A different 1866 (actual TL)

This is the product, in a more organized TL form, of the fruitful debate previously held here (where TL discussion may continue), plus further reflection of mine and introduction of some new (and not so new) developments. It also owes some ideas to this nifty TL, which the present one aims to be a sibling thereof.

A different 1866, v. 1.1

1861-1865: Italy gets a more talented Premier than OTL, as skilled as Cavour himself. Maybe the great man himself survives to old age, or an ATL statesman just as good emerges. The Italian Prime Minister implements taxations schemes to foster public and private investments into Southern infrastructures, irrigation, industries, and tourism, both from northern Italian, British, and Prussian businessmen. The Italian army is reformed on the Prussian model. Faced with the necessity to fight Austria again to liberate Venetia, and growing estrangement with France owning to French support for the Pope, Italy seeks a strong alliance with Prussia.

1866: Prussia and Italy declare war to Austria. Both allies won total victories on land in Sadowa and Custoza, respectively, effectively destroying the Austrian army. The Austrian fleet is decimated by the Italian one in the Battle of Lissa. Austria is forced to ask for a beggar's peace. At the peace table, Italy claims Venetia, Trento, South Tyrol, Gorizia-Gradisca, Trieste, Istria, and Dalmatia. Spurred by the triumph of the alliance, and extensive Italian claims, King William I and the Prussian generals force Bismarck to claim Bohemia-Moravia from Austria.

Worried about the outcome of the war, which bolsters Prussia and Italy way beyond his wildest expectations, Napoleon III intervenes and threatens war if the victors don't scale down their claims. With their armies deep within Austria, Prussia and Italy are forced to comply, but neither their governments nor their public opinion, swept by nationalist enthusiasm, forgive or forget.

In the Treaty of Vienna, Prussia annexes Hanover, Schleswig-Holstein, Hesse-Kassel, Frankfurt, Nassau, the northern half of Hesse-Darmstadt, Saxony, Austrian Silesia, and the German-majority districts of northern Bohemia-Moravia (effectively, the Sudetenland, except the parts directly bordering German Austria). Italy annexes Venetia, Trento, South Tyrol, and Gorizia-Gradisca.

Groups of irredentist Irish expatriates (the Fenians) launch raids into Canada, with the intent to conquer it and use it as a bargaining price to force Britain to give Ireland its independence. The Fenians have got a significant amount of covert training and support from US private groups and sectors of the American military (but not the US government or the public at large) that aim to annex Canada; so they score substantial successes, throwing the disorganized Canadian militias into disarray and overrunning large areas of Canada along the US border. Angered British government start deploying troops in Canada, which recover most of the conquered areas, although Fenian raids continue to harry them. Britain blames America for the raids and threatens war, asking to suppress any support for the Fenians in America, to pay reparations, and to accept limitations of US military presence on the Canadian borders. The USA, still resentful for the support that UK gave to Confederate raids on Union shipping during the Civil War, disallows any support for the Fenians, but remains defiant on the other British requests, declaring that the British only have to blame themselves for their “colonial” practices in Canada and Ireland if they face unrest. Tensions escalate and Britain declares war to the USA. British declaration of war angers the American public into patriotic defiance and the USA redeploys the vast army it had built to fight the American Civil War to stage an all-out invasion of Canada. British troops, expecting to reap a quick, easy victory against the undervalued “colonials”, are overwhelmed while still in half-deployment across the Atlantic, and poor-quality Canadian militias, already harried by the Fenians, are simply overrun. American forces conquer western Canada, southern Ontario, and New Brunswick. The Royal Navy stages an iron tight high-seas blockade and sweeps American merchant shipping from the seas, causing substantial economic damage; raids. The US Navy manages to win some engagements in coastal waters and to avoid a British blockade of coastal shipping, even if it shuns large-scale battles with the superior RN. They gear up for large-scale raids on British merchant shipping. America feels the economic punch from the overseas blockade (even if American overseas trade had already diminished significantly during the ACW because of British-supported Confederate), but victories on land and survival of American coastal trade keeps morale up.

1867: Prussia forms the Northern German Confederation under its leadership (despite the name, a federal state) with all surviving German states north of the river Main (including the Grand Duchy of Hesse). Alarmed by the growing Italo-German power, and anxious to reaffirms French supremacy in Europe and his personal prestige, Napoleon III starts to plot a war against Prussia and Italy (unaware that Bismarck and the Italian Premier are doing the same). Although he is confident that the French army alone can crush the upstart Prussians and Italians, he seeks an alliance with the powers that were recently bested by Prussia, Austria and Denmark. Both powers, expecting an easy revenge thanks to French might, are receptive to the offer.

Austria, however, has been suffering serious consequences for the defeat. The Army in disarray, and the prestige of the dynasty collapsed after the defeats of 1859 and 1866, is suffering increasing domestic unrest, as the various nationalities squabble among themselves and with the discredited Habsburg regime. The Magyars especially seem on the verge of a new rebellion, and even many Germans feel the lure of national reunification with the NGF. Half-hearted attempts to concoct a power-sharing scheme with the Magyars fail, increasing their unrest.

