French India

Well, considering French India lasted IOTL until the mid 20th century.. ;)

Assuming though you mean France controlling (directly and indirectly) a sizable chunk of the subcontinent, then yes, it's possible, British domination of India was hardly assured and France itself did at one point have some sizable possessions in India and influence in an even larger area.

If you mean a French Raj though I doubt it, as ultimately the British really did get lucky and it took them centuries of focusing on India to do so (and a good portion of it was'nt even conquered until the 19th century).
 
Well, considering French India lasted IOTL until the mid 20th century.. ;)

Assuming though you mean France controlling (directly and indirectly) a sizable chunk of the subcontinent, then yes, it's possible, British domination of India was hardly assured and France itself did at one point have some sizable possessions in India and influence in an even larger area.

If you mean a French Raj though I doubt it, as ultimately the British really did get lucky and it took them centuries of focusing on India to do so (and a good portion of it was'nt even conquered until the 19th century).
Basicly I got this idea of the lets say early 20th century colonial situation in Asia.

The Netherlands got roughly Indonesia and Sri Lanka
France got (most of) India (at least the southern part)
England got Indo-China, Thailand, Malaysia, Sumatra, Birma and the bay of Bengalen

They either control it directly or through vasal kingdom (just like Britain and the Netherlands did OTL). Is this in anyway possible?
 
Basicly I got this idea of the lets say early 20th century colonial situation in Asia.

The Netherlands got roughly Indonesia and Sri Lanka
France got (most of) India (at least the southern part)
England got Indo-China, Thailand, Malaysia, Sumatra, Birma and the bay of Bengalen

They either control it directly or through vasal kingdom (just like Britain and the Netherlands did OTL). Is this in anyway possible?

Depends on how far back the PoD is, the Dutch territory is obviously plausible since it happened IOTL, the French getting Southern India is plausible as well (it was their main area of focus IOTL), however Britain getting all of Indochina I'm not so sure of as it never had any interest in the area while France (and Spain for the matter) had interests in the area of OTL French Indochina dating back to the early 18th century.

Ultimately in Indochina's case I think it most likely that France gets roughly OTL, Britain gets Burma and the Malay Peninsula and the remainder of Thailand is either a buffer state or split between the two.
 
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Depends on how far back the PoD is, the Dutch territory is obviously plausible since it happened IOTL, the French getting Southern India is plausible as well (it was their main area of focus IOTL as it was), however Britain getting all of Indochina I'm not so sure of as it never had any interest in the area while France (and Spain for the matter) had interests in the area of OTL French Indochina dating back to the early 18th century.

Ultimately in Indochina's case I think it most likely that France gets roughly OTL, Britain gets Burma and the Malay Peninsula and the remainder of Thailand is either a buffer state or split between the two.
I was thinking a 17th century POD (although it might be early/mid 18th century) and with Britain out of the subcontinent it focusses more on going east from the Bengal area, while France has his hands full on trying to control India and thus shows no interest in Indo-China.
 
I was thinking a 17th century POD (although it might be early/mid 18th century) and with Britain out of the subcontinent it focusses more on going east from the Bengal area, while France has his hands full on trying to control India and thus shows no interest in Indo-China.

The thing is though Eastern Indochina really holds no value for Britain, the English/British colonies were always based on profit (or protecting India in the 19th century onward), and the area really is'nt that appealing for them.

Now if Britain has Bengal and Burma they very likely would go North into Uttar Pradesh, Tibet and Yunnan, as they border their regional core and are potentially very lucrative.

Assuming that France for whatever reason does'nt have an interest in Indochina then the area of what's now Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos would end-up in the Spanish sphere as it's right next to the Spanish Philippines and, as I said, they had a long standing interest in the region.
 
Hi,

Why you say that the British cannot have any interest in Indochina ? Especially if they do not have India at all ? Why Indochina is not lucrative ?

The thing is though Eastern Indochina really holds no value for Britain, the English/British colonies were always based on profit (or protecting India in the 19th century onward), and the area really is'nt that appealing for them.

Now if Britain has Bengal and Burma they very likely would go North into Uttar Pradesh, Tibet and Yunnan, as they border their regional core and are potentially very lucrative.

Assuming that France for whatever reason does'nt have an interest in Indochina then the area of what's now Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos would end-up in the Spanish sphere as it's right next to the Spanish Philippines and, as I said, they had a long standing interest in the region.
 
