As he had on other occasions, Nicholas I tried again in 1853 to
get an understanding with England about the position of Turkey
and to prevent a rapprochement between England and France. The
Russians would not tolerate the establishment of the English in
Constantinople, but did not want to annex the city either. Temporary
occupation by Russia might, however, be necessary to secure Russia's
aim of finally getting secure outlet from the Black Sea. In discussions
with Foreign Minister Russell of Britain Russia suggested an independent
Moldavia and Wallachia, a Serbia under Russian protection, and
an independent Bulgaria. The English were to get Egypt and Crete.
The Austrians could establish themselves on the Adriatic.
Russell rejected the "offer" and said that France would
have to be consulted on the matter. Nicholas I, however, was under
the erroneous impression that some sort of "new system"
existed as a result of Nesselrode's Memorandum of 1844, which
had suggested a arrangement with regard to the Straits. This particular
memorandum and the substance of the current diplomatic conversations
with British Ambassador Seymour in St. Petersburg were published
by Britain and touted as proof that "dark ambitions of a
foreign despot" were endangering the peace of Europe.
The Franco-Russian dispute over the holy places in Palestine was
the immediate cause of the Crimean War. At the time Turkey controlled
Palestine, Egypt, and large chunks of the Middle East. The Port
(Moslem ruler of Turkey) had given privileges to protect the Christians
and their churches in the Holy Land to many nations. That explains
why so many different churches and nationals control various holy
shrines in Israel to this very day. At the time France and England
had gotten more specific commitments from the Port than other
nations.
France's interest in Palestine had been stimulated by a domestic
crisis in 1840-1841. Napoleon II pushed it because he relied on
the support of militant clerical groups in France. In 1850 Napoleon
III requested the restoration to French Catholics of the capitulations
of 1740. This meant that the French wanted the key to the Church
of the Nativity in the old city of Jerusalem and the right to
place a silver star on Christ's birthplace in Bethlehem. The French
threatened military action if the Porte did not give way and the
Russians threatened to occupy Moldavia and Wallachia if he did.
The weak Porte did the best he could under the circumstances and
gave a yes answer to foreign parties. This bit of typical Turkish
duplicity was soon discovered. When it was discovered the French
send the warship Charlemagne to Constantinople and a squadron
of ship the Bay of Tripoli. In December 1852, having no other
choice, the Porte gave in to Paris.
In February Nicholas responded by mobilizing two army corps and
sending his ambassador, Menshikov, to Constantinople. Menshikov
demanded not only the restoration of Greek rights but also a secret
alliance and the protection of all orthodox laymen under Turkish
rule-that meant some 12 million subject of the Porte. At this
point the British got into the act in the person of a very clever
diplomatic operator in Constantinople by the name of Stratford
de Redcliffe. The latter outfoxed Menshikov who got concessions
on the Greek rights issue but non of the other demands. So Meshikov
went home.
It seems silly to us today that they argued over the keys to a
church, but then it was not just any church. And besides, the
religious issue was not the essential factor in the Franco-Russian
dispute. France wanted to break down the continental alliance
that had paralyzed her for half a century. National interests
were involved here. England and France, in particular responded
to popular sentiment stirred up by liberal and patriotic groups
in their countries. Financial and trading groups, as always, were
involved as well. Such pressure is not evident in the case of
Russia. The Black Sea trade at this time was still quite insignificant.
When the Menshikov Mission became public knowledge it strengthened
the anti-Russian faction in the British cabinet. So the British
decided it was worth a war to keep and expand their interest in
the Eastern Mediterranean. In June 1853 an Anglo-French naval
force entered the Dardanels. In July the Russian army invaded
the principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia (modern day Rumania).
The war could still have been prevented. There were 11 different
project for pacification at the end of 1853. But the only important
one was the so-called "Vienna Note" to Turkey and Russia
by France, Austria, Prussia, and England. The Porte was to promise
no change in the status quo without the explicit consent of France
and Russia. Russia accepted this condition, but Turkey naturally
rejected it. Nicholas I and Francis Joseph of Austria even had
a personal summit at Olmütz. Nicholas promised not to intervene
in Turkey or to extract some right to protect orthodox Christians
under Turkish, like in the famous Treaty of Kuchuck Kainardje.
The English, however, turned this deal down.
Then in October 1853 Turkey took action by declaring war on Russia.
The Anglo-French fleet now penetrated further into the straits
and anchored in the Bosphorus. In November off the coast of Sinope
in the Black Sea, meanwhile, the Turkish fleet was defeated by
the Russians. Any settlement after this was impossible. The popular
press in England and France became violent. In January 1854 the
Anglo-French fleet sailed into the Black Sea. France, England
and Turkey then made a formal alliance. When the Russian troops
crossed the Danube, the Turkish war merged into a war against
the European coalition. This was precisely the turn of events
Nicholas had tried so hard to avoid.
