AHC: CSA wins Civil War, CP win WW1, France becomes fascist...what next?

This is a broader question related to one I previously asked, with a similar starting point.

The first POD is in the 1860s, where the Confederacy wins over the Union. This is through some better decisions by the CSA, some luck, and weariness from many in the USA. There are some alliances with the USA and Germany, plus CSA with Britain, but for the most part the North American continent fights all of this on its own, and mostly stays clear of European politics for the next 50 years. I know that this scenario opens a LOT of discussion on its own, but for now, assume that this is what happens.

WW1 starts virtually identical to how it did in OTL. Because of foreign alliances the CSA & USA end up going to war again, but there is a long enough border to battle over that they really can't send troops overseas to help Britain or Germany. So WW1 is fought without North American involvement, and the North American faction of the war is pretty much a proxy of the European war. Again, this is a huge POD in many places, and opens up a ton of discussion, but it's not the point of my question. For my purposes assume that Germany/Central Powers win in Europe in 1918. In North America the USA gains some territory in Canada (which Britain can't really defend properly due to the European war) and possibly a little in the CSA, but since the CSA has had 50 years to increase productivity and prepare to stand against the USA, it ends up being a bit of a stalemate. What I'm thinking here is similar to Turtledove's TL-191, but without the trouncing against the CSA in that TL and without it becoming fascist.

Again, all of the above is necessary for the AHC I'm proposing, so assume that after 1918 the CP have won, Britain isn't in bad shape, and North America is split between the CSA and USA. Also assume that France then starts down the road to fascism, and some parties in that country have a serious grudge against Germany.

Please speculate what happens in Europe over the next 20-30 years. With Germany dominating, what happens to the rest of the countries, especially ones under German influence? Would a second world war ever happen, and if so, what would it look like? Would France ever find the allies or power to take the fight back against Germany? Does Germany remain dominant or does it eventually lose power? What changes happen in European monarchies & government with a CP win compared to OTL?

As an additional challenge, I'd like speculation on what happens both with the standard Bolshevik win in Russia as in OTL, as well as a new POD where the White Russians hold onto power against the socialists. How does these two TL differ, given the above circumstances?

And.....go!
 
There is much butterfly killing. And it really not be plausible that UK would support slave-owning nation.

Firstly you have find way CSA to win war probably without Brits. And even bigger thing is surviving to early 20th century and becoming strong enough avoiding re-conquest by USA.

Germany and its allies might win WW1 but it is very different. France might develope as extremist ideology nation but its fascism is very different from OTL. And Russian revolution if it ever occur is surely different.
 
I like spanning topics! :)

Yes, civilized France goes fascist for many of the same reasons civilized Germany went fascist. Just that opens up some hell of some interesting possibilities.
 
My first question is: how is this TL different from Turtledove's and why?
Because it sounds very parallel so I'm wondering what the point is? A less politically extreme series, dropping fascism in America?

I think its fine to set the victory of the Confederacy as a POD, but you'd need to define the form of it quite a bit. What year does the ACW end and what territories is CSA composed of?
You don't need to spend a lot of time on this, but have to lay it out in broad strokes for your ATL 20th century to make sense.

One plausible POD is Jeffrey Evans Brooks's Shattered Nation approach in which a war-weary Union elects McClellan in 1864 because Atlanta did not fall.
A POD I haven't seen yet would be that the Confederates don't boycott cotton sales to UK in 1861-1862. That brings in a lot more foreign money and keeps the Confederacy strong long enough for Lincoln to lose the 1864 election.

With a CP victory in 1918 the Germans get all their colonies back with the possible exception of Tsingtao, plus acquiring many of France's in exchange for return of land in European France. Also, the former Belgian Congo goes to Germany and Belgium becomes a German client state. The Germans gain a huge swath of territory from the Russians and in this ATL they get to keep it. The monarchic empires of Europe stumble along with the same internal divisions weakening Austria-Hungary and Ottoman Turkey until they blow apart internally, leading to communism, fascism, and/or civil war. Italy still goes fascist as in the OTL pattern since defeat would be worse than profitless victory. Britain isn't 'fine' per se because she has a powerful Germany to share the colonial world with. France seizes upon De Gaulle's tank warfare concept and builds a military around it. Germany struggles to grow into her new role as a big colonial power.

That's all I have until you define more details.
 

GarethC

Donor
Hold on for a second. There's a lot of stuff that happens in the half-century between the ACW and WWI that is tough to just gloss over.

WW1 (amongst other contributing factors) was reliant on the Franco-German hostility remaining from the 1870-1 Franco-Prussian War, which saw France lose, Napoleon III abdicate and a republic arise in his place.

CSA victory is going to have an enormous effect on French policy here, in no small part because of the effect on the French intervention in Mexico, to put Maximilien Hapsburg on the throne as Emperor.

OTL, the French intervention was unsuccessful in no small part because of US hostility to it - Johnson supplied weapons to the republican side and pressured France to withdraw, and with the surplus of materiel available after the civil war and short supply line to the US, Napoleon withdrew.

