Board Thread:Timeline Discussions/@comment-24652856-20140308231841

Hi there,

in my Liberal German Empire timeline, the Reich is transformed into a true constitutional monarchy after British model in 1875, with a liberal and anglophil Friedrich III as Kaiser and Bismarck deposed.

The question is now how European politics would develop after 1877. In OTL, Bismarck manipulated the other powers to escalate small conflicts to large crises, hoping to deflect any aggression away from Germany and toward the fringes of Europe. Thus the Balkan powder keg wars, the Berlin conference and the entangled web of alliances and treaties of mutual protection. Meanwhile, Bismarck followed through with a very hardline policy against social democrats and later even against liberals, waging economic wars on Russia and even grapping colonies in Africa and southeast Asia.

If the Reich was instead ruled by a liberal, free trade and non-aggressive (non-colonial) monarch with good relations with Britain and somewhat less bad relations to France and Russia, how would the time until Friedrich's death in 1888 have developed? Would the Russo-Turkish war of 1877 with the subsequent Congress of Berlin have been any different? How could the Empire be reconciled with the French short of returning Alsace-Lorraine?

Thanks for any ideas! 