In 1855 Piedmont joined the war, largely to be present at the
peace conference and thus able to argue for her interest in Italian
unification. Prussia remained neutral. Austria, although not belligerent
had a definitely anti-Russian policy and came to the brink of
war twice. Seeking some advantage in the conflict, Prussia and
Austria signed a defensive alliance. Then they joined France and
England in a diplomatic demarche demanding the withdrawal of Russia
from Moldavia and Wallachia. Russia was soon forced to withdraw
from those principalities and Austria then proceeded to occupy
Moldavia and Wallachia. This forced Russia to keep an army on
the Pruth, however.
Meanwhile, the Vienna Conference, in session throughout the war,
formulated a peace proposal:
Russia did not give in to this program until Austria sent an ultimatum
and threatened war. Frederick William IV urged Alexander II (since
February 1855) to accept.
Lord Palmerston, the new Prime Minister of England (since February
1855) wanted a partial dismemberment of Russia. Napoleon III and
Francis Joseph of Austria were not willing to go that far. Nicholas
II had been expecting an uprising of Christian subjects of the
Porte, or even been willing to promote it, but he was dissuaded
from doing so by his minister Nesselrode. The latter argued that
it was contrary to the Russian policy of maintaining the Porte.
While the equipment oft he Allies was clearly superior to that
of the Russian, they could not win the war--or at least there
was no quick victory. When the Danubian campaign of Gorchakov
turned into a disaster, Palmerston suggested the Crimean expedition--an
attempt to hit Russia in the soft underbelly, as Churchill might
have said. But strong Russian resistance at the Savastopol naval
base came as a shock to the Allies. What followed was a surprise
to the general public but not those in the know. A storm of indignation
broke out in France and England over the failures of the military
high command. The famous "charge of the Light Brigade"
was only the most blatant example of allied military blundering.
Russia did better with the Turks and won the battle of Kars, their
only victory.
Total Russian losses in the war, including victims of disease,
amount to 600,000. This was a loss the government could hardly
sustain. Nicholas and his ultra-conservative policies were held
to be responsible for the formation of the anti-Russian coalition
which defeated them. The personal ambitions and irresponsible
adventures of Nicholas, Napoleon, Palmerston, and Stratford also
played a role in the disaster of the war. Unwise decisions at
the very top were made consistently throughout the war. For Russia
it meant that reforms were now unavoidable.
The coup de grace was delivered by the Austrian ultimatum, not
the fall of Savastopol. Napoleon offered to help Russia secure
"peace with honor," but Palmerston vigorously opposed
such a move. Napoleon and Walewski supported Russia as much as
they could in the Congress of Paris without intimidating and hurting
the Anglo-French alliance.
So Savastopol was exchanged for Kars. No big deal. A piece of
southern Bessarabia was ceded to Moldavia to insure internal navigation
of the Danube. The integrity of the Ottoman Porte was once more
guaranteed. All promised not to interfere in Turkey. The Straits
remained closed to warships. The Black Sea, in fact, was neutralized.
Moldavia and Wallachia were put under Turkish suzerainty. The
same fate awaited Serbia, with Ottoman troops allowed to garrison
the territory. Russia, meanwhile, was forbidden to station troops
on the Aland Islands.
Britain, France, and Austria signed a special treaty to defend
the Paris settlement by force, if necessary. There is little doubt
that the whole affair had a definite anti-Russian flavor. It is
no surprise, therefore, that Russia remained hostile to the settlement--and
Britain, to some extent as well. In Russia the Paris Treaty gave
rise to the chauvinistic Slavophile movement.
Russian Revisions: Major themes:
Gorchakov, who was Foreign Minister throughout the reign of Alexander
II, carried out an elegant diplomacy without substance. From 1856
until 1859 a kind of Franco-Russian friendship existed, although
Alexander clearly mistrusted Napoleon III.
#ussia and France cooperated in supporting the union of Moldavia
and Wallachia (1858-1866), and also on Serbia and Montenegro.
Russia, therefore, remained neutral during the Franco-Austrian
War of 1859 which began the process of Italian unification. All
Russia did was mass troops on the Austrian frontier. The Russian
effort to get a diplomatic demarche of the powers with regard
to the oppressed Christian subjects of the Porte failed to get
French support in 1860. What drew the Eastern powers closer together
was the common fear of revolution. France, for instance, continued
to support the efforts oft he Polish revolutionaries. The Russo-Prussian
Convention of 1863 (the so-called Alvensleben Convention) permitted
Russian troops to cross into Prussia in pursuit of the Polish
rebels. As you might have expected, there was once more a revolution
in Poland in 1863 to through off the Russian yoke.
