Map Thread XVIII

[Historyman 14]

Thanks @Historyman 14 and @Joshua Ben Ari for the insightful comments. I'll try answer them to the best of my ability.

Ah. That's rather interesting--my knowledge regarding the war is purely confined to what I can find on Wikipedia, which lacks such insight. I was looking for a reason as to why Iran could spread her influence through the Levant with such speed, and this seems like one. But I do think the Israelis would have been somewhat antagonistic towards Iran, given the Israeli-American connection; and that a human capital flight would still have occurred, though on a smaller scale. Iran may not be Islamist, but it is certainly a threat to the established status quo, and therefore an enemy of Saudi Arabia and the US. Though in the long term, I do think Israeli-Iranian interests somewhat align, and Israel might want to position itself as a more independent political actor in the region.

I see. Just consider it me looking for something to do with North Africa.

Eh-I'm a bit iffy on this one. A world that is far more socialist tolerant than OTL means that the US is happy to help Yugoslavia just to stick a thumb in Brezhnev's eye with very few repercussions amongst voters. Yugoslavia would receive more foreign aid and have more time to reform herself.

Unfortunately, reforming herself also means finding a national identity. As Yugoslavia implies, any national identity would have to be based on Pan-Slavism, and so a defacto Serbo-Croatian commonwealth places a heavy emphasis on secularism. It'd be oddly similar to OTL Iran: the Islamic Republic ties the country together through Shi'ism; TTLYugoslavia ties the country together through Slavic nationalism. To sweeten the deal for minorities, Yugoslavia also looks like an HRE-lite.

And it was a real proposal.
'...when Britain handed back Hong Kong to China in 1997, there would be no future for its 5.5 million inhabitants.

The alternative, he suggested, was to resettle them in a new “city-state” to be established between Coleraine and Londonderry – a move, he said, which could revitalize the stagnant Northern Ireland economy...

George Fergusson, an official in the Northern Ireland Office...fired off a memorandum to a colleague in the Republic of Ireland Department of the Foreign Office, declaring: “At this stage, we see real advantages in taking the proposal seriously.”'


I can't say I agree. The Soviet Union's collapse was by no means a definite in the late '80s, and considered absolutely ludicrous. The world was absolutely shocked when Ukraine declared her independence. That the Soviet Union has effectively lost the African cold war also means it's less of an investment to maintain the Soviet Empire. I was thinking that a general acceptance of (moderate) socialism would allow for an earlier rapprochement between the West and the Soviet Union, as well as strengthen reformism in the Union.

But I don't think I mentioned Soviet intervention in Yugoslavia?

Before 1979, Israel and the Shah's Iran in fact had close military and intelligence ties. Israel and Iran would continue to maintain their good working relationship with Iran not going off the deep end/not go Islamic. American Israel...it's complicated, and still is today. Both Israel and Iran would be threatened by Saddam's Iraq and Assad's Syria. So Israel seeing Iran beat the Hades out of Iraq would be in favor of Israel.

Nassrism never really recovered from the Six Day War, and Nasser's death and more of it was either replace, or water down, and I doubt the coup could survive. Egypt would be a drain on the Soviets.

Yugoslavia surviving requires POD roughly in 1945-48 at latest to 1917 at best. The long standing animosity and rivalry between Croats, Serbs, Slovenians and Bosniaks can't simply 'go away with money and reform'. Only Tito could keep it together. If you had killed Tito during WW2, there would have not been a Yugoslavia at all. (It didn't help he purge the reformers in the 70s and listen to the more hardliners). With his passing, nationalism is on the rise, and you can't keep everyone happy.

That's what makes it so crazy. It would be better if the UK had in fact cared about Hong Kong citizens and not doing everything in its power to stop them from coming to the UK as 97 rolled around. (Which the deal was the best the British and Hong Kong would get.)

The Soviet's are basically screwed once Brezhnev comes to power. Brezhnev really ruined it. The stagnation, the military spending, the growing corruption, the growing resistance (among the youth, especially) to his (or rather, especially later, the men who actually ruled the regime) silly policies, his blunders (like his speech), the entrenchment of the gerontocracy, and so on was what hurt the Soviet Union most. There is just too much rot to save the USSR. Gorbachev reforms open a floodgate, thinking people would pick Communism once it got to reforms. He was so wrong. You see something like in OTL in which the Hardliners screw everything up in trying to 'save' the Soviet Union, more so with the ' rapprochement' with the West. Maybe even a ealry 1991 style coup attempt. Same with the reforms opening the same floodgates that can't be stop.

