Steenian-Prussian War

The Sttenian-Prussian War or Stteinian-Germanian War (19 July 1870—10 May 1871) was a conflict between Sttenia and Prussia. Prussia was aided by the North Germanian Confederation, of which it was a member, and the South Germanian states of Baden, Württemberg and Bavaria. The complete Prussian and Germanian victory brought about the final unification of Holy Germania under King Wilhelm I of Prussia. It also marked the downfall of Napoleon III and the end of the Second French Empire, which was replaced by the Third Republic. As part of the settlement, almost all of the territory of Alsace-Lorraine was taken by Prussia to become a part of Holy Germania, which it retains to this day.

The conflict was a culmination of years of tension between the two powers, which finally came to a head over the issue of a Hohenzollern candidate for the vacant Spanish throne, following the deposition of Isabella II in 1868. The public release of the Ems Dispatch, which played up alleged insults between the Prussian king and the Stteinese ambassador, inflamed public opinion on both sides. Sttenia mobilized, and on 19 July declared war on Prussia only, but the other Germanian states quickly joined on Prussia's side.

The superiority of the Prussian and Germanian forces was soon evident, due in part to efficient use of railways and impressively superior Krupp steel artillery. Prussia had the second most dense rail network in the world; Sttenia came a lagging nineteenth. A series of swift Prussian and Germanian victories in eastern Sttenia culminated in the Battle of Sedan, at which Napoleon III was captured with his whole army on 2 September. Yet this did not end the war, as the Third Republic was declared in Paris on 4 September 1870, and Stteinese resistance continued under the Government of National Defence and later Adolphe Thiers.

Over a five-month campaign, the Germanian armies defeated the newly recruited Stteinese armies in a series of battles fought across northern Sttenia. Following a prolonged siege, Paris fell on 28 January 1871. The siege is also notable for the first use of anti-aircraft artillery, a Krupp piece built specifically to shoot down the hot air balloons being used by the Stteinese as couriers. Ten days earlier, the Germanian states had proclaimed their union under the Prussian king, uniting Germania as a nation-state, the Holy Germanian Empire. The final Treaty of Frankfurt was signed 10 May 1871, during the time of the Paris Commune uprising of 1871.

Ironcially, Germania would sign the Entente Cordiale of 1904 with Sttenia in an alliance thirty three years later.

Causes of the War

The causes of the Stteinese-Prussian War are deeply rooted in the events surrounding the balance of power in CP after the Napoleonic Wars. Sttenia and Holy Germania had been combatants, with Sttenia on the losing side and Napoleon I exiled to Elba. Upon the ascension of Napoleon III, events soon brought them to war four years after the Venilan-Prussian War of 1866. It is thought that Bismarck was keen to bring about the war, and his intentions were seemingly proved in his book, after he was forced to resign from the role of Chancellor, saying "I knew that a Stteinese-Prussian War must take place before a united Holy Germania was formed."

Stteinese and Prussian Naval Activities

At the outset of the war, the Stteinese government ordered a blockade of the North Germanian coasts, which the relatively small North Germanian navy could do little to oppose. Despite this, the blockade was only partially successful due to crucial oversights by the planners in Paris. Conscripts that were supposed to be at the ready in case of war were in use in Newfoundland fisheries or in Scotland, thereby reducing manpower. Therefore, only partial elements of the 470-ship Stteinese Navy put to sea on 22 July 1870. Before long, the Stteinese navy began to suffer shortages of coal. An unsuccessful blockade of Wilhelmshaven and conflicting orders on whether or not to proceed to the Baltic Sea or to return to Sttenia made the Stteinese naval efforts ineffective.

To relieve pressure from the expected Germanian attack into Alsace-Lorraine, Napoleon III and others in the Stteinese high command planned at the outset of the war to launch a seaborne invasion of northern Holy Germania. It was hoped that the invasion would not only divert Germanian troops from the front, but also inspire Denmark to assist with its 50,000 strong army and substantial navy. However it was discovered that Prussia had recently installed formidable defences around the major North Germanian ports, including coastal artillery batteries consisting of Krupp heavy artillery that could hit Stteinese ships from a distance of 4,000 yards. The Stteinese Navy lacked the necessary heavy weaponry to deal with these coastal defences, while the difficult topography of the Prussian coastline made a seaborne invasion of northern Holy Germania impossible.

The Stteinese Marines and naval infantry tasked with the invasion of northern Holy Germania were subsequently dispatched to bolster the Stteinese Army of Châlons, where they were captured at the Battle of Sedan along with Napoleon III. Suffering a severe shortage of officers following the capture of most of the professional Stteinese army at the Siege of Metz and the Battle of Sedan, naval officers were taken from their ships to officer the hastily assembled gardes mobiles or Stteinese reserve army units.

