The Age of Bismarck #8: The Seven Weeks' War (Patreon)

[PATRONS]

What a way to start the new year! Here we look at the opening phases of the Austro-Prussian War of 1866. What did contemporaries think of Prussia's odds of victory at the time, going up against the Habsburg dynasty, and virtually all the middle German states? How could Prussia hope to match such enormous combined forces? If you asked Moltke, he would say the key was to attack before they could combine.

Thus, four Prussian armies launched themselves into Saxony, Hanover and Bohemia, attacking their foes in detail before they could be overwhelmed. When taken in combination with Prussia's advantages in organisation, logistics and even firearms, the question becomes one of how anyone imagined Austria stood a chance at all. Yet even Bismarck could not be sure, as he paced up and down in the HQ, whether this immense gamble would pay off. If it did not, he claimed, he would go down fighting. But if it did, his name would be etched into German mythology...