Exposition Universelle (April-June, 1867).

International]

France holds an international fair, in the midst of its diplomatic crisis with the Kingdom of Prussia, it is a diplomatic opportunity and to show what France is now. From a political point of view.

Napoleon III has carried out a remarkable renovation of Paris, since April 1 (and it was planned to last until November).

The international fair or Exposition Universelle as they called it in French, had more than 50,000 exhibitions, among these, the second European exhibition to present Japanese art (having lost this position to London thanks to the then Tsesarevich Alexander Alexandrovich selling Japanese art).

France obviously hosts the majority of exhibitions.

In the Russian pavilion (with some 1,300 exhibits in total), Mendeleev and his colleague Professor Zinin participated as some of the main managers of the pavilion. Mendeleev took particular interest in the study of impractical and not-important (at the time...) uranium. (Mendeleev would predict that uranium had enormous potential ...)

As Russia at the moment had little to demonstrate industrially (apart from some novelties such as its dynamite), Russia presented mainly cultural and ethnic material.

Among the exhibits were a Kyrgyz yurt (the Kyrgyz are an Iranian-speaking people of Russian Turkestan) and a Yakut Urasa (a summer house of the natives of Siberia).

Nikolai Ivanovich Koksharov, Julius Fyodorovich Fritzsche and Boris Semyonovich (von) Jacobi also participated in the Russian pavilion.

The Russian pavilion was the largest exhibition of Russian material at international fairs up to that time.

At the beginning of May it became a much bigger event than it already was, one of the brothers of the Emperor of Japan attends, Abdülaziz the 32nd Ottoman Sultan, King Wilhelm I of Prussia and Otto von Bismarck, the Khedive of Egypt Isma'il Pasha, and Prince Metternich and Franz Josef of Austria.

And Tsar Alexander III of Russia, accompanied by his brother Tsesarevich Vladimir Alexandrovich of Russia (an acquaintance interested in art).

Everything could have turned out relatively well, Franz Josef, Wilhelm I (and Otto von Bismarck), Alexander III and Napoleon III could have put an end to the Luxembourg crisis.

The writer Victor Hugo himself spoke about the exhibition as : "A great peace treaty."

Not only for Luxembourg, but for Europe and the World.

Unfortunately a Polish radical ruined it on May 25. Anton Iosifovich Berezovsky (polish: Antoni Berezowski

) attempted against the life of Emperor Alexander III while he, along with Emperor Napoleon III, was attending the Longchamp racecourse, where a military parade would be held.

Prior to a diplomatic meeting between the emperors and kings present to resolve the Luxembourg Crisis, as Napoleon III and Wilhelm I of Prussia had agreed (bringing Franz Joseph and Alexander III as mediation).

Berezovsky lived in France since 1865, he participated at the age of 16 in the uprising of 1863 (curiously, against the will of his father), spoiled by the then Tsesarevich, Alexander Alexandrovich. Making the Okhrana supression of Polish nationalism.

In June he had the idea of trying to assassinate the Tsar. Reason why he bought a gun.

Unfortunately, it seems that Berezaovsky never learned how to truly use a pistol, it exploded in his hand because it was badly loaded, and his attempt to assassinate the emperor did more damage to the near horse than to the Russian Tsar.

Tsar Alexander III immediately insisted on a trial in late May in France. So Prussia, Austria, and Russia checked something out of France.

The French like the Poles.

The prosecutor argued that Berezovsky actually had no personal motivation to complain about the Russian government, and therefore "there is no excuse for him, unless political passions serve to reduce his guilt."

On his side, the Polish nationalist affirmed his actions, and only regretted having committed them on French soil: "France, which is friendly to us."

Berezovsky was defended by French lawyer Charles Lacho, Lacho insisted that Berezovsky avenged his enslaved homeland and his family exiled after the January uprising, and referred to the good qualities of Berezovsky. Qualities that for obvious reasons Tsar Alexander III and other emperors (and king) present never saw, but which supposed (French) witnesses verified.

