Map Thread XXI

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Crosspost from MotF 262:
Backstory is that Germany opts for more of a "Mediterranean Strategy" in WWII, coercing Spain into joining the war on the side of the Axis, which in turn ensnares Portugal on the side of the Allies - but the war still ends in a decisive Axis defeat.

Portugal is devastated by the war, though receives increased Marshall Plan aid and some territorial gains. The Olivença dispute is resolved in Portugal's favor. Portugal regains Ceuta, as the victorious allies want the strategically located city to be in the possession of a "trusted" nation (disliking the defeated Spanish and unsure where Morocco's loyalties will firmly lie). Furthermore the island of Annobon in Spanish Equatorial Guinea, whose inhabitants speak a Portuguese creole, is added to Portuguese São Tomé and Príncipe.

The Estado Novo regime in Portugal is in a weaker position than real life - especially with a democratic Spain as a neighbor. Portugal is forced to give up most of its colonies in the 1960s, but manages to hold integrate its insular colonial possessions in the Atlantic (as well as the oil rich Angolan province of Cabinda) with grants of autonomy and generous financial transfers. The regime staves off a revolution by undertaking earlier reforms and eventually transitions to a sort of illiberal democracy where the "People's National Action Party" (Acção Nacional Popular) a rebrand of the National Union, is the dominant party - but not unassailably so.

Cabinda's oil wealth helps develop Portugal, but the ANP begins to misuse the funds as time goes on, leading to a corruption scandal surrounding the building of stadiums for Portugal's 2006 FIFA World Cup bid known as "Stadium gate"

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While many foreign commentators had their suspicions that FIFA only accepted Portugal's bid to host the 2006 FIFA World Cup due to kickbacks from influential oil tycoons and most Portuguese on some level knew that some of the newly built stadiums were built in certain locations for political reasons (the ANP had recently been making a rhetorical point of "standing up for peripheral Portugal")- few expected the rampant corruption that underpinned Portugal's preparations to host the 2006 FIFA world cup. Just weeks ahead of the games (which ultimately saw Portugal be defeated by Germany in the final round), Lisbon newspaper Diário de Notícias published a story indicating how renovation contact for the Estádio da Luz had improperly been assigned to Carlos Frederico Jardim, a businessman with deep ties to the the ANP government. Eventually, popular pressure compelled the government to appoint a special investigator to investigate corruption in construction contracts. The special investigator's report would upend Portuguese political scene.

While exonerating the Prime Minister of any direct involvement, the special investigator's report found that mid-level and local ANP officials had illicitly steered construction contracts to ANP-aligned businessmen in nine of the twelve stadiums built or renovated for the 2006 FIFA World Cup. Furthermore, in four instances, the special investigator's team found that ANP politicians had bribed or otherwise coerced local inspectors to turn a blind eye to health and safety standards for the stadiums - allowing the recipients of ill-gotten contracts to cut corners when building the stadiums to save money and pocket the difference. In total, almost one hundred officials and accomplices would be jailed or fined in response to the "Stadiumgate" scandal. The improperly constructed stadiums were shut down until repairs could be provided - though not every Portuguese locality made an effort to repair or maintain their stadiums. Many credit the ANP's narrow defeat in the 2008 general election (to an ad hoc opposition coalition of liberals and socialists) to the Stadiumgate scandal.

Today, the Estadio Alentejo and Estadio Sarmento Rodrigues sit abandoned, while many other stadiums built or expanded for the 2006 cup are only sparingly used at anything approaching full capacity. While the ANP would return to power after the early 2010s global financial crisis hit Portugal, the "Stadiumgate" scandal has left a lasting scar on the party's reputation, from which it still hasn't recovered.
 
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Europe in 1976

Inspired by EdT's A Greater Britain timeline, a world where Germany went to an earlier war over Austria against the British-French-Italian coalition. Fortunately for them, the conflict didn't last long.
 
