ABSTRACT
Dramatic diplomatic successes, particularly victorious wars, became a way to defeat domestic political opposition, ensure the election of parliamentary candidates favourable to the government, and mobilize support for the regime. The major extra-European involvement of the Great Powers in the period between 1815 and 1850 occurred as a result of the Civil War in the United States. After 1815, Britain was the only Great Power with a substantial overseas empire interest in and struggle over colonial acquisitions during subsequent thirty-five years was, at the most, brief and episodic. While eighteenth and early nineteenth century European governments had sought to rally public opinion, and foreign affairs had played an important role in revolutions of 1848, the post-1850 period was distinct from previous decades in three different respects. As early as the 1840s, even before there was much in the way of railways in continental Europe, Helmuth von Moltkes recognized the importance of rail transportation for mobilization and deployment in future warfare.
