AHC: Pax Belgio?

Ok, I know this is probably near impossible; but I was wondering how you could replace the Pax Brittania with a Pax Belgio, or a Peace of the Netherlands.

That is, how could you make the netherlands the dominant colonial power by the 1800s.

I have a few ideas;

have new amsterdam last and prosper.
have the dutch claim and settle australia and new zealand when the map them in the 1600s.
but then they'd probably have to federalise in order to pull as many troops as their european neighbors.

But i know that the dutch east indies made them a f**k load of money, so they could use that money to settle across the globe and build the greatest navy.

is it possible?
 
Have them hold Northern Brazil? Grabbing Malaysia and the Philippines would be good too. Also, they'd need to be big enough that France or Germany can't hold them hostage in Europe if they're without allies. Dutch Rhineland maybe?
 
Britain basicly had two major advantages over the Netherlands. One it lies on an island, so it can avoid getting into continental wars and two it had a large population advantage. For the Netherlands to become a major colonial power colonies aren't the problem. With a bit more luck and competence the Dutch could easily keep their part of Brasil, the New Netherlands, Malaysia, Ceylon, South Africa, and (part of) Australia. For settler colonies manpower will soon be a problem, but I think that could be solved by using Germans, Scandinavians, Hugenots etc.

The problem remains that the Netherlands is still too small. Earlier succes during the Dutch revolt and thus regaining a large part of the southern Netherlands would be useful; certainly if it can be esteblished before Flanders and Brabant are reconverted to Catholicism. A protestant (or largely protestant) Flanders and Antwerp could mean breaking the extremely strong position Holland had OTL. Maybe it could even mean earlier emancipation of Dutch Catholics, that would be usefull.

Still even with the southern Netherlands, it will probably be too small to be the major power on the continent. It could use some expansionism into Germany. I think East-Frisia, Cleves, Bentheim, etc. could be useful addition to the Netherlands, especialy if they manage to gain the Ruhr area, useful for the industrial revolution.

In the end I fear the European continent will still be dominated by France and not the Netherlands. The Netherlands can have a pretty big colonial empire, including a decent piece of north America, part of Brasil, Guyana, the Gold coast, South Africa, Ceylon, South East Asia and Australia, but in the end if your safety is threatened by your homecountry being overrun by France, you simply cannot only focus on seapower. If the Netherlands will develop as I suggested, it will be one of the major European powers and likely remain that way, have a large and proffitable colonial empire, but will still remain third behind both Britain and France.


Wouldn't a Netherland-wank be more likely a Pax Batavia?
Possible, but Belgica was used as a synonim for the Netherlands too. Only when Belgium became independent in 1830, it wasn't used for the Netherlands and solely for Belgium.
 
Like was said it requires a good population basis.

A France screw might be helpful. Netherlands need some german territories. Rhineland would be nice, but it´s hard to imagine them expanding like that...

It requires a very different netherlands I´d think.
 
Like was said it requires a good population basis.

A France screw might be helpful. Netherlands need some german territories. Rhineland would be nice, but it´s hard to imagine them expanding like that...

It requires a very different netherlands I´d think.

I'm not sure if it's that hard with the right POD. The Rhineland had an economy of trading towns, a middle class, liberalism and influential merchants. Language aside, I'd say culturally they were more similar to the Dutch than the Austrians or the Prussians.
 
didn't the dutch successfully invade England in the 1600s?

besides that, so really all it needs is a larger population?
but if its overseas colonies boom in population could it just draw up troops from its colonies while at war in europe.

even if they overrun the Netherlands couldn't they just come back with much more troops (considering France really didn't have a colonial empire) while the government temporarily move to new Amsterdam or another colony?
 
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HJ Tulp

Donor
didn't the dutch successfully invade England in the 1600s?

besides that, so really all it needs is a larger population?
but if its overseas colonies boom in population could it just draw up troops from its colonies while at war in europe.

even if they overrun the Netherlands couldn't they just come back with much more troops (considering France really didn't have a colonial empire) while the government temporarily move to new Amsterdam or another colony?

17th-19th century warfare didn't really work like that.
 
I'm not sure if it's that hard with the right POD. The Rhineland had an economy of trading towns, a middle class, liberalism and influential merchants. Language aside, I'd say culturally they were more similar to the Dutch than the Austrians or the Prussians.

But there was never a desire to incorporate towns into the Republic. The Dutch occupied some German towns during the period, and they were never treated as Dutch territory.
 

iddt3

Donor
didn't the dutch successfully invade England in the 1600s?

besides that, so really all it needs is a larger population?
but if its overseas colonies boom in population could it just draw up troops from its colonies while at war in europe.

even if they overrun the Netherlands couldn't they just come back with much more troops (considering France really didn't have a colonial empire) while the government temporarily move to new Amsterdam or another colony?
It was a consensual invasion :p.
 
Indeed, the foreign intervention was actively sought by Parliament and the Protestants of the UK.

Is there any limit as to how far back the PoD can be? Because if there isn't, we can always play around with Medieval-era Flanders, and see if they can't become a decently sized power.
 
Is there any limit as to how far back the PoD can be? Because if there isn't, we can always play around with Medieval-era Flanders, and see if they can't become a decently sized power.
In my opinion the early days of the Dutch revolution would be enough. Make sure a large part of Flanders and Brabant remains part of the Netherlands.
 
One thing that really hindered the Dutch during the 17th century was the Stadholder/States General power struggle. Butterfly that away and they can even defeat England without breaking a sweat (thats how powerfull they were, and how much the power struggle weakened them).

Alternatively have Willem 2 be a different person, his jerk behavior ensured nothing more than having the Dutch be unprepared for war when the English decided to be the trolls (as in the forum definition) they historically were.
 
One thing that really hindered the Dutch during the 17th century was the Stadholder/States General power struggle. Butterfly that away and they can even defeat England without breaking a sweat (thats how powerfull they were, and how much the power struggle weakened them).

I disagree with that. The biggest problem of the republic was that they only cared for money. Of course that was part of their greatest strengths, it meant they realy did have a lot of money, but they ignored everything else. They more or less disbanded and ignored the army and navy after the Dutch revolt; they found out it wasn't a good idea the hard way during the first Anglo-Dutch war and Franco-Dutch war.
 
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