At the end of the Napoleonic wars, the Great Powers assembled in Vienna to restore the European state system – a delicate balance between the various major and minor powers that restrained aggression by the mighty, and upheld the rights of the weak.
They hoped to build a permanent peace by suppressing revolutionary republics and upholding stable, orderly monarchies. Despite the divergent aims and ambitions of Russia, Prussia, Austria, Britain and France, a compromise was created, following the brief interruption of Napoleon's ‘Hundred Days' and the Battle of Waterloo.
Nicholas decided to settle the ‘sick man of Europe' by carving up the European part of Turkey.
After the Treaty of Vienna the great powers enjoyed three decades of peace, years in which industrial, political, economic, social and nationalist pressures were suppressed or deflected. But eventually the Vienna system broke down. The initial problem was the weakness of the Ottoman-Turkish empire, and the opportunities this provided for European interference in support of the Christian populations.
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