Beyond Europe: The Global Dimension of the Thirty Years War 1624/25

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The Thirty Years’ War could  have been over after five years.   The Catholics defeated the protestants first at  white mountain, then in the Palatinate. But the   war did not end. It got caught up in international  affairs and power politics more and more.   France, the Spanish Habsburgs, England, the  Dutch Republic and other major European powers   were quickly sucked into the conflict and because  many of them were in the process of establishing   colonies, they expanded the scope of the war  overseas to Indonesia, Africa and the Americas.   This was in part due to the fact that the trade  routes to asia became less reliable and more   expensive due to the Ottoman control of most of  the vital ports in the mediterreanean.Because   the Thirty Years’ War is usually looked at  with a focus on Germany, the global aspect of   the war is often neglegted. But in 1624/25 little  actually happened in Germany while Globalisation,   colonization and mercantilism pushed the war  far beyond the German territories. That is why   in this video we’re looking at the European and  even global dimension of the thirty years war.  The forces that drove the globalization of the  Thirty Years’ War were money, power, and family   relations. When the Protestant leader Frederick  V, count Palatine and king of Bohemia, had been   defeated, first at the battle of White Mountain  in 1620 and then during the Palatinate Phase of   the Thirty Years war 1620-1623, he turned to King  James VI of Scotland and I of England for help.   Frederick was married to James‘  daugther Elizabeth Stuart and   from his exile in The Hague, he was  now activating this family relation.   He was looking for money – and he did receive  some, but he spent it quickly and lavishly,   for example, on an entirely useless but expensive  Winter Palace in the Dutch city of Rhenen.  Money, however, was a concern to James too.  He was facing the problem of getting approval   of the House of Commons to acquire large sums  of money. As a ruler in the age of absolutism,   he was not satisfied with this restriction  and intended to expand his power to reduce his   dependency on the parliament. One way to do this  was to get money from alternative sources. So,   James accepted an offer first made to him in  1614 by Spain. He was to reduce the activity   of English privateers in the Spanish-American  waters and marry his son Charles to the Spanish   princess Maria Anna of Spain. In exchange  he would get about 500’000 £ (later 600’000   £) – quite an extensive sum. This substantial  deal is referred to as the “Spanish match”.  In 1622, the timing for such a match with Spain  was good. England had been at peace with Spain   since 1604, and relations were mostly cordial  despite conflicts in the American colonies. Trade   was flourishing between the two states. Spain  was also hoping England might offer naval support   against the Dutch, who had recently attacked  English ships in Indonesia. There were , however,   also problems: Spanish forces were holding  much of the Lower Palatinate, the territory   of James’ son-in-law Frederick V. Aware of  that fact, he couldn’t intervene militarily,   James sought a rapprochement with Spain through  the Spanish match. There was also the ideological   issue of marrying James‘ Protestant son Charles  to the deeply catholic Maria Anna of Spain.   When Charles set off to Spain to fetch his bride  in what the historian Peter Wilson calls “the   romantic Scottish tradition” and arrived in Spain  unannounced he embarrassed himself and his crown.   Maria Anna wouldn’t marry a protestant,  and nobody believed Charles was sincere   when he said he would convert to Catholicism.  Humiliated, he went back home. The consequence   of this failing match was a change in policy  from cordial relations to planning for war.  England directed its resources at the protestants  on the continent. But for lack of better options,   James once more flushed money into the pockets  of the already defeated protestant paladins of   the Palatinate: Ernst of Mansfeld, Duke Christian  of Brunnswick-Wolfenbüttel and George Frederick   of Baden-Durlach. Little came of it. Mansfeld’s  meager troops fell ill because they were forced   to drink seawater as the local authorities denied  them to leave their ships in Dover, where they   were trying to recruit more men. He again went  to the Netherlands and joined the Dutch army.  The Dutch could use Mansfeld’s help since their  war with the Spanish Habsburgs had resumed in   1621. In August 1624 General Spinola  besieged Breda with his army of 70’000   men. Despite Dutch relief efforts, the  spanish entrenchments remained impenetrable,   and the town eventually surrendered on 5 June.  Breda was a decisive achievement for the Spanish,   so much so that contemporaries compared Spinola’s  victory to Caesar's epic siege of Alesia (52 BC).   The Spanish commemorated it in various forms,  including poems, plays, and Velazquez's renowned   painting. The Spanish victory at Breda contributed  much to spreading the conflict overseas,   mainly because of how Habsburg Spain dealt  with the resumed war in the Netherlands.  The Spanish Count Duke Olivares, the most  important advisor to Philip IV of Spain,   realized that the cost of sieges such as at Breda  were so high that it was much more sensible to   fight the Dutch economically with a trade embargo.  