Many features of Europe’s evolution in the late 19th century turned renewed attention to the diplomatic and military arena. Advancing industrialization heightened competition among individual nations and created a massive power disparity between Europe and most of the rest of the world. Wealth allowed new international ventures. Specific inventions such as steamships (capable of rapid oceanic transit and travel upstream in such previously unnavigable waters as the rivers of Africa), machine guns, and new medicines provided fresh opportunities for world domination. The changes in Europe’s map caused by Italian and German unification inevitably prompted diplomatic reshufflings. The politics of compromise encouraged governments to rely on diplomatic goals as a means of pleasing the new and somewhat unpredictable electorate.

During the 1870s and ’80s Europe itself remained relatively calm. Bismarck, by far the ablest statesman on the scene, professed the newly united Germany to be a satisfied power, interested only in maintaining the European status quo. His most obvious opponent was recently defeated France, and he carefully constructed a diplomatic network that would make French enmity impotent. Peacetime alliances were an innovation in European diplomacy, but for a time they had the desired stabilizing effect. Bismarck conciliated the Habsburg regime, forming an arrangement in 1879 between the two emperors. In 1882 he joined Italy to this understanding, completing a Triple Alliance on the basis of assurances of mutual aid against outside attack. Beyond this, Bismarck negotiated a separate understanding with Russia in 1887. These linkages required sensitive juggling, because they loosely grouped some potential opponents (such as Russia and the Habsburgs). They did offer a means of isolating France, especially since Bismarck also cultivated good relations with Britain, which was interested primarily in colonial expansion where France was its most obvious rival.

Even before it was fully constructed, Bismarck’s plan to stabilize Europe faced an important challenge. Revolts in the Balkans, in areas nominally under Ottoman control, called attention to what was then Europe’s most volatile area. Effective Ottoman dominion over this region had been declining steadily along with the vigour of the government more generally, and nationalist fervor, spreading from western Europe, had galvanized many ethnic groups. Revolts in Serbia and Romania won partial independence earlier in the 19th century, and Greece had gained national status outright. In the 1870s rioting broke out in several regions, and Serbia and another small nation, Montenegro, declared war on the Ottoman empire. Russia joined in, to protect its Slavic “brethren” and to gain new territory at Turkey’s expense. Easy victories followed, and a large new Bulgarian state was proclaimed, along with Russian acquisitions along the Black Sea. At this point Austria-Hungary and Britain, both interested in stability in the region, intervened. Bismarck, anxious for peace, called a Berlin Congress in 1878 to win an acceptable compromise. The result was a smaller Bulgaria, full independence for Serbia, Montenegro, and Romania, and Austrian occupation of the Slavic provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Britain gained the island of Cyprus, which gave it a closer watchdog position over its routes to India, and France was encouraged to take over Tunisia. The great loser at the Congress of Berlin was Russia, which left resentful that its enormous gains were nullified. Although Bismarck claimed that Germany had acted as an honest broker, the Russians believed that he had favoured Austria-Hungary. Germany would not be able to conciliate Russia for almost a decade. In the meantime, Bismarck’s alliance system unfolded in the wake of the Congress of Berlin with Germany siding first with Austria-Hungary because both countries faced Russian enmity.