I don't think you did, and that would be the final nail in the Soviet Union's coffin. Yugoslavia is A-Bigger and more mountainous, B-sharing a direct border with NATO states, and C-deliberately training a partisan force. They've just seriously pissed off the Non-Aligned States while the Red Army is chew up and spit out and NATO sending aid to the partisans.

B_Munro said it best with Carter winning, not in the cards. Brooke is your man. (Or anyone of the GOP.)

 

[Historyman 14]

Maybe, @Xianfeng Emperor , Brooke wins the primaries and then loses the election - maybe even by some faithless elector in the South or something?

Now don't be like that. Brooke is almost the Party of Abe finally fulfilling an long in the works prophecy.

Nixon had a lot of respect for Brooke - he even offered Brooke a job as part of his cabinet, or even the US ambassador to the United Nations; and the press was touting Brooke as a possible Vice President after Agnew resigned in 1973. (Nixon was pretty intent on keeping Reaganite conservatives from taking over the party.) He draw in a lot of African-Americans, fiscal conservatives, and moderates Dems.

 

[Red Arturoist]

I am fine with Brooke as POTUS, too, of course.

 

[Historyman 14]

I see I have been somewhat ninja'd. To follow up on some stuff and cover points brought up by Historyman14:

In case of a mid-80s Iran-Iraq war with a less messed up Iran, I'd agree that Iraq would do worse than OTL, even with more foreign support, but I don't think it gets broken up: the major powers won't stand for it, and there will be a negotiated peace, even if only grudgingly accepted because the Red Army is assembling on the border. Iran gets some minor territorial concessions and it's star soars internationally as the country which stood up to the US and USSR combined and their puppet, regardless of how small it's actual gains are. I doubt Saddam gets overthrown: he wasn't after the first Gulf War, he wasn't during the 90s in spite of the benefits it would have brought the country - he had a ruthlessly efficient police state staffed with loyalists tied by blood and origin to make sure he wasn't. Modern dictators historically don't go down easily.

Iraq best bet in breaking up and coming under Iran's wing is for Saddam to die and his sons Uday and Qusa to fight the other in trying to take power, breaking up Iraq, or something like that.

 

[Historyman 14]

I am fine with Brooke as POTUS, too, of course.

RIGHT!?

 

[wildviper121]

Okay, a little English grammar lesson. I get that you are using "an" in a rather correct context, as it is always end only used for words that start with vowels. However, nobody says "EEEE-row-pee-an", but rather "YOU-row-pee-an", which does not start sounding like a vowel, but rather a consonant letter, as pointed out in my demonstration. As defined by linguists, consonant letters make a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. I would say "I'm an apple" as the vowel in "apple" is sounded with my vocal tract open in an "AAAHHHHH!" "An" is reserved for that kind of speech. Therefore, it would sound silly when people say "An person was robbing my house" as you're rolling some consonants on each other that makes a rather clunky trip-over in a sentence. That was how I felt when I spoke the quote from your post out loud.

You're doing good, BTW, I just get OCD'd out of sanity when I see rookie mistakes like that.

And no, I'm not an English teacher, I just happened to score a 25 on the English test of the ACT.

This was definitely not worth the time it took to write up.
Also an English ACT score of 25 is 78th percentile. Definitely not an English teacher.

 

[damein fisher]

Ten without One
​

A One Shot I decided to do when I was bored, the premise is that once Jamaica leaves the West Indies Federation, Barbados and Trinidad/Tobago are able to hold the union together and actually federalize the colonies into a single associated state. In 1971, a communist revolution occurs and actually takes control of quite a few of the northern islands, though the US and UK are able to suppress it. Seeing the rise of desires for self-governance in the state, the UK gives the West Indies Federation independence in 1977.

Eventually new provinces are admitted from either existing ones or from other provinces; Such as Anguilla becoming its own province in 1981. Guyana had always been an observer state and eventually joined in 1980 following a failed socialist revolution. Rather than gain independence, Belize joined the WIF in 1982 [At the time admitted as British Honduras until a name referendum in 1989].

