I'm taking this one directly from the AH cliches list on the wiki, but the idea that WWI and WWII must always occur is one that I'm starting to think is increasingly tiresome as I read more TLs on the site. Which isn't to say that timelines where said wars occur or are centered around said wars are bad, far from it, but it'd be nice to see more threads that go against the grain and avert/subvert the idea, which is what I'm trying to do with my current TL. On a similar note, the cliche/trope that nothing ever happens in South America in TLs is just as bad, though I've seen a number of SA-based threads, so it seems to be going away on its own.
AH Recurring Tropes, and the timelines that avert or subvert them
- Thread starter SavoyTruffle
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I agree that's a bit of a cliche, especially given that in real life we've only had one real-world war. WW1 was really more of a Eurasian war with American allies and a rather one-sided African theatre.
There was also a Pacific theater, but it was even more one-sided than the African one, and relatively uneventful. However, the results played a role setting the stage for the Asia-Pacific theater of WW2.
Only one real world war? Sounds like the opposite of the historians and writers who will cite the Seven Years War as the "true" first world war, or especially those who will cite even earlier conflicts as world wars. Although yes, the designation of World War I and World War II is very arbitrary, but understandable since the conflict was so huge and the last global war had been a century before.
One could argue for the Seven Years' War to be the first real world war.
I think a weird convergence regarding global conflicts is how you get an industrial scale war early in the 20th century that involves a ton of destruction, but is never decisive enough to prevent a second war instigated by a radicalized party. On that note alt WWIs tend to be "for all the marbles" imperialistic conflicts, then alt WWIIs wars of ideology.
Yeah, the Asia-Pacific theater of WWI was a cakewalk compared to WWII, especially when you realize that it basically consisted of the Siege of Tsingtao, the swift takeover of German Guinea and Samoa, and the hunt for the German East Asian Squadron.
Arguably previous European conflicts like the Seven Years War already check out the "people on different sides are fighting across the world" part of the World War but it wasn't until WW1 or WW2 where multiple non-colonial states across the world were involved in a global conflict (mainly Japan, Brazil, and China).
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If you want a Confederate Kentucky and Missouri then you have to do two things:
1. The United States must fire the first shots of the Civil War to trigger secession in those two states.
2. Shift the Civil War to an earlier decade like the 1850s and have a different event that causes the conflict (i.e. Texas going into New Mexico and fired upon by the United States thus uniting the rest of the South to secede and form the Confederate States earlier).
Having Revolutions of 1848 succeed basically helps created a Greater Germany (Grobdeutschland) comprised of all the German states and Austria.
Civil War AUs tend to have an issue where, they start off realistically, with one or two minor changes leading to the Confederates winning a battle that they lost IOTL, but the thread then quickly becomes a ridiculous Confederate wank where the Army of Northern Virginia just waltzes into DC five minutes after winning the Battle of Antietam or whatever. I've been working on one for the last few days that is a lot more realistic than most- at least, I think it is. The POD is that John Bell Hood doesn't get injured at Chickamauga, leading to his divisions being able to exploit the gap they had discovered in Union lines before it got closed.
I like exploring late 1863 in the civil war. It's a time period in which things are far from over, and either side could win, but things are firmly in the Union's hands. Major Confederate victories, even crucial ones, don't necessarily lead to a victory in the war. In this one I'm focusing mostly on the Western Front, though I'll definitely cover some of the events in the east, as they will be affected. There are a lot of cool ways that shuffling around commanders in Tennessee in 1863 could affect the mid-to-late war
John Bell Hood's Charge - A Chickamauga Civil War AU
Midday, September 20, 1863, at Chickamauga: Longstreet had discovered a gap in the Union lines, and rushed to exploit it as quickly as possible. He gave the order to move at 11:10 a.m. and Johnson's division proceeded across the Brotherton field, by coincidence to precisely the point where...
www.alternatehistory.com
I like exploring late 1863 in the civil war. It's a time period in which things are far from over, and either side could win, but things are firmly in the Union's hands. Major Confederate victories, even crucial ones, don't necessarily lead to a victory in the war. In this one I'm focusing mostly on the Western Front, though I'll definitely cover some of the events in the east, as they will be affected. There are a lot of cool ways that shuffling around commanders in Tennessee in 1863 could affect the mid-to-late war
Japan was most definitely not non-colonial in either world war. They invaded Formosa (Taiwan) in 1895 and Korea in 1910. They seized German colonies in China and Oceania in world war I. Then in WWII you get into the invasions of Manchuria, China proper, the Dutch East Indies, Guam, the Philippines, Burma, French Indochina ...
What I meant is that Japan was an independent state that wasn't controlled by European powers at that time, unlike India, which was controlled by Britain, so they were inevitably going to join in WWI/WWII on behalf of the British Empire. It's the same with China in WWII, albeit they joined the Allies because they opposed Japan.
Maybe I should've been more accurate. Non-European states?
Hmmm... strangely like in OTL
I think it's just that nobody has the patience to draw borders for all the Princely States... or takes time to do the research to figure out how things may have gone a bit differently...
