Eastern Question

In diplomatic history, the 'Eastern Question' refers to the strategic competition and political considerations of the European Great Powers in light of the political and economic instability in the Ottoman Empire from the late 18th to early 20th centuries. Characterized as the 'sick man of Europe', the relative weakening of the empire's military strength in the second half of the eighteenth century threatened to undermine the fragile balance of power system largely shaped by the Concert of Europe. The Eastern Question encompassed myriad interrelated elements: Ottoman military defeats, Ottoman institutional insolvency, the ongoing Ottoman political and economic modernization programme, the rise of ethno-religious nationalism in its provinces, and Great Power rivalries.France takes Algeria from Turkey, and almost every year England annexes another Indian principality: none of this disturbs the balance of power; but when Russia occupies Moldavia and Wallachia, albeit only temporarily, that disturbs the balance of power. France occupies Rome and stays there several years during peacetime: that is nothing; but Russia only thinks of occupying Constantinople, and the peace of Europe is threatened. The English declare war on the Chinese, who have, it seems, offended them: no one has the right to intervene; but Russia is obliged to ask Europe for permission if it quarrels with its neighbor. England threatens Greece to support the false claims of a miserable Jew and burns its fleet: that is a lawful action; but Russia demands a treaty to protect millions of Christians, and that is deemed to strengthen its position in the East at the expense of the balance of power. We can expect nothing from the West but blind hatred and malice... (comment in the margin by Nicholas I: ‘This is the whole point’). In diplomatic history, the 'Eastern Question' refers to the strategic competition and political considerations of the European Great Powers in light of the political and economic instability in the Ottoman Empire from the late 18th to early 20th centuries. Characterized as the 'sick man of Europe', the relative weakening of the empire's military strength in the second half of the eighteenth century threatened to undermine the fragile balance of power system largely shaped by the Concert of Europe. The Eastern Question encompassed myriad interrelated elements: Ottoman military defeats, Ottoman institutional insolvency, the ongoing Ottoman political and economic modernization programme, the rise of ethno-religious nationalism in its provinces, and Great Power rivalries. While there is no specific date on which the Eastern Question began, the Russo-Turkish War (1828-29) brought the issue to the attention of the European powers, Russia and Britain in particular. As the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire was believed to be imminent, the European powers engaged in a power struggle to safeguard their military, strategic and commercial interests in the Ottoman domains. Imperial Russia stood to benefit from the decline of the Ottoman Empire; on the other hand, Austria-Hungary and Great Britain deemed the preservation of the Empire to be in their best interests. The Eastern Question was put to rest after World War I, one of the outcomes of which was the collapse and division of the Ottoman holdings. The Eastern Question emerged as the power of the Ottoman Empire began to decline during the 18th century. The Ottomans were at the height of their power in 1683, when they lost the Battle of Vienna to the combined forces of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and Austria, under the command of John III Sobieski. Peace was made much later, in 1699, with the Treaty of Karlowitz, which forced the Ottoman Empire to cede many of its Central European possessions, including those portions of Hungary which it had occupied. Its westward expansion arrested, the Ottoman Empire never again posed a serious threat to Austria, which became the dominant power in its region of Europe. The Eastern Question did not truly develop until the Russo-Turkish Wars of the 18th century. The Napoleonic era (1799–1815) brought some relief to the faltering Ottoman Empire. It distracted Russia from further advances. Napoleon I himself invaded Egypt, but his army was trapped there when the British sank the French fleet. A peace interlude in 1803 allowed the army to return to France. To secure his own domination and to render the rest of Europe virtually powerless, Napoleon established an alliance with Russia by concluding the Treaty of Tilsit in 1807. Russia undertook to aid Napoleon in his war against Britain; in turn, the Emperor of Russia would receive the Ottoman territories of Moldavia and Wallachia. If the Sultan refused to surrender these territories, France and Russia were to attack the Empire, and the Ottoman domains in Europe were to be partitioned between the two allies. The Napoleonic scheme threatened not only the Sultan, but also Britain, Austria and Prussia, which was almost powerless in the face of such a potent alliance. The alliance naturally proved accommodating to the Austrians, who hoped that a joint Franco-Russian attack, which would probably have utterly devastated the Ottoman Empire, could be prevented by diplomacy; but if diplomatic measures failed, the Austrian minister Klemens von Metternich decided that he would support the partition of the Ottoman Empire—a solution disadvantageous to Austria, but not as dangerous as a complete Russian takeover of Southeastern Europe. An attack on the Empire, however, did not come to pass, and the alliance concluded at Tilsit was dissolved by the French invasion of Russia in 1812. Following Napoleon's defeat by the Great Powers in 1815, representatives of the victors met at the Congress of Vienna, but failed to take any action relating to the territorial integrity of the decaying Ottoman Empire. This omission, together with the exclusion of the Sultan from the Holy Alliance, was interpreted by many as supportive of the position that the Eastern Question was a Russian domestic issue that did not concern any other European nations. Serbian revolution or Revolutionary Serbia refers to the national and social revolution of the Serbian people between 1804 and 1815, during which Serbia managed to fully emancipate from the Ottoman Empire and exist as a sovereign European nation-state, and a latter period (1815–1833), marked by intense negotiations between Belgrade and Ottoman Empire. The term was invented by a famous German historian Leopold von Ranke in his book Die Serbische Revolution, published in 1829. These events marked the foundation of modern Serbia. While the first phase of the revolution (1804–1815) was in fact a war of independence, the second phase (1815–1833) resulted in official recognition of a suzerain Serbian state by the Porte (the Ottoman government), thus bringing the revolution to its end. The revolution took place by stages: the First Serbian Uprising (1804–13), led by Karađorđe Petrović; Hadži Prodan's revolt (1814); the Second Serbian Uprising (1815) under Miloš Obrenović; and official recognition of the Serbian state (1815–1833) by the Porte.