The Legacy of the Glorious (Milarqui's Cut)
- Thread starter Milarqui
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How about the main protagonists of your scenario, like Francisco Serrano and Juan Prim?
Razgriz 2K9
Banned
My thoughts on the nations here:
Europe:
Great Britain & Germany: You practically hit the nail on the head with Britain and Germany. Britain is the top dog, Germany wants to be the top dog, they're going to butt heads sooner or later.
France: Sometimes I wonder if the Orleanists wielding Nationalism like that will backfire on them in the end game.
Austria-Hungary: it's essentially the zombie of Europe. Already dead, but holding on, primarily due to the beloved nature of its Emperor. Now while it is possible for it to reform greatly so, it's not like the Spains. While the Spains did have multiple ethnicities and most of them were already tied together, they were practically all similar (except for the Basques, but they've been content lately.) Austria's multiple ethnicities however as so vastly disparate from each other however.
Italy: The Irredentists also want Dalmatia as well. I wouldn't be surprised if Italian irredentism would also take them to take on other former Venetian holdings in the Eastern Med.
Russia: Hoping Russia survives, that is all.
Ottomans: They're looking to die out soon, it might prolong its existence if the Young Turks and other Turkish Nationalist groups don't get to it.
Corsica: Good for Corsica getting Tunisia. This is going to impress the Corsican nationalists greatly, although at great expense to the French and to a lesser extent the Italians (the irridentists want Corsica and Tunisia...)
Sweden-Norway:Isn't Sweden-Norway going to be breaking up soon? (OTL they did in 1905)
Asia:
Qing: Well that depends on if the Boxer Rebellion becomes a thing, the Rebellion was the final death knell that led to the Republic.
Afghanistan & Persia: Assuming the battle lines will be maintained (Spain, Italy, the Ottomans, Germany vs. Britain and France, Russia and Austria-Hungary), the Great Game will be a moot point.
Siam: I dunno...the reason Siam remained independent was due to then hostile relations between Britain and France, and Siam was a buffer (or rather, I think it was to protect French Indochina from British India) It being a Spanish protectorate is only looking for partitions across the board.
The Americas:
U.S: I thought Manifest Destiny was all but dead at this point.
Brazil: Is Isabel ruling Brazil around now?
Argentina: Viva Virrientism, probably a very good way to establish itself as a premier South American power and rival to Brazil.
Chile: Well, at least the Second Chilean Civil War was butterflied away...so far.
Colombia: Could there be an earlier U.S.-Colombian relationship?
Peru & Bolivia: This, could probably put another cramp on any Argentine expansion.
Dominican Republic: Hoping for another foral region.
Africa:
Ethiopia: The sole Orthodox (and that's questionable) nation in Africa...If Italy doesn't do stupidity we could see it being a colony rather than a protectorate.
Belgian Congo: Welp, there goes the Free State.
Egypt: Except Egypt was a protectorate, not a colony...or did the British decide to make it a colony and get rid of its monarch.
Madagascar: Hoping the House of Merina actually lives to see decolonization TTL.
Europe:
Great Britain & Germany: You practically hit the nail on the head with Britain and Germany. Britain is the top dog, Germany wants to be the top dog, they're going to butt heads sooner or later.
France: Sometimes I wonder if the Orleanists wielding Nationalism like that will backfire on them in the end game.
Austria-Hungary: it's essentially the zombie of Europe. Already dead, but holding on, primarily due to the beloved nature of its Emperor. Now while it is possible for it to reform greatly so, it's not like the Spains. While the Spains did have multiple ethnicities and most of them were already tied together, they were practically all similar (except for the Basques, but they've been content lately.) Austria's multiple ethnicities however as so vastly disparate from each other however.
Italy: The Irredentists also want Dalmatia as well. I wouldn't be surprised if Italian irredentism would also take them to take on other former Venetian holdings in the Eastern Med.
Russia: Hoping Russia survives, that is all.
Ottomans: They're looking to die out soon, it might prolong its existence if the Young Turks and other Turkish Nationalist groups don't get to it.
Corsica: Good for Corsica getting Tunisia. This is going to impress the Corsican nationalists greatly, although at great expense to the French and to a lesser extent the Italians (the irridentists want Corsica and Tunisia...)
