A Hybrid of a TL and a Challenge: A more successful 1848

Beer

Banned
Does Germany create a real fleet early? That would be extremly expensive, you know, for a state that has just unified itself. And Germany's coastline is pretty weird, anyway. Why would you wand Rupert's Land? It's as far north as the Russian port of Arkanglesk, which is icebound most of the year.
Hi, Art! It up to what you think of as a real fleet. As I wrote in one post, at this point in time (between 1864-1900) Germany build up her Navy a bit, since they need more ships for the defense of Canada, but it´s a modest expansion, most of it would have to be done anyway, since a nation like Großdeutschland needs at least some force on the High Seas. The actual number of ships build because of Canada is rather small. Just enough to defend the few useful seaways to Rupert´s Land against most navies of the time. Against true seapowers like GB it would not be enough, but TTL Second Empire is busy consolidating herself, growing and industrialising. Besides that, she works on how to integrate the Minorities Germany now has and to make Canada into a second Germany (hoping that will be true sometime in the 20th. Century). So Germany´s plate is full and aggression has to come from the outside. As long as Germany does not have to fight a top seapower, the TTL German Navy before 1900 does well enough. Not splendidly, but it meets the end.

As for why Germany "wants" Canada I quote myself, so I don´t have so much to write.;)
So in basic terms why there is a German Canada: G and GB want to end a war neither side want to let go on. Germany´s "warscore" is higher due to a prestigeous big victory at Flensburg, so Bismarck needs some token to show to the public as spoils of war.
GB came into the war due to the poor management of a PM with no talent for foreign policy. They know Germany can´t touch the Isles, Britain can´t touch the Germans on land, it´s a stalemate. London took a prestige loss at Flensburg, so they can´t get a "status antebellum".
Trying to look magnanimous in "defeat" and get a cunning shin hit in, they want to give Germany Heligoland only in combination with RL, inflating the worth of Rupert´s Land for the eyes of the public. It looks good on paper and for the foreign press, but is actually a just big inconvience for Germany. Heligoland is good, the rest is "argh".:)
Britain can get prestige back for her "sacrifice" and leave Bismarck with a foreign policy stone around his neck, rather sure to get RL back soon, after Germany is fed up with it.
Bismarck recognises what London tries to do, but he wants an end to the unneeded war, especially after getting from Denmark what he wanted in the first place.
Bismarck accepts, because consolidating the young Second Empire (13 years in 1864) in peace is far preferable over a war with England neither side wanted. Palmerstons hipshot help for Denmark only made a mess.

Now Germany has Heligoland, which is a strategic plus and Rupert´s Land, which she did not want. Now what to do? RL is wilderness, there might be rich ressources and farmland, but developing and making it defendable and useful will be extreme costly and it will be the next century before this happens.
The other option is to sell it to someone. But even if it is not in the open, doing this after the fanfare about RL would mean admitting defeat to the british political play.Some would even see it as admitting being unable to stem the task of developing Canada.
Here comes german/prussian stubbornness in: Doing something 100% or not at all.
The german government decides to beat the british in their own game by making Rupert´s Land a success, "even if it kills us". To the consternation of some states, who betted that the Germans would do the more logical thing by selling it.
By the time of the great colonial grab, the "crazy Germans" have the first very tender and delicate successes in Canada they can be proud of, but the expense is so great, Germany´s appetite for more colonies went extinct. Only for prestige reasons Germany takes some more colonies. Bits and pieces here and there compared to other colonial powers, several times even exchanging claims, showing the flag, nothing more. The main colony was and is RL. So TTL Germany does not get sucked into great colonial rivalries.
I hope this helps!
By the way, Art; I work on a new part for this TL and I try to put something about the TTL Italian unification in, since you asked.
Bye!
 
Last edited:

Beer

Banned
Hi, Boys and Girls!
More stories about this TL will come sometime this week. I´m not so good making maps (mainly because of too constricted time for more training, but this map might get upgraded later on), but as a gimmick, here is TTL Canada in 2010. Please comment!
P.S. A "Brownie point" for those who know where Kanitoga comes from.

