A Destiny Realized: A Timeline of Afsharid Iran and Beyond
- Thread starter Nassirisimo
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It seems TTL France might take the lead as an biggest industrial power in place of OTL Germany.
Spain? Spain definitely needs some more love here. Not every day we see one much on AH site. Although, it'll be easier for Spain to hold her Latin American colonies than Philippines which is half the world away.
Spain? Spain definitely needs some more love here. Not every day we see one much on AH site. Although, it'll be easier for Spain to hold her Latin American colonies than Philippines which is half the world away.
I certainly wouldn't call it pedantry. Embarrassingly enough I had noted the spelling while doing the research but it had evidently slipped through in the writing.
Austria may well be the "third" industrial power in the first half of the 19th century, and considering the OTL trajectories of territories such as Silesia, Bohemia and Lower Austria, I wouldn't be surprised if she turns out to be a much greater economic and industrial player than OTL. Depending on how things pan out, she may well emerge as the leading contender to the British crown later on.
France also has much more going for it however. A different government may well lead to different attitudes toward industrialisation. Especially if the working-class left emerges as a powerful force, the French government may well look to its cities as a base of support as opposed to the country (which remained an important base of support for Napoleon III's regime in OTL).
A Commonwealth, should it hold, would be very beneficial for Spain. It's worth bearing in mind that Spain has the world's most extensive colonial empire at this point, and keeping it all together would certainly enhance Spain's place on the world stage.
All this being considered however, those poster's who've pointed out that it will be difficult to keep together have a very good point. As part of the virtue of having such a large colonial empire, Spain's population is very much overshadowed by that of her colonies. The Americas alone have around twice the population of Spain, and the Philippines a few million more. The Criollos may be sated with increased autonomy and representation for now, but as their own countries grow in importance and indeed, economic independence, they may not be so satisfied in a few decades time. The question of where the Mestizos, Indians and Blacks stand in the new order will likely be a bone of serious contention going forward as well. What will happen going forward is still unclear due to the sheer number of factors that are at play here, but suffice to say that Spain and Latin America's 19th century are going to be very, very different to that of OTL.
In regards to the Philippines, the most serious security threat (after the unlikely British) are probably the Moros, who while being a threat to Filipino peasants aren't really capable of threatening Spanish rule over the archipelago in the long run.
Wallonia and Saarland are both French. I am working on a population list, though it is taking some time in compiling. It will be worth it when it's here though.
Political Culture and Society in Iran - 1831 to 1846
Challenges to Stability in Early 19th Century Iran
Whether or not Nader Shah’s religious reforms were ever meant to seriously bridge the divide between Sunni and Shi’a Muslims in his empire has largely been dismissed as an irrelevancy. By the reign of his sons Reza and Nasrollah, Shi’ism had once again become publically practiced in its heartland of the Iranian Plateau, although the Ulema never became the power that they had been under the latter Safavid Shahs. Religious tension remained in Iran, violently erupting after the conversion of Shahrukh to the Shi’a rite, an action which ultimately unleashed revolt and almost caused the collapse of the Afsharid State. His successors were thus wise to maintain a policy which, for lack of a better word, can best be described as “secular”, in practice if not ideologically. Although the state maintained ties to the religious establishment, and indeed still identified itself to its Muslim neighbours as a Sunni state, actual state participation in terms of religious policy was minimalistic. The Mullahbashi was more often than not an irrelevancy. Whereas religion had been a major source of legitimacy for the Safavids, for the Afsharids it was an irrelevancy at best and a major irritant at worst.
Instead, the Afsharids had placed a renewed emphasis on a shared Persian high culture and language. By the early 19th century, Iran had very much become a “Territorial State”. The Afsharid state increasingly had to rely on local notables in order to exert its writ as the sheer distances of the empire and changing internal conditions forced a reversal of sorts on the previous policy of centralisation, but outside areas such as the Caucasus Mountains, there were few who imagined themselves as separate entirely from the rulers in Mashhad. Although less than half of Iranians were Persian speakers by 1840, almost all of Iran’s cities outside the Turkic cities of the West, Mesopotamia and the Persian Gulf were Persian speaking, and over the course of the previous century had become more, rather than less integrated to the Persian cultural sphere. As Isfahan had been for the Safavids, the court culture of Mashhad became the model to be emulated throughout Iran. Even in the distant Fergana Valley, the local Khan proudly boasted to passing merchants that his own palace was a miniature Kalat-i-Naderi.
