Bigger Bulgaria

[tom]

Make Bulgaria as big as you can.

 

[Grey Wolf]

Make Bulgaria as big as you can.

Realistically and unless you want to change a millennia or so, you are looking for a San Stefano sized Bulgaria. There are two ways to achieve this IMHO

1. Have San Stefano stand and not be reworked by the Congress of Berlin

2. Have the Central Powers win the First World War. Bulgaria would then gain the S Dobruja from Rumania, and the bulk of Macedonia from Serbia and probably Greece given that Salonika is both a vital prize, and was the base for the anti-monarchist Greek government

I suppose a third possibility revolves around the Balkan Wars - either Bulgaria takes Constantinople and Salonika in the First Balkan War, or it does not screw up the Second so badly as to be beaten up on by all sides

Grey Wolf

 

[Abdul Hadi Pasha]

Realistically and unless you want to change a millennia or so, you are looking for a San Stefano sized Bulgaria. There are two ways to achieve this IMHO

1. Have San Stefano stand and not be reworked by the Congress of Berlin

2. Have the Central Powers win the First World War. Bulgaria would then gain the S Dobruja from Rumania, and the bulk of Macedonia from Serbia and probably Greece given that Salonika is both a vital prize, and was the base for the anti-monarchist Greek government

I suppose a third possibility revolves around the Balkan Wars - either Bulgaria takes Constantinople and Salonika in the First Balkan War, or it does not screw up the Second so badly as to be beaten up on by all sides

Grey Wolf

I don't think the Balkan Wars are the best bet; the tensions were heavily built in, and would have erupted into war before long. I think your best solution is CP win WWI; then you will have a pretty stable alliance between Bulgaria and the Ottomans, with the Germans to back them, Serbia crushed utterly, and Greece in no position to be uppity. Even San Stefano was pretty unstable. Have you SEEN the map? Holy moly! That was about five wars waiting to happen.

 

[Grey Wolf]

I don't think the Balkan Wars are the best bet; the tensions were heavily built in, and would have erupted into war before long. I think your best solution is CP win WWI; then you will have a pretty stable alliance between Bulgaria and the Ottomans, with the Germans to back them, Serbia crushed utterly, and Greece in no position to be uppity. Even San Stefano was pretty unstable. Have you SEEN the map? Holy moly! That was about five wars waiting to happen.

Yes, I concur whole-heartedly. Being a major victor in a major war would be the best bet. San Stefano they relied entirely on Russian support to protect those boundaries, and it would have led to renewed fighting pretty soon after. The Balkan Wars had they gone better for Bulgaria would probably have seen a Second Balkan War as a kind of inverse of OTL's with the others trying to seize gains from Bulgaria rather than the other way round.

After a Central Powers victory in the Great War, especially if Italy is on the defeatd side, all of Serbian Macedonia and probably most of Greek Macedonia would have been Bulgarian. Greece, in the person of the monarchy rather than Venizelios, could have been compensated with 'Northern Epirus' (i.e. S. Albania) and possibly even more.

Grey Wolf

 

[valio_98]

the grater bulgaria

Make Bulgaria as big as you can.

Sure, I would like that.

Go to the Golden Age - the time of king Simeon the Great (not the present day ex-king and currently prime-minister), change the opucome of the seige of Konstantinopole and you will get it.

P.S. See my entry under Valentin Ivanov in the Uchronia...

 

[Abdul Hadi Pasha]

Sure, I would like that.

Go to the Golden Age - the time of king Simeon the Great (not the present day ex-king and currently prime-minister), change the opucome of the seige of Konstantinopole and you will get it.

P.S. See my entry under Valentin Ivanov in the Uchronia...

But then it wouldn't be Bulgaria.

 

[Duncan]

But then it wouldn't be Bulgaria.

Hey, he didn't say _which_ Bulgaria. I favour not letting the Khazars split up Old Great Bulgaria in the 7th century.

Now, make Volga Bulgaria a lasting great power, there's a challenge....

 

[Max Sinister]

In Gurps AE 2 there's the Caliph TL (right, Muslims win). The Volga Bulgars are converted to Islam in the 9th century, get gunpowder and civilization, conquer the Empire of Kiev, and eventually the balcans with Christian Bulgaria. Later, they also get Siberia (without Central Asia, however), northern and western America and (I think) also have colonies in SE Asia. All in all, an empire bigger than OTL Sovjet union...

 

[Duncan]

In Gurps AE 2 there's the Caliph TL (right, Muslims win). The Volga Bulgars are converted to Islam in the 9th century, get gunpowder and civilization, conquer the Empire of Kiev, and eventually the balcans with Christian Bulgaria. Later, they also get Siberia (without Central Asia, however), northern and western America and (I think) also have colonies in SE Asia. All in all, an empire bigger than OTL Sovjet union...

The Volga Bulgars adopted Islam in OTL anyway (only in 922, though), and grew to be quite civilized. It would have to be something like that TL, beating out the Rus somehow or other and getting strong enough to stop the Mongols, or deep-rooted enough to re-emerge afterwards.