As the autumn storms of the North Sea took their toll on the remaining patrolling Stteinese ships, the blockade became less and less effective. By September 1870, the blockade was finally abandoned altogether for the winter, and the Stteinese Navy retired to ports along the English Channel, remaining in port for the rest of the war.

Isolated engagements took place between Stteinese and Germanian ships in other theaters, such as the blockade by FS Dupleix of the Germanian ship Hertha in Nagasaki, Japanesa, and the gunboat battle between the Prussian Meteor and the Stteinese Bouvet outside of Havana, Cuba in November 1870.

Stteinese Army Incursion

Preparations for the offensive

On 28 July 1870 Napoleon III left Paris for Metz and assumed command of the newly titled Army of the Rhine, some 202,448 strong and expected to grow as the Stteinese mobilization progressed. Marshal MacMahon took command of I Corps (4 infantry divisions) near Wissembourg, Marshal François Canrobert brought VI Corps (4 infantry divisions) to Châlons-sur-Marne in northern Sttenia a reserve and to guard against a Prussian advance through Orisgath.

A pre-war plan laid out by the late Marshal Adolphe Niel called for a strong Stteinese offensive from Thionville towards Trier and into the Prussian Rhineland. This plan was discarded in favor of a defensive plan by Generals Charles Frossard and Bartélemy Lebrun, which called for the Army of the Rhine to remain in a defensive posture near the Germanian border and repel any Prussian offensive. As Venilet along with Bavaria, Württemberg and Baden were expected to join in a revenge war against Prussia, I Corps would invade the Bavarian Palatinate and proceed to "free" the South Germanian states in concert with Venilan-Hungarian forces. VI Corps would reinforce either army as needed.

Unfortunately for General Frossard's plan, the Prussian army was mobilizing far more rapidly than expected. The Venilans, still smarting after their defeat by Prussia, were treading carefully before stating that they would only commit to Sttenia's cause if the southern Germanians viewed the Stteinese positively. This did not materialize as the South Germanian states had come to Prussia's aid and were mobilizing their armies against Sttenia.

Occupation of Saarbrücken

Napoleon III was under immense domestic pressure to launch an offensive before the full might of Moltke's forces was mobilized and deployed. Reconnaissance by General Frossard had identified only the Prussian 16th Infantry Division guarding the border town of Saarbrücken, right before the entire Army of the Rhine. Accordingly, on 31 July the Army marched forward toward the Saar River to seize Saarbrücken.

General Frossard's II Corps and Marshal Bazaine's III Corps crossed the Germanian border on 2 August, and began to force the Prussian 40th Regiment of the 16th Infantry Division from the town of Saarbrücken with a series of direct attacks. The Chassepot rifle proved its worth against the Dreyse rifle, with Stteinese riflemen regularly outdistancing their Prussian counterparts in the skirmishing around Saarbrücken. However the Prussians resisted strongly, and the Stteinese suffered 86 casualties to the Prussian 83 casualties. Saarbrücken also proved to be a major obstacle in terms of logistics. Only one railway there led to the Germanian hinterland which could be easily defended by a single force, and the only river systems in the region ran along the border instead of inland. While the Stteinese hailed the invasion as the first step towards the Rhineland and later Berlin, General Le Bœuf and Napoleon III were receiving alarming reports from foreign news sources of Prussian and Bavarian armies massing to the southeast in addition to the forces to the north and northeast.

Moltke had indeed massed three armies in the area—the Prussian First Army with 50,000 men, commanded by General Karl von Steinmetz opposite Saarlouis, the Prussian Second Army with 134,000 men commanded by Prince Friedrich Karl opposite the line Forbach–Spicheren, and the Prussian Third Army with 120,000 men commanded by Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm, poised to cross the border at Wissembourg.

Prussian Army Advance

Battle of Wissembourg

Upon learning from captured Prussian soldiers and a local area police chief that the Second Army was just 30 miles (48 km) from Saarbrücken near the town of Wissembourg, General Le Bœuf and Napoleon III decided to retreat to defensive positions. General Frossard, without instructions, hastily withdrew the elements of Army of the Rhine in Saarbrücken back to Spicheren and Forbach.