Sweden-Norway:Isn't Sweden-Norway going to be breaking up soon? (OTL they did in 1905)
Asia:
Qing: Well that depends on if the Boxer Rebellion becomes a thing, the Rebellion was the final death knell that led to the Republic.
Afghanistan & Persia: Assuming the battle lines will be maintained (Spain, Italy, the Ottomans, Germany vs. Britain and France, Russia and Austria-Hungary), the Great Game will be a moot point.
Siam: I dunno...the reason Siam remained independent was due to then hostile relations between Britain and France, and Siam was a buffer (or rather, I think it was to protect French Indochina from British India) It being a Spanish protectorate is only looking for partitions across the board.
The Americas:
U.S: I thought Manifest Destiny was all but dead at this point.
Brazil: Is Isabel ruling Brazil around now?
Argentina: Viva Virrientism, probably a very good way to establish itself as a premier South American power and rival to Brazil.
Chile: Well, at least the Second Chilean Civil War was butterflied away...so far.
Colombia: Could there be an earlier U.S.-Colombian relationship?
Peru & Bolivia: This, could probably put another cramp on any Argentine expansion.
Dominican Republic: Hoping for another foral region.
Africa:
Ethiopia: The sole Orthodox (and that's questionable) nation in Africa...If Italy doesn't do stupidity we could see it being a colony rather than a protectorate.
Belgian Congo: Welp, there goes the Free State.
Egypt: Except Egypt was a protectorate, not a colony...or did the British decide to make it a colony and get rid of its monarch.
Madagascar: Hoping the House of Merina actually lives to see decolonization TTL.
It seems that Germany (and by extension Spain) is in a good position in the probably-inevitable future land war in Europe. Whatever Thiers's flaws, he was probably right that republicanism is the form of government that divides the French people least; I can't imagine this restored Kingdom of France being utterly unopposed. The German Army is probably in good shape for the campaign against France for the same reasons as was the case IOTL, in addition to France's extra instability ITTL.
The problem for the Hohenzollern powers is naval; if it comes to war against the British Empire, they can't keep their colonial empires if their navies aren't roughly equal to the Royal Navy (OTL's Kaiserliche Marine wasn't even close), and the British IOTL were capable of navally out-building Germany alone without great effort and ITTL they'll probably be able to out-build Spain and Germany together, with greater difficulty but probably still success. It isn't reasonably in dispute that if US ambitions to end Spanish rule in the Americas end up in war the Hohenzollern powers are doomed, so they'd better tread carefully in regard to US public opinion. Will they? Only future updates will tell.
(In any case, the maintenance or loss of a colonial empire is hardly of great importance to a European power compared to the continued independence of its homeland; I'm sure that OTL's German Empire would have been happy to lose its colonial empire a million times over in order for the Kaiserreich to survive.)
Of course, all of that is presuming that there will indeed be a war, and unless Austria-Hungary and Russia wedge themselves into the system of alliance blocs (thus putting a trigger for general European war into the unstable Balkan peninsula) then that's not certain. But there's an element of narrative here; I doubt you'd set all of this up and then not have the great powers face off.
Good luck with writing more.
The problem for the Hohenzollern powers is naval; if it comes to war against the British Empire, they can't keep their colonial empires if their navies aren't roughly equal to the Royal Navy (OTL's Kaiserliche Marine wasn't even close), and the British IOTL were capable of navally out-building Germany alone without great effort and ITTL they'll probably be able to out-build Spain and Germany together, with greater difficulty but probably still success. It isn't reasonably in dispute that if US ambitions to end Spanish rule in the Americas end up in war the Hohenzollern powers are doomed, so they'd better tread carefully in regard to US public opinion. Will they? Only future updates will tell.
(In any case, the maintenance or loss of a colonial empire is hardly of great importance to a European power compared to the continued independence of its homeland; I'm sure that OTL's German Empire would have been happy to lose its colonial empire a million times over in order for the Kaiserreich to survive.)
Of course, all of that is presuming that there will indeed be a war, and unless Austria-Hungary and Russia wedge themselves into the system of alliance blocs (thus putting a trigger for general European war into the unstable Balkan peninsula) then that's not certain. But there's an element of narrative here; I doubt you'd set all of this up and then not have the great powers face off.
Good luck with writing more.