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Europe in 1976

Inspired by EdT's A Greater Britain timeline, a world where Germany went to an earlier war over Austria against the British-French-Italian coalition. Fortunately for them, the conflict didn't last long.
Some details here are surprisingly similar to what I had in mind for my own timeline, even though they emerge under different circumstances.
 
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Europe in 1976

Inspired by EdT's A Greater Britain timeline, a world where Germany went to an earlier war over Austria against the British-French-Italian coalition. Fortunately for them, the conflict didn't last long.
Oh boy Poland will be a mess in that timeline.

On the one hand, Poland survived. On the other hand, Sanacja survived. Militarist, authoritarian-lite Poland with a colonialist attitude towards Ukrainians and Belarusians. Hopefully they liberalize by 76 lol
 
Cool alternate migrations. IIRC, IOTL immediately prior to their migration to thee Balkans, the Croats were in Northern Czechia (obviously it's hard to be sure but based on Greek primary sources that say they bordered the Franks and Lusatia and where later early medieval Czech Croat tribes were located). How did the Croats end up in Slovakia and the Serbs in Czechia? (I'm not criticizing, I'm asking for lore)
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Europe in 1976

Inspired by EdT's A Greater Britain timeline, a world where Germany went to an earlier war over Austria against the British-French-Italian coalition. Fortunately for them, the conflict didn't last long.
Interesting concept and BEAUTIFUL map. Any more lore? Also I can't tell but des Albania own a piece of Metohija there or is it the OTL border and it just looks odd in this projection and style? Is Serbia-Montenegro just Serbia from the London Agreement but united with MNE?
 
Oh boy Poland will be a mess in that timeline.

On the one hand, Poland survived. On the other hand, Sanacja survived. Militarist, authoritarian-lite Poland with a colonialist attitude towards Ukrainians and Belarusians.
It would actually be starting out as one of the nicer European countries to live in even if you're a subject nationality. Not that standards at the time are particularly high when even the supposedly nice democracies such as Britain and France aren't being run with the best interests of Africans in mind (even parts of their metropoles are ... troubled), being a minority isn't too much fun all across Europe from the Basque country to Transylvania (even the fully democratic Czechoslovakia had little sympathy for the aspirations of its Germans), and even being an ethnic local living in the capital doesn't exactly ensure a quiet life if you live in the non-denazified Germany or the Stalinist USSR. As in OTL (after the 15 years of Hitler and Stalin of course) it would also be militaristic and authoritarian, but this time the militarism and authoritarianism doesn't come as a package deal with a crazy economic doctrine and it's easier to protest against an authoritarian regime when there is no military superpower next door with a Brezhnev doctrine which openly states that it will support said authoritarian regime against you.
 
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Your premise of the North American Amerindians having polities is historically and factually incorrect. Most Amerindians in North America, prior to 1492, were not societally advanced or organized enough to form their own states with actual monarchs; instead, the vast majority of them lived in tribes and clans without any well-defined boundaries of where they inhabited. On the other hand, the Aztecs in Central America and Incas in South America were both at a higher stage of organization than their North American counterparts that allowed them to form complex societies with social stratification, developed civilization, urban culture, scientific/technological progress, and established boundaries of their territorial control.
You are certainly correct, it is rather silly to depict most of these as proper states on the same level as old-world polities. The things shown in this map (and the one it's based on) are not "nations" in the sense of nation-states, rather they are ethnicities, who are subdivided into innumerable band and tribe level societies.

If you really want to display these "nations" on WorldA, for most of them they should have the brown borders, and rather than being a solid color they should be white with a colored outline, which is something I've seen on WorldA's that want to depict certain ethnicities whose polities are too small to be shown properly (like the Classical Greeks). Or better yet, have the brown borders with colored outlines, but have the interior color be the terra incognita green.

