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22-7-26 France's Hx & Geostrategic Choices in Central Europe - gtbt > .
The government, regular forces and police subsequently evacuated the city for Versailles. The vacuum of power was filled by units of the National Guard. By the next evening the red flag of the Commune was flying over the Hôtel de Ville. Elections were called and, on 26 March, ninety-two representatives were elected to form the Commune council.
The results were declared on 27 March and the Council held its first meeting the following day. Within a week, however, the first skirmishes between the Commune’s National Guard and the regular army from Versailles had begun.
The refusal of the Communards to accept the authority of the French government led to the Commune being brutally suppressed by the regular French army in May during ‘The Bloody Week’. By 28 May the Commune had been defeated. Estimates say that between 10 and 50,000 Communards were killed or executed.
France mobilised its army on 15 July 1870, leading the North German Confederation to respond with its own mobilisation later that day. On 16 July 1870, the French parliament voted to declare war on Prussia, and the declaration of war was delivered to Prussia three days later. French forces invaded German territory on 2 August. The German coalition mobilised its troops much more effectively than the French and invaded northeastern France on 4 August. The German forces were superior in numbers, had better training and leadership and made more effective use of modern technology, particularly railways and artillery.
A series of swift Prussian and German victories in eastern France, culminating in the siege of Metz and the Battle of Sedan, saw French Emperor Napoleon III captured and the army of the Second Empire decisively defeated. A Government of National Defence declared the Third French Republic in Paris on 4 September and continued the war for another five months; the German forces fought and defeated new French armies in northern France. The French capital, Paris, was besieged and fell on 28 January 1871, after which a revolutionary uprising called the Paris Commune seized power in the city and held it for two months, until it was bloodily suppressed by the regular French army at the end of May 1871.
The German states proclaimed their union as the German Empire under the Prussian king Wilhelm I and Chancellor Bismarck. They finally united most of Germany as a nation-state (Austria was excluded). The Treaty of Frankfurt of 10 May 1871 gave Germany most of Alsace and some parts of Lorraine, which became the Imperial territory of Alsace-Lorraine (Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen). Following this war, Bismarck maintained great authority in international affairs for two decades.
French determination to regain Alsace-Lorraine and fear of another Franco-German war, along with British apprehension about the balance of power, became factors in the causes of WW1.
28th March 1871: Paris Commune proclaimed; Council met for first time - HiPo > .
The government, regular forces and police subsequently evacuated the city for Versailles. The vacuum of power was filled by units of the National Guard. By the next evening the red flag of the Commune was flying over the Hôtel de Ville. Elections were called and, on 26 March, ninety-two representatives were elected to form the Commune council.
However, as a result of some nominees securing victories for multiple seats, and some candidates who had been nominated without their approval refusing to take up their seat, only 60 representatives actually joined the Council.
The results were declared on 27 March and the Council held its first meeting the following day. Within a week, however, the first skirmishes between the Commune’s National Guard and the regular army from Versailles had begun.
The refusal of the Communards to accept the authority of the French government led to the Commune being brutally suppressed by the regular French army in May during ‘The Bloody Week’. By 28 May the Commune had been defeated. Estimates say that between 10 and 50,000 Communards were killed or executed.
The causes of the Franco-Prussian War are strongly rooted in the events surrounding the gradual march toward the unification of the German states under Otto von Bismarck. In the midst of the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, Empress Eugénie, Foreign Minister Drouyn de Lhuys and War Minister Randon, worried that a Prussian victory might jeopardize France's status as the dominant power in Europe gained after the Franco-Austrian War of 1859, unsuccessfully urged Napoleon to implement an armed mediation which would consist in a mobilization and the massing of troops at France's eastern borders while the bulk of the Prussian armies were still engaged in Bohemia, as a warning that no territorial changes could be effected in Germany without France being consulted. As a result of Prussia's annexation of several German states which had sided with Austria during the war and the formation of the North German Confederation under Prussia's aegis, French public opinion stiffened and now demanded more firmness as well as territorial compensations. As a result, Napoleon demanded to Prussia a return to the French borders of 1814, with the annexation of Luxembourg, most of Saarland, and the Bavarian Palatinate. Bismarck flatly refused what he disdainfully termed France's "politique des pourboires" (gratuity policy). He then communicated Napoleon's written territorial demands to Bavaria and the other southern German states of Württemberg, Baden and Hesse-Darmstadt, which hastened the conclusion of defensive military alliances with these states. France had been strongly opposed to any further alliance of German states, which would have significantly strengthened Prussia militarily.
