Oh no! I was really hoping the Misians would win this round but hopefully this has been a Pyrrhic victory for Cortez. They really need a way to counter his cavalry, but it’s tougher given the topography of their Empire.
I think Marx probably said it best - men make history, but they do not make it from conditions of their own choosing. The macro processes of political economy have a logic in themselves, but there is contingency at certain junctures so that the decisions of one man (or a few) makes a real...
Does this analysis assume some path out of the scissors crisis? If so, I’d love to hear what assumptions it made about that. This kind of analysis always strikes me as wishful thinking and hand-wavy so would be good to see the specifics.
By what logic can you assert this? It just doesn’t pass the sniff test. The lack of support you’re claiming for the PCF is belied by the fact that a majority of the SFIO membership left to form the PCF. And somehow in the wake of the total discrediting of the parties that brought the war, this...
The PCF absolutely hated the SFIO and saw them as traitors to the proletarian cause for supporting the war. The French left absolutely had those same splits and they would have been even worse in a WW1 loss
I don’t quite think that works. The Soviets and many other interested parties will be monitoring anything that looks like a nuclear detonation or radiological activity and will certainly publicize it if for no other reason than to embarrass the US and help the anti-nuke movement. That movement...
Everyone in the thread seems to be looking at the impact on WWII, but I would posit that an oil discovery in the 1930s means Italy stays neutral or at least doesn't formally join the war against the Allies. They know that access to the oil and getting it to Europe will basically be impossible...
The “Muslim World” was not a monolith. The Ummayads ruling al-Andalus had strong conflicts with other Muslim rules like the Abbasids who viewed them as just a step above heretics. There’s no reason to believe that they would have been able to stay integrated into the trade networks of the Med /...
Ironically, this might actually lead to mainland China remaining divided. If the USSR grabs way more of Northern China, they'll be under a lot of pressure to declare a PRC in the territory they control. After that, they'll want to restrain the CCP from trying to launch a reunification war...
My initial instinct is that Japan is still very likely to get caught up in China but may decide to go "Strike North". The oil fields make Manchuria the most important part of the Empire and it will need to be defended at all costs - as much as the Home Islands. This could mean that the border...
My quick answer is that the “Sickle Cut” during the invasion of France fails and Germany gets stuck fighting a protracted war in the West that ties up more and more resources. Stalin keeps feeding the Nazis enough raw material to keep them grinding but cuts things off around 42/43 and basically...
And the “fraternal republics” in Eastern Europe didn’t exist, until they did. Similarly, the real question is on distance. The USSR shares a border with China while the US doesn’t. The willingness to invest political capital varies accordingly