Lacho's words and favorable French public opinion towards the Polish nationalist who tried to assassinate an emperor on French soil, only created sympathy between Franz Joseph and Wilhelm I of Prussia (and Otto von Bismarck) towards the emperor Alexander III.

Russia, Austria and Prussia divided Poland-Lithuania, they have important populations of Poles who were their subjects, Polish nationalism was a serious problem for the geo-political interests of these three nations.

Berezovsky was sent to live for the rest of his days in New Caledonia as a criminal who have to do forced labor.

But the damage of Berezovsky and Lacho was done, the peace talks between Prussia, Austria, Russia and France came to nothing. Britain tried to put the other great powers back on the table, but regrettably they failed (also the Fenian were making trouble in England, Ireland and Canada).

*******

On May 11, the last great battle between Mexican imperialists and Republicans in the south occurs, the government of Benito Juarez fell, with the president of Mexico himself (not recognized by the imperial government of course) captured by the tripartite armies of Miguel. Miramón, Leonardo Márquez and Tomás Mejía winning over the Republican side.

On June 19, Benito Juarez is shot according to the Black Law of the Second Mexican Empire, putting an end to the rebellious Mexican republic of this war.

The entire Mexican territory is now the Second Mexican Empire, currently completely free of French. Now the question is what the United States intends to do ...

With the death of the president, the Emperor Maximilian I of Habsburg abolishes the Black Law and proclaims royal pardons for liberal elements that join the Second Mexican Empire (partly a way out to get non-traditionalist elements that tend to be less opposed to Maximiliano's liberal reforms, although he is a bit too liberal for Mexican liberals ...).

Porfirio Diaz, "governor" of one of the southern republican provinces, joins the Second Mexican Empire.

On May 29, the Austrian Empire and other territories under Franz Joseph form the Austro-Hungarian Empire, when the Austro-Hungarian Compromise (Ausgleich in German or kiegyezés in Hungarian) is ratified.

Thus forming a dual monarchy or a land formed by two crowns under the same monarch. On June 8, Franz Joseph was officially crowned King of Hungary.

********

[French-Prussian War]

On June 15, the Prussians rejected the French demand of Emperor Napoleon III to withdraw his armies from the fortress of Luxembourg. France maintaining that they legally bought Luxembourg.

France began the general mobilization of its armies towards Luxembourg, and the rest of Europe goes on alert when the Prussians do not retreat.

Some of the southern states of Germany already have pacts with the Kingdoms of Bavaria, the Kingdom of Würtemberg and the Grand Duchy of Baden. These states are the states which Otto von Bismarck wants to integrate into a unified Germany.

There is also the Grand Duchy of Hesse-Darmstadt or Grand Duchy of Hesse and by Rhine, but this does not have an exact pact with the Prussians.

The northern part of the Grand Duchy of Hesse is part of the North German Confederation, but the southern part is not.

Speaking of the rest of Europe, the situation is complicated and could go in different directions.

Austria: Still recovering from the Austro-Prussian war and composing. There is a certain revenge towards Prussia, but there are also positive feelings for the lax terms of the war.

United Kingdom: The war poses a threat to the Belgian pawn in London, and France (already a threat once) has now been the active party in a new European war of conquest.

Alexander III's Russia for its part remained neutral at the outbreak of war.

In part it was:

Blame the Crimean War. Napoleon III basically reached the top of it in that war and the rest went coast down, one of the few times that Russia would cooperate with Napoleon III's France was the punitive expedition to Korea ... and Napoleon III was not so involved in that.

Guilt for the assassination attempt in France. That put Alexander III in tune with Franz Joseph and Wilhelm I of Prussia in those months.

The fact that Russia was not ready for a new European war like that. Simply put, Alexander III valued Russia more than the rest of Europe, and Russia was industrializing.

