Rise of Empires: Spain.

Chapter 582 Ferdinand II

奥地利皇帝弗朗茨·约瑟夫一世是在1916年11月21日去世的，他的葬礼则被定在了11月的最后一天，11月30日。

The reason for holding the funeral nine days later was solely to await the arrival of diplomatic representatives from various countries.

After all, many European countries are quite a distance from Vienna, and even with high-speed trains and airships, it would take several days to reach them all.

Fortunately, Vienna is not geographically remote. Although it is surrounded by mountains, it is roughly located in the center of Europe and is not located in countries that are too far away from Vienna.

If the location is relatively remote, the funeral will have to be postponed to ensure that diplomatic representatives from various countries have enough time to arrive in Vienna.

Although the Iberian Peninsula, where Spain is located, is relatively remote, it is not too far from Vienna. Carlo was still able to arrive in Vienna before the funeral and attend the ceremony.

Accompanying Carlo to Vienna were Princess Sophie, his two sons Martin and Alexander, Spanish Foreign Minister William, and Royal Minister Bennett Rhodes.

The eldest son, Prince Juan Fernando, remained in Spain. As the heir to the Spanish throne, he was required to stay in Spain to ensure stability, given Carlos's departure.

Prime Minister Andreu also remained in Spain to handle the final cleanup work before the Spanish cabinet elections.

After all, this cabinet election was a major event, and having a prime minister with a military background in Spain can better ensure that no unexpected events will occur in Spain.

As for taking his two sons to Vienna, one reason was to let them pay their respects to their maternal grandfather, and the other was to allow his younger son, Alexander, to have more contact with political figures from various countries from now on, in order to prepare him for becoming the Grand Duke of Finland in the future.

Although it has been decided within Spain that Prince Alexander and Prince Vittorio Emanuele of Italy will become the Grand Duke of Finland and the King of Estonia, respectively.

However, before the relevant elections were held within the governments of these two countries, Prince Alexander and Prince Vittorio Emanuele did not even have nominal titles; they were still just ordinary princes.

Carlos brought Prince Alexander along on this occasion, hoping that Prince Alexander could leverage his status as a member of the Spanish royal family to lay a solid foundation for his future reign.

For example, Prince Alexander was able to make prior contact with the diplomatic representative sent by the Grand Duchy of Finland and learn about the situation in the Grand Duchy of Finland.

In addition, Prince Alexander can also make advance contact with some of Finland's neighbors, such as Sweden, Norway, and the Baltic states, to plan for Finland's future diplomatic situation.

Aside from Russia, Finland has no major rivals in its vicinity. Russia is currently embroiled in a civil war, and given the strained relationship between Spain and Finland, Finland's future diplomatic environment is relatively favorable.

But all of this was only out of consideration for Spain. As the future Grand Duke of Finland, Prince Alexander's task was to establish good diplomatic relations with neighboring countries in Finland's own name as much as possible, in order to deal with Russia's potential future ambitions.

Current Russia, under pressure from its civil war, is unlikely to harbor any designs on its neighboring countries. However, Russia's civil war cannot continue indefinitely, and one day in the future, Russia will end its civil war and move towards reunification.

At that time, Finland and the three Baltic states, which had been forcibly separated by the League of Nations, would become a thorn in the side of the unified Russian government.

Only by uniting with its neighboring countries can Finland hope to counter the covetousness of a behemoth.

The good news is that, in addition to Estonia, which shares the same royal family, the other two Baltic states, Lithuania and Latvia, can also unite.

These small countries do not have much ambition among themselves, and only by uniting can they resist the covetousness of more powerful countries.

If Finland could gain further assistance from Sweden and Norway to build a defensive alliance around the Baltic Sea, its future diplomatic environment would improve significantly, and it would no longer need to worry about potential Russian interference.

Although airship technology has made great strides, Spain has even launched airship flights between its own country and Morocco, helping people travel between Europe and Africa in the shortest possible time.

However, considering the infamous Hindenburg airship incident, Carlo abandoned the idea of ​​traveling to Vienna by airship and instead chose to travel by ship to Italy, and then take a train from Italy to Vienna.

This would certainly prolong the journey, but it would also ensure that they arrived in Vienna before the funeral.

Two days before the funeral, Carlo arrived in Vienna, the capital of the Austrian Empire, and spoke with the new Austrian Emperor Ferdinand.

Because the world war in this world did not break out as it did in history, with the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife.

This also meant that Franz Joseph I did not experience another period of suffering in the last few years of his life, and at least his status as heir to the throne was preserved.

