A "warning shot" backfires...!


It's the year 1634.

What we later called the 30 Years' War has been raging for 15 years. The commander-in-chief of the Catholic League, Albrecht Wenzel Eusebius von Waldstein, called Wallenstein...



... has come to the conclusion that the conflict between the Catholic and Protestant power blocs can no longer be won militarily.

War is beginning to eat up and drain the land!





Wallenstein, not only a commander but also a war businessman who had become very rich in recent years, sees not only the country and its people in danger if the war continues, but also what he has earned himself - and in Vienna at the imperial court he urges more and more emphatically for peace to conclude through negotiations.

In contrast, Emperor Ferdinand II.



... an arch-Catholic zealot, unchanged on the total victory and the complete submission of the opposing parties, above all Sweden!

Against all the rules of art and against all reason, Emperor Wallenstein orders a winter campaign to begin!

The commander fears for his army - hunger and cold would claim too many victims.

And then Wallenstein risks the open showdown with the Kaiser!

Against the Kaiser's strict marching orders, Wallenstein leads his soldiers to their winter quarters..:



A tremendous provocation for the ruler in Vienna!

Wallenstein, who had previously acted in an overly high-handed (and also selfish) way, had more enemies than friends at the imperial court - and they now whispered to the emperor that the general was planning high treason and wanted to seize power, supported by his army.

This rumbling at Vienna is so loud that it soon reached Wallenstein at his headquarters in Pilsen. He confers with his sub-commanders Christian von Ilow...



...and Adam Erdmann Trčka von Lípa...



... what to do about it.

All three come to the conclusion that the emperor should be given a "warning shot"!

And so, on January 13, 1634, the so-called "Pilsener Revers" was drafted...:



In the form of a written address of allegiance, the entire senior officer corps of the army signed Wallenstein to assure them of their loyalty...:



Wallenstein, not the Kaiser! In the document, the emperor is not mentioned at all!

The "Pilsener Revers" hits Vienna like a bomb and is grist to the mill of Wallenstein's enemies. However, it is also the beginning of the end of the commander himself!

Emperor Ferdinand II judges the confession to be open high treason on the part of his generalissimo and subsequently gives the order for his arrest. But that's not enough for Wallenstein's enemies at court, so they continue their digging!

With success!

Less than five weeks later, on February 25, 1634, at the "Blood Banquet of Eger" Wallenstein's faithful...



... and then he himself was murdered at the instigation of the Viennese court...



When the news of Wallenstein's death reaches the Vienna Hofburg, cheers break out there...:



The war will drag on - without a major battle - for another 15 years - until all parties to the conflict are completely at the end of their means and strength and half the population of Germany is exterminated.

Only then will one be as clever as the murdered Wallenstein was 15 years earlier - and conclude a negotiated peace...