Ah Maria, Stuck in the Middle with Who?

In order to save Austria, Queen Maria Theressa entrusted her diplomat, Kaunitz, with a lot of power, even encouraging his partying. Meanwhile she turned her attention to the shambles of her empire.

As late as 1754 all of Europe wanted peace. Kaunitz knew that a war would be required to recover Silesia, but not right away. The ground had to be prepared. As long as France was allied with Prussia, attacking the Prussians in Silesia was out of the question. That some sort of arrangement with the French would have to be made was clear to Kaunitz. But how to achieve this without upsetting England would require some thinking.

At this point, France and England were at war over British raiding of French Atlantic shipping. England was very anxious that Austria remain in the Austrian Netherlands, modern-day Belgium, for the sake of keeping Hanover secure. Austria was ready to write this off as a territory that could not be defended, which cost real money to administer and returned little.

But they couldn’t tell the English that. Maria told Prime Minister Newcastle that she would gladly provide troops for the defense of Hanover. All England had to do was sign a treaty with her, and Russia, promising to attack Prussia and put down Frederick once and for all.

That wasn’t what Newcastle had in mind, and Maria knew it. However, first and foremost for England was the defense of Hanover. And in pursuing this goal, Newcastle went and did something really stupid. If Austria wouldn’t play ball, he would have to talk to someone who would. That someone was Frederick.

Frederick was tickled pink to sign a deal with England. The Convention of Westminster was signed in January 1756. This said that England and Prussia would oppose passage through Germany of any foreign (French and Russian) armies.

Frederick had lately been assured by France that she had no intention of invading Hanover. He also knew that Russia would never fight without a bribe to do so and Austria didn’t have that kind of money. So…He was promising to protect Hanover from a non-existent threat. Sure! Why not? And he’d get English gold in the bargain. Frederick was having a wonderful day.

The French were not amused at all. King Louis XV didn’t much care for Frederick in the first place. Plus his mistress had been poisoning the well on Kaunitz’s behalf. That was about to start paying dividends.

The Russians were even more upset than the French. Tsaritsa Elizabeth, never an easy person to get along with under the best circumstances, had a fit. Said one historian; “Russia was dumbfounded by the agreement partly directed at her and baring entry into Germany only four months after the conclusion of the subsidy treaty (with England) designed to effect precisely this.”

For Kaunitz, things were happening too fast. King Louis had been put out by Frederick’s behavior for some time. Mme De Pompadours pillow talk served mainly to move him in a direction he was already inclined to take. Prussia’s agreement with England was like a poke in the eye. Suddenly, the anti-Prussia faction at Versailles, a small minority, was being given a warm welcome.

Tsaritsa Elizabeth considered it a personal insult. She had made an earlier agreement with England because her foreign minister, Bestuzhev, assured her that Russian troops would only be called on to fight Prussia. She had, among other motives, her eye on East Prussia.

The Prussian agreement with England seemed to announce to the world that King George believed he had Elizabeth in his back pocket. The Russians would do whatever their British paymasters told them to do.

Kaunitz suddenly found himself in the position of having to restrain the Russians. Austria wasn’t ready, she would be, but more time was needed. Meanwhile, the French needed jollying. Having King Louis upset with Prussia was good, but there was nothing on paper. Kaunitz entrusted negotiations to Count Gundaker Starhemburg, Maria’s finance minister who’s reputation for honesty was well known.

His job was made all the easier when Louis appointed Abbe Bernis to negotiate for France. The Abbe fancied himself a major player who worked best when not surrounded with the stuffy, legalistic types from the foreign ministry who would spend all their time telling him he was wrong.

No, he would talk to the Austrians one on one and be hailed as a brilliant diplomat. To this end, and with Mme De Pompadour at his side, negotiations were carried out in secret in a chateau outside Paris.

The Austrians played their hand carefully. Bernis may have had an inflated view of his abilities, but he wasn’t stupid. Wrote Kaunitz in a letter; “A great power had to be convinced that the whole political system which it had hitherto pursued had been directly opposed to it’s true interests.”

The first Treaty of Versailles provided for nothing more than a declaration on neutrality on the part of Vienna in the Anglo-French spat, and a pledge by France to leave the Netherlands alone if Austria felt the need to invade Hanover. It was a joke and everyone except Bernis and Louis realized that.

The French could have had Austrian neutrality for nothing. In fact, Kaunitz had offered it to France the year before as a good-will gesture. What should have been glaringly obvious to the French was that the Austrians needed them much more than the French needed Austria. France was in an excellent position to make some demands of their own, but they didn’t.

But now, the fact that Austria and France were signing ANY kind of treaty was part of an alarming development. The French and Austrians, centuries-old enemies, were suddenly kissing and making up. And doing so while the Russians were straining at the leash to attack Prussia.

Frederick was very alarmed. As well he should have been, considering that France was also in alliance with Sweden. Sweden to the north, Russia to the east, France to the west, Austria to the south. Gulp. So he did what he knew how to do best, he invaded somebody.

— Mr Al