Prussia and Italy, on their part, are enormously pleased by the war’s outcome and the success of their alliance, which is confirmed and strengthened, as they expect a war with France in the near future. Napoleon III ‘s recent actions indicate that the way for their success lies through the defeat of France. They get aware of French attempts to build an alliance with them, and react accordingly: Prussian and Italian agents foster national unrest in the Habsburg empire.

Napoleon III, always the one to seek the easy victory if at all possible, seeks to build Luxemburg from the King of Netherlands, that is also its Grand Duke in personal union. The King, deep in financial debt, is receptive to the offer, but Bismarck publicly vetoes the purchase, pleasing German nationalists (he also makes a secret counteroffer to the Dutch King for Luxemburg). On its part, France claims the withdrawal of the Prussian garrison that is stationed in Luxemburg since 1815. A diplomatic stalemate is reached and the issue festers, increasing nationalistic antagonism between France, Prussia, and German public opinion.

In Italy, Garibaldi, at the head of a volunteer corps covertly supplied by the Italian government, invades the Papal States, defeats its army, and triggers a patriotic insurrection in Rome, which forces the Pope to flee. Napoleon III, who relies on the support of French Catholics to support his regime, sends a French expeditionary corps to relieve the Pope. Garibaldi defeats the French, and stages the annexation of Latium to Italy, unleashing the wild enthusiasm of the Italian public opinion.

Napoleon III, doubly humiliated in Luxemburg and Rome and already feeling the backlash of the costly French intervention in Mexico, feels necessary to bolster his prestige by bringing back the Pope in his states and winning a military victory. He decides to do away with the upstart Prussians and Italians and declares war. Denmark, eager to recover Schleswig and trusting a French victory, joins the war, as Bismarck, having his own designs for the revanchist Danes, has instructed his generals to feign weakness at the northern border. Austria mobilizes and is about to declare war as well, but the French declaration of war has caused a massive wave of nationalist enthusiasm among German public opinion, which spurs southern German states to join the side of Prussia, and brings Austria on the brink of revolution. So Austria backs down at the last moment.

The Pope lands in France, sets up court in Avignon, and calls a council to affirm the controversial doctrine of papal infallibility. He showers scathing condemnations and excommunications on the governments of Italy and Prussia, calling on a crusade to unseat “ungodly” rulers and blessing the weapons of France. Papal appeals spur some noticeable unrest throughout Catholic nations, but support for the enemies of the Fatherland also unleash a massive wave of liberal and nationalist indignation in the public opinions of Germany and Italy, which essentially nullifies the influence of the Church on the Catholic masses thereof. Moreover, the council soon splits about the declaration of papal infallibility. Pius IX forces it through despite the vehement opposition of the liberal bishops, that condemn it as a tyrannical and heretical innovation to the traditional doctrine of the Church. Those bishops, which mostly represent and are largely influential in Netherlands, Switzerland, Germany, Italy set up a schismatic “Old Catholic” church. The governments of Germany and Italy react against hostility of the Papal Catholic clergy with a series of harsh measures, such as seizure of Church properties, limitations to use of the pulpit for political propaganda, state control of clergy education, restriction to catholic schools and fostering of public ones. Old Catholic clergy is exempt from all punitive measures and gets strong state support, as well as the favor of liberal-nationalist public opinion.

Papal militant activism and news of Fenian and American successes in Canada trigger a vast insurrection in Ireland, organized by the Irish Republican Brotherhood. Well-armed and organized with the assistance of American agents and weapon-smugglers, IRB insurgents begin to attack British government property, carry out raids for arms and funds and target and kill prominent members of the British administration. Support by Papal Catholic clergy and organizations makes the rebellion popular with the Irish people and grants it a vast amount of popular mobilization and support. The IRB's main target in the first part of the conflict is the mainly Catholic Irish police force, the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC), which were the British government's eyes and ears in Ireland. Its members and barracks (especially the more isolated ones) were vulnerable, and they were a source of much-needed arms. IRB attacks and, more so, popular ostracism demoralize the force as the rebellion goes on, as people turn their faces from a force increasingly compromised by association with British government repression. The rate of resignation goes up, and recruitment in Ireland drops off dramatically. Attacks on isolated RIC stations in rural areas increase, causing them to be abandoned as the police retreats from most of the countryside to the larger towns, leaving it in the hands of the IRB. British administration collapses across south and west Ireland, when assizes fail and tax collection by British authorities stop. The British government is forced to deploy the regular British Army in the country in large numbers, and to declare martial law. The British Parliament passes an act to extend the powers of military martial courts and cover the whole population and to use the death penalty and internment without trial. Coroners' courts and local governments are suspended, and Ireland is to be ruled as a crown colony. The British forces, in trying to re-assert their control over the country, resort to arbitrary reprisals against republican activists and the civilian population. An escalation between IRB guerrilla attacks against and reprisals by British troops soon ensues, with a spiralling of the death toll in the conflict.

