DBWI: Ottoman and Qing collapse

[SavoyTruffle]

It's hard to imagine a world as multipolar as ours, with the United States of America as the premier power across the Atlantic, the Ottoman Empire the hegemon of the Near East, and Qing China as the dominant power of Eastern Asia.

That said, how can we construct a world where the Sublime Porte is no more and the sons of Nurhaci do not occupy the Forbidden City? What PODs would be most suitable?

 

[Whiteshore]

Well, a good POD for making the Ottomans collapse would be having them lose the Greek Insurrection of 1821 as the quick manner in which the Greek rebels were crushed and the military reforms implemented afterwards helped the Ottoman Empire resist European imperialism.

 

[SavoyTruffle]

Well, a good POD for making the Ottomans collapse would be having them lose the Greek Insurrection of 1821 as the quick manner in which the Greek rebels were crushed and the military reforms implemented afterwards helped the Ottoman Empire resist European imperialism.

Having the Greeks be victorious would have a domino effect I think - perhaps it convinces people like Muhammad Ali Pasha to de facto break away from the Empire, and as history shows the loss of Egypt was a big blow to empires that controlled them.

What about China, though? I find it harder to imagine China collapsing so quickly in any case, unless everything goes wrong for them all at once.

 

[AltoRegnant]

Well, the Ottos collapsed briefly during the mid 1800s, when the Jannisaries worked with a rebellious vassal in Egypt to overthrow the government, and killed the emperor. And then they forgot to actually overthrow the government-a new emperor was crowned in Athens, the Capitol to this day. Emperor went to Egypt, where he recruited everyone he could and trained them to be the People's Army. He marched up Mesopotamia and Anatolia, with his navy starving out the traitors. When the emperor arrived, they were dead men walking. Most surrendered then and there, only asking their families be compensated.

The Qing? Idk man, maybe have them win the first opium war so reforms arent seen as needed? Course then you have an angry britain...

 

[Snowstalker]

Would a weaker China open up the door for another Asian state (Siam, Japan, or Korea) to become a great power?

 

[SavoyTruffle]

The Qing? Idk man, maybe have them win the first opium war so reforms arent seen as needed? Course then you have an angry britain...

I still don't see it - China has a much larger army and it didn't take them that long to catch up with the Royal Navy in terms of size (though of course they didn't need to project as much naval power).

Perhaps a more reactionary court might do it as well? If the Xianfeng Emperor (commonly placed up there with his ancestors Kangxi, Yongzheng, and Qianlong) were a far weaker man I could see it.

Would a weaker China open up the door for another Asian state (Siam, Japan, or Korea) to become a great power?

I could see Japan being the Asian great power in China's place (they had the ingredients for a rapid rise to power), but obviously if and only if China collapses.

 

[Whiteshore]

Would a weaker China open up the door for another Asian state (Siam, Japan, or Korea) to become a great power?

Even in our world, Siam was a regional power, so there's that.

 

[Whiteshore]

So, how much do you think did Germany's unification in 1848 help the Ottomans as the newly united German Empire heavily helped the Ottoman Empire in modernizing their military and industrializing?

 

[Optical_Illusion]

As much as it may seem this way to us today, the set of intellectual arguments in the late 1800s - mid 1900s that led to establishment of the Qing State as the constitutionally bound monarchy which it became, and its unique path towards balancing its traditional bureaucracy with growing demands for direct participation in politics by its subjects, were by no means inevitable.

It's quite imaginable that Qing had avoided these issues for a more culturally conservative path, ultimately leading to a nation both with a stronger sense of exclusion and tendencies towards revolution among much of its people, and a smaller and more vulnerable state with a weaker fiscal basis, all of which could eventually tip into revolutions and warlordism.

The late Qing's friendliness to exporting so much of its excess population overseas to Southeast Asia is undoubtably also very important in offsetting the big problems of demographic bust and associated social unrest that could have sprung from early-mid Qing's demographic boom. At the same time, this Chinese diaspora and its integration with the stable centre has been vital for maintaining China's status as a hegemon across SE Asia, which easily could've slipped towards powers like the British and from them to the United States or a Japan with a stronger relative developmental lead than the strong but relatively small state of OTL. It's easy to imagine that wouldn't happen either.

 

[HIM Dogson]

I could see Japan being the Asian great power in China's place (they had the ingredients for a rapid rise to power), but obviously if and only if China collapses.

Japan? Absolutely ridiculous. The island's one of the most resource poor in the world; to even fuel industrial development sooner or later they'd have to fight Britain, France, the Netherlands, or Russia- they wouldn't be stupid enough to pick a fight with powers that great. The Qing did, of course, but China actually had the industry to drive the West from Asia; it's the biggest economy today for a reason. But really, I can't see how Japan ends up anything more than a tributary of Peking- certainly after the Second Sengoku following the Shogun's murder of Emperor Meiji going public I can't see a way. I don't know, it's hard to see a nation where the Shogun has to call the Qing army in at least once a year to save his ass from the Restorationists ever being a great power.

 

[Dolan]

So, how much do you think did Germany's unification in 1848 help the Ottomans as the newly united German Empire heavily helped the Ottoman Empire in modernizing their military and industrializing?

Well, maybe earlier iteration of The Great War might be enough to topple the Sino-Turco-German Alliance. Maybe the American Hellenic community decides to stir things up by accusing Ottoman of doing Greek Genocide much much earlier than 1920s.

