federal model, with more equality for national minorities, despite protests of Hungarians. Civil war breaks out (known in Hungary as war of Hungarian independence), and after few weeks of infighting neighbor Germans, Russians, Serbians, Romanians and Italians essentially agree that Austria-Hungary is half-dead corpse, and agree to partition it.
Germany takes Austria and sets up puppet rump Bohemia, Russians take Galich and Slovakia, Italians take Trento and most of Illyria, Serbs grab Slavonia-Croatia, Romanians seize Transylvania. There is rump independent Hungary as buffer state.
Berlin starts to reconsider their commitments to Austria-Hungary, but nothing serious comes out of it, until few years later, when Austria-Hungary wants to invade Serbia or Romania over some minor squabble. Humiliated Austria-Hungary threatened by Russia backs down, and this greatly damages the prestige of country. When Franz Joseph dies, Franz Ferdinand, notoriously stubborn, tries to reform Empire to more federal model, with more equality for national minorities, despite protests of Hungarians. Civil war breaks out (known in Hungary as war of Hungarian independence), and after few weeks of infighting neighbor Germans, Russians, Serbians, Romanians and Italians essentially agree that Austria-Hungary is half-dead corpse, and agree to partition it.
Germany takes Austria and sets up puppet rump Bohemia, Russians take Galich and Slovakia, Italians take Trento and most of Illyria, Serbs grab Slavonia-Croatia, Romanians seize Transylvania. There is rump independent Hungary as buffer state.
This is a hard change to achieve.
Russian gains from such a deal are a bit problematic for the Romanovs due the way the populations of the Empire are geographically spread out:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Austria_Hungary_ethnic.svg
Outright annexing Galicia seems quite possible for Russia, as well as the German annexation of German-speaking Austria. But what about the Slovaks and Czechs, Hungarians, Romanians and the South Slavs? Creating a chain of pro-Russian clique of semi-independent Balkan states would require the breakup of Ottoman Empire, and unless that is accompanied by arrangement that brings the Turkish Straits to Russian control, Russia will be firmly against such a deal. And that's something Germany alone cannot offer.
Italy could be a possible backup for a possible takeover of the Straits, provided that Moscow and Berlin can bribe her by promising concessions in the Adriatic coast, but that would lead to a situation where Britain and France would see it vital for their interests to back up Ottoman Empire against this kind of arrangement. And a deal that leaves Italian nationalists happy will be a really unpopular arrangement for Croatians and Slovenes.
Just like with the Ottoman Empire, the more powerful neighbors of the Dual Monarchy all had very compelling diplomatic and geostrategic reasons to support her continued existence despite the appeal of potential territorial annexations. Changing this situation in even remotely plausible manner seems really hard.
Look at OTL they had no territorial disputes, but Germany not wanting to let Russia dominate the Balkans post 1878 broke their alliance apart. Stop Russia from being so supportive of pan slavism in the Balkans and the two of them can be allied.
I always think the problem lies deeper. Both Russia and Germany wanted to be Nr 1. in Europe so they were rivals in terms of sphere of influence. France could offer Russia money and a free hand on the Balkan so to separate the two post 1900 seems very difficult.
I am currently planning a Dogger Bank timeline which leads to a temporary cooling of Russo-French and better Russo German relations.
But even then, when the Balkan troubles roll around Germany finds itself more inclined towards the Ottomans/British and Austrians in restraining Russian gains.