Although still a land riven by particularism, perhaps an unavoidable consequence of Iran’s geography, Iran’s cities served as outposts for Persian language and culture. A Russian intelligence report on Fararud noted “In the towns and cities of the region, even those which are a thousand miles or more from old Iran, almost all the inhabitants of these centres no matter what their origin will be Persian speakers. An old Uzbek man was heard to lament that his own language is forgotten by his grandchildren, who in all but physical appearance resemble the Persian peoples” [1]. The countryside was a different story however, where regional languages and dialects such as Lur and Kurdish survived even on the Iranian Plateau. There were millions of Oghuz Turkish speakers in the northwest of the Empire, representing the second largest linguistic group as well as Pashto speakers in the East. Particularly among nomadic peoples, there was little assimilation of Persian language and culture with exception of the odd loan-word here and there.
Nevertheless, until the second third of the 19th century, it can safely be said that Iran was slowly moving towards a linguistic and cultural integration of both elites and urbanites, as Persian dialects converged and non-Persian speakers gradually adopted the language. This rosy picture belies the fast-emerging religious divide that characterised Iran during the 1830s and 1840s. As previously discussed, Iran’s government for the most part tended to take little notice of religious affairs after the death of Nader Shah. While this had meant that religion could not be the powerful centripetal force that it had been under the Safavids, it also avoided for the most part the religious conflict that had partially resulted in their downfall. The lack of state support for the ulema, especially the Shi’a ulema had been powerful in the Safavid era had created something of a gap in the religious fabric of the empire, one that Sufi orders were increasingly filling by the 19th century.
During the 1830s, the economic impact of industrialisation in the West began to make itself felt in Iran as much as the rest of the world. Cheap textiles from Lancashire began to worsen the economic situation of Iranian weavers, particularly in areas with better transport links to the west such as Mesopotamia and the South of Iran. Wages for most manufacturers declined for much of the 1830s and 40s, making the impact of famine ever more acute among the artisanal manufacturers of Iranian cities. As much as the guilds, these people now became more closely associated with Sufi orders as they turned to religion in search of meaning in their increasingly difficult lives. This tendency linked itself with a growing millennialism that increasingly took a hold of many in Iran, as worsening economic conditions for much of the urban population and an inability of the traditional guild organizations to protect their members from hardship led to dissatisfaction with the existing order. Competing religious trends, such as the revived Usuli tradition which supposedly adhered to the official “Jafari’ Sunni” rite, were simply outmatched by the appeal of Sufism.
It was into this situation that Sayyed Ali Mohammad, or the Bab, emerged in 1844 [2]. A critic of both the traditional Shi’a Ulema as well as the government, he preached that the return of the Mahdi to the world was imminent, and that he would overthrow “illegitimate” and “false” rulers to install a just government. His movement quickly spread among the urban centres of Iran, a trend which began to worry the government, who were very much aware of his revolutionary teachings. Although subject to harassment by authorities, the ulema was too weak to seriously challenge the movement, and the authorities increasingly distrusted by an increasingly impoverished populace. The Famine of 1846 led to perhaps half a million deaths within Iran, as well as huge numbers of emaciated people crowding into Iran’s cities [3]. The reports of Europeans in Iran tell of riots, as well as targeted acts of violence against state officials, religious minorities and Europeans, and the Shah issued a proclamation that the Babis were to blame for the unrest. The army was sent to suppress the riots and the Bab himself was arrested and subsequently executed.
This did not stop the popularity of his millenarian movement however. The fact that violence had been used to combat the movement only excited the belief of the Babis that Iran’s rulers were false Muslims who would soon be overthrown by the Mahdi whose arrival was said to be imminent. Iran was seemingly on a knife’s edge as foreigners in Iran began to retreat to the coastal cities of the country, ready to flee if the violence that everyone expected erupted.
[1] – Fararud is the Iranian name for Transoxania/Central Asia, which it seems more appropriate to use when discussing Iranian Central Asia.
[2] – The Bab was a historical figure who gave rise to Babism in Iran, a forerunner to the Bahaism of OTL. Needless to say, the course that matters took in OTL will not happen in a vastly different Iran.
[3] - The cause of this famine is the potato blight, which has had a larger effect on an Iran that has taken to potato cultivation more so than OTL.
