Belgium, Bohemia, Romania, and Hungary the under dogs of Europe becoming Great Powers

[Parry1021]

So here's my question for the people, is there a way for the countries I've listed to become great powers? In our timeline they all were secondary or regional powers, but how could they be the masters of Europe? The POD has to be after 1066 (because I want a Norman lead England), and France also needs to exist (if a lot weaker). Other than that go nuts.

I'll even get the ball rolling...The hasburgs don't gain control over Bohemia and Hungary, leaving them independent. How that happens is beyond me, but some one can make it work.

P.S. anyone that plays Victoria 2 HIGH FIVE!!!!

[miguelrj]

Belgium:
Charles the Bold has a male heir or doesn't marry her heiress with an Habsburg. His realm expands enough to become contiguous. This Bruges-led über-Netherlands/Lotharingia will take over Holland's role in overseas expansion and, having more human capital than its OTL counterpart, after a while it becomes more than a second rate world empire.

Bohemia:
Any given Holy Roman Emperor (Habsburg or not) establishes his residency in Prague.

Hungary:
It successfully stops Ottoman advances. Besides Croatia it can also get to be in a personal union with Poland-Lithuania so that it can get to be even larger and presumably more powerful than it was.

Romania:
Harder, specially having such a large Hungary nearby. I'll get back to this later.

[Alex Richards]

Perhaps if Romania is the name given to some sort of Neo-Roman/Byzantine state or Empire in the Meditteranean? Perhaps if Bohemond of Sicily is more sucessful against the Byzantines and Empire and we see a unified state ruling Southern Italy, Antioch and Greece, later expanding to include Rome and Constantinople when Hungary smacks down the Turks?

Might not really work though.

[kasumigenx]

Bohemia: If Wenceslaus III manages to survive and rule both Bohemia and Poland, I think a Poland-Bohemia could be a super power.

[miguelrj]

Originally Posted by Alex Richards

Perhaps if Romania is the name given to some sort of Neo-Roman/Byzantine state or Empire in the Meditteranean? Perhaps if Bohemond of Sicily is more sucessful against the Byzantines and Empire and we see a unified state ruling Southern Italy, Antioch and Greece, later expanding to include Rome and Constantinople when Hungary smacks down the Turks?

Might not really work though.

A surviving Byzantine Empire as "Romania" is quite doable given the right PoD. In this scenario the Turks never go any farther than Anatolia and Hungary is free to expand southwards.
But to have a Romania correspondent to OTL Romania to be huge at the same time as Hungary, the only way they can go after uniting is northeastwards. Russia must be killed or crippled at its crib leaving space for Romania to expand, like OTL Lithuania did.

[seraphim74]

I don't know about Belgium, but how about Jagiellon dynasty uniting Poland, Bohemia, Hungary and Romania into one big fat superpower?

Jogaila accepts Bohemian crown ftom the Hussites (IOTL he refused). His son, Władysław III is king of Poland and Bohemia (Lithuania goes to his brother, Casimir); in 1440 he becomes also king of Hungary, and stops Ottoman Empire, thanks to cooperation with John Hunyadi and Vlad III Tepes, who later is crowned king of Valachia and Moldova creating Romania; In 1454 Poland-Hungarian-Bohemian-Lithuanian forces crush the Teutonic Order and caonquer all Prussia; Pomeranian duchies quickly declare themselves Władysław's vassals; his son, John I, reforms all his states creating Union of Three Crowns - Poland, Bohemia and Hungary. PBH (Poland-Bohemia-Hungary) become first line defence of Europe against Ottoman Empire and in alliance with Romania slowly but steadily pushes the Ottomans back. At the end of XVIth century the Grand Duchy of Lithuania falls apart after a civil war and is divided between Poland, Muscovia and Romania. In XVIIth century the last of Basarab dynasty dies and the Romanian crown is offered to the king of PBH Casimir VI. In XVIIIth century PBHR is big and powerful but has some srious internal problems. Eventrually they are dealt with by queen Catherine the Great and PBHR becomes a federal, constitutional monarchy. In the Grand Union of Intermare there are four kingdoms (crowns): Poland, Bohemia, Hungary and Romania - each of them is divided into autonomic, often ethnic, duchies, ruled by local governors (monarch of the Union is formally a duke of every duchy in his country); in fact, duchies with time become more important than crowns - think United States of Central-Eastern Europe. The head of the state is the monarch: King of Poland, Bohemia, Hungary and Romania, prince of Prussia, Pomerania, Silesia, Livonia, Ruthenia etc., duke of.... There is a federal Parliament in Cracow, which is the capital of the Union. National colours are white-red-yellow.

[Voltaireness]

Hungaria and Cehia
Rise to power after Kuruc Rebellion 1711
They gain independence and unite with Poland to block the Habsburgs and Russia.
Austrian succesion alow them to pick Boemia and Silezia.
Keeping Poland+Hungary+Cehia+Silezia as independent political power

Romania
Save the first union made in 1600 by Michael le Brave of Valahia.
Alow the new born United Principality of Valahia,Transilvania and Moldova till 1683 failure as starting point to the rise as great power.
During hungarian war for independence(1703-1711) they expand taking Serbia,Bulgaria and Golden Horde from the otomans.