Red is the Canadian Federation with semi-independent British Columbia
Grey is Germany since the 5 Länder (States) are fully part of Germany, so German-Canada (Deutsch-Kanada) does not really apply from Decolonization onward anymore.
The term "Deutsch-Kanada" is mainly a descriptor from other nations to this day and some german colonial documents between 1864-1920. The TTL Germans call their part of Canada in common parliance normally still Rupprechtsland, the german version of Rupert´s Land, or by the names of the 5 states if to be more specific (of which one state has the same as the whole region); Kanada is used mainly by the travel business to make it sound more "exotic".

Kan2010.jpg
 
Red river settlements + Permafrost + 800 KM = Germany fall down go boom.

But since plausibility has never any sort of prerequisite on these boards, carry on with your dreck, no one has to read it after all.
 

Beer

Banned
Red river settlements + Permafrost + 800 KM = Germany fall down go boom.

But since plausibility has never any sort of prerequisite on these boards, carry on with your dreck, no one has to read it after all.
Deckhand, if you would read everything in the thread you could see that it is possible with a very expensive effort to stem it. By the way, as I tried to show you before, back at that time the situation and the Zeitgeist were different from today. Additionally your big Red River settlements were mostly not even there when TTL Germany gets Rupert´s Land. By the time the settlement of the Prarie provinces really starts, Germany has held the territory for 40 years already and sunk a lot of her money into making Rupert´s Land her own. If you would have read my discussion with Alex, you would know how and why Germany get´s Rupert´s Land and why Germany does not take the easy road and sells it, but decides to bite into the sour apple and burn lots of money to make Rupert´s Land German.

You´ve shown your colours early on, so if you don´t have something constructive to say and considering you just insult others, take your trolling somewhere else!
 
Last edited:

Beer

Banned
Hi! Since Art wanted to read something about the Italian Unification, here it comes. As the other parts, it will be extended when I have time. Please comment and feel free to add to this TL (as long as you don´t insult like a certain other person), it is meant as a collaborative effort!

From Ian Kershaw´s “The Unification of Great Powers – History altered forever”

In parts 1-3 we followed the Unifications of Germany in 1851-53 and the widespread influence on the world stage the Second Empire had since then. In parts 4 and 5 we compare the Unifications of Germany with that of Italy 1852-58, another important nation, often called the Sibling Unifications, since both were started by the same event, the Revolution of 1848 and the becoming of Germany and Italy influenced the other process.
When in 1848 the demonstrations and Uprisings began, there were several attempts to unify Italy, the most important by the two key factions in the struggle for a united Italy, the state of Sardinia-Piemont under House Savoy and Giuseppe Mazzini´s “Giovine Italia” (Young Italy) movement.
Both had very different approaches: Mazzini´s group was for democracy and a revolution of the people, Piemont wanted more power for herself and a monarchy. At first, both failed. Mazzini´s coup in Austrian Milan was crushed by the Austrian Army and Piemont´s military advance was blunted by Austria too. For roughly 4 years “Resorgimento” was stopped. Sardinia-Pirmont was swept fully into the revolutionary uprisings popping up all over Europe and Mazzini fled to Rome.
Then in 1852, Piemont had a new plan. The revolution inside was stopped, where in other nations the struggles still went on. House Savoy, with the help of the brilliant Camillo Cavour had gotten the backing of France. The French were naturally not happy that Germany had united, but had too many problems to intervene. So Paris searched for allies. Sardinia-Piemont was willing to give part of her holdings like e.g. Nizza to France for help in her quest to unite Italy. It was a no-brainer for Napoleon III.. Helping House Savoy would give France new territory, giving problems to Austria, who held a sizeable part of northern Italy and if Piemont was successful, it would become a friendly ally against the “Fridolins outré-Rhine”.

And it would be revenge against Mazzini´s group too. After fleeing to Rome, he led an uprising against the Pope´s government and erected a Roman Republic. France, protector of the papal state, normally would have stamped out this upstart Republic, but like all other very or halfway important states of Europe, “La Grande Nation” had enough on their plate due to the revolutionary spirit blasting over the Continent.
Now in 1852, France saw the light at the end of the tunnel, with order mostly restored Paris could think again about foreign policy which went beyond colonial affairs. After a bit over 3 years, it was high time to end the Roman Republic once and for all. The alliance with Piemont would bring the whole Italian peninsular onto France´s side, once House Savoy conquered it.
More counterweight against the Germans.