Despite the overconfident expectations of the French, their Danish allies, and most neutral observers, the Prussian-German and Italian armies, better organized and equipped, inflict a catastrophic series of defeats to the French forces in a series of battles, and overrun northeastern and southeastern France. Eventually Napoleon III himself is taken prisoner, which triggers a republican revolution in Paris. The French expeditionary corps is withdrawn from Mexico, leading to a quick series of victories by the Mexican Republicans against the imperial forces. Soon afterwards, Paris itself, as well as Lyon and Marseilles, are besieged by the Italo-Germans, as the remaining professional French armies are routed or forced to surrender. The republican provisional government harbors wild expectations that mass levies of new French recruits can defeat the invaders with patriotic élan as in 1793, but the wars of the Industrial age are a wholly different issue. The poorly trained and equipped French militias are disastrously beaten and France is reluctantly forced to ask for an armistice. The Danish, too, are taken wholly by surprise by the efficiency and ferocity of the Prussian counterattack, and in short order Prussian forces overrun the Jutland peninsula. Soon Denmark, too, is forced to beg for peace.

In North America, the USA remain victorious on land, as they seize control of northern Ontario and overrun Quebec. British troops are holed up in Nova Scotia, where a stalemate ensues in the isthmus. The British attempts to achieve a breakout in Nova Scotia and to land in North Carolina and Alabama turn into very bloody failures. Another British attempt to land in California is repulsed with heavy losses thanks to the brilliance of the local American commander’s counteroffensive. The economic effects of British high-seas blockade on US economy continue to worsen, even if the USN, at a heavy price, manages to repel UK coastal raids, and to keep an amount of US coastal shipping alive. Both powers are feeling substantial hardship from the war, the Americans seeing the effects of UK superiority on sea and the British being apparently unable to challenge American control of the North American mainland and paying a high blood price for it (its demoralizing effects only worsened by the ongoing guerrilla war in Ireland). Despite British expectations and attempts to stir up trouble, the defeated South remains mostly quiet as most Southerners feel compelled to side with fellow Americans against an European colonial power. American raiders surprisingly prove quite effective against British overseas shipping, causing a substantial amount of damage to UK trade. Both government seek a way out from the apparent, mutually harmful impasse and tentative peace feelers are sent.

1868: peace negotiations between France and the Italo-Prussians start, but they are soon delayed by the explosion of a revolutionary insurgency in France. Backed by a motley crew of various far left movements, the so-called French Commune sweeps Paris, Lyon, and Marseilles. It is fueled by rage for the defeat, the hardships of the siege, lingering resentment for the authoritarian Napoleonic regime, and fear of a monarchical restoration, since the newly-elected National Assembly has a royalist majority. The insurrection seizes control of the three main cities of France, but fails to spread further, since conservative rural France distrusts and fears the “communist” extremists. Bismarck and the Italian Premier, eager to crush a possible nest of subversion on their borders and bring the war to a successful conclusion, allow the early release of French PoWs. The regular French forces thus reconstituted, allow the government to crush the Commune in a bloody siege and harsh repression in a couple months.

Southern German states, spurred by the patriotic enthusiasm created by the war, accept to join the NGF, which transforms into the German Empire. The Habsburg government is barely able to resist the popular call to join as well, but the empire seems to drift more and more into instability.

In the Treaty of Frankfurt, Germany annexes Luxemburg and Denmark, which become member states of the German Empire, and the provinces of Alsace and of Lorraine up to the Maas/Meuse river. On its part, Italy annexes Savoy, Corsica, Nice, the French Riviera up to Hyeres, and a slice of territory in the Alps between Savoy and the Riviera to ensure control of the watershed. It also gains eastern Algeria (the Constantine department). Residents of the annexed regions are given one year and half to decide between keeping their French nationality and emigrating, or to remain in the region and become German or Italian citizens. France is also forced to pay an hefty war indemnity of 6 billion gold francs (3 to Germany and 3 to Italy) and to cede its shares of the Suez Canal company, which Germany and Italy divide in equal parts. The victors also gain French colonies in Indochina: Cambodia and Cochin china become an Italo-German protectorate.

The tightening of the British blockade, and gradual worsening of the American economy continues. On the other hand, new British attempts to break out of the Nova Scotia bottleneck or land on the US mainland become costly failures, and the Royal Navy, despite its dominance of the seas, is hard-pressed to stomp out the wily American raiders entirely. The British government is also increasingly concerned that French and Austrian weakness may spur Russian expansionism in the Balkans and the Middle East while the British Empire is beset by multiple conflicts. Public opinion in both countries pressures for a compromise and after a sizable amount of diplomatic wrangling, the Treaty of London is signed. America acquires the portion of Rupert’s Land, British Columbia, and North-Western Territory that lie between 95° W and 55°N, while Britain keeps Vancouver Island. America agrees to pay $ 12,000,000 for the land. The USA also annex Southern Ontario except for the Eastern Ontario sub-region. Residents of the annexed regions are given three years to decide between keeping their British nationality and emigrating, or to remain in the region and become American citizens. The USA accept to indemnify all residents that choose to leave, and to cease and suppress all support to Irish nationalist groups. They also agree to the British purchase of Alaska, which the Russian government has been willing to sell out of financial difficulties and doubts about its ability to defend the territory in a war against Britain. Both powers agree to drop any request for war indemnities (including compensation for the Fenians raids and the so-called “Alabama” claims for damages by the USA against Britain for the covert assistance given to the Confederate cause during the Civil War). The treaty reaffirms the freedom of passage throughout the Great Lakes and the St.Lawrence river for both powers. Despite being widely denounced by nationalist radicals on both sides, the settlement is reluctantly accepted by moderates in both countries as a viable compromise to end to a costly war.

