Find a realistic POD, as late as possible, that gives a majority Czech nation with it's capital in Prague a coastline on either the baltic or Mediterranean (or somewhere else...idk how though)
AHC: Give Czechia a coast
- Thread starter Adora Basil Winterpock
- Start date
How about Luxembourgs stay holy Roman emperors with their capital in Prague, but maintaining control of their dynastic home in Luxembourg and possibly getting a port on the North sea? Their territory is majority Czech, ruled from Prague and it's just a matter of keeping the Holy Roman Empire more or less intact
Perhaps HRE Charles IV get control over Pomerania? That was his long term goal to build Luxembourg block along Oder river.
When's the point of reference? Having a Bohemian bit of coastline is a lot harder in 2020 than it would be in 1420...
Wouldn't that state be ever so slightly majority German, though?
If Czechia after swallowing Silesia and Lusatia gets also Pomerania through conquest or union then Czechia would have corridor to the Baltic populated by West Slavs, who could be easily assimilated linguistically.
How about a global warming so devastating that all the ice caps on earth are melting and causing sea levels to rise?
It would be fun if the Sea of Pannonia were to reappear in Central Europe and thus give the Czechia a coastline.
It would be fun if the Sea of Pannonia were to reappear in Central Europe and thus give the Czechia a coastline.
The Holy Roman Empire as a whole would be sure, but not the territory ruled directly by the Luxembourgs.
That would be an inland sea would it not? Would that count? I guess it would have easy access to the Greater Black Sea through the Danube, but it would have to control the iron gates as well
This would be post-1900, but at Paris in 1919 wasn't there a proposal for a "Czech strip", presumably including the Burgenland and Slovenia, to the Adriatic? I suppose the seaport would be either Trieste or Fiume, depending upon Italian... ummm... cooperation or the lack of it...
Well that's easily worked around, all we need is a convenient dynastic partition that parcels off Brandenburg and some more off to a junior branch of the dynasty.
IDK, the light pink areas is extensive. If it includes Pomerania as well...
An old post of mine from soc.history.what-if:
***
Challenge: The Coast of Bohemia
Ben Jonson mocked Shakespeare for having a ship wrecked on the coast of
Bohemia in *The Winter’s Tale.* Actually, there had been a couple of
occasions when Bohemia had had a toe-hold on the Adriatic in the thirteenth
and sixteenth centuries. However, what interests me here is whether one
could imagine a *modern* Czech state with a seacoast. For purposes of this
challenge, merely making the Czech lands part of a broader multinational
federation (e.g., a continuation or revival of Austria-Hungary, or a
Czechoslovak-Polish federation) with access to the sea will not do. The
Czech state itself must have a seacoast.
One possibility: Stalin decides after World War II that Czechoslovakia,
having been a victim of German aggression, should not only be restored, but
should get some additional territory from the Germans--the more so as it is
losing Subcarpathian Rus' to the USSR. So he gives Czechoslovakia a narrow
corridor along one or both banks of the Oder-western Neisse line reaching
north to the Baltic. (When Czechoslovakia breaks up decades later, the
corridor becomes part of the Czech Republic.) One problem with this scenario
is that Czechoslovakia in the immediate postwar era, though friendly with the
USSR, is not yet a completely Communist state, so I am not sure that Stalin
will trust it with such a strategic area. So maybe he waits until after
1948, and in deference to the Poles who have settled the east bank of the the
Oder-western Neisse, makes the new Czech corridor entirely on the western
side. After all, so many Germans have already been relocated that a few more
won't make that much difference...
https://www.alternatehistory.com/shwi/AH Challenge, The Coast of Bohemia.txt
***
Mike Stone suggested later in that thread:
Oddly enough, something close to that was urged in 1919. The Czechs asked for a
territorial "corridor" to give them a common frontier with Yugoslavia. It was
rejected as "unnecessaryand impractical"
That wouldn't have quite got them to the coast, but at some later date Slovenia
might have fallen out with the Serbo-Croats and joined CZ instead.
