AH Challenge: Best case for the Ottoman Empire.

This is the other idea I had for a thread. Namely, what is a realistic best-case scenario for the Ottomans? Wanks are not what I'm asking for, simply what the best-case scenario possible is. The Ottomans introduced a secular government with a standing army and combined a cosmopolitan worldview with a huge number of peoples and amount of territory under their control. Is there a way for a contemporary (21st Century) ATL Ottoman Empire to become a Great Power?
 

Philip

Donor
This is the other idea I had for a thread. Namely, what is a realistic best-case scenario for the Ottomans?

That largely depends on when the POD is.

Is there a way for a contemporary (21st Century) ATL Ottoman Empire to become a Great Power?

Assuming a rather late POD, an OE that stays out of WWI has an excellent chance of still being around today. OTL Turkey + Syria + Iraq seem reasonable (or even just northern Iraq), and would make an oil-rich nation. I don't know if it would become a super-power, but could easily be in the *G8/*UNSC Permanent Seat class.
 
That largely depends on when the POD is.



Assuming a rather late POD, an OE that stays out of WWI has an excellent chance of still being around today. OTL Turkey + Syria + Iraq seem reasonable (or even just northern Iraq), and would make an oil-rich nation. I don't know if it would become a super-power, but could easily be in the *G8/*UNSC Permanent Seat class.

If the OE stays out of the war, it also controls all the useful parts of Saudia Arabia and North Yemen (plus Jordan, Lebanon, and Palestine, which I assume you include in Syria. So the population would be about 200 million, and the GDP PPP about equal to France or Britain.

But that all assumes everything being equal. I would guess that the economy would be much greater than that, as you'd have a huge proportion of oil resources controlled by one state, and these would be combined with all the resources and manpower of Turkey in one large market.

In addition you have the military potential of Turkey, with money to finance serious equipment, plus a commanding strategic position. So not a huge power like the USA or China, but probably quite beyond Britain or France.
 
That largely depends on when the POD is.



Assuming a rather late POD, an OE that stays out of WWI has an excellent chance of still being around today. OTL Turkey + Syria + Iraq seem reasonable (or even just northern Iraq), and would make an oil-rich nation. I don't know if it would become a super-power, but could easily be in the *G8/*UNSC Permanent Seat class.

As recent as to make it a Great Power and the world at least somewhat recognizable.

Biggest possible wank, or best possible standard of living for its citizens?

Best possible standard of living for its citizens. I'm not asking how an Ottoman Superpower would happen....

If the OE stays out of the war, it also controls all the useful parts of Saudia Arabia and North Yemen (plus Jordan, Lebanon, and Palestine, which I assume you include in Syria. So the population would be about 200 million, and the GDP PPP about equal to France or Britain.

But that all assumes everything being equal. I would guess that the economy would be much greater than that, as you'd have a huge proportion of oil resources controlled by one state, and these would be combined with all the resources and manpower of Turkey in one large market.

In addition you have the military potential of Turkey, with money to finance serious equipment, plus a commanding strategic position. So not a huge power like the USA or China, but probably quite beyond Britain or France.

What kind of issues would a strong Ottoman Empire face in the later part of the 20th Century?
 
As recent as to make it a Great Power and the world at least somewhat recognizable.



Best possible standard of living for its citizens. I'm not asking how an Ottoman Superpower would happen....



What kind of issues would a strong Ottoman Empire face in the later part of the 20th Century?

That's hard to say. It could face separatist challenges, but then it will have all the oil revenues of Iraq and Saudi Arabia, too - and a representative government. It's probably more vulnerable than an African state to such pressures, but there are pretty much no African countries that are not extremely multi-ethnic and -confessional, and they don't really have all that much in the way of nationalist and ethnic conflict.

If the Ottomans stay out of the war, the whole history of Europe will change, so it's also hard to predict what kind of external threats it will face. Some sort of Russia will be around, and there's still the Zionists, but I think most of the challenges will be internal, not external.
 
