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estudos internacionais • Belo Horizonte, ISSN 2317-773X, v. 8, n. 4, (dez. 2020), p. 110-131
The Ottoman Empire and Europe from the
late Westphalian Order to the Crimean
System: the ‘Eastern Question’ Revisited
El Imperio Otomano y Europa desde el último orden de
Westfalia hasta el sistema de Crimea: la “cuestión oriental”
revisada
O Império Otomano e a Europa do final da Ordem
Westfaliana ao Sistema da Crimeia: a ‘Questão Oriental’
Revisitada
Gabriel Leanca
1
DOI: 10.5752/P.2317-773X.2020v8.n4.p110
Received in: September 21, 2020
Accepted in: February 04, 2021
A
The ‘Eastern Question’ is one of the most controversial and persistent subjects
in the history of international relations. This article looks at two aspects of the
evolution of the relations between the Ottoman Empire and Europe. The rst one
focuses on the importance of the 18
th
century in the emergence of the ’Eastern
Question’. The second one emphasizes on several episodes that may reopen the de-
bate on the origins of the Crimean War. Our research is an attempt to demonstrate
that the ’Eastern Question’ was only a piece of a larger puzzle. The more Russia
was inuential in world politics, the more her contribution became valuable for
the stability of the international system. The idea to challenge in the early 1850’s
the heritage of the 18
th
century in world politics (meaning to marginalize Russia in
European aairs), did not serve on the long run neither to the security of the Otto-
man Empire, nor to the ’new multilateralism’ put forward by Napoleon III.
Keywords: Ottoman Empire, late Westphalian international order, Eastern Ques-
tion, Vienna system, Crimean War, Great Power Politics 18
th
-19
th
centuries
R
La “cuestión oriental” es uno de los temas más controvertidos y persistentes en la
historia de las relaciones internacionales. Este artículo analiza dos aspectos de la
evolución de las relaciones entre el Imperio Otomano y Europa. El primero se cen-
tra en la importancia del siglo XVIII en el surgimiento de la “Cuestión Oriental”. El
segundo enfatiza varios episodios que pueden reabrir el debate sobre los orígenes
de la Guerra de Crimea. Nuestra investigación es un intento de demostrar que la
“cuestión oriental” era solo una pieza de un rompecabezas más grande. Cuanto
más inuyente se destacaba Rusia en la política mundial, más importante sería
su contribución para la estabilidad del sistema internacional. La idea de desaar a
principios de la década de 1850, la herencia del siglo XVIII en la política mundial (es
1. Gabriel Leanca is a lecturer in inter-
national history at the Faculty of History,
Alexandru Ioan Cuza University, Iași,
Romania. He holds a collaborative PhD
from Alexandru Ioan Cuza University
and Bourgogne University, France. He
recently edited L’entrée de la Roumanie
dans la Grande Guerre. Documents
diplomatiques français (28 juillet-29
décembre 1914), Paris, L’Harmattan,
2020 and he is the author of À l’ère des
empires et des nations: la France et les
principautés de Moldavie et de Valachie
(1711-1859), t. I (1711-1789), Les
Éditions Isis, coll. du Centre d’histoire
diplomatique ottomane, Istanbul, 2019.
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-
9903-7433.
111
Gabriel Leanca, Alexandru Ioan Cuza The Ooman Empire and Europe from the late Westphalian order
to the Crimean system: the ‘Eastern Queson’ Revisited
decir, marginar a Rusia en los asuntos europeos), no sirvió a largo plazo ni para la
seguridad del Imperio Otomano, ni para el nuevo multilateralismo, presentado por
Napoleón III.
Palabras clave: Imperio Otomano, orden internacional tardío de Westfalia, cuesti-
ón oriental, sistema de Viena, guerra de Crimea, política de las grandes potencias
en los siglos XVIII-XIX.
R
A ‘Questão Oriental’ é um dos assuntos mais polêmicos e persistentes na história
das relações internacionais. Este artigo examina dois aspectos da evolução das
relações entre o Império Otomano e a Europa. O primeiro enfoca na importância
do século XVIII no surgimento da ‘Questão Oriental’. O segundo enfatiza vários
episódios que podem reabrir o debate sobre as origens da Guerra da Crimeia.
Nossa pesquisa é uma tentativa de demonstrar que a ‘Questão Oriental’ era apenas
uma peça de um quebra-cabeça maior. Quanto mais a Rússia se tornava inuente
na política mundial, mais sua contribuição se tornava valiosa para a estabilidade do
sistema internacional. A ideia de desaar, no início da década de 1850, a herança do
século XVIII na política mundial (o que signica marginalizar a Rússia nos assuntos
europeus), não serviu a longo prazo nem para a segurança do Império Otomano,
nem para o novo multilateralismo apresentado por Napoleão III.
Palavras-chave: Império Otomano, ordem Westfaliana tardia, Questão Oriental,
Sistema de Viena, Guerra da Crimeia, Política das grandes potências nos séculos
XVIII-XIX
Introduction
In 1853, in the eve of the war between Russia and the Ottoman Empi-
re, which shortly after became the Crimean war, Lord John Russell rejected
the secret Russian proposal to dismantle the Ottoman Empire (CRPLGCT,
1854, p. 883). He did so not only because it was impossible to implement such
an arrangement without risking a continental war, but because the proposal
was made after several attempts from the Russian side to gain exclusive in-
uence at Constantinople. And it was not only the quarrel between the La-
tin and the Greek churches, brought to the table in May 1850 by France, that
rst sounded the alarm at London. As a matter of fact, the rst signs appea-
red in 1848, at a time when Nesselrode, tsar’s minister of Foreign Aairs,
tried to legalize the Russian military intervention at Bucharest which put an
end to revolution. As one can expect, such initiatives did not go unnoticed
neither in London, nor in Paris (LEANCA, 2013). But the decision of tsar Ni-
cholas I to assist the Habsburgs in late autumn of 1848 in their ght to regain
control over their empire restrained the British from acting in the Near Eas-
tern aairs. The latter agreed that the Russians crush the Hungarian rebel-
lion and were reluctant to align with the French in contesting the Russian
projects for the European Turkey. In the eyes of the British government, the
Habsburg Empire, no matter how authoritarian the Metternich regime was
perceived in Europe, was the only political entity which could, by its geogra-
phical position, neutralize or at least weaken Russia’s Near Eastern policy.
But with Austria depending on Russia after 1848, the British statesmen had
to get over their anxieties regarding France and its global ambitions and to
openly oppose Russia in the Near East.
The collapse of the Habsburg Empire in 1848 and the well-known ten-
dency of the Russians to dominate the Ottomans were both European pro-
blems, but in a very dierent way. Contrary to the general view regarding
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the impact of the 1848 revolutions on the international politics (JELAVI-
CH, 1984, p. 50), Russia was not able to change the status quo in its relation
with the Ottoman Empire. In other words, Russia was not able to secure
more treaty rights in the Ottoman Empire neither after the conclusion of
the treaty of Adrianople of 1829, nor after the Saint-Petersburg Convention
of 1834. The so-called Balta-Liman Convention of 1849, which should have
legitimised, in Russian terms, the use of unilateral military means to crush
civil unrest in Moldavia and Wallachia, did not go beyond practical arrange-
ments respecting the administration of these two provinces. No alliance to
counter Russia in the Near East was to be formed between France and Great
Britain during the 1848 crisis either. However, the treaty of Adrianople and
the other agreements that followed, were the absolute maximum the British
and the French could accept in terms of Russian inuence at Constantino-
ple. On top of that, it was not the proposition itself which was made in 1853
to Lord John Russell that nally set the Concert of Europe on re, but the
fact that tsar Nicholas I remained adamant about securing unprecedented
inuence at Constantinople even after the British rejection of the scheme.