Is a French India possible? And if so, how? And when?

It was very possible and could very well have happened. You may not have heard about Joseph François Dupleix. But until being ousted from the general governorship of the french east India company, he had extended the french sphere of influence to the majority of India.

To a large extent, Robert Clive did only copycat the strategy Dupleix had conceived and implemented a generation earlier.

If the french government had not stupidly fired Dupleix from the french general governorship of India, there may very well never have been a british control of India.

The best starting point would be the last days of the war of austrian succession, in 1748, when the french successfully took Madras. They restored Madras to the british because technically the ceasefire had been signed in Europe before the fall of Madras but it had taken time for the news to reach India.

Just imagine the french take Madras before the ceasefire in Europe and then don't give it back to the british.
And have Duplex become friend with the Pompadour, and you may have the french dominate India quite the same way the british did.
 

katchen

Banned
Now here's the interesting question. If the French dominate India, will they follow pretty much the same policies the British did and make the same mistakes the British did (ie. run it as a company until the 1850s and then wind up supporting the Muslims against the Hindus leading to a partition of India) or will they reach a rapproachment with organized Hinduism?
And how will the French prevent the British from taking India away from them after the debacle of the fall of Napoleon (unless Napoleon and revolution are somehow butterflied away by France possessing India).
 
I don't think that India can have two rulers. All Indian territory controlled directly by an European Power is ASB and I don't see how rival Europeans powers would manage the Princely States: They'd probably just throw them against their rival ad infinitum...
 
I don't think that India can have two rulers. All Indian territory controlled directly by an European Power is ASB and I don't see how rival Europeans powers would manage the Princely States: They'd probably just throw them against their rival ad infinitum...
I have no idea what you mean with this
 
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could it be that britains focus shifts more west? (Persia, pakistan)


I don't think that India can have two rulers. All Indian territory controlled directly by an European Power is ASB and I don't see how rival Europeans powers would manage the Princely States: They'd probably just throw them against their rival ad infinitum...
Ah ok, so the british got help from an asb then in otl? (overuse of the ASB expression again anyways)
 
I have no idea what you mean with thi

Well, India can't be divided in two by the French and the British without an obvious endless conflict between them. As I said, India is too big to solely ruled by a direct European administration. The British knew that as they bought up the Native States submission. Now, if the French are able to buy their loyalty as well, we will only have countless wars until only one Great Power is dominant (basically what happened OTL).
 
Well, India can't be divided in two by the French and the British without an obvious endless conflict between them. As I said, India is too big to solely ruled by a direct European administration. The British knew that as they bought up the Native States submission. Now, if the French are able to buy their loyalty as well, we will only have countless wars until only one Great Power is dominant (basically what happened OTL).
I, of course, meant a French India instead of a British India. So no British, just French.
 
India was never entirely ruled by the British, there were the Princely States too...

By the 20th century the Princely States were for the most part no longer relevant and what London said went, regardless of how they felt, and even when they did matter they were in the end Imperial Protectorates that Britain could easily get to do what they wanted but just never bothered most of the time because they did'nt care so long as they did'nt interfere.
 
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could it be that britains focus shifts more west? (Persia, pakistan)



Ah ok, so the british got help from an asb then in otl? (overuse of the ASB expression again anyways)

While it is true that Britain managed it, what Britain managed was a result of thousands of events all lining up perfectly to result in the exact situation for the British to take advantage of. If the situation is somewhat different (say a different primary power broker who has less naval acumen and power projection capabilities overseas) then the situation could end up totally different.

And of course that's not to say the French won't have signifigant influence on the subcontinent, but I would say it's much more likely that the continent ends up divided between the French and locally controlled states.
 
Those princes were not independent. They basically had to ask the British for permission to go to the bathroom.

Depends on the state. It varied hugely depending on the specific treaty governing relations with Britain.

Hyderabad and Travancore, for example, were essentially internally independent. They ran their own finances, their own administrative systems and in Hyderabad's case, even their a pocket sized army.

On the other hand you had states whose princes were basically pensioners of the Crown.
 
Still, this greater degree dependence only took place after the stabilisation of the British rule as the sole European ruler of India. In a scenario where we have two European nations warring for India, the loyalty and submission of these Indian princes to one or another nation wouldn't be that certain in a long time frame.
 
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