Yes, but just because the Mound Builders had distinctive structures, doesn’t mean that they were on the level of societal organization that the Aztecs and Incas were at, not does that mean that they had an actual civilization. It’s like saying that a random Polynesian island in the Pacific was “very societally organized” and “had a civilization” prior to its colonization by Europeans just due to the discovery of a bunch of random stone carvings some archeologists just happened to stumble on.
I must take issue here. The mounds of the mound builders are not merely distinctive cultural artifacts or structure types, they are absolutely titanic feats of manpower that had to have required a fair degree of political and cultural sophistication. Though they may just look like hills to our eyes, these are truly impressive structures, and they were built by people living in large basically sedentary settlements. By one estimate, Cahokia at its height is estimated to have had a population similar to London at the same time period.

These societies, however, began declining in the 13th century, and the remnants of them (which were still fairly impressive) succumbed to European diseases with only the most minimal of contact with Europeans, some times not at all.
 
Cool alternate migrations. IIRC, IOTL immediately prior to their migration to thee Balkans, the Croats were in Northern Czechia (obviously it's hard to be sure but based on Greek primary sources that say they bordered the Franks and Lusatia and where later early medieval Czech Croat tribes were located). How did the Croats end up in Slovakia and the Serbs in Czechia? (I'm not criticizing, I'm asking for lore)

Interesting concept and BEAUTIFUL map. Any more lore? Also I can't tell but des Albania own a piece of Metohija there or is it the OTL border and it just looks odd in this projection and style? Is Serbia-Montenegro just Serbia from the London Agreement but united with MNE?
Thank you!

Albania owns parts of Metohija. As for Serbia, the London Agreement Serbia is entirely a coincidence. What happened is Yugoslavia was allied with Germany, but lost and was dismembered after the shorter WWII (losing Slovenia, Croatia, Banat and other small bits.) Afterwards, Serbia-Montenegro saw Italy weakening during the transition from Mussolini's rule and attempted to grab Croatia back, which was succeeding but in turn prompted Italy to react by promising major concessions to Serbian neighbors if only they assist in counterbalancing them. This lead to the next Balkan War with Bulgaria getting Macedonia and Greece being paid off with Cyprus.
 
Out of honest curiosity...

What, exactly, was missing out of the Mississippian culture that prevents it from being on the same level of "civilization" as it Meso-American neighbors?
It was not as organised politically, meaning the population centers were smaller. Long-distance trade was far less common and there was nowhere near the degree of specialisation. It was essentially rulers of communities working together for the mutual interest of their people (a confederation). Population estimates are often overstated. There is a real tendency in archaeological research on the Mississippians to ignore comparisons to their descendent cultures and assume something far grander than (likely) existed, which also extends to reading primary sources like narratives of the De Soto expedition, where the natives are portrayed in terms familiar to Europeans in a manner similar to 17th century French and English accounts of natives of New England or Canada (who unlike the Mississippians, are not often assumed to have been incredibly complex in the past yet "broke down" somehow in the 15th-16th centuries).
At the very least, Cahokia should be compared to the Mesopotamian city states
Maybe, but by Mesoamerican standards, it would not be one of particular note given few estimates assume it had more 15-20K people in the entire area (and likely the city itself wasn't too much larger than other large centers). It stands out because of the size of its mound and the fact other very large mound sites nearby were plowed over before anyone really thought much of it. Basically, Cahokia as a "New York of pre-Columbian North America" is rather controversial in terms of archaeological evidence. I think the minimalist perspective (which I've been come across a lot lately because I'm trying to prepare for an update to my TL, check Mississippian Political Economy, even if it's from 1999) isn't entirely correct, but it has a lot more ground than you see in popular discussions on this topic.
I must take issue here. The mounds of the mound builders are not merely distinctive cultural artifacts or structure types, they are absolutely titanic feats of manpower that had to have required a fair degree of political and cultural sophistication. Though they may just look like hills to our eyes, these are truly impressive structures, and they were built by people living in large basically sedentary settlements. By one estimate, Cahokia at its height is estimated to have had a population similar to London at the same time period.

