DBWI: The United States Succeeded

The American Revolt collapsed against almost insurmountable odds. They were unable to economically compete with Britain, their military was weak, poorly trained, under-supplied and uneven, they were plagued by colonial infighting (both between their States and the factions within the Continental Congress), and they failed to gain the major support of other European powers. Americans still maintain a rebellious spirit today, but it is unlikely that the United States could have survived against Britain. Even a short term victory would likely devolve into various separated States which would be easily picked off and absorbed by Britain. Even so, the topic remains one of the most popular in counterfactual history, ranging from Ward Moore's The Opposition Silenced to Mr Turtledove's American Victory series. Often, these alternate histories feature things that are too far out, like the United States expanding to the west coast and into the Pacific and Pacific Northwest, and succeeding in war after war against it's neighbors in very unlikely circumstances, to the United States becoming an industrial behemoth that drains the Great Lakes to make more living space.

What if the United States had succeeded in the revolt and succeeded as a nation?
 
Long term success as an independent state and actually prospering? That is just ASB. Most likely, the Spanish would conquer most of the southern colonies, while Britain could have reasserted itself and reconquered most of the Northern ones. And don't forget about the French and their secret deal to take back Louisiana. France probably would have been the real winner taking over most of the North American Continent which would have complimented their European Empire nicely.
 
It's hard to see a government based on the idea that the masses have "inalienable rights" surviving. The experience of the French Revolution shows that if you give the people the chance to rule, they'll promptly descend into regicide and tyranny.
 
Oh god, not that tired argument. The Summer of Revolutions showed that liberal revolution could be done peacefully - the only reason the French Revolution devolved into massacres was the incitement of the monarchy and the threat of the other hierarchically organized European powers.

Not my fault you were born in a miserable illiberal backwater and support your "benevolent" and "enlightened" tyrants. Sorry if I don't want to listen to a slave telling free people how wondrous his bondage is!

The technological and industrial changes in human society over the past two hundred years have enabled us to largely overthrow the outdated aristocratic regimes in favor of egalitarian societies. Sure, many of these were bloody mass revolutions but only because the alternative was the annihilation of these revolts in their cradle. I'd say those parts of society able to throw off their monarchies are doing far better today than they were under despotism with their fundamental rights silenced.

The people cried out for rebellion and they got it. Sure, the colonies weren't able to revolt but you seem to have forgotten that the British rule over them was still relatively light. It necessarily had to be. In many ways the legacy of the American rebellion endured and would inspire others. They were martyrs in the eternal struggle for freedom and egalitarianism.
 
It's hard to see a government based on the idea that the masses have "inalienable rights" surviving. The experience of the French Revolution shows that if you give the people the chance to rule, they'll promptly descend into regicide and tyranny.

What do you mean? Ultimately, the French Revolution ended with the creation of a stable moderate republic, even though there was tyranny between the royal regime and the moderate one. Today, such inalienable rights are commonplace, even though they are talked of in different terms.

OOC: I find it impossible to believe that such a late POD can avoid liberalization and the emergence of democracy.
 
OOC: I took the approach of assuming he was playing a reactionary of some sort. Perhaps in this timeline at least a few nations have remained with strict class structures, even if most were overthrown or phased out? I imagine such states have had to at least made widespread compromises to various alt-leftist and alt-liberal parts of society, but they could well exist. It's not as if there aren't reactionaries in our timeline who'd argue in favor of monarchies - there's just very very few of them.
 
Well, while the wars in the 20th Century would have been butteflied away, I have to wonder how the British Empire would have fared in a successful North American revolt. Would they have been able to ensure victory against the Prussian led German confederations, or whatever happens in Central Europe after the butterflies, without being able to rely in industrial and human power (and numbers) their North American dominions were able to provide? Even more, what if the British European foes, be them Prussians, Russians or anyone else, had been able to ally with the United States against the British Empire?
 