* * * * * *
London, 1847
London, 1847
Exile from one’s homeland is never an easy thing. For Ja’afar Korouni, the distance to which his exile took him had made things far worse. Shunned by Sunni Muslims for his unrepentant Shi’ism, and by his fellow Shi’a for the rejection of the Bab, he had fled far from home, first to the city of Vienna, then to Paris. Even after five years of exile, he had not grown used to either the strange customs or the strange thoughts of the French. And yet this was still a time when Muslim Iranians were few and far between in Europe, and for the most part the French and other Europeans was the only company he had.
Strange then that on one summer’s morning, he was to receive word from an Iranian living not so far from his own residence, in the British capital of London. He had never been to this city, though he had heard that it was fast becoming the capital of the world, as Paris was becoming the capital of Europe, a great hub for trade and finance. The person who had sent the message was one Abbas Mirza Abdari, formerly of Tabriz but who had scandalised his home town first by expanding on the possibly heretical philosophies of his father, but in settling in Britain to understand what he could of Western knowledge [4]. Apparently, Abbas had heard about a newsletter that Ja’far had started in Paris, and was curious to meet with a fellow “Eastern Intellectual”.
Was this a wise invitation to accept? Even for one who was an exile, meeting with a man like Abbas carried ruinous risks for one’s reputation. Rumour had it amongst Iranians in Europe that the man was a heretic at best, and possibly an atheist of all things!
But as seems to be the case with characters such as these, there is also a certain allure. Certainly, Ja’afar was curious to hear from Abbas’ own mouth clarification on some of the more extravagant rumours that had circulated amongst Iranian expatriates, not to mention just what he had actually learned from his time studying in England. Thus it was that Ja’afar found himself travelling to London, first by train to Calais, by ship across the English Channel and train again into London. The journey had taken him under two days, something which he found rather astonishing.
London itself was an astounding sight, even to one who was accustomed to European cities. The familiar features of modern industry were already apparent in Paris, whose eastern side was quickly becoming an industrial powerhouse, and yet London seemed even more focused on the accumulation of wealth than Paris. Certainly, there seemed to be more human misery and poverty, perhaps the inevitable side of a city in which the rulers did not have an equivalent of the Paris mob to fear. Abbas himself lived far away from London’s poor however, in an unassuming terrace not too far from the British Museum [5].
“Khosh amadid” Abbas greeted Ja’afar in his reception room, in Farsi that seemed out-of-practice. Abbas appeared every inch an English gentleman, or would have done were it not for his hooked nose and dark complexion. Complete with a waistcoat, he’d have seemed more suited for attending a formal dinner with his English peers as opposed to meeting a fellow exiled Iranian. “Perhaps Abbas really has gone native and abandoned Islam”, Ja’afar pondered.
Abbas began speaking in French, which seemed to come to him more naturally now than Farsi did. “I trust that your journey was a good one?”
“Indeed it was, it had been quite some time since I had travelled far from Paris. One forgets how the railway has changed travelling from one place to another in recent years”
Abbas nodded. “It is certainly the case here. Give the country a few more decades, and you will be able to travel to the smallest village at the very edge of civilization by train”
The two exchanged a few more notes on travel in the west as well as other pleasantries.
“You know, I rather enjoyed reading your newsletter. It becomes rather depressing at times, continually reading the words of those who wish only to preserve things in our homeland as they are, albeit with themselves at the top. As if a change of dynasty or those in the nobility would stop poverty and oppression. It has certainly worked in the past…”
Ja’afar looked at Abbas quizzically. Abbas explained “English humour, I have spent too much time here. But you know as well as I that the world is changing. You have seen it in France as I see it in England. Iran has to change too, in organization, in thought…”
“Which is a hard task. I scarcely think that we are a people ready to abandon our religion for atheism”
“Yes, yes, I know very well what people think of me. Point out where our dear clerics have gone wrong, and they will spread all a manner of lies about you. I may have forgotten much about our culture, that is true, but I have not forgotten about our religion”
“That is comforting”
“And it is beside the point. There was a reason for me inviting you here. You see, across the Islamic world and even outside of it, there are some who are aware of the changes taking place in the world. In Europe, if we are being specific. These new technologies are unrivalled in the history of the world you know, and they come from somewhere”
“But what does this have to do with me?” Ja’afar asked.
