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... Gastein was created, which ensured that only Austria and Prussia could make decisions of the future of the Duchies - Austria received Holstein and Prussia received Schleswig under the treaty. The war with Denmark and the treaty of Gastein were viewed as excuses to go to war with Austria in 1866- which is in fact what Bismarck claimed to plan since the beginning. In 1866, Austria reneged on the prior agreements and demanded that the German states should determine the Schleswig-Hostein issue. Bismarck thus started the war under the pretext that the Austrians had violated the treaty. However, the counter-claims prove that if Bismarck wanted to go to war with Austria he needed not to engage in war with Denmark - and was therefore solely seeking to prevent Austrian control of the German states. Austria was defeated in the war and would not intervene in Prussian affairs; thus Prussia annexed ...