ABSTRACT

The Vienna system's 40-year success in preventing war between the great powers in the core followed from its export of bellicism to the periphery. The best example of sustained bellicism in the Middle East during the Vienna system is the second British Empire in two of its most recent historiographical forms. The Vienna system showed its bellicism in the periphery throughout the Middle East. The great powers' inability to decide how the Ottoman Empire should act as the Concert of Europe's south-eastern boundary gave contagious bellicism the opportunity to transform the Vienna system. The export of bellicism by the Vienna system eventually led to its transformation following the intrusion of the periphery into the core. A dream born of bellicism in the periphery was transferred during the Crimean War to the core. Equilibrium was more likely than balance of power to lead to the export of bellicism.