Otto Von Bismarck played his cards very carefully, hoping for a Russian alliance and French neutrality. Once France realized that a United Germany was a power that could threaten the them, they went after the smaller southern German states that were not yet united with the north. Bismarck made it look like the French were the aggressors and convinced the states to unify with the north. After Prussia defeated them, they declared the birth of the German empire at the French palace of Versailles, making Wilhelm ll the new Kaiser.