Britain, already harried by the war in North America and the insurrection in Ireland, is annoyed by German annexation of Denmark and Italo-German control of the Suez Canal (but not radically so, since the main strategic effect of the former is that the Russians are all the more holed up in the Baltic, and the French, which controlled the Suez Canal previously, were no big friends of Britain). The British government asks Germany and Italy to share control of the Suez Canal and the three powers agree to divide their shares in equal parts, with a secret agreement to do likewise if any of them ever were to gain control of the Egyptian share, as it indeed happens a few years later. America, too, is concerned by German expansion in the New World, but Bismarck has very little interest into picking a feud with either Britain or the United States. So Germany agrees to sell Greenland to Britain and the Danish West Indies to the USA. Iceland, which had gotten restive after the union of Denmark and Germany, is given full home rule and Germany agrees with Britain to limit its own basing rights in Iceland, in exchange for joint Anglo-German defense of the island. Britain is greatly pleased by the willingness to compromise of the Italo-German alliance and relationships warm considerably.

With the withdrawal of the French expeditionary corps, and the end of the Anglo-American war, which allows the USA to deploy troops to the Rio Grande, and threaten an invasion, Mexican republicans soon gain nearly complete control of the country, as imperial forces collapse. Maximilian is captured and, following a court-martial, was sentenced to death and executed.

With the end of the war in North America, Britain is able to deploy the bulk of its regular army in Ireland. Large-scale sweeps and internments of IRB personnel and suspected sympathizers take place, and allow the British forces to disrupt the IRB network and score several successes in clashes with the insurgents. The end of American weapon-smuggling and British increasingly successful counterinsurgency actions leave most IRB units critically short of both weapons and ammunition and there is a gradual fall off of guerrilla attacks.

After the victory in the Franco-German-Italian war, the Italian government decides to change the army organization so that each battalion is made up with men from the same region, as in the Prussian model. Up to now, they included a mix of recruits include men from from all over the country, to combat regionalism. Italian elites feel confident that with the boost to national self-consciousness brought from the late string of victories, regionalism is no more a serious concern, and the regional model would further improve the already good efficiency of the army, completing its transition to the German model. The government decides to set up a public school system modeled on the German system and make strong investments to spread knowledge of the national language among the Italian citizens.

1869-72: General realignment of European politics. The Old Catholic - Papal Catholic schism deepens and widens and in a few years creates a split of the catholic Community only comparable to the Eastern Schism or the Reformation. Fueled by liberal-progressive feelings and nationalist outrage at papal support of France, and getting lavish support from the governments of Germany and Italy, the Old Catholic movement soon claims the allegiance of the vast majority of Catholics in Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Switzerland, and the United States. It effectively abolishes the papacy and the College of Cardinals, and it develops a conciliar-episcopal structure. Albeit it claims to represent the “authentic” Catholic doctrine, against the deviations of the papists, the OC movement attracts pretty much all the liberal thinkers and leaders within the Church, and soon it develops an increasingly liberal-progressive outlook in political and social matters. Its differences with the Anglican and, to a lesser degree, Lutheran confessions diminish considerably (up to nothing as it concerns the Anglicans), which wins the OC more and more sympathies in Britain and America. Conversely, the Papal Catholic faction remains dominant in France, Spain, Ireland, Russian Poland, and Brazil, and over time it becomes more and more reactionary-authoritarian in political matters and conservative in social ones. The Pope remains in Avignon, and seeks to shape France and Spain into a tool to reaffirm the hegemony of reactionary Catholicism over Europe. Other countries, like Belgium, Portugal, Mexico, and Argentina remain ideological battlegrounds of the schism.

After a few years of political instability, France, reeling from the shock of the war and the Commune, suffers another swing of the political pendulum. Under the drive of the PC clergy, which seeks to remold France and Spain, where it holds sway, into the “sword and shield of the true church” a reactionary-authoritarian regime change occurs to a restoration of the Bourbon monarchy. The Count of Chambord takes the throne. He is but a figurehead for a ruling clique of nationalist-revanchist officers and politicians, reactionary PC clergy and landowners, conservative industrialists and financers. The regime could effectively be described as “the Inquisition married to a barrack” (or in OTL terms, proto-fascism). They desire revenge towards the hated Germans and Italians, whom they reviled both for the humiliation France suffered in 1867-68, and for ideological-religious reasons, but for now, France is far too weak to seek a rematch. Instead, the Bourbon regime seeks to bolster its strength in a different direction. Spain, like France, is a PC stronghold, the far right has in a strong following among the supporters of the Carlist pretendent to the throne. It happens that Spain is suffering a dynastic crisis again after the ousting of Isabel II and conveniently, the French heir to the throne is the Carlist pretendent. With abundant French support and the backing of the PC Church, the Carlist movement is revitalized and in a few years, it engineers a successful coup. France and Spain are joined in a dynastic union under the same political regime.

