Another map. This one is less satisfactory for me to be quite honest. I need to learn writing better description.
This world diverge from ours shortly after the ascension of Osman II, the young gifted Ottoman Sultan through overthrowing Mustafa II in a coup. IOTL, Mustafa’s mother and Vali, Halime was responsible for cutting his rule short by mobilizing her networks of allies in harem, administration and janissaries to overthrow and murder Osman II. In here, her son had a severe episode of depression and committed suicide. His mother, plagued with grief, lost her touch with politics and then passed away rather shortly after. This did not prevent a Janissary rebellion later, but without Halime’s hand in it failed to overthrow the young Osman. On his part, surviving his assassination attempt imbued a lesson to heart that the Janissaries were still too strong, thus he chose to reconcile with them, giving him time consolidate his own power and wait until the right time to strike. He reigned for another 20 years before he passed away, officially due to illness though it was widely suspected he was poisoned. After his passing, his crown prince became the Sultan, which means his mother became Valide Sultan and chief of the harem, and together they pushed through Osman II’s agendas to abolish the Janissaries and reform the military and the state. Janissaries, who were mostly recruited from Balkan and Caucasian Christians, were replaced by a new force that were drawn from mainly ethnic Turks. With stronger, fresh armed forces formed just decades prior, it means Ottomans were more successful in later Great Turkish War, in which Vienna was successfully occupied if only temporarily. All of Hungary thus fell to Turkish rule, and will remain so for a long time.
The reform also had other effect of increasing Turkish settlement in European territories, in tandem with administrative reform and centralization pushing for more infrastructure and connection between administrative and economic centers with rural countryside and each other, kicking off urbanization and nurturing a class of entrepreneurs, craftsmen and service providers, aka. the middle class. In short, the ingredients necessary for industrialization. Like our world’s Bakufu Japan, the changes made it prepared for the incoming change brought by western progress later to have its own Meiji. Unlike Japan however, Ottoman Empire is just next door to Europe, meaning that it was at least updated on state of art weapons technology and military doctrines, with military and supporting state structure sufficiently effective to keep up. It means that it won’t hurry to adopt wholesale western discourse and political model when faced with European explosion in technological progress and industrial revolution in 19th century even as the system decays(which will not approach anywhere near OTL level). Instead it means more equal exchange of ideas between the west and Islamic world. For the west, it means western statehood and political ideologies are mobilized by incorporating Islamic MOs and philosophies, enabling them to take form of identitarian populism(Assabiyah), as well as strengthening and standardization of nationalism in liberal discourse. While for Islamic world, which adopts capitalism and industrialism but without liberal discourse package, means that consequential social transformation under industrialization translates to recontextualization of Assabiyah rivalry and millenarianism under the new industrial context, begetting radical religious interpretations revolving around society’s material structure and its distribution of wealth. All while Islamic political framework also provides political model for anti-liberal western conservatives as well as for non western countries which aim for modernization package where liberal democracy is absent.
The rest is history. As per OTL, Jacobin revolution set Europe towards the path of consolidation of nation states, which as stated prior went overall stronger due to unavoidable Islamic influence. On the other hand. Ottoman model of industrialization spread eastward to oriental empires that could afford to emulate it. It translates to series of wars between industrializing nations and empires across Europe and Eurasia, culminating in the Great World War at the turn towards 20th century. Then, more followed, such as more industrial wars, then revolutions and decolonizations. While a single full scale industrial war inspired pacifism and reconciliation in Europe, industrial warfare still drew the appetite of former gunpowder empires to the east for a bit longer. The Great Eurasian War erupted in 1925 between the great despots of Russia, Persia, China and Ottoman Empire ended up in stalemate and political chaos sweeping through the region. Following these wars were emergence of radical forces. In Europe the Jacobin ideology rebounded by the general Republican revolution sweeping across the continent, before formally unifying into European Federation. Islamic world however saw the emergence of polarizing and jeopardizing radical discourses, with Russian Empire brought down by Jacobin revolution and Iran by millenarian Islamist movement, a trend which ripples through the entire Islamic world, most notably to West Africa.
It was this swinging geopolitical equilibrium that then gave rise to division of the world into two camps espousing different global aspirations. United States, here not butterflied away yet developed differently due to more radical and complete reconstruction, inspired by liberal capitalism embarked on anti-European foreign policy to wrestle global market from European colonialism, which led to approach and trade with Asian Empires, meddling and undermining in European colonies in Africa and South Asia, and eventually rolled into Global Initiative, a movement initially aimed to connect the global market which became belligerent in the face of rising radical ideologies and renewed European ambition, this time under Jacobinist dressing.
Global Initiative:
Led by the United States and participated by major powers such as Ottoman Empire, China and Indonesia, the Global Initiative was at first formed to liberalize trade between United States and its allies, but then quickly transformed into a mutual security alliance to respond the rise of ideological challenges and threats to global trade, mainly Jacobinism. From the very beginningm Global Initiative espouses the ideal of a peaceful global order where trade can flourish regardless of cultural differences. In response to the rise of radical and reactionary ideologies, it develops a dialectic where the end goal of the world is mutual prosperity and that global market integration is the way to achieve it, and as such humanism must be based on mutual understanding and cooperation between nations and cultures, instead of forcing one’s own ideology and creed upon the other. Being a massive and disparate network of alliance, it is effectively consisted of three sub-bloc, the American bloc consisting of ANASAC and other American client states, the Ottoman-led Islamic bloc that stretches all the way to Mozambique, and the Indian Rim Forum.
Jacobinist States:
It is less a formal alliance and more of an ad-hoc grouping of nations under Jacobin ruling ideology. The Jacobins espouse the classic enlightenment brand of humanism as the only possible conclusion of human civilization and strive to spread the Jacobin revolution to unite the entire humanity under the ideals of individual rationality, liberty and equality. As it has won over the entire European sphere, it has set its eyes to the remaining “despotic”, “feudal” and “superstitious” dictatorial regimes around the world and seek to replace them with democratic republican system. Thus they have come into conflict with the Global Initiative who prefers coexistence and free trade. Ostensibly democratic, democracy in fact varies from one Jacobin state to another. The two largest Jacobin states, Democratic Republic of Russia and Azad Hindustan are semi-military junta and single party regime respectively, if with stated long term goal of completing democratization as in principle, a humanist world state is Jacobin’s vision of humanity.
Aside from the two global movements, there are also smaller important ideological currents. The Catholic world outside of Jacobin-ruled Europe and global initiative countries is divided between two ideologies: the naturalists and the liberationists. The naturalists espouse reactionary form of nation building based on natural law and religiously sanctioned hierarchy while adopting oriental industrialization model, while the liberationists are vanguarded by diehard catholic missionaries hell bent on removing corruption and injustice within Roman Catholic Church in order to legitimize the proselytization of Catholic faith, and have supported anti-colonial and anti-aristocratic movements such as in Camerún and Charcas respectively. More concerning case however lies in Islamic world, where two major radical epicenters have emerged. One in Persia where millenarian Shia movement overthrew the late Afsharid dynasty and replace it with a claimant to Ali’s lineage, which oversaw massive social reform as well as redistribution of wealth and land on the expense of traditional land lords and nomadic grazers, as well as experimenting with a form of popular participation centered around guilds and unions, although it quickly degenerated into Soviet-esque exploitative totalitarianism. Shia millenarianism, without saying, bears no appeal to its immediate neighbors who see it as ideological and geopolitical threat, such as it remains hostile to both Global Initiative and the Jacobinists. Another is the Sahel in West Africa, where dan Fodio’s Caliphate of Sudan once briefly unified. Originating in state ideological reform to centralize the empire and expand its influence and ideology, and later its backfire as the agitated masses outside of Hausa realm turned toward the caliphate as well as antagonizing other major muslim empires of Ottomans and Morroco, a new strand of populist ideology emerged in former Sudanese client of Wassoulou. Instead of simple centralization and depriving opposition lords of their labor, the new emir of Wassoulou visionizes an industrialized Islamic Sahel society where egalitarianism and meritocracy rules supreme, tapping the maximum potential of Sudanese people to once again become a center of Islamic civilization. Needless to say, both Ottomans and Morocco view this radical awakening as an ideological threat and will not stand by on its growth. Despite American urging for restrain, a major war was inevitable. By February 1970, the alliance of Morocco and Ottoman Empire begins invasion into the Sahel states.
Well I hope this isn't too dubious for you, plus I made the PoD occur in the 1840s-1860s, current year is 1920
For the lore, Nader Shah is not assassinated in 1847, his reign continues until the 1860's, where his sons will continue the Afsharid dynasty, while the military successes of the Afsharids begin to slump in the mid 19th century, the economy begins to recover from previous mass military spending, a campaign is led into central asia leading to a Persian consolidation of power, the ottomans and Russians however slowly begin taking land in the west over the course of the 1830's-1870's, during this time Persia modernizes as all of its domestic policies allow it do so, without the afghans, there is no great game, and so the British and Persians begin to trade more and have more open relations, small border skirmishes and even a war occur until the british and persians sign a treaty allowing Persia to own all of the land west of the Indus river valley, while the land on the right remains as a part of the British Raj, this also causes a decline of muslims in the British Raj, with the policies of Nader Shah and afsharid dynasty still inplace, Persia by this point in time would be roughly half sunni- half shia, with a large christian minority.