This WW1 will not be really easier than OTL. Spain might create a second front against France, but Russia is stronger, while A-H and Ottomans are not. So, the best strategy for Central Powers would be to convince Italy to join them, and defeat France as fast as possible. Even with the defensive focus of WW1 warfare, there's no way France can hold in three fronts against industrialized nations for too long. Then they can turn their land forces on Russia and win, hopefully before the US joins and secures naval supremacy and the loss of overseas colonies.
Aye. A fight will be unavoidable, but the intensity may vary, though, considering that Germany has not gone through Wilhelm II's reign (so far).
Perhaps, perhaps...
There was a proposal called the United States of Greater Austria, that could have helped in there, but Franz Joseph's intransigence did not help at all.
I doubt that would happen, actually. It would require a fall of the Ottoman Empire, and Greece would have a higher claim to those territories. And you have also given me an idea for the 20th century! So, thank you.
They will, thanks to Aleksandr's reforms.
Yeah, they are bound for death.
Yup.
Who knows?
I have something in the works for something that might actually save it...
Yeah, but they are still relatively important.
When they have Britain on one side and France on the other, with both of them friendly towards each other, the best chance of survival might be to call on someone that is opposed to both of them, instead of praying that they won't make a deal and decide to divide them in two.
It could see a revival in the advent of Spain's growth as a power, and even then the Monroe Doctrine still exists. Though, I think that maybe I should either change the president from Thomas Reed to someone else, or establish that Reed's outlook has changed in the last thirty years to make him more pro-application of the Doctrine.
Yes, she is.
Indeed. Argentina could, hilariously, ally with the Entente as a counter-point to Brazil.
Yeah. The situation changed quite a lot after the defeat in the Second Pacific War.
I'm not sure. There could be an initiation of a relationship, but it was also the US that supported Panamanian independence when the Colombians didn't accept the deal the US offered.
A revival of the Peruvian Confederation could be in the future...
Hell yeah.
They count with Britain's protection, that prefers to keep them independent, so no, there's not much of a chance that Italy wins that without a war.
Considering the travesty that the CFS was for humanity, I'd say it's an improvement. Of course, this means that Heart of Darkness does not get written, at least not in the way it was in RL.
*facepalm* I have re-written that part to explicitly state that Egypt is a protectorate.
*taking notes on how to derail this*
In first place, your analysis of the Spanish and German land forces is quite good. However, the situation in the Third French Kingdom isn't as bad as you imagine: their stability is a bit greater than you seem to imply would be.
As for the naval front, I would not write Spain and Germany off so easily. Yes, the British Empire can outbuild Spain and Germany put together, but Spain does have something over the UK: an advantage on submarine and destroyer design (plus some other things I'll show on Parts II and IV). Did you know that the first destroyer was a Spanish design? The name for that type of ship actually comes from said warship. And, yes, I know that this does not mean handing Spain the "I Win" button, but it does provide a nice extra.
In regards to the US, given what I plan to do for the ATL Spanish-American War, they will be a bit likelier to join an European war. One thing about the land war on Cuba is that it was not as straightforward and easy as the Americans would like to think, and that was with the Spanish Army in there and in the Philippines being in the middle of a rebellion. Imagine what it'll be with the Cubans and Filipinos being loyal (more or less) citizens of the United Empire of the Spains, not to mention that the Spanish Navy will be much more capable and alert (no Disaster of Cavite!).
As for there being a great war between the European powers... there will be. A sad thing, but it was almost impossible to avoid. The actual trigger may actually not be in the Balkans, though. (Still have to decide how to start the spark, though)
Thanks for the support, and I hope you'll like the rest.
In parts, it might be even worse. France and Britain will have it worse in the Western Front (because of the two fronts), the Mediterranean won't be as accessible to the British ships as they hope (Gibraltar may not have enough defenses to hold off a determined Spanish attack), the British-French colonies in the Caribbean will be in danger because of Spain's strong position and those in the Pacific as well given Spain's friendship with Japan, but, on the other side, the Eastern Front will be more balanced (stronger, more powerful Russia), Spain's colonies in the Caribbean will be in danger when the US gets involved, and Africa will be a difficult affair (all of Spain's colonies will be bordering French or British colonies, save for Angola's southern border, shared with German South-West Africa). All in all, it will be a difficult thing for everyone involved ("Home for Christmas" might not even appear!)
All right. I hope it isn't impertinent to ask why.
