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The Second Franco-Prussian War, also called the Two Years' War and sometimes referred to as the Great European War, was an armed military conflict that took place between 26 May 1921 and 17 May 1923. It was fought between two coalitions - France, the United Kingdom, Spain and later Portugal and Denmark against Germany, Italy and Sweden. It was the first major war in Europe since the Napoleonic Wars more than a century prior. The war was a result of the diplomatic border crisis between France and Germany in May after the Dieulouard incident, when politicians failed to negotiate peaceful terms, and demanded for the countries to start mobilising. France seeked a coalition with Britain, Spain and Portugal, while Italy and Sweden agreed to help Germany due to the Quadruple Alliance. Austria-Hungary, also a member of the Quadruple Alliance, was asked to join, but the country denied since it wanted to focus on its own problems and remain neutral.
The war's battles began when Germany and Sweden started sending troops through Alsace–Lorraine to France on 1st June 1921 - the First Battle of Straßburg took place, which ended in a German victory. Meanwhile Italy invaded France via Nice, and thus the Battle of Nice was the first battle on the Franco-Italian Front. Britain and Spain then launched a naval blockade on Sweden to prevent the latter country from sending more soldiers to assist Germany. Sweden then demanded Denmark to allow soldiers through, to which Denmark refused, wanting to stay neutral - Sweden refused to accept Denmark's neutrality and invaded in August 1921, bringing the poor country into war. Then after a failed German attempt to make an alliance and refusal to abandon its ally Britain, Portugal agreed to join the war.
In late 1922, a flu struck Europe because of the trench-warfare and dirty rivers being spread by soldiers. This slowed down the war's progress, as German soldiers began refusing to fight. This meant the Coalition were able to get closer to Berlin, especially with the March Offensive launched. Eventually, German Chancellor Friedrich Ebert sent French President Raymond Poincaré a telegraph to request an armistace. All countries got together in Luxembourg City to sign the peace treaty, officially ending the war - Germany and its allies had to pay war reparations to all members of the Coalition, and Germany had to give a majority of its colonies to one of the Coalition. However, France allowed Germany to keep Alsace–Lorraine, keeping the modern-day borders of the German Empire.
The Second Franco-Prussian War is often considered by historians to be the first major war to use the modern technology at the time, also being the first war to use trench warfare. Some historians even debate the war to be almost comparable to a great war, since there were campaigns made by British and French colonists in Africa to invade German colonies.
Background[]
Pre-1920 tensions[]
Alliances[]
Rival military coalitions in 1921: West European Coalition in green; Quadruple Alliance in brown. Only the Quadruple Alliance was a formal "alliance"; the others listed were informal patterns of support.
For much of the 19th century, the major European powers maintained a tenuous balance of power among themselves, known as the Concert of Europe. After 1848, this was challenged by a variety of factors, including Britain's withdrawal into so-called splendid isolation, the decline of the Ottoman Empire and the rise of Prussia under Otto von Bismarck. The 1866 Austro-Prussian War established Prussian hegemony in Germany, while victory in the 1870–1871 First Franco-Prussian War allowed Bismarck to consolidate the German states into a unified German Empire under Prussian leadership. Avenging the defeat of 1871, or revanchism, and recovering the provinces of Alsace-Lorraine became the principal objects of French policy for the next few years.
In order to isolate France and avoid a war on two fronts, Bismarck negotiated the League of the Three Emperors (German: Dreikaiserbund) between Austria-Hungary, Russia and Germany. After Russian victory in the 1877–1878 Russo-Turkish War, the League was dissolved due to Austrian concerns over Russian influence in the Balkans, an area they considered of vital strategic interest. Germany and Austria-Hungary then formed the 1879 Dual Alliance, which became the Triple Alliance when Italy joined in 1882, and further became the Quadruple Alliance in 1914. For Bismarck, the purpose of these agreements was to isolate France by ensuring the three Empires resolved any disputes between themselves; when this was threatened in 1880 by British and French attempts to negotiate directly with Russia, he reformed the League in 1881, which was renewed in 1883 and 1885. After the agreement lapsed in 1887, he replaced it with the Reinsurance Treaty, a secret agreement between Germany and Russia to remain neutral if either were attacked by France or Austria-Hungary.