A second Russian unauthorized occupation of the principalities, followed
by the military preparations of the maritime powers against Russia and the
violation of the Straits Convention by France and Great Britain thus marked
the destruction of the European Concert as conceived at the end of the Na-
poleonic hegemony. To contain Russia in 1853, Britain had to seek common
ground with imperial France, already prepared to embark in such a ventu-
re. But such an unprecedented rapprochement, which was to bring a major
blow to Russia’s Near Eastern interests, had, nevertheless, clear implications
on the international system. Napoleon III and his advisors were not against
the European Concert as a tool in preserving peace and nding ways to sett-
le major disputes among great powers, but they were anxious to reverse the
so-called Vienna political order and the diplomatic defeat suered by France
in the Near East in 1840. Clearly, in 1853, it was a turning point in centre-
-periphery relations and a major security dilemma: to preserve the Vienna
order as it was meant to leave the Ottomans at the mercy of tsar Nicholas I;
to resist Russia’s projects for the Ottoman Empire meant to contain Russia
in European aairs and thus redene the core of the international system.
‘Nous avons sur les bras un homme malade – gravement malade’
It is in these terms that tsar Nicholas I perceived the Ottoman Empire
in 1853 (CRPLGCT, 1854, p. 877). His image of the Ottomans was actually
not very dierent from that of the British, French, and Austrian statesmen
of the same period of time. It suggested the idea that “Europe had political
and moral obligations to manage the Ottoman collapse” (FRARY; KOZEL-
SKY, 2014, p. 4). Despite the long life of this perception, it cannot serve as a
satisfactory denition of the ‘Eastern Question’. In the reading of Winfried
Baumgart (1999), prominent historian and editor of primary diplomatic
sources on the Crimean War, the “Eastern Question” is “the aggregate of
all the problems connected with the withdrawal and the rollback of the Ot-
toman Empire from the areas which it had conquered since 1354 in Europe”
(BAUMGART, 1999, p. 3-4). No doubt, this is a denition in which the Eu-
ropean dimension is essential. It is also a distant echo of J. A. R. Marriott’s
(1917) vision: “The primary and most essential factor in the problem is […]
the presence, embedded in the living esh of Europe, of an alien substance.
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Gabriel Leanca, Alexandru Ioan Cuza The Ooman Empire and Europe from the late Westphalian order
to the Crimean system: the ‘Eastern Queson’ Revisited
That substance is the Ottoman Turk” (MARRIOTT, 1917, p. 3). The Otto-
mans, as well as the Russian Empire, were excluded from the European
order as it was settled by the 1648 system of treaties. Winfried Baumgart,
as many other historians, pinpoints the beginning of the ’Eastern Question’
in the internationalization of the Greek rebellion during the 1820’s. Thus,
he does not pay much attention to the contribution of the 18
th
century to
this international problem. Some other scholars located the ’Eastern Ques-
tion’ in a broader geopolitical scenery. For instance, the historian Dimitri
Kitsikis (2002) conceptualized what he called the intermediary region, whi-
ch was located between the very core of the international system and the
very margins of it. Eastern and South-Eastern Europe, including Russia,
Turkey and Greece are considered by Kitsikis to be part of this geopoliti-
cal depiction (KITSIKIS, 2002, p. 99-116). Recently, Jacques Frémeaux (2014)
also used geographical and political instruments in dening the ’Eastern
Question’, regarded as a conglomerate (FREMEAUX, 2014, p. 12) and not as
a homogeneous ensemble.
The ’Eastern Question’, as a concept, operates within a fundamen-
tal distinction between the centre and the periphery of the international
system. An asymmetrical relationship is established between the two ca-
tegories. The centre tends to dominate the periphery, as well as the inter-
mediary region. On this layer of analysis, one would have in mind the wri-
tings of the much-regretted Edward Said (2003). He argued that in western
academic tradition, the ’geographical Orient’ is connected to an imaginary
Orient, which is subject to invention, distortion and narrative colonization
(SAID, 2003, p. 99). According to Said (2003), it is power that manipulates
most of these representations. It is power that distributes a specic geopo-
litical conscience over the ’Orient’ in academic and public life that nullies
all contact with reality with respect to Eastern or Near Eastern peoples
and societies. Such interpretation is not built upon a critique formulated in
Soviet Communist style. It actually aims at ghting against the oblivion of
facts, as Georges Corm points out, which can explain in a meaningful way,
violence and political change in the Balkans and the Middle East. To sum
up Corm’s perspective, it is the European narcissism and will to intervene
that are mostly overshadowed in the study of the Ottoman-European en-
counters (CORM, 2002, p. 10-13).
Other contributions have also to be taken into account when dening
the ’Eastern Question’. Albeit well known for his in-depth social history of
the Ottoman Empire, Halil Inalcik (2006) also turned his attention towards
political and international history. As one would expect, the patriarch of the
Ottoman studies is not very comfortable when using a cliché like the ’Eas-
tern Question’. However, he refers to the ’so-called Eastern question’ when
he touches upon the subject of the Russian annexation of Crimea at the end
of the 18
th
century. Inalcik (2006) wrote: “The new situation was labelled in
European diplomacy as the Eastern Question, showing Western concern
to preserve the Ottoman Empire, considered necessary for the European
balance of power” (INALCIK, 2006, p. 113). In this particular case, Inalcik
(2006), an international scholar of Turkish descent, shows a milder criticism
towards the label put forward by the European chancelleries. That is to say
that when European powers express concern over the Ottoman rollback,
the ’Eastern Question’ has a less malign connotation. Inalcik (2006) states
that the solution to the ’Eastern Question’ was postponed until 1856 on
western religious grounds, thus admitting that the phenomenon existed.
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Nonetheless, Inalcik (2006) denounces vigorously what he considers to be
the reduction of the Ottoman Empire to “the conditions of a semi-colony
of the Western powers” (INALCIK, 2006, p. 118). In the same fashion, the
historian Cemal Kafadar (1998) labelled the ’Eastern Question’ as a Euro-
pean question: “its responses were not necessarily based on Eastern reali-
ties”. However, Kafadar admits the idea that “the impact of Europe, whe-
ther military, diplomatic or economic worked only in tandem with internal
factors” (KAFADAR, 1998, p. 70). The criticism of the ’Eastern Question’ as
a historical concept was also fuelled by what certain historians described as
the imperial turn in historiography (MIKHAIL; PHILLIOU, 2012, p. 721-
745). But the revival of the imperial dimension in the study of international
history had a boomerang eect, especially with respect to South-Eastern
Europe and the Near East in their relation with the ’Eastern Question’. Firs-
tly, because there was also an Ottoman orientalism (MAKDISI, 2002, p. 768-
796). Secondly, not only that the imperial turn did not dislocate the national
grand narratives of the past in the former territories of the Ottoman Empi-
re (meaning that the sociological reality of nationalism could not be repla-
ced with imperial nostalgia), but it fomented a reection on other imperial
polities of the modern times and on the ways in which global rivalry rose
among them and why they collapsed.