I'm afraid that submarines and destroyers are simply insufficient. (And yes, I apologise to anyone who's been there for the various discussions I've had on exactly this same topic before.)
To put it briefly, WW1 submarines were vastly weaker than WW2 submarines. They were effective against merchant ships and light warships, but not against dreadnoughts, not at all. The total number of British dreadnoughts (of which there were very many to choose from) sunk by German submarines in the entirety of the First World War was zero. The Kaiserliche Marine's advantage in submarines was impotent against the Royal Navy's advantage in dreadnoughts. We should be careful not to apply the lessons of WW2 to the WW1 and pre-WW1 eras; in those times, the people who thought that there were alternatives to heavily armed, heavily armoured battleships (including some of the British, favouring ideas of faster ships instead of heavier ones with more firepower) were generally wrong.
The real enemies of dreadnought dominance in this period were mines and coastal defences, and those were defensive moves, not offensive ones. They were, of course, incredibly important to history—they're the reason why Gallipoli failed and, more importantly, why Britain couldn't carry out its Second Boer War-era threat and bombard Germany's ports to wreck Germany entirely—but they weren't much use as offensive measures.
I don't think that the US conquest of Cuba would depend on Cuban cooperation. Certainly, amphibious invasions in this era were difficult, but the United States can keep throwing men into the meat-grinder and there are so many Americans that Spain can't realistically stop them, since Spain is unlikely to be able to send any substantial reinforcements or supplies to Cuba in the face of the Royal Navy alone, let alone the RN and the US Navy put together.
The only mechanism I can imagine for a US defeat at Cuba is if it wasn't popularly supported in the first place and there's outcry amongst the American public over the United States' participation in a pointless war that doesn't really concern the USA anyway. Depending on the political set-up that you've created for the United States ITTL (and I know far too little about American politics to comment on it) this might well be the case.
At risk of going overboard: Might I give a few ideas?
NB: The sides that I'm assuming are (I'm listing only the great powers) the USA, the UK, France and Russia vs Germany, Austria-Hungary, Spain and the Ottoman Empire. If this isn't the case, please let me know.
Personally I'd say that the Balkans have some major advantages (several hostile, unstable states with claims on each other that had the potential to shift allegiances between the two main great powers in the region) but there are other potential clashes. Some Morocco-esque crisis in Africa is an easy one to think of, and probably the second-likeliest flashpoint, after the Balkans. With the United States involved, the war might actually start between Spain and the USA, especially if there's some minor agitation in Cuba to give the USA a convenient pretext. Latin America is another potential flashpoint, perhaps with problems over the Canal, and there's plenty of potential for Americo-Spanish clashes over spheres of influence in minor Latin American countries, especially as Spain and the USA will both see these Spanish-speaking countries in the Americas as their own rightful spheres of influence and the Latin American countries will be torn between fear of Spanish reconquest-in-all-but-name (in any ATL with a resurgent Spain that is strongly holding on to power in the Americas, this is a given) and US economic domination (though the latter may come as more of a surprise in an ATL without the example of what the United States did to Cuba).
Of course, you're under no obligation whatsoever to listen to any of these suggestions. I hope you find the ideas useful, that's all.
You're welcome, and I hope you don't take the various bits of constructive criticism as insults. If I were uninterested I wouldn't be reading.
Not at all. One of the things that has helped stabilize the Third French Kingdom is the moderating presence of the King, who has helped a bit there. The governments have longer lives, and the effects of the post-war economy boom linger, even if for a bit.
I didn't say that the submarines and destroyers would be beating the British dreadnoughts willy nilly, just that they would be giving a small edge. Also, a dreadnought does not a victory make. Take into account, though, that unlike Germany, Spain has a couple of drydocks that are full of expert shipbuilders. Sure, they are not as modern and advanced as that of the British, but good enough to put out several powerful ships. Submarines will be good to harass medium-sized ships (particularly with this idea that was developed in RL but never got to be used) and maybe sink a few of them.
I was not saying that. I was pointing out that the American invasion of Cuba was met with quite a lot of resistance, even as the Spanish troops had to fight the Cuban rebels, so an attempt to invade when the Spaniards are fresh and fully concentrated on fighting them would be much worse for the Americans. And I doubt that the American public would actually accept sending troops into a meat-grinder when the memories of the Civil War are still quite fresh. Add to that that the Spanish troops would have more experience in fighting in Cuba (try to find any troops that are better at fighting in the Cuban jungle better than the locals!) and you've got the recipe for a potential disaster for the American invading troops. The fact that you are considering that the RN would be needed to stop Spain from sending reinforcements is quite telling, as well.
