The venerable Kingdom of Prussia and the Austrian Empire made a powerful alliance, while the United Kingdom and France were locked in an economic stalemate.
The wily tactician left some wriggle room: his renunciation was to facilitate a grand alliance of the right; if it does not happen, he could make another U-turn.
We will reinforce old alliances and form new ones and unite the civilized world against radical Islamic terrorism, which we will eradicate completely from the face of the Earth.
Three of them, Austria, Prussia, and Russia, under the leadership of the Czar, Alexander I, in the autumn of 1815, had entered into a Holy Alliance to sustain by reciprocal service the autocratic principle in government.