These societies, however, began declining in the 13th century, and the remnants of them (which were still fairly impressive) succumbed to European diseases with only the most minimal of contact with Europeans, some times not at all.
They are very impressive (I've been to several), but in terms of manpower it's not as intensive as you'd think. They seem to have been built (or expanded) fairly quickly using large, temporary armies of manpower. While it does require cultural sophistication, political sophistication is optional given Poverty Point is a sizable mound and was constructed by people who didn't even farm.
 
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meromania.png

I thought of this last night while half-asleep, this is something akin to a shower-thought.

So, I was reading on the influences Slavonic literature and culture had on Romania, and I figured: why not make Romania revert back to Slavonic? What could possibly go wrong! So here it is. The Space Bats are busy at work keeping this monster alive.

So, here's a few reforms this Romania has that separate it from OTL.
  • The official languages are Romanian and Old Church Slavonic, with the goal of creating a population that can read, write and speak Church Slavonic and (in theory) communicate with the Slavs around with the ease of a native (if sounding too posh or old-timey for them)​
  • The Presidency has been turned into a sort of dictatorial office (of course it did), sorta like North Korea.​
  • Moldova (Romanian term denotes both Romanian and Republic of Moldova, which we usually call Basarabia in Romanian) is autonomous, subordinate only to the President. It is the testing grounds for the wider legislation. The language has/is being taught OCS as the first language, with Romanian encouraged at home. The goal is to create a mixture of Romanian and OCS, either a more Slavic Romanian or a more Latin Slavonian.​
  • Banat is a lil state for the Romanian Army to use and train in. No, do not ask how Romania got it.​
  • The Magyars have autonomy, though the Secret Services keep 'em in close watch.​
Aside from this, feel free to tell how unrealistic this whole scenario is. Though, Romania reverting back to Cyrillic would be fun. Бунъ зиуа. I now realize Romanian with Cyrillic would look a lot like Bulgarian at first glance. Ромыния.
 
Cool alternate migrations. IIRC, IOTL immediately prior to their migration to thee Balkans, the Croats were in Northern Czechia (obviously it's hard to be sure but based on Greek primary sources that say they bordered the Franks and Lusatia and where later early medieval Czech Croat tribes were located). How did the Croats end up in Slovakia and the Serbs in Czechia? (I'm not criticizing, I'm asking for lore)
Not my map, but "Serbs" or "White Serbs" were historic names for the Sorbs.

 
I thought of this last night while half-asleep, this is something akin to a shower-thought.

So, I was reading on the influences Slavonic literature and culture had on Romania, and I figured: why not make Romania revert back to Slavonic? What could possibly go wrong! So here it is. The Space Bats are busy at work keeping this monster alive.

So, here's a few reforms this Romania has that separate it from OTL.
  • The official languages are Romanian and Old Church Slavonic, with the goal of creating a population that can read, write and speak Church Slavonic and (in theory) communicate with the Slavs around with the ease of a native (if sounding too posh or old-timey for them)​
  • The Presidency has been turned into a sort of dictatorial office (of course it did), sorta like North Korea.​
  • Moldova (Romanian term denotes both Romanian and Republic of Moldova, which we usually call Basarabia in Romanian) is autonomous, subordinate only to the President. It is the testing grounds for the wider legislation. The language has/is being taught OCS as the first language, with Romanian encouraged at home. The goal is to create a mixture of Romanian and OCS, either a more Slavic Romanian or a more Latin Slavonian.​
  • Banat is a lil state for the Romanian Army to use and train in. No, do not ask how Romania got it.​
  • The Magyars have autonomy, though the Secret Services keep 'em in close watch.​
Aside from this, feel free to tell how unrealistic this whole scenario is. Though, Romania reverting back to Cyrillic would be fun. Бунъ зиуа. I now realize Romanian with Cyrillic would look a lot like Bulgarian at first glance. Ромыния.
How about: Bulgaria reverts back to its Turkic root? (Imma make it a reality if you don't mind.)
 
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