Persian Empire 1845

Chapter 132 Britain and France Declare War
For the first two weeks after the start of the war, neither Russia nor Turkey made any significant moves. Due to information delays, it wasn't until February that Russian troops attacked and quickly occupied the two principalities along the Danube River.

The British government was in an uproar. Even Queen Victoria, who rarely intervened in politics, couldn't sit still and convened a high-level meeting at Buckingham Palace. The result of the meeting was to send the navy into the Black Sea and simultaneously dispatch the army to cooperate with the French forces in a land offensive.

Of course, Russia was not unprepared. With the encouragement of the Orthodox Church, Orthodox Christians in Bulgaria, Macedonia, and Serbia began to revolt, preparing to welcome the Russian army.

However, the Russian army's progress after occupying the Danube Principality was not smooth, and then it ran headlong into Silistra, its southern wall.

Silistra was defended by 1.8 Ottoman soldiers who had undergone systematic European training, greatly enhancing their combat effectiveness.

Menshikov ordered the Russians to attack the fortress, and they bombarded it with artillery, but Ottoman engineers always risked their lives to repair it. Usually, the breaches that had just been blasted open were repaired by the engineers almost immediately afterward.

Even in infantry, the two countries were evenly matched, with Ottoman soldiers even displaying greater morale than their Russian counterparts, as they were determined to fight to the death against Russia to defend their fortress. Therefore, they fought with exceptional bravery.

At sea, however, the situation was different. On February 24, an Ottoman fleet entered the port of Sinop in Anatolia and collided directly with the Russian Black Sea Fleet led by Nakhimov, and the two sides engaged in battle. The Russians designed an advanced shell that would penetrate the wooden hull of the Turkish ships before exploding, blowing the ships to pieces from the inside.

An hour and a half later, the shelling had largely ceased, with only the occasional cannon shot echoing across the sea. Half the Turkish fleet's crew had been killed, most of their cannons capsized, and they had been completely overwhelmed by the numerically and firepower-superior Russian fleet. Some ships were still burning… The Russians cheered; they had achieved their objective in the Gulf: destroying the Ottoman fleet.

Although they should have ceased fire by any measure, and no one could blame them for doing so, they continued firing on the incapacitated ships adrift at sea. Russian three-masted fast warships entered the bay and sank all the remaining vessels. Many were killed either by artillery fire or drowned while trying to escape to shore. In addition to the Turkish fleet, the Russians also fired on the Turkish-populated areas of Sinop Bay. The area was littered with corpses and ruins; local residents had fled with local officials when the fighting began.

Of the 4,200 Turkish sailors in the Gulf of Sinop, 2,700 were killed by Russian artillery fire. Local restaurants served as makeshift hospitals, but only three doctors treated the hundreds of wounded. The Russian shelling ceased six days later, allowing the wounded to be transported by ship to Constantinople.

This news severely alarmed the British. They had no interest in land battles, but any naval engagement would trigger an overreaction. Now, the entire nation of Britain was calling for Russia to be taught a lesson.

Prime Minister Russell was impeached and removed from office by Parliament for not being tough enough, and was replaced by the Earl of Aberdeen. This Earl demonstrated a tough stance on Russia, telling Lord Cowley, the British ambassador to Paris, that dialogue was too late and it was time to end Russia's status as a naval power in the Near East.

France also supported a hardline stance. Napoleon III was determined to use the Sinop incident as a pretext for taking strong action against Russia, partly because he considered it could solidify the alliance with Britain, and partly because he believed that it would be a disgrace to the French fleet if the Russians were not punished, which he, as the French emperor, could not tolerate.

On March 4, Britain declared war on Russia. On March 6, France declared war on Russia.

Such actions angered the Russian people, as Slavic leader Pogokin wrote in a letter to Nicholas I.

France seized Algeria from Turkey, and Britain annexed a principality in India almost every year, yet none of this affected the balance of power; but when Russia occupied Moldavia and Wallachia, however temporarily, it disrupted the balance. France occupied Rome and stationed troops there for several years during peacetime, but that was insignificant; when Russia was only considering the occupation of Constantinople, European peace was threatened.

To support the lies of a pathetic Jew, Britain threatened Greece and burned its fleet—a legitimate action; but when Russia demanded a treaty protecting millions of Christians, it was seen as expanding its power in the Near East at the expense of the balance of power. We can expect nothing from the West except blind hatred and malice. They don't understand us, nor do they want to.

Nicholas I wrote in the blank space next to him, "This is the problem."

Russia ordered a nationwide mobilization, intending to seize Bulgaria before the British and French arrived, and then advance directly on Istanbul. Of course, Russia could also utilize the vast Orthodox population of the Balkans.

To persuade the Tsar to accept Pan-Slavic ideals, Pogokin cleverly convinced him from two angles: Nicholas believed he bore a divine mission to defend the Orthodox Church, and at the same time, he increasingly felt excluded by the West. He claimed that Russia had no other choice but to join hands with the Slavs, because the Western powers, especially Britain, had allied with the Turks to resist Russia's "sacred mission."

Pogokin pointed out that if the Slavs become enemies, Russia will become a second-rate power. Nikolai underlined the last few sentences three times.

The greatest moment in Russian history has arrived—perhaps even greater than Poltava and Borodino. At this juncture, Russia must either advance or retreat—this is the law of history. But can Russia truly retreat? Will God allow it? No!
He is guiding the great soul of Russia, a fact we can see in its glorious history. He will not allow it to happen that Peter the Great established Russia in the East, Catherine the Great consolidated it, Alexander the Great expanded its territory, and then Nicholas abandoned it to the Latins. No, this cannot happen, this will not happen. God is with us, and we must not back down.

However, Nicholas remained reserved about Pan-Slavism: he did not harbor the illusions of Pogokin's plan to mobilize large numbers of Slavs into an army in the Balkans, and politically he disapproved of inciting revolutionary uprisings, preferring instead to support the Slavic liberation movement from a religious standpoint. However, the more explicitly Britain and France opposed Russia's occupation of the two Danube principalities, the more he inclined to gamble on establishing an Orthodox Christian alliance, threatening that if Austria joined the Western powers in opposing Russia, Russia would support a Slavic uprising.

Strong religious convictions made the aging Tsar rash and reckless, willing to sacrifice the interests Russia had gained through decades of diplomacy and military force, and gamble everything on a war with the Slavs.

(End of this chapter)