Worst 19th Century Alternate History Cliches

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Deleted member 67076

That's true, but it doesn't always have to be utterly dire. I don't doubt that Haiti is bound to suffer for decades after independence (including that French indemnity). But even by 1900, Haiti can be on the way to something more, even if not much more than a standard Latin American country. And it isn't hard to imagine a 21st century Haiti which isn't much less developed than the Dominican Republic.

And then of course the more flavorful Haiti's, like the Kingdom of Haiti and such, could always exist. It isn't like every wannabe Napoleon has to be a Bokassa-type and have an utterly disastrous reign.
Honestly you could have Haiti as a first world country with a POD in the 1950s. Its absurdly easy to have the place be less bad than OTL.

Frankly I'd argue the Kingdom of Haiti would have been much more prosperous than OTL Haiti for the first few decades since it managed to restart sugar and coffee production, earning it enough hard cash to modernize a military apparatus (see all the forts left over in modern day Haiti) alongside receiving diplomatic relations with Britain and the new Latin American states. If it were to take control of the Southern State of Haiti, then its in a position to recover from the Revolution in a few generations (albeit as a Russia style oligarchy). A Bokassa would be a dramatic outlier not consistent at all with Henri Christophe's personality.
 
Honestly you could have Haiti as a first world country with a POD in the 1950s. Its absurdly easy to have the place be less bad than OTL.

Frankly I'd argue the Kingdom of Haiti would have been much more prosperous than OTL Haiti for the first few decades since it managed to restart sugar and coffee production, earning it enough hard cash to modernize a military apparatus (see all the forts left over in modern day Haiti) alongside receiving diplomatic relations with Britain and the new Latin American states. If it were to take control of the Southern State of Haiti, then its in a position to recover from the Revolution in a few generations (albeit as a Russia style oligarchy). A Bokassa would be a dramatic outlier not consistent at all with Henri Christophe's personality.

True, but it isn't like a republican leader of Haiti couldn't have done it. But we don't see enough Haitian monarchies here, let alone successful ones. I've liked the idea of portraying Haiti's frequent military coups as generals holding the ear of the King of Haiti, rather than rulers of Haiti themselves.

Come to think of it, we don't see a lot of divided Haitis either, and people assume that if Haiti has to suck, it has to suck as one country.
 

Deleted member 67076

True, but it isn't like a republican leader of Haiti couldn't have done it. But we don't see enough Haitian monarchies here, let alone successful ones. I've liked the idea of portraying Haiti's frequent military coups as generals holding the ear of the King of Haiti, rather than rulers of Haiti themselves.

Come to think of it, we don't see a lot of divided Haitis either, and people assume that if Haiti has to suck, it has to suck as one country.
The Republic is less likely IMO because Petion put forth Jeffersonian esque policies that more or less dismantled any remnant of the old planation system which hurt the states finances and forced it to gain most of the revenue through customs. Future leaders would go with that philosophy, and as Boyer continued them it became pretty much engrained, leading to this massive battle between the state and the people over control of land and forcing people onto plantations.
 
Lithuania's primary goal in foreign policy was conquering all of Russia (Grand Duke Kęstutis even said "All of Rus' must belong to the Lithuanians"), and an independent Lithuania would continue that policy, I think.

I don' think they have enought population neither the mobilization capacity to do that, the Russians would defeat them by sheer numbers

Lithuania already held "Ukraine" in the 1400s (as in, the core of the territory of OTL Ukraine, there was no "Ukraine" back then)

Yes, but not all of it, you can plant grain everywhere and so as much of ukraine you control, the larger the population you can field

There was no Commonwealth in the 1400s, only a personal union, and that union was pretty much only limited to the same monarch, and otherwise the two countries were separate until the late 16th century (they didn't even usually help in each other's wars). A personal union can very easily be broken and indeed had been temporarily broken twice IOTL, but it would also be just as possible to outright avoid it.

My error :v still the personal union should be broken in muh TL project

Would Napoleon even exist in this TL? No Commonwealth would have huge implications on the history of Central Europe, and butterflies from there would likely reach France way earlier than the 18th century.

It can reach, but I like to slaughter butterflies :v if we went for a realistic scenario then I doubt that Poland would ally with Russia just to defeat Lithuania
 
-Nothing ever happens in Latin America other than the Eternal Yanqui stomping on it forever.
-Latin America will always take a presidential model that dooms it to Caudilloismo
-Nothing ever happens in Africa except for
-The US is always immune to internal instability. (Wonder what would happen if someone did a timeline where the US had the political instability of Mexico)
-New Imperialism is guaranteed, nevermind the impact of the Long Depression of the 1870s and how Free Trade was the predominant mentality of the 1860s.
-The Middle East and China are as fragile as glass
-American annexation of Central America/Spanish Caribbean (Granted that's also my personal bias, particularly against the 1870 annexation attempt at Santo Domingo because no one seems to realize the guy who drafted the treaty was only in charge for Four Months and barely controlled the capitol)
-Spain always keeps some remnant of their empire until its snatched away by another Great Power.

Wait hang on a minute didn't the US have a brief period of internal instability in the 1860's.
I'm sure I've heard something about that?

(No precedent there at all)
 
Japan always modernizes, Africa is stagnant and if anything undergoes a worse Scramble for Africa, successful CSA, Native Americans get screwed, Korea remains a shrimp among whales.
 