I coincide that a lack of support from the US public would help in making it easier to win such a war, but not that it is the only way it can happen. The Spanish army and navy are much more modernized, and their admirals and generals are very good.
Well, I am grateful for any ideas you guys may be willing to give me, so never be afraid of that. The USA is not yet involved in the alliance system, nor is the Ottoman Empire, and you should add Italy to the second team.
Any of those things could actually start a war. A problem with the Canal, or any battle between the US and Spain, would probably restricted, in a military sense, to the Americas, so it would be the United States vs Spain + Germany (although Germany, lacking bases in the Americas, would have to rely on Spain for that).
No worries, mate. I'm glad to listen to things on how I can improve my story.
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OK. How does the Orléanist king get rid of the no-doubt lingering sentiment for republicanism and legitimism (Bonapartism, I'll assume for the sake of simplification, being completely discredited by association with Corsica as opposed to France)? The French political division between republicans, Bonapartists, legitimists and Orléanists lasted absurdly long even IOTL.
What sort of edge? Their main edge, both IOTL and ITTL, is in sinking *Entente trade. That was a noteworthy advantage for Germany IOTL, but ITTL, with a belligerent USA inclined to enter the war against the *CP if presented with a convenient casus belli, it's not the best idea.
But OTL's Central Powers could sink a few British ships too. It didn't make victory. The truly decisive naval story of WW1 wasn't any of the battles or the shots fired; it was the lack of them. More specifically, it was the fact that the German High Seas Fleet was confined to port for almost the entire war and German naval power on the surface was rendered almost totally inoperable against the Entente powers. This gave the Entente powers total victory over Germany's colonial empire, and also made British support of and supply to France and Belgium possible where otherwise it would not have been. More importantly even than that, it meant that the Entente powers could trade with the rest of the world whereas Germany could not, since it made the naval blockade of Germany possible, and it's difficult to overstate the importance of the economic asphyxiation of the German Empire IOTL.
Unless the *Central Powers' fleets can avoid this fate, they are ultimately a waste of money in the event of any war. And that's what happens picking a fight against the French and British at the same time (which wouldn't enormously change if TTL's Spain is added to the equation, as OTL's British Empire was building dreadnoughts at a significantly slower rate than it could have chosen to); add the Americans too and the naval balance of power just becomes cruel.
It's very difficult for any European power to win a war against the United States right next to the Americas at any time after the American Civil War (a war far away from the Americas is a different story but that's not the subject of conversation here). US supply lines are short and easily manageable; the supply lines of any European power are very long and defeatable by the US Navy, which, due to the industrial capacity of the United States, is likely to grow to outnumber any naval force that a European power can deploy against it, unless that European power is completely undistracted by any opponents in Europe (which is extremely unlikely). [1] Military skill can do a lot, but any European power at war with the United States and unable to muster naval power equal to the US Navy in US waters will find itself unable to supply whatever possessions it has there, and even the most skilful general can't keep fighting if he runs out of ammunition or, worse, food. I'm reminded of the Germans in Africa in WW1; for all their skill and for all their opponents' weakness in the terrain in which they fought, because of their lack of supply they simply didn't stand a chance and everything they did was just a matter of delaying the inevitable.
It's almost impossible to exaggerate just how extremely important supply is.
Italy fighting on the same side as Austria-Hungary, which holds the territories that Italy wants, and against Britain and especially France, the powers which between them dominate the Mediterranean Sea? How? Wary neutrality and later jumping in on the *CP side when it's clear that the CP are going to win, I can imagine; openly siding with the *CP straight from the beginning, less so.
I understand the corrections about the USA and the Ottoman Empire and will adjust accordingly. For the USA it might stay out, but for the Ottoman Empire it's only a matter of time; the Tsardom of Russia and later the Russian Empire have been continuously attacking the Ottoman Empire since the 16th century (it's one of the longest-running enmities in human history), let alone the 20th, so the Ottoman Empire would undoubtedly side with Russia's enemies fairly soon. The *CP would have to play their cards pretty poorly to not have the Ottoman Empire soon pick their side.