“If Iran is to maintain pace with these countries, we need better rule. Shah Muhammad Ali will not live for long, and his son is a fool. Replace the dynasty, and we will only postpone the problem. You said it yourself when you quoted Ibn Khaldun before. We need rule by a number of people”
“Don’t we have that already?”
“Not rule by court favourites or cronies. We have a bureaucracy at the bottom, why not at the top too? Experienced men who rule for the country, not their own dynasties. Men accountable to the people”
Ja’afar approved this nod to his own writings. “If the path to progress is the same as the path to justice, I could support it”
[4] – See post #466
[5] – Only a natural part of London for someone as curious as Abbas to settle. Interestingly enough, the British Museum was founded in 1753, and thus has not been butterflied.
* * * * * *
Author's Notes - Religion had been a great centripetal force in Safavid Iran, and it has been one that Afsharid Iran has lacked. This has been one of the causes for the multiple revolts that have afflicted Iran, and still means a lack of legitimacy for the Afshar rulers over a hundred years after the dynasty's foundation. Other methods to bind the country together have seen limited success, but in a pre-modern world they aren't quite as effective as the religious aura that the Safavids had enjoyed.
The narrative parts of the timeline are going to figure a bit more heavily from this point on, as we will follow various characters through the 19th century and perhaps beyond. The focus will largely be on Iran, but we will see characters from other parts of the world involve themselves as well, and some of the action will take place far from Iran.
Now do these intriguers mean to institute a constitution for the monarchy or republicanism?
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I wonder how Iran will modernize. Hopefully they can come out of the 19th century in a good condition.
Also, I hope that Thailand modernizes soon, and do they have a large population? I can't remember what it is. BTW, IOTL, when Louis XIV saw Ayutthaya (city) in the 1700's, he said it was as fine as Paris (and considering it had 1 million people at the time, it was likely as big as Paris)
Also, I hope that Thailand modernizes soon, and do they have a large population? I can't remember what it is. BTW, IOTL, when Louis XIV saw Ayutthaya (city) in the 1700's, he said it was as fine as Paris (and considering it had 1 million people at the time, it was likely as big as Paris)
Really interested to see where this religion goes in development when compared to OTL.
Oh the irony.
But still, I am happy to see these short stories as they give depth to the characters and making the world feel lived in.
Though I am curious if you have been writing fiction before focusing on the speculative variety currently.
Well, it won't be surprising if there's an Persian equivalent of French Revolution in Iran, given the conditions. At this rate, Iran might slide towards Constitutionalism, one way or another. Absolute monarchy isn't going to stay for long, no doubt.
Deleted member 67076
This honestly should already be the case by the time of the colonies becoming a confederation all things considered. Spain wouldn't have realized it yet though.
Yeah, which, I suspect, is why a lot of people don't take global warming very seriously. We've basically been lucky in terms of volcanic eruptions and such, although events in the Indian Ocean in 2004 and Japan in 2011 really should have made people realize how vulnerable we still are.
Personally, looking at Spain's messy 19th and early 20th century history, I think the forces of reaction in Spain itself are unlikely to be spent, and the results of the revolution will have to face violent challenges in the future.
Anyhoo, good updates. It looks like Iran is going to have a rough patch to get through, and the Russians are lurking...
Will the French Republic be open to an alliance with the Ottomans? Considering the mutual enemies the two had, namely Austria and Russia, who had joined together in a Holy Alliance, it would balance things a bit Europe, and the two already had a history of allying with one another.
The one thing that hampered the alliances between the two in the past is of course religion, but now with the Republic that particular branch of society seem to take a backseat in matters of politics, it makes an alliance with the two more viable. With an ally right at the borders of Austria and Russia, France would have time to mobilize her armies in times of war, whereas both her enemies have to immediately face the Ottomans.
The Ottomans, who is currently seriously trying to westernise, will benefit from the French advisors and technology entering the country, helping them in their efforts to catch up with the rest of Europe. France, seemingly emerging as one of the premier industrial powers, will help with realization of these efforts immensely, perhaps even helping the Ottomans build railways in the empire. Maybe telegraph lines also, but that seems to be a bit of a stretch for me.
The Ottomans may well also be looking for an alliance with the Shah too, who they shared Russia as a common enemy. Both of them combined will become an almost unbreakable bulwark against Russian expansion into the south, and if France is in this also, the Russians have to manage three fronts at once.