We'd probably have seen a world more sharply divided between more conservative monarchies and more...problematic republics. As things happen...

Well, look at Britain today, and look at the Greater British Empire. The failed revolt caused Britain to see the wisdom of giving greater regional representation to the colonies. Which in turn led to Britain becoming a more democratic nation. Loyalty to the monarchy emerged stronger than ever, but so did Parliament.

Ultimately, the failed revolt strengthened constitutional monarchy in Britain, which in turn led to constitutional monarchy becoming the model to follow.
 
the revolution would need two things to succeed... decent leaders and money. When you look at the parade of military leaders who sided with the Brits (Washington, Greene, Arnold, etc.) and the ones the rebels had (Gates, Charles Lee), it's hardly surprising the rebels lost. Shift some of those leaders over to the rebels, and the odds improve (how you get that, no idea). Then you have to overcome the money problem... the Continental Congress was perpetually broke. They needed foreign backing.... maybe France or Spain? Of course, to get that foreign backing, they would have to win a few battles first, so you need those better leaders right off the bat.
As for the idea that the states would all splinter into separate nations if they did win... I dunno. I think you'd have more two big sides, the north and the south; the states in those two regions had a lot in common with each other, and no real incentive to go haring off on their own. You might even get both sides to stay together in one (fractious) nation if they could draw up some form of government that would satisfy everyone involved (granted, that's a big 'if')....
 
Oh god, not that tired argument. The Summer of Revolutions showed that liberal revolution could be done peacefully - the only reason the French Revolution devolved into massacres was the incitement of the monarchy and the threat of the other hierarchically organized European powers.

Not my fault you were born in a miserable illiberal backwater and support your "benevolent" and "enlightened" tyrants. Sorry if I don't want to listen to a slave telling free people how wondrous his bondage is!

The technological and industrial changes in human society over the past two hundred years have enabled us to largely overthrow the outdated aristocratic regimes in favor of egalitarian societies. Sure, many of these were bloody mass revolutions but only because the alternative was the annihilation of these revolts in their cradle. I'd say those parts of society able to throw off their monarchies are doing far better today than they were under despotism with their fundamental rights silenced.

The people cried out for rebellion and they got it. Sure, the colonies weren't able to revolt but you seem to have forgotten that the British rule over them was still relatively light. It necessarily had to be. In many ways the legacy of the American rebellion endured and would inspire others. They were martyrs in the eternal struggle for freedom and egalitarianism.

Very true, very true. And don't forget Robert Sobel's excellent Stars & Stripes book from 1976(in which America develops into a Great Power to be admired by many! And, also, has a *huge* fan community today.), which inspired Turtledove's American Victory series.

And, by the way, continued British rule might not have ended up as well as it did IOTL: Robert Stirling's The Century of Darkness being the most pessimistic example of an ATL scenario along those lines(although it ended with a *Socialist revolution overthrowing the old order in 1919).

OOC: Stars & Stripes is mostly OTL, 50 states and all, but with a select few changes(no James Polk, no Woodrow Wilson, etc.). The Century of Darkness was a shoutout to Mumby's Centuries of Shadow timeline.
 
Oh god, not that tired argument. The Summer of Revolutions showed that liberal revolution could be done peacefully - the only reason the French Revolution devolved into massacres was the incitement of the monarchy and the threat of the other hierarchically organized European powers.

Not my fault you were born in a miserable illiberal backwater and support your "benevolent" and "enlightened" tyrants. Sorry if I don't want to listen to a slave telling free people how wondrous his bondage is!

The technological and industrial changes in human society over the past two hundred years have enabled us to largely overthrow the outdated aristocratic regimes in favor of egalitarian societies. Sure, many of these were bloody mass revolutions but only because the alternative was the annihilation of these revolts in their cradle. I'd say those parts of society able to throw off their monarchies are doing far better today than they were under despotism with their fundamental rights silenced.

