But the underlying thesis of this post: that Gustavus Adolphus was fighting for religious freedom (something he never believed in and which he absolutely forbid in his own kingdom) and that his motive for going to war was out of religious principle (he was financially induced to join the war by Cardinal Richelieu of France) is ridiculous.
The war had been raging for years and Gustavus Adolphus never raised a finger. He only intervened when Catholic France, locked in its usual power struggle with the Catholic Habsburgs, offered him financial incentives to do so.
Moreover, Wallenstein is portrayed as a Catholic absolutist bent on destroying Protestantism, when in reality he tried to mediate a compromise between both sides and was arrested for his trouble.
After Adolphus' death in the Swedish victory at Luetzen, the next major clash between the two sides was at Nordlingen where the Catholic League decisively defeated the Swedes. The Swedes became a non-factor in the war at that point and the next major military threat to the Catholic League was the entrance of Catholic France into the war against the Catholic League.
Portrayals of the Thirty Years' War as a religious struggle are childish. There was certainly a religious aspect to it - but it really was a struggle over which Great Power would exercise control over the disorganized small states of Germany -the Emperor, the King of France or the King of Sweden.
Waldstein wasn’t merely arrested for his scheming; he was assassinated.
Waldstein’s ambition defeated him more surely that anything Gustavus Adolphus threw at him.
Gustavus Adolphus himself didn’t believe in tolerance and such things which the Swedish military elite at that time probably considered as girly nonsense.
What Gustavus believed in was the RIGHT to restore true Christianity and the RIGHT to rule over territory that succumbed to Swedish weapons.
In any case, one of the lasting consequences of the Thirty Years’ War was a greater deal of religious tolerance shooting forth.
Today, few Protestants in Germany oppose what Gustavus once did. Sooner, Northern Germans hail him as a defender of the faith and culture of their own land.
Sweden owes Germany a deep apologize for the atrocities that we as a nation bear responsibility for, but again, something positive has come out of this havoc, just like Germans, Americans and French today are rather good friends (Chirac excluded from it all).