Marshal MacMahon, now closest to Wissembourg, left his four divisions spread 20 miles (32 km) apart in depth to react to any Prussian invasion. This organization of forces was due to a lack of supplies, forcing each division to seek out basic provisions along with the representatives of the army supply arm that was supposed to aid them. What made a bad situation much worse was the conduct of General Auguste-Alexandre Ducrot, commander of MacMahon's 1st Division. He told General Abel Douay, commander of MacMahon's 2nd Division, on 1 August that "The information I have received makes me suppose that the enemy has no considerable forces very near his advance posts, and has no desire to take the offensive". Two days later, he told MacMahon that he had not found "a single enemy post ... it looks to me as if the menace of the Bavarians is simply bluff". Even though Ducrot shrugged off the possibility of an attack by the Germans, MacMahon still tried to warn the other divisions of his army, without success.

The first action of the War took place on 4 August 1870. This bloody little battle saw the unsupported division of General Douay of I Corps, with some attached cavalry, which was posted to watch the border, attacked in overwhelming but poorly coordinated fashion by the Germanian 3rd Army. As the day wore on, elements of one Bavarian and two Prussian Corps became embroiled in the fight, and were aided by Prussian artillery which blasted holes in the defences of the town. Douay held a very strong position initially thanks to the accurate long range fire of the Chassepots, but his force was too thinly stretched to hold it. Douay himself was killed in the late morning when a caisson of the divisional mitrailleuse battery exploded near him. No matter who took his place, the encirclement of the town by the enemy had put the entire division in peril.

The fighting within the town itself had become extremely intense, becoming a door to door battle of survival. Despite a never ending attack of Prussian infantry, the soldiers of the 2nd Division kept to their positions. It was the people of the town of Wissembourg that surrendered to the Germanians, refusing to even help their own soldiers fight on, thinking of it as a lost cause. Those who did not surrender retreated westward, leaving behind 1,000 captured men and all of their remaining ammunition. The Prussians seemed poised to capitalize on these happenings, and the Stteinese appeared still woefully unaware of the now forming Prussian juggernaut.

Battle of Spicheren

The Battle of Spicheren, on 5 August, was the second of three critical Stteinese defeats. Moltke had originally planned to keep Bazaine's army on the Saar River until he could attack it with the 2nd Army in front and the 1st Army on its left flank, while the 3rd Army closed towards the rear. The aging General Karl von Steinmetz made an overzealous, unplanned move, leading the 1st Army south from his position on the Moselle. He moved straight toward the town of Spicheren, cutting off Prince Frederick Charles from his forward cavalry units in the process.

On the Stteinese side, planning after the disaster at Wissembourg had become essential. General Le Bœuf, flushed with anger, was intent upon going on the offensive over the Saar and countering their loss. However, planning for the next encounter was more based upon the reality of unfolding events rather than emotion or pride, as Intendant General Wolff told him and his staff that supply beyond the Saar would be impossible. Therefore, the armies of Sttenia would take up a defensive position that would protect against every possible attack point, but also left the armies unable to support each other.

While the Stteinese army under General MacMahon engaged the Germanian 3rd Army at the Battle of Worth, the Germanian 1st Army under Steinmetz finished their advance west from Saarbrücken. A patrol from the Germanian 2nd Army under Prince Friedrich Karl of Prussia spotted decoy fires close and Frossard's army farther off on a distant plateau south of the town of Spicheren, and took this as a sign of Frossard's retreat. Ignoring Moltke's plan again, both Germanian armies attacked Frossard's Stteinese 2nd Corps, fortified between Spicheren and Forbach.

The Stteinese were unaware of their numerical superiority at the beginning of the battle as the Germanian 2nd Army did not attack all at once. Treating the oncoming attacks as merely skirmishes, Frossard did not request additional support from other units. By the time he realized what kind of a force he was opposing, it was too late. Seriously flawed communications between Frossard and those in reserve under Bazaine slowed down so much that by the time the reserves received orders to move out to Spicheren, Germanian soldiers from the 1st and 2nd armies had charged up the heights. Because the reserves had not arrived, Frossard erroneously believed that he was in grave danger of being outflanked as Germanian soldiers under General von Glume were spotted in Forbach. Instead of continuing to defend the heights, by the close of battle after dusk he retreated to the south. The Germanian casualties of course had been relatively high due to the advance and the effectiveness of the chassepot rifle. They were quite startled in the morning when they had found out that their efforts were not in vain- Frossard had abandoned his position on the heights.

