For much of the nineteenth century there had been a simmering conflict between Russia and the Ottoman Empire. Russia desired to expand its influence in the Balkans, most of which was still ruled by the Ottomans, and to gain an ice-free port in the Mediterranean. The increasingly rickety Ottoman Empire, dubbed by Tsar Nicholas I ‘the sick man of Europe’, still controlled much of the region, as well as the Middle East. Nicholas was well aware, of course, of the dangers of pushing too far or too fast; the last thing he wanted was the Ottoman Empire to disappear altogether; paradoxically, perhaps,
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