Time: AD. 1911 (alternative history) Background: After reclaiming eastern Burgundy and savoy by Austria in 1871 and the restoration of Holy Roman Empire , HRE become the sole nation that borders Switzerland. High offcials from HRE seek to reunite Switzerland back into the empire, but Swiss "stubbornly" uphold their neutrality. Despite massive amount of promise HRE gave to Switzerland (autonomy, kingdom title, does not need to send troop when HRE are in war. etc.), all attempt of negotiation fell fruitless. After almost 40 years of failure, HRE offcials finally had enough, and issue fully embargo of Switzerland, hope to use starvation to "clear their misguided mind" and "persuade" them into "voluntary" rejoin the empire. Switzerland's only neighbour are federation empire HRE, which consist of more than two dozens of Duchy and Kingdom under the banners of house Von Habsburg. HRE are allied with Russian Empire (Romanov), Kingdom of Spain (Habsburg) and Empire of Mexico (Habsburg), and the imperial crown have been recognize and coronated by The Pope himself (Papal State). What I am considering here is, what kind of response will HRE receive when the news of fully embargo of a neutral nation spread (MC are one of the high offcial to sign fully embargo order, and HRE did not sign Geneva Convention), Mostly from the great powers such as France, Britain and USA. Would Switzerland able to self-sustain themselve? If not, would they compromise under these circumstances? Can this be the trigger to start (AH)WW1?
I don't really understand all this, but if you think about it in WW2 Switzerland did pretty well at surviving surrounded by Nazi allies. Of course I don't think they'd be able to do very well in industry (I don't know if Switzerland has coal) but I think it would do well in terms of simple sustaining as they'd be able to farm cows and sheep for food and textiles but they wouldn't flourish as they don't have enough resources. Want of expansion and trade could raise tensions but I think there would be heavy debating before out right war as there was in this time line with the Ultimatum.
But the Switzerland aren't the Nazi's priority, HRE are dead set for Switzerland to rejoin them. If fully embargo does not bring Swiss to their knees, the empire WILL invade them, which, the Nazis never did.
I still personally think that Switzerland could survive on its own, it just depends on how long HRE want to sit around for. If there was a war Switzerland wouldn't survive that and would be engulfed.
What type of economies do both have? Has the HRE industrialized, or are they still mostly a slave-labor nation? How has economy progressed in your history?
If I'm not mistaken, one of the main industries of Switzerland is banking. The kind of banking the rich people of the whole world rely upon. How would that figure in?
HRE are heavily industrialized, and aside from Mexico, all slave labor were banned in imperial bloc. Switzerland still have its historical economy type, but due to border issues and HRE's claim on Switzerland, the banking industry withered since 1871. Economies through out the world are mostly the same, Britain still have the world's greatest economy, followed by HRE. The dominance of British pound are heavily threatened by imperial crown which was distributed by Austrian bank. Aside from Russia, all imperial bloc nations have accepted imperial crown as the dominating currency to lessen the exchange process of economy flow.
I think banking cannot really work anymore when your only neighbor eagerly want to annex you, and all of your international economy flow are going through them.
It certainly does! Very useful imformation to understand how Switzerland survive been surrounded by enemys, and I could certainly use some of the ideas. Thank you very much for the link.
I was thinking along the lines of: if the whole world does its banking with you, the rest of the world isn't going to take kindly to their banking country being annexed to a country that might threaten their financial stability and resources. Interesting article here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switzerland_during_the_World_Wars
Sorry that I misunderstood your reply. It really is a problem, HRE would make a ton of enemy if they try to annex Switzerland. But WW1 are going to start sooner or later, might as well use this chance to replace Britain and establish hegemony over world economy, just like Americans use both world war to become world's economical dominance. I had a quick read of the article, and found out that no one really want to invade Switzerland anyway. But HRE were dead set to make Swiss rejoin them one way or another, It's a matter of national dignity.