However, with a CSA that looks to Paris (and London) for trade, such support to the Republicans will not be forthcoming, and it feels unlikely that things in Europe will transpire as they did, with Prussian victory, Napoleon's regime's collapse, and the loss of Alsace-Lorraine setting the stage for a rematch two generations later. Continued (but successful) French entanglement in Mexico may push Napoleon to temporise with Bismarck - and either not have a war at all, or wait a couple of years until the troops are back home and the treasury is a bit better off, which coincidentally will mean that some more French Army reforms are complete and the inferiority in artillery and rail logistics is addressed. If France is more moderate in 1870, will German Confederation happen? If Napoleon doesn't feel so butthurt about Mexico and act so rashly in Europe, might he not use the levers of diplomacy and money to pry some of the Rhine, Bavaria, or Hanover out of Bismarck's grip?

Can the CSA resume it's supply of cotton to the textile industry of Britain, or will antipathy to slavery and the geopolitics of Empire make Egypt the source for the dark, satanic mills of the green and pleasant land? If not, where does the economy of the CSA go? Can the CSA drop slavery de jure while keeping some de facto apartheid to satisfy the local strongmen, yet allow foreign relations to normalise?

Will Anglo-French fin de siecle colonial tensions evolve to an Entente Cordiale with Hapsburg Mexico and the CSA in the mix? Will there be clashes in Africa or around Malaya and FIC, perhaps over an attempt to interfere too egregiousy in Thailand? Will Yul Brynner get to be in The King and I?

Will family ties cause Mexico to veer from France to Austria? Austria shifts from Prussian foe in 1866 to German ally in 1914 because, well, because of Russia. If Britain is less certain of French non-intervention around the world, will Russia win the Great Game faster, and look to threaten India? The Russian people demand empire or bread, but will revolt if they have neither goes the old saying; but Pakistan might do as well as the Balkans for the former. With a balkanised Germany, might Wilhelm I look to the historic Prussian national pastime of drang nach osten?

Where will Hawaii go? Can a diminished USA still look to annex the Republic? Will it join the British Empire instead? If it does, does US intervention in the Philippines make sense, or will they go German?

Will there be a CSA presence in China? Will the Boxer Rebellion take the Foreign Legations in Peking, or will a CSA presence make the defence more robust?

How will Cuba evolve? What about the Philippines? Will the USA and CSA cooperate to divide up the Spanish Empire? If Spain retains some presence in the New World, can it have more governmental stability? Will there ven be a Spanish Civil War? Will Hemingway even be a writer? No "For sale - baby shoes. Never worn." [On the other hand, there also won't be the Hemingway joke - "Why did the chicken cross the road? To die. In the rain."]

Enquiring minds want to know!
 
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If the CSA wins independence from the USA, then there is no way that it will get rid of slavery in the near future. Slavery was enshrined in the CSA constitution, and there is not a hope of it being abandoned in any size, shape or form. As it was, many of the firebrands in the CSA had grandiose plans to expand slavery into the Caribbean and Latin America. If the CSA wins, look to the hotheads deciding that expansion into the Caribbean to expand the slave trade would be a neat idea (it was proposed, and they've just licked the USA, so let's get moving, 'cos one Confederate is worth 10 of whatever we happen to be facing at the moment).

If the CSA is a slave state, there is not a hope in hell of the UK being in anyway supportive of it. The UK took a lead in stamping out the slave trade, and regarded the Caribbean as an area of interest. The UK was always keen to stay on good terms with the USA, because that was the easiest way to defend Canada. Cotton was coming in from Egypt and India, and while the Confederate economy had to sell cotton, the UK didn't need to buy Confederate cotton, unless the Confederates were offering a cheap deal.

Basically, it's nonsense on stilts to make such a major change in the 1860s, and expect there to be minimal consequences over the next 50 years. Does French intervention in Mexico succeed? What happens with the Fenian invasions of Canada? Will a USA freed of the slavery question become more expansionist westwards and northwards, or less, or get more or less involved in world affairs? Will the purchase of Alaska go ahead? What happens when the Confederate economy falls apart? What happens in the border states? There was bitter infighting during and immediately after the ACW in places like Missouri and Kentucky and Tennessee, and these ill-feelings aren't going to vanish in a puff of armwavium.
 

Archibald

Banned
CSA wins 1865 - does that butterflies Franco - Prussian war, 1870, and then birth of 3rd Republic ? Then the 3rd Republic hellish instability can push France into any direction all the way from 1871 to 1940.
 
My first question is: how is this TL different from Turtledove's and why?
Because it sounds very parallel so I'm wondering what the point is? A less politically extreme series, dropping fascism in America?

Sort of. Yes, I want to avoid some of the political extremities in America, and also keep it very Euro-centric. I'm using parts of his TL as a starting point in this exercise, but wanting to take it a different direction that may or may not lead to a second WW.

