30YearsWar #34: The Emperor's Benefactor (Patreon)

[PATRONS]

With the King of Denmark on the march, and the net closing in on him, Emperor Ferdinand was forced to go big or go home. So instead, he went big, VERY big. He turned to Albrecht von Wallenstein, thus far his most important loan shark and self-made millionaire, not to mention influential landowner. What would be the consequences if the Emperor created his own private army, answerable to nobody but him? In fact, you could argue that this was the moment when the war became the conflict we know today. Ferdinand raised the stakes, and those stakes would eventually swallow him whole.