I mean you could say the same of WW2 until the Pacific theater which may or may or not be a sure thing.
I think this is because the tragedy of the first war produces radicalization and that leads to the second war. But I suppose there's no reason why the first war can't be caused by a radical idealogy fueled by some other sort of tragedy.
I've seen some timelines where India is not that divided but is split up more than in our world, though I can't remember exactly where right now. But in all honesty, drawing the borders for all the Princely States is one of those things I cannot muster the courage to inflict on myself, along with drawing all the constituent parts of the Holy Roman Empire.
True, but the Asian theatre was much larger and things actually happened in Africa other than the Germans immediately losing everything except for the one force that carried on guerilla warfare until the end of the war. And the countries of the Western Hemisphere were more involved, were involved in larger numbers, and were involved for more of the conflict.
As the resident Inca stan of the site...
A) That the Inca(or other organized societies in the New World with advanced economies but lacking gunpowder, steel, or natural resistances to European viruses) are doomed to be toppled as soon as Europeans show up
B) That Europe is destined to become the economic hegemons and the 'explorers' of the world
I've beaten point A like a dead horse over the years, but the gist of it is that the Spanish showing up at exactly the time they did is a hell of an argument for divine intervention. Anything resembling a PoD, even a few days' delay for Pizarro, changes the history of the Andes radically. The Inca aren't going to roll over and die after one encounter in a scenario where the Emperor isn't a hostage and the majority of the soldiers aren't unarmed as a show of force.
Point B ties into point A a little but the gist of is this: without the gold and silver of the New World, the powers of Europe aren't able to wage wars to the same extent of OTL, the production and purchase of arms is going to be lessened, the amount of capital available to the bourgeoisie is going to be less, the demographics more uncomfortable as there's less release valves to overpopulation due to less war and less immigration. All the factors that compounded on each other to lead to European dominance are going to be weaker, if not mitigated outright. Europe can still do what they did OTL to an extent if they still usurp Indian Ocean trade, but then, if you butterfly an independent Portugal then you can potentially disrupt this process for a while or perhaps even entirely if another state rises to fill a similar role in trade. Portugal was able to focus on the seas to the extent it did because it was largely at peace with its neighbors on land, it's only interests in expansion lay across a sea, and it was an independent state at the bad end of the world's longest trade route. A more violent Iberian peninsula or an Iberia where Portugal is subsumed into a state that has better access to Mediterranean goods, or even just a unified Iberia that's at constant war with a North African or Gallic power, and suddenly the resources that went into naval advancements aren't there anymore, there's no autonomous state akin to Portugal to lay the foundations for the rest of Europe.
If you can keep the powers centered on Europe's best geographic chokepoints(The British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula) focused less on trade and more on war be it due to internal divisions, a powerful enemy constantly on their borders for which they need an army, etc. then the slower that naval advancements could come about, leaving a window of opportunity for exploration to come about from another source. Historically, the world's most prominent thalassocracies all came about due to their ability to remove themselves from traditional land warfare. Tyre, Venice, Portugal, Great Britain, etc. There is a pattern to this for a reason. Disrupt that ability to ignore or avoid land warfare, and you have potential to clip the wings of Western Europe and butterfly their compounding advantages.
A) That the Inca(or other organized societies in the New World with advanced economies but lacking gunpowder, steel, or natural resistances to European viruses) are doomed to be toppled as soon as Europeans show up
B) That Europe is destined to become the economic hegemons and the 'explorers' of the world
I've beaten point A like a dead horse over the years, but the gist of it is that the Spanish showing up at exactly the time they did is a hell of an argument for divine intervention. Anything resembling a PoD, even a few days' delay for Pizarro, changes the history of the Andes radically. The Inca aren't going to roll over and die after one encounter in a scenario where the Emperor isn't a hostage and the majority of the soldiers aren't unarmed as a show of force.
Point B ties into point A a little but the gist of is this: without the gold and silver of the New World, the powers of Europe aren't able to wage wars to the same extent of OTL, the production and purchase of arms is going to be lessened, the amount of capital available to the bourgeoisie is going to be less, the demographics more uncomfortable as there's less release valves to overpopulation due to less war and less immigration. All the factors that compounded on each other to lead to European dominance are going to be weaker, if not mitigated outright. Europe can still do what they did OTL to an extent if they still usurp Indian Ocean trade, but then, if you butterfly an independent Portugal then you can potentially disrupt this process for a while or perhaps even entirely if another state rises to fill a similar role in trade. Portugal was able to focus on the seas to the extent it did because it was largely at peace with its neighbors on land, it's only interests in expansion lay across a sea, and it was an independent state at the bad end of the world's longest trade route. A more violent Iberian peninsula or an Iberia where Portugal is subsumed into a state that has better access to Mediterranean goods, or even just a unified Iberia that's at constant war with a North African or Gallic power, and suddenly the resources that went into naval advancements aren't there anymore, there's no autonomous state akin to Portugal to lay the foundations for the rest of Europe.