Olivares encircled the Netherlands on land and   sea, which severely reduced their fighting  capabilities. Here, the famous Dunkirkers,   some of the most notorious privateers, enter the  stage. They were in Spanish service and in charge   of fighting the Dutch trade on sea. From 1621  onward, they put a halt to much of the trade   going through the English Channel. While between  1614 and 1620, 1,005 Dutch ships traversed the   Channel from the Mediterranean and the Baltic or  vice versa, only 52 Dutch ships risked the journey   between 1621-7. The Dunkirkers also seized ships  from various nations that were either on their   way to the Republic or were simply caught in the  wrong place at the wrong time. The English lost   390 vessels to these privateers between 1624  and 1628, which amounted to a fifth of their   mercantile marine. By 1626, 35 out of the 58  Dover-registered ships were out of commission.  The Spanish trade embargo hampered not  only the Dutch and the English but the   Baltic maritime trade in general. It severely  affected other states such as Denmark-Norway,   Sweden and the Hanseatic Cities in the North  of Germany such as Bremen, Hamburg or Lübeck.   From the 14th to the 17th century, Baltic trade  had been gaining importance, among other reasons,   because the Ottomans were steadily increasing  their control over the Mediterranean.   While goods from Asia became more  expensive in western and northern Europe,   emerging powers like muscovite Russia, Finland,   Poland and Lithuania became ever more important  players in the economic system. Furthermore,   the increasing importance of the Baltic trade  intensified the dispute between Denmark and   Sweden over the Baltic Sea. For the time being,  Sweden was busy fighting the Polish-Lithuanian   Commonwealth for control of the vital trade cities  in the Baltic, while Denmark-Norway got richer and   richer by charging heavy sound tolls for ships  passing the Oresund, in English “The Sound”.   One of the most consequential developments  globally, however, was that the Portuguese,   Spanish, Dutch, French and English intensified  their search for resource rich colonies.  Since both fighting wars and trading was  done on water, more ships were required.   In the Baltic and Mediterranean seas, most navies  relied on Galleys that could be propelled by oars.   In the Atlantic Ocean however, large, sturdy  sailing ships were the vessels of choice.   Around this time, these did not only grow in  numbers but also in size. For example, the average   Dutch ship grew from 80 to 160 tons in 1590 to 300  or 400 tons thirty years later, those of the Dutch   East India Company (VOC) even up to 1,000-tons. The Construction of such ships consumed enormous   quantities of timber: an ocean-going warship of  560 tons required 900 oak trees, and a galley   required over 200 pines. Spain benefited from the  large oak forests of Galicia, Asturias and the   rest of its northern coast, while the Catalonian  pine woods served the galley fleet. In England,   the Stuarts had deforested much of the country  by the 1640s and became dependent on imports   from Scotland, Ireland and America. In France,  Richelieu’s naval program stripped Brittany of   its fine trees and made it necessary to import  timber from the Rhineland. The Dutch Republic was,   comparatively speaking, largely treeless and  had always relied on imports, while all powers   depended on imports of pine, tar, and hemp from  the Baltic. This again increased the importance   of the Baltic trade, which would become one of  the focal points of the war from 1626 onwards.  The Dutch were increasingly suffering from the  Spanish embargo. In trying to improve their   situation, it was the Dutch who eventually brought  the war overseas to the colonies in the Americas.   Yet the Spanish bases in the Caribbean proved too  strong. Nevertheless, while the Dutch were keeping   the Spanish busy, the British and French could  gain American footholds. The main Dutch effort,   however, was directed at the Spanish-Portuguese  possessions in Indonesia and Brazil. By 1621 the   Dutch East India Company had driven the Portuguese  out of most of Indonesia which gave them the   commanding position in the lucrative spice trade.  A new Dutch West India Company was formed in June   1621. Its main task was to gain a firm hold on the  Brazilian sugar boom. The Portuguese lacked the   capacity to exploit Brazil’s economic potential,  and the Dutch West India Company soon controlled   over half of the sugar trade into Europe. Another attempt to break the Spanish   encirclement was an attack on the vital  port of Cadiz. The Dutch attacked together   with the English fleet, but the Spanish  were prepared and easily repulsed them.   The only thing this achieved was that England  became increasingly more isolated. Meanwhile,   the Dutch were becoming desperate as the economic  noose around their economy was slowly tightening.  Another effect of the Spanish blockade of  the Netherlands was that it alarmed France.   The French feared their southern neighbor  more than the trouble east of the Rhine.   This might seem odd, considering France was a  Catholic power, just like the Spanish-Habsburgs.   But French politics were dominated by the idea of  the French King being an arbiter, at home between   various factions and internationally as a form of  peacekeeper. Much of this goes back to Jean Bodin,   a French statesman, and proponent of absolutism.  