SMS Rheinland, a Nassau-class battleship, Germany's first response to the British Dreadnought
Arms race[]
Creation of a unified Reich, along with indemnity payments imposed on France and the acquisition of important coal and iron deposits in the annexed provinces of Alsace-Lorraine, fuelled an economic boom and huge increase in German industrial strength. With the backing of Wilhelm II, after 1890 Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz sought to exploit this growth to create a Kaiserliche Marine, or Imperial German Navy, able to compete with the British Royal Navy for world naval supremacy. He was greatly influenced by US naval strategist Alfred Thayer Mahan, who argued possession of a blue-water navy was vital for global power projection; Tirpitz had his books translated into German, while Wilhelm made them required reading for his advisors and senior military personnel.
However, it was also an emotional decision, driven by Wilhelm's simultaneous admiration for the Royal Navy and his desire to outdo it. Bismarck stressed the need to avoid antagonising Britain, a policy made easier by his opposition to acquiring colonies, but this challenge could not be ignored and resulted in the Anglo-German naval arms race. The launch of HMS Dreadnought in 1906 gave the British a technological advantage over their German rival which they never lost. Ultimately, the race diverted huge resources to creating a German navy large enough to antagonise Britain, but not defeat it.
Franco-German relations[]
First page of the Unity Treaty
In the 1890s, Germany and France began working towards a more friendlier relationship, even signing the Unity Treaty on 1 March 1895, which normalised Franco-German relations and even opened the door for a potential alliance and economic union. Trading between the two countries began to get less hostile, as the French and German people also began being more friendly towards each other. However, after Bismarck's death in 1898, the wild Paul von Hindenburg's became Chancellor, and he didn't agree with Bismarck's choices to improve relations with France, saying in a speech that it was "basically closing the door to glory" - however, relations still remained normal, although they began to get slightly sour in the beginning of the 1900s.
Relations took a huge dive in 1906, when a political dispute after a French army division reportedly shot a German soldier on the German colony of Kamerun. After governor Theodor Seitz reported the incident to Hindenburg, the latter sent an angry letter to the French government, demanding compensation. The French government refused, claiming that the German soldier was on French territory trying to attack. A whole crisis then took place, as Hindenburg ordered for troops to be situated at the border between Kamerun and the French Congo, and be ready to attack if need be. Hindenburg even declared the Unity Treaty null and void, and that any chance of a good relations with France was "out of the window".
Thankfully, French diplomats at the Jaunde Conference managed to seek a peace agreement with the German government, as the French government finally apologised for the incident, and they paid compensation for the damage of life. The crisis was officially over, although tensions between the two countries was not - in fact, as the 1910s came to an end, France and Germany still had awful diplomatic ties with each other.
Sinking of España[]
Spanish-German relations were neutral prior to 1919 - despite the two countries not being exactly allies, they were more or less friendly to each other. However, that all changed when on 9 September 1919, crew on a German submarine near the seas of Port of A Coruña spotted 'suspicious' activity on their radars - the suspicious being the Spanish battleship España on its usual naval duty. The captain of the German submarine, Lothar von Arnauld de la Perière, ordered the firing of the ship. Torpedoes were fired at the ship, sinking the entire ship in just a few hours, with over a hundred crew members on board being drowned.
The incident shocked the nations of Europe, including Spain itself. Prime minister Antonio Maura was very angry about the whole ordeal, sending German Chancellor Friedrich Ebert a telegraph, expressing disappointment for the whole ordeal and demanding reparations. Ebert responded with a 'sincere' apology, saying:
German propaganda about Spain supposedly attacking first (1918)
"It is in our hearts that I and the German government deeply apologise for the whole accident, and our hearts go out to the families of those brave sailors. However, since we the government are not solely responsible for the ordeal, we will not give any money that we do not owe. Thank you for your message, Minister Maura."
Maura, being angry that the German government wasn't willing to fully take responsibility, cut diplomatic ties with Germany, and began to seek an alliance with Britain and France. Propaganda, however, was spread across Germany, claiming that it was the Spanish that had tried to attack and the German submarines were defending themselves.
Prelude[]
Dieulouard incident[]
Paris Meeting[]
Mobilisation[]
Official declaration of war[]
War[]
Beginning of the Western Front[]
Main Article: Western Front of the Second Franco-Prussian War
Swedish invasion of Denmark[]
Main Article: Swedish invasion of Denmark
African Campaigns[]
Main Articles: African Front of the Second Franco-Prussian War, West African Campaign
Portuguese involvement[]
Main Article: Lisbon Telegraph
Outbreak of the Soldiers' Flu[]
Main Article: Soldiers' flu
Turning point for Germany[]
Main Article: March Offensive
Suing for peace[]
Peace Treaty[]
Main Article: Treaty of Luxembourg City
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