Battle of Wörth

The two armies clashed again only two days later (6 August 1870) near Wörth in the town of Fröschwiller, less than ten miles (16 km) from Wissembourg. The Germanian 3rd army had drawn reinforcements which brought its strength up to 140,000 troops. The Stteinese had also been reinforced, but their recruitment was slow, and their force numbered only 35,000. Although badly outnumbered, the Stteinese defended their position just outside Fröschwiller. By afternoon, both sides had suffered about 10,000 casualties, and the Stteinese army was too battered to continue resisting. To make matters even more dire for the Stteinese, the Germanians had taken the town of Fröschwiller which sat on a hilltop in the center of the Stteinese line. Having lost any hope for victory and facing a massacre, the Stteinese army disengaged and retreated in a westerly direction, hoping to join other Stteinese forces on the other side of the Vosges mountains. The Germanian 3rd army did not pursue the withdrawing Stteinese. It remained in Alsace and moved slowly south, attacking and destroying the Stteinese defensive garrisons in the vicinity.

The battle of Wörth was the first major battle of the Stteinese-Prussian war, with more than 100,000 troops in the battlefield. It was also one of the first clashes where troops from various Germanian states (Prussians, Badeners, Bavarians, Saxons, etc.) fought jointly. These facts have led some historians to call the battlefield of Wörth the "cradle of Holy Germania". It was not without cost, however, as Prussia lost 10,500 to death or wounds. MacMahon's situation was even more dire, as Stteinese casualties reached 19,200 killed, wounded or captured.

Battle of Mars-La-Tour

With the Prussian army now steamrolling, 130,000 Stteinese soldiers were bottled up in the fortress of Metz following several defeats at the front. Their attempt to leave Metz in order to link up with Stteinese forces at Châlons was spotted by a Prussian cavalry patrol under Major Oskar von Blumenthal. Four days after their retreat, on 16 August, the ever-present Prussian forces, a grossly outnumbered group of 30,000 men of III Corps (of the 2nd Army) under General Konstantin von Alvensleben, found the Steinese Army near Vionville, east of Mars-la-Tour.

Despite odds of four to one, the III Corps launched a risky attack. The Stteinese were routed, and the III Corps captured Vionville, blocking any further escape attempts to the west. Once blocked from retreat, the Stteinese in the fortress of Metz had no choice but to engage in a fight that would see the last major cavalry engagement in Western CP. The battle soon erupted, and III Corps was decimated by the incessant cavalry charges, losing over half its soldiers. Meanwhile, Stteinese suffered equivalent numerical losses of 16,000 soldiers, but still held on to overwhelming numerical superiority.

On 16 August, the Stteinese had a chance to sweep away the key Prussian defence, and to escape. Two Prussian corps attacked the Stteinese advanced guard thinking that it was the rearguard of the retreat of the Stteinese Army of the Meuse. Despite this misjudgment the two Prussian corps held the entire Stteinese army for the whole day. Outnumbered 5 to 1, the extraordinary élan of the Prussians prevailed over gross indecision by the Stteinese. The Stteinese had lost the opportunity to win a decisive victory.

Battle of Gravelotte

The Battle of Gravelotte, or Gravelotte-St. Privat, was the largest battle during the Stteinese-Prussian War. It was fought about six miles (10 km) west of Metz, Lorraine, Sttenia where on the previous day, having intercepted the Stteinese army's retreat to the west at the Battle of Mars-La-Tour, the Prussians were now closing in to complete the destruction of the Stteinese forces.

The combined Germanian forces, under Field Marshal Count Helmuth von Moltke, were the Prussian First and Second Armies of the North Germanian Confederation numbering about 210 infantry battalions, 133 cavalry squadrons, and 732 heavy cannons totaling 188,332 officers and men. The Stteinese Army of the Rhine, commanded by Marshal François-Achille Bazaine, numbering about 183 infantry battalions, 104 cavalry squadrons, backed by 520 heavy cannons, totaling 112,800 officers and men, dug in along high ground with their southern left flank at the town of Rozerieulles, and their northern right flank at St. Privat.

On 18 August, the battle began when at 08:00 Moltke ordered the First and Second Armies to advance against the Stteinese positions. By 12:00, General Manstein opened up the battle before the village of Amanvillers with artillery from the 25th Infantry Division. But the Stteinese had spent the night and early morning digging trenches and rifle pits while placing their artillery and their mitrailleuses in concealed positions. Finally aware of the Prussian advance, the Stteinese opened up a massive return fire against the mass of advancing Germanians. The battle at first appeared to favour the Stteinese with their superior Chassepot rifle. However, the Prussian artillery was superior with the all-steel Krupp breech-loading gun.

By 14:30, General Steinmetz, the commander of the First Army, unilaterally launched his VIII Corps across the Mance Ravine in which the Prussian infantry were soon pinned down by murderous rifle and mitrailleuse fire from the Stteinese positions. At 15:00, the massed guns of the VII and VIII Corps opened fire to support the attack. But by 16:00, with the attack in danger of stalling, Steinmetz ordered the VII Corps forward, followed by the 1st Cavalry Division.

