Challenge: Strange Alliances

World War breaks out between two mighty alliances....

Challenges are:

- PoD or Timeline making this scenario happen (bonus points for later PoD, or plausible PoD) - n.b. switching countries between alliances is allowed provided you switch the corresponding country in the other alliance over (e.g. you could swap Equatorial Guinea with Papua New Guinea if it helps you make a more plausible scenario)

- Propose any additional members of the alliances



THE UNITED ALLIANCE OF FREE NATIONS

England (capital city = York)
Equatorial Guinea
The (Dutch) East Indies
South Wales
South Korea
Democratic Republic of Congo
Guinea
Guyana
Micronesia
People's Republic of China
Georgia (in North America)
New Jersey
(British) Virgin Islands
Nigeria
Cyprus
(Netherlands) Antilles
(Western) Samoa
Dominica
East Germany
North Vietnam
South Yemen


THE FREE ALLIANCE OF UNITED NATIONS

New England (capital city = New York)
Papua New Guinea
The West Indies (Federation)
New South Wales
North Korea
Republic of Congo
Guinea-Bissau
(French) Guyana
(French) Polynesia
Republic of China
Georgia (in the Caucasus)
Jersey
(Danish/US) Virgin Islands
Niger
Northern Cyprus
Netherlands
(German/American) Samoa
Dominican Republic
West Germany
South Vietnam
North Yemen
 
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If York is the capital of England, the POD would be around 700 AD or so, or earlier, so the names of the other countries probably would be different. And the English language would be different.

But maybe a 19th century POD would be doable. A British explorer in Africa comes back with AIDS or another viral infection; they didn't know about viruses until the 1890s, so the disease becomes a pandemic, and even the Royal Family is affected. There is panic and pandemonium, the colonial empires collapse, the Scramble for Africa is cut off.

London is firebombed by a zeppelin and the capital moves to York. The US Civil War goes on longer and New England secedes. The Confederacy wins the war but later breaks up.

The people of New York are sympathetic to New England and that's why they later agree to be annexed to New England. But New Jerseyites are too stubborn to join any of the other nations of North America, and remain independent. They become wealthy as a tax haven, with banking, tourism, and a burgeoning movie industry.

Virginia is too devastated by the war to be significant, and the most powerful remaining state is Georgia, which proceeds to conquer the rest of the South and Southwest from the period 1880-1920.

Mercenaries from North America and Europe flee the constant fighting, and they go to various countries in the Pacific and elsewhere looking for riches and establish their own independent countries. That's why we have countries like Guinea and Congo and Guyana being powerful and stable.

They're run very efficiently by oligarchs smart enough to establish firm rules
for succession and they keep the peasants fed enough and busy enough that they don't rebel.

By 1900, the person who holds the throne of England was 90th in line for the throne--the others being too young, old, ill, crazy, unprepared, etc.

The Manchu dynasty collapses and the region is divided between two new countries each dominated by a European-influenced group of oligarchs, one socialist and one fascist.

Hawaii is independent, and one of their wealthy entrepreneurs goes to conquer his own empire among the Pacific Islands we know as Micronesia.

The Austrian and Prussian empires break up in civil war and conflict with France, Italy and the Ottoman empire. The Western German states remain disunified and small, but the eastern German states are united in a new realm known as "East Germany."

Vietnam was dominated by Thailand for a time, but the Thai kingdom breaks up in civil war, and a Vietnamese general who didn't live in OTL raises an army. He expands his territory westward, conquers Thailand and surrounding regions to establish the Kingdom of South Vietnam.

His brother, a naval genius, takes control of the northern region and expands eastward, into S. China, Taiwan, and nearby islands, eventually taking control of the Philippines.

Some of these countries, such as Cyprus, become wealthy through tourism, banking, selling stamps and coins, offshore tax havens, etc.

A political genius who lived on the island of Dominica becomes a popular, populist leader, his family is wealthy, and buys up land on various other islands, so the Dominican republic includes Dominica, Cuba, and nearby places. They get wealthy from plantation crops.

Some of the other names can be applied to other regions, or larger regions, such as Dominica, which could be a new name for South Africa, for example.

Catholics fleeing the plagues and fighting in Europe settle in South Africa in the 1920s, and take over the government. "South Africa" is too generic a term, a geographical term, and they rename it Dominica.

The Koreans conquer Japan in 1920. The country on the Korean Peninsula is called North Korea. In order to preserve the fiction of Japan being "independent", but also a Korean realm, Japan is renamed, "South Korea". Its government is a puppet of the North Korean government.

Ned Kelly's Rebellion leads to worse, Australia breaks up into several countries, the largest of which is New South Wales. Or, Welsh settlers flee to someplace nice like Panama, and call that place, New South Wales; they don't care that Australia already has a province by that name.

Mexico breaks up in civil war, Panama, now known as New South Wales, becomes the dominant power in the region. They start building that canal.

The Armenians and Georgians ally against the Ottomans and defeat them, but the Georgians are able to get more of the territory and resulting wealth, power and influence in that region.

And so on.

This all happens in the period 1830-1940. After everything settles down, the two groups develop opposing idealogies and a cold war develops, and a world war takes place in the 1970s or so. Luckily nobody bothered developing the atom bomb.
 
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