PODs for a United Europe

[Dunois]

It is really odd to me why people say this, and then never wonder why the Rhine was not the center of a powerful polity that dominated Europe.

(Off base what if: The gunpowder empire of Burgundy).

The Rhine valley has pretty much been the economic centre of Europe ever since the 13th century. This economic dominance was never translated into real political dominance until the German Empire came along. As stood in 1914 the German Reich was on its way to dominate Europe, economically, culturally and politically. Them expanding even a little bit as a result of a successful World War One would have made that dominance even more obvious.

As for a POD for a united Europe, I can think of a controversial one, it is simply to ensure that the sealevels remains much lower than they are now. Essentially to have them remaining at Ice Age levels which would result in this:

The Rhine would flow were the Channel currently is and in all likelyhood the "Channel plain" would be an extremely rich and fertile lowland. One easy to control to boot by virtue of geography and of the mobility afforded by this larger Rhine river system.
A polity centered around this plain would have the necessary population base to easily dominate Northern Europe and subsequently southern Europe.

 

[Elfwine]

The Rhine valley has pretty much been the economic centre of Europe ever since the 13th century. This economic dominance was never translated into real political dominance until the German Empire came along. As stood in 1914 the German Reich was on its way to dominate Europe, economically, culturally and politically. Them expanding even a little bit as a result of a successful World War One would have made that dominance even more obvious.

Just my two cents: Dominate as the single greatest state, yes. Dominate as able to conquer all opposition - no.

As for a POD for a united Europe, I can think of a controversial one, it is simply to ensure that the sealevels remains much lower than they are now. Essentially to have them remaining at Ice Age levels which would result in this:

The Rhine would flow were the Channel currently is and in all likelyhood the "Channel plain" would be an extremely rich and fertile lowland. One easy to control to boot by virtue of geography and of the mobility afforded by this larger Rhine river system.
A polity centered around this plain would have the necessary population base to easily dominate Northern Europe and subsequently southern Europe.

Now this is an interesting scenario, not to mention map.

Are we permitting geological PODs for purposes of this discussion?

That is, are they appropriate to the question of the original post?

Personally I've been ruling them out because they're outside our control, but I have no inherent objection to them assuming they meet the usual criteria of plausibility (I don't know if this does or not - not my field of study).

 

[kasumigenx]

Can't respond to the first, but the second...um, how again?

So Castile and France are joined in a personal union. Whoopie. What about the rest of Europe?

It can happen if their descendants take advantage of all opportunities they have to merge the kingdoms surrounding them, the son of Isabella and Louis can become a Holy Roman Emperor.

 

[Elfwine]

It can happen if their descendants take advantage of all opportunities they have to merge the kingdoms surrounding them, the son of Isabella and Louis can become a Holy Roman Emperor.

And if no one, alarmed by this, decides to interfere.

And so on.

The son of Isabella and Louis could be Emperor, but the electors are unlikely to want to support someone able to impose centralized authority on Germany.

 

[wietze]

The Rhine valley has pretty much been the economic centre of Europe ever since the 13th century. This economic dominance was never translated into real political dominance until the German Empire came along. As stood in 1914 the German Reich was on its way to dominate Europe, economically, culturally and politically. Them expanding even a little bit as a result of a successful World War One would have made that dominance even more obvious.

As for a POD for a united Europe, I can think of a controversial one, it is simply to ensure that the sealevels remains much lower than they are now. Essentially to have them remaining at Ice Age levels which would result in this:

The Rhine would flow were the Channel currently is and in all likelyhood the "Channel plain" would be an extremely rich and fertile lowland. One easy to control to boot by virtue of geography and of the mobility afforded by this larger Rhine river system.
A polity centered around this plain would have the necessary population base to easily dominate Northern Europe and subsequently southern Europe.

With a much lower sealevel, there most likely is not a black sea as we know it.
If I remember correctly the breakthru of the bosporus occurred after the end of the iceage.

 

[Zimmerwald1915]

With a much lower sealevel, there most likely is not a black sea as we know it.
If I remember correctly the breakthru of the bosporus occurred after the end of the iceage.

Before the breakthrough of the Bosphorus there was still a Black Sea. It just was fed by rivers and did not drain into the Mediterranean, similar to the Caspian. It was also less extensive in the north, as shown on the map.

Dunois, is there a world version of that map, or something similar?

 

[Pachac]

Before the breakthrough of the Bosphorus there was still a Black Sea. It just was fed by rivers and did not drain into the Mediterranean, similar to the Caspian. It was also less extensive in the north, as shown on the map.

Dunois, is there a world version of that map, or something similar?

Here's one.

 

[Malta]

Ehhhh I have to go with that the last time Europe had such a common culture was during the Roman times when Latin was supreamacy. While later on we have the fractioning of linguistic culture with the advent of migrations of germanic and slavic peoples and Latin being reduced to being a religious language. A decrease in literacy as experianced during the Dark Ages as it moved out of urban centers to religious centers (monastery). While such languages as French would later on be used in the different political groups, it would be a language of the elites not the common people.

