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As I sit on a bus on my way to Boston for a convention, I'm reading a bit about Germany in the 1860s. One thing which I just came across is that in 1870, the pro-Prussian cabinet in Munich was replaced with one dominated by the Patriot Party, which was led by particularists opposed to continued...

I'm surprised this has never been discussed. By 1922, it had seemed that Sun and the KMT had, well, fizzled. The KMT-Warlord alliance that controlled Guangzhou had ruptured, and Sun was cooling his heels in Shanghai. Enter the Comintern. As part of its plan to promote revolutionary...

Okay, during the American Revolution and War of Bavarian Succession, Gustav III got ideas. And when absolutist monarchs (I prefer the term dictator but recognize most people consider it inappropriate) get ideas, they usually involve invading neighboring countries. While urging France to...

"The action of the French ministry [in recognizing American independence], it seems to me, has deviated from the principles of justice and practical interests, and from state principles of nations that have been in force for centuries. I cannot admit that it is right to support rebels against...

This is an incredibly dark idea, and since it requires a German victory (or stalemate in the east). Hitler envisioned Germans from the Americas being drawn back to the Greater German Reich, and helping resettle the Ostland. Israel, of course, uses Birth right to attract Jews to Israel by...

Assume Basil II leaves a capable heir, and Sicily ends up conquered by the Byzantines. we've talked about the effects on the crsuades; but what would the effects on Italy, and Sicily itself be? Unlike Baisl's conquests on the borders of Anatolia, Sicily has a large Muslim population; and of...

This is from a legal article, but I thought you might find it interesting. The Article itself is: Bruce Ackerman, The Living Constitution, 120 HARVARD LAW REVIEW 1737 (2007): A lot of ways for this to go; and none of them good for America, IMO. (My support for freedom of association is...

Okay, traditionally, if you imagine British victory in the Revolution we imagine a Redcoat's boot on the face of mankind. Forever. [1] I agree there would be some negative consequences to British victory. Some colonial legislatures would be suspended, although for how long is unclear...

I said I'd post some of what Revolutionary Britannia, by Edward Royle, had to say about Britain's "revolutionaries", and lack of an uprising. So here it goes: First, Edward Royle makes no bones about the fact he thinks that the reason there was no Revolution was not because there was no...

In OTL of course, Romania folded to Stalin and ceded Bessarabia. But WI Carol had chosen to fight? I'm not so sure it's as crazy as it seems; when the war with Finland began, after all, Stalin had set up a puppet Finnish government; after resisting, Stalin was content to walk away with some...

October, 1848. It is only a few months from the springtime of pepoles, btut much has changed in the Habsburg capital. A mutiny by grenadiers no the 6 of October caused radicals to seize the city's armory and execute the conservative war minister by piercing his heart with a bayonet. In response...

We've discussed Roman Germany, and Roman Ireland, before, of course. So let's invert it. Suppose Claudius never invades Britain? What becomes of the island? Well, in OTL the southeast was becoming increasingly Romanized, with the incipient urbanization we saw in Pre-Roman Gaul, increased...

While taking a break from studying, I came upon an article I thought might be of interest to people here: The Immortal Republic: The Myth of Venice during the Italian Wars, from The Sixteenth Century Journal. Venetians, in the 15th century, had a sense of manifest destiny that upset their...

Okay, let's suppose that gustavus Adolphus wins at Lutzen. It's heroic, it's epic... and then what? Richelieu has no desire for a Protestant state to dominate northern germany. The Habsburgs are still a force. And what is Wallenstein going to be up to? Will he still toy with defecting...

During the 1650s, Sweden invaded Poland, with a series of conflicting goals. It oscillated between a partition of Poland among its neighbors; the installation of a Swedish king, and, of course, its goal of controlling the major ports of the Baltic. It did a pretty god job of beating the...

A thought. Historically, England and the Netherlands were horrified by the idea of either Sweden or Denmark gaining control of the Sound, since the Baltic was the source of naval supplies necessary to maintain their respective fleets. Hence the opposition to Sweden's attempt to conquer Denmark...

Okay, even in OTL, proprtionate to their number, free blacks were more likely toj oin the fray than white Aemricans. There were Black militiamen at Bunker Hill, and they served throughout the war. But IMO it could have gone further. Rhode Island's First Regiment was raised from the state's...

Okay, this is a rough sketch which I suspect all the Britons will steadfastly deny would never happen, but... Imagine a situation in which America lost the Revolution, and George III's successor was someone like Ernest Augustus. Nasty, very anti-catholic, against any idea of reform. Thanks...

Okay, an idea inspired by my playing with the HOI2 turtledove mod... Rather than racing through Ohio and being halted at Pittsburgh, Feahterston's initial offensive gets blunted at the hands of the larger, better equipped, Union Army. The Confederacy gets trashed over the next year, with a...

An idle thought. In OTL, soviet agriculture in the 1970s and 1980s essentially stagnated and then began declining. In OTL, the Soviets lost about 25 million people during the Second World War; so that means plenty more mouths to feed. Will the Soviet Union run into a wall in terms ofa...