📅 On This Day in Military History

October 18

1 event across history

⚔️📍 Münster and Osnabrück, Germany1648

Peace of Westphalia — 30 Years' War Ends

The Peace of Westphalia ended the Thirty Years' War — the most destructive European conflict before WWI — through two simultaneous treaties signed in Münster and Osnabrück. Up to 8 million people had died in what was partly a religious war.

Westphalia established the modern system of sovereign nation-states with recognized borders — the foundation of international relations still used today.

Outcome

Thirty Years' War ends; modern nation-state system born