Germany and Italy experience overwhelming self-confidence and fulfilling and become mostly satisfied powers, focusing their energies into post-unification nation-building and economic development. The huge success of the alliance in the Austrian and French wars imprint the Italo-German partnership as a constant of European politics. The military alliance is made permanent, economic integration is established through a series of treaties, and patriotic culture, from poets to playwrights, celebrates Italo-German friendship as the best guarantee of national unification. The past coexistence of both nations in the Holy Roman Empire is revisited and celebrated as a worthy experiment thwarted and destroyed by papal and French power-greedy treachery and envious meddling. There is still some territory in the Habsburg Empire that both nations desire to complete their national unifications, but the partners look at the sorry domestic state of the Habsburg Empire and feel confident that their wishes shall not frustrated for long (just to be sure, German and Italian agents are busy adding fuel to the fire).

Besides military successes and the victory of national unification, feelings of satisfaction in Germany and Italy are fueled by the booming economy, since both countries are industrializing at a quick pace only matched by the United States across the Atlantic. Italy especially is reaping the fruits of its economic reforms and German and British investments with the quick growth of its industry in the northern regions and modern agriculture and tourism in the southern ones, while Germany starts to look like the future industrial giant of the continent. This mood finds expression in the sumptous celebration that Italy throws to celebrate the official transfer of the capital to Rome in 1870 (after the goverment spent some serious effort to renovate it and cancel the worst signs of the Popes' obscurantist misrule). The ceremony is marked by the inauguration of the colossal statues built to celebrate the victories of the Italo-German alliance and the friendship of the two nations. A double copy meant to be set up in Berlin and Rome, the statues, inspired by Overbeck's masterpiece painting "Italia and Germania", represent Italy and Germany as shield maidens with swords pointing to the ground, one holding the torch of truth and the other the scales of justice. The statues soon become a popular tourist attraction and in future years shall be a model for the even more famous Statue of Liberty that Italy and Germany shall gift to America. The social highlight of the event, however, is the marriage of Italian Crown Prince Umberto and a princess of the house of Hohenzollern. The future queen soon wins the sympathies of the Italian public with her sunny disposition and proves to be a positive moderating influence on her husband.

Indeed, if France is a mix of light and shadow, Austria is doom and gloom. The Magyars and the Pan-German nationalists inch closer to rebellion every day, the Czech and the Croats squabble with them fearing to be absorbed by stronger nations, liberals of all stripes fight the increasingly reactionary and authoritarian, if ineffectual, Habsburg regime. Austria has become an ideological battleground of the schism, and for all that the Habsburg support the papal church, liberal and nationalist feelings are giving increasing support to Old Catholics, making them gain the upper ground. Franz Joseph has fallen under the sway of reactionary PC advisors, that urge him to resist all significant liberal and national autonomy reforms, making the regime more and more despised on top of the discredit caused by the 1859-66 defeats. The Emperor and his ruling clique hope and expect that if worst turns to worst, they can repeat 1848-49 and crush the upstart rebels with the help of Russia.

Russia, which is eventually recovering from the defeat of the Crimean War, senses terminal weakness in the Ottoman and Habsburg empires and expect to exploit it into fulfilling its long-felt aspirations to hegemony in the Balkans and the Middle East and control of the Straits. Its agents get busy stirring up unrest among the Christian subjects of the Sultan.

America, although largely war-weary, is relieved by the outcome of the American Civil War and the Anglo-American war (which it comes to see as the final chapter of the former), which allowed it to affirm its national unity and its hegemony on the North American continent, winning a sizable amount of valuable land. National mood remains ambivalent about Britain: Several remain suspicious of British power and decry that Britain was allowed to keep most of British North America, and expand it with Alaska and Greenland; others realize that the outcome of the war was pretty much the best possible given UK naval supremacy and the harsh effects of the blockade on American economy, and suggest to focus on rebuilding the country and to seek coexistence, if not reconciliation, with the British Empire, albeit supported by a strong defense of American territory and coasts. For now, America mostly turns inward, and focuses on rebuilding itself and redressing the effects of the war. Some effort is given to re-establish trade links with Britain, although strong interest is expressed to balance them and lower US economic dependency with Britain, by fostering American self-sufficiency and trade links with the emerging European powers of Germany and Italy. The new-found spirit of inter-sectional patriotic brotherhood created by the Anglo-American war significantly diminishes the animosity between North and South left by the Civil War, and the government sees wise to foster this by implementing a program of agrarian relief and infrastructure development for the South, as well as re-enfranchising the Southerners that fought in the Anglo-American war. At the same time, the North is eager not to waste the fruits of the victory in the Civil War, so the South is pressed to accept the constitutional amendments and statutes that ban slavery and guarantee the civil rights and the vote of the freedmen. The compromise package pleases moderates of both sections, and the South, although annoyed by Black enfranchisement, is appeased by economic relief.

