page_title: Franco-Austrian Alliance
section_title: Peacetime alliance
hierarchical_section_title: Franco-Austrian Alliance / Peacetime alliance
context_page_description: The Franco-Austrian Alliance was a diplomatic and military alliance between France and Austria that was first established in 1756 after the First Treaty of Versailles. It lasted for much of the remainder of the century until it was abandoned during the French Revolution.
  The Alliance had its heyday during the Seven Years' War, when France and Austria joined forces to fight their mutual enemy, Prussia. Following the allies' defeat, the intimacy of the alliance weakened, and by the 1780s it had become something closer to a formality, and Austria even briefly considered the idea of entering the American War of Independence on Britain's side against France. By the time of the French Revolution, when France first declared itself a constitutional monarchy and then overthrew and executed its king, the alliance had already collapsed entirely, and Austria actively tried to restore the French monarchy by going to war with the new French Republic.
context_section_description: Austria and France were both disappointed with the other's military performance during the war. The failure of the two states and their allies to overwhelm Prussia was considered by France a major reason for France's loss of numerous global colonies to the British, and Austrians was unimpressed by the level of French help that it had received to recover Silesia. That disappointment led to a cooling of relations between the two states, as France drew closer to its neighbour, Spain, and Austria looked to its Russian ally in the east, as both shared an enmity towards the Ottoman Empire.
  By the 1780s, the alliance had grown much weaker after the death of Maria Theresa and the fall from power of Kaunitz. The new emperor, Joseph II, was more willing to consider establishing fresh alliances, such as with Britain, then fighting a global war against France, Spain, Mysore, the Dutch Republic and the United States. (The last had declared independence in 1776.) Britain was, therefore, diplomatically isolated and without a major ally. Britain now tried to secure Austrian support in the hope that an Austrian attack on France would draw French resources back across the Atlantic to concentrate on Europe, thereby safeguarding Britain's valuable West Indian colonies.
  Although Austria ultimately remained neutral in the conflict, the alliance was considerably weakened, partly because the French failed to support Austria adequately in its brief War of the Bavarian Succession against Prussia. One of the strongest remaining links between the two states was the marriage of Marie Antoinette, daughter of Maria Theresa and sister of Joseph II, to Louis XVI of France, which had taken place in 1770. Marie Antoinette was regarded by the French public as having enormous influence over her husband and in persuading him to pursue a pro-Austrian line. In reality, she had little control over the King who was guided instead by his ministers, including the anti-Austrian Comte de Vergennes.
caption: The Alliance was weakened when Joseph II came to rule Austria
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