The relations between the countries and peoples on the European continent are actually more complicated than the relations between the peoples in the Chinese mainland. Before the great empires established by the various races, they attacked each other, and the racial consciousness and national consciousness were even stronger than the Chinese feudal society. Today, I will talk to you about some of the grievances between Germany and Austria.
In fact, the relationship between Germany and Austria is still relatively deep, and both states were once members of the Holy Roman Empire of the German nation, and the Holy Empire at that time was very large, accounting for almost half of the entire Area of Europe. Between the 17th and 18th centuries, the military genius Napoleon attacked the Holy Roman Empire several times, eventually disintegrating it.
After the collapse of the Empire, Germany ceased to exist in name only and became a region of many states. The most powerful state in the north belonged to Prussia, while the most powerful state in the south belonged to Austria. Both countries worked for the next hundred years to reunite Germany.
The contradictions between the two states eventually broke out in 1866. As a result of a series of reforms by the Junker aristocracy, Prussia grew stronger and put a redefinition of The German landscape on the agenda. Under Bismarck's plan, Prussia induced Austria to take the initiative to provoke war, and Prussia was "forced" to declare war on Austria.
At that time, throughout Germany, there were many small states, which were subordinate to Prussia or Austria, and when war broke out, they needed to choose which side to help or to show neutrality. At that time, on the western side of the border between Prussia and Austria, there was a small state called Liechtenstein, which was originally part of the Holy Empire, and after the dissolution of the Empire, it had always expressed its obedience to Austria.
Of course, during the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, it certainly chose Austria without a doubt, and sent an expeditionary force of 80 men to join the Austrian camp and help Austria fight. At that time, infantry tactics were still large-scale cluster charges, and a war often involved thousands, or even tens of thousands, of people to fight, and a mere eighty people could not do anything at all.
So the expeditionary force of Liechtenstein was sent by Austria to a remote town to camp here, where it was scouted to prevent the Prussian army from bypassing here and attacking the Austrian flank. Of course, it was impossible for the Prussian army to come around from here, and this was obviously to send the Liechtenstein soldiers.
As a result, liechtenstein soldiers encountered the enemy in it, and the other side was a reconnaissance team obeying a small Prussian state, which was almost the same task as the Liechtenstein soldiers. Without a clear order to fight, soldiers on both sides even sniffed each other and even greeted each other in German. In order to fool Prussia and Austria, both sides fired their guns into the air, and most of the time, both sides were eating and waiting to die.
At this time, the flintlock gun had long been eliminated by the Prussian army, and the new breech single-shot gun was large-scale loading the army. On the other hand, the Austrian side, in the spirit of chivalry, is still using the front-loading flintlock gun of "eating with the mouth". As a result, the Prussian army was defeated, and the war ended in just a few months, Prussia successfully unified Germany, and Austria had no choice but to withdraw from Germany.
When the news came, the soldiers of Liechtenstein cheered and the war was over! They happily marched toward Liechtenstein, and when they returned home, the original 80-man expeditionary force had become 81. It turned out that on their way back home, they met a lost Austrian officer and simply brought him back.
Although Liechtenstein is a funny war, but the economy is indeed a good hand, the country is now the only highly developed capitalist country in the world, the national income is frighteningly high.