His theory of alliances states that any group   of three or more requires a leader to provide  direction and to ensure no disagreements would   threaten the alliance. However, things were  not that straightforward, neither at home,   where France was troubled by the infighting of  different noble factions and rebellions of the   protestants, called Huguenots, nor abroad  where France was increasingly threatened   by Habsburg territories all around its borders. The figure who was leading France’s affairs at the   time was Cardinal Richelieu, who de facto ruled  the kingdom in lieu of the young king Louis XIII.   Richelieu came of age during the turbulent French  Wars of Religion, which made him a firm supporter   of Bodin's notion that a powerful monarchy was  necessary to prevent both tyranny and anarchy.   He saw the growth of Spanish power as a threat to  France’s traditional role as arbiter. In his eyes,   this posed a greater threat to Christendom  than the Huguenot heretics at home. According   to the historian Peter Wilson, Richelieu’s  goal was ‘a good peace for Christendom’,   a concept he deliberately left undefined. Because of his politics and the power he wielded,   Richelieu had many enemies abroad and in  France. Quickly many plots to rid France   of his influence emerged, and rumours galore  were afloat. Alleged Spanish involvement in   these plots added to Richelieu’s conviction  that all European conflicts were related,   not by religion, but by Habsburg malevolence. He  believed Philip IV wanted to make Ferdinand II,   Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, an  absolute ruler and use German resources   to conquer the Dutch republic. Philip IV , on the other hand,   was angry with the French King because  Louis XIII treated Philip’s sister Anne,   who had married the French king in 1615, very  badly. Since her arrival, the young king had shut   her out both from politics and his affection. This  stood in stark contrast to Spanish expectations:   namely Catholic solidarity symbolized through  the bond of marriage. In Spanish eyes, France was   in league with the devil, tolerating heretics at  home and subsidizing the Dutch protestants abroad.  In this situation Richelieu’s politics  were governed by four strategies:   The first was a network of alliances to enable  France to overcome Spanish hegemony and effect   the desired general pacification of Europe. Two  examples are the support of German princes who   were opposing the authority of the Holy Roman  emperor and active help of Italian states which   were challenging Habsburg Milan and Naples in  Italy. This conflict between central Habsbug   power with smaller princes in Italy and Germany  is usually referred to as the fight about German   or Italian liberties. Secondly, Richelieu often  made bilateral alliances with individual states.   This included offering subsidies and, less  often, recruits, to assist an ally without openly   supporting it. This characterized his support  for the Dutch, Danes, and Swedes until 1635,   whom he hoped would keep both the Austrian  and Spanish Habsburg branches occupied.   His third strategy was to offer protection  to weaker territories that might assist   France by allowing passage for French troops. For  examples cities like Verdun or Metz but also Susa,   Pinerolo, Saluzzo and Casale which controlled  some of the major routes over the Alps.   The fourth and least desired strategy was direct  military action. Like the later military theorist   Clausewitz, Richelieu saw military force as the  continuation of diplomacy by other means. Force   was merely intended to make the other side more  reasonable. Richelieu’s counterpart in Spain,   Count-Duke Olivares, saw war much in the same  sense. Of course, this would mean that once   war erupted, stopping the cycle of “making the  other party more reasonable” would be difficult.  By 1625, Richelieu had done his part in concocting  a scheme to guarantee French interests. In The   Hague, an alliance between England, the Dutch and  Denmark – under French supervision – was forged.   This set up the Danish King Christian IV with  financial support and stylized him as saviour of   German protestants. Anxiously, religious fanatics  called up the biblical myth of the king of the   north who would come and save everyone from the  tyranny of the King of the south. They referred   to the phrase “Mene mene tekel parsin”, chapter  5 of the Book of Daniel, the origin of the phrase   “the writing is on the wall” and by 1625, indeed  it was. The Danish King was ready to interevene   in in the war in Germany changing the reasons for  the conflict from religion and authority in the   Empire to power and economics in Europe. If you liked the video, please consider   donating via Patreon. We’re still trying to cover  the cost of the artwork that we use in the videos.   We’re also posting regular updates, behind the  scenes and previews to make it worth your while!
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Channel: SandRhoman History
Views: 111,402
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Keywords: thirty years war, history, documentary, thirty years war global dimension, thirty years war olivares, thirty years war richelieu, thirty years war colonies, colonialization, education, educational, historical, richelieu, spanish habsburgs, thirty years war history, thirty years war docu, thirty years war danish phase, thirty years war palatinate campaign, spanish empire, habsburgs, france thirty years war, spain thirty years war, netherlands thirty years war
Id: EZoBP1JN7yY
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Length: 15min 40sec (940 seconds)
Published: Sun May 14 2023
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