Okay, so Gustav is king and getting nervous. The French are his biggest supporters. He's managed to get them to send a diplomat Broglie picked out, one Gustav likes: Vergennes.
But French diplomacy continues to be a disaster. Vergennes' initial instructions are: * Proceed with caution * No inciting royalist coups * Keep a sharp eye on Ulrike * Reconcile the Hats and the caps * Limit any constitutional change to going back to the way things were in 1720. No *new* changes.
At the time, Gustav says he's happy with this. This tells us that he was probably *not* planning a coup the moment he became king.
But then the French foreign minister starts to get nervous about the Polish Partition, and he starts thinking a strong Sweden is the way to go. So his new policy involves writing a letter to Gustav III in December 1771, telling him that he needs to carry out a "coup de force," because the alternative is anarchy that the Russians control (so basically what's going on in Poland, which is making both Sweden and France–like Prussia, Russia, and the Turks–nervous).
But guess who doesn't get told this? Vergennes, the ambassador! Now, he's part of the King's Secret, so he should be in on all the secret diplomacy. But now we have three diplomacies: the official one, the secret one the king wants, and the secret one the foreign minister wants.
[Chevalier d'Eon: See? Me being a woman is perfectly plausible in comparison!]
So whenever Gustav brings up to Vergennes the idea that he wants to start a coup and would maybe like some money from France toward that end, Vergennes is all, "Mmm, ah, not so sure that's a great idea," and Gustav drops it.
For example, at this time there's a little interlude in Swedish history in which the burghers make an appearance: they're willing to support Gustav's coup in return for more social equality between burghers and nobles. There is a significant layer in society during this period for whom preserving the "liberty" of 1720 (which had roots in the centuries before that) and tying the monarch's hands is less important than their social program of "stop oppressing us."
However, nothing comes of this negotiation, partly because Gustav is too much of a snob, but mostly because Vergennes doesn't know his boss (one of his bosses) would want him to provide Gustav with money for this endeavor.
The correct response to reading about French diplomacy in this period is: *facepalm*.
So finally, it's May 1772, and Gustav has decided a military coup is the way to go. The First Partition of Poland is about to be completed, and Catherine is negotiating with the Turks for an end to the Russo-Turkish War. The time for Gustav to move is while she's got her hands full with Poland and Turkey, not when she's free to focus all her attention on him.
Now, in hindsight it turned out that the war with the Turks dragged on longer than expected, and she ended up with a major rebellion, the Pugachev rebellion, in 1773, in which a Cossack was pretending to be her husband Peter III and claiming to be tsar. So she really wouldn't have had her full attention for Sweden for a couple more years. But Gustav had no way to know that.
Michael Roberts' description of the coup is gripping enough that I'm just going to quote it at length:
Vergennes at last made large sums available for bribing common soldiers and underofficers. One may question whether they were really needed For it was personality rather than gold that ensured the success of the enterprise. In the twenty-four hours between the evening of the eighteenth and that of the nineteenth Gustav III displayed a steadiness of nerve and a capacity for physical endurance of which his enemies can hardly have believed him capable, together with a talent for dissembling and a histrionic ability which they knew only too well. He believed that his life was in danger; but on the evening of the eighteenth the routine of the court proceeded with much liveliness and an appearance of perfect normality: numerous guests invited to supper, including all the Senate; a dress rehearsal of the new opera Thétis och Pélée; political friends and enemies making up their parties of quadrille; and the king gracious, affable, talking at ease, manifesting not the least symptom of nervous strain under the keen scrutiny of his enemies.
When the evening was over and the guests dispersed, he rode out to inspect the Burgher patrols: their goodwill might be valuable tomorrow. He was not in bed until 3 a.m.; rose at 6; made his last preparations and gave his last orders; and by 10 was inspecting the parade at the Artillery headquarters. Thence he went to the Arsenal; thence back to the castle, with an ever-growing number of royalist officers accompanying him. The officers and underofficers of the Guards had been ordered to attend at the orderly room in the castle courtyard, and were awaiting his arrival.
He went in and addressed them; at first with visible nervousness, but gradually with assured eloquence. He told them of the danger that threatened himself; denounced the "aristocratic" rule of the Estates; gave them a written assurance that he had no intention of making himself absolute; and invited them to renounce their allegiance to the Estates and take an oath of loyalty to himself. There followed a dreadful minute of silence: the tension in the orderly room was so great that one officer fainted. At last someone cried "Yes! God save your Majesty!" and the crisis was over: with one single exception all the officers followed that example, and subscribed the oath which he tendered to them.