In this asymmetrical relationship between centre and periphery, was
the latter deprived of all means in order to play a role in the stability of the
former? The answer to this question is not very simple to give. The histo-
rian Edward Ingram, referring to the Vienna order, cut the Gordian knot by
pointing out that “The core [of the Vienna system] reposed in equilibrium only
because it exported to the periphery its previously bellicist style [meaning that
of the Napoleonic era]” (INGRAM, 2002, p. 225). Thus, Ingram states that “the
Vienna System would last as long as it ignored […] what happened in the
Ottoman Empire” (INGRAM, 2002, p. 217). He actually considers that the
Ottoman Empire and Persia “formed the Vienna system’s operational core”
(INGRAM, 2002, p. 206) – an idea that did not get the attention it deserved
in the eld of international history. In a critical article about the application
of the so-called concert norms in the context of the Eastern aairs, Korina
Kagan (1997) numbered four major features of what some scholars might
consider to be a kind of security culture after 1815: the rst one refers to
“individual moderation, self-restraint and the forfeit of unilateral gains”;
the second one evokes the path of “multilateralism and mutual considera-
tion” in the management of crisis; the third one takes into consideration
the will of all the “members of the club” not to separate from each other
in the moment of decision. The last commitment would have imposed on
the great powers “the avoidance of mutual threats and shows of force” (KA-
GAN, 1997, p. 18-19). If real, how eective these norms were in the context of
the ’Eastern Question’? Korina Kagan (1997) draws rightfully the conclusion
that “the Concert was a weak and ineective institution that did not signi-
cantly constrain state behaviour” (KAGAN, 1997, p. 55). Following the same
logic as Korina Kagan (1997), but based on a more rened scholarship on the
Russian case, the historian Matthew Rendall (2000) reopens the debate on
concert eectiveness during the Greek war for independence. He analyses
how Russia behaved during that crisis and sheds light on the functioning of
the European Concert and of its presumed norms outside the purely Euro-
pean arenas. Rendall (2000, p. 87 ) argues that “while the Concert of Europe
embodied principles and norms, however, it lacked rules and procedures
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Gabriel Leanca, Alexandru Ioan Cuza The Ooman Empire and Europe from the late Westphalian order
to the Crimean system: the ‘Eastern Queson’ Revisited
for putting them into eect”. Regarding the European Concert’s involve-
ment in the ’Eastern Question’, Rendall (2000) notes: “Crucially, it was never
clear whether its principles [of the European Concert] applied to the Ottoman
Empire” (RENDALL, 2000, p. 87). To put it in a French realist’s words, as
Jean-Baptiste Duroselle (1984) may be described, “can one agree that the Eu-
ropean Concert prevented wars or the absence of wars – caused by another
factors – allowed the Concert to exist” (DUROSELLE, 1984, p. 279)? To be
more precise, some of the reactions with respect to the European Concert
also derived from a certain religiosity which distorted Paul W. Schroeder’s
(1986) meaningful hypotheses (SCHROEDER, 1986, p. 1-26) about multilate-
ralism in the 19
th
century. Too much focus on systemic explanations in order
to feed current European federalist grand narratives blurred the complex
motivations that stood behind great power behaviour in various interna-
tional contexts. Controversies on Schroeder’s (1986) works also arose from
his own ndings, as Matthew Rendall (2000) rightfully pointed out. On one
hand, Schroeder (1986) seems to have the intentions of an idealist in the eld
of diplomatic history. On another hand, he presents his thesis with the luci-
dity of the most pessimistic realist.
The heritage of the 18
th
century and why it matters
The decline of the Ottomans in world aairs started only when the
Habsburgs and the Romanovs put forward a strategy of territorial expansion
towards the line of the Danube and created powerful networks of clients wi-
thin the sultan’s possessions. In conjunction with the Iranian threat and the
Russian appetite for late crusade and expansion into Asia and the Caucasus,
the porous Ottoman frontiers have been continuously under siege from the
end of the 17
th
century. Thus, the risk for the Balkans, which was the rst
territory conquered by the Ottomans at the beginning of their expansion
towards the Catholic world (GEORGEON, 2005, p. 31), was paramount. And
because signicant resources had to be directed towards the European pos-
sessions of the sultan, the growing Russian and Austrian threat paved the
way for the slow political awakening of the Arab speaking communities of
the Ottoman Empire that exploded in the 19
th
century. While Austria was
a pillar of European order, Russia started to play an international role only
after tsar Peter the Great put an end to Sweden’s imperial ambitions. This
particular moment had tremendous consequences, as the vacuum of power
that appeared in the region had to be lled somehow. Besides this aspect,
there was something else: it was the slow destruction of the Westphalian or-
der imposed by France in the 17
th
century with the help of Sweden in order
to counter the Habsburg universal ambitions (SCHNAKENBOURG, 2011,
p. 237-254). As we will show further on, the Ottomans were the indirect
beneciaries of this particular international order. That is to say that any
serious threat to it had the potential to raise security concerns on the Bos-
porus. Once the ball has been set rolling in this direction, the Ottomans
proved not to be in position to stop it. They were dragged into a spin that
had long term consequences to their international position. However, the
transformations of the international politics were not sudden and the Otto-
mans were by no means isolated.
In the eve of modernity, the French diplomacy, which was the most
dynamic of the modern times, invented a way in which the Ottoman Empi-
re could be integrated into the wider European balance of power. This was
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not the result of some strident conception or of a short-term ambition, but
of a solid and of a sharp vision that passed the test of time. While the French
were accused of betraying the Christian faith by relying on the Ottomans
in order to full their political interests, the French defended themselves by
revealing how much the capitulations granted to them by the sultan impro-
ved the situation of the Catholic pilgrims and merchants in the lands of the
Indels. Nonetheless, the French-Ottoman rapprochement was built upon
a long and generally predictable Bourbon-Habsburg antagonism (BEREN-
GER, 2003, p. 297-329). And, for the French, the main purpose was in the 17
th
century to inaugurate a balance of power within the Holy Roman Empire
that tted their security needs. A formal alliance between the French and
the Ottomans was never formed, but, the quick de facto alliance at the time
of François I was followed by a long-lasting political relation between the
two entities. However, setbacks occurred as the French tried to use what
looked like unlimited human and material resources of the Ottomans in
order to create diversions against the Habsburgs. The Ottoman responses
to the French demands were formulated, as one can imagine, according
to their own security agenda. But to take into consideration only the fact
that the French were looking for an ally of circumstance at Constantino-
ple would not explain entirely what was behind the French position and it
would not give us a real insight into the initial stages of the ’Eastern Ques-
tion’. Actually, the French grand strategy included alongside the Ottoman
Empire, Sweden, Poland and to a certain extent, Hungary. Thus, les alliances
de revers represented a compound of relations of exceptional value. The Fren-
ch diplomacy not only endeavoured to create diversions against Austria, but
also contributed signicantly in fastening the ties among these allies at the
periphery of the international system. It was also a condition that had to be
met in order the grand strategy to survive. In the context of Russia’s rise
in world aairs in the rst half of the 18
th
century, France took the relation
with its junior Eastern partners on a dierent level: the creation of a long
buer zone, stretching from the Baltic to the Mediterranean was envisaged.
It was multilateralism at its best in the 18
th
century. Among the three allies,
the Ottoman Empire was the strongest and the richest one and it remained
as such even after its crushing defeat at Vienna in 1683. This particular con-
frontation with the Habsburgs, in which the Poles mingled as well on the
side of the Habsburgs under Rome’s instigation, only turned the Ottoman
political system north of the Danube (composed of Transylvania, Wallachia,
Moldavia and the Crimean Khanate) more fragile, but not yet on the point
of collapsing. However, the Ottomans were extremely far from their main
chain of fortresses, supply lines and human resources. At the extremities of
their Christian tributary states, control was dicult to maintain. It would
have implied, on the long run, the redenition of the state and of its central
administration in order to fully intervene in these far-ung regions and do-
minions. But such plans were never advanced. Nevertheless, threats that
occurred in other corners of the empire had to be dealt with too and Cons-
tantinople suited best the task of scrutinizing both North and South. Hence,
what was dicult to achieve for the Ottomans, it was also for the Habs-
burgs. It meant a dicult control of the lands lost by the Ottomans even if
inhabited by Christian populations. The Christian tributary states were rea-
dy to accept Habsburg rule, if situation occurred, but only after recognition
of their full political autonomy and status within the Holy Roman Empire.
The Habsburgs never agreed to such a concession. Thus, Ottoman rule was
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to the Crimean system: the ‘Eastern Queson’ Revisited
preferred by these intermediary actors and a true Danube Monarchy never
saw the day, even after the conquest of Transylvania.
