Post russo-german war why did Britian and germany not come closer and form a alliance? Surely when france formed an alliance the US it would be the UK interest to ally germany.
Es Geloybte Aretz Continuation Thread
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Canada was still in danger if the US didn't stay on the US's good side. Joining an alliance with Germany would likely bring war with France and so the US too. Then Canada would fall and possibly the rest of British America.
Germany was too big to be a comfortable ally. London and Berlin did come closer before the war - they maintained closer ties for quite a while as both were worried about France. But in the end, Britain did not see thw wisdom in allying with a nation that actually could dominate the continenrt. They did not approach France in an effort to actively check the Germans - the worry did not quite go that far. They were even willing to go along in shared interests, prolonging their agreement on mutual defense against attacks in Europe in 1912. But in the end, the two power blocs were too much of a worry for each other to ally comfortably.
And of course there was relatively little Germany could do for Britain except with regard to France. German troops could not help defend Canada, hold India, or keep the Mediterranean sea lanes open. With the likelihood of all-out European war receding, it is just less interesting.
The crust of it is I think the same as IOTL before WWI (and the anglo-french entente): Both dont like France (OTL Russia as well) but for different reasons - and neither would be ready to go to war agaisnt France for the reasons of the other. Germany definetely would not want (meaning refuse) a war with France (and its allies) for an anglo-french african (or wherever else) colonial conflict. And the british too would never want to get involved in global war with France and allies (possibly including USA) because of a conflict started on the continent - maybe between Italy and Austria or Germany and France for reasons they dont care about.
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@carlton_bach I don’t recall you ever having discussed modern Russia much... I assume that with 1st generation atomic weapons Germany is able to win the war but not change her government at gunpoint. What happens after?
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Is it possible there will be expression ITTL :"London has class, Paris has style, Berlin has ..."
What would be said about Berlin?
What would be said about Berlin?
efficiency, maybe? With the building style I could see something related to that.
According to powerthesaurus.com:
Panache antonyms. Top antonyms for panache (opposite of panache) are awkwardness, backwardness and spiritlessness.
The Germans would probably prefer "Berlin has will"
The French are going to go with "Berlin à du raison"
The Londoners probably "Berlin has drive"
Berliners are liable to say "Berlin has rats". They are like that.
Piecemeal, and haltingly.
Reichstag sugffrage is defined constitutionally and will not change substantially for a considerable time. The first big shift is women's vote, which requires a constitutional change. The second is the change to proportional representation. That does not happen until the 1960s "Preußendämmerung" as conservative parties get behind it in an effort to break the FPTP-based dominance of Zentrum on the southwest.
Developments at the state level are more interesting, but also more fitful. Prussia just saddled itself with a white elephant of a graduated suffrage. Some states seek to emulate it while others move closer to manhood suffrage one way or the other. It won't be until the 1980s that all German states have an equal and universal vote, though all the big ones do by 1920.
Other things happen at the level below electoral law. Details of how an election must be run shift and change as states codify the process, eventually settling on the mode that courts find satisfies the spirit of the law: paper ballots cast in secret. Districts are equalised on a census basis, first at the state level (Prussia long rejects the idea), then by order of the Reichsrat. Polling stations are required on a per-capita basis. Things move towards equality - slowly.
Does Preußendämmerung imply that eventually, the Kingdom of Prussia dissolves itself into its constituent provinces in the name of administrative rationality (I guess this implicitly would be followed by some rationalization of the internal borders of Germany)?
Alternatively, would regional peculiarities like Bavarian semi-independence continue until the present day?
Alternatively, would regional peculiarities like Bavarian semi-independence continue until the present day?
Oh, no, it's nothing that consequential. Preußendämmerung refers to the perfect storm that hit the old elites in the decades after the Second Russo-German War. Until then, the elites of Prussia dominated most aspects of the Empire. Landowning families dominated the upper reaches of the civil service and the army, exerted outsize influence in the Reichstag, all but controlled the Prussian legislature (and through it, the Reichsrat) and had preferential access to all kinds of rewarding careers. A German minister, (Protestant) bishop, general, judge, senior civil servant or member of any of the parliaments was likely to be a 'von' from the old Prussian families.
After the war, a lot of developments accelerated. Public higher secondary schooling and university education opened up to far more people with the perceived need for more scientists and engineers. Army promotions were given to lots of non-nobles, many of whom continued to male stellar careers post-war. The status of the technical branches, dominated by bourgeois officers, increased hugely. Urbanisation increased, with more and more people moving from conservative rural areas to 'red' cities. The kingdom of Prussia was the last big state to move to universal equal suffrage and shortly afterwards introduced redistricting, putting paid to lots of the rural 'rotten boroughs' that sent so many vons to the Landtag. And food prices were dropping compared to industrial products and services, meaning farming paid less and less. Tens of thousands of small faming families gave up, sold, and moved to the industrial centres. But you don't sell a knightly estate that has been in the family for centuries.
In isolation, all of this could have been handled. In aggregate, it meant a seismic shift in politics. The old elite consisted of people who knew how to manage a double oxer with their stirrups crossed and spent their holidays in the forest with a rifle. The new ruling class had a distinctly shopkeeperish flavour to it, many of them descending from families of business owners or artisans and risen through education. And with so much industry concentrated in the Rhine Province and Saxony, many of them were (shudder) Catholic. And these were the people the old nobles were willing to make common cause with. The working-class ones, overeducated hooligans who read Marx and got their educational credentials through post-vocational institutions...
It was the end of the world as they knew it.
Oh, absolutely. The fiction of state sovereignty is a cornerstone of the Empire. It will NOT be touched. Though of course everyone knows it means nothing in practice. Even the territorial adjustments made to create the Greater Hamburg, Bremen and Lübeck metropolitan areas were technically international treaties involving territory swaps.
when does the prussian three class franchise end?
Will Poland expands its border in peace treaty at the end of second russo german war?
Also in general do the new former russian nations have nobility? if not what is the new upper class like in the new nations?
So am I, because I really have no idea. I assume the phase of economic growth mid-century will spread literacy and foster shared 'national' identities throughout the region. The realisation that the colonial governments will never permit the gains to be distributed even remotely fairly will cause bad blood. I'm guessing they will follow the general trajectory of many colonies ITTL, with localised insurgencies, terrorism, and grudging agreement to share power eventually leading to independence.
In 1904. But it is replaced with an even more complex and stupidly convoluted system of multiple votes. That lasts until after the war.
It would be a stupid and cruel thing to do, so I am tempted to say yes. But truth be told, I am on the fence on that. Poland bit off more than it could digest the first time round. They may settle for a satellite state.
That is slightly complex. Russia has a legal nobility, though the system is slightly tweaked. The Baltics and Poland have legally protected noble titles (i.e. families holding titles are assured of their right to use them and nobody else is allowed to arrogate one) roughly following the German model, but no legal privileges. Finland uses a grandfather clause by which all families holding old titles get to retain them, but new nobility no longer uses them.
Poland will ennoble people on a fairly large scale, as a common form of acknowledgement of civic virtue or economic success (if you rise into the ruling class, nobility will be offered at some point unless you already have it). The Baltics are much stingier giving out titles.