DBWI: German States United in the 1800s

As we all know, in the 1800s, Prussia came near to uniting the various German states, but for various reasons, it never occured and the states of Germany remained disunited, and under the rule of the German Confederation Government. Then, the 40 years war came in 1920, and by the end of the war Germany was devestated, and many have compared it to the 30 Years War Round 2, so my question is, what if Germany had united, could the Great North American War have been averted, and would this Germany have been a world power?
 
The first question is, how should a German unification work?
Prussia and Austria are too deeply adversaries to even ally, let alone unite.
Moreover, either of them is far too strong and self-confident to submit to a federate crown.

And with at most one of these two, how is that "Germany"?

For the mid-sized states like Bavaria, Saxony, or Württemberg, there would be no reason to join a federation with one of these dominant partners. Hence if either Prussia or Austria would make a move towards actual unification, it would at best end as them absorbing a few smaller states.
 

Zachanassian

Gone Fishin'
How about the 1848 French Rebellion actually succeeding? If the July Monarchy is overthrown, the subsequent republic probably would be about as stable as the Revolutionary Republic.
How possible is it for a revanchist government to arise and attempt to retake the Rhineland?
A 2nd Napoleonic Wars in the 1860s might be enough to encourage national unity among the Germanies. Perhaps, if 1848 succeeds in France, it could also succeed in Hungary and the Slavic lands. Bereft of most of its empire, Austria might then join Germany.
 
As we all know, in the 1800s, Prussia came near to uniting the various German states, but for various reasons, it never occured and the states of Germany remained disunited, and under the rule of the German Confederation Government. Then, the 40 years war came in 1920, and by the end of the war Germany was devestated, and many have compared it to the 30 Years War Round 2, so my question is, what if Germany had united, could the Great North American War have been averted, and would this Germany have been a world power?

OOC: Nice scenario, but this "40 Years War" thing is not plausible, sadly. Will be ignoring.

IC: "40 years war"? You've been reading Steve Heinlein's "Medieval Modernity" again, haven't you? ;)

In any case, I do wonder what would happen in the event that the Soviet Union somehow survives the POD(and it could) and Germany is defeated in a war with them as Prussia was in our World War II; in our timeline, after the executions of both Kaiser Wilhelm III and Josef Himmler, the People's Republic of East Germany was created in 1949 from Prussia(well, most of it. East Prussia became it's own nation and with a substantial Jewish minority, I might add), while Bavaria, the Rhineland, Lower Saxony, western Thuringia, and southern Holstein were confederated into the West German Federation(which was broken up again in 1991 just before the CPSR collapsed).

Should this Germany get into a war with the ATL *Soviets and lose, what would happen? Might Germany stay intact, or would it be broken up(as Austria was after WWII IOTL), possibly coming to resemble the situation in OTL?
 
OOC: The "40-years War" could have been the name for a long term proxy conflict ala the Cold War, with outside powers fostering unrest and conflict in a divided Germany. That even fits with the general premise and makes it more similar to the 30 Years War. It doesn't have to be 40 years of all out WWII style Total War, although I imagine it would eventually spiral out of control into a massive Total Global War type thing.
 
OOC: Nice scenario, but this "40 Years War" thing is not plausible, sadly. Will be ignoring.

IC: "40 years war"? You've been reading Steve Heinlein's "Medieval Modernity" again, haven't you? ;)

In any case, I do wonder what would happen in the event that the Soviet Union somehow survives the POD(and it could) and Germany is defeated in a war with them as Prussia was in our World War II; in our timeline, after the executions of both Kaiser Wilhelm III and Josef Himmler, the People's Republic of East Germany was created in 1949 from Prussia(well, most of it. East Prussia became it's own nation and with a substantial Jewish minority, I might add), while Bavaria, the Rhineland, Lower Saxony, western Thuringia, and southern Holstein were confederated into the West German Federation(which was broken up again in 1991 just before the CPSR collapsed).

Should this Germany get into a war with the ATL *Soviets and lose, what would happen? Might Germany stay intact, or would it be broken up(as Austria was after WWII IOTL), possibly coming to resemble the situation in OTL?

OOC: Who made you the dbwi tsar? You can't just dismiss what comes before you in a dbwi without some degree of consensus. That's the point of a dbwi. And contrary info-dumps are rude.

