How would a Modern day Ottoman Empire look like?

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With pre-1878 territory, no doubt it will be first world, or at least equal to US, which is first world save for some parts like the deep south.

Wait, ARE you claiming that parts of the US aren’t first world? Because I thought you couldn’t possibly be until I read further.
 
1) Depends on the PoD. Britain actually invited Ottomans to occupy Egypt and deal with Mahdi in Sudan, but Ottomans just got tragically defeated in 1878 so they ignored the request. Otherwise, the Ottomans would've gladly accepted the offer.
That's a new one on me. Do you have any more details on when and where the offer was made? Having always had something of a soft spot for the Ottomans, along with the Austrian Habsburgs which is something of a contradiction :), it would certainly be a handy way of helping them recover.
 
I think that's a joke about cultural regressiveness in the Deep South.

That's the reasonable part, the joke is the idea that the Ottomans could be on par with the rest of the US. Which is ASB really. Oil alone isn't going to do that.

That requires the local Arabs to feel oppressed.

Assuming you don't just mean using it as an excuse to seize territory by the western power.
It requires a segment of the population feeling oppressed (or opportunistic) enough for a western power to take advantage of. General positive Arab feelings towards the Ottomans alone aren't going to be sufficient to maintain Ottoman control over regions with vital natural resources.
 
1) That's the reasonable part, the joke is the idea that the Ottomans could be on par with the rest of the US. Which is ASB really. Oil alone isn't going to do that.


2) It requires a segment of the population feeling oppressed (or opportunistic) enough for a western power to take advantage of. General positive Arab feelings towards the Ottomans alone aren't going to be sufficient to maintain Ottoman control over regions with vital natural resources.

1) The joke is that the entire Ottoman will be deep south save for Constantinople, which is ASB.

No question over 1878 empire will be first world in living standard, save for places like Yemen or perhaps Caucasus should the Ottomans annex it too.Size of economy and power projection capability will be another matter, but it will still be Great Power level. The later at least will still be ahead of present day China by 1950s, if not earlier.

1914 Empire also has a great chance at becoming first world. At least, it will become as developed as Argentine, Spain or Italy.

2) It will require (1914) Ottomans getting dragged into a general European war, which once it happens the empire is doomed, but was actually preventable. Prevent Italo-Ottoman War and everything in the Balkans will change. Even under the Young Turks the pro-British/neutrality faction could've won and steered the empire away from war.
 
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That's a new one on me. Do you have any more details on when and where the offer was made? Having always had something of a soft spot for the Ottomans, along with the Austrian Habsburgs which is something of a contradiction :), it would certainly be a handy way of helping them recover.

That had always been the way of Britain doing things, before Egypt anyway. They always tried their best to avoid having to administer directly their economic sphere and rely on the native structure when they can. Egypt was de jure Ottoman anyway so it would be simply natural for the Ottomans to police their own territory.
 
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What would be the consequences of a surviving caliphate on muslim world?

We have a moderate Islamic pope, which will pressure fundamentalism and encourage social progress and religious tolerance while still remains essentially conservative and wielding a dangerous amount of spiritual authority to throw weight with around in International as well as domestic politics.
 
Superpower? This implies nuclear power and/or economic power. Care to elaborate?
The economy would be quite large at any rate. There is definitely room for at least some economic development during the pre-oil period if the Ottomans hold onto the Balkans, and when the oil does roll around, this is going to be spent more on education, infrastructural development and other useful things than OTL. This is because there is only one smaller royal family to loot from the oil pot rather than half a dozen. Also, the Ottoman Empire was an established, bureaucratic state with a lot more people to spend the money on.

As for nuclear power, I would find it strange if the Ottoman Empire didn't become one by 2013 in any ATL save one where they keep only modern Turkey as a rump. The Ottoman Empire at the lowest estimates would still have a population that is probably over 200 million. With further back PODs, this could be over 400 million, which would put them ahead of the United States and Russia in terms of population. With a good chance of having a qualitative advantage over China and India as well.
 