Despite the Russian involvements in Sweden and Poland and the Rus-
sian-Austrian rapprochement after the death of Peter the Great, the French
system at the borderlands of Europe preserved itself well in the rst half of
the 18
th
century. The less known treaty between Russia and the Ottoman
Porte concluded at Pruth (1711), and the famous treaty of Belgrade (1739),
proved that the Ottoman Empire was a relevant regional actor. Moreover, it
showed that the problems of core and periphery could not be treated sepa-
rately. The rst treaty included a provision upon which Russia would nd
herself at war with the Ottomans if she would invade Poland again. The
contribution of France to this agreement was not small. It was the French,
using her envoys and several intermediaries on the battleeld, that preven-
ted any hesitation of the Ottomans on advancing such a regional strategy. It
was meant furthermore to tie a weak state like Poland to the more powerful
and more organised Ottoman Empire. Moreover, it gave hope to the French
that the Westphalian arrangements will be protected from a revisionist po-
wer like Russia. The second treaty, negotiated by Louis de Villeneuve, the
French ambassador at Constantinople, went hand in hand with the Otto-
man moderate victory over the Austrian forces. It recognized the Ottoman
authority over all Walachia and Moldavia and left the Russians, the allies of
Austria during this war, with no territorial gains after a rather good cam-
paign. Not only that the French interceded with the opposing parties, but
ocially guaranteed the nal settlement. Despite the fact that no formal
provision about Poland was inserted in this particular treaty and that the
alliance between Russia and Austria was still in place, the Ottomans noti-
ed the Francophile members of the Polish nobility that Russian violations
of Polish territory would set the case for an Ottoman military intervention.
Thus, the Ottoman interest in Polish aairs was clear, even if not simply al-
truistic. It also implied that the Ottomans get a share of the foreign inuence
in Polish aairs. And they had the back of the French for it for the sake of
preserving as much as possible of what remained of the Westphalian order.
Almost thirty years of peace between the Ottomans and the Euro-
peans passed since the negotiations of Villeneuve. To say that the Ottoman
absence from the battleelds during the Seven Years War was a mistake it
would not be true (AKSAN, 2012, p. 165-195). Nevertheless, the new context
deserves more attention from the historians. And it is not only the fact that
the Russians developed new combatting techniques and acquired glory by
entering Berlin that must be pointed out, but also the relative isolation in
which the Ottomans fell in Europe during this period of time. Moreover,
the conclusion of the famous alliance between France and Austria in 1756
opened the door to a massive geopolitical transformation in Eastern Euro-
pe. What undermined the Sublime Porte’s position was that France had to
guarantee Austria against any aggression, including that of the Ottomans.
It was true that the Habsburgs extended after 1739 their peace treaty with
the Ottomans, but the fact that the sultan was not excluded in the mutual
French-Austrian agreement made a negative impression at Constantinople.
When the Russians (the allies of Austria, and par ricochet, of France against
Prussia), spread the fake news of the French abandonment of their well-k-
nown policy towards the East, the Ottomans became dominated by frustra-
tion. While it was unquestionable that the French accepted and favoured the
Russian intervention against Prussia and wanted the Ottomans to remain
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neutral in this truly rst world war, this was not at the expense of their in-
uence at Constantinople. However, to believe that the Russian army was a
mercenary force in a purely European war, it was a huge mistake which was
made at Versailles. Russia’s full recognition as a great European power was
not formalised until 1779, but its inuence in Europe after 1755 surpassed by
far that of Peter the Great. Vergennes, the French ambassador at Constan-
tinople, had to work hard in order to convince the Ottomans not to disturb
the march of the Russian army through the polish lands. It was dicult for
the French ambassador to be credible after encouraging the Ottomans to
observe every move of the Russians in the region (LEANCA, 2019: 128).
The consequences of the Seven Years War for France, which was the
friendliest Christian Power towards the Ottomans, were catastrophic. Not
only that France lost Canada, but, because of its military defeats in Europe, it
was not in position to support Sweden, Poland and the Ottoman Empire, if
the situation would have demanded it. In the second half of the 18
th
century,
all Eastern periphery of the international system fell gradually under the in-
uence of Prussia, Austria and especially Russia (SCOTT, 2001, p. 249-250).
Sweden managed to nd its internal balance and resisted outside pressu-
re on its political elites, but Poland was partitioned, which destabilised the
whole region from the Baltic to the Mediterranean. It was evidence to the
brutal change within the international system during the second half of the
18
th
century, but this was not all. As Paul W. Schroeder rightfully pointed
out, the ‘engulng’ of the Ottoman Empire had implications on great power
politics which surpassed by far the polish question, to which it was much
connected (DAVISON, 1996, p. 180; SCHROEDER, 1994, p. 20).
Two notable Ottoman initiatives have to be mentioned in the context
generated by the Seven Years War. The rst one was the natural attraction
the Ottomans found in the Prussian star for its victories against Austria
and France, as well as for its struggle against Russia. The second one was
the Ottoman interest in the Polish aairs. The war that the Ottomans
decided to make against Russia in 1768 had the purpose of establishing a
shared inuence in Poland with the other powers. The Prussian tempta-
tion was not only a failure but the rst step towards a new evolution that
inuenced considerably the fate of the 1768-1774 war. It was the fact that
Frederic II used the Ottoman proposal for an alliance in order to determi-
ne Catherine II to conclude a mutual assistance treaty between Russia and
Prussia (SCOTT, 1977, p. 153-175). The Austrians would have been isolated
by such an agreement. The treaty that came into existence also named
areas of interest for Prussia and Russia. It meant free hand for Russia in
what Prussia considered territories of no interest for her. Moreover, one
has to take into account that there was no general treaty in Europe after
the Seven Years War but two treaties which were concluded separately
and where Russia was not present. Thus, she had free hand to choose what
suited her interests better. In other words, Russia saw its inuence recog-
nized in the ’broader Middle East’ before it was truly eective. It was the
clear dierence between European and non-European aairs that the Russian
diplomacy actually validated and to which she remained much attached
thereafter. And this is where the concept of ’Eastern Europe’ and its cousin
the ’Near-East’ truly derive from. Thus, the ’Eastern Question’ originated
not only from an old cultural and religious root, but also from the age of
Enlightenment and of its two most illustrious representatives. It is ironical
that it came straight from a binding agreement in 1764 between Catherine
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II of Russia and Frederic II of Prussia in which the Ottoman Empire was
not even mentioned (LEANCA, 2019, p. 146).
In the war that followed between Russia and the Ottoman Empire,
Prussia chose to tolerate the Russian expansion towards the south, if the
Russian armies were to be successful. It thus paved the way for obtaining
Catherine II’s support for the partition of Polish lands. Austria had no choi-
ce but to participate in this massive geopolitical revolution. Vienna chose
to abandon the idea of supporting the Ottomans, which was advocated by
France, her ally in the West. For the Habsburgs, it was the only less expensi-
ve mean of minimizing the rapprochement between Prussia and Russia, and
thus to save the very fragile balance of power in the Holy Roman Empire
between the two German signicant dynasties. The malfunctioning of the
Ottoman supply line, the success of Orlov’s expedition in Eastern Mediter-
ranean, and the massive disobedience in the Ottoman military ranks during
the 1768-1774 campaign made all the rest in order to facilitate the Russian
epoch-making victory. Moreover, driven by hostility towards Prussia, Aus-
tria encouraged Catherine II Greek mesmerizing project, thus fomenting
partition schemes of the sultan’s domain. It becomes obvious why the Rus-
sian ambitions grew bolder in the Near-East. The annexation of Crimea by
Russia (1783) was certainly a bigger blow to the Ottoman Empire than the
Austrian annexation of Bukovina (1775). But they were not the only ones.
