Martha Frick Lives! American Doves and the Spanish-American War

Hi! This is my first shot at doing any kind of alternate history. I sent it to my friend and he said I should post it here.

Anyway, here goes:

So in real history, Martha Frick dies in 1891 at age 2. Her father commits Pinkertons to quell the Homestead Strike, which unfolds poorly, and
he is pushed out of the company by Carnegie. Both men lose a lot in
the American public's eyes. Six years later, the Spanish retreat from
the Phillipennes after the Americans take Manila. German troops arrive
that day, and swear that they will colonize the island if America
won't. We pay Spain $20M to leave. Carnegie, who at the time was a
huge anti-imperialist, actually offered to buy the country's
independence from any power, but was turned down. As part of our
original agreement with the Filipino rebels, we said we would pay
their soldiers pensions if they helped us defeat the Spanish. We never
did. We actually kind of dicked them over for forty years after that,
and then abandoned them to the Japanese during WWII.

Here's how I see it going down differently:

Martha lives. Henry Clay Frick's heart is not broken in 1891, as it
would have been. Due to this heartwarming event, he becomes in some
ways a softer man, and when Andrew Carnegie goes off to Scotland for
the summer, and the union leaders begin to grumble, he caves to his
newfound "Gospel of Wealth" and agrees to their demands. Carnegie
returns, and notes not compassion, but bad business sense. He quietly
asks Frick to step down, pointing out that he can talk to a few people
and get him "a nice seat somewhere in Washington"

Frick (anti-imperialist, dove (war is chaotic for business), and
accepting-of-labor man) accepts, and in 1893 is appointed Attorney
General rather than Boston Lawyer Richard Olney (a strong imperialist,
hawk, and anti-labor man). The Pullman Strike of 1894 is settled
without any sort of military intervention, although it is here that
Carnegie and Frick part ways (Carnegie calls him yellowbellied, and
unwilling to commit force even when clearly necessary). Unfortunately
for Carnegie, Frick's rise isn't over. Walter Q. Gresham, the
Secretary of State, croaks in the spring of 1895, and Frick is chosen
as his replacement.

In 1896, the British Colony of Guiana gets into a territory dispute
with Venezuela. Rather than extend the Monroe Doctrine to include
South America, Frick argues that it did not apply to border disputes,
only the direct interactions of whole nations. War breaks out on the
Guiana-Venezuela border.

That same year, William McKinley is elected president. Frick becomes
Pennsylvania's Senator. After the sinking of the USS Maine and a
speech by Senator Redfield Proctor, and a talking to by Andrew
Carnegie, he reluctantly agrees that war seems the only answer, but
that expansion is a bad plan. Spanish power must be quelled, but it
should not be replaced by American Power, but rather by independance.

Meanwhile, Alexander Berkman, an anarchist in Boston, has been hearing
much of the atrocities being committed in Venezuela thanks to the US
government's refusal to act. He is not a supporter of government
intervention, or even government, but he is a humanist first and an
archarist second. He takes a pistol and travels down to Washington. As
Henry Clay Frick gives a speech at a Hearst-sponsored public hearing
on "Expansion Through Liberty" he is shot in the head and neck three
times, killing him dead. Berkman is arrested and hung, but not before
others in his group manage to successfully bomb the Ford Mansion,
killing the industrialist and his family.

The war marches on without Frick, and a young Roosevelt kicks quite a
lot of ass.

When Spain offers to sell the Philippines and end the violence for
$20M, Andrew Carnegie's offer to buy its independance outright is
accepted by all parties. (another $20M finds its way into the federal
coffers, the navy under command of Teddy R needing some serious
expansion to combat the British Fleet that has blockaded Venezuela and
its recently discovered oil).

With a new, strong, Democratic government, and the backing of much
American capitol, the Philippines industrializes quickly, allowing it
in later decades to quickly and easily expand across the Pacific.

What might have happened, one could ask, had Manila not stood so
readily against the Japanese in the early 1940s, or if American
U-Boats had not stepped in so readily against the growing threat of
German trade blockades on the seas around Europe? Or if the new
Anglo-Aztec empire reconstituting itself in South America, India
having been abandoned to its own ethnic infighting so many decades
past, had died in infancy thanks to American intervention.

But it is best not to ask such counter-factual questions.
 
Hi! This is my first shot at doing any kind of alternate history. I sent it to my friend and he said I should post it here.

Anyway, here goes:

So in real history, Martha Frick dies in 1891 at age 2. Her father commits Pinkertons to quell the Homestead Strike, which unfolds poorly, and
he is pushed out of the company by Carnegie. Both men lose a lot in
the American public's eyes. Six years later, the Spanish retreat from
the Phillipennes after the Americans take Manila. German troops arrive
that day, and swear that they will colonize the island if America
won't. We pay Spain $20M to leave. Carnegie, who at the time was a
huge anti-imperialist, actually offered to buy the country's
independence from any power, but was turned down. As part of our
original agreement with the Filipino rebels, we said we would pay
their soldiers pensions if they helped us defeat the Spanish. We never
did. We actually kind of dicked them over for forty years after that,
and then abandoned them to the Japanese during WWII.