That's the reasonable part, the joke is the idea that the Ottomans could be on par with the rest of the US. Which is ASB really. Oil alone isn't going to do that.
Oil alone will not. But a well educated population, ruled by a nation with modern administrative experience in a unified block of hundreds of millions of people does have a pretty good chance of doing it.
It requires a segment of the population feeling oppressed (or opportunistic) enough for a western power to take advantage of. General positive Arab feelings towards the Ottomans alone aren't going to be sufficient to maintain Ottoman control over regions with vital natural resources.
It also requires the West to be willing to sacrifice tens of thousands of troops, if not hundreds of thousands, to secure some black sticky stuff coming out of the ground. Oil is important, but hardly a reason to exterminate a generation of young men. Outside of fantasies involving the inept Ottomans just proving a better road for the Western Superpowers to gain easier access to oil, there really isn't much basis for the view that the West will have a easy time breaking apart the Ottoman Empire to get at its oil.
 
It requires a segment of the population feeling oppressed (or opportunistic) enough for a western power to take advantage of. General positive Arab feelings towards the Ottomans alone aren't going to be sufficient to maintain Ottoman control over regions with vital natural resources.

There's a substantial difference between "European powers seize 'regions with vital natural resources'" and the Arab population wanting to break away and signing over oil rights for help in doing so.

So while no, general positive Arab feelings aren't enough, their presence is going to make it a lot less "helping the rebels" and a lot more "seizing what we want" than even OTL.


It also requires the West to be willing to sacrifice tens of thousands of troops, if not hundreds of thousands, to secure some black sticky stuff coming out of the ground. Oil is important, but hardly a reason to exterminate a generation of young men. Outside of fantasies involving the inept Ottomans just proving a better road for the Western Superpowers to gain easier access to oil, there really isn't much basis for the view that the West will have a easy time breaking apart the Ottoman Empire to get at its oil.

How much did the West have to sacrifice to do break apart the Ottomans OTL? Just for comparison, I'm not saying that OTL represents the best or most probable scenario - just something to put all of this into perspective.

"Some black sticky stuff coming out of the ground" is worth a fair amount of blood for the greedy, but judging by Iran's fate - the West is going to send lawyers to invade if there's no WWI like thing going on, IMO.
 
The economy would be quite large at any rate. There is definitely room for at least some economic development during the pre-oil period if the Ottomans hold onto the Balkans, and when the oil does roll around, this is going to be spent more on education, infrastructural development and other useful things than OTL. This is because there is only one smaller royal family to loot from the oil pot rather than half a dozen. Also, the Ottoman Empire was an established, bureaucratic state with a lot more people to spend the money on.

As for nuclear power, I would find it strange if the Ottoman Empire didn't become one by 2013 in any ATL save one where they keep only modern Turkey as a rump. The Ottoman Empire at the lowest estimates would still have a population that is probably over 200 million. With further back PODs, this could be over 400 million, which would put them ahead of the United States and Russia in terms of population. With a good chance of having a qualitative advantage over China and India as well.

A highly educated, resource driven (oil) country with an established bureaucratic state sounds a lot like modern Russia. Russia gets superpower status because they have a massive nuclear arsenal. No nuclear arsenal and they are next to Brazil - NOT a superpower. So, I have a hard time seeing the OE becoming a superpower unless they use all that oil money to build a major stockpile of nuclear arms.

Countries with large natural resources have a mixed track record with regards to developing modern, competitive economies. Sure Canada, Australia and Norway offer nice examples of prosperity. But countries like Brazil and Indonesia have had rather mixed success. Regardless, none of these are close to superpower status despite Brazil and Indonesia have certain obvious advantages. On the other hand China, India, Japan, and Korea have all thrived despite natural resource deficiencies. One could argue having insufficient natural resources forces one to develop their economy in other ways. So, I suggest oil is a mixed blessing at best.