The UK and France might well find some paper-thin excuse to intervene on the USA's side in such an instance; there's no way France, in particular, would let go of the opportunity to fight a war against the *Central Powers where the *CP are in just about the worst possible position they can realistically ever be in (having to fight a war against the Anglo-French entente cordiale, the then-vastly-overestimated Russian Empire in the east and the United States in the Americas all at the same time)—this opportunity, to enlist Russian and British and US aid in the French grudge match against Germany (and ITTL against Spain too), isn't something that comes around every day.
But yes, I agree there are plenty of potential flashpoints. I won't, of course, ask for the spoiler of which one (or perhaps one that wasn't mentioned) you're going to choose.
Thank you, and I'm glad you're alright with it. I ought to add that I have enjoyed/am enjoying the TL and I hope to see the continuation of it.
[1] This is not a contradiction to the criticism I gave before of simply comparing nations' industrial capacity, though it may seem so. One can simply consider US industrial capacity as it stands without accounting for damage as one must for, e.g., French or German industrial capacity in any major war, because in almost any major war there's no realistic chance that a European power can invade the United States. The sole exception is an Anglo-American war (or a Mexican-American war in an ATL with a powerful Mexico) because the British Empire is in the unique position of having a foothold in North America from which an invasion of the United States is theoretically possible, and even then it's unlikely that the British would fight an Anglo-American war in this time-period unless the war was practically forced on them because they would almost certainly lose Canada and because they had such strong economic ties to the United States anyway.
Milarqui's last story post indicated that Italy also wants Savoy and Nice, and when Spain captures Gibraltar (which should happen quite early given that Spain has now a competent military), France's situation will soon become untenable, having to fight a three-front land war plus the naval challenge on the Mediterranean (This might also have an impact on the African theater). British naval reinforcements will then have to come through the Suez channel, which can be captured by ground forces, and even then they won't be able to help France fast enough. A three front war against industrialized nations should cause the collapse of the French earlier than Russia collapsed IOTL, then the Central Powers turn their attention towards Russia.
While the Spanish colonies in the Americas and Philippines will be toast if the US joins, it does not mean that much in the European theater if France falls early enough. And even then, their naval superiority would be challenged more than once, more often than OTL. Also remember that Japan might join later to strike Russia, so the Americans and British will still need a significant naval presence in Asia.
Now the question would be: Is the Italian military good enough this time to make significant gains vs France, before A-H and Ottomans lose too much ground against Russia?
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I know it's a little late but, how about changing the name of the United Kingdom of the Spains to United Kingdom of Hispania? Personally I find it more badass 
Anyways, hoping to see more from this TL.
Anyways, hoping to see more from this TL.
Deimos
Banned
For anyone who might be interested in what a decently realistic and successful u-boat campaign may look like can take a look at BlondieBC's timeline for a worthwhile read.
Perfidious Albion actually raises some good points - logistics is key. Where do Spain and Italy get their supplies from (As far as I know Italy was dependent on foreign coal and Spain even on food imports IOTL) in case of war?
For an example on the Entente side, what can the ANZAC-troops do in Asia when there are Spanish and maybe even German vessels near their colonies or if they are needed elsewhere? Going for Africa is hard because they still need to be supplied and African diseases and local resistance are going to take a massive toll (especially the former).
I would generally assume that they want to travel through as less contested waters as possible. With the Mediterranean very hotly contested by Spain, Italy, Austria-Hungary and the Ottomans the only safe route would be through the South Pacific and traveling north to Canada and then through Canada and the North Atlantic to reach the primary theaters of the war. Egypt might be another option to deploy them but they will lack supplies there.
Raiders can create a logistical nightmare and a lack of men and ammunition will directly translate to losses of ground or slower progress on the battlefield.
Although it is not a real flashpoint for a war I might add that the situaton in Ireland can be a factor when it comes to US-British relations.
Perfidious Albion actually raises some good points - logistics is key. Where do Spain and Italy get their supplies from (As far as I know Italy was dependent on foreign coal and Spain even on food imports IOTL) in case of war?
For an example on the Entente side, what can the ANZAC-troops do in Asia when there are Spanish and maybe even German vessels near their colonies or if they are needed elsewhere? Going for Africa is hard because they still need to be supplied and African diseases and local resistance are going to take a massive toll (especially the former).