The people cried out for rebellion and they got it. Sure, the colonies weren't able to revolt but you seem to have forgotten that the British rule over them was still relatively light. It necessarily had to be. In many ways the legacy of the American rebellion endured and would inspire others. They were martyrs in the eternal struggle for freedom and egalitarianism.

Sorry if I don't want to hear about how happy someone is to be ruled by whores! Look at yourselves! The French "Republic"- it's so obviously dominated by corporations it hurts! There is one party, and we all know that said party is the bitch of AubelCorp! At least the Kaiser of Germany and the Tsar of Russia are honest about their tyranny! It's obvious that the only true path to democracy is through Constitutional Monarchy, like we have in the Federal Empire of Britain! God save the Empress!
 
Yes the most prosperous nations are the multicultural ones. See what happened in the wake of the 1847 "Revolution" - in the Central European Federation (then Austria) - first put down by force, but the Empress realised that federalisation and liberalisation would cost the Empire less than permanantly use your resources against internal enemies. Because of this the Austrians were able to draw on vast resources when Prusssia tried to unify Germany into a Prussian like state. No wonder the South Germans choose the Habsburg reign over the Hohenzollern... - and some northern states too And look at the vast colonial Empires once owned by France, Russia and Prussia. All gone but the British and Austrian colonies are still tied to their mother countries.

But back to the so called United States - -yes a sucessful Revolution would ultiately have led to another superpower - the Immigration from all over the world would have brought the best and most innovative heads to this new Nation creating the very cultural variety that allowed Britain and the CEF to prosper...
 
OOC: I find it impossible to believe that such a late POD can avoid liberalization and the emergence of democracy.

OOC: The actual French Revolution didn't end with a stable and moderate republic. I will stand by the firmly controversial stance that the failure of democratic revolutions in the 18th century would mean we don't end up with a shiny happy utopia in 2015.
 
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I personally don't see how such a high minded rebellion could ever have worked in the real world. I mean how exactly was that airy-fairy "all men are created equal" stuff supposed to reconcile with all those slave plantations in the southern colonies?

And once the union of states broke back up into colonies, Great Britain would just sweep in for revenge 5 - 10 years later and take back what she lost.
 

GdwnsnHo

Banned
It was a lovely idea, but without a strong central authority, any state at this time was doomed to fall to the more organised states that were.

Regardless, what would we expect the United States to do? Once they were across the Appalachians, where would they go? Native tribes caused the French and Spanish no end of trouble, and the various nomadic tribes on the Great Plains would have made any attempt to colonise impossible.

Frankly, the US only had the audacity to rebel BECAUSE the Appalachians protected them from the Great Plains tribes. The New Orleans Massacre shows what they were capable of when provoked. (This is also why I'd say a French N.American Empire was doomed, that was the only direction they had to expand in, what practice did the French have in fighting on the Plains?)
 

jahenders

Banned
The implausibility increases as time and events advance.

The chance of the colonies successfully rebelling against Britain was slim. The colonies were outclassed in EVERY category -- men, material, training, money, leadership, etc. Their only hope lay in the stretching things out long enough that Britain, facing war in Europe, would tire of the affair as too costly. But for that to work the colonies would have to operate cohesively. Instead, the British were able to seize key ports in the Northern colonies and effectively knock them out of the war. It was then a relatively simple matter to quarantine the southern colonies until the rebellion died out.

Then, even if the colonies won, the odds of them forming a working government afterwards was slim. Their radical liberal ideas simply don't lend themselves to prudent government. One need only to look at the excesses of the French Revolution to envision what would have almost certainly happened in America.

Even if they made it that far, it's generally given that the British would swoop back in and retake the colonies (or some of them) when they were no longer distracted by a European War. By 1815 or so, the British would almost certainly have reclaimed and retamed their colonies.