Belgium/Burgundy
During the 100 hundred years war a kingdom of Normandy criple the future France in 2 nearly equall size countries.
Kingdom of Normandy ends in the hands of the burgundian dukes.

Columb doesnt find the road to America and no one does till the industrial revolution.
France is reduced in size and Holy Roman Empire ends as a 3 kingdoms hating each other:Bavaria,Saxony and Westfalia based on religions they use.
Otoman empire has to fight for survival against Persia and Egipt.Greece gains independence much earlier.

Russia is defeated by Sweden in the Great Northern War and abandon plans to exand westwards.
They are able to recover some space during austrian succesion war taking place in the same time with the Great Livonian War.

[The Ubbergeek]

For Hungary, if the Magyars and Hungarian kingdom-lords managed to assimilate the austrrians of modern days and germanic speakers... or became the richer populated part of the union...

[Parry1021]

Belgium would work if Burgendy had survived. Then is spreads over northen France, giving it the man power, resources and time to secure itself.

Romania is a tougher one because of the expanded Hungary, but doable. A god real life example would be an united Germany or Italy because it looked unlikely that all the little kingdoms could be put under control, and ther fact that there was France, Austria, and Russia on all sides, fighting against it.

[MarshalBraginsky]

Does this Hungary have to stay in where they're at right now? What if the Magyars migrated in the different direction than in the Balkans, perhaps in the Volga? The Magyars could possibly dominate the Slavic tribes there and form a different kind of Russia, but with the Magyars assimilating the Slavs. If the Magyars migrated in a different direction, I guess the Vlachs may have a chance of creating a major empire.

[kasumigenx]

Originally Posted by Sibirskaya

Does this Hungary have to stay in where they're at right now? What if the Magyars migrated in the different direction than in the Balkans, perhaps in the Volga? The Magyars could possibly dominate the Slavic tribes there and form a different kind of Russia, but with the Magyars assimilating the Slavs. If the Magyars migrated in a different direction, I guess the Vlachs may have a chance of creating a major empire.

But the Slavs might assimilate the Vlachs completely if the Magyars did not migrate to the Carpathians, Magyars are the ones responsible for the Split between West and South Slavs.

[MarshalBraginsky]

Good point, but what I'm trying to point out is that the Magyars used to settle in what would become Russia before they migrated westwards. Maybe a PoD where they opted to stay and either assimilate or be assimilated by the Slavs. Of course, the southern Slavs of the Balkans might assimilate the Vlachs unless there's a unifying figure in either Wallachia or Transylvania.

[wolf_brother]

With a POD so far back you can fairly effectively write off anything you want as butterflies.

[MarshalBraginsky]

Originally Posted by wolf_brother

With a POD so far back you can fairly effectively write off anything you want as butterflies.

More like butterflying the existence of Hungary and wanking Romania a bit further.

[SavoyTruffle]

Preventing Magyar ascendancy in the Pannonian plain would also butterfly away the term Romanian for the alt-Dacians.

[sirharryflashman]

i do not know about belgium but romania bohemia and hungary is easy....great moravian empire does not go down to magyars but asimilate them....and then it goes on to spread to ukraine poland and balkans...after all it more or less made good progres in to these lands already...by today it is a major european power eith border on elbe with a buffer zone of small german states between it and its great enemy the france
posibly you can also have premysl otakar to defeat rudolf and somhow get the hungarian crown
last obtion is hussites not falling to pieces and being more united eventually giving the crown to jagielos....and after while uniting with hungary
hussite influence would lead to early industrial revolution giving and a decent army which would give a blody nose to turks
last obtion is not my idea but goes as folows...czechs fight in 1938 germany is stalemated generals get rid of hitler poland atacks czechs during the was soviets go after poland after the war hungary joins little entate this develops in sort of NATO/free trade pact soviets go on to crusade to get rest of poland,finland and germany LT joins in ww2 starts etc
there was a atomic subplot due to czech uranium deposits so it all ends with soviets geting nuked and eastern europe more or less united in a strong pact

[MarshalBraginsky]

I was thinking more on the lines of the Magyars building the empire on the spot of Old Great Bulgaria before it split off into Danube Bulgaria and Volga Bulgaria. With a hypothetical Pannonian Hungary and Volga Hungary after the Khazars stomp on an earlier hypothetical Old Great Magyaria, it could result in two Magyar states in Europe, with one presumably turning Catholic and one either turning Muslim (like Volga Bulgaria in OTL), or turning Orthodox (Greek or Oriental). This hypothetical Volga Magyaria would have ended up assimilated the Golden Horde's Tatars if they still came as in OTL, but they'd acquire a Hunnic/Finno-Ugorian identity instead of the OTL Turkic identity.

[The Ubbergeek]

You forgot a famous country starting by P, too.

Seriously, it would be intrigating to see an ATL with a mighty Poland...

[MarshalBraginsky]

A mighty Poland in union with Lithuania is OTL, though they can easily acquire territories overseas. Poland by itself, not so much. Ditto for Lithuania going solo.

[The Ubbergeek]

Originally Posted by Sibirskaya

A mighty Poland in union with Lithuania is OTL, though they can easily acquire territories overseas. Poland by itself, not so much. Ditto for Lithuania going solo.

Make one wonder if, how and what would happens if the bases for modern Austria didn't happens, no german peoples there...