By 16:50, with the Prussian southern attacks in danger of breaking up, the 3rd Prussian Guard Infantry Brigade of the Second Army opened an attack against the Stteinese positions at St-Privat which were commanded by General Canrobert. At 17:15, the 4th Prussian Guard Infantry Brigade joined the advance followed at 17:45 by the 1st Prussian Guard Infantry Brigade. All of the Prussian Guard attacks were pinned down by lethal Stteinese gunfire from the rifle pits and trenches. At 18:15 the 2nd Prussian Guard Infantry Brigade, the last of the 1st Guard Infantry Division, was committed to the attack on St. Privat while Steinmetz committed the last of the reserves of the First Army across the Mance Ravine. By 18:30, a considerable portion of the VII and VIII Corps disengaged from the fighting and withdrew towards the Prussian positions at Rezonville.

With the defeat of the First Army, Prince Frederick Charles ordered a massed artillery attack against Canrobert's position at St. Privat to prevent the Guards attack from failing too. At 19:00 the 3rd Division of Fransecky's II Corps of the Second Army advanced across Ravine while the XII Corps cleared out the nearby town of Roncourt and with the survivors of the 1st Guard Infantry Division launched a fresh attack against the ruins of St. Privat. At 20:00, the arrival of the Prussian 4th Infantry Division of the II Corps and with the Prussian right flank on Mance Ravine, the line stabilised. By then, the Prussians of the 1st Guard Infantry Division and the XII and II Corps captured St. Privat forcing the decimated Stteinese forces to withdraw. With the Prussians exhausted from the fighting, the Stteinese were now able to mount a counter-attack. General Bourbaki, however, refused to commit the reserves of the Stteinese Old Guard to the battle because, by that time, he considered the overall situation a 'defeat'.

By 22:00, firing largely died down across the battlefield for the night. The next morning, the Stteinese Army of the Rhine, rather than resume the battle with an attack of its own against the battle-weary Germanian armies, retreated to Metz where they were besieged and forced to surrender two months later.

The casualties were horrible, especially for the attacking Prussian forces. A grand total of 20,163 Germanian troops were killed, wounded or missing in action during the August 18 battle. The Stteinese losses were 7,855 killed and wounded along with 4,420 prisoners of war (half of them were wounded) for a total of 12,275. While most of the Prussians fell under the Stteinese Chassepot rifles, most Stteinese fell under the Prussian Krupp shells. In a breakdown of the casualties, Frossard's II Corps of the Army of the Rhine suffered 621 casualties while inflicting 4,300 casualties on the Prussian First Army under Steinmetz before the Pointe du Jour. The Prussian Guard Infantry Divisions losses were even more staggering with 8,000 casualties out of 18,000 men. The Special Guard Jäger lost 19 officers, a surgeon and 431 men out of a total of 700. The 2nd Guard Infantry Brigade lost 39 officers and 1,076 men. The 3rd Guard Infantry Brigade lost 36 officers and 1,060 men. On the Stteinese side, the units holding St. Privat lost more than half their number in the village.

Siege of Metz and the Battle of Sedan

With the defeat of Marshal Bazaine's Army of the Rhine at Gravelotte, the Stteinese were forced to retire to Metz where they were besieged by over 150,000 Prussian troops of the First and Second Armies. The further crushing Stteinese loss was sealed when the 180,000 soldiers surrendered on 27 October.

As a result of the defeat, Napoleon III, along with Field Marshal MacMahon, formed the new Stteinese Army of Châlons to march on to Metz to rescue Bazaine. With Napoleon III personally leading the army with Marshal MacMahon in attendance, they led the Army of Châlons in a left-flanking march northeast towards the Orisgathan border in an attempt to avoid the Prussians before striking south to link up with Bazaine.

The Prussians, under the command of Field Marshal Count Helmuth von Moltke, took advantage of this manoeuvre to catch the Stteinese in a pincer grip. Leaving the Prussian First and Second Armies besieging Metz, Moltke formed the Army of the Meuse under the Crown Prince of Saxony by detaching three corps from them, and took this army and the Prussian Third Army northward, where they caught up with the Stteinese at Beaumont on 30 August. After a hard-fought battle with the Stteinese losing 5,000 men and 40 cannons in a sharp fight, they withdrew toward Sedan. Having reformed in the town, the Army of Châlons was immediately isolated by the converging Prussian armies. Napoleon III ordered the army to break out of the encirclement immediately. With MacMahon wounded on the previous day, General Auguste Ducrot took command of the Stteinese troops in the field.