By the treaty of Kuchuk-Kainardji (1774), the Ottomans were forced to agree
that the Russians can ‘speak’ in the interest of the principalities of Molda-
via and Wallachia. Thus, it appeared a form of coimperium in this bordering
area which had incalculable consequences for the construction of peace in
the region and in Europe, in general. The scal obligations of these two
Christian provinces towards the Porte were to be rationalised, which paved
the way for a polizeistaat and cameralist Russian policy in European Turkey.
From this time onwards, the battle of the Russians with the Ottomans stret-
ched over the forms of civilisation, technical achievements and sanitation.
As shown in the historiography of the problem (DAVISON, 1976, p. 463-483),
it is not true that Russia obtained by this treaty the right to protect all the
orthodox living in the Ottoman Empire. However, as Vergennes observed,
by inserting in an international treaty the obligation to protect Christians
(AMAE-FRANCE-CADN, 1774), the Ottomans deprived themselves of fun-
damental elements of sovereignty at a time when a clear separation between
internal and external juridical regimes was rising. By obtaining the right to
interfere in the governance of the two principalities, which were fully part
of the Ottoman Empire, a powerful diplomatic tool was to be put in the
hands of the Russian diplomacy until the Crimean war.
Under the leadership of Vergennes, the French diplomacy found a
very interesting solution in order to bring more stability to the Near Eastern
aairs. While Austria’s oriental ambitions were put in check by the French
alliance, Russia had to be forced to restrain itself in a dierent fashion. It was
by virtue of her status as a guarantor power of the Holy Roman Empire,
alongside France, Austria and Prussia that Russia had to lter her policy at
Constantinople. As a consequence of this situation, Russia agreed to provi-
de explanatory interpretations of some provisions included in the treaty of
Kuchuk-Kainardji. Thus, in the context of negotiating what became later
the agreement of Teschen (1779) for the Holy Roman Empire, the Ainali-
-Kavak convention was signed. In both cases, the French had a crucial role.
Certainly, France was not able to prevent the Russian annexation of Crimea
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because the French statesmen judged the mission impossible without the su-
pport of the British Royal Navy. After the independence war in North Ame-
rica and despite Vergennes’s openings at London on this specic matter,
such a move was impossible to foresee. However, Vergennes succeeded in
stopping the Ottomans from reacting to the Crimean crisis and threatened
the Austrians with the break of the alliance if they would not give up plans to
annex Moldavia and Wallachia. But after the conclusion of the French-Rus-
sian treaty of 1787, Russia was tied as never before to Europe. It also meant
access for the Russian and Polish goods to the Marseille markets, as well as
benets from attracting the formidable French commercial network in the
Ottoman Empire towards the Black Sea coastline sales counters. With such
advantages for an economy with limited cash ow, a war with the Ottoman
Empire would have been useless for the Russians (LEANCA, 2019, p. 230).
It was actually the Sublime Porte that nullied this sophisticated approach
by declaring war to Russia in 1787. Only the risk of a continental war (in the
context of entente between Prussia and England over the Netherlands) and
the outbreak of the French Revolution saved the Ottomans from ceding to
Russia more than the Yedisan. If the European aairs would not have tur-
ned violent, the Ottomans would have been completely wiped out from the
defensive line of the Danube by the Austrian and Russian forces.
While the French revolution opened up a new era in international po-
litics, it did not change much in the geopolitics of the Ottoman Empire. The
end of the French-Austrian alliance, as well as the disappearance of Poland
(1795), favoured the revival of the French-Ottoman classical political rela-
tion (FIRGES, 2017, p. 47). But the initiatives of the French revolutionaries at
Constantinople needed time. What once was the powerful ottoman army
needed reform and long-term training. In 1797, the Ionian Islands were oc-
cupied by France, but the French-Ottoman proximity was of no use for the
sultan. This time, the blow to the Ottoman sovereignty came unexpectedly
from the French themselves. Napoleon, driven by Talleyrand’s projects to
bring havoc in Britain’s economy, invaded Egypt in 1799 and, shortly after,
entered Syria (LENTZ, 2012, p. 84). While the Ottomans managed partially
to drive back the French, they were in no better position internationally. The
French pushed the Ottomans into the arms of the Russians with which they
even concluded a treaty of alliance (MOURAVIEFF, 1954, p. 16). Moreover,
the Ionian Islands passed from the hands of the French to the hands of the
Russians, thus stimulating the latter’s appetite for the geopolitics of the Me-
diterranean. However, there can be no denitive judgement of Napoleon’s
Near Eastern policy. Once he became the master of Europe, the Ionian Is-
lands re-entered among the French possessions and Poland reappeared on
the map of Europe. In such extraordinary context, the Ottomans shifted si-
des and returned to their traditional anti-Russian policy. War between Rus-
sia and the Porte followed soon, but its fate depended on Napoleon’s moves.
The French emperor left the impression that he would leave room to Russia
in the direction of the Danube after encouraging the Ottomans to resist tsar
Alexander’s occupation of Moldavia and Wallachia (PURYEAR, 1951: 266).
Napoleon already controlled much of what once was Poland and, therefore,
tsar Alexander regarded as justied the presence of his armies on the line of
the Danube. With the growing mistrust between Russia and France, such a
settlement could not pass the test of time. The fact that the Ottomans, by the
treaty of Bucharest (1812), ceded half of Moldavia to Russia may have been
regarded as foolish by those who were aware of Napoleon’s preparations to
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invade Russia. But when the Russian contribution to the defeat of French
imperialism became obvious, the Ottomans found themselves in a rather
correct position in relation to Russia. In other words, for the Ottomans, the
1812 arrangement was painful and useful in the same time.
From the Vienna order to the Crimean system: the last revival of the
Ottoman Empire and the origins of its dissolution
The Vienna order occupies a special place in the history of interna-
tional relations. It is considered to be the beginning of an almost forty years
peace in Europe and the main chronological predecessor of the European
integration policies. However, the aura surrounding the Vienna settlement
should not restrain historians from analysing in a critical fashion the period
in question and the dangers that existed in Europe in the aftermath of Na-
poleon’s fall. One can trace the origins of the bloody French-German rivalry
from this particular moment (LENTZ, 2013, p. 160). In short, the Vienna
arrangement was actually less visionary than many of its apologists think.
Nonetheless, one should admit that after decades of violence, war and coer-
cion in the name of liberty, peace was nally achieved in Europe. Great Bri-
tain and Russia were the main guarantors of the new order. The rst power
dominated the sea and the second one dominated the land. At rst glance,
the Ottomans beneted from this era of relative calm and detente. But their
absence from the crucial negotiations at Vienna, as it was the case during
the diplomatic preliminaries of the Seven Years War, could not be benecial
for their security. The period of time between the fall of Napoleon and the
outbreak of the Crimean War reveals the ambiguity in which the Ottomans
found themselves in relation to Europe.
The Greek crisis was brought on the table of the European diplomats
in a very unusual way. At its beginnings, it was strictly perceived as an inter-
nal issue of the Ottoman Empire. The key leaders of the Greek revolution,
at least at the moment of its outbreak, were based in Russia. It goes without
saying, particularly in the legitimist atmosphere of Restoration Europe, that
tsar Alexander had no choice but to disavow any connection with them and
their ambitious plans. Count Capodistrias, tsar’s minister of Foreign Aairs,
who was of Greek descent, had to leave oce. In fact, the Russian position
in the Concert of Europe was considered at Saint-Petersburg more impor-
tant than exercising open protection for the pro-Russian orthodox factions
throughout the Ottoman Empire. Thus, despite the massive sympathy for
the Greek cause, Russia took no military action against the Porte in the rst
years of the rebellion. The Greek issue did not become a true European
aair until 1823 when Lord Strangford, the British ambassador at Constan-
tinople, advocated the idea of an armistice between the conicting sides.
His action was followed by the recognition of the Greeks as belligerents.