The Anglo-American war has showed the huge strategic and economic value of having an intercontinental railway connection with the West Coast (since British occupation of the West Coast was only barely avoided by the brilliance of local US commanders), so there is strong interest to build it as soon as possible. One such route was already being built, that connects Iowa and California across the so-called “central” route, alongside most of the Oregon Trail. However, acquisition of Western Canada indicates the strategic and economic necessity of having a reliable railway connection through those lands as well. So the construction of a second, “northern” intercontinental railway is financed, that connects Minnesota with Vancouver running through the Saskatchewan River system. Both railroads are to greatly accelerate the settlement and economic development of the western territories. Despite the focus on internal development, the war has fostered strong interest towards American control of the Caribbean, so in 1870 America accepts the annexation proposal of the Dominican Republic, and growing interest is proffered towards the acquisition of Spanish colonies of Cuba and Puerto Rico. However, offers to purchase them are sharply turned down by Spain and America is (for now) too war-weary to contemplate another conflict to conquer them, although significant American interest for their acquirement by any means necessary lingers. About Britain, American policy (and public mood) wavers between seeking reconciliation and deeming them a long-term strategic rival. Nonetheless, the war has shown the absolute need for a strong US Army and Navy. Although most of the wartime army is demobilized, care is taken to maintain a high quality and efficiency of the officer corps and equipment, so that a large army could be quickly mobilized in a short time and effective basic defense of the borders guaranteed by the peacetime army. Likewise, the efficiency of the state militias and of the coastal defense system, is fostered, and a naval building established that would make the USN able to maintain naval supremacy in American coasts and naval parity in the North American theater. The American public is determined not to suffer another coastal blockade ever again, even if the US is not (yet) strong enough to make a sustainable or credible challenge for global naval supremacy. Nonetheless, America essentially focuses on ensuring its own continental defense, and eschews entanglement in European alliances and conflicts.

Britain, after the first spell of wariness caused by Italo-German expansion, seems to have found a Modus Vivendi with the new couple at the top of the European totem pole, and is instead focusing its alarmed attention on Russian meddling in the Balkans. Unchecked expansion of the Bear towards the Straits cannot be allowed, if the Italo-German wunderkinds can be persuaded to help muzzle it, then maybe a satisfying European equilibrium can be rebuilt, even if Austria has the look of death and the crazy French Papists seem busy to head the Middle Ages at full speed.

The outcome of the Anglo-American war has left the UK public annoyed that the British Empire has been (again) checked by the upstart Americans in a colonial war, and a valuable part of British North America has been lost. At the same time, there is widespread relief that British naval might has forced America to withdraw from most occupied territories, and the bulk of settled Canada has been regained with the exception of Southern Ontario. Its loss irks somewhat, although the most British-loyalist sub-region in character, Eastern Ontario, was retained, and a sizable minority of South Ontarians make good use of the treaty provisions to relocate to Northern Ontario, whose development is thus greatly improved, and this lessens the sting of the loss. Some voices call for strong militarization and fostering of economic development of Canada, and strategic projection in Latin America to check American ambitions. Others warn that according to the outcome of all British wars in North America, maintaining British power in that continent against implacable American hostility is doomed to failure, America is growing stronger every year, and picking a strategic rivalry in the Americas means to exposing the British Empire to possible exhaustion, and vulnerability of its vital interests in Asia. Reconciliation and cultivation of economic links with the USA is counseled.

Mirroring American attitude, Britain wavers between the two options of reconciliation and confrontation towards America: investments are made to improve the defense of Canada and to improve its settlement and economic development. At the same, time, re-establishment of profitable economic links with America is sought. The war has shown the desirability of setting up settled Canadian territories as a unified, autonomous political entity better able to care for its own needs within the British Empire. Pre-war efforts in this direction, which had been stalled by the conflict, are restarted and in 1870 the federal Dominion of Canada is established, with the provinces of Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. It has extensive autonomy in internal matters, even if foreign policy remains in British hands, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council remains Canada's highest court of appeal, and the constitution can be amended only in Britain. In 1872, the Dominion acquires Rupert's Land from the Hudson's Bay Company and Alaska and the North-Western Territory from the Crown, and takes ownership, merging them and naming them North-West Territories.

The Irish insurgency gradually dies down and it is all but extinguished by 1871, although it leaves an immense hotbed of resentment among the Papal Catholic population of Ireland against British rule and its brutal methods of repression. On its part, the insurrection creates widespread fear and distrust of Papal Catholicism in the British public and an hostile atmosphere against reactionary-authoritarian powers that appear to champion it, like France and Spain. This strengthens the voices of those who call for cooperation with Germany and Italy, and détente with America.