 

[Xgentis]

It is strange that it need geological or climatic change to unite europe. lol

 

[Elfwine]

It is strange that it need geological or climatic change to unite europe. lol

Unite all of Europe? Not so strange.

Strange is treating Europe as as wide open as the steppes.

 

[scholar]

Clearly not, and I never implied that this was the case. Qin conquered other successor states of a previously unified, largely culturally homogeneous region and reforged it.

You would be wise to never repeat that again, all of the states that were forged from the Zhou had distinct cultural, lingual, and even religious identities.

 

[scholar]

Inner Mongolia was already Chinese and speaks Jin and Mandarin Chinese before the Qing dynasty.

No, not really. The Yuan maneuvered a very large population into what we call the Inner Mongolia, but it was under the control of the various Northern Yuan remnants until the Qing, which then populated those areas with enough Chinese to out populate the region.

 

[Tangerine]

You would be wise to never repeat that again, all of the states that were forged from the Zhou had distinct cultural, lingual, and even religious identities.

Yet they were economically integrated, and shared at least a legacy of political unity. Besides, my point is not that China has always been united - it is that China is ideally suited for unity and trended towards unity from its conception. The tail end of the Zhou period is when that trend first bore fruit.

Also, we're all friends here. Ease off on the hostility.

 

[jkay]

There's my Hitler's Republic. Though Italy and Spain have special deals that allows them extra sovereignty within the German Republic's empire.

EDIT: I've got many doubts it's plausible before the airplane.

 

[scholar]

Yet they were economically integrated, and shared at least a legacy of political unity. Besides, my point is not that China has always been united - it is that China is ideally suited for unity and trended towards unity from its conception. The tail end of the Zhou period is when that trend first bore fruit.

Also, we're all friends here. Ease off on the hostility.

No, most were economically self sufficient, trade between the empires were limited to only a few neighbors. Sure, through some twisting of facts you could say that Chu was integrated with Yan, but that's like saying Persia was economically integrated with Germany. Also, this economical integration was no more than what European countries had.

And the legacy of political unity existed in Europe under the Roman Empire.

My point is that China was never suited towards Unity, that it became united due to thousands of wars with themselves and foreign powers uniting them. You'll notice that there were three, including the Mongols. The Mongols invaded China, united it, and shipped it's people everywhere. The Ming took that people and united a single force against the Mongols. The Qing then took over a single state, but used the Chinese to colonize their holdings because they were easier to control. Before the Mongols China may never have been any more than the Jin-Song divide, and the Jin is about as "Chinese" as the Kingdom of Italy was Roman.

I'm not being hostile, I was just saying you should never say that again. If I was hostile I would be much more confrontational than that light reprimand.

 

[Elfwine]

Compared to Europe, which was fought over as enthusiastically as China, China at least seems to have been inclined towards unification as opposed to Europe having issues pushing it even further away plus the lack of such convenient relatively speaking bases for unification.

So a pan-China unification was easier to create in the right sort of circumstances than pan-European unification which never had such circumstances in any OTL period to begin with - it was always at the "long slog towards anything resembling" level.

 

[Tangerine]

My point is that China was never suited towards Unity, that it became united due to thousands of wars with themselves and foreign powers uniting them. You'll notice that there were three, including the Mongols. The Mongols invaded China, united it, and shipped it's people everywhere. The Ming took that people and united a single force against the Mongols. The Qing then took over a single state, but used the Chinese to colonize their holdings because they were easier to control. Before the Mongols China may never have been any more than the Jin-Song divide, and the Jin is about as "Chinese" as the Kingdom of Italy was Roman.

Sure, in all cases China has had to be reunified by force, but the very fact that it was possible to use military force to achieve a lasting political unification speaks of an underlying social unity. It is almost impossible to find an example anywhere in history of any kind of shift in borders happening without military force being used. This is just the nature of human societies. Conquest is a means to an end.

In China, it has been possible time and again for strong warlords and kings to unite the country through military force, and the country has remained united until the inevitable erosion of their short-lived state structures ushers in another cycle of political collapse. This has never deterred Chinese civilization from being able to consistently reunite under a single imperial banner.

So why has China been able to reunify consistently, while Europe has not? Every post-Roman attempt by a European ruler to unify the continent through force has failed due to resistance from the regions being conquered. Furthermore, the greater spread of economic hotspots in Europe means that a balance of power is more easily achieved between regions in Europe: whenever one region becomes too powerful, it will be swatted down by the others - this has not occured in China, where geographical and economic factors have made control from a central point much more easily maintained. This tendency to fall under central control is easily supported by the historical record. Again, i can cite six examples in the last 2000 or so years when China has been unified after a period of disunity, and only once for Europe.

Furthermore, the dominance of the Roman Empire was only possible because the European economy was so heavily unbalanced in favor of the Mediterranean - Northern and Western Europe were still in their economic infancy and essentially colonies of Rome. The great achievement of the Roman Empire was not in uniting Europe but in uniting the Greek and Roman worlds - the only parts of Europe that mattered in those days. If the regions of Europe had been more equal in power the empire would have been an impossible proposition.