The British tried in this way to control as much as they could the political
emancipation of the Greeks and the likely internationalisation of this purely
Ottoman internal conict.
To reinforce its position, the British government sent Wellington, the
hero that put down Napoleon, in a mission at Saint-Petersburg in 1826 in
order to discourage a Russian unilateral military intervention against the
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Ottomans. But Wellington was an unskilled diplomat. Count Nesselrode, a
giant of diplomacy, convinced the illustrious British envoy to sign an agree-
ment which allowed Russia to take action against the Ottomans with or
without the participation of Great Britain. Needless to say, this bilateral ar-
rangement was exactly the opposite of what the British statesmen had ho-
ped for. Instead of restraining Russia and tying it down to the British line
of conduct, it opened the door to her unilateral military intervention in the
Ottoman Empire (COWLES, 1990, p. 688-720; BFSP, 1828, p. 629-639) and
crushed the idea of consensus in the European Concert on the Greek issue.
Moreover, it paved the way for the admission of the French in the negotia-
tions ahead that were to take place precisely at London.
If the British and the Austrians opposed the use of coercive measures
against the Ottomans, the French had a dierent approach to the crisis. Pa-
ris saw in the very unlikely self-restrain of Russia an opportunity to redene
the Vienna system according to its interests. Furthermore, it was a good
chance to mediate between Great-Britain and Russia on a wide range of sub-
jects relevant to international politics. In 1828, when it became clear that the
Ottomans will not accept an European solution to the Greek question, tsar
Nicholas I decided to make use of force precisely on the basis of the 1826
agreement, which was never denounced. While France could not bring into
open her project of redrawing her north-eastern border (LEANCA, 2020),
she obtained nevertheless in 1830 the diplomatic support of Russia for the
annexation of the ottoman port of Algiers. Thus, besides the idea of com-
pensating the French for their moderation, tsar Nicholas I manoeuvred skil-
fully in order to put pressure on the British presence in the Mediterranean.
The British statesmen admitted that during the Greek crisis, they became
‘the tools of Russia’ (INGRAM, 1979, p. 49). However, the British defeat on
the Near Eastern playground should not be overestimated. Closer as never
before to Constantinople in September 1829, the Russian army halted its ad-
vance. The decision may have been justied from the military standpoint,
but it also had a strategic and diplomatic motivation. The closest advisors of
tsar Nicholas I convinced him that the advantages of maintaining the Ot-
toman Empire in Europe were superior to its rollback (KERNER, 1937, p.
287). On top of that, Russia was not isolated in Europe and Greece was freed.
Nesselrode judged wisely to consider only minor territorial compensations
in the aftermath of hostilities, which contradicted the idea of a Russian mas-
terplan to swallow European Turkey. Nevertheless, the nature of the Rus-
sian-Ottoman treaty of Adrianople that followed the war was bilateral, not
multilateral. That is to say that no collective guarantee was yet applied to the
Ottoman Empire. Such a guarantee concerned only the newly created state
of Greece. In other words, Russia preserved its special place in the coloured
economy of the Ottoman foreign aairs. According to Nesselrode, Russia
could use in Europe dierent principles of diplomatic action compared to
those practiced in the Near East. On top of that, no French-British collabora-
tion was yet possible on the muddy waters of the ’Eastern Question’, which
added more avour to the epoch-making success of the Russian diplomacy
in the autumn of 1829.
But the dominant position of Russia in the Near Eastern aairs was
far from being indestructible. The unpredictable fall of Charles X in 1830 de-
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tached France from Russia, thus opening a new era in Ottoman-European
encounters. The creation of the Belgian state and the Polish revolution, no
matter how peculiar they were, added new ingredients to the everlasting
rivalry between powers at Constantinople. France sought a rapprochement
with the Saint-James cabinet in order to counter what seemed to be, accor-
ding to the liberal press, tsar’s unaccountable and encroaching policies upon
Europe and the Ottoman Empire. At rst glance, the ties between France
and Great-Britain seemed to have an eect on the Near Eastern aairs. But
a true alliance between the two most liberal governments of Europe did
not emerge from this special relation. The British closed their eyes to the
annexation of Algiers, but they perceived the Entente Cordiale as a tool of
containing France (BULLEN, 1974, p. 7). As for the Orleanist political eli-
tes, they had no reason to tie down their views on foreign aairs to those
expressed on the other side of the Channel. The rst Egyptian crisis (1833)
did not show much of this divergence between the two powers; the Russian-
-Ottoman treaty of Unkiar-Iskelessi, concluded after the French mediation
between Muhammad Aly and the Ottomans over Syria, placed London and
Paris more or less on the same attitudinal line. By contrast, the second Egyp-
tian crisis (1839) that posed an existential threat to the Ottoman Empire for-
ced England to nd common ground with Russia in order to discourage
France from supporting the aggrandizement schemes of Muhammad-Aly
at the expense of the sultan. As a result of Palmerston’s ideas, the British
gave a severe blow to France’s Near Eastern policy and fomented in this way
what we call the Rhine crisis (BROPHY, 2013). It was enough evidence to
demonstrate the inextricable relation between the centre and the periphery
of the international system.
The position of tsar Nicholas I needs to be explained in order to shed
light on the international situation of the Ottomans at this stage. Russia was
regarded at London and Paris as a power that imposed in 1833 unilaterally
to the Ottomans an unfair agreement that had implications for the future
of the balance of power in Europe. The bottom line of such formidable ac-
cuse was the following one: the Straits had to be kept opened to the tsar’s
military eet but close for the warships of the maritime powers. According
to this interpretation, it was in these conditions that Russia guaranteed the
Ottoman territorial integrity in case of an Egyptian assault. Contrary to this
reading of the treaty of Unkiar-Iskelessi, the Russian side never had such
intentions. Actually, as revealed by the publication of key documents from
the Russian archives, Nesselrode intended to prevent the entry of the Ro-
yal Navy into the Black Sea, but not to transform the Ottoman Empire in
a base of operations for Russia in the Mediterranean. The reason for this
self-restrain was that an aggressive Russian maritime policy would have en-
couraged the French and British to ask the Ottomans for the same kind of
treatment with respect to the Straits (HUREWITZ, 1975, p. 261-265). The
Russian position in the Crimea and in the bordering regions, such as, for
instance, in Moldavia and Walachia, would have been endangered by the
supposed British and French military penetration of the Black Sea. It is thus
easy to understand why the Straits Convention (1841) was another success,
albeit the very last one, for Russia on the entrenched diplomatic battlegrou-
nd of the ’Eastern Question’. The Convention strictly forbade the access of
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military vessels though the Bosporus and the Dardanelles, which served
very well the Russian purpose of protecting the Crimea. In conjunction
with the Münchengrätz agreement with Austria (1833), Russia was able to
continue alone working for the political fragmentation of European Turkey.
Thus, the Straits Convention was not a guarantee for the integrity and sove-
reignty of the Ottoman Empire. Despite the generous introduction attached
to it, it was only a document referring to the collective use of the Bosporus
and of the Dardanelles. If the Straits Convention would have served a larger
purpose than this particular one, as the French diplomats suggested during
the preliminary phases of the Crimean crisis, it should have in the rst pla-
ce nullied the ’Russian system’ in the Ottoman Empire that had for basis
the treaty of Kuchuk-Kainardji. But it was not the case, because the British
preferred to leave things as they were at Constantinople instead of embar-
king in some perilous adventure with no clear agenda; it would have most
probably brought back the French into the matter, just as during the Greek
crisis. The 1841 convention was no victory of the European Concert against
Russia and no miraculous cure for solving the ’Eastern Question’. The most
tangible argument in this direction is the Crimean war itself. But the tacit
agreement that took place between Great Britain and Russia made believe
the latter that she might be on intimate terms with the former (PURYEAR,
1965, p. 51). The reverie of tsar Nicholas I, fomented by the exchanges he had
with the British statesmen at London in 1844, ended sooner than expected.