Just finished reading this, and I have to say that this is one of the most interesting TLs i have seen in this website. A shame that this does not attract more readers, the thread should be drowning in them by now. Keep up the good work.
The one thing that hampered the alliances between the two in the past is of course religion, but now with the Republic that particular branch of society seem to take a backseat in matters of politics, it makes an alliance with the two more viable. With an ally right at the borders of Austria and Russia, France would have time to mobilize her armies in times of war, whereas both her enemies have to immediately face the Ottomans.
The Ottomans, who is currently seriously trying to westernise, will benefit from the French advisors and technology entering the country, helping them in their efforts to catch up with the rest of Europe. France, seemingly emerging as one of the premier industrial powers, will help with realization of these efforts immensely, perhaps even helping the Ottomans build railways in the empire. Maybe telegraph lines also, but that seems to be a bit of a stretch for me.
The Ottomans may well also be looking for an alliance with the Shah too, who they shared Russia as a common enemy. Both of them combined will become an almost unbreakable bulwark against Russian expansion into the south, and if France is in this also, the Russians have to manage three fronts at once.
Just finished reading this, and I have to say that this is one of the most interesting TLs i have seen in this website. A shame that this does not attract more readers, the thread should be drowning in them by now. Keep up the good work.
Constitutionalism is the aim of these chaps, but as any paranoid monarchical dictator knows, constitutionalism is the first step toward republicanism. In the long run, either option remains for Iran and it isn't actually something I have decided yet, though absolutism (in a sense limited by Iran's vast geographical sprawl) can't last forever. Especially with a political culture like Iran's, which propelled even the backwards Iran of OTL toward Constitutionalism at the beginning of the 20th century, it seems like an organic direction, even if one of the key elements of Iran's political culture in OTL, namely its powerful clergy, is somewhat less pronounced here.
Iran does have a number of things going for it, whether it's obvious or not. There is actually room for growth in the agricultural sector, something which was noted by many visitors in the 19th century of OTL. Although Iran at this point is using far more of her agricultural potential, there is the possibility of expansion in Central Asia. And then of course you have Iran's resource wealth (both coal and iron).
Thailand's population isn't huge. As of 1831 in TTL, we're probably looking at just under 6 million, which is roughly what it was in OTL. Ayutthaya would have been a magnificent city at the time, many of the ruins from before the Burmese invasion are still spectacular today (I've been there so I can personally attest to that!). What Thailand does have is room to grow, and even in OTL it is actually the world's biggest rice exporter.
Babism (without Bahaullah, it is unlikely to evolve into the Bahaism of OTL) may well take on an identity more similar to that of the Ahmadis of OTL, not quite considered as separate from Islam by most, although certainly considered as heretics. The Shi'a of Iran have taken to the Bab, though the same is not true of Shi'a in places like the Gulf or Iraq. The Mahdists are likely to make things even more challenging than OTL however.
In regards to the stories, we'll be seeing many of these characters further down the line too. The timeline was altogether feeling a bit sterile for me, and re-reading my previous timeline With the Crescent Above Us made me realise how much I missed writing them.
Interestingly enough, there are definitely parallels between the Pahlavis of OTL and the Afsharids of TTL. Reza Shah Pahlavi actually held Nader Shah up as a great figure, and more earnestly than any other Iranian Shah before him attempted to emulate Nader's style of administration. Although we are unlikely to see the unpopular secularisation attempts and haphazard land reform attempts of Mohammed Reza Shah, there may well be other actions undertaken by the Afsharids that will push Iranians towards an embrace of constitutionalism, if not out-and-out republicanism. Of course, without the highly influential Shi'a clergy of OTL, any revolution will likely end differently than the Iranian Revolution of 1979 in OTL.
Well especially without a big bad USA to threaten it, Mexico is the likely candidate to inherit the American West of OTL. Hell, how about a Spanish-speaking city where Vancouver is? It's all quite possible at this point, and a Mexico of that size would certainly be far richer and more powerful than Spain. Even the Spaniards may realise this.This honestly should already be the case by the time of the colonies becoming a confederation all things considered. Spain wouldn't have realized it yet though.
Even I sometimes lapse into the pattern of thought that "Well I don't see any global warming happening yet", so I do think there is something to be said that we think of ourselves as being more liberated from the environment than we actually are. Unless you live in Aceh perhaps.