Here's how I see it going down differently:

Martha lives. Henry Clay Frick's heart is not broken in 1891, as it
would have been. Due to this heartwarming event, he becomes in some
ways a softer man, and when Andrew Carnegie goes off to Scotland for
the summer, and the union leaders begin to grumble, he caves to his
newfound "Gospel of Wealth" and agrees to their demands. Carnegie
returns, and notes not compassion, but bad business sense. He quietly
asks Frick to step down, pointing out that he can talk to a few people
and get him "a nice seat somewhere in Washington"

Frick (anti-imperialist, dove (war is chaotic for business), and
accepting-of-labor man) accepts, and in 1893 is appointed Attorney
General rather than Boston Lawyer Richard Olney (a strong imperialist,
hawk, and anti-labor man). The Pullman Strike of 1894 is settled
without any sort of military intervention, although it is here that
Carnegie and Frick part ways (Carnegie calls him yellowbellied, and
unwilling to commit force even when clearly necessary). Unfortunately
for Carnegie, Frick's rise isn't over. Walter Q. Gresham, the
Secretary of State, croaks in the spring of 1895, and Frick is chosen
as his replacement.

In 1896, the British Colony of Guiana gets into a territory dispute
with Venezuela. Rather than extend the Monroe Doctrine to include
South America, Frick argues that it did not apply to border disputes,
only the direct interactions of whole nations. War breaks out on the
Guiana-Venezuela border.

That same year, William McKinley is elected president. Frick becomes
Pennsylvania's Senator. After the sinking of the USS Maine and a
speech by Senator Redfield Proctor, and a talking to by Andrew
Carnegie, he reluctantly agrees that war seems the only answer, but
that expansion is a bad plan. Spanish power must be quelled, but it
should not be replaced by American Power, but rather by independance.

Meanwhile, Alexander Berkman, an anarchist in Boston, has been hearing
much of the atrocities being committed in Venezuela thanks to the US
government's refusal to act. He is not a supporter of government
intervention, or even government, but he is a humanist first and an
archarist second. He takes a pistol and travels down to Washington. As
Henry Clay Frick gives a speech at a Hearst-sponsored public hearing
on "Expansion Through Liberty" he is shot in the head and neck three
times, killing him dead. Berkman is arrested and hung, but not before
others in his group manage to successfully bomb the Ford Mansion,
killing the industrialist and his family.

The war marches on without Frick, and a young Roosevelt kicks quite a
lot of ass.

When Spain offers to sell the Philippines and end the violence for
$20M, Andrew Carnegie's offer to buy its independance outright is
accepted by all parties. (another $20M finds its way into the federal
coffers, the navy under command of Teddy R needing some serious
expansion to combat the British Fleet that has blockaded Venezuela and
its recently discovered oil).

With a new, strong, Democratic government, and the backing of much
American capitol, the Philippines industrializes quickly, allowing it
in later decades to quickly and easily expand across the Pacific.

What might have happened, one could ask, had Manila not stood so
readily against the Japanese in the early 1940s, or if American
U-Boats had not stepped in so readily against the growing threat of
German trade blockades on the seas around Europe? Or if the new
Anglo-Aztec empire reconstituting itself in South America, India
having been abandoned to its own ethnic infighting so many decades
past, had died in infancy thanks to American intervention.

But it is best not to ask such counter-factual questions.

You had me until the last paragraph, where you showed your noobdom by demonstrating your limited understanding of the butterfly theory. And the last sentence was a real puzzler. You deliberately came onto an Alternate History Board posted an interesting and plausible scenario, and then said that it doesn't matter. I'm :confused:ed.
 
What might have happened, one could ask, had Manila not stood so
readily against the Japanese in the early 1940s, or if American
U-Boats had not stepped in so readily against the growing threat of
German trade blockades on the seas around Europe? Or if the new
Anglo-Aztec empire reconstituting itself in South America, India
having been abandoned to its own ethnic infighting so many decades
past, had died in infancy thanks to American intervention.

But it is best not to ask such counter-factual questions.

This last part was meant to be an in-universe perspective- IE, actual history is "counter-factual". 'Cause I was trying to be clever.

And yeah, that last (above-quoted) paragraph does kind of just go off somewhere nooby.
 
This last part was meant to be an in-universe perspective- IE, actual history is "counter-factual". 'Cause I was trying to be clever.

And yeah, that last (above-quoted) paragraph does kind of just go off somewhere nooby.

Ah! That's called a DBWI, ie a look from an alternate timeline into ours from their perspective. You didn't show much indication of that, so I got confused, my apologies.

And yes, you did overlook the ripple effects that an independent Phillipines would have created. However, without American presence, the Phillipines may have fractured into several states based on cultural and linguistic differences. Germany may have bullied one or two of those into trade, inclusion in sphere of influence, and possibly even annexation. Any of those could have had an effect on Germany's strength/influence in the Far East, which would have been interesting with TTL version of WW1 breaks out.
 
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