The construction of the Suez Canal, which had been halted during the Franco-German-Italian war, is completed. Despite some initial minor financial and technical difficulties, it soon becomes an enormous commercial success, having an immediate and dramatic positive effect on world trade. Combined with the two American transcontinental railroads completed in the same period, it allows the entire world to be circled in record time. It success heightens the interest in America and Europe for building a similar Canal in Central America

1873-74: The death spiral of the Habsburg Empire eventually hits the bottom, as a series of seemingly minor clashes between Germans and Czechs in Bohemia, Italians and Croats in Istria, Magyars and Pan-German liberal-nationalists and the police in Vienna and Budapest quickly escalate into a series of insurrections against the regime and fighting between rival nationalities. The Habsburg army, which never really recovered morale and organization after the 1866 disaster and the 1867 mobilization fiasco, badly infiltrated by liberal and nationalist dissent, largely disintegrates and its remnants, mostly Czech, Croat, and reactionary PC loyalists, are overwhelmed by rapidly organizing liberal-national militias. Soon the Empire is swept by revolution. Franz Joseph flees from Vienna and appeals to Russia for help, and the Russian government starts to move troops. But the Hungarian and German Austrian provisionary governments, acting on cue, make an appeal for help to Germany and Italy, who threaten war. Russia, mindful of the fate of Austria and France, gets second thoughts and seeks a compromise. After some negotiation, a partition scheme is devised: Germany gets Austria (with Burgenland), Bohemia-Moravia, and Slovenia, which join the German Empire as member states, Italy gets Trieste, Istria, and Dalmatia, Russia gets Krakow, Galicia, and Bukovina. An independent Kingdom of Hungary is set up as a vassal of Germany with Slovakia, Transylvania, Vojvodina, and a federal union with Croatia.

Incidents in Bulgaria fueled by Russian agents, soon escalate and are amplified by Russian propaganda (echoed by European press at large, which has a big soft spot for poor Christian folks “oppressed” by the nasty Muslim Ottomans). Serbia, Montenegro, and Romania send an ultimatum to the Porte and declare war. However, better trained and equipped Ottoman armies soon root the Serbians, push back the Romanians, and advance towards Belgrade and Bucharest. Russia sends an ultimatum to the Porte and joins the war. Russian troops enter Bulgaria, attack in southern Caucasus, and steadily push back the Ottomans from northern Bulgaria and western Armenia, albeit at an heavy price. Serbians are able to fight back the outnumbered Ottomans and re-conquer southeastern Serbia while Romanians support Russian advance into Bulgaria.

Martial law in Ireland is gradually phased out, although the bulk of the PC Irish population remains strongly hostile to British rule. As a result, the British parliament repeals all the “Catholic Emancipation” laws, passed in in the late 18th century and early 19th century, that had reduced and removed many of the restrictions on Roman Catholics which had been introduced by the Act of Uniformity, the Test Acts and the Penal Laws. However, their application is limited to Papal Catholics, and Old Catholics (which most British come to see as not really different from Anglicans) are wholly exempt from those restrictions. Papal Catholics are disenfranchised, forbidden to own property, hold arms, inherit land, join the army, and are excluded from the learned professions, the civil service, and the judiciary. PC clergy and schools are outlawed.

1875-76: Russo-Romanian forces clear southern Bulgaria and press towards Constantinople. The British government goes into high alarm at the perspective of Russian forces in the Straits, starts to seek diplomatic support and prepares for an intervention. Feelers to Germany and Italy get a sensitive ear and the three powers bargain I-G support for British stand in the Balkans with UK support for partition of Habsburg Empire. The three powers send a common note to Russia and the Porte asking for a ceasefire. Russia, feeling the financial strain of the war, reluctantly accept and so do the Ottomans, on military dire straits.

A pan-European congress opens in the Hague to address the Balkan crisis and deal with the settlement of the Habsburg mess. As pretty much every great power is burdened by war fatigue, there is no exceeding willingness to fight a general European war at this point, so reluctantly, a compromise is reached.

The partition scheme of the Habsburg empire between Germany, Italy, Russia, and Hungary is ratified by the congress. Russia gains southern Bessarabia and the districts of Ardahan, Artvin, Batum, Kars, Olti, and Beyazit; Romania gets independence and northern Dobruja; Serbia gets independence and a northern slice of Kosovo; Bulgaria gets self-rule over Moesia and northern Thrace (AKA Eastern Rumelia); Greece gains Thessaly and southern Epirus. Britain gets Cyprus; Italy gets a sphere of influence in Tunisia and Libya; France gets recognition of its dynastic union with Spain; Crete is put under the administration of the Great Powers. Bosnia becomes a self-ruling principality under a sovereign picked by the powers; Montenegro gets independent under an Italian protectorate. The Ottomans keep Albania, Macedonia, most of Kosovo, western and eastern Thrace, and they are bound by the powers to enact a strong set of capitulations and internal reform for their Christian subjects. The powers proscribe every state and principality from enacting abuses on their minorities.

Although the restriction acts against Papal Catholics in Britain and Ireland are not extended to Canada, which enjoys legislative autonomy in internal matters, their existence becomes a matter of heated public debate in Canada and fuels political polarization and unrest among French-speaking Papal Catholic Canadians, as many of them fear their eventual application in the Dominion.

