France And England example essay topic

A bond between two nations is like a serious relationship between two people who are soul mates there is nothing that can be done to break up their passion or alliance. This is the best way to describe the selected cartoon from Punch Magazine that will be analyzed in this essay, "Trust Me!" August 13th, 1870. This essay will discuss England's support of Belgium independence and neutrality from a political and diplomatic viewpoint from the mid to late Nineteenth Century. Accordingly this essay will predominantly focus on the build up to the Franco-Prussian War, English diplomatic actions during the Franco-Prussian War in defense of Belgian independence and neutrality. Also, to understand England and Belgium's relationship, the Treaty of London signed in 1839 will be analyzed and discussed. Thus, this essay will cover or touch on events from 1830 to approximately 1872 and explain why England had to get involved between the belligerents of the time.

To accurately describe the situation at hand during the late nineteenth century in England that is depicted in the selected cartoon one must go a bit further back to understand decisions and actions that have happened in the past which would be effecting England and its decisions in the time period being discussed. To do this one must consider the Belgian Revolution of 1830. The cause of the revolution was brought upon the nation in La Monnaie opera house in Brussels on August 25th, 1830. A previously banned play about Neapolitan insurrection against Spanish Rule managed to work the crowd into revolution through a song lyric, "My country gave me life, I shall give it liberty!" The revolt was a huge success for the Belgian people as they took the royal authorities by surprise with their intensity and rapid spread of rebellious activity that pushed Dutch troops out of Belgium. By September 27th, 1830 the Belgians had managed to set up a provisional government, proclaim Belgian independence, ordered an early election of a national congress, and finally drafted and proclaimed the proclamation of independence for Belgium by October 4th, 1830. Given the short time frame in which the Revolution of 1830 occurred, it didn't give England and the other super powers much time to make a decision on what had to be done.

The situation was best describe by the British Prime Minister of the time, The Duke of Wellington, "It is a devilish a bad business, the most serious affair for Europe that could have arisen". The seriousness of the situation was worry about a war breaking out. Wellington's cabinet feared that France was going to try to annex Belgium, which could cause a major war and England's major concern was to keep the peace in Europe. The first effort to keep the peace in Europe arose from a conference called by Wellington in London.

The first meeting came one month after the Belgian's independence had been proclaimed and drafted and the delegates from Great Britain, France, Austria, Prussia and Russia hammered out a mutual understanding over the course of the next year. Although their plan was written and ready to go in October of 1831 the plan was delayed until the formally named Treaty of London was signed on April 19th, 1839. The Treaty of London was signed by Holland and Belgium to allow Belgium to form an independent state of perpetual neutrality. To insure that neutrality, as promised by the treaty, Great Britain, Prussia, France, Austria and Russia also signed the treaty on August 19th, 1839.

When the Great Powers signed the treaty they became the guarantors of perpetual neutrality, which simply means that because the most powerful nations in the world are backing Belgium that the newly independent nation is safe. After the signing of the Treaty of London there was still more drama between Belgium and the rest of the world, however, Britain merely moderated all the troubles with the help of other nations who recognized such problems occurring. For example, one of the most important factors leading up to the relevance of the cartoon selected for the essay was the Luxemburg Affair of 1867. The Luxemburg affair of 1867 started as talks between Napoleon of France and Bismarck of Germany. Bismarck suggested to Napoleon to try and peacefully acquire Luxemburg because it was still within Prussian garrison and they had a fortress there as well. What this would allow France to do is have strategic positioning on Belgium, thus allowing Napoleon to unite Belgium with France, "without unsheathing a sword".

This caused great unrest for Belgium. It resulted in Leopold II, the current monarch of Belgium, to appeal to Queen Victoria for help in the matter. The Queen was shocked when Leopold's news reached her and in her response she told him, "She (England) is bound by every tie that can bind a Nation to assist another, to stand by Belgium in a time of need". It was settled, Queen Victoria simply stated that Belgium would be protected at all costs. To protect Belgium from Napoleon something had to be done about the crisis over Luxemburg. One of many suggestions of what to do with Luxemburg was to annex Luxemburg to Belgium, stemming from the idea of what better way of giving Belgium a new consecration of neutrality.

Although this was of more benefit to England as opposed to the other powers it was decided that another London Conference, or the Concert of Europe ideal prevailed. The Concert of Europe was an exceptionally frustrating set of meeting for the five super powers. Everyone except England who had the Queen supporting this endeavor fully was displaying a "get out at all cost" mentality. The main idea was to grant perpetual neutrality to Luxemburg just as they did to Belgium, however, the powers were not satisfied in having these neutralized states as a result of having to much obligation to them, as they felt they did towards Belgium already.