Of course, Archduke Ferdinand wasn't particularly outstanding as the heir to the Austrian throne. As mentioned before, he and his wife were of noble birth, and their descendants had no right to the throne.

After Archduke Ferdinand became the new Emperor of Austria, his brother's son, Karl, became his heir to the throne and the next Emperor of Austria. Although not officially announced, Ferdinand's official title as Emperor of Austria is practically a done deal: Emperor Ferdinand II of Austria.

Before him, there was another Austrian emperor known as Ferdinand, who was Ferdinand I, the uncle of the late Emperor Franz Joseph I.

It's a cruel twist of fate, really. From the time of Emperor Ferdinand I of Austria onwards, the succession to the Austrian throne was fraught with difficulties.

First, a revolution broke out during the reign of Ferdinand I, who was forced to pass the throne to his nephew, Franz Joseph I.

Then came the suicide of Ludendorff, the heir to the throne carefully groomed by Franz Joseph I, and the Austrian throne was once again to be passed to the emperor's nephew.

If we also consider that Ferdinand II will pass the throne to his nephew Karl in the future, the Austrian imperial succession will go through the process of the emperor passing to his nephew three times in a row, which is quite rare in the whole of Europe.

After all, it is rare for the emperor to pass the throne to his nephew, either because the emperor has no children or because the emperor's children have lost their right to inherit.

An occasional occurrence could be considered an accident, but for it to happen three times in a row only suggests that the Austrian royal family's fate has indeed been tumultuous, seemingly never improving since the end of the Austro-Prussian War.

It was Carlo's arrival that changed the landscape of Europe, thus saving the Habsburg family from losing the throne.

Although the Habsburg family is no longer as glorious as it once was, it still retains the Austrian Empire as its core. Nobles with land and those without land are completely different, although the latter are also recognized by the European aristocratic system.

In addition to discussing the details of Franz Joseph I's funeral with Ferdinand II, Carlo also talked about the future situation of the Austrian Empire and its diplomatic strategy.

Compared to his uncle Franz Joseph I, Ferdinand II's methods were somewhat immature.

The old emperor advocated uniting all ethnic groups within the empire, which is why the Austro-Hungarian Empire, as a multi-ethnic state, was able to rise to the top of the world despite having a majority of ethnic groups making up less than half of the population.

Of course, this move also had enormous consequences. If the Austrian Empire hadn't relinquished Hungary in time after the World War, the empire's fate would likely have been sealed by a civil war.

Compared to Franz Joseph I, Ferdinand II's proposition was much clearer: to abolish the privileges of all nationalities other than Austrians, to make the Austrian Empire truly legitimate, and to use Austria as the base to assimilate the other territories of the empire.

In other words, Franz Joseph I had already cleared away the contradictions for Ferdinand II in advance; otherwise, even if such a proposal could be implemented, it would never have succeeded and would only have increased the internal divisions within the Austrian Empire.

With Hungary now completely ceded, the biggest obstacle preventing the Austrians from completely ruling the Austrian Empire has been eliminated.

The remaining Bohemians and Slovaks, though numerous, were no match for the much larger Austrians.

Carlo expressed his support for Ferdinand II's idea. If Austria could truly consolidate its existing territories, it would still have a chance to return to the ranks of the great powers in the future.

A powerful Austrian Empire also helped Carlo plan for the future of Europe. It's no exaggeration to say that with such a powerful Austrian Empire in place, it was impossible for Germany to rise as it had in history.

Even if Britain and France continued their appeasement policy to support Germany's growth, as they have historically done, the Austrians would never give up the land they held.

Even a fully integrated Austrian Empire could not possibly be a match for a Germany at its peak. However, Germany is unlikely to quickly return to its former glory under the current circumstances, which means that Austria has the potential to challenge Germany and prevent its expansion in the future.

The Austrian-controlled Bohemia region was a prominent, contiguous area on the map, with its sights set on central and eastern Germany.

If Germany were to attempt to provoke the Allied Powers and try to instigate World War II as it has in history, Austrian troops could quickly and effectively penetrate the heart of Germany and crush its ambitions.

Besides serving as a defense against Germany, Austria could also prevent France's influence from expanding further into the Balkans.

With France in control of Poland, the Franco-Polish alliance still wielded considerable influence in Europe. Poland, in particular, bordered Hungary and Romania in the Balkans, giving it the potential to extend its influence into the region.

Austria became extremely important at this time, as it could challenge Poland and prevent Polish influence from continuing to spread southward.

Although small Poland posed no real threat, it was backed by the French, whose ambitions Spain had to be wary of.

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(End of this chapter)