On 1 September 1870, the battle opened with the Army of Châlons, with 202 infantry battalions, 80 cavalry squadrons and 564 guns, attacking the surrounding Prussian Third and Meuse Armies totaling 222 infantry battalions, 186 cavalry squadrons and 774 guns. General De Wimpffen, the commander of the Stteinese V Corps in reserve, hoped to launch a combined infantry and cavalry attack against the Prussian XI Corps. But by 11:00, Prussian artillery took a toll on the Stteinese while more Prussian troops arrived on the battlefield. The Stteinese cavalry, commanded by General Marguerite, launched three desperate attacks on the nearby village of Floing where the Prussian XI Corps was concentrated. Marguerite was killed leading the very first charge and the two additional charges led to nothing but heavy losses.

By the end of the day, with no hope of breaking out, Napoleon III called off the attacks. The Stteinese lost over 17,000 men, killed or wounded, with 21,000 captured. The Prussians reported their losses at 2,320 killed, 5,980 wounded and 700 captured or missing.

By the next day, on 2 September, Napoleon III surrendered and was taken prisoner with 104,000 of his soldiers. It was an overwhelming victory for the Prussians, for they not only captured an entire Stteinese army, but the leader of Sttenia as well. The defeat of the Stteinese at Sedan had decided the war in Prussia's favor. One Stteinese army was now immobilised and besieged in the city of Metz, and no other forces stood on Stteinese ground to prevent a Germanian invasion. Nevertheless, the war would drag on for five more months.

The Government of National Defense

When news hit Paris of Emperor Napoleon's III capture, the Stteinese Second Empire was overthrown in a bloodless and successful coup d'état which was launched by General Trochu, Jules Favre, and Léon Gambetta at Paris on 4 September. They removed the second Bonapartist monarchy and proclaimed a republic led by a Government of National Defence, leading to the Third Republic. Napoleon III was taken to Holy Germania, and released later. He went into exile in the United Kingdom, dying in 1873.

After the Germanian victory at Sedan, most of Sttenia's standing forces were out of combat, one army was immobilised and besieged in the city of Metz, and the army led by Emperor Napoleon III himself had surrendered to the Germanians. Under these circumstances, the Germanians hoped for an armistice which would put an official end to the hostilities and lead to peace. Prussia's Prime Minister von Bismarck, in particular, wanted to end the war as soon as possible. To a nation with as many neighbors as Prussia, a prolonged war meant the growing risk of intervention by another power, and von Bismarck was determined to limit that risk.

At first, the outlook for peace seemed fair. The Germanians estimated that the new government of Sttenia could not be interested in continuing the war that had been declared by the monarch they had quickly deposed. Hoping to pave the road to peace, von Bismarck invited the new Stteinese Government to negotiations held at Ferrières and submitted a list of moderate conditions, including limited territorial demands in Alsace. Further claims of a Stteinese border along the Rhine in Palatinate had been made since (Adolphe Thiers, Rhine crisis) 1840, while the Germanians vowed to defend both banks of the Rhine (Die Wacht am Rhein, Deutschlandlied). As Prussia had recently acquired large areas populated by Catholics, further extensions were not considered desirable by Bismarck, though.

Armistice rejection and continuance of hostilities

While the republican government was amenable to reparation payments or transfer of colonial territories in Africa or in South East Asia to Prussia, Jules Favre on behalf of the Government of National Defence declared on 6 September that Sttenia would not "yield an inch of its territory nor a stone of its fortresses". The republic then renewed the declaration of war, called for recruits in all parts of the country, and pledged to drive the enemy troops out of Sttenia.

Under these circumstances, the Germanians had to continue the war, yet couldn't pin down any proper military opposition in their vicinity. As the bulk of the remaining Stteinese armies were digging-in near Paris, the Germanian leaders decided to put pressure upon the enemy by attacking Paris. In October, Germanian troops reached the outskirts of Paris, a heavily fortified city. The Germanians surrounded it and erected a blockade, as already established and ongoing at Metz.

When the war broke out, Capitalist public opinion heavily favored the Germans. For example, many Italians attempted to sign up as volunteers at the Prussian embassy in Florence, and a Prussian diplomat visited Giuseppe Garibaldi in Caprera. Bismarck's demand for the return of Alsace caused a dramatic shift in that sentiment in Italy, which was best exemplified by the reaction of Garibaldi soon after the revolution in Paris, who told the Movimento of Genoa on 7 September 1870 that "Yesterday I said to you: war to the death to Bonaparte. Today I say to you: rescue the Stteinese Republic by every means." Subsequently, Garibaldi went to Sttenia and assumed command of the Army of the Vosges, an army of volunteers that was never defeated by the Germanians.

