A total of 26 German states attended the conference, but most of them had little say.

Since the end of the Austro-Prussian War and Austria's commitment to leave the north of the Main River at the disposal of Prussia, the German states have either been directly annexed by Prussia, or they have been taken over the command of the army and reduced to Prussia's echo worms.

That is, South Germany maintained complete autonomy because they were not in the Austro-Prussian Treaty.

The first item of the conference was the reaffirmation of the alliance between North and South Germany.

Bismarck himself appeared in the hope of changing the defensive alliance into an offensive and defensive alliance.

However, before the French delegate could say anything, the Bavarian delegate categorically rejected the request.

Fortunately, Bismarck was not surprised by this, and instead proposed the creation of a comprehensive police organization in Germany to deal with the growing number of popular uprisings and threats from foreign powers.

The countries agreed to this plan, and for them the Prussian influence was too deep to go any further, and it was certainly good to be able to help maintain their rule.

The Bavarian delegates were now recalling their domestic confession: in the best case, Prussia should be persuaded to abandon its involvement in the affairs of South Germany by moderate force, so that they could stay out of the Franco-Prussian war.

If it doesn't work, find a way to fall out and force Prussia to take the initiative to attack.

Just thinking about it, you can feel the smell of gunpowder in it, and let Bavaria provoke Prussia...... Even if the representative did not like the northern barbarians as much as the king, he felt that this must be crazy.

The representative looked sideways at the French ambassador, who was sitting quietly next to him, and his heart was a little calmer.

After a pause, the Bavarian representative spoke with difficulty: "We agree, but there is one precondition. ”

Without waiting for a reaction, he continued: "We demand that Catholics have full autonomy and that Catholics build Catholic communities throughout Germany.

The soon-to-be-formed police organizations, including the former ones, will be subject to the orders of the local government to punish violations of the rights of Catholics. ”

As soon as he finished speaking, several representatives of the small states of North Germany stood up angrily, not to blame them for not being able to calm down, is this to make the Catholics superior to the Protestants?

The most worthy of anger is not the oppression of external enemies, but the unfair treatment of one's own people.

Such conditions put the North Germans in a position, especially if the South Germany was still annexed, but set conditions that the dominant ones did not dare to open.

Bismarck's heart sank, and he immediately saw the other party's intentions, he personally did not attach much importance to the religious aspect, but he knew that he would never agree.

The front foot agrees to this condition, and the back foot walks out of the conference room and the North German Confederation falls apart.

"In the future, Germany will treat all people equally, regardless of their status, as long as they are Germans, and we will ensure that they are not violated in any way, including Catholics." After Bismarck finished speaking, he gently revealed the matter.

However, no matter how nice he said, the first two issues were declared failures but could not be faked.

The mood in the conference room took a turn for the worse.

And the astonishing rhetoric of the representatives of Bavaria has not stopped.

"Since it is not possible to create a nationwide police organization, I propose to create a small security company.

As you should have seen from the recent turmoil in South Germany, Bavaria will bear all the costs and do everything it can to maintain order and stability in its own country, as well as in Württemberg, Hesse, and Baden. ”

Directly proposing the formation of South Germany would be too much of a slap in the face of Prussia to achieve the goal of portraying the other side as an aggressive attacker.

The representative of Bavaria threw up such a topic to test it.

While Bismarck was still considering whether to agree, the French ambassador blatantly violated the rules of attendance and said before the end of the meeting: "I don't know if this security company will go public, France is very interested in investing in it." ”

Hearing this, not only Bismarck expressed displeasure, but also the representatives of Austria-Hungary voiced their opposition.

Austria-Hungary still maintained some influence over South Germany at this time, and certainly did not want to see the birth of a unified South Germany.

Moreover, Austria-Hungary still had the idea of taking advantage of the Franco-Prussian War, and there was a lot of resistance to the annexation of South Germany at home, but everyone was happy to see it reintegrate it into its sphere of influence.

France, Austria and Hungary all violated the rules, and the rest of the powers did not have to worry too much, and the British ambassador directly asked about the details of the security company.

In this matter, Britain, who maintained close relations with Prussia, was on the opposite side of her.

In an instant, countries stood in line, forming a scene of Britain, France, Spain, Italy vs Austro-Austria and Russia.

Among them, although Russia was dissatisfied with Prussia's annexation of the territory of the Tsar's relatives (Hesse), they were even more dissatisfied with the aggressiveness of Britain and stood on the side of Prussia with a clear banner.

On the surface, the land forces on the Prussian side could completely crush the French side, but the standing forces in the conference room did not represent anything.

Neither Britain nor Russia could have participated in the war, and Austria-Hungary would not have sided with Prussia.

Spain and Italy, on the other hand, were weak in the face of Prussia, but they had a real possibility of entering the war, which was enough to profoundly change the balance of power between Prussia.

The scene was so stiff that the meeting could not go on, and Bismarck announced an intermission after saying a few words.

The representatives of the four southern German states returned home directly at halftime, which was considered not to give Prussia face at all.

After the meeting, King Wilhelm I of Prussia heard of this severe humiliation and asked Bismarck what to do.

Bismarck replied: "Let each of us prepare for war." ”

……

On August 13, an empty shell security company was founded in Munich.

The next day, the Protestants of Bavaria, united with the Unionists who opposed the South German Plan, staged a revolt in Nuremberg, Bavaria's second largest city, announcing that they would no longer recognize the perverse current Bavarian government.

The Bavarian army went to suppress it, but was met with a head-on attack by the Prussian army, which recognized the Nuremberg government and demanded that the Munich government be dissolved immediately.

That evening, the Munich government appealed to France for help, claiming that it had been invaded by Prussia.

France readily agreed, and the Franco-Prussian War broke out.