Hi, my name's Blake Alley and this is not Crash Course: World History
and today, I'm going to talk about the Thirty Years' War.
I know, (it's) the single most exciting topic of modern-day history.
So, what caused it?
How did each side fight?
And how did other European countries get in on the action?
We'll find out eventually.
[LOUD THEME MUSIC]
This story starts off in 1618
when Emperor Ferdinand II ascends to head of state in the Holy Roman Empire.
He forced everyone to strictly adhere to Roman Catholicism
which ended up causing some religious conflicts between
people of different faiths in the Holy Roman Empire.
After Ferdinand's religious decree,
the Bohemian nobility wanted to show their displeasure with him
so they, just possibly,
took it a bit too far and threw his representatives out of the window.
[MIC RUMBLE]
L i t e r a l l y .
Nick Kuntz, 2017: ¡No me gusta tú!
[Glass breaking]
And now, for the open letter.
[Turns on projector]
[Selects projector video source]
[CHAIR RUMBLING]
An open letter to the official Crash Course: World History series...
But first,
Let's see what's in the secret compartment.
[Opens natural gas valve]
Slams natural gas valve lid]
Never mind.
Dear Crash Course: World History;
I am merely a student with Premiere and After Effects knowledge
and I really only have until about
2:30 to finish this.
I know my production value will never be as good as yours.
Except for the fact that this is
recorded in 4K on the
Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera, but
that's really it.
Your show has inspired us to all learn more about history.
And...
even enough to make me do a parody of it.
So, thank you for creating the original series.
And I'm hoping my version will help us learn more about the Thirty Years' War.
And you can keep doing whatever topics you're doing.
Sincerely, Blake from BAA Electronics.
[Chair rumbling]
Now, I have to somehow get this office chair (back) upstairs.
And now for an exhaustive list of various people.
The leaders of each participating country in the Thirty Years' War were...
[Clears throat]
[Deep sigh]
[Drinks water to clear throat]
[Metal clinking]
The most often (used) military strategy was a massive army
often assisted by firearms and (executing the tactic called) a "caracole" or
"caracol" or however you say it.
The use of cavalry was the most important part of the military
plus, just being able to control them all.
This eventually led to something called "professionalism"
which was defined as an absolutely massive army
with complete control of everyone in it.
The muzzle-loading rifle was also developed for the war
and it was designed to be completely standardized
to help aid the repair and operation of it by pretty much anyone in the army.
Despite all these new revolutions, 
no one army could perfectly develop all these tactics in order to defeat everyone else.
So, later at the end of the war in 1648,
the Treaty of Westphalia was established, effectively ending the Thirty Years' War.
The treaty did create some geopolitical effects in Europe
like Spain losing Portugal and the Dutch Republic
and grants of self-government to the former Holy Roman Empire
in only the German-speaking part of central Europe.
The Thirty Years' War also created a ton of problems for the German people
like a drastic population decrease from
both illness and starvation caused by the war.
About one-fourth to one-third of Germany's entire population
was estimated to have died
and it probably took around a century for the population to 
come back to where it was in 1618.
[Kicks microphone]
[Computer goes to sleep]
So, that basically concludes everything I found useful about the Thirty Years' War.
And next week, we'll be discussing...
Nothing! HA!