In the 90's, the West Indies are given a few dependencies by the British; while not provinces or territories, they have a similar relationship to the West Indies as the Cook Islands do with New Zealand. These dependencies are the Turks and Caicos Islands, the Cayman Islands, and the British Virgin Islands, with negotiations underway for the possible entry of Bermuda.

Since the end of the Cold War, the Federation has grown to accept other entities as observer states; such as Haiti, Suriname, the Bahamas, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, and Panama. Some of these states [especially Haiti and Suriname] have expressed interest in joining the WIF. Other, non sovereign dependencies have been labeled associated states; the big ones being Bermuda, Aruba, Curaçao, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, Sint Maarten, Saint Barthélemy, and Saint Martin. All of which have discussed the possibility of joining the WIF to various degrees of success upon their potential independence.

If anyone finds this idea interesting, I've considered doing a 2019 sequel in which the negotiations to expand the union succeed. Sorry for the quality, clicking the image links to a much higher resolution image. Any questions, criticisms or other comments would be greatly appreciated.

 

[XFE]

Happy to see that my map has inspired so much discussion.

You're doing good, BTW, I just get OCD'd out of sanity when I see rookie mistakes like that.

Ah-second language problems I'd think. Thanks!

Regarding Egypt:

Probably not booming with double digit economic growth, I suspect.

Definitely not. Perhaps similar to China in terms of repression, but not in economic growth--which means Egypt is IMO hanging onto life by the skin of its teeth.

and Egypt's revolution, if disruptive in other ways, is unlikely to be that influential on oil prices, Egypt, unlike Iraq or Iran, being a fairly minor OPEC player.

I saw it as more of the shock effect. Iran and Iraq going to war is going to cause a slump in the economy through driving up oil prices, but add in Egypt, one of the more recognizable names to the general public and the nightly news would paint you a picture of the entire middle east in flames. The market would respond with shock and make 1979 the annus horribillis for absolutely everyone. Perhaps oil prices would go down in the long term, but that isn't going to influence the economy right here and now.

Regarding the Iran Iraq War (and it's fallout):

In case of a mid-80s Iran-Iraq war with a less messed up Iran, I'd agree that Iraq would do worse than OTL, even with more foreign support, but I don't think it gets broken up: the major powers won't stand for it, and there will be a negotiated peace, even if only grudgingly accepted because the Red Army is assembling on the border. Iran gets some minor territorial concessions and it's star soars internationally as the country which stood up to the US and USSR combined and their puppet, regardless of how small it's actual gains are. I doubt Saddam gets overthrown: he wasn't after the first Gulf War, he wasn't during the 90s in spite of the benefits it would have brought the country - he had a ruthlessly efficient police state staffed with loyalists tied by blood and origin to make sure he wasn't. Modern dictators historically don't go down easily.

If the US is looking less reliable, some sort of regional ally certainly is not to be scoffed at.

Before 1979, Israel and the Shah's Iran in fact had close military and intelligence ties. Israel and Iran would continue to maintain their good working relationship with Iran not going off the deep end/not go Islamic. American Israel...it's complicated, and still is today. Both Israel and Iran would be threatened by Saddam's Iraq and Assad's Syria. So Israel seeing Iran beat the Hades out of Iraq would be in favor of Israel.

I'd agree with B_Munro here. The world wouldn't tolerate Iran marching into Baghdad and dismantle Saddam's empire the same way Napoleon dismantled the HRE.

Israel wouldn't jump on the Iran train just yet, even though their long-term interests align. However much Begin might want to bring down Saddam if given the chance, I don't see Tel Aviv making a 180-degree foreign policy alignment against the US. Any shift towards Iran might take place in 1983 earliest when Egypt, Israel's traditional enemy goes Neo-Nasserist.

Saddam remained in power OTL until he was overthrown by outside military force in 2003, still perfectly compos mentis and not yet 70. If he lived as long as the OTL Khomeini, he'd be still in power today. Also, no matter what lies the Bush II administration trotted out after 2001, Iraq in 1990 really was working on an atom bomb, and unless stopped by outside pressure or probably would have obtained one well before 2003.