A quasi-solidarity of European powers developed, but it had no
effect on Russia in terms of stopping her from crushing the Poles
again. Napoleon III called for a congress, but he could not intervene
to help the Poles since he was deeply committed and overextended
in his Mexican expedition. Palmerston, typically, refused to intervene
on behalf of the Poles. In this situation, Russia was estranged
from Europe and France and drew closer to Prussia. This began
some thirty years of cooperation between Russia and Prussia.
The succession of the Danish George I in Greece in 1863 came off
with reasonable cooperation among Britain, France, and Russia,
the protecting powers. The same held true during the crisis of
the Crete revolt in 1867-1869, although Russia lost considerable
prestige in Athens. Russia objected helplessly to the succession
of Charles Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen to the throne of Cuza in Rumania
(Moldavia and Wallachia had been united in 1866 to form Rumania).
Russia had pushed hard for a guarantee that Prince Christian of
Glücksburg would be the ruler of Schleswig-Holstein-Lauenburg,
as part of the Danish crown. This had been settled in the Treaty
of London in 1852. The Danish royal charter then annexed Schleswig.
Prussia did not like this and sent an ultimatum to the Danes in
1863. The German Confederation (created after the defeat of Napoleon
in 1815) sent troops to occupy Holstein. Austria and Prussia sent
troops into Schleswig-Holstein-Lauenburg. The Danes were thus
forced to cede all three provinces to Austria and Prussia by the
virtue of the Gastein Convention in 1865.
But this was merely a stopgap. Bismarck had an alliance with Italy
and an understanding with France which would allow for Venice
to be ceded to Italy and Schleswig-Holstein to Prussia. So the
balance of power changed. Russia facilitated the moves of Bismarck
and kept England and France from doing anything. This was, in
part, the result of the Alvensleben Convention. Russia only half-heartedly
opposed the annexation of Schleswig-Holstein, despite the fact
that she was pledged to uphold the 1852 agreement on Glücksburg.
Russia in general favored Prussia with some misgivings but with
an eye on the revision of the Paris Treaty. Foreign Minister Beust
of Austria was pro-French and helped Russia draw closer to Berlin.
King William and Alexander met at Bad Ems in 1870 to reach an
accord on the Danish matter. Russia even promised to neutralize
any move by Austria. Russia, Britain, Italy, and Austria in fact
signed a pact to inform each other in case any of them decided
to deviate from the general policy of neutrality.
The close understanding Russia had with Prussia led Gorchakov
in 1870 to renounce the Black Sea neutrality clause of the Paris
Treaty on grounds that the treaty had been violated with the unification
of Rumania and was against the security of Russia. The objections
of the European powers at this point was mostly because of his
procedure, not the fact of it. The British did push for a conference,
which was held in London, but did no more than stamp approval
on a fait accompli. Russophobia, however, soon rose again in the
West and Russia, for that matter, did very little to put a navy
in the Black Sea.
When Count Andrassy replaced the Russophobic Beust, Austria became
willing to cooperate with Russia in maintaining the Ottoman Porte.
Russia for the first time was now willing to renounce her claim
tot he exclusive protection of Balkan Christians. The rulers of
Russia, Austria, and the newly-formed German Empire, exchanged
visits in 1873 and formed the so-called Three Emperors League.
Russia and Germany promised military assistance to each other
of they are attacked. Austria and Russia did the same at Schönbrunn.
So, we have here a revival of the old Holy Alliance to preserve
the status quo. The terms of the entente were vague and led to
severe strains in 1875 when Gorchakov (hostile to Bismarck) backed
France and claimed to have prevented a new Franco-Prussian war.
It was during this time that Russia sold Alaska to the United
States for some 7.2 million dollars. That is less than a good
warplane costs today! Why did they do it?
Well--Russia was eager to complicate American relations with England,
her foe in the Crimean War. England was suspected of favoring
the Confederacy in the American Civil War. The U.S. refused to
take part in the European demarche with regard to Poland in 1863,
so she was persona grata in Russia. In fact the Russians sent
one of her fleets to the Untied States in 1863 for fear that a
war in Europe would destroy the fleet. Besides, the Russian-America
Company in Alaska was never very prosperous and the furs she got
from Alaska were of inferior quality. The Russians thought that
the British attack in Crimea meant that would also attack Alaska.
So the Russian-America Company was transferred to the American
flag for a while.
Discussion of the proposed sale began in 1854. Bribery was liberally
used by the Russian ambassador (Stoeckl) in Washington to sway
politicians in favor of a buy. There was still a chance that the
American fleet could have gone to the Mediterranean to balance
British power in that region. The Russians, of course, were trying
to prevent that eventuality. It is amazing today, but at the time
there was much criticism of this 7.2 million-dollar deal in both
countries. In America they called it "Seward's folly!"