In the mid-16th Century the world was, at best, a hard place to live in, especially Europe. Religious turmoil was at an all time high and no country supported any other belief than their state religion. There sometimes would be a leak of religion, where it would cross an unwelcomed border. Only more turmoil would come of this, each country wanted a pure nation and nothing else. This meant that Austria was an oasis for Catholics in an unforgiving world. Protestant France and reformed Burgundy were having a tough time keeping order within their borders and focused much less on the outside world than once before. France undoubtedly had to redouble their efforts, with reformed England still holding bits of Normandy and Aquitaine and aggressively sending out missionaries to spread their word, France would plunged into religious upheaval such as the world had never seen.
This meant that Austria had to handle the thousands of catholic immigrants who would have to get used to their protestant, reformed, orthodox, and Islamic neighbors. For the most part the Emperor, installed in the late 15th Century, kept the country untainted with the help of the one of the world’s largest armies, all 120 thousand men with a top of the line generals.
The necessary historical information for Austria is short. When it was but a sapling it spread roots of an empire to Italy, playing neighbor off of neighbor. Then eyes were cast towards the rich trade center of Venice and Ragusa, a hub of trade publicly funded by the Hungarian government. The expansion of Austria took off, grabbing land at almost an exponential rate. All of a sudden expansion stopped, and Austria realized that it had run out of room, the land that was close was held by large empires allied against the expanding country. So instead of looking east or north, Austria looked south.
The conflicts between Austria and The Ottomans were inevitable. They were both nations that were becoming ever increasingly hungry for land and they were matched tooth for tooth, nail for nail. At first they were small wars, such that one would guarantee another country and then become asked upon to defend their smaller neighbors. All of them ended shortly and returned to the status quo with a few bumps and bruises. Nevertheless, this built up hatred on both sides, both calling each other the wrongdoer.
With The Ottomans having the Middle East secured and a large number of allies, Austria was forced to resort to sending out its best diplomats to persuade other countries to join the cause. The Castilians and the Portuguese gladly accepted these offers, as they too were catholic and a bloodline leading to a royal marriage between the two countries was found. Now the only powerful catholic countries were united and had a combined total force of around 250 thousand men.
Leopold X Johann ascended the throne on Saturday 19, 1559. Being one of the diplomats that were sent to the Iberian Peninsula, Leopold had a firm sense of negotiating even out of the toughest spots. There was one problem, he didn’t inherit many of the hatreds against the Turks as his forefathers had. Most disturbing was his desire to patch things up between the two old foes and focus colonizing, something that had recently taken hold of England and France.
The country would no allow it. They had worked themselves up into a frenzy. “The enemy is weak,” they claimed, even ignoring the fact that just around the black sea held 50 thousand highly experience soldiers from the campaigns into India. The people didn’t care, their forefathers and all their ancestors had fought magnificent battles against the infidels and they wanted stories to pass onto their children too. Leopold stood firm, telling the people that he would not be the aggressor against the people that he wanted to befriend.
This seemed to anger the people and a few pretender rebels spawned from Southern Italy. Leopold would spare no mercy for betrayers and so he swiftly and ruthlessly crushed the rebels. The young emperor distinguished himself leading the main force and proved himself a valuable asset. The people of Italy would be quiet for the foreseeable future and the skills Leopold learned would be priceless.
Instead of angering their ruler, the nobles submitted a petition containing all the Austrian autocratic signatures, stating that the Transylvania region was being unfairly persecuted for trying to become catholic, and it fell upon Austria to liberate its people. If done, the nobles pledged that wouldn’t stop saying Leopold’s name and how glorious it was.
Leopold broke.
