alternatehistory.com

http://ww1.habsburger.net/en/chapters/war-crimes-habsburg-army-between-soldateska-and-court-martial

A-H in WW1 already showed signs of impending ethnic cleansings in the future. Viewing whole population groups as unworthy hostile infiltrators and spies is a prime component for really nasty genocides...A-H seems to have a big number of war crimes under its belt, that a lof of people tend to ignore in their idealized view of the Danubian monarchy.

Even if the CPs win early(ish) and A-H avoids an exhausted dissolution (late 1916/ early 1917), I could easily see WW1 as a dangerous precedence.

The military/diplomatic elites in the Empire already believed in solving internal problems with external actions (either military or diplomatic ones). In the 20s and 30s a generation of men traumatized by war and vindicated in this belief will take over.

Without full federalization and democratization A-H is going to be a basket case in ITTLs early 30s. Ethnic conflicts probably have turned the various parliaments into gridlocked affairs, this has probably hampered economic growth.

My picture of a surviving A-H (if it doesn't pull off the insanely hard transformation to a Danubian Federation) is a economically weak, internally troubled, second rate power. Germany has probably long surpassed them while A-H regresses into self-centered Isolationism (assuming Russia is neutered).

If the "war generation" comes into power, they might attempt to break the internal decay with the means they used back in WW1- violence and war. It would be their paramount goal to drag A-H back on the world stage as a principal actor. Being a backwater, anachronistic sattelite of Germany hardly seems like something the Austro-Hungarian elites could or would swallow.

So I could easily imagine some kind of drift towards fascism. ITTL it is probably going to be seen as some form of neo-absolutism. Corporatism, authoritarianism, militarism and the other elements of the clerical fascism of the Ständestaat will be highly attractive for the elite, even in a surviving A-H.

Now if anything manages to set off the powder keg again, maybe a civil war between the Hungarians and the Austrians, I could easily see a situation where military and politics start emplyoing ethnic cleansing. There were large, systematically oppressed and hated minorities. I actually think it is likely that ITTL A-H would try to secure German/Maygar dominance with similar methods that the Spanish Nationalists or the Nazis employed.
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