While this article does not intend to branch out into a general discus-
sion on the origins of the Crimean War, it has to touch upon what we consi-
der to be its two intertwined sources. The rst one has to be identied in the
diculties that surrounded the reintegration of Mount-Lebanon and Syria
into the Ottoman administration after Muhammad-Aly’s retreat from these
regions. The second one refers to the crisis generated by the 1848 revolution
at Bucharest and in Hungary.
It is not arguable that Russia was suspected in the West of intending
to annex the Danube provinces. And, indeed, the Russians perceived Mol-
davia and Walachia as a periphery, albeit exterior, of their own empire, whi-
le the maritime powers continued to look at these two provinces through
the Ottoman lens. Nevertheless, a real competition between Russia and the
other powers at Iasi and Bucharest never truly passed the limit of secondary
consular disputes. By contrast, the maritime powers, showed more interest
regarding the Levantine territories of the Ottoman Empire than Russia. In
fact, European projects in order to award to Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Na-
zareth the status of free cities have been formulated after the return of the
Ottomans to Damascus (POPOFF, 1910, p. 225). Such initiatives had a depar-
ting point in the orientalist mentality of the western diplomats, as well as in
the fact that the Ottoman political system did not improve after the promul-
gation of the Gülhane decree. Despite the fact that the 1844’s massacres in
Lebanon proved such a state suciently, it was actually no real alternative
to the Ottoman rule neither in the Levantine territories, nor in Moldavia
and Wallachia.
The Ottoman authority in the Levantine provinces, no matter how
keen it was to assert itself as a reformed one, was trapped in a mixture of lo-
cal interests combined with a set of growing aspirations expressed by the do-
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minant powers in the region. In theory, modernisation and reinforcement of
sultan’s authority was the common denominator of the policies of the great
powers for the Middle East after 1841. But reform and other western cures
for ’the sick man of Europe’ served many purposes, both of internal and ex-
ternal signicance for each of the parties involved. Besides encouraging fac-
tional conict in order to weaken the establishment of strong local networks
of power, the Ottomans had a dierent war to ght. They intervened in the
internal organization of the Orthodox church in order to tie it down to the
authority of the sultan. As a matter of fact, Ottoman bureaucrats intervened
in the election and removal of the patriarchs. But weakening the Orthodox
Church was also envisaged by the British, who succeeded the Russians in
the Ionian Islands and who experienced the opposition in 1838 of the bear-
ded orthodox popes on several civil reforms (FAIREY, 2015, p. 79). As expec-
ted, the Russians were unpleasantly surprised by the Ottoman appetite for
reform in the aairs of the Orthodox Church and by the British intrusion
in such a delicate matter. On top of that, the Russians were worried by the
progress of the French diplomacy in the Middle East. A large proportion of
the Maronite leaders became the clients of France and a French consulate
opened its gates at Jerusalem in 1843 (BOUYRAT, 2013, p. 279-432; NEU-
VILLE, 1948, p. 32-34). Russia asserted itself as the protector of Orthodoxy
in the Ottoman Empire and France was entitled by its capitulations to assist
the needs of the Catholic clergy in the Holy Land. Such a situation did not
mean that both powers were ready to support whatever claim their clients
would lay to the Ottoman authorities. Native Russian clergymen were cri-
tical of the ways in which the orthodox hierarchy in the Ottoman Empire,
mainly of Greek descent, understood to interact with the believers in Syria.
But France had its problems too. Its protectorate was in danger to pass to
the Kingdom of Sardinia. Neither one of these complications interested the
Ottomans, but from the beginning of the 1840’s onwards, they were slowly
dragged into a complex dispute that they thought they can handle by simply
using delaying tactics.
When in 1842, the Orthodox requested to repair the church of the
Holy-Sepulchre, both French and Russian diplomacies reacted. If it was
true that the Orthodox had an authorisation to operate on the site, it did
not mean that they could carry out the task. Adolphe de Bourqueney, the
French ambassador at Constantinople, opposed the plan. Under sharp criti-
cism from the French, the Ottomans were ready to change the terms of the
approval given to the Greeks. Titov, the representative of the tsar, unders-
tood well that the purpose of the French was to undermine the privileges
that Russia defended in the name of the Greek clergy. The status quo would
have been altered. He thought that une déclaration de droits dispatched di-
rectly from Saint-Petersburg would be enough to silence ’the Europeans’
(POPOFF, 1910, p. 316). But neither the French, nor the Russians got entirely
what they hoped for because the Ottomans delayed their backing to one or
the other position expressed on the matter. In fact, it was not the reparation
itself that was at stake, but the advantages and the potential symbolic privi-
leges that could be added for each side after such action. Only the Ottomans
could resolve the issue. However, their decision regarding the Holy Places
of Christianity became harder and harder to take. The election of Kyrillos
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II on the orthodox episcopal seat of Jerusalem (KILDANI, 2010, p. 36) seem
not that important at rst glance, but actually increased the pressure on the
Ottomans to pronounce a solution favorable to the Greeks. It was Russia
that imposed this candidate and decided that the elected one must reside
in Jerusalem, not in Constantinople, as previously. And if one takes into
consideration the Russian sympathy for the Arab orthodox element (HOP-
WOOD, 1969, p. 21; KILDANI, 2010, p. 66), it becomes obvious that the La-
tins had to counteract somehow these movements. Rome simply gave a new
life to the diocese of Jerusalem, which was up until that time only nominal,
and ocially appointed Giuseppe Valerga as patriarch (1847). The French
government did not like the choice made by the Pope because Valerga was
Sardinian (KILDANI, 2010, p. 277-280). However, the theft of the Star from
Bethlehem forced the French diplomats to engage in detailed discussions
with the patriarch and to set up a plan in order to improve the situation of
the fathers serving the Catholic church in the Holy Land. Otherwise, the
protect ion of the Frenc h govern ment would have been completely useless.
The 1848 revolution only paused for a quick period of time what see-
med to be initially a struggle of inuences between the Russian and the
French consular oces in the Holy Land. But it was soon to be discovered
that it was more than that. The bottom-up political movements across Eu-
rope did not only touch upon domestic aairs, they impacted signicantly
on international politics. While repression and restoration of order in Eu-
rope did silence the radical spirits, it did not foster tranquillity, but a race
among ambitious actors at the immediate periphery of the international sys-
tem. And there was only a matter of time before redistribution of inuence
among the great powers in the Middle East would have a boomerang eect
on Europe.
The Ottomans had to deal with the seize of power by the revolutio-
naries in Bucharest. But the Ottoman envoys which were appointed to jud-
ge the events on site realized that the movement was not directed against
sultan’s authority, but against Russia and the creatures who patronized the
regime that was just overthrown (LEANCA, 2013). It goes without saying
that the Ottomans did not sympathise with the ideals expressed by the Pari-
sian style new politicians from Bucharest. Nevertheless, under the inuence
of the French Republic’s representatives in Constantinople, Suleyman-Pa-
cha, the representative of the sultan at Bucharest, engaged in negotiations
with the new power. Such way of dealing with the ’demagogues’ legitimi-
zed the movement and its criticism towards the Russian reforms underta-
ken in Moldavia and Wallachia since the treaty of Adrianople. In such cir-
cumstances, the tsar authorized the army to cross the border in Moldavia.
Unexpectedly, Nesselrode managed to reverse the decision. According to
his views, a powerful response to the crisis would have been less manageab-
le from the diplomatic point of view. Despite the fact that the Russian forces
already crossed the Russian-Ottoman border, they started to retreat after a
while. But orders were countermanded again, as the evolution of events at
Bucharest was considered at Saint-Petersburg impossible to solve without a
military demonstration. The Ottomans had no choice but to accept a joint
occupation of Moldavia and Wallachia with the Russians and to come to
terms with the fact that they have to negotiate with them an agreement.
