I would say Otto Bismarck had plenty of imagination and understood Germany's limits

He did state that Kaiser Wilhelm the second would ruin everything and he did somebody like that had no business being in power

The European continent embrace the Divine right of Kings end of absolute monarchy in order centralised their Kingdoms

For England it's an island nation with just the quantitative and quality advantage of the Royal navy and it's predecessor

Also didn't experience mass conscription until world War 1 unlike the rest of Europe

For prussians they have the Swedish to the North, Russians to the east, austrians to the south and the French to the west

The only way forward was a militarized state and s capable central government

The Germans also luck natural defences so for security they would need to expand