Spain's position is awkward both in the short and long terms, and it will be a task for liberal Spanish politicians to keep the commonwealth together in the face of diverging interests amongst its colonies and the impact of reactionaries at home.
France is a natural ally for the Ottomans in realpolitik terms, though of course ideological factors prevent the immediate conclusion of an alliance between the two. However, as the French system moderates, it is more likely that her leaders will recognise the importance of the Ottoman's position. In terms of infrastructure, a more prosperous Ottoman Empire (not nearly to the extent of Iran, but there is a difference by this point vis-a-vis OTL) would be more likely to attract foreign investment, which a richer France would be able to engage in.
In regards to an alliance between the Ottomans and Iran, as of 1831 in TTL the two countries combined actually exceed Russia in terms of population. That is no small feat, and as Europe's increased power becomes more obvious, religious similarities may push them toward a stronger alliance than OTL.
I do appreciate the praise. Honestly speaking I would have hoped it would be a bit more popular, but I do appreciate the loyal reader base I do have.
Shhh. Possible spoilers ahead.
The Third Revolutionary Wars - Europe 1832 to 1838
Toward Moderation? The Third Revolutionary War and its Aftermath
Until the summer of 1832, the spate of revolutionary activity in Europe seemed nigh-unstoppable. Spain, a key conservative power, had succumbed to its own revolution, now casting itself as a neutral party within Europe’s great ideological split. Southern Italy seemed to be undergoing a great wave of revolts, one which would soon threaten Austria’s southern approaches. What was even more troubling about Italy’s revolutions was that they were primarily peasant-driven, and perhaps even more anti-clerical than the French. The exaggerated stories of prosperity and easy living for peasants in Sicily and the Mezzogiorno served as temptation for poverty-stricken peasants elsewhere in Europe, and as frightful cautionary tales for its aristocracy and clerics. The new Austrian Archduke Franz, determined to shore up his position as Holy Roman Emperor, sent troops to Rome to protect the Pope from the threat of encirclement by the Revolutionaries. He even went as far as to turn the decrepit Republic of Venice into a duchy, while annexing some territories in Istria and Dalmatia for himself [1].
This naked territorial aggrandizement served to alienate Austria from her European Allies. The new Russian Emperor Mikhail was at any rate, something of a romantic, who felt ill at ease “turning his guns on peasants”. His chief minister announced that Austria’s ambitions were “not worth the bones of a single Russian Grenadier”, and Russia began to look South rather than west, where Christian peasants in the Balkans appeared to be stirred by the events taking place elsewhere in Europe. When Serbian Peasants expulsed the Ottoman Garrison from Belgrade and began massacring Muslim soldiers and civilians in the countryside, it appeared as though these revolutions had begun to spread to the orient as well. The brutal conduct of the Ottoman army in its counter-attacks served to inflame Russian opinion, and by 1833, Russian troops were once again attacking those of the Ottoman Empire. With Russia thus distracted and Spain in the throws of its own internal struggle, Austria and Britain were alone and confronted by a continent that seemed increasingly French-aligned.
Perhaps in one of the strangest turns of history however, the biggest check to France was not to come from one of the conservative powers. The idea of Pan-Nationalism was a recent one in Europe, and an attempt to forge an Italian federation out of the republics of Northern Italy, Naples and Sicily floundered on regional differences as well as personal conflicts (as well as some intrigue from a France increasingly wary of potential challengers). In Germany however, some attempt of unity seemed to be more of a priority. Many of the smaller states of the Holy Roman Empire had banded together following their own revolutions, and the grandstanding of the Austrian Archduke gave many of these states the fear that he would lead his armies into Germany to force a conservative settlement. Initially, the Frankfurt Congress was only aimed at producing a common front for defence, but during the course of the congress, those voices that called for a unified German state encompassing all German states save Austria and Prussia, seemed to gain a lot of ground. By the congress’ end, a Federal German Republic was declared.
This sent out a message not just to Austria, but to France as well, which suddenly had a state of some twenty million people on its western border. Elated as the French left was to see the spread of revolution into Central Europe, conservatives and nationalists saw this unified Germany as a threat rather than an ally. After all, who was to say that this Germany would not someday decide that the Alsatians, who spoke a dialect related to German, would be better off amongst “their own” as opposed to the French. Much of this was simply paranoid conjecture, there was little to suggest that this was an aspiration even for the most ambitious German nationalists, who instead looked eastward toward the far more significant lands of Prussia and Austria.
