Geostrategic ruptures have in common certain determining characteristics. An examination of three important moments in the history of French diplomacy (the reversal of the alliances of 1756, the forming of a triple entente in the early years of the twentieth century and the birth of the Federal Republic of Germany after the Second World War) shows that they follow a logical chain of events, and that such major decisions are a response to deep-seated needs.
Geostrategic Ruptures: Characteristics and Predictability
There are certain historic moments in diplomacy when fundamental changes occur in international relations. Such moments are experienced by contemporaries as astonishing ruptures, as breaches with long-established habits and feelings.
They are a source of anxiety both because they upset the comfortable, if threadbare, beliefs which have become part of the fabric of general opinion, and because they mark the opening of a new period, on different foundations, and thus heavy with uncertainty.
Apart from the singularities of each rupture, which of necessity derive from the specific circumstances of the international situation that has provoked it, they reveal common characteristics by which they can be identified.
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