I would generally assume that they want to travel through as less contested waters as possible. With the Mediterranean very hotly contested by Spain, Italy, Austria-Hungary and the Ottomans the only safe route would be through the South Pacific and traveling north to Canada and then through Canada and the North Atlantic to reach the primary theaters of the war. Egypt might be another option to deploy them but they will lack supplies there.
Raiders can create a logistical nightmare and a lack of men and ammunition will directly translate to losses of ground or slower progress on the battlefield.
Although it is not a real flashpoint for a war I might add that the situaton in Ireland can be a factor when it comes to US-British relations.
But France and Britain between them are dominant in the Mediterranean and the *Central Powers are not (unlikely to change with Spanish action; if the *CP build more ships then the *Entente can just build more, and the *Entente can withstand such an escalation far better than the *CP can), so Italy is likely to not be too loud about it, especially since France on its own is a considerably greater power than Austria-Hungary on its own.
Are you familiar with the previous two assaults on Gibraltar and why they failed horrifically? Gibraltar is a tiny area right next to the sea that is incredibly easily defensible by any power with control of the sea nearby, in an era (the WW1 era) where fixed fortifications had a huge advantage over attackers, and strategically positioned such that the entire British Mediterranean fleet becomes nearly useless if it's taken so the British will fight tooth and nail to retain it even if they have to lose everything else in the Mediterranean to do so. I'm happy to believe that TTL's Spain might capture it in an Anglo-Spanish war, but I don't think it will be as easy as you're implying.
The naval challenge which will be impotent against *Entente naval power (as I've already outlined). And France's situation may indeed become untenable, but not certainly (again, as I've outlined) and probably not soon, judging by the example of OTL where incredibly fast assaults simply weren't possible in the conditions of the Western Front with the technology available at the time.
And Germany is going to contest *Entente control of North Africa… how? This sounds like Gallipoli on steroids.
Russia didn't collapse IOTL as the direct result of German military power; even late in the war, Germany hadn't advanced that far into Russia. What made Russian resistance collapse was the weakening of government authority over the Army (mass desertions et cetera) and the Russian Civil War. We can argue as long as we want about how much of a factor the war had in the fall of the tsarist regime, but that's irrelevant; what matters is that, in this era, military power alone was not sufficient to make a major industrialised nation collapse quickly.
The *CP can probably win the war in Europe, I agree, but I don't think it'll be anywhere near as fast as you're implying.
In the European theatre, yes, you're entirely right. But even if Germany wins entirely in the European theatre it doesn't mean it will win outside the European theatre.
Let's be careful with what we mean by 'challenge' here; IOTL there was no serious challenge to Entente naval superiority. Jutland was a skirmish in which the German navy performed admirably, inflicted disproportionate losses and then successfully retreated in the face of overwhelming enemy power lest it be totally destroyed. Not a single dreadnought was sunk. If Germany had somehow fought ten more battles identical to the Battle of Jutland, British naval superiority would still be overwhelming.
Both IOTL and ITTL, the naval balance of power was so tilted in the Entente's direction that the German navy could, and did, perform far, far more impressively than the Royal Navy did and yet it still wasn't anything remotely close to enough.
It's easy to take popular conceptions of the origins of WW1 and apply them falsely, but we should be careful here. The British government consistently made sure that the Royal Navy outnumbered its enemy's dreadnoughts at all times, and accelerated naval construction when it felt it necessary to do so to achieve this goal, but it was still so confident (correctly) that it had nothing major to worry about that it was even willing to build extra dreadnoughts and sell them to various other countries across the world (instead of keeping them for itself) to make some money on the side: hardly the action of a desperate power. British politicians and military leaders (as opposed to the British public, ever-vulnerable to the latest invasion scare produced by the Royal Navy in the press to get more funding) were unworried about the German naval threat, and made such comments as speaking of how many dreadnoughts they would have before Germany had even one.
To a great extent this vast superiority in ship-building is because Britain didn't have to maintain the enormous land armies that the other powers did, so it could afford to spend far, far more effort and money building ships than any other nation on Earth except the USA, which at the time wasn't competing in the naval arms race to anywhere near the extent that the European powers were.
Oh no. It's not just you; this is a misconception I've rebutted many times before, and yet it keeps popping up.
