President Donald Trump’s heated Oval Office meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky upended the United States’s relationship with Ukraine and Europe.
The fact that a routine diplomatic meeting unraveled into an event that reshaped the global order shocked many but has historical precedent. In numerous past incidents, what began as a trivial diplomatic matter became an episode with wide-ranging, sometimes world-changing, results.
Here are four times a minor diplomatic spat had a major geopolitical impact:
The Fly-Whisk Affair
During the Napoleonic Wars, France went deeply into debt with the Bachri-Boujana company, an Algerian Jewish merchant company, which borrowed heavily from the Bey of Algiers. After 30 years, the Bourbon government had only paid part of the debt. Several internal crises made the repayment of the debt all the more urgent.
Adding to tensions, local French officials began fortifying French trading posts in Algiers, in violation of several treaties. Amid the rising tensions, Hussein Dey summoned French consul Pierre Deval to his court to answer questions on the matter.
On April 29, 1827, Dey questioned Deval about the latest developments on the debt and fortifications, to which Deval failed to give adequate answers. The meeting quickly devolved into a shouting match between the two, ending in the dey hitting the consul with his fly swatter and sending him away.
French King Charles X was outraged when he heard of the insult on French honor, and quickly took drastic measures. An ultimatum was presented, demanding a personal apology from all of Algiers’s highest officials with the exception of the dey; for the French flag to be flown above the dey’s palace and all forts; and for a 101 canon salute in apology.
After the ultimatum was rejected, a French naval squadron was dispatched to blockade the port of Algiers. The blockade lasted for nearly three years, escalating into a full-on French invasion and conquest of the country.
The so-called Fly-Whisk Affair led to a 70-year-long French military campaign to conquer modern-day Algeria, during which it was transformed into what the French saw as an integral part of their country. The initial conquest of Algeria, followed by its war for independence in the 20th century, would claim millions of lives.
The Ems Dispatch
In 1870, France and Prussia were the two preeminent powers of the continent, each having defeated Austria within the past 11 years. Prussia, which had already expanded under the North German Confederation, was eyeing the remaining southern German states, excluding Austria. The great Prussian strategist, Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, believed the only way to unite the remaining German states was a great victory against France, but was unable to declare war.
In July 1870, the German Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen was offered the Spanish throne. While Bismarck supported the expansion of Prussian influence, French pressure forced him to ultimately reject the crown, over Paris’s fears that it would mean the Prussian encirclement of the country.
On July 13, the day after Leopold’s candidacy was withdrawn, French ambassador Count Vincent Benedetti approached Prussian King Wilhelm I while on a morning stroll. Benedetti, under orders from the French foreign minister, requested that Wilhelm assure that no other Hohenzollern candidate would ever make designs on the Spanish throne. Wilhelm politely declined the request, and the two departed without incident. Wilhelm later sent an adjutant to inform the ambassador that he had no further news on Leopold’s candidacy.
A Prussian official sent Bismarck a telegram from the king’s vacationing spot at Ems describing the incident, with the intention of Bismarck transmitting the telegram to the press. However, Bismarck shortened and altered the telegram in several key ways. He removed the formalities expressed between the king and ambassador, made the meeting appear to have ended abruptly, and painted Wilhelm’s minor move to have the ambassador informed that he had no further news as instead indicating that he had banished the ambassador.
“His Majesty the King thereupon refused to receive the French envoy again and informed him through an adjutant that His Majesty had nothing further to say to the Ambassador,” Bismarck’s altered telegram read.
Bismarck’s choice of “adjutant” was another clever trick of words, as while in German adjutant referred to a commissioned staff officer, the French translation, aide de camp, referred to a non-commissioned rank. As such, it appeared that Wilhelm had deliberately insulted French honor by implying its ambassador wasn’t worthy of being received by an officer.
Outrage consumed France over the incident. Tens of thousands of Parisians took to the streets, demanding Emperor Napoleon III immediately declare war to restore French honor. France declared war on Prussia on July 19, giving Bismarck his desired war. Paris’s declaration made France the aggressor, obligating the South German states to join Prussia in the war. France’s aggressive stance deprived it of any potential allies.
Prussia and its allies, drawing on superior tactics, logistics, and making better use of its rail network, quickly surrounded and destroyed the main French armies. The war ended in a French humiliation and the formation of the German Empire. Germany’s acquisition of the formerly French Alsace and Lorraine would stir up nationalistic fervor within France, ultimately leading to the First and Second World Wars, and the ensuing world order.
Wendell Willkie’s expedition
Wendell Willkie unsuccessfully ran for president in 1940 as a Republican, losing in a landslide to incumbent President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Nevertheless, Roosevelt sought to turn his former rival into an ally after the start of World War II, and his role as a diplomat would help transform the United States’s relationship with the British Empire, primarily due to his interactions with British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and a trip across the British Empire.
