Calling on European powers to intervene if Louis was threatened, this declaration was intended to serve as a warning to the French revolutionaries not to infringe further on the king's prerogatives and to permit his resumption of power.[1] The statement contributed to the outbreak of the French Revolutionary Wars. (The Pillnitz Conference itself dealt mainly with the Polish Question and the war of Austria against the Ottoman Empire.)
The declaration stated that Austria would go to war if and only if all the other major European powers also went to war with France. Leopold chose this wording so that he would not be forced to go to war; he knew William Pitt, prime minister of Great Britain, did not support war with France. Leopold merely issued the declaration to satisfy the French emigres who had taken refuge in his country and were calling for foreign interference in their homeland.
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