Frederick II, the Great

Reference

Picture; [Wikipedia];

Excerpts from Books and Wikipedia

"Within this advantageous diplomatic and geographical context, the early kings of Prussia played the game well. The acquisition of Silesia—described by some as the industrial zone in the east—was in particular a great boost to the state’s military-economic capacity. But the limitations of Prussia’s real power in European affairs, limitations of size and population, were cruelly exposed in the Seven Years War of 1756–1763, when the diplomatic circumstances were no longer so favorable and Frederick the Great’s powerful neighbors were determined to punish him for his deviousness. Only the stupendous efforts of the Prussian monarch and his well-trained troops—assisted by the lack of coordination among his foes—enabled Frederick to avoid defeat in the face of such a frightening “encirclement.” Yet the costs of that war in men and material were enormous, and with the Prussian army steadily ossifying from the 1770s onward, Berlin was in no position to withstand later diplomatic pressure from Russia, let alone the bold assault of Napoleon in 1806." [Kennedy: Great Powers, p. 92] Known for his patronage of the Enlightenment and success against great odds in the Seven Years' War. [Wikipedia] "Here we have, in general, the duties which a prince should carry out. So that he never neglects them, he should often recall to mind that he is a man just like the least of his subjects; if he is the first judge, the first general, the first minister of society, it is not so that he can indulge himself, but so that he can fulfil the duties involved. He is only the first servant of the state, obliged to act with honesty, wisdom and with a complete lack of self-interest, as if at every moment he might be called upon to render an account of his stewardship to his fellow citizens." [In letter from Frederick the Great, quoted in Blanning: Pursuit of Glory, p. 292-3] "On the other hand, there was no even trajectory from 1740 to 1786. This was not a steady-state universe; rather there was one big bang, the explosion occurring less than a year after his accession when he took the decision to seize the Austrian province of Silesia. To put it simply, he began by robbing an apparently defensive woman and spent the rest of his life trying to hang on to his booty, a herculean effort which colored all his foreign and domestic policies and actions. . . . In short, when Frederick came to the throne, he was confronted by a very fluid international situation in which no one state was dominant. . . . Also in his favor was the eclipse of Prussia’s two chief rivals for the domination of northern Germany—Sweden and Saxony-Poland." [Blanning: Frederick the Great, Kindle, p. 1, 92]