A guard was now set upon the chamber in the palace where the Senate was in session; its members were informed that they were under arrest; arrangements were made to provide them with lunch; and subsequently they were removed to comfortable confinement in the palace. With that, in the space of less than an hour, the revolution was in effect over; a revolution orderly, bloodless, and in the sequel marvellously magnanimous towards the vanquished.
For the king, the labors of the day were by no means over: the foreign ministers had to be given reassurances and explanations; elaborate care was taken to inform the wives and families of the imprisoned Senators that no harm should come to them; innumerable urgent letters had to be written–to Louis XV, to Lovisa Ulrika, to his brothers; not until the small hours was he able to retire in the conviction that the revolution was secure. For the first and last time in his life he had shown that he was everything that his most devoted admirers believed him to be.
In theory, this should have led to war. Catherine was invested in keeping Sweden weak, i.e. preserving the 1720 constitution, and Fritz was bound by treaty to help. But as we know, Fritz didn't want to go to war, and Britain, which also wanted peace after the Seven Years' War, threw its weight on the scales and told Catherine to calm down. Britain also knew that France would send a fleet to the Baltic to help Sweden out if Russia invaded, so the Brits told the French that if they tried any such thing, they would be facing the British navy, which they could count on being superior to their own forces.
Finally, Gustav was willing to be diplomatic about it and assure Catherine he meant no harm to her. He had actually been eyeing Norway (which belonged to Denmark), but the Danes (this is post-Struensee, so Juliana Maria and her ministers are ruling in Christian VII's name) were careful not to make any moves that might provoke a war, and Gustav didn't feel strong enough to start a war in which he was clearly the aggressor.
Since Britain refused to go to war and did its best to keep the peace, Denmark sat carefully on its hands to avoid provoking a war, Fritz scolded Gustav into playing nice with Catherine by acting like he, Fritz, was totally willing to go to war (though he was specifically trying to create the conditions where Gustav behaved himself so Prussia could remain at peace), and Catherine still had the Turks as well as Pugachev to deal with, war was avoided.
1764-1772 Foreign policy: Sweden: Gustav's coup (1772)
But French diplomacy continues to be a disaster. Vergennes' initial instructions are:
* Proceed with caution
* No inciting royalist coups
* Keep a sharp eye on Ulrike
* Reconcile the Hats and the caps
* Limit any constitutional change to going back to the way things were in 1720. No *new* changes.
At the time, Gustav says he's happy with this. This tells us that he was probably *not* planning a coup the moment he became king.
But then the French foreign minister starts to get nervous about the Polish Partition, and he starts thinking a strong Sweden is the way to go. So his new policy involves writing a letter to Gustav III in December 1771, telling him that he needs to carry out a "coup de force," because the alternative is anarchy that the Russians control (so basically what's going on in Poland, which is making both Sweden and France–like Prussia, Russia, and the Turks–nervous).
But guess who doesn't get told this? Vergennes, the ambassador! Now, he's part of the King's Secret, so he should be in on all the secret diplomacy. But now we have three diplomacies: the official one, the secret one the king wants, and the secret one the foreign minister wants.
[Chevalier d'Eon: See? Me being a woman is perfectly plausible in comparison!]
So whenever Gustav brings up to Vergennes the idea that he wants to start a coup and would maybe like some money from France toward that end, Vergennes is all, "Mmm, ah, not so sure that's a great idea," and Gustav drops it.
For example, at this time there's a little interlude in Swedish history in which the burghers make an appearance: they're willing to support Gustav's coup in return for more social equality between burghers and nobles. There is a significant layer in society during this period for whom preserving the "liberty" of 1720 (which had roots in the centuries before that) and tying the monarch's hands is less important than their social program of "stop oppressing us."
However, nothing comes of this negotiation, partly because Gustav is too much of a snob, but mostly because Vergennes doesn't know his boss (one of his bosses) would want him to provide Gustav with money for this endeavor.
The correct response to reading about French diplomacy in this period is: *facepalm*.
So finally, it's May 1772, and Gustav has decided a military coup is the way to go. The First Partition of Poland is about to be completed, and Catherine is negotiating with the Turks for an end to the Russo-Turkish War. The time for Gustav to move is while she's got her hands full with Poland and Turkey, not when she's free to focus all her attention on him.
