Nicholas I of Russia - Foreign Policy

Foreign Policy

In foreign policy, Nicholas I acted as the protector of ruling legitimism and as guardian against revolution. It has often been noticed that such politicies were linked with the Metternich counter-revolutionary system; indeed, Austrian special ambassador Count Karl Ludwig von Ficquelmont was well known for his wide influence over the tsar of whom he was a close friend. His offers to suppress revolution on the European continent, trying to follow the trends of his eldest brother, Tsar Alexander I, earned him the label of gendarme of Europe. In 1825 Nicholas I was crowned and began to limit the liberties of constitutional monarchy in Congress Poland. In return, after the November Uprising broke out, in 1831 the Polish parliament deposed Nicholas as king of Poland in response to his repeated curtailment of its constitutional rights. The Tsar reacted by sending Russian troops into Poland. Nicholas crushed the rebellion, abrogated the Polish constitution, and reduced Poland to the status of a province, Privislinsky Krai, and embarked on a policy of repression towards Catholics. In the 1840s Nicholas reduced 64,000 Polish nobles to commoner status.

In 1848, when a series of revolutions convulsed Europe, Nicholas was in the forefront of reaction. In 1849 he intervened on behalf of the Habsburgs to suppress the uprising in Hungary, and he also urged Prussia not to accept a liberal constitution.

While Nicholas was attempting to maintain the status quo in Europe, he adopted an aggressive policy toward the Ottoman Empire. Nicholas I was following the traditional Russian policy of resolving the so-called Eastern Question by seeking to partition the Ottoman Empire and establish a protectorate over the Orthodox population of the Balkans, still largely under Ottoman control in the 1820s.

Russia fought a successful war against the Ottomans in 1828 and 1829. In 1833 Russia negotiated the Treaty of Unkiar-Skelessi with the Ottoman Empire. The major European parties mistakenly believed that the treaty contained a secret clause granting Russia the right to send warships through the Bosporus and Dardanelles straits. By the London Straits Convention of 1841, they affirmed Ottoman control over the straits and forbade any power, including Russia, to send warships through the straits. Based on his role in suppressing the revolutions of 1848 and his mistaken belief that he had British diplomatic support, Nicholas moved against the Ottomans, who declared war on Russia 8 October 1853. On 30 November 1853, Russian Admiral Nakhimov caught the Turkish fleet in the harbor at Sinope and destroyed it.

In 1854, fearing the results of an Ottoman defeat by Russia, Britain, France, the Kingdom of Sardinia, and the Ottoman Empire joined forces in the conflict known as the Crimean War to the Ottomans and Western Europeans, but known in Russia as the Eastern War, Russian: Восточная война, Vostochnaya Vojna (March 1854 – February 1856). In April 1854, Austria signed a defensive pact with Prussia. Thus, Russia found herself in a war with the whole of Europe allied against her.

Austria offered the Ottomans diplomatic support, and Prussia remained neutral, thus leaving Russia without any allies on the continent. The European allies landed in Crimea and laid siege to the well-fortified Russian base at Sevastopol. The Russians lost battles at Alma in September 1854. This loss was followed by losses in battles at Balaklava and Inkerman. After a Siege of Sevastopol (1854–1855) the base fell, exposing Russia's inability to defend a major fortification on its own soil. After the death of Nicholas I, Alexander II became Tsar. On 15 January 1856 the new tsar took Russia out of the war on very unfavorable terms which included the loss of a military fleet on the Black Sea.