Nevertheless, Luxemburg was granted neutrality which resulted in the Prussian garrison being removed, the fortress dismantled, no new fortifications were to be constructed since Luxemburg is now neutral, and Luxemburg was only permitted enough troops to maintain order. With yet another crisis of the mid nineteenth century resolved it would not make sense for another to not arise. The next important event in English history followed the Luxemburg Affair by only two years, The Belgian Railway Affair of 1868-1869. When Napoleon failed to gain territorial compensations while Bismarck was enlarging Prussia and uniting North Germany, the Emperor turned to economic imperialism as a means of drawing Belgium under French influence once again. Napoleon's plan was to purchase the two main railroads in Belgium. The private French company which supported the purchase for Napoleon was the Societe de l'Est Francois whom made several offers to the private owners of the railroad, however, Belgian government worried about the transaction and how it could possibly effect the economy of its greatly criticized perpetually neutral sovereign nation.

This resulted in Napoleon sending a non-experienced diplomat to Belgium to try and smooth relations in order to achieve his triumph, and that man was Viscount Arthur la Gueroniere. Gueroniere was surely nothing more than a journalist and certainly not a diplomat, regardless of this Napoleon trusted him to lead discussions. The first offer consisted of Napoleons government offering guaranteed payment for the railroads and the price was substantially higher than market value. The Belgian chamber of representatives chose to vote against the sale of the railroads and after that the French press was unmerciful against the Belgians as they criticized their government for being suspicious and antagonistic towards Frances intentions.

The relentlessness of the French press finally went under supplied after a month of unfavorable slander towards the Belgian government. The severity of the situation had started to become more evident on March 13th, 1869 when the Queen's government decided that although it had not played a significant role in continental affairs as of late, it would defend Belgium. The result of this was full support towards the Belgians from all English press. This came at a good time cause it appeared as if Napoleon had began thinking about annexing Belgium, but he quickly change his mind and withdrew. He withdrew because of powerful British influence, coupled with strong Belgian resistance. As the English public began to recognize the rights and the wrongs of what was happening during this crisis they too believed that England should firmly stand behind Belgium's choice to not sell the railroads and demanded that the English cabinet do the same.

The ultimate result of this situation in English history was that Napoleon did not force the issue to its breaking point, war and eventually the French Empire accepted the result of its efforts, which was a close cooperation between existing railroad companies in Belgium as of July 1869. Ultimately, this was another failure for the French Empire at the hand of the British, which potentially could have led to more anger and angst on the French side, thus leading to another important event the Franco-Prussian War. After the Belgian Railway crisis was solved and prior to the start of the war, England was not out of hot water with the other powers just yet. At this point in time the English military was obscenely weak compared to that of France and Prussia's milit aries and this pressure was felt by England, who was trying to achieve a better economy by cutting expenditures on the army. However, because of the constant arms battle between Prussia and France they realized that some tensions could arrive. As a result of these thoughts the English government decided that the only way to achieve peace, and focus on the economy, of an already overpopulated country, was the disarmament of the Prussian and French armies.

However, this would not be an easy task, as tension between Prussia and France mounted, Queen Victoria expressed, to her government, concerns about the state of the English army and insisted that action be taken right away to rectify the problem. The problem was that there was simply not enough bodies in the English military and the only way to achieve the Queen's wish required a parliamentary vote. If this vote was successful it could put the entire British Empire into a financial nightmare. Despite the financial situation of the nation, the Queen coming down on the government and the publication of the Bismark-Benedetti draft treaty in August of 1870, which was a secret treaty written by Benedetti and published by Bismarck suggesting the French annexation of Belgium, the English parliament voted to approve the addition of twenty thousand men to the armed forces and an additional 2 million in funding. With the addition of the new men into the English army and the looming Franco-Prussian War England had some major decisions to be made.

For starters, what to do with the new men? How to allocate the funding? Well the English Navy answered those questions, with most of the funding going towards the construction of three new ships and the rest towards ammo, weapons, etc. The increase in military and naval expenditure, and the ability of the English economy to sustain such a tremendous loss in the money supply, allowed England to bring back some of her former diplomatic glory which was lost due to a previously fading military and naval forces which compromised the effectiveness of British diplomacy. With this new found diplomatic confidence the English government realized that although their policy was the preservation of peace, that the only way to bring peace back to Europe was through a continental disarmament which would equal the military and naval situation, of current, in which England was still heavily out manned. It was now time for English diplomacy to do the military spending justice.

From English perspective the main concern of the continental disarmament was obviously the tensions between Prussia and France. Prussia was of utmost concern primarily because of their ability to produce a more than adequate number of men for combative purpose, that number being nine hundred thousand men ready for combat in six weeks. Based on this impressive military feat, England decided that their main focus for disarmament should be the Prussian army. This was ultimately the decision because it was believed that as long as the Prussian weren't disarming there would not be a chance of another nation disarming. However, it would not be that easy because the Prussian's refused to disarm based upon a perceived chance of France disarming. This left England without any options other than Franco-Prussian disarmament, no easy task.

At the beginning of discussions France agreed that this was indeed a noble cause, but did not give a final answer and Prussia refused to make any changes to their army because it was their only defense against France. Despite further efforts and understandable fact that if each power was to reduce their armies by a certain number of men there would be less fear and less burden placed on each country Otto Von Bismarck, Prussian leader, refused to disarm. The failure to disarm France and Prussia caused serious diplomatic as well as economic problems for England. On the economic side England really needed the money that went into arming and preparing soldiers to feed the nation.