Now, in hindsight it turned out that the war with the Turks dragged on longer than expected, and she ended up with a major rebellion, the Pugachev rebellion, in 1773, in which a Cossack was pretending to be her husband Peter III and claiming to be tsar. So she really wouldn't have had her full attention for Sweden for a couple more years. But Gustav had no way to know that.
Michael Roberts' description of the coup is gripping enough that I'm just going to quote it at length:
Vergennes at last made large sums available for bribing common soldiers and underofficers. One may question whether they were really needed For it was personality rather than gold that ensured the success of the enterprise. In the twenty-four hours between the evening of the eighteenth and that of the nineteenth Gustav III displayed a steadiness of nerve and a capacity for physical endurance of which his enemies can hardly have believed him capable, together with a talent for dissembling and a histrionic ability which they knew only too well. He believed that his life was in danger; but on the evening of the eighteenth the routine of the court proceeded with much liveliness and an appearance of perfect normality: numerous guests invited to supper, including all the Senate; a dress rehearsal of the new opera Thétis och Pélée; political friends and enemies making up their parties of quadrille; and the king gracious, affable, talking at ease, manifesting not the least symptom of nervous strain under the keen scrutiny of his enemies.
When the evening was over and the guests dispersed, he rode out to inspect the Burgher patrols: their goodwill might be valuable tomorrow. He was not in bed until 3 a.m.; rose at 6; made his last preparations and gave his last orders; and by 10 was inspecting the parade at the Artillery headquarters. Thence he went to the Arsenal; thence back to the castle, with an ever-growing number of royalist officers accompanying him. The officers and underofficers of the Guards had been ordered to attend at the orderly room in the castle courtyard, and were awaiting his arrival.
He went in and addressed them; at first with visible nervousness, but gradually with assured eloquence. He told them of the danger that threatened himself; denounced the "aristocratic" rule of the Estates; gave them a written assurance that he had no intention of making himself absolute; and invited them to renounce their allegiance to the Estates and take an oath of loyalty to himself. There followed a dreadful minute of silence: the tension in the orderly room was so great that one officer fainted. At last someone cried "Yes! God save your Majesty!" and the crisis was over: with one single exception all the officers followed that example, and subscribed the oath which he tendered to them.
A guard was now set upon the chamber in the palace where the Senate was in session; its members were informed that they were under arrest; arrangements were made to provide them with lunch; and subsequently they were removed to comfortable confinement in the palace. With that, in the space of less than an hour, the revolution was in effect over; a revolution orderly, bloodless, and in the sequel marvellously magnanimous towards the vanquished.
For the king, the labors of the day were by no means over: the foreign ministers had to be given reassurances and explanations; elaborate care was taken to inform the wives and families of the imprisoned Senators that no harm should come to them; innumerable urgent letters had to be written–to Louis XV, to Lovisa Ulrika, to his brothers; not until the small hours was he able to retire in the conviction that the revolution was secure. For the first and last time in his life he had shown that he was everything that his most devoted admirers believed him to be.
In theory, this should have led to war. Catherine was invested in keeping Sweden weak, i.e. preserving the 1720 constitution, and Fritz was bound by treaty to help. But as we know, Fritz didn't want to go to war, and Britain, which also wanted peace after the Seven Years' War, threw its weight on the scales and told Catherine to calm down. Britain also knew that France would send a fleet to the Baltic to help Sweden out if Russia invaded, so the Brits told the French that if they tried any such thing, they would be facing the British navy, which they could count on being superior to their own forces.
Finally, Gustav was willing to be diplomatic about it and assure Catherine he meant no harm to her. He had actually been eyeing Norway (which belonged to Denmark), but the Danes (this is post-Struensee, so Juliana Maria and her ministers are ruling in Christian VII's name) were careful not to make any moves that might provoke a war, and Gustav didn't feel strong enough to start a war in which he was clearly the aggressor.
Since Britain refused to go to war and did its best to keep the peace, Denmark sat carefully on its hands to avoid provoking a war, Fritz scolded Gustav into playing nice with Catherine by acting like he, Fritz, was totally willing to go to war (though he was specifically trying to create the conditions where Gustav behaved himself so Prussia could remain at peace), and Catherine still had the Turks as well as Pugachev to deal with, war was avoided.