I see. I was looking for a gap where Iran could make a break towards the Mediterranean, and killing of Saddam seemed like a easy answer. Would an increasingly totalitarian and paranoid Saddam who is brought down by a chaotic popular revolution make more sense? Saddam is a resilient bastard, but I think Iran could spark a revolt if it proves as able as OTL in coordinating her proxy groups.

Regarding POTUSes and the Recession:

Nixon had a lot of respect for Brooke - he even offered Brooke a job as part of his cabinet, or even the US ambassador to the United Nations; and the press was touting Brooke as a possible Vice President after Agnew resigned in 1973. (Nixon was pretty intent on keeping Reaganite conservatives from taking over the party.) He draw in a lot of African-Americans, fiscal conservatives, and moderates Dems.

So you are assuming that without a hostage crisis, Carter wins? Even under those circumstances, I think you will find a lot of people will disagree: Carter was already not a popular president, the economy was in the doldrums, the spike in oil prices OTL (and probably ATL) from the revolution peaked in 1980, the election year, and whatever else one has to say about him, Reagan had charisma in bucketloads.

AH I see-I hadn't accounted for Carter's term ending in 1981. Carter (and by extension the Dems perhaps?) would probably suffer badly come November 4th. Brooke seems like a genuinely fascinating character after some research *cough* Wikipedia *cough*, and it does fit my idea of a more America that is generally more liberal than OTL.

Regarding the USSR: I don't really have much to say about the matter. Listening to the arguments here I agree the USSR's survival is probably implausible after Brezhnev.

 

[Tethys00]

Little something I've been working on. Someone tell me if someone has already made a Worlda of this so I can be spared of the effort.

1983: Doomsday: WIP

​

 

[wtw]

Ten without One
​

A One Shot I decided to do when I was bored, the premise is that once Jamaica leaves the West Indies Federation, Barbados and Trinidad/Tobago are able to hold the union together and actually federalize the colonies into a single associated state. In 1971, a communist revolution occurs and actually takes control of quite a few of the northern islands, though the US and UK are able to suppress it. Seeing the rise of desires for self-governance in the state, the UK gives the West Indies Federation independence in 1977.

Eventually new provinces are admitted from either existing ones or from other provinces; Such as Anguilla becoming its own province in 1981. Guyana had always been an observer state and eventually joined in 1980 following a failed socialist revolution. Rather than gain independence, Belize joined the WIF in 1982 [At the time admitted as British Honduras until a name referendum in 1989].

In the 90's, the West Indies are given a few dependencies by the British; while not provinces or territories, they have a similar relationship to the West Indies as the Cook Islands do with New Zealand. These dependencies are the Turks and Caicos Islands, the Cayman Islands, and the British Virgin Islands, with negotiations underway for the possible entry of Bermuda.

Since the end of the Cold War, the Federation has grown to accept other entities as observer states; such as Haiti, Suriname, the Bahamas, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, and Panama. Some of these states [especially Haiti and Suriname] have expressed interest in joining the WIF. Other, non sovereign dependencies have been labeled associated states; the big ones being Bermuda, Aruba, Curaçao, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, Sint Maarten, Saint Barthélemy, and Saint Martin. All of which have discussed the possibility of joining the WIF to various degrees of success upon their potential independence.

If anyone finds this idea interesting, I've considered doing a 2019 sequel in which the negotiations to expand the union succeed. Sorry for the quality, clicking the image links to a much higher resolution image. Any questions, criticisms or other comments would be greatly appreciated.

I'd be interested in seeing one, granted on power projection I do not think that something like this would be able to stand up to the US, however Guatemala would drop claims, Venezuela might not be interested in claims on Guyana, although you have to work on Suriname's claims.

 

[damein fisher]

I'd be interested in seeing one, granted on power projection I do not think that something like this would be able to stand up to the US, however Guatemala would drop claims, Venezuela might not be interested in claims on Guyana, although you have to work on Suriname's claims.

Agreed, I doubt that this nation would even come close to rivaling the Southern US even. They are likely more akin in power to Cuba or Mexico, but surrounded by mostly weaker nations. I imagine that Suriname could go either way, maybe the union accepts their claims in exchange for admission, maybe they buy off their claims, the first seems more likely and interesting though.