Even if the colonies (or whatever they'd call themselves) got past all that, they'd likely implode, collapse economically, or fall apart in secession or civil war over regional issues.

At most the colonies could form a semi-functional country, economically poor, riven with dissent, at the mercy of mobocracy, and hemmed in on all sides by more powerful neighbors or strong indian nations that would brook no encroachment. That's the highest pinnacle that they could even remotely achieve and that would have taken very long odds indeed.
 
Are you serious? This is totally ASB! How could a group of ragtag militiamen which are all the colonies have defeat the greatest military in the world. You must be insane to think that the revolution had even a chance of succeeding.
 
It was a lovely idea, but without a strong central authority, any state at this time was doomed to fall to the more organised states that were.

Regardless, what would we expect the United States to do? Once they were across the Appalachians, where would they go? Native tribes caused the French and Spanish no end of trouble, and the various nomadic tribes on the Great Plains would have made any attempt to colonise impossible.

Frankly, the US only had the audacity to rebel BECAUSE the Appalachians protected them from the Great Plains tribes. The New Orleans Massacre shows what they were capable of when provoked. (This is also why I'd say a French N.American Empire was doomed, that was the only direction they had to expand in, what practice did the French have in fighting on the Plains?)

The implausibility increases as time and events advance.

The chance of the colonies successfully rebelling against Britain was slim. The colonies were outclassed in EVERY category -- men, material, training, money, leadership, etc. Their only hope lay in the stretching things out long enough that Britain, facing war in Europe, would tire of the affair as too costly. But for that to work the colonies would have to operate cohesively. Instead, the British were able to seize key ports in the Northern colonies and effectively knock them out of the war. It was then a relatively simple matter to quarantine the southern colonies until the rebellion died out.

Then, even if the colonies won, the odds of them forming a working government afterwards was slim. Their radical liberal ideas simply don't lend themselves to prudent government. One need only to look at the excesses of the French Revolution to envision what would have almost certainly happened in America.

Even if they made it that far, it's generally given that the British would swoop back in and retake the colonies (or some of them) when they were no longer distracted by a European War. By 1815 or so, the British would almost certainly have reclaimed and retamed their colonies.

Even if the colonies (or whatever they'd call themselves) got past all that, they'd likely implode, collapse economically, or fall apart in secession or civil war over regional issues.

At most the colonies could form a semi-functional country, economically poor, riven with dissent, at the mercy of mobocracy, and hemmed in on all sides by more powerful neighbors or strong indian nations that would brook no encroachment. That's the highest pinnacle that they could even remotely achieve and that would have taken very long odds indeed.

Are you serious? This is totally ASB! How could a group of ragtag militiamen which are all the colonies have defeat the greatest military in the world. You must be insane to think that the revolution had even a chance of succeeding.
You're all forgetting Sobel's book, though: I know some may have a hard time believing in this scenario, but his TL was actually quite plausible and well detailed(even Jack Smith liked it, and his standards are rather strict-see his commentary in the June 1992 issue of Alternities): although, I might add, it certainly did help that the French finally stepped in after the ATL Battle of Saratoga(only after a lot of prodding of King Louis by his more liberal & pro-Enlightenment advisors).

OOC: Alternities is a "Counter-Factual" magazine based in New York(though not in NYC itself), and Jack Smith is an ATL cousin of real world author L. Neil Smith.
 

jahenders

Banned
I found the whole thing somewhat implausible and the last minute French rescue seemed like a contrived "here comes the cavalry moment" so popular in the "Redcoats and Indians" movies

You're all forgetting Sobel's book, though: I know some may have a hard time believing in this scenario, but his TL was actually quite plausible and well detailed(even Jack Smith liked it, and his standards are rather strict-see his commentary in the June 1992 issue of Alternities): although, I might add, it certainly did help that the French finally stepped in after the ATL Battle of Saratoga(only after a lot of prodding of King Louis by his more liberal & pro-Enlightenment advisors).
 
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