99 Red Balloons: Scratchpad

Hnau

Banned
From 2009 to 2011 while I was on my mission in Brazil I had a lot of ideas concerning my previous timeline A Lenin-less World. I'm going to change it up quite a bit, hopefully for the better. It has become an even more ambitious project for me and I'm excited to get started. But, all I've got are a number of ideas that I still need to polish up. While I am working on the actual timeline I'd like to get some ideas out there in the open and see if it is agreed that it's plausible. I'm sick and tired of putting together really good-looking installments for my timeline and then having it nitpicked to death so that I feel more and more pressure to start completely over. I'm hoping I can get the obvious nitpicking out of the way here on the "Scratchpad" before I put it together. This might seem amateur, but, let's face it even after 7 years on the board I am pretty amateur.

One of the ideas I've had is that the POD is in 1894 when something inconsequential occurs in Central Russia that does little but generate butterflies across the country and throughout the world. I'm a conservative when it comes to butterflies, I believe that history has it's own internal momentum that is difficult to throw off all at once. But I do believe they affect the whole world pretty quickly. By 1896 there are little changes here and there throughout the entire world.

The first butterfly that creates a major change is that the USS Maine is never blown up in Spanish waters. Yellow journalism still runs amok in the American press and the American market chooses Cuban revolutionaries over the Spanish... but the Spanish-American War never happens. Theodore Roosevelt takes a little longer to rise to prominence and in his place Joseph G. Cannon is put on the ticket with McKinley. The election is closer but still ends in a Republican victory. Without the Spanish-American War and Roosevelt's rapid ascension the political mindset of the United States remains trapped in the traditions of the 1880s and 1890s for some time to come. The Cuban Rebellion comes to an end in 1900 when President McKinley offers to mediate between the leadership of the Cuban revolutionaries and the Spanish government. A peace treaty is decided upon in mid-1901 which results in the cession of almost complete internal autonomy to Cuba and Puerto Rico which nevertheless remains part of the Spanish Empire. The war in the Philippines takes longer and wraps up by 1904 when a near-bankrupt Spain agrees to a peace similar to the one agreed upon with the Cuban revolutionaries. So, Spain hangs onto their colonial possessions but at a large cost to their national economy which refuses to industrialize and modernize. In order to keep control of the Philippines despite the calming effect of the peace treaty the Spanish create stronger ties with the UK, Germany and Japan. Each of these powers are given long-term leases of ports in the Spanish Philippines in return for military assistance in the islands. As time passes the Germans and Japanese compete more and more to see if the war-torn archipelago can be bought from the Spanish.

American President McKinley is still assassinated but in October 1901. Cannon takes his place as POTUS and immediately adopts a more critical position against the South than his predecessor or Roosevelt. A strange situation occurs when Cannon is assassinated by a southerner in March 1902. Without a VP, the US government faces a peculiar constitutional problem. The Supreme Court calls the shots, agreeing that the best course of action is to organize a new presidential election for November 1902 which changes the election cycle forever after. Congress selects George F. Hoar to be the temporary Acting President until the elections can be held. TTL's equivalents of the 20th and 25th amendments are to be had much sooner, within a few years of this tragic series of events.

The Russo-Japanese War happens but several events occur which lead to a much clearer Japanese victory. Russia is battered even more than OTL and Japanese makes some important gains in Manchuria. However there is no Dogger Bank Incident and as such there are better Anglo-Russian relations.

In China the Boxers never burn down the Hanlin Yuan. The Empress Cixi's involvement with the Boxers is discovered in 1902 causing her to be exiled to France. The Emperor Kuangshu returns to his former position of power in China.

Oh, and of course, Vladimir Lenin dies of tuberculosis in the year 1900 and never has a major effect on Russian politics.

Those are enough ideas for now. Comments on what these subtle changes might lead to?
 
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