If you can keep the powers centered on Europe's best geographic chokepoints(The British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula) focused less on trade and more on war be it due to internal divisions, a powerful enemy constantly on their borders for which they need an army, etc. then the slower that naval advancements could come about, leaving a window of opportunity for exploration to come about from another source. Historically, the world's most prominent thalassocracies all came about due to their ability to remove themselves from traditional land warfare. Tyre, Venice, Portugal, Great Britain, etc. There is a pattern to this for a reason. Disrupt that ability to ignore or avoid land warfare, and you have potential to clip the wings of Western Europe and butterfly their compounding advantages.
The new world wasn't actually that much of a profit turner otl. The sugar plantations in the Caribbean were where the money was, settlement the continent was a combination of general political strategy (British expansion was often to check the French and the French barely cared about the continent other than to feed their real prizes in the Caribbean) and want of gold that the Spanish found but couldn't replicate. Plus the exploration could have come from anywhere but it probably wouldn't. China and India were the prizes that Europe wanted to trade with otl, so they wouldn't explore outside of fringe cartographers with too much money; similarly, the Middle East, Korea, Japan, and SEAsia were all close enough to trade directly, and the ottoman empire was the reason for Europe's exploration (the tariffs they implemented were pretty sectarian, and north Africa wasn't in a good spot during the age of exploration, also knocking them out). That leaves sub-Saharan Africa, or the natives themselves.
Now, points where they're due, Mali did send some expeditions out otl (in fact I think this is how Mansa Musa rose to power, his boss went out on an expedition with him as regent and the predecessor was never seen again). But the Sahel empires were in a poor place to take advantage of that (flat, in constant flux due to being in a relatively thin place without a lot of mountains, basically the opposite of what you said allowed Britain and Spain the safety to build their empires), and other parts were simply screwed by lack of trade routes going that far. And the natives need way more domesticated animals, and more importantly, time, to be able to cross either ocean.
Now, I don't think that European dominance was inevitable, but I do think it was the only region with both the capacity and the incentive to explore. But they certainly don't have to be as successful as otl- perhaps the native Caribbean islanders domesticated some sort of beast of burden and some birds in the classical period, so they had some plagues to return fire to the Europeans with. Or maybe the Princely states are simply uninterested in the offers to buy X port for Y Massive Chunk of Money. Europe rolled a lot of 6s and nat 20s in the period
That is fine, but I think Majapahit refugees fleeing to Luzon creating an exile state there is the actual plausible scenario.
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To be fair @EMT the Aztecs where kind of doomed since their style of warfare was horrible against well everything the Spanish had all their neighbors hated them etc so the collapse of the Aztec empire is very likely but I agree with the Inca Pizarro showed up when plague and civil war had brought the empire to it's knees and it was atahualpa who decided to stay in cajamarca just receiving news that his armies captured cuzco and heck had atahualpa decided not to make a feast and talk to the Spanish instead went with actual armed forces cajarmca would have been a slaughter of Pizarro men
This reminds me of Unmaking the West. One of the scenarios involved Europe beginning the colonial process but then stagnating because of a lack of competition between the European countries.
More generally, I think the dominance of Europeans on this site is guaranteed by the fact that over half of the non-ASB stories have a POD after 1900, and thus well after European colonialism had not just triumphed, but had already begun to decay. And many of the ones from the before 1900 section still take place at a time when the reversal of "the Rise of the West" would be difficult if not impossible. Many of the timelines set in the ancient world have probably butterflied away Europe's status as the rulers and "explorers" of the world but aren't usually walked out that far.
This isn't actually about a certain trope, it's more of a compliant about a trend that I've noticed in alternate history stories/timelines/settings/etc.
An aspect of alternate history that I think isn't really explored that much is culture and how it changes and diverges from OTL. My interpretation of the butterfly effect is that the rate of changes grows exponentially as the timeline progresses. So about a century or so after the POD the world would be a lot different than what it looked like at that point OTL. I personally like to look at alternate history from a worldbuilding perspective, how culture and society changes if certain historical events and developments went differently. Paradoxically, the timelines which have the most interesting cultural developments are the ones that I have the hardest time reading; timelines with a POD set in late antiquity/early middle ages. I have a hard time getting invested in any timeline set before the late middle ages/early modern period either because I'm unfamiliar with or just don't care about the subject matter.
An aspect of alternate history that I think isn't really explored that much is culture and how it changes and diverges from OTL. My interpretation of the butterfly effect is that the rate of changes grows exponentially as the timeline progresses. So about a century or so after the POD the world would be a lot different than what it looked like at that point OTL. I personally like to look at alternate history from a worldbuilding perspective, how culture and society changes if certain historical events and developments went differently. Paradoxically, the timelines which have the most interesting cultural developments are the ones that I have the hardest time reading; timelines with a POD set in late antiquity/early middle ages. I have a hard time getting invested in any timeline set before the late middle ages/early modern period either because I'm unfamiliar with or just don't care about the subject matter.