AHC: Constitutional monarchy for Germany

JJohnson

Banned
With a PoD after 1700, have a Germany today that fulfills these criteria:
-has a constitutional monarchy and nobility, similar to the UK.
-has at least its 1871 borders (bonus for also having Longwy, Briey, Belfort, Teschen Silesia, New Silesia, South Prussia/New East Prussia, German Bohemia/Sudetenland (German Moravia), Austria+Ödenburg+Preßburg+Marburg an der Drau, South Tyrol, or any combination thereof)
-has protection of civil rights on par with the UK and/or the USA (freedom of speech, religion, press, etc)
-bonus if the monarch is head of gov't and state and not just a figurehead, but still has limited powers (no suspension of rights, for example)
-this Germany must not have caused any world wars in the late 19th to early 20th century, and be the ally of the UK in any conflict with France and/or Russia, and never caused any genocides
- bonus if this Germany retains any overseas possessions to this day as territories or integrated states
-some form of Poland must exist also, as a stable and peaceful (today) nation, and no German state has a restless Polish majority.
-bonus if former colonies have today an ethnic German majority and are also peaceful, stable, prosperous countries where the German monarch is also their monarch.
 
I think generally, a surviving Bismarckian Empire could easily meet most of your requirements, but these two:

- never caused any genocides

-some form of Poland must exist also, as a stable and peaceful (today) nation, and no German state has a restless Polish majority.

I don't think that's doable unless you are using the restrictive definition of genocide (actual killing). What Germany was trying to do in its Polish territories was the systematic destruiction of the Polish population by forced assimilation. That meets the definition as it is frequently used today.

The Herero genocide is easily handwaved away - it was not even part of the original war plan - and 'killing a lot of people, but not systematically all of them' in Ostafrika would not count.

So, likely without the bonus pointrs, but for a viable solution, I suggest a POD in which Bismarck is toppled earlier and Germany gets to develop through a WWI-less early twentieth century. With saner alliances (which are always possible), chances are better than even Germany will be on the winning saide of any war it enters. Poland could become indeperndent at any point in the century for any number of reasons, and being neighbours with Russia and Germany, it had better be peaceful. Among all the Schutzgebiete, though, I can only see Südwest having an ethnic German majority, and that will take a very unpleasant history.
 
-(bonus for also having New Silesia, South Prussia/New East Prussia)
-never caused any genocides
-some form of Poland must exist also, as a stable and peaceful (today) nation, and no German state has a restless Polish majority.
These three are quite incompatible.
 
With a PoD after 1700, have a Germany today that fulfills these criteria:
-has a constitutional monarchy and nobility, similar to the UK.
-has at least its 1871 borders (bonus for also having Longwy, Briey, Belfort, Teschen Silesia, New Silesia, South Prussia/New East Prussia, German Bohemia/Sudetenland (German Moravia), Austria+Ödenburg+Preßburg+Marburg an der Drau, South Tyrol, or any combination thereof)
-has protection of civil rights on par with the UK and/or the USA (freedom of speech, religion, press, etc)
-bonus if the monarch is head of gov't and state and not just a figurehead, but still has limited powers (no suspension of rights, for example)
-this Germany must not have caused any world wars in the late 19th to early 20th century, and be the ally of the UK in any conflict with France and/or Russia, and never caused any genocides
- bonus if this Germany retains any overseas possessions to this day as territories or integrated states
-some form of Poland must exist also, as a stable and peaceful (today) nation, and no German state has a restless Polish majority.
-bonus if former colonies have today an ethnic German majority and are also peaceful, stable, prosperous countries where the German monarch is also their monarch.

- Succesful revolution of 1848/49, one of the Habsburgs become emperor, so Germany has the 1871 borders + German Austria and Bohemia (okay, without Elsass-Lothringen)

- North Italy, Hungary and Croatia have a personal union with Germany, Poland can become partially independant if the Polish population supports the revolution

- If Germany unites earlier, it can take part in colonization of Africa and grab North Africa and some parts of the middle east. A majority of German immigrants in the colonies is nearly impossible, but the natives can speak German and be germanized; if the colonies are released early, the local elites will maybe agree to form a union.
 

Perkeo

Banned
I don't think that's doable unless you are using the restrictive definition of genocide (actual killing). What Germany was trying to do in its Polish territories was the systematic destruiction of the Polish population by forced assimilation. That meets the definition as it is frequently used today.

The official definition by the UN is:

any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

It is more than clear that the forced assimilation of the Poles pre-WWI is bad, but not a genocide. And IMO to dilute the definition so much that forced assimilation counts as genocide would ridicule the victims of real genocides (as defined above), which BTW includes the Poles.


The Herero genocide is easily handwaved away - it was not even part of the original war plan - and 'killing a lot of people, but not systematically all of them' in Ostafrika would not count.

Sooner or later comes the time when the colonial power has to choose between genocide and decolonization, and it's not easy to have them choose right at the first attempt. I'd rather try not giving Ostafrika to Germany in the first place.
 
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- Succesful revolution of 1848/49, one of the Habsburgs become emperor, so Germany has the 1871 borders + German Austria and Bohemia (okay, without Elsass-Lothringen)

- North Italy, Hungary and Croatia have a personal union with Germany, Poland can become partially independant if the Polish population supports the revolution

- If Germany unites earlier, it can take part in colonization of Africa and grab North Africa and some parts of the middle east. A majority of German immigrants in the colonies is nearly impossible, but the natives can speak German and be germanized; if the colonies are released early, the local elites will maybe agree to form a union.

With a POD like this how likely (given possible German military might if there is one standing army) that Savoy Italy (or Republican Garibaldian Italy) take North Italy? I say next to impossible. And Hungary/Croatia is screwed because the Habsburgs could overwhelm them if they try for independence.
Here's a though. Instead of expanding East (I can't see an independent Poland of some kind unless unification under the Habsburgs means the Hohenzollern/Prussia get some losses like their Polish territory) the New German Empire expands South and goes after Bosnia/Albania/Serbia/the Ottomans in the 1850s.
 
As a conservative/romantic reaction to the 1848 revolutions, a neo-medieval empire is established with the Habsburgs as hereditary Emperors and the Hohenzollerns as hereditary commanders-in-chief. There is a diluted parliamentary structure. In the resultant internal wrangling, the Habsburgs side with the liberals so that the military comes under parliamentary/civilian control.
 
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