The first phase went like France and Piemont hoped. Unlike at the beginning of the revolutions four years earlier, the Austrian army was splintered all across the multi-ethnic Empire to keep or restore order. Austria was deeply in trouble; internal strife between the various nationalities, revolutions and counter-revolutions had sapped much of Austria´s considerable strength.
The army units in Italy held Piemont´s forces back for the moment, but it was only a matter of time until a total collapse would come, since the few available reserves were far away in other parts of the Danube Monarchy and the attackers advanced nearly unopposed in the non-austrian parts of northern and middle Italy. A part of Piemont´s forces would be soon in the position to cut off the Austrian forces in the Lombardy and then the first “domino” would fall.

The Italians wanted Unification and even if more than one Italian state did not like Sardinia-Piemont, getting rid of the foreign overlords was worth it. House Savoy was pleased. Her forces advancing into Tuscany, had taken parts of the Austrian holdings and putting enormous pressure on the last Austrian units.
The news from the Italian peninsular hit Vienna like a bomb. The situation could become a true political catastrophe; if a breakdown happened there. As much as the young Emperor Franz Josef (Francis Joseph) despised it, he had to talk with the Prussian upstarts, who cheated, as far as he was concerned, Austria out of her deserved chance to unify Germany. But the only way to get enough forces to stabilise the Italian front was to talk to Germany.

The Emperor was shocked during the first round of talks in Salzburg. The German Chancellor Bismarck was willing to help Austria, but to a price. Accepting would be the end of all Austrian dreams to take the leader role in a whatever-form Germany; not accepting would be risking all. Austria could rise to the challenge, yes, but in the tense situation would it be fast enough to stop the worst?
Bismarck was willing to negotiate further and had an idea how to win time: Giuseppe Mazzini. He was not a friend of Piemont and had openly rejected House Savoy´s selling off Italian soil to the French for help. His Roman Republic would be a prime target of the Sardinia-Piemont forces. Both sides wanted Unification, but under which circumstances was another thing. Back in 48, Mazzini had teeth-grindingly supported Sardinia-Piemont, since his group lacked punch, but now in 1852 he had a state modelled mostly on his ideals. So Mazzini would not cave in without a fight. Still, it was doubtful if the roman forces could win against the French backed North Italians.
Envoys were sent to Rome. Germany and Austria would help the Republic against Sardinia-Piemont, if Consul Mazzini was willing to give Austria (and in one or two cases Germany too) certain concessions. Austria would also be prepared to give some of her territory to Rome and negotiate about other parts of her Italian lands.
Mazzini did not like the Austrians and it was clear to him, that the Habsburg wanted to use him to stop the loss of all her Italian possessions, but on the other hand he did not want the power-hungry autocratic Savoy´s to dismantle the democratic Roman Republic he and his followers erected Without the French helping Turin, Rome could hold it´s own, but since French help was the case, Rome only had a chance with outside help too.
Like Berlin and Vienna had hoped, Consul Mazzini took the chance to bring his vision of Italy to all parts of the peninsular. The Italian Civil War had begun.

Fuelled by the more or less clandestine supplies from France and Austria/Germany (after 5.2.1853 just Germany) the war went from late summer 1852 until spring 1857. One of the few truly noteworthy battles was the S-P victory at the first battle of Bergamo, because this bloodbath led to the founding of the Red Cross.
Other important battles were fought at Genua, Florence, Riva, Rimini, two at Modena and Milan, altogether 3 at Bergamo and the deciding battles at Tusculum near Rome, Salurn in South Tyrol and Trient (Trento).
By 1857, both sides were war weary and Tusculum and South Tyrol/Trentino showed that a negotiated peace was needed. The victory for Piemont at Tusculum made it possible for them to lay siege to Rome, but on the other hand the bulk of their forces were wiped out by roman troops near Trient and german units after the S-P troops were lured by the Romans into German-majority territory. For the northern roman army group the way to Turino was now wide open, after the two battles Piemont had nothing in North Italy anymore which could stop the Romans. So despite their capital besieged, the Romans were in the better position, since they could send an army south to relieve Rome and send another group to Piemont. While Turino was frantically calling in the last reserves from Sardinia, in the hope to stop the larger roman forces marching west, Paris and Berlin made both sides the offer to mediate to stop further bloodshed. Germany had tried more than once to bring an end to the war, since even after Austria became part of the Empire, Germany had only few aims in Italy at all, but only after France had turned her attention to other vistas, talks could begin.