I think its fine to set the victory of the Confederacy as a POD, but you'd need to define the form of it quite a bit. What year does the ACW end and what territories is CSA composed of?
You don't need to spend a lot of time on this, but have to lay it out in broad strokes for your ATL 20th century to make sense.

One plausible POD is Jeffrey Evans Brooks's Shattered Nation approach in which a war-weary Union elects McClellan in 1864 because Atlanta did not fall.
A POD I haven't seen yet would be that the Confederates don't boycott cotton sales to UK in 1861-1862. That brings in a lot more foreign money and keeps the Confederacy strong long enough for Lincoln to lose the 1864 election.

That's along the lines of what I'm thinking. I know that many in the Union were war-weary and some wanted to just let the Confederacy go it's own way. Lincoln's re-election wasn't an absolute given, so this fits into my considerations. I would see the war ending with Lincoln losing re-election and Congress ending the war in early 1865. As far as territory I'm considering that they end up in the typical USA/CSA split, neither gaining or losing states or territories.

CSA wins 1865 - does that butterflies Franco - Prussian war, 1870, and then birth of 3rd Republic ?

There's a lot of stuff that happens in the half-century between the ACW and WWI that is tough to just gloss over.

WW1 (amongst other contributing factors) was reliant on the Franco-German hostility remaining from the 1870-1 Franco-Prussian War, which saw France lose, Napoleon III abdicate and a republic arise in his place.

CSA victory is going to have an enormous effect on French policy here, in no small part because of the effect on the French intervention in Mexico, to put Maximilien Hapsburg on the throne as Emperor.

OTL, the French intervention was unsuccessful in no small part because of US hostility to it - Johnson supplied weapons to the republican side and pressured France to withdraw, and with the surplus of materiel available after the civil war and short supply line to the US, Napoleon withdrew.

However, with a CSA that looks to Paris (and London) for trade, such support to the Republicans will not be forthcoming, and it feels unlikely that things in Europe will transpire as they did, with Prussian victory, Napoleon's regime's collapse, and the loss of Alsace-Lorraine setting the stage for a rematch two generations later. Continued (but successful) French entanglement in Mexico may push Napoleon to temporise with Bismarck - and either not have a war at all, or wait a couple of years until the troops are back home and the treasury is a bit better off, which coincidentally will mean that some more French Army reforms are complete and the inferiority in artillery and rail logistics is addressed. If France is more moderate in 1870, will German Confederation happen? If Napoleon doesn't feel so butthurt about Mexico and act so rashly in Europe, might he not use the levers of diplomacy and money to pry some of the Rhine, Bavaria, or Hanover out of Bismarck's grip?
*SNIP*

Assume that France develops similarly to in OTL, unless there is a darn good reason not to. Even if the specifics differ slightly, the end result is the same. The point is to keep European politics similar enough to lead to a World War very similar to OTL, but without America. So limited butterflies affecting how Europe develops. I know that Europe doesn't exist in a vacuum, and American politics did influence it during the late 1800s and early 1900s. But I'm taking the approach that ripples in the stream don't affect its overall course, and even a big boulder won't affect the next stream over as the two feed into a larger river. Make sense?

I'm also not interested at this time in developing the details of economics and influence of the USA and CSA, or how that changes Alaska, Hawaii, etc. My focus in the challenge is Europe, and what happens after the CP wins in 1918. If I wanted to spend time on the 1865-1914 period I would have posted that as the challenge and put this in the pre-1900 forum.

Again, I KNOW that my two PODs open a can of worms and discussion. But that's not the point of my proposed challenge here, and I don't want to discuss those points unless they have direct relevancy to my original question. I'm assuming that events happened similar to OTL, other than the POD with the ACW and Germany winning WW1. Under these circumstances I'm wanting to look beyond 1918 through the 1940s (which is why this is not in the pre-1900 forum). That's what I want speculation on. The point of this challenge is to assume that the circumstances came about, regardless of how that may have happened. France still loses in '70-71. The Hapsburgs still have power as in OTL. The circumstances leading to the outbreak of Europe-wide war in 1914 still happen, and the war goes along as it did in OTL but without American involvement, and with the CP victorious. If we get into too many details of the 1865-1914 period then we may conclude that WW1 would never happen, which defeats the whole point of my question.

So back to my original question and parameters.....

Again, all of the above is necessary for the AHC I'm proposing, so assume that after 1918 the CP have won, Britain isn't in bad shape, and North America is split between the CSA and USA. Also assume that France then starts down the road to fascism, and some parties in that country have a serious grudge against Germany.

Please speculate what happens in Europe over the next 20-30 years. With Germany dominating, what happens to the rest of the countries, especially ones under German influence? Would a second world war ever happen, and if so, what would it look like? Would France ever find the allies or power to take the fight back against Germany? Does Germany remain dominant or does it eventually lose power? What changes happen in European monarchies & government with a CP win compared to OTL?

As an additional challenge, I'd like speculation on what happens both with the standard Bolshevik win in Russia as in OTL, as well as a new POD where the White Russians hold onto power against the socialists. How does these two TL differ, given the above circumstances?
 
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