And we havent discussed the impact of the collapse of the European empires post wwii. I have a hard time believing Egyptians, the various Balkan nationalities, and the various Arab nationalities wouldnt look enviously at India, Algeria and the rest. This could get ugly given the oil involved.

I have no idea how the OE would turn out - way too many butterflies here. But superpower status seems like a reach with regional power more likely a best case scenario.
 
A highly educated, resource driven (oil) country with an established bureaucratic state sounds a lot like modern Russia. Russia gets superpower status because they have a massive nuclear arsenal. No nuclear arsenal and they are next to Brazil - NOT a superpower. So, I have a hard time seeing the OE becoming a superpower unless they use all that oil money to build a major stockpile of nuclear arms.

Is Russia a highly educated state as compares to the rest of the world?

Countries with large natural resources have a mixed track record with regards to developing modern, competitive economies. Sure Canada, Australia and Norway offer nice examples of prosperity.

The US and Germany come to mind as other examples of countries with "large natural resources" - the US even having oil too.
 
The Ottoman Empire could still exist as a loose federation. many countries like under the apologetic framework and survive (South Africa, Brazil and South American countries with natives, Australia with natives, CIS) with some loose contingency between all the groups. I wouldn't be surprised that if the Ottomans survived the first world war, oil would make them rich, industrialize turkey, and then, through decolonization, produce a British Commonwealth like organization that still obeys the constitutional Sultan.
 
The Ottoman Empire could still exist as a loose federation. many countries like under the apologetic framework and survive (South Africa, Brazil and South American countries with natives, Australia with natives, CIS) with some loose contingency between all the groups. I wouldn't be surprised that if the Ottomans survived the first world war, oil would make them rich, industrialize turkey, and then, through decolonization, produce a British Commonwealth like organization that still obeys the constitutional Sultan.

Why would a successful Ottoman Empire lop off the loyal non-ethnic turkish territories? That honestly just seems like a bad idea in general.
 
The Ottoman Empire could still exist as a loose federation. many countries like under the apologetic framework and survive (South Africa, Brazil and South American countries with natives, Australia with natives, CIS) with some loose contingency between all the groups. I wouldn't be surprised that if the Ottomans survived the first world war, oil would make them rich, industrialize turkey, and then, through decolonization, produce a British Commonwealth like organization that still obeys the constitutional Sultan.

It was not a colonial empire, except for the Yemenis. If you mean 1914 empire, then I agree it will be rather decentralized, but it won't be any looser then Canada.
 
A highly educated, resource driven (oil) country with an established bureaucratic state sounds a lot like modern Russia. Russia gets superpower status because they have a massive nuclear arsenal. No nuclear arsenal and they are next to Brazil - NOT a superpower. So, I have a hard time seeing the OE becoming a superpower unless they use all that oil money to build a major stockpile of nuclear arms.

Except it won't be very likely for the empire to turn commie. Had Russia not done so she would've been first world super power today.
 
Except it won't be very likely for the empire to turn commie. Had Russia not done so she would've been first world super power today.

Why would a Russia that hadn't gone through Communism be stronger when we look at how much of a a distant fourth place it was in 1913?

That's not encouraging the idea that Russia is in good shape.
 
Why would a Russia that hadn't gone through Communism be stronger when we look at how much of a a distant fourth place it was in 1913?

That's not encouraging the idea that Russia is in good shape.

Because as bad as Russia's position was in 1913, it was still rapidly gaining in strength; it was industrializing at a rapid clip; and given a few more years, it would have laid down some serious military reforms.

By contrast, the USSR did little more than continue on the path the Tsars would have set it upon, except with a fuckton more corpses, and with policies which led directly to four years of unmitigated destruction of the Russian heartland.

I'd honestly say that Russia was a better place under the Tsars than under Communism, which is about as faint as praise gets for any system of government.
 
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