In Prussia, some officials considered a war against France both inevitable and necessary to arouse German nationalism in those states that would allow the unification of a great German empire. This aim was epitomized by Prussian Chancellor Otto von Bismarck's later statement: "I did not doubt that a Franco-German war must take place before the construction of a United Germany could be realised." Bismarck also knew that France should be the aggressor in the conflict to bring the four southern German states to side with Prussia, hence giving Germans numerical superiority. He was convinced that France would not find any allies in her war against Germany for the simple reason that "France, the victor, would be a danger to everybody – Prussia to nobody," and he added, "That is our strong point." Many Germans also viewed the French as the traditional destabilizer of Europe, and sought to weaken France to prevent further breaches of the peace.
The immediate cause of the war resided in the candidacy of Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, a Prussian prince, to the throne of Spain. France feared encirclement by an alliance between Prussia and Spain. The Hohenzollern prince's candidacy was withdrawn under French diplomatic pressure, but Otto von Bismarck goaded the French into declaring war by releasing an altered summary of the Ems Dispatch, a telegram sent by William I rejecting French demands that Prussia never again support a Hohenzollern candidacy. Bismarck's summary, as mistranslated by the French press Havas, made it sound as if the king had treated the French envoy in a demeaning fashion, which inflamed public opinion in France.
In Prussia, some officials considered a war against France both inevitable and necessary to arouse German nationalism in those states that would allow the unification of a great German empire. This aim was epitomized by Prussian Chancellor Otto von Bismarck's later statement: "I did not doubt that a Franco-German war must take place before the construction of a United Germany could be realised." Bismarck also knew that France should be the aggressor in the conflict to bring the four southern German states to side with Prussia, hence giving Germans numerical superiority. He was convinced that France would not find any allies in her war against Germany for the simple reason that "France, the victor, would be a danger to everybody – Prussia to nobody," and he added, "That is our strong point." Many Germans also viewed the French as the traditional destabilizer of Europe, and sought to weaken France to prevent further breaches of the peace.
The immediate cause of the war resided in the candidacy of Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, a Prussian prince, to the throne of Spain. France feared encirclement by an alliance between Prussia and Spain. The Hohenzollern prince's candidacy was withdrawn under French diplomatic pressure, but Otto von Bismarck goaded the French into declaring war by releasing an altered summary of the Ems Dispatch, a telegram sent by William I rejecting French demands that Prussia never again support a Hohenzollern candidacy. Bismarck's summary, as mistranslated by the French press Havas, made it sound as if the king had treated the French envoy in a demeaning fashion, which inflamed public opinion in France.
France mobilised its army on 15 July 1870, leading the North German Confederation to respond with its own mobilisation later that day. On 16 July 1870, the French parliament voted to declare war on Prussia, and the declaration of war was delivered to Prussia three days later. French forces invaded German territory on 2 August. The German coalition mobilised its troops much more effectively than the French and invaded northeastern France on 4 August. The German forces were superior in numbers, had better training and leadership and made more effective use of modern technology, particularly railways and artillery.
A series of swift Prussian and German victories in eastern France, culminating in the siege of Metz and the Battle of Sedan, saw French Emperor Napoleon III captured and the army of the Second Empire decisively defeated. A Government of National Defence declared the Third French Republic in Paris on 4 September and continued the war for another five months; the German forces fought and defeated new French armies in northern France. The French capital, Paris, was besieged and fell on 28 January 1871, after which a revolutionary uprising called the Paris Commune seized power in the city and held it for two months, until it was bloodily suppressed by the regular French army at the end of May 1871.
The German states proclaimed their union as the German Empire under the Prussian king Wilhelm I and Chancellor Bismarck. They finally united most of Germany as a nation-state (Austria was excluded). The Treaty of Frankfurt of 10 May 1871 gave Germany most of Alsace and some parts of Lorraine, which became the Imperial territory of Alsace-Lorraine (Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen). Following this war, Bismarck maintained great authority in international affairs for two decades.
French determination to regain Alsace-Lorraine and fear of another Franco-German war, along with British apprehension about the balance of power, became factors in the causes of WW1.
