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Austria Loss of Leadership in Germany
Through the early 1860s, Austria maintained hope of retaining
leadership in Germany because the smaller states preferred weak
Austrian leadership to Prussian domination. Nonetheless, by
mid-1864 Franz Joseph realized that war was inevitable if
Austrian leadership was to be preserved.
The immediate cause of the Seven Weeks' War between Austria
and Prussia in 1866 was Prussia's desire to annex the Duchy of
Holstein. Austria and Prussia had together fought a brief war
against Denmark in 1864 to secure the predominantly German
duchies of Schleswig and Holstein for Germany. Pending final
decision on their future, Prussia took control of Schleswig, and
Austria took control of Holstein. In April 1866, however, Prussia
plotted with Italy to wage a two-front war against Austria that
would enable Prussia to gain Holstein and Italy to gain Venetia.
Although Austria tried to keep Italy out of the war through a
last-minute offer to surrender Venetia to it, Italy joined the
war with Prussia. Austria won key victories over Italy but lost
the decisive Battle of Königgrätz (Hradec Králové in the presentday Czech Republic) to Prussia in July 1866
(see The Habsburg Military
, ch. 5).
Defeated, Austria agreed to the dissolution of the German
Confederation and accepted the formation of a Prussian-dominated
North German Confederation, which became the basis of the German
Empire in 1871. The south German states--Bavaria, Baden,
Württemberg, and Hesse-Darmstadt--were accorded an "independent
international existence" and, in theory, could have gravitated
toward Austria. Nevertheless, their military and commercial ties
to Prussia militated against such an outcome. The province of
Venetia, Austria's last Italian possession, was transferred to
Italy.
Data as of December 1993
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