Them not getting screwed probably requires a POD prior to the 19th century. There's such an overwhelming amount things against them (demographics, disease, technology) that their fate is pretty much sealed in 1801.

I dunno. I feel like things could've gone differently, if a little less plausibly to give the Native Americans a Great Plains state with semi-autonomous to call their own. Or maybe large connected chunks of multiple Great Plains states.
 
I dunno. I feel like things could've gone differently, if a little less plausibly to give the Native Americans a Great Plains state with semi-autonomous to call their own. Or maybe large connected chunks of multiple Great Plains states.

Once the buffalo were being killed it was all over. That was the backbone of their society and without it they basically starved. I could see them getting a better deal with different reservations and perhaps more autonomy, but they occupied such a massive amount of land that's infinitely more valuable as homesteads. Once that's realized, they'll just be conquered or drowned out demographically.
 

Deleted member 67076

Wait hang on a minute didn't the US have a brief period of internal instability in the 1860's.
I'm sure I've heard something about that?

(No precedent there at all)
1 single civil war. Where's the coups, counter coups, foreign interference, low level insurgencies, brushfire wars, revolts, bankruptcies, and multi sided civil wars?
 
1 single civil war. Where's the coups, counter coups, foreign interference, low level insurgencies, brushfire wars, revolts, bankruptcies, and multi sided civil wars?

A failure of the Constitutional Convention could have done that, and I have seen at least one time line in this forum on that, so it isn't undiscovered country as far as a theme is concerned.
 
1 single civil war. Where's the coups, counter coups, foreign interference, low level insurgencies, brushfire wars, revolts, bankruptcies, and multi sided civil wars?

Indian wars probably count as brushfire wars/revolts. Race riots and labor strikes turned violent were also pretty common for a long while. Anyways, how much instability is normal? France is notorious for being unruly, but they haven't had a multi-sided civil war since 1453.
 

Deleted member 67076

Indian wars probably count as brushfire wars/revolts. Race riots and labor strikes turned violent were also pretty common for a long while. Anyways, how much instability is normal? France is notorious for being unruly, but they haven't had a multi-sided civil war since 1453.
It really depends. Presidential systems such as the US more or less naturally lead themselves to strongmen rule and centralism most of the time, so its possible to have a system ironically much like Mexico or Colombia with frequent coups and revolts from disappointed groups.

Through in a stronger landed oligarchy like in the South and slow down industrialization for a bit and that's a recipe for a very unstable century.
 
It really depends. Presidential systems such as the US more or less naturally lead themselves to strongmen rule and centralism most of the time, so its possible to have a system ironically much like Mexico or Colombia with frequent coups and revolts from disappointed groups.

Through in a stronger landed oligarchy like in the South and slow down industrialization for a bit and that's a recipe for a very unstable century.

I mean, the problem with that is that we had a rather weak Presidency until the mid-20th Century, so calling it a Presidential system seems misleading. The real power was concentrated in Congress for basically this whole century. Throw in a deliberately weak military and the odds don't seem that great for dictatorship.
 
I mean, the problem with that is that we had a rather weak Presidency until the mid-20th Century, so calling it a Presidential system seems misleading. The real power was concentrated in Congress for basically this whole century. Throw in a deliberately weak military and the odds don't seem that great for dictatorship.

aside from Lincoln and Jackson of course, but they were exceptions in the 19th Century. Teddy Roosevelt came along and changed things early in the 20th though
 
aside from Lincoln and Jackson of course, but they were exceptions in the 19th Century. Teddy Roosevelt came along and changed things early in the 20th though

I don't think even they would have been able to do much if Congress had been particularly interested in ruining them. And in the former's case because he had a rebellion to justify quite a bit of his actions.
 
Them not getting screwed probably requires a POD prior to the 19th century. There's such an overwhelming amount things against them (demographics, disease, technology) that their fate is pretty much sealed in 1801.

In Lone Star Republic along with @drewmc2001 "Forget the Alamo", the Republic of Texas institutes a citizenship program for native tribes where Native Americans will received thousands of acres of territory for their entire tribe and citizenship of Texas in return for following all the laws that are created by Congress and no longer using a hunter-gatherer lifestyle unless its on public property. The reason this can happen successfully in an alterante Texas is due to the numerous treaty systems Texas had with them in their brief existence, and the need to coexist with Indian tribes with Texas' low established population. It's not a perfect utopia as the Comanche and the Apahce will usually cause trouble, but it's a good start. If you want the Native Americans to achieve success of any form, then you'll either need Andrew Jackson to never become President or have him impeached and removed for defying the Supreme Court in Worcester V Georgia, along with the Indian Removal Act having failed in the first place due to the close four votes in the House. Although from there their may be an early civil war from the Deep South or at least some sort of revolt.
 
It also requires a tremendous amount of foresight (as it costs more than it earned nearly its entire existence) They could barely feed it for that matter. Once the sea otters were hunted out it's usefulness from the standpoint of that period of time and knowledge available was over. Russia had plenty of tundra, tiaga and glaciers already in Siberia.

And yet, for Russia to keep it, Russia only has to do absolutely nothing. Russia has no more reason to leave Alaska than to leave any other part of the Arctic.

I'm rather more annoyed by the idea that any random up and comer can (and will have the intention to) buy Alaska, and always around the same time if not the same year. Granted, it wasn't seriously discussed but I remember at least a Mexican Alaska, a Confederate Alaska and a couple of WIs about a Japanese Alaska.
 
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