***
Still later in the thread, Dragan Antulov wrote:
You shouldn't go that far in the past. I could find more suitable POD in
late 1990s. Few years ago Croatian press reported about secret meetings
between representatives of Czech and Croatian government. Czechs
apparently proposed that few strips of Adriatic coast, containing camps
almost exclusively visted by Czech tourists during summers, become
sovereign Czech territory in exchange for hefty financial compensation.
The reason for that proposal was widespread custom of Czech tourists to
fill the trunks of their cars with food and drink bought in Czech
Republic in order to evade buying said goods on local Croatian markets.
Czech enclaves on Adriatic were supposed to allow Czechs to enjoy local
cuisine at Czech prices (which were much lower than in Croatia).
However, Croatian government rejected the deal, mostly due to Tudjman
being unwilling to sell off chunks of Croatian territory, or, to be
precise, unable to present this to Croatian public as a triumph of his
statesman's genius.
***
Challenge: The Coast of Bohemia
Ben Jonson mocked Shakespeare for having a ship wrecked on the coast of
Bohemia in *The Winter’s Tale.* Actually, there had been a couple of
occasions when Bohemia had had a toe-hold on the Adriatic in the thirteenth
and sixteenth centuries. However, what interests me here is whether one
could imagine a *modern* Czech state with a seacoast. For purposes of this
challenge, merely making the Czech lands part of a broader multinational
federation (e.g., a continuation or revival of Austria-Hungary, or a
Czechoslovak-Polish federation) with access to the sea will not do. The
Czech state itself must have a seacoast.
One possibility: Stalin decides after World War II that Czechoslovakia,
having been a victim of German aggression, should not only be restored, but
should get some additional territory from the Germans--the more so as it is
losing Subcarpathian Rus' to the USSR. So he gives Czechoslovakia a narrow
corridor along one or both banks of the Oder-western Neisse line reaching
north to the Baltic. (When Czechoslovakia breaks up decades later, the
corridor becomes part of the Czech Republic.) One problem with this scenario
is that Czechoslovakia in the immediate postwar era, though friendly with the
USSR, is not yet a completely Communist state, so I am not sure that Stalin
will trust it with such a strategic area. So maybe he waits until after
1948, and in deference to the Poles who have settled the east bank of the the
Oder-western Neisse, makes the new Czech corridor entirely on the western
side. After all, so many Germans have already been relocated that a few more
won't make that much difference...
https://www.alternatehistory.com/shwi/AH Challenge, The Coast of Bohemia.txt
***
Mike Stone suggested later in that thread:
Oddly enough, something close to that was urged in 1919. The Czechs asked for a
territorial "corridor" to give them a common frontier with Yugoslavia. It was
rejected as "unnecessaryand impractical"
That wouldn't have quite got them to the coast, but at some later date Slovenia
might have fallen out with the Serbo-Croats and joined CZ instead.
***
Still later in the thread, Dragan Antulov wrote:
You shouldn't go that far in the past. I could find more suitable POD in
late 1990s. Few years ago Croatian press reported about secret meetings
between representatives of Czech and Croatian government. Czechs
apparently proposed that few strips of Adriatic coast, containing camps
almost exclusively visted by Czech tourists during summers, become
sovereign Czech territory in exchange for hefty financial compensation.
The reason for that proposal was widespread custom of Czech tourists to
fill the trunks of their cars with food and drink bought in Czech
Republic in order to evade buying said goods on local Croatian markets.
Czech enclaves on Adriatic were supposed to allow Czechs to enjoy local
cuisine at Czech prices (which were much lower than in Croatia).
However, Croatian government rejected the deal, mostly due to Tudjman
being unwilling to sell off chunks of Croatian territory, or, to be
precise, unable to present this to Croatian public as a triumph of his
statesman's genius.
Last edited:
