I have a question- how long will this war be going on? Theoretically, the longer it goes on, the greater the amount of concessions made to the various colonies will have to be made, and frankly, it would be interesting to see more groups on the line of Congress form over the war....especially in the British West African territories.
Malê Rising
- Thread starter Jonathan Edelstein
- Start date
You know, this actually touches on a serious problem for the Italians that seems to have gone largely unrecognized. Yes, they'll naturally be on the defensive because of the terrain. Yes, the combination of the terrain and multiple fronts will put both France and Austria in much the same position. And yes, this suggests that the opening of the war will be, however bloody, begin more like a Sitzkrieg compared to the major fronts. But based on the model of our WWI or even WWII that does not suggest that the Italians will be focusing on the defensive. In those wars, allies could (and did) demand (and get!) their allies to make mass offensives purely to draw forces away from their front. This was one of the main historical drivers of the otherwise absurd Italian offensives we saw in OTL.
This is both a total war and a general war. That means that, sooner rather than later, there's going to come a moment where Italy's allies are screaming for help. Given the extreme vulnerability of the nation's coastline and its dependence on Britain to defend it, Italy will have to listen. So Italian forces will be massed and thrown against France or Austria-Hungary. Later on it may occur when the BOG general staffs feel that "one last push will do it." But probably by the beginning of the second year it will happen because the North Germans seem to be rapidly draining dry of young men and bullets to shoot them. Then a massed offensive against whichever power seems more vulnerable will be politically mandatory. France would be the stronger opponent, but on the easier front, and distracting the big guy is a passable idea anyway. The Hapsburgs, on the other hand, will likely be viewed as the weak link of the FAR, and will be tempting targets.
And if we assume, as I feel we must, that Italian offensives will be forthcoming, nor can we rule out FAR counterattacks. Politically, geographically, and economically, Italy is arguably the most vulnerable power of the BOG coalition. Unlike North Germany, it does have mountains to defend it. But beyond those mountains it is far from the homogenous industrial power its ally is. Italy is in effect like an egg, protected by a hard shell of mountains and steel ships, but with nothing of substance behind it. When and if the country has spent significant strength trying to jump on its opponents' backs, and has begun to destabilize worse than it did in the nineteen teens.... Then I suspect the FAR will seriously consider a two-front offensive against Italy.
You have a point. Italy can endure a long defensive war, much less a long offensive one. However, we are discussing Italy that is considered not the weakest of Great Powers but, at best, the strongest of minor ones, largely swapping places with the Ottomans relative to OTL.
This means that she will be considered an easier target, but also a lower priority one. I suppose that it could go in several ways. IOTL, the main industrial regions of Italy were very vulnerable to a French successful attack in depth, and I suppose this is the case here too. French troops taking Turin and Genoa could be a VERY serious problem, to say the least. France managed to resist in WWI in similar conditions, but France wasn't fighting another front and was more powerful and industrialized anyway.
In 1832, after the end of November Uprising (1830-1) Gregory XVI issued an encyclical Cum Primum, in which he condemned the uprising as evil. His successor, Pius IX, wasn't so supportive of Russian Tsardom, but not because of support for Polish national movement, but because of persecution of Church in Russian-held Poland. All in all, during XIXth C. popes, including Leo XIII, were insistient that Polish subjects of the Tsar were obliged to obedience to Tsar. As you can imagine it didn't make Poles happy.
Would any side risk raising Polish volunteer units? The Poles may get ideas...
wolf_brother
Banned
And more populous. Italy at this point might have a few million over IOTL, which would put her up still nearly 15mil behind France and nearly twenty million versus Austria-Hungary.
wolf_brother
Banned
Agreed. As much as the French or British might pressure their respective allies (who actually have large Polish populations and own the former Polish territories, something the western powers and their romanticized views of the Polish Diaspora didn't have to contend with), there's no way short of facing total existential annihilation that Berlin, Vienna, or St. Petersburg would ever even think of raising a 'Polish Legion' or the like. Conscripting Poles into the regular army is one thing, raising a volunteer unit of Poles is a completely different ballgame.
Figures I have put the difference at about 10 mil IOTL, which is still quite significant though I think Italy had a slightly higher proportion of combat-age males relative to France because of higher birthrates in preceding decades. I doubt Italy would be have much larger population ITTL, I'd put it a couple of million above OTL at very most.
Well, if, as Jonathan says, Prussian Poland is already under Russian occupation, the NGF may come to the conclusion that it makes sense to give up on regaining Posen in order to get back Danzig and Königsberg. They will do that only when they feel that they cannot push back the Russians without Polish help.
As presently planned, the war will last about four and a half years, ending in the fall of 1897. That will be long enough for Britain to need the colonies a great deal - one of the names the war will have in the British popular press is "the Empire War."
How the colonies fare will depend on how much they can supply what Britain wants. The white dominions, India and the Malê successor states, which have both manpower and untapped production capacity, will have the most cards to play. The colonies with only manpower won't have as much to gain, although the more troops they provide, the more points they can score.
I'd expect participation in the war to increase nationalist sentiment throughout the empire - the soldiers and their leaders will want their service to be rewarded, and army service will help knit them together and build networks that can be used for postwar political organizing. One or more Congress-type organizations might well come into being, in southern as well as western Africa, although much of the organizing will also focus around local issues.
Fair point, and one I hadn't thought through. I'd definitely expect the North Germans to start screaming for an Italian offensive by the spring thaw in 1894, if not earlier. And once that happens, the losses in men and money could destabilize Italy very quickly. As Falecius says, Italy in TTL will be a lower priority so the counterattacks it faces might not be as strong, and the FARs' top priority will still be breaking the North Germans, but it could go badly if the French and Austrians decide to launch a major offensive.
Interesting. I could imagine the Pope doing the same thing during TTL's Great War, because he would consider Russia's alliance with the Catholic powers more important than Polish Catholic nationalism. This could cause a great deal of tension between the Polish church hierarchy and the papacy. I could see France trying to act as mediator in order to prevent a rupture that could weaken both the Church and the Russian empire, but such mediation has the potential to go badly wrong.
They might face a fait accompli, though - if the Poles rebel behind Russian lines, Berlin may have to choose between accepting them as allies or having to fight their way through Poland against two armies. Also, if the FARs are clearly losing and Russian territory is on the chopping block, the North Germans might be wary of annexing such a large Polish minority, and might prefer to recreate Congress Poland as a client state. That could also lead to the recruitment of Polish volunteer battalions. It would be very risky, but the government in Berlin might think it can control Polish nationalism - plenty of governments in OTL have made similar mistakes.
Things would have to be really, really bad before this happened - it would probably take a few failed offensives and a serious manpower shortage before the NDB would consider such a thing. As I said earlier in the thread, the North Germans would have to be at a point where they'd consider cutting off a hand to save the arm.
BTW, is it safe to assume that the Ruhr, Saxony and the Hanseatic cities will still be the North German industrial centers? The Ruhr is vulnerable to a French attack in depth, and Saxony is vulnerable to the Austrians or even the Russians, although I'd expect the NDB to defend these regions at all costs.
Russia does not look like she's going to be in the shape of profiting of pretty much anything.
By the way, Jonathan, what's FAR aiming at with Italy? Does the goal include restoration of the Papacy in Rome and surroundings as politcally separate from Italy? Dismantle the Italian state altogether? Paint the alpine roads red because it's cool?
I don't think the Germans need to be incredibly desperate to try to stoke Polish nationalism. After all, if they win the war, they stand to gain southern Germany. That's easily worth Posen.
It does not look that way to us, having OTL's results firmly in mind. Around mid-1893 in-TL? Totally different story.
North Germany's been too focused on Bavaria and is now too overwhelmed to do anything that would display the weaknesses of the Russian juggernaut. And Russian logistics suggest by that point the Ottomans haven't done so either - Crimea's probably fallen, but other armies meant for the Caucasus would've done little better than make contact by that point.
So Russia looks superficially like an irresistible force, whereas any troops serving under the Hapsburgs would be well aware of the vulnerabilities of their own system.
Well, again with reference to OTL, that won't really protect Italy in the long run. No matter how important a value the FAR place on North Germany, the butcher's bill will eventually be just too much to stand. Unless they actually overrun most of the country early on, there just won't be sufficient returns on the effort for the political cost of each offensive. At that point there will be an endless supply of eager ears wanting to believe any crackpot alternative strategy. Gallipoli and Zeppelins - that sort of gambit. It's going to end up largely the same as in OTL as far as Italy goes - bled out and unstable, but only more industrialized the longer the war goes on, with the added bonus of two fronts and an accessible capital city. There's a reason the Germans were up for an offensive away from the main fronts.
Hrm. The more I think about it, the more I suspect Italy will need a lot of luck to avoid abject ruin.
And Silesia, yes?
wolf_brother
Banned
TBF, that all the powers involved have that issue. Granted though that it means the Russian giant moves as slow as cold molasses, and I'm sure the Germans are spiking their own rails as they fall back to prevent the Russians from using them.
But Russia in 1896 IOTL was not really seen to be weak was it? Given that the events of 1905 had not yet occurred. Sort of like what JE said about Britain not as yet being revealed to have feet of clay as per OTL's Second Boer War.
It's a relative difference, not an absolute one htough; and that's why it matters.
For what it's worth, Paul Kennedy's "Rise and Fall of the Great Powers" suggests that Russia was in relative decline with respect to Germany through much of the 19th century, and only began to turn this around in the 1890s. So if north German growth patters are similar to a united Germany - and Russian ones haven't seriously changed for the better - north Germany will probably be at it's _strongest_ relative to Russia sometime early in that decade.
(If you buy Kennedy's statistics, anyway)
Bruce