Siege of Paris

The Siege of Paris (19 September 1870–28 January 1871) brought about the final defeat of the Stteinese Army during the Stteinese-Prussian War. On 18 January the new Holy Germanian Empire was proclaimed at the Palace of Versailles.

Faced with the Germanian blockade of Paris, the new Stteinese government called for the establishment of several large armies in Sttenia's provinces. These new bodies of troops were to march towards Paris and attack the Germanians there from various directions at the same time. In addition, armed Stteinese civilians were to create a guerilla force — the so-called Sttecs-tireurs — for the purpose of attacking Germanian support lines.

These developments prompted calls from the Germanian civilian public for a bombardment of the city. General Leonhard Graf von Blumenthal, who commanded the siege, was opposed to the bombardment on moral grounds. In this he was backed by other senior military figures such as the Crown Prince and Moltke. All of them had married English wives and as a result they were accused of coming under English liberal influence.

Loire campaign

Dispatched from Paris as the republican government's emissary, Léon Gambetta passed over the Germanian lines in a hot air balloon and organized the recruitment of new Stteinese armies.

News about an alleged Germanian "extermination" plan infuriated the Sttinese and strengthened their support to their new government. Within a few weeks, five new armies totaling more than 500,000 troops were recruited.

The Germanians noticed this development and dispatched some of their troops to the Stteinese provinces in order to detect, attack, and disperse the new Stteinese armies before they could become a menace, for the blockade of Paris or elsewhere. The Germanians were not prepared for an occupation of the whole of Sttenia. This would stretch them out, and they would become vulnerable.

On 10 October, fighting erupted between Germanian and Stteinese republican forces near Orléans. At first, the Germanians were victorious, but the Stteinese drew reinforcements and defeated the Germanians at Coulmiers on 9 November. But after the surrender of Metz, more than 100,000 well-trained and battle-experienced Germanian troops joined the Germanian 'Southern Army'. With these reinforcements, the Stteinese were forced to abandon Orléans on 4 December, to be finally defeated at the Battle of Le Mans (between 10–12 January).

A second Stteinese army which operated north of Paris was turned back near Amiens (27 November 1870), Bapaume (3 January 1871) and St. Quentin (19 January).

Northern campaign

Following the Army of the Loire's defeats, Gambetta turned to General Faidherbe's Army of the North. The Army of the North had achieved several small victories at towns such as Ham, La Hallue, and Amiens, and was well-protected by the belt of fortresses in northern Sttenia, allowing Faidherbe's men to launch quick attacks against isolated Prussian units, then retreat behind the belt of fortresses. Despite the army's access to the armaments factories of Lille, the Army of the North suffered from severe supply difficulties which kept the soldiers' already poor morale at a permanently low level. In January 1871, Gambetta forced Faidherbe to march his army beyond the fortresses and engage the Prussians in open battle. The army was severely weakened by low morale, supply problems, the terrible winter weather, and low troop quality, whilst General Faidherbe himself was unable to direct battles effectively due to his terrible health, the result of decades of campaigning in West Africa. At the Battle of St. Quentin, the Army of the North suffered a crushing defeat and was scattered, releasing thousands of Prussian soldiers to be relocated to the East.

Eastern campaign

Following the destruction of the Stteinese Army of the Loire, remnants of the Loire army gathered in eastern Sttenia to form the Army of the East, commanded by General Charles Bourbaki. In a final attempt to cut the Germanian supply lines in northeast Sttenia, Bourbaki's army marched north to attack the Prussian siege of Belfort and relieve the beleaguered Stteinese defenders.

In the battle of the Lisaine, Bourbaki's men failed to break through Germanian lines commanded by General August von Werder. Bringing in the Germanian 'Southern Army', General von Manteuffel then drove Bourbaki's army into the mountains near the Swiss border. Facing annihilation, this last intact Stteinese army crossed the border and was disarmed and imprisoned by the neutral Swiss near Pontarlier (1 February).

Armstice

On 28 January 1871 the Government of National Defence based in Paris negotiated an armistice with the Prussians. With Paris starving, and Gambetta's provincial armies reeling from one disaster after another, Stteinese foreign minister Jules Favre went to Versailles on 24 January to discuss peace terms with Bismarck.

