A Modern Crusade?

War Profile: Crimean War (1854 - 1855)

During the year 1850 in Europe, tensions were high. Two years earlier, revolutions had broken out in France, Prussia, and the Austrian Empire. The conservatives (pro-monarchists) wanted to keep the status quo of the previous 35 years, set up by the Congress of Vienna. But there was one big problem: Russia.

Emperor Louis Napoleon III, of France, was itching for a war. He craved the glory that his near-mythical uncle had gained. France had been under a watchful eye since Napoleon Bonaparte's final defeat in 1815, and thus it was severely weakened. Napoleon III wanted to bring France back to the European forefront as a key power.

Napoleon III set his eyes on Russia, which was perceived as a threat by the rest of Europe. The enormous nation was expanding rapidly, and the Ottoman Empire was threatened by this expansion; the Ottomans had long been Europe's tolerable neighbors, too weak to pose a threat to European sovereignty. But, if the Ottomans fell to Russia, the balance of power in Europe would be in jeopardy.

When Catherine the Great severely beat the Ottomans in skirmishes, Frederick the Great of Prussia avoided an all-out European war by averting attention on Poland, partitioning it between Prussia, Russia, and Austria. This occurred during the late 1700s.

Now Louis Napoleon III saw a chance to pick a fight with a nation that was loathed by the rest of Europe. He could turn the negative spotlight off of France and make it look like France cared for the well-being of the Continent.

Napoleon's reasons for going to war were political, but he masked them with religion. Russia had long been the protector of the Eastern Orthodox religion, and France had been the self-proclaimed protector of Roman Catholicism. If the Ottoman Empire fell to Russia, Russia would have influence over the Holy Lands and thus curtail Roman Catholic interests.

The Ottomans placed the Holy Lands under French control in 1851, angering the Russians, who agitated a war by claiming Eastern Orthodox citizens of the Ottoman Empire were being oppressed. Russia immediately seized the Ottoman territories of Wallachia and Moldavia. War erupted between the Ottoman Empire and Russia; the Ottomans were helped by the geography (Russia had to have access to three straits to reach the Mediterranean), but the Russian navy appeared to be winning.

Britain had long been concerned with keeping Russia out of the Mediterranean. Britain had interests there, as the Mediterranean was Britain's easiest access to its colony in India. Britain, France, and the Ottoman Empire formed an alliance against Russia, which promptly claimed that the war was an accident and placed Wallachia and Moldavia under the control of Austria, a neutral nation throughout the conflict.

The Crimean War started in 1854, with the goal of weakening Russia's presence in the Black Sea. Britain and France formed a naval blockade of Russian bases on the Crimean peninsula, but the water around Crimea was too shallow for the large military vessels. An invasion was needed. The main points of the war was the siege of Sevastopol, where the British and French besieged the Russians at that city. One in ten soldiers sent to Crimea actually made it there alive. Russia, as well as the allies, suffered enormous casualties. Russia itself lost millions of soldiers.

The war was a sad affair, poorly conducted by all sides. The French commander was incompetent, and the British commander Lord Raglan (an aid to Wellington in 1815) was senile (at a meeting with French officers, he exclaimed that they were going to beat the French). Raglan would die of disease at Sevastopol. Disease was the main killer of soldiers during the Crimean War. The British Charge of the Light Brigade, celebrated by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, was a result of military incompentence.

Sevastopol fell in September 1855, and Austria threatened to enter the war for the allies, so Russia cried uncle. The Treaty of Paris of 1856 left everyone feeling cheated: Russia gave up its claims over the Holy Land and gave up the Black Sea bases. The 39 years of peace established by the Congress of Vienna ended, and distrust arose among the major European nations.

The sole winner in the war was Piedmont and Sardinia, a small nation led by Count Camillo Cavour (later to gain prominence in Italian unification). They entered the war despite having no stake in it, and gained the trust of the European allies. At the post-war negotiations, Piedmont and Sardinia gained little territory, but it did get Britain and France's indebtedness and goodwill.

The biggest loser was neutral Austria, which was alienated by the angry allies, who felt Austria should have helped them. Russia was left with a bad taste in its mouth concerning Austria. Thus, Austria had no friends in Europe after the war, having lost all of Europe's goodwill.

France became isolated, and gained the suspicion of Britain. Napoleon III did get his wish: France was once again a preeminent European power. Britain's government suffered from the fiasco at Crimea: public opinion was very negative due to battlefield photographers, who captured the horrors of war on film.

The only positive outcome of the war was in the future of Italy. Piedmont and Sardinia, under clever Cavour, would lead the way to Italian unification in 1861.

Source: Lecture by Dr. Ralph S. Hattox, Elliott Professor of History at Hampden-Sydney College, Wikipedia