Japan in the WW1 era was not an independent naval power in its own right; it was a British client state (ITTL, a client state of Spain and Germany instead) and the Imperial Japanese Navy was only as strong as its European benefactors decided for it to be. At the time, Japan was making the transition from simply buying battleships directly off Britain to "making" battleships out of components almost all of which (even including the main guns of every single Japanese battleship until 1917) were pre-made in Britain and then shipped over to Japan to be put together. It didn't have the ability to build dreadnoughts of its own without such a foreign role until after WW1.
(Yes, this does mean that the British Empire deliberately built the foundations for the rise of Imperial Japan out of British self-interest in the early 20th century. That sort-of backfired in the Pacific War, didn't it? Law of unintended consequences and all that.)
If the *Central Powers want Japan to have a navy capable of threatening Entente interests in Asia, they will have to provide Japan with a navy capable of threatening Entente interests in Asia (thus diverting shipyard capacity that they could have used for their own navies), as Britain did IOTL, and they are far less capable of doing this than OTL's Britain was. To pretend that Japan was a major naval power in the WW1 era is to commit the mistake (albeit a very common mistake, so I don't blame you) of confusing WW2-era Japan with WW1-era Japan.
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Good update, Milarqui!
Yes indeed; I've been so busy discussing details that I probably haven't emphasised enough that this is a really great TL and I'm very interested in it.
I feel like I should hate you, Perfidious Albion, for making those good comments that make it harder for Spain to win. I'll try to answer your last questions later.
Still, I like your comments, because they do help me with getting ideas on how to continue the story. One of the things I'm working on for Part II is the Spanish Navy, which is going to be quite different from what it was in RL at that point in time.
Anyway, what I had thought for the Great War was something quite unlike what happened in RL, yet different to what would have been the likeliest other choice.
Let's see who guesses what's my choice.
I'll try to answer your last questions later. Still, I like your comments, because they do help me with getting ideas on how to continue the story. One of the things I'm working on for Part II is the Spanish Navy, which is going to be quite different from what it was in RL at that point in time.
Anyway, what I had thought for the Great War was something quite unlike what happened in RL, yet different to what would have been the likeliest other choice.
Let's see who guesses what's my choice.
I feel like I should hate you, Perfidious Albion, for making those good comments that make it harder for Spain to win.
Not completely. The factors I mentioned make it harder for Spain to win across the world, in the short term. I would argue that ITTL victory in Europe for the *Central Powers (even if the USA does join in on the *Entente's side) is probable, though not certain, and that the war is definitely not going to be swift and easy no matter who wins. Another facet of any CP victory ATL is that the United Kingdom will be put into lots of debt which it won't easily be able to repay (unless the United States takes it upon itself to prop up the British Empire, which I doubt will be popular enough amongst the American electorate to last very long) so in most CP victory TLs I'd argue that the British Empire is likely to collapse earlier than it did IOTL. And if resistance in the US-occupied Spanish possessions is fierce and it becomes clear to the American people that the client state "Republic of Cuba" (and other such US client republics) are very unpopular among the Cuban people, the American people might—not "definitely will", but "might"—get tired of such imperialist ventures costing lots of money and lots of American soldiers' lives and consequently pull out, giving Spain the opportunity to come back.
So yes, if you want a TL where Spain gets 100% victory in every war and never suffers any reverses at all, even temporary ones, I don't think that's plausible (I don't think it's happened for any nation in history, even the United States)—but if you want a TL where, overall, Spain comes out far ahead of where it did IOTL (both in territorial extent and in economy), I think that's entirely possible given what you've set up here.
(If you weren't set on Spain going to war against other great powers, it's entirely possible that Spain could go through the 20th century without suffering any even temporary reverses, but since you are then I don't think it's an option.)
It ought not to need saying, but I'll say it anyway: Ultimately this is your ATL, not mine, so if you want me to stop raising various objections I'm happy to do so.
Great update! A question, though...
So... ITTL the *CP is (essentially) Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire and Spain. How politically tenable would be in Spain to be allied to an infidel country? Let's remember than even IOTL, today, not few Spaniards haven't forgiven France for shortly allying with them in the 16th century.
So... ITTL the *CP is (essentially) Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire and Spain. How politically tenable would be in Spain to be allied to an infidel country? Let's remember than even IOTL, today, not few Spaniards haven't forgiven France for shortly allying with them in the 16th century.
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