IC: Boto makes a good point. No German monarchy would want to give up any of its own power to another. The only way possible is some kind of popular Pan-German revolution.
The long term effects would be enormous. The natural resources at its disposal would surely make a unified German Republic (presumably including Bohemia and Moravia with their substantial minorities but excluding Hungary) an industrial powerhouse. The most powerful state, economically, in the world I daresay.
Militarily it would have a large population at its disposal and the industrial base to arm it. I suspect it might get in on the colonial game unlike most German states in OTL.
A significant question would be how the Republic would deal with German minorities outside its borders. Would such an explicitly nationalist state seek to bring them into the fold? Alsace, Luxembourg, and Schleswig are obvious candidates, but would it go after Switzerland? The Baltic Germans? Volga Germans? Transylvanian Saxons? I don't think it would want the minorities associated with capturing the latter few though.
Unification would be a major blow to the balance of power in Europe. The Great Powers may very well attack as they did in the French Revolution.
 
OOC: The "40-years War" could have been the name for a long term proxy conflict ala the Cold War, with outside powers fostering unrest and conflict in a divided Germany. That even fits with the general premise and makes it more similar to the 30 Years War. It doesn't have to be 40 years of all out WWII style Total War, although I imagine it would eventually spiral out of control into a massive Total Global War type thing.

OOC: Well, he ought to change the name of the event, then, I think.
Edit-The problem is, too, is that OTL's Cold War was nowhere near similar to the 30 Years' War, for a variety of reasons(which I try to explain below.)

IC: Yes, but Medieval Modernity's "40 Years War" wasn't like our Cold War in the least. In fact, Have you read the book? The beginning of the story didn't even involve nukes but a single mysterious magnetic event which destroyed all of the world's connected electronics at 7:53 pm GMT, September 15, 2021.

The book largely took place in the 24th Century in a post-apocalyptic Europe, in which a Cold War scenario would not even be possible, at least not at the time in which the novels took place.

OOC: (Okay, I'll admit it, I largely ripped off the opening from the fictional novel from the real well-known Steve Stirling series, "Island in a Sea of Time", and it's twin, "Dies the Fire".)

@Helios: The problem is, as noted above, you simply cannot plausibly have a 30 Years War equivalent in the modern age; there are things like chemical weapons and such that were not even conceived of in the Renaissance age. In fact, OTL's WWI lasted for only four years(and wasn't quite as intense as WWII) and look how badly it affected much of Europe, particularly where the worst fighting was.
A proxy conflict lasting 40 years, like a worse & nastier version of OTL's Cold War shenanigans, would certainly be doable, but it wouldn't be anywhere near similar to the 30 Years' War; OTL's Cold War did not involve any actual conflict between the USSR and U.S.; The 30 Years War, did indeed see direct conflict at times.(any actual sustained conflict lasting that long, even if far lower in intensity than OTL's WWII, would badly wreck much of Europe, even in half the time. And that's without nukes.) and thus this is why I suggested a name change of said event if that's what the OP really intended.

Sorry if I can't explain this any better, btw. If anyone would like to try to come up with a better explanation, they are more than welcome. :)
 
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OOC: Well, he ought to change the name of it, then, and frankly, you can't have a Cold War as we would even remotely understand it without nukes, anyway, which almost certainly wouldn't be developed in the 1920s with a POD in the 19th century. And you certainly couldn't plausible sustain 40 years of actual conflict in the modern age, either, even if it wasn't a "total" war like WWII IOTL and even without nukes.

IC: Yes, but Medieval Modernity's "40 Years War" wasn't like our Cold War in the least. In fact, Have you read the book? The beginning of the story didn't even involve nukes but a single mysterious magnetic event which destroyed all of the world's connected electronics at 7:53 pm GMT, September 15, 2021.

The book largely took place in the 24th Century in a post-apocalyptic Europe, in which a Cold War scenario would not even be possible, at least not at the time in which the novels took place.

OOC: (Okay, I'll admit it, I largely ripped off the opening from the fictional novel from the real well-known Steve Stirling series, "Island in a Sea of Time", and it's twin, "Dies the Fire".)

