ALT 21st Century Super Powers

But the Ottoman empire would be between two and three times the population and with hugely more industrial and agricultural resources than Japan, so I'm not sure I understand the comparison.

Despite the apparent size on the map, the Fertile Crescent is neither large nor, as it happens, particularly fertile. Virtually all inhabitants live extremely close to the coast and rivers on a fraction of the land, necessitating an enormous navy just to remain whole on its own merits, rather than at the sufferance of the real powers. For all that the population could have been large combining all of those disparate bits, it's population still wouldn't hold a candle to that of the US or Russia unless both were truncated. And geography means that it will never achieve the kind of sustained economic explosion that made America and Russia (and is making China) into superpowers.

Regardless of political boundaries and infrastructure development, Tunis and Tripoli will economically be tied to Algeria and Italy more than the Balkans, Iraq, or even Egypt. So.... Great Power, yes. Superpower, no.

Also, why would oil wealth be worse than a wealth of any other industrial resource? The Ottomans had coal and numerous metals in the Balkans and Anatolia, so they certainly wouldn't be lacking in other important resources.

As for who they would sell oil to, any great powers who are neutral or allied with them, and quite possibly their rivals so long as war doesn't seem to be imminent, based on OTL oil sales.

Dutch disease. Natural resource wealth inflates currency to the point export industry becomes impossible.
 
I think you need to define the difference between Great Power and Superpower.

The United States is the only superpower right now. China, India, etc are Great Powers.

So, to be a superpower you need:
1. Population
2. Geographic extent
3. Political Stability
4. Wealth
5. Technical sophistication - i.e. global reach
6. The willingness to maintain - and use - a large military

So - using rivaling the USA as the benchmark - who could be a 2012 superpower assuming a 1866 POD (to avoid Civil War screws of the USA)?

The British Empire - if they can federate and not fight two world wars.

Heck, it can go ahead and fight the wars. If it can manage to federate sustainably, a superpower it would be. Albeit one centered in New Delhi.

German hegemon - Germany plus Austria plus some Nordic component that achieves some kind of living space in the East. Probably not a nice place.

China: On the way already; butterfly Chaing and Mao, have some charismatic leader toss out the Japanese and engage economically with the world starting in 1945.

India: Britain collapses for some reason (maybe Commie revolt in 1919 after WWI goes bad); British intelligensia flee to India ... maybe too Peshawar Lancers ...

Yup, yup, yup. But you don't necessarily need everyone fleeing Britain to manage it, IMHO.

Argentina: Had first world per capita income in 1900. Maybe some leader manages to unify Spanish-speaking South America under Buenos Aires (in response to some Brazilian threat?); good resource base, lousy communication, but isolated enough to grow, especially if USA leaves them alone.

The numbers were high because they were all cattle ranchers. There's no coal or oil to speak of. I don't buy it. Still waiting to see how Thande excuses it in LTTW.

Japan: Only with a 'Kinder, Gentler, Co-Prosperity Sphere' that manages not to piss off the USA until it is integrated.

But a 'Kinder, Gentler, Co-Prosperity Sphere' won't be a Japanese superpower. No matter how they intended it, it'd be Chinese inside a generation and a half.

Russia: Tuchachevski purges Stalin in 1937. He believes the British, and the Red Army is ready for June 22. Still forced back, but terrible German casualties, stopped short of Minsk. Soviet counterattacks knock out Germans by 1944. Meet Allies on Rhine in early 1944. Much less demographic and physical destruction resulting in more ethnic Russians; less paranoia. Much better relations with West. Sustained economic growth. Still here in 2012; tottering a bit as non-Russian population growth starts to exceed Russians...

Ayup. Russia's easy.

South Africa: Not without wacky ASB level stuff; i.e. meteor strike in Europe forces massive migration to Capetown in 1870 ...

Mike Turcotte

Oh, I don't know. From 1800 we might be able to get them to superpower status a couple rungs down from the post-Barbarossa USSR. But it'd take near everything going right and even then I doubt they'd get to that point in time to be superpower for a significant portion of the 20th century.
 
How about a German Empire that doesn't bait the rest of Europe into a massive arms race and subsequent destructive war, but waits and later integrates with the German parts of Austria-Hungary, and manages to keep it's colonies? There's certainly the potential.

Otherwise, Britain, France, Mexico, Russia, perhaps Spain, of course China and India.
 
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