While Prussia was improving its economy, Austria stayed with its old feudal system. Even though abandoning the old feudal system would probably have benefited the nation more in terms of economy, the highly ranked citizens had no intentions to give up their wealth and other advantages to the middle class people and peasants, so it was quite hard for the nation to have successful economy as the Prussians did. Although Prussia influenced many German states to the Zollverein, they excluded Austria and due to this reason, Austria was forced to be from foreign trade (even though the Austrians tried to gain influence in the Zollverein.). The exclusion from the Zollverein resulted crisis to the Austrians but excluding the economy, Austria was still in better conditions than Prussia.
Since 1815, Austria used almost forty percent of their national income on suppressing nationalism in Italy; later when the Italian revolution broke out, the Austrians wasted much of their strength fighting against the Italian nationalists. Due to this reason the German states believed that they no longer needed the Austrian influence. Another major crisis for Austria took place during the Crimean War. Austria had decided to betray the alliance with Russia and instead support the French and the British through economical support. However as the war had ended, the western powers decided to turn their backs to the Austrians because they were furious that the Austrians did not use their military during the war. Through this Austria became isolated from European foreign affairs, and this was a chance for Otto von Bismarck to unite Germany. Basically the Austrians should have invested everything for the western powers during the Crimean War, since it would let Austria remain alliance with the western powers, and prevent huge loss against the Prussians (who later had an excellent foreign relation with other nations).
Bismarck became the new minister president of Prussia in 1863, and for four years he governed Prussia without a legitimate approved budget; he also had to face parliamentary opposition until the war against Austria.
Bismarck main goal was basically to unify Germany under Prussian rule. Bismarck himself said : ‘As soon as the army shall be brought into such a condition as to inspire respect, I shall seize the first best pretext to declare war on Austria, dissolve the German Diet, and give national unity to Germany under Prussian leadership’. This speech basically tells us that he was desperate for the war against Austria, but in reality according to historians, he tried to avoid wars if possible.
In general it seemed that Bismarck served only those who could benefit his goals. Historian A.J.P. Taylor wrote: ‘He claimed to serve sometimes the King of Prussia, sometimes Germany, sometimes God. All three were cloaks for his own will.’
Another important reason for why Germany was unified under Prussia was due to Prussia’s strong army. Prussia’s army improved during the years 1850 to 1860. When Helmut von Moltke was appointed chief of staff in 1857, he transformed the army. The Prussian army became much more organized and was trained harder; the success of the army was largely due to the nation’s rapid economic growth since the nation’s successful economy produced effective railway system, which made transport of troops to the frontier much faster. The first objective for the Prussian army was to protect the Germans, who lived near France. Napoleon III was looking to expand territories and those German states were in a particular weak position. However due to Prussia’s military efforts, these states were able to avoid French control and Prussia was able to extend its influence. The Austrian army though, was weak and unorganized. Unlike Prussia, its military officers got their positions not because of their skills or achievements but because of family status, and the training was unorganized.
Although the Prussian military strength was much better than the Austrians, there was a problem in Prussia. By 1859, the War Minister, Albrecht von Roon of Prussia tried to pass a reform of the army to the parliament. These reforms included removing the importance of the reserve militia, the Landwehr (which had the advantage of being freer from the detested spirit Junker militarism and of costing them far less in taxes for the liberal majority.). This was not easy though, since the liberals and Parliament was satisfied with the current situation. The dispute lasted for two years, where the Government was not able to pass any budget past the Parliament (which Wilhelm was facing abdication). However when Otto von Bismarck was appointed as Minister President of Prussia, Bismarck immediately took power over the Parliament and unconstitutionally passed the military reforms, which soon the army of Prussia was reformed, removing the Landwehr. Basically Bismarck’s power was the key factor for the military success.
The Schleswig-Holstein crisis was an important turn towards the wars of unification. The crisis allowed Prussia to demonstrate their military power and also allowed them to grow their influence in the north. In the year 1864 and early 1865, war on Austria seemed too be dangerous; the reason was due to France. It was uncertain how France would react in case of an Austro-Prussian war. But between October and November in 1865, Bismarck had a meeting with France’s leader Napoleon III at Biarritz and at St Cloud. He managed to guarantee French neutrality towards an upcoming Austro-Prussian war. He also had to make sure he had support from Italy, who he still had not managed to persuade through their trade treaty with the Zollverein. Basically due to Austria’s bad relationship with the Italians (in terms of preventing the Italian unification), the Prussians used this chance to persuade the Italians to meet alliance. A military alliance was signed between Italy and Prussia with Venetia as Italy’s award. During the war, several northern German states allied with Austria, but they were very little successful. Prussia won their final victory at the Bohemian front, and opened up the way to Vienna. As soon as the end of the Austro-Prussian war, the Treaty of Prague was set up; the treaty allowed Prussia to control Hanover, Hesse-Cassel, Nassau, Frankfurt, Schleswig-Holstein, and form all German states north of the river Main into the new North German Confederation. Although a North German Parliament was established, Bismarck retained most of his power. In the aftermath, the southern German states remained outside the new Confederation. Following the unification, Prussia and France ultimately caused war on each other; Prussia was able to demonstrate its military power, therefore defeated the French in 1870. The victory set a influence in the southern states, and soon most of the states became part of the new Confederation. By 1871, Wilhelm I was honored emperor of Germany, and the last states joined forming Germany.
Prussia’s major aim was first to stabilize its economy, and when Bismarck was appointed as the minister President, the nations aim extended (officially) on unifying Germany. In terms of military strategies/ strengths, Prussia had much more power than the Austrians, and their economy was much better too. Basically a successful economy was one of the key points on strengthening the military and therefore unifying Germany. Historian such as Helmut Bohme believes that the dynamics of the German economy were of greater importance than political priorities of the Prussian government. Other experts believe that the political priorities (Bismarck) were the main reasons of unification. However without the Austrians, Prussia might not have been able to unify Germany. The general reason why Austria was not able to unite Germany was because they were always below (or later) Prussia (in terms of economy, military strength, government, etc…). also they have made lots of unwise or unlucky decisions and these basically caused crisis to the nation; Prussia though did not just watch the Austrians falling but used this chance (such as meeting alliance with western powers, excluding Austria from Zollverein, etc…) to destroy Austria and unify Germany by themselves. So basically the Prussians had deep ambitions on unifying Germany.