*******

[Grand Duchy of Finland]

Finland suffers the worst effects of the famine caused by the bad climatic and agricultural conditions of the moment, but fortunately the food reserves during the diet of Finland and the Emperor Alexander III have managed to avoid a large number of deaths.

Indeed, they have been greatly minimized: Famine, cold and infectious diseases have been mostly resolved thanks to prompt government action.

Few Finns had to eat pine bark during this time, the minor effects of the famine would last until the end of the year and the first weeks of 1868, but the situation was more under control from now on.

This has been largely capitulated with propaganda by the government of Alexander III and the Finnemans, to further gain the support of the peasant mass in Finland.

Normally some farmers still believe that famines are God's punishment, but many others actually feel quite positive about the government's actions to help, getting support.

It is clear that Finnish agriculture must be diversified and improved, for that the Ministry of Education has added particular reforms for Finland to the 1872 plan. In the area of agronomy as well.

For example, it was proposed to convert the Royal Technical School of Helsinki, created in 1872, into the Polytechnic Institute of Helsinki.

The 1872 reform of Finland has not only as an interest the technical promotion of education, but also to equate Finnish with the Swedish language and to give compulsory Russian courses (at university level only).

Equating Finnish educational degrees to Russian degrees (at university level). Of course, this reform would still take years to implement.

*******

[Russian military]

Throughout the last years of his father's life, and the first years of his reign, Tsar Alexander III encouraged Russian military (army and navy) to observe and learn from modern wars of the epoch.

These soldiers were also trained in the art of teaching (prepared for the next Russian military reform, which includes the Russian military academies).

Now Tsar Alexander III sends the most experienced of these generations of scouts to train a group of new servicemen observing the French-Prussian War.

The Russian military who observed the Austro-Prussian war now see what it means to not prepare for a scenario like the Franco-Prussian war.

The Prussians have proven that their armies work, but now a new situation makes things difficult for them.

The Prussians are less prepared, not that the French are too, but the Prussians have been caught off guard.

They have less mobility in infrastructure and their forces have not fully recovered from the battle with the Austrians and other Germans.

The armies are not at their best, the French reforms were planned for 1870, but it does not mean that they will be crushed by Prussia.

Prussia has not had much time to prepare after the Austro-Prussian war, its lines of movement were not quite ready at this time.

The North German Confederation doesn't even have a constitution yet (it was planned for July).

*******

The Russian neutrality in Europe during the first years of the reign of Alexander III would be called by some historians like a government "Germanophilic".

This is claimed under the precepts of non-intervention or friendly neutrality that Tsar Alexander III of Russia and Russian foreign diplomacy upheld during the French-Prussian War and the Austro-Prussian War.

However, this ignores the panorama of the causes of such neutrality or support for Prussia, with respect to the interests (and personal motives) of tsarist Russia under Tsar Alexander III.

In the first place the Crimean War, where Austria had a hostile neutrality towards Russia or friendly neutrality towards the Anglo-French coalition.

Napoleon III was involved in the same Crimean War, one of his first publicity successes (the defeat of Russia).

There were also economic and scientific reasons behind it, Russia could not afford too much money invested in fighting a war or extensively supporting one side. On the other hand the government of Tsar Alexander III was also interested in integrating Western forms of warfare into the Russian form of warfare.

The Russian Empire was also spending its focus on other areas, both militarily (Central and East Asia) and administratively (development of Alyáska, the Far East, European Russia, etc).

*******

[Taking advantage of the war]

The Luxembourg and Dutch economy (and to a much lesser extent the German and French), would seriously suffer from the French-Prussian War of 1867. Mainly from the border confrontations and subsequent military actions throughout the region.

The Russian Empire, with investments in the region of Germany and France, received more cash from some economic refugees who were mobilized avoiding the worst catastrophes of the war.

Not as much as the United States, the United Kingdom, or other parts of Europe, but they got their share of the cake.