In Egypt, huge debt to European banks forces the government to sell Egypt's share in the Suez Canal to Britain, Germany, and Italy. According to the 1868 treaty, the three powers now share control of the Suez Canal Company in equal amounts. According to the terms of the Hague Treaty, Italy moves in to establish its protectorate in Tunisia, Tripolitania, Fezzan, and Cyrenaica, without opposition by the Ottoman Empire.

ERRATA:

(...)

1868:

In the Treaty of Frankfurt, Germany annexes Luxemburg and Denmark, which become member states of the German Empire, and the provinces of Alsace and of Lorraine up to the Maas/Meuse river. On its part, Italy annexes Savoy, Corsica, Nice, the French Riviera up to Hyeres, and a part of eastern Dauphiné and eastern Provence to ensure control of the Alps watershed and territorial continuity between Savoy and the Riviera. It also gains eastern Algeria (the Constantine department). Residents of the annexed regions are given one year and half to decide between keeping their French nationality and emigrating, or to remain in the region and become German or Italian citizens. France is also forced to pay an hefty war indemnity of 6 billion gold francs (3 to Germany and 3 to Italy) and to cede its shares of the Suez Canal company, which Germany and Italy divide in equal parts. The victors also gain French colonies in Indochina: Cambodia and Cochin china become an Italo-German protectorate.

(...)

the Treaty of London is signed. America acquires the portions of Rupert’s Land, British Columbia, and North-Western Territory that lie between 90° W and 55° N, while Britain keeps Vancouver Island. America agrees to pay $ 12,000,000 for the land. The USA also annex Southern Ontario except for the Eastern Ontario sub-region. Residents of the annexed regions are given three years to decide between keeping their British nationality and emigrating, or to remain in the region and become American citizens. The USA accept to indemnify all residents that choose to leave, and to cease and suppress all support to Irish nationalist groups. They also agree to the British purchase of Alaska, which the Russian government has been willing to sell out of financial difficulties and doubts about its ability to defend the territory in a war against Britain. Both powers agree to drop any request for war indemnities (including compensation for the Fenians raids and the so-called “Alabama” claims for damages by the USA against Britain for the covert assistance given to the Confederate cause during the Civil War). The treaty reaffirms the freedom of passage throughout the Great Lakes and the St.Lawrence river for both powers. Despite being widely denounced by nationalist radicals on both sides, the settlement is reluctantly accepted by moderates in both countries as a viable compromise to end to a costly war.

(...)

1875-76:

(...)

A pan-European congress opens in the Hague to address the Balkan crisis and deal with the settlement of the Habsburg mess. As pretty much every great power is burdened by war fatigue, there is no exceeding willingness to fight a general European war at this point, so reluctantly, a compromise is reached.

The partition scheme of the Habsburg empire between Germany, Italy, Russia, and Hungary is ratified by the congress. Germany bargained the control of the Fiume county with Italy and Hungary to get a port in the Mediterranean. Italy got a favourable revision of the terms of economic union with Germany, which was extended to Hungary. Russia gains southern Bessarabia and the districts of Ardahan, Artvin, Batum, Kars, Olti, and Beyazit; Romania gets independence and northern Dobruja; Serbia gets independence, northern Kosovo, and nothern Sandzak; Bulgaria gets self-rule over Moesia, northern Thrace (AKA Eastern Rumelia), and southern Dobruja; Greece gains Thessaly and southern Epirus. Britain gets Cyprus; Italy gets a sphere of influence in Tunisia, Tripolitania, Cyrenaica, and Fezzan; France gets recognition of its dynastic union with Spain; Crete is put under the administration of the Great Powers. Bosnia becomes a self-ruling principality under a sovereign picked by the powers; Montenegro becomes an Italian protectorate. The Ottomans keep Albania, Macedonia,southern Kosovo, southern Sandzak, northern Epirus, western and eastern Thrace, and they are bound by the powers to enact a strong set of capitulations and internal reform for their Christian subjects. The powers proscribe every state and principality from enacting abuses on their minorities.

Nice, keep it coming.

Europe in 1876:

Terribly sorry about not getting a map done. Things have been a bit busy.

North America in 1876:

Nice map, nice TL too, but I can't help but wonder if the Romanian borders aren't a little off. Could be me being wrong, but I do have the feeling that they're somewhat off.

Also, just wondering, why did you use these confusing colours? First of all, Greece and Britain look like they're the same colour, and unless I missed that, Greece is not a British province. Also, someone who's too much into the UCS scale might immediately dismiss this TL as ASB and not read anymore once seeing what appears to be communist Britain, a Japanese Middle-East, nationalist Chinese Italy and a communist Chinese Germany. Not to mention the Ottoman Netherlands, Greek/Byzantine Romania, the Swiss-Belgian personal union, and so on...

No offence, but you might want to adjust that so you'll be sure you won't scare off any readers.

I've adjusted the border of Romania and tried to make the map UCS-compliant to the best of my knowledge.

Thanks to the invaluable mapmaking skill of Helios-Ra, "a different 1866" now has a fully shaped 1876 world map, too.