Agitation within the French Assembly was strong however, and in 1834 the French president was strong-armed into sending an army across the Rhine to disband the Frankfurt Congress and split Germany up into a number of smaller states. Germany’s armies were far too uncoordinated to stop the French advance, committed as the French army was to other conflicts, but the move produced a great amount of revulsion among the other Republics of Europe, not to mention a great amount of anger in France itself [2]. French president Jean Berger was assassinated and riots occurred not only in Paris, but particularly in France’s northern cities. The president of Northern Italy threatened to repudiate France’s alliance and called the event “a cowardly betrayal”. What was more however, the myth of revolutionary solidarity had been shattered, and it appeared as though realpolitik and the interest of the state were once again considerations for European statesmen even in the revolutionary states.
France and Austria finally concluded their war with the Treaty of Versailles in 1835. This was a peace neither were satisfied with, with France more or less leaving revolutionaries in Hungary on their own to face the wrath of Austria, and the Austrian Archduke finally losing his title of Holy Roman Emperor, if not quite his influence within Germany, which was enhanced by territorial gains. Perhaps the most important aspect of the peace was not its territorial adjustments, but its political ramifications. After the peace, the ideological divide in Europe seemed to lesson somewhat. This trend would be reinforced by later events in the 1830s and ‘40s, both France and Austria had secured a peace that seemed to conform more to their own self-interest than to propagate or limit revolutionary ideals. While not mending the great schism in Europe, the peace treaty had taken some tentative steps toward this.
[1] – The Ionian Islands that Venice have formerly held have an interesting turn of events at this point. The island’s inhabitants, as well as exiles from Ottoman Greece, have set up an “Ionian Republic”, a possible eastern base for France and thorn in the side of the Ottomans.
[2] – The French army at this point is also in Italy and Algeria, though isn’t doing too well in the latter. It’s also worthwhile noting here that the French have seized Malta from the Knights to secure their communications with the Ionian Republic, not to mention provide them with a convenient base.
* * * * * *
The Revolt of the King - Spain's post-Revolutionary Civil War
The Revolt of the King - Spain's post-Revolutionary Civil War
The Spanish Constitution and the new institutions that had resulted from it seemed to have satisfied many of the demands from reformers within Spain itself, as well as the Criollos from Spain’s American colonies. Though there were certainly those in either faction who had felt that the reforms had not gone far enough, they were too small in number to pose any serious challenge to the new order. The same was not true however of Spain’s conservatives and reactionaries, amongst whom word of rebellion soon began to spread. The church and gentry wondered if this was not simply the first step toward a French-style revolution which would end with the massacre of those classes judged not to be sufficiently sympathetic to the revolutionary cause. The great differences between Spain’s revolutionary movement and France’s were ignored by the conservatives, who rose up in rebellion in Catalonia and the Basque Country in the winter of 1832. Troops from Madrid who were sent to put down the rebellion failed and were repulsed at the Battle of Zaragoza.
This rebellion now became a serious threat when Spain’s king and crown prince both fled to Bilbao, and announced that it was the Constitutionalists who were in fact the rebels. Their defections did not quite have the intended effect, as a regency council was formed. The twenty-two year old second son of the King, Fernando, was appointed as the new king, and he issued a statement to the effect that sovereignty was not due to divine right, but rather from the will of the people. This was a bold statement, unimaginable only a few years before and one which seemed to be more in line with the ideologies of the French Revolutionaries. Despite this, the Spanish system remained different to that of France’s with the king working as a constitutional monarch alongside a Cortes that held the power to introduce legislation. King Fernando was adept at ingratiating himself with the new order in Madrid, but this was overshadowed by the advances of his father and brother, who in the first half of 1833 had captured Bilbao, Valladolid and were laying siege to Barcelona.