 

[scholar]

Sure, in all cases China has had to be reunified by force, but the very fact that it was possible to use military force to achieve a lasting political unification speaks of an underlying social unity. It is almost impossible to find an example anywhere in history of any kind of shift in borders happening without military force being used. This is just the nature of human societies. Conquest is a means to an end.

There were only... four times that there was an actual reunification above a brief civil war. The Qin, the Jin, the Sui, and the Song. The rest were either brief civil wars between maybe two or three factions while or just regime changes. The Ming showed up a general revolt from the Yuan Dynasty, while there was some infighting it was quickly decided the Ming would rule. I'm tempted to say that Yuan-Ming-Qing were all quick wars, because they were all done in under a decade with only two opposing sides bashing each other's heads in.

And what should also be noted is that the Qin was pitifully small at the time with only lose control over what it conquered. The brief war between the Han and Chu ended with the Han expanding things greatly. The Jin conquered just one foe, Wu, and it was mostly culturally motivated. The Sui showed up after 300 years of civil war, but then again it was a period known as the Norther and Southern era of China, there were only two kingdoms at any one time, again apart from brief civil wars inside individual Kingdoms. The Song was a true... well, again what it had was relatively small. From there it expanded against the Wu Hu Kingdoms only to be forced to a Northern Southern analog.

The borders of what we know of as China was never reached until the Qing. So if we were to just focus on the four times it had to be reunited and just not a brief civil war lasting no more than a decade or two. If we look at Persia, the Steppes, or India we find very similar occurrences.

In China, it has been possible time and again for strong warlords and kings to unite the country through military force, and the country has remained united until the inevitable erosion of their short-lived state structures ushers in another cycle of political collapse. This has never deterred Chinese civilization from being able to consistently reunite under a single imperial banner.

Four times, only twice were what I'd call real triumphs and the Song and Qin were very small. In a sense it would be uniting an area the size of, well, Germany and Poland with maybe some added Belarus. It was after this unity that they would expand. Most maps you see of the Song or Qin is at its highest extent, never what it was when unity first came.

As for Europe being united twice, we have three examples that are similar. We have the Roman Empire, the Carolingian Empire, and the Holy Roman Empire. Each of these united an area greater to, or about the same, the Chinese points of unity. And all the time they had powerful foreign Kingdoms on the borders. The Xiongnu, Jurchen, Nanchao, Northern Yuan, Tibet, Wuhuan, Xianbei, Northern Wei, and many, many, others.

Furthermore, the dominance of the Roman Empire was only possible because the European economy was so heavily unbalanced in favor of the Mediterranean - Northern and Western Europe were still in their economic infancy and essentially colonies of Rome. The great achievement of the Roman Empire was not in uniting Europe but in uniting the Greek and Roman worlds - the only parts of Europe that mattered in those days. If the regions of Europe had been more equal in power the empire would have been an impossible proposition.

It was much less balanced in the far East, trust me on that. China was the center of economic power only four times. The Han (where it was still bested by the Xiongnu), The Tang (which collapsed due to pressure from "barbarians", but made the notable campaign of fighting against the Caliphate and losing badly to Tibet), The Song (and most of that power was actually under the Jin, the Song got some bare necessities), and the era of the Ming-Qing. And those eras of being the most unbalanced were actually still much more balanced than most other times. It would be under the Ming-Qing where China was a superpower until the mid1800s.

 

[Timmy811]

Probably true. I'm not familiar enough with why they weren't invented earlier or how useful they are to address this properly.

But I do want to reply to note that I'm willing to acknowledge that such could make a difference - just that OTL it wasn't there (so my statement on medieval communications that were available stands).

Not historical but entirely possible communications...where's an expert on semaphores when we need one?

They seem relatively simple to me, but perhaps I'm missing something. They seem like they would have revolutionized military and governmental administration.

line of stations between Paris and Lille, a distance of 230 kilometres (about 143 miles...The speed of the line varied with the weather, but the line to Lille typically transferred 36 symbols, a complete message, in about 32 minutes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semaphore_line

 

[The Admiral Hook]

Maybe we're going about this all wrong...

Instead of uniting Europe and it remaining united, why not unite all or some of Europe more often over the years? First with Rome and so on and so forth until the 19th century? This creates more of a sense of cultural unity and then the issue becomes a lot easier to work with.

I think another option is throwing in a "Great Man" at some point like a Napoleon/Alexander the Great/Hitler all rolled up into one, but not evil, just nationalistic for a unified nation of Europe. If he is strong and attractive enough, he could inspire at least a Confederation.

Speaking of which, are there any TL's of Alexander going West instead of East? If something inspired Alexander the Great to conquer Europe before going east and he lives longer, the effects could be outstanding in this direction. That may all sound retarded, I don't know much about Alexander, admittedly.