The

The Hello and welcome to a History of Europe Ki- Battles podcast.

This is the Aruso-Turkish War of 1768 to 1774 and the annexation of Crimea.

Part 1 of 2

In early 2014, Crimea became the focus of the worst East-West crisis since the Cold War,

when Russian forces seized control of the Crimean Peninsula from their neighbour Ukraine.

An earlier annexation of Crimea by Russians took place more than two centuries previously in year 1783 during the reign

of Catherine the Great and was a significant moment in the rise of Russia as a great power.

Then it was captured from the Ottoman Empire which was in a state of slow decline.

It was a time when the political shape of Europe was forming into six great powers.

Britain, France, Habsburg, Austria, Prussia, Russia and the Ottomans,

while all other states were significantly weakened or even threatened with extinction.

An example is Poland, which lost a substantial part of its territory in the so-called first partition,

which took place at the same time as the conflict for Crimea, the Russo-Turkish War, 1768 to 1774.

In the earlier Austrian War of Succession, 1756 to 1763, Europe had divided into two blocks,

on the one hand, Britain and Prussia, and on the other, France, Austria and Russia.

These blocks had only appeared recently in the so-called diplomatic revolution, which had altered a number of traditional allegiances,

in particular the enmity between France and Habsburgs. Russia's relationship with Austria was largely positive, in part due to sharing a common foe, the Ottoman Empire.

Russia traditionally also had good diplomatic relations with Britain since their trading relationships were mutually beneficial, but a more troubled

relationship with Prussia since both coveted Polish and territory, which lay between them, especially

on the Baltic coast.

The Commonwealth of Poland, Lithuania, comprised a significant amount of territory,

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