... and there's still the Zionists, but I think most of the challenges will be internal, not external.

Correct if I am wrong but Jews were huge supporters of the OE correct? In fact I believe Jews were the primary representatives of Ottoman Authority in the Levant. So what is the Zionist threat exactly? As long as the OE (which seems to be secular according to the OP) be threatened by Zionists? They allow a religious freedom and Islam has traditionally been friendlier to Jews than to Christians be concerned at all about Zionists?

Also one outside factor to consider, If WW1 goes differently and Germany comes out with a Status Quo Antebellum peace who is to say a WW2 even happens? Without WW2 its conceivable that there will be less agitation for a Jewish state.
 
This depends hugely on the POD.

The very latest POD with any real significance is staying out of WW1. If the OE can hold together until oil is discovered, they will control an enormous proportion of the world's oil. All that wealth can be used to raise living standards to prevent large-scale unrest. Assuming WW1 goes essentially as OTL without the Ottomans, they'll probably end up staying pro-Allied neutral in some kind of WW2 (some kind of reckoning is inevitable after Versailles). WW2 goes broadly as OTL, resulting in an Allied victory and subsequent Cold War between the Soviets and the US. Best-case, the OE manages to exploit its oil and become a first-world country while staying neutral in the Cold War. The Sultan becomes a figurehead similar to the British monarchs. The OE becomes a parliamentary democracy. They are more powerful than any single European country due to their size and oil wealth, and lead to Muslim world. Pretty good world compared to OTL, especially in the Middle East.
 
Correct if I am wrong but Jews were huge supporters of the OE correct? In fact I believe Jews were the primary representatives of Ottoman Authority in the Levant. So what is the Zionist threat exactly? As long as the OE (which seems to be secular according to the OP) be threatened by Zionists? They allow a religious freedom and Islam has traditionally been friendlier to Jews than to Christians be concerned at all about Zionists?

Also one outside factor to consider, If WW1 goes differently and Germany comes out with a Status Quo Antebellum peace who is to say a WW2 even happens? Without WW2 its conceivable that there will be less agitation for a Jewish state.

The Jews of the Ottoman Empire were Asiatic and refugees from Spain for the most part, and were distinctly non-Zionist. They were highly favored and protected by the Ottomans, but I wouldn't call them the primary representatives of Ottoman authority, as they were very few in number. The influx of Ashkenazim from Europe were a different and more complicated matter.

Zionism as a movement was well underway by the early 20th c., and the Ottomans were ambivalent. It was mostly a cultural movement at first, so it was viewed as a welcome counterbalance to European imperial influence, but on the other hand, the territorial ambitions in Palestine of many Zionists were troubling, especially after Zionism in general had focused on the Holy Land around 1909.

In addition, remittances from European Jews to Palestine were good for the balance of accounts, and Palestine was no so overcrowded that additional taxpayers were unwelcome.

On the negative side, most insisted on retaining their Western citizenships, and too rapid an influx was destabilizing.

The former problem would have disappeared with WWI, as the Capitulations were abolished and most Ottomans lost their ability to retain foreign citizenship. The latter was a very difficult problem. Jews were welcome in any number into the Empire, but a limited number were allowed to settle in Palestine, although there was no limit on retirees. But once in the empire, you could make your way there, so the Jewish population was rising, albeit not to unmanageable levels.

So if Zionists made a concerted effort to colonize Palestine, it would lead to problems.

On the other hand, the Jewish millet had voted to drop all their various languages and adopt Turkish, so that would be pretty welcome if implemented seriously and an important bolstering of Ottomanism. But, the Jewish millet was dominated by non-Ashkenazi & non-Zionist Jews, so newcomers might be less enthusiastic about that.

Anyway, Zionism would certainly present challenges, but by itself, probably not a mortal danger to the empire.

Sorry, that was long.
 
The Ottoman Empire can at least be more diverse than modern day Turkey. There would still be a significant Greek and Armenian population in Anatolia.
 
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