In the end several compromises were reached:
-France got 2/3 of the territory Piemont promised them
-Germany ceded all former Austrian territories in Italy, except lands with either German majority or minority, which meant in addition to german-majority South Tyrol, Germany kept the Trentino and parts of northern Venetia and Friaul. As a gift, Berlin gave Rome a small land corridor and the city of Trieste from Küstenland.
-Italy united under the leadership of Rome, but as a gesture to S-P and her allies, Italy would get a monarch from the House Savoy with limited powers.
 

Beer

Banned
Hello! I will post a bit more sometime this week, but only a handful comments and replies? :(
(Thanks to Alex Richards, Art and van555 for commenting/Ideas!:cool:)
As written before, please comment and add events and/or TL ideas for the nations on earth, so we can discuss it and fill this world to make it a living and breathing TTL.:)
Bye!
 

Art

Monthly Donor
An interesting compromise.

But what about Edwardo Mortara and Pope Pius IX? Where'd they go? Avignon?
 

Beer

Banned
But what about Edwardo Mortara and Pope Pius IX? Where'd they go? Avignon?
Hi, Art! Well, Egardo Mortara followed in his father´s footsteps and became a merchant. By the time the story about the "emergency baptism" made rounds (TTL like OTL 1857) the papal reign is history and gone. Mortara´s case (it wasn´t the first in the corrupt papal state) made the newspapers for some days, but since the rather secular Roman Republic governed most of the old papal state at that time, it became a footnote in history.
The Roman Republic never allowed Pius IX (neither wanted the Pope in any case) the return. Pius IX went to Avignon as a Pope-in-exile. During the Civil War, as a showing of Roman sovereignity, Pope Leo XIII became the Counter Pope and he, not Pius was recognized officially as the rightful Pope during the treaty negotiations in 1857. For all the nations involved, even France as protector of the Pontificate, the conservative (during his time as Pope he became much more open), but down to earth Leo was far more attractive, than the convinced "Divine Right" would-be king Pius.

Leo XIII would go down in history as the Pope with the longest time as head of the Catholics ever; 46 years from 1857 to 1903.
Pius was allowed to stay in France, but to his death in 1878 he was a bitter man.

As said before, more about this TL sometime this week.

Btw, Art, do you want to write something about Italy´s fate in this TL after her Unification? Ideas, comments, etc. always welcome.
 

Art

Monthly Donor
Maybe. I don't know THAT much about 1840's-1890's Italy. It was a seriously time of change for Italy, in both good and bad ways.
 
So Mazzini, the dark horse of Italian unification, got part of what he wanted, and Italy looks really funny.

So would another Avignon vs Rome scenario create the second Western Schism, not that more countries would honestly care due to the Reformation and increasing secularism?
 

Beer

Banned
Maybe. I don't know THAT much about 1840's-1890's Italy. It was a seriously time of change for Italy, in both good and bad ways.
Hi, Art! You can write/add to the TL about other nations too. I just thought that you had a special interest in Italy due to your questions. As I said many times before: Feel free to add to this TL.

SavoyTruffle said:
So Mazzini, the dark horse of Italian unification, got part of what he wanted, and Italy looks really funny.

So would another Avignon vs Rome scenario create the second Western Schism, not that more countries would honestly care due to the Reformation and increasing secularism?
Hi, SavoyTruffle! Yes, TTL Italy looks a bit different than the Italy in other "1848 TLs". A part of the Savoy lost in OTL is still in italian hands, in the northeast Italy hold less land with all ethnic German settlements staying part of the Second Empire and Italy got the "Trieste-Appendix" far earlier as a gift from Germany.
During research for this TL, I found out that without military Intervention the Roman Republic and Mazzini as an alpha-wolf there, would have had great potential. Since one of the premises for this TL are more widespread, enduring 1848 revolutions, the Roman Republic is saved by that due to the allies of the Papal State having more pressing concerns somewhere else.
But the real difference to the Italy of OTL will be political. Due to the meddling of other powers in the Civil War and the difference in spirit between the "top dogs" Rome and Turino the foreign policy of TTL Italy is very different from what we know. I might write a bit about that someday.
 
Top