 

[TrucKola]

This was definitely not worth the time it took to write up.
Also an English ACT score of 25 is 78th percentile. Definitely not an English teacher.

I usually do that to myself when I have nothing else to do whilst in a car trip for 10 hours.

 

[Bleh]

Okay, a little English grammar lesson. I get that you are using "an" in a rather correct context, as it is always end only used for words that start with vowels. However, nobody says "EEEE-row-pee-an", but rather "YOU-row-pee-an", which does not start sounding like a vowel, but rather a consonant letter, as pointed out in my demonstration. As defined by linguists, consonant letters make a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. I would say "I'm an apple" as the vowel in "apple" is sounded with my vocal tract open in an "AAAHHHHH!" "An" is reserved for that kind of speech. Therefore, it would sound silly when people say "An person was robbing my house" as you're rolling some consonants on each other that makes a rather clunky trip-over in a sentence. That was how I felt when I spoke the quote from your post out loud.

You're doing good, BTW, I just get OCD'd out of sanity when I see rookie mistakes like that.

And no, I'm not an English teacher, I just happened to score a 25 on the English test of the ACT.

An European English speaker might pronounce "european" in such a way that it ought to follow an "an" rather than an "a"

 

[inversepieta]

Finally finished the write-up on this thing! Hope it's not too horrible to read.

And, as a bonus, a sneak peak into the 100 years post-ISOT map:

 

[Oliveia]

Finally finished the write-up on this thing! Hope it's not too horrible to read.

Hate to say it, but it seems the numbers are off, starting at number 35 or 36.

 

[inversepieta]

Hate to say it, but it seems the numbers are off, starting at number 35 or 36.

I just fixed it! The formatting's a little messier now (not that it was neat to begin with) but that's alright. Thank you for pointing that out!

 

[B_Munro]

Hope it's not too horrible to read.

Very nice indeed - I see you had the sort of "numbering error" I often fall prey to. Condolences.

The bit about northern Chile seems a bit dubious - that's not the most densely populated part of Chile, and they'd be outnumbered better than ten to one. I guess Bolivia must have been going through a pretty chaotic phase at that time for it to look plausible.

What is going on with Israel?

 

[inversepieta]

Very nice indeed - I see you had the sort of "numbering error" I often fall prey to. Condolences.

The bit about northern Chile seems a bit dubious - that's not the most densely populated part of Chile, and they'd be outnumbered better than ten to one. I guess Bolivia must have been going through a pretty chaotic phase at that time for it to look plausible.

What is going on with Israel?

In all honesty, I did sort of overlook Chile's population density for the sake of future Argentina wanking. Let's just say that Northern Chile had some rapid population growth and a maniacal fervor for invasion.

Israel has been occupied for around a decade by Canadian, Argentine, and Australian forces, following a brief-but-deadly nuclear attack on several neighboring countries; they had expelled the Palestinians a few years before this attack (who relocated to the (mysteriously unlabeled!) red-pink strip on the Red Sea). Currently, they're negotiating the end of occupation and some form of reparations to the Arab Union.

 

[B_Munro]

Israel has been occupied for around a decade by Canadian, Argentine, and Australian forces, following a brief-but-deadly nuclear attack on several neighboring countries;

Why would they do that? Their main regional threats are either in chaos or just gone: post-ISOT*, they're hardly in any short to medium range danger of being overrun by anyone.

 

[Minchandre]

Why would they do that? Their main regional threats are either in chaos or just gone: post-ISOT*, they're hardly in any short to medium range danger of being overrun by anyone.

Well, you know, Israelis be crazy

A few years ago, every third timeline on this board had Israel nuking the Aswan Dam or, God forbid, Damascus (which would, in addition to killing millions of civilians, contaminate large amounts of Israeli freshwater and probably spread fallout all over Israel).

I think people also overestimate Israel's dependence on the US, militarily. Without US aid, Israel would have to cut back military spending by 10% or tighten belts elsewhere, but it's not as though Israel isn't the most powerful military in the region, with an indigenous arms industry covering everything from rifles to aircraft (it would take them a few years to cobble together a fighter, and it wouldn't be the F35, but they could probably build F-16 equivalents in-house; and, indeed, almost did once).