While on the diplomatic side England was on the brink of possible involvement in a war between France and Prussia was a more than unfortunate circumstance because a lack of soldiers would make England's future a trying one because a Franco-Prussian war could potentially jeopardize Belgian neutrality, which England was obliged to protect by treaty. Although England tried hard to prevent the break out of war between Prussia and France, for the sake of themselves and Europe as a whole, it was inevitable. The inevitable was simply a case of two super powers living next door in a continent that just wasn't large enough to handle them. Despite this, England's main responsibility during the Franco-Prussian war was, of course, Belgian neutrality.

English diplomats during this time of need in Europe came up with several options, which were believed and perceived to be the nation's best defense strategy in competing with their opposition's unmatchable size and strength in their armed forces, and it all focused around diplomacy. England's diplomatic journey to ending the Franco-Prussian war was no easy task because circumstances were changing so rapidly it was hard for England to keep up with the situation. Still in the early days of war England was confused, but managed to come up with an adequate short-term plan in which England was to not provoke France or Prussia because the added resistance of England could potentially danger Belgian independence. Also, since England itself was not prepared for war a strictly neutral stance was to be followed.

Unfortunately England's neutral stance was picked up on by Bismarck of Prussia and he used it as a security measure to prevent English sympathies being directed towards France with threats of taking Belgium. With this startling news England was back in the starting block. At this point of the Franco-Prussian War there still had not been a large battles and England was at a standstill about what to do. They soon made a decision to speak up and followed their first course of diplomatic action.

The plan was to ask both Prussia and France to not only respect their treaty obligations to Belgian neutrality, but to take it one step further by upholding Belgian neutrality by taking arms against any power who chose not to respect Belgian neutrality. This was a smooth move by England who not only managed to create an option that would be almost beneficial to either France or Prussia in their war, because if Prussia invaded Belgium then France and England would take out Prussia and vice versa. Despite that benefit the main reason of this diplomatic effort was that of protection. England knew that it would not be able to fend off a super power like France or Prussia on its own.

The treaty became known as the Belgian Draft Treaty and it was time to put it into action. England asked both Prussia and France to accept the terms and Prussia agreed almost right away with little questions asked most likely because of the military successes they were having against France. And for the same reason, it can be assumed, France was being stubborn about signing the treaty because it felt that it was to vague on England's stance on the war and what they would do themselves if Belgian neutrality was jeopardized. Despite France's initial worries and military defeats France signed the treaty two days after Prussia did, thus preserving Belgian neutrality. England had now committed itself to a definitive course of action based on the future contingency of the Franco-Prussian War. The signing of the Belgian Draft treaty marked a revolutionary change in British diplomacy.

This was the first ever treaty to be signed to protect against future, possible events and it could not of come at a better time for England because of the situation at hand with their army and navy. England was happy with the results of the Belgian Draft treaty and their next course of action in the Franco Prussian war was simple, strict neutrality. Strict neutrality between the battling super powers was to be England's course of action at all costs and this strategy was almost blown out of the water when there was a possibility of Denmark and Italy joining the French effort, along with another rumor of Austria joining forces with France as well. However, the Austrian rumor was short lived after more successful Prussian military successes. All these rumors had started to get Bismarck and Prussia mildly concerned about what France was up to and asked England for her help. England declined and maintained the neutral stance they had set out to maintain and this caused Prussia to accuse England of a preference towards France.

Regardless of these attacks on English character England maintained its neutral stance. The Franco-Prussian war was now coming to an end as it was obvious Prussia was the clear victor in the battles. England's next and final role of the war was to mediate discussions of Prussian armistice. The Prussian armistice consisted of France yielding the territories of Strasbourg, Toul and Verdun, which England agreed to as fair terms, however, the demand for the French territory of Alsace and Lorraine troubled England deeply. The English concern was that of Bismarck's unscrupulous, cynical and cruel policies. There concern was based on how vulnerable France would be to Prussia, and a soon to be a untied German Confederation, if Prussia chose to attack again and in the English opinion the first object of a peace treaty should be to prevent the break out of future war.

However, despite best efforts it was apparent that Prussia wanted to crush France and by sticking to the neutral stance that they had used throughout the entire war, and lacking the manpower to do otherwise, it was obvious that the diplomatic efforts of England to preserve peace in Europe while maintaining a strong economy were simply not enough. During the mid to late nineteenth century in England foreign policy was dedicated to peace and governing a Nation that was dedicated to initiating, with the industrial revolution as an influence, a strong and stable economic presence in the world. Thus, peace and prosperity was what England was all about, this is apparent in its lack of an army, and explains why when war broke out in Europe they put their best diplomatic effort into preventing huge disaster. One huge disaster was that of Belgium losing neutrality. Consequently, England did realize that during Belgium's time of need, on several different occasions, that peace was not only necessary for herself, but for that of her "dear friend". However, the cartoon does represent a much stronger image of England as a protector of Belgium than what actually occurred in the protection process.

In conclusion, England's efforts to maintain the perpetual neutrality of Belgium can be described as compliant at best, but honorable and successful in her efforts.

Bibliography

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