Miscellaneous >1900 (Alternate) History Thread
- Thread starter RMcD94
- Start date
WI: "Find Me", the sequel to "Call Me by Your Name", was made, but as a miniseries, combining the remaining chapters of the latter with the whole plot of the former, using some of the principal cast, same production crew and director, but with a larger budget.
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In one of my TLs, the Columbia disaster is butterflied away. How would that impact the space industry?
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Been reading about the Russian Revolution of 1905. It looks like there was a brief period where there was a legislative body, before being quickly undermined by Nicholas II. What if Nicholas (or whoever the ALT leader should be to make this work) did not give himself the title of "supreme autocrat" and all that implies?
The 1905 reforms were doomed almost regardless of how Nicholas felt about them, and in some sources I have come across it suggests that he did try and support the institution. The problem was that no one really expected, wanted, or worked towards the body actually functioning. The state Duma was plagued by infighting, factionalism, and personal interests from the get go and as a result very little could be accomplished without the direct intervention of the Tsar, which was just autocracy with extra steps and alot more yelling.
So even if Nicholas kept the legislature around it would have been little more than a very load detour for the emperors edicts to pass through before they became law and would be unlikely to achieve its goals. The problem Russia faced in the period is that it was going to collapse one way or another eventually. The German line about merely kicking the door in for the whole rotten edifice to come crashing down applies very well to imperial Russia. Key issues facing the country were.
1) A bad leader, I dont think Nicolas was bad deliberately, but with his father dying when he was still young he assumed power before his training to rule was truly complete, and how and why his father died (see other causes of the empires collapse) would feed into several bad decisions he made during his reign. He was not particularly fond of his rule, and that may have fed into his decisions as well.
2) Industrialization, pretty much the entire world struggled with the industrial revolution, large immigrations to cities leading to urbanization caused problems everywhere. But due to the empire's size coupled with other problems the class struggles and effects of the collapse of typical social norms would hit the empire hard. The way in which the empire modernized, with heavy foreign and state level investment and little native interest for most of the period also led to further levels of issues as the people at the top had even more reason to dislike industrialization as they were not profiting from it, while the working class still perceived them as greedy ineffectual pigs.
3) Inefficiencies, while the imperial government was not truly a feudal state like some pop culture histories say the empire's governing organs were hardly modern despite efforts at reform. Nobility still held large amounts of power in theory, but in practice they were out of touch and increasingly irrelevant as their fortunes dried up and they became more and more out of touch. What was left was often unqualified themselves.
4) Diversity, the population of the empire was probably the most racially, linguistically, and ethnically diverse empire in the world after the British. And this led to further problems as several strategically vital areas of the empire had major tensions because of these issues. Which resulted in the Russian empire trying to suppress them through violent means, which just caused further issues and more unrest.
These really just touch the surface, but should go a long way to explain that Duma or no Duma the Russian empire was not in a good place as it both needed massive reforms, but was unable, unwilling, and unqualified to enact such reforms.
Grey Wolf
Donor
The USA invading Japan is a fascinating how-if. They'll need good command of the sea, which requires massive power projection. The logical way would be to take the other islands first, whilst isolating Honshu under a blockade. Allying with Satsuma-esque daimyo against the Meiji might give them the necessary allies to attempt the major invasion of the main island itself.
Yeah, I dont see the USN of 1858 being able to send a force large enough to support a purely American invasion force. But if the US can get allies as you say, and use the navy to transport smaller numbers of Americans and run supplies in cooperation with allied Daimyo then there are scenarios where the US could probably pull it off.
Grey Wolf
Donor
1858 - the US is going to have activate the entirety of its navy, including all ships in ordinary, then transfer it from the East coast to the West, either via Cape Horn or across 3 oceans... I don't even know the state of the San Francisco navy yard in 1858, it's only a decade or so since it was annexed. Of course, federal will power can expand it, and create shipbuilding capacity, but that will cost a LOT of money.
Yeah, and even then the navy, with the best will in the world, is not really a top tier fleet, they have a few ships of the line in varying states of neglect, a handful of sailing and screw frigates, and a reasonable number of sloops. The USN is not a weak navy, but it is underfunded and small given the size of the United States at the time and will likely struggle even if congress suddenly does open the purse to activate the ships they do have to find crews for them all. And even if all that happens the fleet is still small. Though I do wonder if, in a scenario as outlined, what the navy would do ironclad wise.
Butterflying away the civil war then the navy is going to get alot of funding right as the ironclad is coming onto the world stage, and given what the USN built iotl I could see the navy building some innovative ocean going ironclads as long as the war in Japan lasted and congress kept the money coming.
Did the Americans believe that there were nuclear weapons in Cuba at the start of the Missile Crisis, or did they think they hadn't been deployed yet? I can remember reading an argument somewhere that due to [REASONS], vague memories of the Soviets not posting guards to the weapons bunkers, they thought they hadn't been shipped in yet.
Kick
From the end of ww2,How do you keep western culture culturally more "conservative" today ?
that doesn't mean segregation and no women rights yada yada, I'm thinking more of an american like conservativesm ideal. a religiously christian and following strong christian traditions and rules. (so no lgbt rights).
that doesn't mean segregation and no women rights yada yada, I'm thinking more of an american like conservativesm ideal. a religiously christian and following strong christian traditions and rules. (so no lgbt rights).
Honestly I doubt that there's a POD from WW2's end that could lead to a more conservative America
Perhaps if the Soviets were more of a menace and were even more anti-theistic could we see a more homophobic America
POD from WWII's end
Civil Rights movement happens primarily under Republican presidents? (This leads to the modern liberals in the Democratic Party not as much of a force?)
Relatively recent POD
Maybe a more successful George H.W. Bush? If he beats Bill Clinton, it could have led to a more conservative America since it would extend the Republican period of dominance? (Or would that not change matters that much?)
Now the question is... how to do that? Maybe Clinton gets into a scandal on the campaign trail? George H.W. Bush doesn't make as many errors in his presidential term?
I mean perhaps that'd delay LGBT rights, but emphasis on delay
An election can't shift the course of American culture
Warning
Uh, are you from OTL? Did you not notice the US after 2016? I don't want to stray into current politics but I definitely think that it is possible for a single election to potentially change the culture of the country in question.
Let's keep this brief
Are you claiming that the 2016 election lead to America's radicalism today? If so, then I'd argue that it was more or less due to declining wages and rising prices
I'm not too fond of Jackson's presidency. For Lincoln's presidency I think the civil war/dominance of the radical republicans had more to do with a change in American society than Lincoln. I guess you could argue that the rad reps and Lincoln are one of the same though.
Also how did FDR's presidency influence American culture?
I have a question about the Argentine-Chilean naval arms race. Were there any incidents that could have had this arms race turn into a hot war? According to my understanding and what I read, a conflict between these two would quickly spiral into a conflict encompassing most of South America.
If anyone has a good English, German or French book recommendation for this, I would also appreciate it.
If anyone has a good English, German or French book recommendation for this, I would also appreciate it.