 

[Koprulu Mustafa Pasha]

Qing collapse seemed close after the death Qianglong Emperor. But the Imperial family assimilated in the Han culture a century after, ending the animosity of the Han majority. Getting rid of the Banners in the 1820s was what got the military modernised. British-India could not deal with the larger modern Chiness forces. The Industrialisation after the 1850s made China unstoppable. Not even Russia dared to fight them.

The Ottomans were saved of getting rid of the Janissary Corps in 1806 by Selim III counterattack. The Nizam-I Cedid reforms made the military and economy stronger. The Ottomans keeping out of continental wars while being Russia's good symbolic friends avoided destruction of Thrace. Had the Ottomans fought the Russians in the 19th century then the industrial centre of the Ottoman Empire, Thrace, would be destroyed. Thrace today is as developed as Bavaria in Germany. See the importance?

I'd say if both Qing and Ottoman Empires collapse it will turn into ethnic wars. Imagine the Manchu and Han conflicts, Serb and Albanian conflicts. But worse and on larger scale. British India would live past 1900. The Mughals may not have been deposed by the British for treason.

 

[Koprulu Mustafa Pasha]

Well, maybe earlier iteration of The Great War might be enough to topple the Sino-Turco-German Alliance. Maybe the American Hellenic community decides to stir things up by accusing Ottoman of doing Greek Genocide much much earlier than 1920s.

I wonder if the American Greek population would reach 4 million in the States had the Ottomans collapsed. Abdul Hamid II did not mind them leaving, he even supported such migrations.

 

[Dolan]

I wonder if the American Greek population would reach 4 million in the States had the Ottomans collapsed. Abdul Hamid II did not mind them leaving, he even supported such migrations.

"The Exoria" is still a very sensitive topic even today. US-and-British Empire still maintaining that there were systematic forced conversions, expulsions, and mass murder of Greek Orthodox communities through Balkans and Asia Minor. All while Ottomans, Qing, and Germans maintain that those ghastly accusations never actually happened in the first place, and while there were riots in Hellas during early 20th century, they were just the usual riots with casualties in the twenties, not thousands.

Trouble in Hellas remains a very common cause of Apocalyptic Nuclear War in many fictions.

 

[SavoyTruffle]

"The Exoria" is still a very sensitive topic even today. US-and-British Empire still maintaining that there were systematic forced conversions, expulsions, and mass murder of Greek Orthodox communities through Balkans and Asia Minor. All while Ottomans, Qing, and Germans maintain that those ghastly accusations never actually happened in the first place, and while there were riots in Hellas during early 20th century, they were just the usual riots with casualties in the twenties, not thousands.

Trouble in Hellas remains a very common cause of Apocalyptic Nuclear War in many fictions.

Yeah, it's gotten to the point where you can't discuss the Exoria on certain internet agora - even mentioning it is a bannable offense.

That said, could there have been a better Ottoman-American relationship, Ottoman collapse or not?

 

[Dolan]

That said, could there have been a better Ottoman-American relationship, Ottoman collapse or not?

Definitely not under President Michael Dukakis though.

The Ottomans also control what is the biggest oil deposit on Earth, with German corporations managing them, and worked by Chinese workers. Now, if somehow we replace German corporations with American, and the Chinese workers with Indians... Maybe the US will have much better relationship with the Ottomans.

 

[Whiteshore]

So, your thoughts on how the liberal democracy of the United States is such a close ally of the Ultranationalist dictatorship running the Russian Empire (OOC: Basically a *fascist Russia with a puppet monarchy providing the regime legitimacy and the support of traditional elites (like the church and the nobility), even with their populist-corporatist economic policies)? Is this a product of the poor Ottoman-American relations?

 

[SavoyTruffle]

Well, that's obviously in response to the Turco-German Alliance, with China after drifting away cozying up to the Alliance for Western Europe instead. Not unlike the Franco-Ottoman alliance centuries ago where differences in things like religion and ideology are set aside in favor of geopolitics.

 

[Dolan]

So, your thoughts on how the liberal democracy of the United States is such a close ally of the Ultranationalist dictatorship running the Russian Empire (OOC: Basically a *fascist Russia with a puppet monarchy providing the regime legitimacy and the support of traditional elites (like the church and the nobility), even with their populist-corporatist economic policies)? Is this a product of the poor Ottoman-American relations?

America is indeed a 'technically' Liberal Democracy, and they are indeed a very democratic government *internally*.

But they also are the most religious Christian Nation on Earth, so much that their electorate supports Greek and Balkan Independence movements while supporting Russia geopolitically as they were the one suppressing the Central Asian Muslims.

This is in contrast with Germany, who while technically a semi-constitutional Monarchy (with Der Kaiser still having major decisions in Military Power, as well as a plethora of very rarely used 'Veto' Powers on Civilian Government), they are also the most secular of the Western 'Christian' nations, to the point that it was often joked about if they could replace Jesus with Kaiser, they will done that long time ago.

 

[Whiteshore]

they are also the most secular of the Western 'Christian' nations, to the point that it was often joked about if they could replace Jesus with Kaiser, they will done that long time ago.

It seems like the Germans are even better at laicite than the French are at times. Of course, the Germans adopted this secularism because they wanted to ensure unity between the Catholic South and the Protestant North.