Spain’s army had been split between father and son, but through 1833, many more troops defected to the old king Carlos. In particular, much of Spain’s officer corps had gone over to the old king, leaving Fernando with many of the army’s dregs, as well as amateur militia leaders. Thus, taking a page from the rulebook of the French Army in the First Revolutionary War, Fernando turned his new army, comprised mainly of conscripts from the south and centre of Spain, alongside a few volunteers from the colonies, into a blunt instrument of shock columns. This tactic appeared to have great success once again, as he won the costly victory at Barcelona, relieving the siege of Spain’s second city. In 1834, his armies saw fresh victories, as his father’s army was forced out of much of Catalonia. It would not be until 1837 that Fernando’s father, wracked by gout and depression, surrendered and went to live the rest of his life in exile on the southern coast of England. Spain’s new liberal order had triumphed, but it had left the country exhausted and impoverished.
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Adjusting to a Changing World – Britain in the 1830s
Adjusting to a Changing World – Britain in the 1830s
Unlike the other conservative powers of Europe, there was never the flirtation amongst the British political mainstream with absolutism that there was in Spain, Austria and Russia. This was in part that earlier British experiments with absolutism had ended with the king losing both the Civil War and his head, as well as subsequent events that had steered Britain to what its elites had considered a kind of political moderation. However, Britain did not exist in a vacuum, and to the increasingly exploited industrial workers of Britain who lived hard lives, the ideals of the French revolution found fertile intellectual ground. And yet the reforms that would see parliament reformed and free trade become a British value would not be the result of pressure from below, but rather those members of the aristocracy and gentry who, in a more romantic fashion than many of their continental counterparts, too desired liberty. Among them were included the exiled yet still influential Gordon Cecil, the Earl of Salisbury who had fought for and subsequently settled in the North Italian Republic.
Britain was also different in that she was perhaps the only “world power”. Although Spain’s extra-European possessions were far larger and more populous, Britain’s naval strength had grown to unrivalled heights, and this enabled her to intervene not only in European conflicts but also those in which her naval power afforded easy access. When British subjects were executed by the Japanese, the British fleet with its new iron ships made short work of the inadequate coastal defences of the Japanese, ending that country’s isolation and guaranteeing British trading rights throughout the country [3]. Similarly, British naval power in coastal areas of Asia made it a desirable ally for some, which ended with Britain gaining a number of naval bases in friendly nations. The success of Britain even extended to her subjects, as evidenced by the establishment of the “Emirate of Aden”, a state headed by a British convert to Islam, Richard Brooke, which would maintain close links to Britain [4].
This growing international influence, especially in Africa and Asia, would lead to the further strengthening of the mercantile and industrialist classes. Their increased wealth ensured that the amount of clout that they held soon exceeded that of the traditional landed aristocracy, and this breaking of the latter’s hold on power in Britain was confirmed with the “Great Reform Act” of 1837, which saw the franchise extended (albeit only to about 5% of the population of the time), saw new cities such as Manchester and Birmingham entitled to representation in parliament, and finally ended the phenomenon of the “Rotten Boroughs”. Although a far cry from the moves toward universal male enfranchisement seen in the republics of the continent, the British reforms of the 1830s nevertheless represented a step towards liberalisation.
[3] – It has taken a war to break the Sakoku, though this has taken place over a decade previous to Perry’s expedition in OTL. We’ll look at this Anglo-Japanese war in more detail later on.
[4] – Remember this chap? I told you we’d see him again.
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Author's Notes - This cycle will likely be a bit Europe-heavy, though of course this will be broken up as much as possible. Through Europe, we're starting to see both moderation in terms of the Conservative Powers as well as the Revolutionaries, which may result in some kind of consensus down the line. Whether or not that would be enough to end the spate of wars in Europe is unclear, but for the time being Europe's political situation more or less ensures that only Britain and Spain can actually project power overseas.
Spain's liberal order has just about survived, but the homeland has been devastated and the colonies more or less untouched, which could change the balance of power sooner than nature had intended. Ultimately, while sentiment and language can link Spain and her American colonies together, Spain still has little to offer in terms of an economic relationship, and cities like Cartagena and Buenos Aries are still more likely to be developing economic ties with Britain and France.
These republics have presidents? IOTL, the use of “president” to refer to a head of state of a republic comes from the US. I’m guessing that American republic has still referred to its head of state as a president?
Or are these presidents of executive councils? The use of “president” as the chairman of a council predates the US by quite a bit.
Or are these presidents of executive councils? The use of “president” as the chairman of a council predates the US by quite a bit.
What is the colonial perception of the Spanish monarchy? Will their drift away from Madrid be republican in nature or more like the Commonwealth Realms.