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  1. AHC: Peacetime ABM/ASAT Use against "Intruding" Spacecraft

    Collateral damage in the form of an EMP from a nuclear-tipped intercept could be very interesting...

  2. Non-Islamic Persia: Sasanian Empire does not fall to Islamic invaders

    The OP scenario was vague, so you don't get to make such pronouncements. In any event I didn't say NO ERE/Sassanian war, just one that is less fight to the death-ish. The only Persia that survives the Arabs is one that hasn't recently been in an existential war, has just undergone civil war...

  3. Non-Islamic Persia: Sasanian Empire does not fall to Islamic invaders

    Yes. A less sapping ERE/Sassanian war might do the trick, though.

  4. Hellenistic Arabia

    OTL, some of the Arab polities were at least semi-Hellenized by Roman times. The Nabateans and Palmyra come to mind. If Al the much-dicussed had brought the Arabian peninsula into his Empire, it really depends on if his successors manage to hold onto it. I suspect they wont and that a number of...

  5. Stephen Jay Gould lives longer and/or is still alive?

    Gould would have carried the banner of a less doctrinaire, live-and-let-live atheism. More productive to the general conversation. He implied more than he pronounced.

  6. Ancient American Discovery

    Not so much as block as control trade from the East through the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant.

  7. Probability of a state creating a Mediterranean girdling empire if not Rome?

    More likely than not, a multi-polar Mediterranean. Diadachi, Carthaginians, a Magna Grecian league. It could take centuries to shake out before a predominant power emerged, if ever.

  8. What would the Romans do if Carthage settled the Canaries and Cape Verde?

    What might cause such far flung Carthaginian colonies to more or less wither on the vine would be lack of free access to Mediterranean markets which would make these colonies utterly dependent on Roman good will. The only other choices for these colonies are to Africanize -- to essentially throw...

  9. What would the Romans do if Carthage settled the Canaries and Cape Verde?

    Inevitable but given the distance, loosely. I think the Romans would settle for tapping into the trade network. The colonies, if long lasting, might offer some interesting effects in West Africa, in the areas of tech and metallurgy. I also see an increased chance of accidental one-way...

  10. AHC/WI: China discovers the Americas?

    I believe that until Soviet times there was OTL continued cross-strait contact between the indigenous people on either side.

  11. AHC/WI: China discovers the Americas?

    In terms of a enhanced naval presence and long term court support, the Song Dynasty may have been the most realistic period for China to venture East. More so than the Ming. However, what I said earlier about laying the foundations for Trans-Pacific exploration and compelling reasons to do so...

  12. AHC/WI: China discovers the Americas?

    (Cont.) If you can describe an analogous process and perceived need for the Chinese to venture across the Pacific as what brought the Europeans both around Africa and across the Atlantic, I'd be more convinced by your line of thought. To be clear, the Chinese were more than technically...

  13. AHC/WI: China discovers the Americas?

    Both the Vikings and Iberians systematically did explore the currents and winds of the Atlantic and not so much as initially crossed the Atlantic in one go as leapfrogging their way across. Also, there was the very strong motivation to seek alternative trade routes to the East that were either...

  14. AHC/WI: China discovers the Americas?

    It would have been interesting if they had. They'd have to be invested in the fur trade, though, for impetus. Not much else to attract anyone there before near modern times. Incidentally, from the Celestial Kingdom to the straits is a fair distance. Getting to the good bits of North and Meso...

  15. AHC/WI: China discovers the Americas?

    Actually not so much. Supply was circumscribed by geopolitical factors. The Europeans only had to cross the Atlantic,as well. A relative puddle in comparison to the Pacific.

  16. AHC/WI: China discovers the Americas?

    They had plenty of sources much closer to home.

  17. Results of successful Mongol invasions of Japan

    During the Kamakura era? Japan was not unified politically.

  18. Results of successful Mongol invasions of Japan

    A Mongol occupation might instigate an earlier unification of Japan -- either through the administrative auspices of the Yuan or as a result of throwing them out. Japan becomes a maritime power and perhaps instigates aggressive overseas campaigns earlier. Perhaps an earlier attempt to conquer Korea?

  19. AHC/WI: China discovers the Americas?

    I think B&C answered most of your question re. Isolated voyages. Unless China would have engaged in massive overseas imperialism (the Yuan dynasty was the only time in Chinese history which was analogous to European efforts -- and they were a Mongol dynasty) I don't see a viable Chinese effort...

  20. AHC/WI: China discovers the Americas?

    Nil unless they exploit the discovery. But it is very hard to come up with a reason for China to do so for either reasons of trade or colonization in a pre-Colombian framework. A singular voyage or two, perhaps.
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