There is also the point of the dutch civil war (or riots whatever you call it) that took place in the decade before the french revolution.
The conflict was between the patriots (republicans) and orangists (royalist) government. They tried to spread the idea of enlightenment but lost in their battle against the troops of the prince of orange & his prussian ally. afterwards in 1787 most fled into exile to france, and I always how much influence these revolutionaries from the netherlands had on the french revolution.
If part of how the british won the revolutionary war was because they got military support from the netherlands like they asked it would have made the conflict against the prince of orange much more heated. And chance is it that it would give the patriots a bigger support, and they might even win. And then they might actively try to spread the enlightenment revolution across europe.
The title implies no war of independence, not an unsuccessful one. That may well butterfly the Patriot revolt too.
But it's an interesting example to bring up. If the patriot revolt had been successful, we might be sitting around saying "the problems were entrenched, it was inevitable". I think we may be being too deterministic about the French revolution.
If the financial crisis is delayed, you will then get bread riots first. That might make the establishment decide against calling for the Estate Generale. The King goes back to the Parlements, and makes further headway but still potentially thwarted. Then you get a French default, and a lot of noble bond holders lose out and start causing trouble. The King then blames the aristocracy's greed for the poverty of the masses. He beefs up the security apparatus at the same time as being forced to cut spending in other areas. Criticism of this behaviour from the salons causes them to be closed down.
Before you know it France is back to being a more stable but more authoritarian state, and we look back on the period as being an 18th Century Prague Spring. In the longer run the government relieves some of the feudal oppression of the peasants to calm things a bit. It's another twenty or thirty years before serious trouble kicks off again.