Before his summer 1942 expedition across the British Empire, Willkie’s view of Churchill had been soured by two previous incidents. Willkie visited Churchill during a January 1941 trip to London, where he was left unimpressed. According to historian James Barr, Churchill misread Willkie during the trip – with his calls on the United States’s Anglo heritage falling on deaf ears for the offspring of German immigrants. Though publicly praising Churchill, Willkie believed the British prime minister was much too self-important.
A second awkward encounter in December of that year further frustrated their relationship. Churchill, aware of Roosevelt’s declining health, sought to establish communications with Willkie, who was expected to run again in 1944 and possibly succeed the incumbent president. Not wanting to upset the president, Churchill sought a clandestine meeting with Willkie. In a major error from the telephone operator, Churchill was unknowingly connected to Roosevelt instead of Willkie. After beginning the conversation as if he was talking with Willkie, Roosevelt announced who was actually on the other end. An embarrassed Churchill canceled his meeting with Willkie without informing him of the reason, leading the presidential hopeful to believe that the premier had dismissed him as a political force.
Roosevelt sought to utilize Willkie in the summer of 1942, requesting he undertake a foreign mission beginning in the Middle East. While intended as a fact-finding mission to boost morale and cooperation between the allies, the details of the trip undermined the U.S. perception of the British Empire.
His trip began in Cairo, where the squalor and miserable conditions of the Egyptians left a deep impact on him. While the British viewed his trip as an opportunity to show off the exoticism of their empire, the contrast between the rich palaces of the local rulers and miserable conditions of the majority left the opposite impression of what the British hoped.
Perhaps the most impactful leg of the journey was his visit to Jerusalem. There, British high commissioner Sir Harold MacMichael gave him a tour of the city, seemingly unconcerned about the plight of the starving children they came across.
MacMichael’s remark that “here was the center of Christianity and, in a metaphorical sense, the core of all the things for which we are fighting,” left Willkie outraged.
“There is only one thing I can think of to say in reply, and that is something I heard way back in Indiana,” he replied after gathering his wits. “Here I am in the land where Christ was born, and I wish to Christ I was back in the land where I was born.”
Upon his return home, Willkie, sickened by what he’d seen in the British colonial possessions and feeling slighted by comments Churchill made in parliament, delivered a damning report directly to Roosevelt, arguing that the conditions in the empire were undermining the war effort and that Roosevelt should push for its end after the war.
He expanded on his indictment of the British Empire in a radio address, listened to by 36 million Americans.
Willkie’s trip and failed British attempts at flattery helped shape the hostile perceptions of the British Empire from within the U.S. government and public. It contributed heavily to the all but forced dismantlement of the British Empire after the war, the creation of Israel contrary to the British’s desires, and the modern Middle East.
Spain-Argentina diplomatic crisis of 2024
Spain and Argentina have enjoyed close relations for centuries, boosted by the latter’s status as a former Spanish colony. In the modern day, however, the fact that Spain is run by one of the most left-wing governments in the western world and Argentina one of the most right-wing set the two on a collision course.
The crash course was made all the more likely due to the character of Argentinian President Javier Milei, a close Trump ally, and a leader often compared to Trump. He had previously sparked diplomatic crises with Vatican City, Colombia, and Mexico over insults to their respective leaders. In the case of Colombia, he called President Gustavo Petro a “terrorist assassin,” prompting the expulsion of Argentine diplomats from the country.
Spanish Socialist President Pedro Sanchez had supported Milei’s rival Sergio Massa, during the 2023 election.
Milei visited Madrid in May 2024 to speak at a rally of the Spanish right-wing opposition party Vox. In his typical flamboyant fashion, Milei began hurling insults, specifically at Sanchez’s wife.
“You have a corrupt wife… And you took five days to think about it,” Milei told rallygoers, referring to a probe of Sanchez’s wife.
The remark quickly drew outrage from Madrid, which demanded an immediate apology. After receiving no apology, Spain withdrew its ambassador from Buenos Aires, nearly cutting off relations.
Milei doubled down on his remarks, citing precedent in Sanchez’s previous support for Massa.
“There is no circumstance in which I will apologize,” he said in a television interview. “Today the whole world is talking about his wife’s corruption cases and they know that [Sánchez] is involved in her influence peddling.”
Argentinian Interior Minister Guillermo Francos said that it was Sanchez who should apologize, as Spanish Transport Minister Óscar Puente had previously suggested that Milei was on drugs.
FOUL-MOUTHED MILEI SHOWS LIBERTARIANS THE WAY
After a five-month standoff, the two quietly restored relations, with Spain appointing a new ambassador.
The foreign ministries of Argentina and Spain agreed in a joint statement to “strengthen our relationship so that it reaches the maximum level of trust and mutual respect in political and institutional terms that our people deserve.” The Spanish government declined to say whether Milei had ultimately apologized. The right-wing firebrand has continued to critique Sanchez’s policies since, but refrained from further swipes against his wife.