@Helios: The problem is, you simply cannot plausibly have a 30 Years War equivalent in the modern age; there are things like chemical weapons and such that were not even conceived of in the Renaissance age. In fact, OTL's WWI lasted for only four years(and wasn't quite as intense as WWII) and look how badly it affected much of Europe, particularly where the worst fighting was.
A proxy conflict lasting 40 years, like a worse & nastier version of OTL's Cold War shenanigans, would certainly be doable, but it wouldn't be anywhere near similar to the 30 Years' War, and thus this is why I suggested a name change of said event if that's what the OP really intended.

OOC: I wasn't defending the plausibility. It is implausible without a great deal more explanation. I was condemning your decree of "Will be ignoring" as if you spoke for the rest of us, then your subsequent unilateral declaration of the true history of Europe in the early 20th century with minimal contribution to the DBWI itself. Most of what you said was about the history of the world this is set in rather than an alternate timeline being discussed by the inhabitants of the world. DBWIs are about collaboration, not info dumps.
 
OOC: I wasn't defending the plausibility. It is implausible without a great deal more explanation. I was condemning your decree of "Will be ignoring" as if you spoke for the rest of us

OOC: Well, I apologize if it seemed to you that I was trying to speak for everyone else, because I wasn't intending to do that. Sorry. :(
 
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OOC: Well, I apologize if it seemed to you that I was trying to speak for everyone else, because I wasn't intending to do that. Sorry. :(

OOC: I'm sorry if I've come off harshly but I hate to see a nice, straightforward DBWI turn into role playing a constant contradicting. It kills the spirit of them. Eh.
 
OOC: I'm sorry if I've come off harshly but I hate to see a nice, straightforward DBWI turn into role playing a constant contradicting. It kills the spirit of them. Eh.

It's okay, and it DOES happen sometimes, unfortunately. Hopefully we can get back on track, though. :)
 
For such a Union to even work, the Prussian royalty would have to make all kinds of political sacrifices to keep the left happy, or else such a union would have no chance of surviving. Considering that Prussia was, and remains, the most conservative of all the German nations (no female sufferage until 1987!), this would be a hard sell indeed.
 
For such a Union to even work, the Prussian royalty would have to make all kinds of political sacrifices to keep the left happy, or else such a union would have no chance of surviving. Considering that Prussia was, and remains, the most conservative of all the German nations (no female sufferage until 1987!), this would be a hard sell indeed.

Although most of the states in the Communist era did allow women to participate in the local assemblies, though I guess it's not the same as genuine democracy, with casting ballots and all.

It's a shame, too, because France, after the Revolution of 1856, immediately began taking those steps to equality, and women were allowed to vote nationwide in 1879, just a year after the Canadian Confederation became the first nation ever, to do so(And this from a Canada who severed their ties with the Brits in 1868 over support for the Confederacy, of all things. They were NOT happy with London backing Richmond in 1861......), and France was a nation not yet as industrialized or even as wealthy, as Prussia in those days.
 
I really don't see a monarchical Germany managing to unite, whether under the Prussians, the Austrians, or some other power if we have a POD farther back. The other monarchs lose all of their powers in such a situation, so they'd only agree under duress. If the Prussians tried to force the other minor German monarchs into a unified "German Empire", they'd draw the intervention of every single other major European power. France, Russia, the UK, all would fear such an enlarged Prussia, and they would go to war to prevent a unified Germany. Thankfully for Prussia at the time, Bismarck realized this IOTL and didn't start a war against the whole of Europe.

The only possibilities I see are either the 1848 or the 1864 revolts succeeding at overthrowing the German monarchies and instituting some sort of unified Republic. 1848 is better, given the massive revolts going on elsewhere in Europe, but I think the other powers could be sufficiently distracted in 1864 to give it a better shot at success. Maybe get France to intervene in the US Civil War, move back the Great Polish Rising to 1864 to distract Russia, somehow get the Hungarians to revolt (this may be tricky) or stir up something in Italy to distract Austria. Any single one of those is possible, it's getting them all to happen at the same time, while having the Schleswig Crisis and Wilhelm I's assassination go as OTL that's the problem.

EDIT: Also, new possibility: just have Napoleon amalgamate more of the minor German states into the Confederation of the Rhine and somehow have that butterfly the invasion of Spain.
 
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