But one problem remained: the Russian occupation of the principalities was
not recognized at Constantinople. The maritime powers supported the re-
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to the Crimean system: the ‘Eastern Queson’ Revisited
sistance of the Ottomans to any attempt to drift out from the provisions of
the treaty of Adrianople. But, again, the Russians did not show any signs of
weakness or concern, as they considered Moldavia and Wallachia a display
for their reformist and pre-revolutionary political culture.
However, the case for an international crisis was already set. The
French republican diplomacy, tired of the delays of the Russians to recog-
nize the new regime in Paris and by the violations committed against in-
ternational law at Bucharest, approached the cabinet at Saint-James. While
Stratford, the British ambassador at Constantinople, was closer in his po-
sition to Aupick, the French representative at the Porte, a united strategy
of the maritime powers against Russia did not come into eect. The rea-
son for this ambiguity resided in the dierences between France and Great
Britain with respect to the fall of the Habsburgs. The memorable and to-
tally unexpected event had a signicant impact on the Russian-Ottoman
relations. The French diplomacy was less touched by the events at Vienna
compared to the British. Once tsar Nicholas I ordered his troops to put an
end to the Hungarian experiment, Russia found in Austria a powerful ally
in order to settle her dispute with the Ottoman government over the two
principalities. If Palmerston proved right on the medium term about the
capabilities of Austria of preventing Russia’s expansion towards the Danube,
he was wrong in this regard on the short term. The Russian intervention not
only produced a high number of Polish and Hungarian refugees south of the
Danube (among them the leaders of the revolution), but threatened the Ot-
toman government with war if the asylum seekers were not handled to their
respective states of origin. It is in this particular context that France and
Great Britain assured for the very rst time the Ottomans of their military
assistance in case of war and oered protection to the refugees. Because the
British squadron dropped anchor very near the Straits, Nesselrode accused
Stratford that he was responsible for the violation of the 1841 convention.
If the aair did not drift towards full scale war, it was nevertheless a repe-
tition for the British and the French in case the crisis between Russia and
the Ottomans turns into open hostility. Moreover, as we have mentioned at
the beginning of this article, the Balta-Liman agreement (1849) did not add
any other privilege to Russia with respect to Moldavia and Wallachia. Later
on, in 1853, when prince Menchikov intended to get new concessions from
the Ottomans, he had to return home with no tangible results, just like it
happened in 1849.
General Aupick did not only watch closely the Russian occupation of
Moldavia and Wallachia. He was eager to take action in order to settle the
question of the Holy Places. His energic attitude has to be understood in the
context of Louis-Napoleon’s rise to power, which signicantly revigorated
the French foreign policy. Basically, the president Louis-Napoleon did not
break with the principles of the Republic in terms of foreign aairs, but he
was more inclined to take action in various international arenas compared
to his predecessors. He was not totally against the ideals of the French Re-
volution, which did not mean that he sympathised uncritically with a more
traditional view on France’s mission in world aairs. By the same token,
Louis-Napoleon criticised the Vienna settlement and envisaged to erase
France’s diplomatic defeat in the Near Eastern aairs in 1840. But he was
not a radical reformist in terms of international politics (SOUTOU, 2009, p.
21-21). For him, concert diplomacy was a valuable instrument as long as it
would keep the balance between liberal-nationalism and imperial forms of
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government. Louis-Napoleon’s moderate, but rm positions were also in-
uenced by his close contacts with the Catholiques engagés. Favouring Catho-
lic education in France went hand in hand with Louis-Napoleon’s military
support to reinstall Pope Pius IX in Rome after the success of revolution
in 1849. It is in this atmosphere that the initiatives of general Aupick were
formulated. His ocial correspondence shows that he knew that raising the
issue of the Holly Places would not leave Russia indierent. But he endor-
sed the idea of a more general approach on the matter. His reading of the
situation was also supported by Émile Botta, the French consul at Jerusa-
lem, and by Eugène Boré, a true advocate of the Franciscan cause in the
Holy Land (AMAE-FRANCE-COURNEUVE, 1850). Asking reparation for
the theft of the Star from Bethlehem was not considered enough in order
to calm down the Catholics at Jerusalem. Only a rm demand to the Otto-
man government in order to obtain the possession of places enumerated by
the capitulations was considered suitable. In the context of Louis-Napoleon’s
involvement in the dispute regarding the Hungarian and Polish political re-
fugees in the Ottoman Empire, Aupick became condent in a more substan-
tial policy respecting the rights and privileges of the Catholic Church in the
Holy Land. Albeit hesitant, La Hitte, the French minister of Foreign Aairs,
approved the line of conduct suggested by his representative at Constanti-
nople. The result was the famous note presented by Aupick to the Ottoman
government the 28
th
of May 1850. The Russians understood with great dif-
culty in 1849 and in 1850 that they cannot alter the status quo. But they
could not understand why France can engage in a process that can change
the status quo with respect to the privileges of the Orthodox Church. Such
contradictions set the path to the Crimean War.
Conclusion
The purpose of this critical tour d’horizon on preBismarkian ’Eastern
Question’ is to provide a framework for a broader reection on the inter-
national system and its transformations during the modern era. It does not
intent to depict the obvious rollback of the Ottoman Empire in a 19
th
cen-
tury Darwinist fashion, but to look at it from a multi-layered perspective.
Thus, we intended to give some insights into the functioning of the ’eternal
triangle’, composed of the classic European powers, Russia and the Otto-
man Empire. The evolution of the ’Eastern Question’ can be studied from
many angles. However, we privileged the French-Russian relations because
both France and Russia were the undisputed pillars of modern international
relations. France represented the old Westphalian order in Europe. In turn,
Russia had “both a role in and a relationship to Europe” (SCHUMACHER,
2014, p. 72). And this situation led to a paradoxical and intriguing system of
communicating vessels between Russia’s international position and the evo-
lution of the Ottoman Empire in its last century of existence.
On one hand, the restrain of Russia on the Near Eastern aairs af-
ter the fall of Sebastopol had a positive impact on the Ottoman aairs. It
strengthened multilateralism and, in a sense, got over most of the Rus-
sian-Ottoman conictual inheritance of the 18
th
century. One has to recall
the case of Moldavia and Wallachia. United in 1859 under the suzerainty
of the sultan, these two principalities remained under the guarantee of the
great powers. Despite the fact that their unication fuelled nationalism
and crystallised statehood, the integrity and inviolability of the Ottoman
129
Gabriel Leanca, Alexandru Ioan Cuza The Ooman Empire and Europe from the late Westphalian order
to the Crimean system: the ‘Eastern Queson’ Revisited
Empire was not aected. In the reading of Napoleon III, the architect of
this change, more liberty given locally was not incompatible with impe-
rial rule, on the contrary. The emergence of the mutashariya regime in
Lebanon was a consequence of the same approach. In a word, bottom-top
and top-bottom conict resolution mechanisms were envisaged in order
to maintain the Ottoman Empire alive. Moreover, one should recall the
military neutralization of the Black Sea and the debut of the full Ottoman
integration in international law.
On another hand, considering the balance of power that emerged
after the Crimean War, one can state that the Ottomans tied themselves
to a divided Europe. The more Russia was pushed to a distant line in Euro-
pean aairs, the more fragile the resulting arrangements for Europe were.
The Russian diplomacy did tolerate the growth of Prussia in order to wea-
ken the Crimean system, but not to the point of undermining its return
on the Near Eastern and European stage. As the chances of the Ottomans
to maintain themselves in the Balkans lessened in the second half of the
19
th
century, the creation of an international sub-system of states in this
region grew stronger and stronger. Marginalised in world aairs by the
German Empire, France and Russia became allies. Such a revolution in
international politics paved the way for the last rapprochement between
Constantinople and Berlin.
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