AHC: European Nations other than UK owned A Quarter of World's Population and Lands

So how to make other European nations get one-quarter of both population and lands of Earth, like the British did in OTL...?
Russia, France, or Spain, maybe...?
 

Anaxagoras

Banned
If France had won the Seven Years War as decisively as the British did IOTL, they could have set forth on the path of a globally dominant empire. This is the basis of my "God is a Frenchman" TL.
 

Zioneer

Banned
Wasn't Russia at it's height around a quarter of the world? If not, then make it even more successful. Maybe the British have a collective brain drain because of the PoD?
 
Wasn't Russia at it's height around a quarter of the world? If not, then make it even more successful. Maybe the British have a collective brain drain because of the PoD?

Maybe make Russia owned northern China? Manchuria? And more of Eastern Europe...?

About France...yeah, SYW was the best possibility...
I wonder though, what would be the French Empire looks like...?

And Spain that hold Latin America have good chance, too...
Larger empire in Africa? Discovering Australia perhaps?

And the Portuguese who has a victory over Indonesian arcipelago...? And keeping Brazil too...
 
France would have a good chance of achieving what Britain did OTL... The First French Colonial Empire (The one France had prior it the 1770s, when it lost New France and its colonies in India) was pretty vast and one of the three largest after the Spanish and British ones. As for the Second Colonial Empire (The one they had around 1900s) was the second largest colonial Empire, behind Britain.
If the French were able to developp a stronger fleet (I don't think you can have a very large and strong colonial Empire without a fleet) and to keep New France and the French (such as Pondychery) parts of India, they could achieve what Britain did.

Spain would be my second candidate in this thread. For a very long time, the Spanish had the larget colonial Empire of the World. Considering it costed them a lot though, I think it would be hard for the Spanish to develop a larger Empire. Might be possible if the Spanish colonies turn out to be not so costly.

The Bourbon Empire scenario would also fit the criterias, but I'm not sure it could last.

After all those possibilities, I can only think of two major colonial powers with the potential of achieving what Britain did : Portugal and the Netherlands. These two would have to be more successful than they were OTL of course.
 
A earlier, and/or lasting, union between Spain and Portugal could be in a very good starting position for that.
 
This gives me an idea - one of the reasons why the Spanish Empire was so fragile was not only because of the sheer amount of gold and silver acquired from the New World, but because of the resulting mismanagement by the Habsburg Spanish administration (especially with the corrupt Duke of Lerma dominating the weak Philip III's reign).

So, if you manage to prevent the Habsburgs sitting on the Spanish throne (as well as making sure the family that does remains more or less competent)...
 
This gives me an idea - one of the reasons why the Spanish Empire was so fragile was not only because of the sheer amount of gold and silver acquired from the New World, but because of the resulting mismanagement by the Habsburg Spanish administration (especially with the corrupt Duke of Lerma dominating the weak Philip III's reign).

So, if you manage to prevent the Habsburgs sitting on the Spanish throne (as well as making sure the family that does remains more or less competent)...

Well, to be fair, the Spanish Bourbons weren't masters of efficiency either...

But you've got a point: a properly handed Spanish colonial Empire could have worked much better for them. Maybe if they attract much more settlers into the Americas, never destroy the Jesuit plantations, develop the Philippines further...
 
Well, to be fair, the Spanish Bourbons weren't masters of efficiency either...

But you've got a point: a properly handed Spanish colonial Empire could have worked much better for them. Maybe if they attract much more settlers into the Americas, never destroy the Jesuit plantations, develop the Philippines further...

Yeah, Spain really got screwed with regards to kings - at least the French Bourbons had Henry IV and Louis XIV.
 
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