Hellewank, or the Megali Idea accomplished

Given that the POD must be after the Greek War of Independence, how far can the Greek nation stretch out by 2000? Can the Hellenic Republic control Macedonia, Epirus, Thrace, Pontus and a good chunk of Anatolia without turning into a military dictatorship?

(Planning stages for my first TL, which I bet will not be about Greeks nor about highly improbable situations)
 
Given that the POD must be after the Greek War of Independence, how far can the Greek nation stretch out by 2000? Can the Hellenic Republic control Macedonia, Epirus, Thrace, Pontus and a good chunk of Anatolia without turning into a military dictatorship?

(Planning stages for my first TL, which I bet will not be about Greeks nor about highly improbable situations)

Well, to start with, accomplishing the Megali Idea is pretty implausible. I believe it started off as being replacing the Ottoman Empire with a Byzantine one, which was pretty crazy anyway and is ruled out by your PoD... and then as to "uniting all Greeks in one state"...

Well, Cyprus and Southern Epirus ought not to be hard, and Imbros and Tenedos aren't so tricky to hold down. Constantinople is most unlikely since this required totally breaking the Ottomans and the most likely candidate to be able to do that, Russia, will take "Tsargrad" for itself. Anatolia, too, woud require the Ottomans to be broken.

One could get a differant border in Thrace somehow, I should think. Macedonia is an interesting question, but I think there is probably some scenario in which Vardar and Pirin Macedonia can be acquired.
 
Regarding IBC's post, I guess we need to take Russia out of the equation. How about the Western Allies crush the Turks and give it to Greece?
Russia can be busy with a revolution. (This is probably WW1 era).
 
Regarding IBC's post, I guess we need to take Russia out of the equation. How about the Western Allies crush the Turks and give it to Greece?
Russia can be busy with a revolution. (This is probably WW1 era).

Thing is, the Western Allies did not have any motivation of resources to destroy and hold down the Ottomans. Sure, they tried to give Greece Thrace and a juicy junky of Anatolia, but the Turkish populations objected, Turkey objected, and Britain and France very rapidly lost any desire to hold up the treaty. What you need is for the Ottomans to suffer total military destruction (in OTL, they withdrew from the Mashriq in good order and recouperated) and reduction to a puppet state, and Russia is the obvious candidate to do that.
 
Thing is, the Western Allies did not have any motivation of resources to destroy and hold down the Ottomans. Sure, they tried to give Greece Thrace and a juicy junky of Anatolia, but the Turkish populations objected, Turkey objected, and Britain and France very rapidly lost any desire to hold up the treaty. What you need is for the Ottomans to suffer total military destruction (in OTL, they withdrew from the Mashriq in good order and recouperated) and reduction to a puppet state, and Russia is the obvious candidate to do that.
Hmm. Well, perhaps we need to change either Britain or France, or let Russia use Greece as a buffer and let Greeks die holding down Turks.
 

Susano

Banned
Well, given AH clichees, its enough if a Russian peasant in Siberia sneezes in 1903 to have at least a Greek aegean coast ;)
 
Well, given AH clichees, its enough if a Russian peasant in Siberia sneezes in 1903 to have at least a Greek aegean coast ;)

Generally speaking, however, what stood between sneezing Russian peasants and a Russia-dependent Greece were France and Britain, and Germany in WW1.

So if for some reason whatever removes all three from the equation, the sneezing peasants begin to look more formidable.

That said, I still don't know why the sneezing peasants would be handing out Aegean coasts left and right. Some kind of deep solidarity?
 
That said, I still don't know why the sneezing peasants would be handing out Aegean coasts left and right. Some kind of deep solidarity?

Avian flu turns out to be a serious problem for Turkey.

...Yes, I'll be going now.
 
Allied support dried up pretty danged quick in OTL when the Greeks started butchering all the Anatolians.
So make the Allies a bit worse morally? France and Britain at their low points could be very nasty.
Of course, once we go into French/British politics it gets far more complicated.
 
Think we've all decided on WWI being the turning point.

Is it possible to give the Greek Army a head start (Greece doesn't lose the first Greco-Turkish war/Greece doesn't get a German king who thinks CP is the way to go)?

The Western Front gets better for the CP; The Russians hold their ground in the East and instead hunts after the Ottomans*.

Entente gets more methodical with the Middle Eastern front. Brits and the French have a much better performance at Gallipoli and Ataturk dies conveniently.

Partition of the Ottomans happen earlier (1917?). Marmara and the Dardenelles are demilitarized zones, and the rest of Anatolia is split among the French, the British, the Italians and the Greek. The Russians scramble to restore the Eastern front as it's obvious they fell into the CP's trap. The Greek gets all OTL territory and maybe Northern Anatolia?

The key is for the Greeks to hold post-WWI territory after the Turkish War of Independence. Maybe without an united Turk leader and British Istanbul there's more incentive for the Empires to keep Greater Greece alive.
 
The key is for the Greeks to hold post-WWI territory after the Turkish War of Independence. Maybe without an united Turk leader and British Istanbul there's more incentive for the Empires to keep Greater Greece alive.

This actually fits in well with a successful Dardanelles campaign. WWI is shorter and less brutal for everyone, and the European Empires are more apt to try holding their shares of the defunct Ottoman Empire with some enthusiasm. The fact that the rump Turkey might be less organized and threatening doesn't hurt either.

Maybe Russia still falls to the Bolsheviks, and the British and French strongly support Greece as part of the Cordon Sanitaire, and to keep the communists from Constantinople?
 

yourworstnightmare

Banned
Donor
WW1 going differently could create a Megalist Greece, I can't see it stay democratic though. There are many Turks and other "undesirable" to exppell and the threat from a revengist Turkey, allied with Bulgaria and Italy would pressure the military to step in.
 
Northern Epirus: Easy.
Smyrna, most of Eastern Thrace, Imbros, and Tenedos: Gotta win that war with Turkey.
Cyprus: Say yes to the Brits in 1915.

Anything more is borderline ASB.
 
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