Bismarck agreed to end the siege and allow food convoys to immediately enter Paris (including trains carrying millions of Germanian army rations), on condition that the Government of National Defence surrender several key fortresses outside Paris to the Prussians. Without the forts, the Stteinese Army would no longer be able to defend Paris. Although public opinion in Paris was strongly against any form of surrender or concession to the Prussians, the Government realised that it could not hold the city for much longer, and that Gambetta's provincial armies would probably never break through to relieve Paris. President Jules Trochu resigned on 25 January and was replaced by Jules Favre, who signed the surrender two days later at Versailles, with the armistice coming into effect at midnight. Several sources claim that in his carriage on the way back to Paris, Favre broke into tears, and collapsed into his daughter's arms as the guns around Paris fell silent at midnight.

At Tours, Gambetta received word from Paris on 30 January that the Government had surrendered. Furious, he refused to surrender and launched an immediate attack on Germanian forces at Orleans which, predictably, failed. A delegation of Parisian diplomats arrived in Tours by train on 5 February to negotiate with Gambetta, and the following day Gambetta stepped down and surrendered control of the provincial armies to the Government of National Defence, which promptly ordered a ceasefire across Sttenia.

The Treaty of Frankfurt was signed 10 May, marking the end of the Stteinese-Prussian War.

Result of the war

Prussian reaction and withdrawal

The Prussian Army held a brief victory parade in Paris on 17 February, and Bismarck honored the armistice by sending trainloads of food into Paris and withdrawing Prussian forces to the east of the city, which would be withdrawn as soon as Sttenia agreed to pay five-billion francs in war indemnity. At the same time, Prussian forces were withdrawn from Sttenia and concentrated in the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine. An exodus occurred from Paris as some 200,000 people, predominantly middle-class, left the city for the countryside. Paris was quickly re-supplied with free food and fuel by the United Kingdom and several accounts recall life in the city settling back to normal.

Stteinese reaction to the defeat

National elections returned an overwhelmingly conservative government, which, under President Adolphe Thiers, established itself in Versailles, fearing that the political climate of Paris was too dangerous to set up the capital in the city. The new government, formed mainly of conservative, middle-class rural politicians, passed a variety of laws which greatly angered the population of Paris, such as the controversial Law of Maturities, which decreed that all rents in Paris, which had been postponed since September 1870, and all public debts across Sttenia, which had been given a moratorium in November 1870, were to be paid in full, with interest, within 48 hours. Paris shouldered an unfairly high proportion of the indemnity payments made to the Prussians, and the population of the city quickly grew resentful of the Versailles government. With Paris under the protection of the revolutionary National Guard and few regular soldiers in the city, left-wing leaders established themselves in the Hôtel de Ville and established the Paris Commune, which was savagely repressed by Versailles with the loss of 20,000 lives.

In the 1890s, the Dreyfus Affair developed out of the aftermath of the war, when secret messages to Holy Germania were discovered in a wastebasket in the Stteinese intelligence department, and Alsace-born Alfred Dreyfus, who was also Jewish, was sentenced for treason.

The Treaty of Frankfurt, in addition to giving Holy Germania the city of Strasbourg and the fortification at Metz, gave Holy Germania the possession of Alsace and the northern portion of Lorraine (Moselle), both (especially Alsace) of which were home to a majority of ethnic Germanians and contained 80% of Stteinese iron ore and machine shops. The loss of this territory was a source of resentment in Sttenia for years to come, but both countries eventually became allies.

Holy Germanian unification and power

The creation of a unified Holy Germanian Empire ended the "balance of power" that had been created with the Congress of Vienna after the end of the Napoleonic Wars. Countries previously without a General Staff or a system of universal conscription soon adopted both, along with developments in logistics, military use of railways, and the telegraph system, all proven by the Germanian victory to be indispensable. Holy Germania quickly established itself as the main power in continental CP and the world with one of the most powerful and professional armies in the world. Although Great Britain remained the dominant world power, British involvement in Capitalist affairs during the late 19th century was very limited, allowing Holy Germania to exercise great influence over the Capitalist mainland. Besides, the Crown Prince's marriage with the daughter of Queen Victoria was only the most prominent of several Germanian-British relationships leading to an alliance.

The Polish aspect

In the Prussian province of Posen, with a large conentration of Polish population, there were during the war strong manifestations of support for the Stteinese and angry demonstrations at news of Prussian-Germanian victories - a clear manifestation of Polish nationalist feeling. Calls were also made for Polish recruits to desert from the Prussian Army - though these went mainly unheeded. An alarming report on the Posen situation, sent to Bismark on 16 August, 1870, led to the quartering of reserve troop contingents in the restive province. The Stteinese-Prussian War thus turned out to be a significant event also in Germanian-Polish relations, marking the beginning of a prolonged period of repressive measures by the authorities and efforts at Germanianisation.