More possible European Settler Colonies across the World

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Considering that there was/is a lot of unutilized lands for settlements with good resources if managed well, what are some of the possible locations for more European Settler colonies that could have been used and achieve a demographic majority in? I can think of Afghanistan and parts of Persia if annexed into British India as provinces. Both these have too much empty lands with good resources and rivers which are unutilized.

In Africa, I can think of locations in the Peninsula with good use of the river waters, resources and empty lands. What do you think? Any other parts in Asia which could be suitable?
 

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Along with this, I can think of Northwest India and the Mid Central regions of Indian mainland with a relatively sparse population and plenty of rivers that could be used without harming the already settled centers in India. These rivers are just massive beyond imagination, being rain and snow fed which could yield as an excellent resource for settler colonies in the surrounding drier regions.
 
The problem is why would people go out of their way to create exclaves in inland Asia when it's clear they have little hope of forming European-dominated states, at best they would double down on areas like Southern Africa.

Along with this, I can think of Northwest India and the Mid Central regions of Indian mainland with a relatively sparse population and plenty of rivers that could be used without harming the already settled centers in India. These rivers are just massive beyond imagination, being rain and snow fed which could yield as an excellent resource for settler colonies in the surrounding drier regions.
I mean "sparse" by Indian standards, which is not actually that sparse, plus it doesn't seem feasible to have people move there rather than Oceanian or American areas.
 

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I mean "sparse" by Indian standards, which is not actually that sparse, plus it doesn't seem feasible to have people move there rather than Oceanian or American areas.
In the sparse drier regions back then, the population seem to be distributed around the Rivers where Agriculture was possible without much use of Technology like building large canals or dams. The regions of Rajasthan, Sindh, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat are very dry but Snow fed rivers aren't far away and building canals would make building European colonial Settler colonies possible.

If empty regions of Afghanistan are annexed, it would give much more empty land with good supply of Snow fed rivers there too. I'm unsure about Persia but there's a lot of empty land with rivers there too.
 
In the sparse drier regions back then, the population seem to be distributed around the Rivers where Agriculture was possible without much use of Technology like building large canals or dams. The regions of Rajasthan, Sindh, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat are very dry but Snow fed rivers aren't far away and building canals would make building European colonial Settler colonies possible.

If empty regions of Afghanistan are annexed, it would give much more empty land with good supply of Snow fed rivers there too. I'm unsure about Persia but there's a lot of empty land with rivers there too.
I'm not sure if you get it but India was densely populated just about everywhere, you need first to ask why would Europeans go an create inland ethnic enclaves in India which would not only require to deal with a very unfamiliar climate but also have to drive millions of locals off in the hope of gathering enough settlers to create any hope of having even a local majority.

The areas that are uninhabited are for a good reason, you can't just expect them to move river water around and tap every single "empty space". They didn't exactly manage in Rhodesia or even South Africa or Namibia why would they in mainland Asia?

I would rather look at areas without many people to begin with and that are actually habitable(as opposed to Europeans somehow becoming "bedouins" and living in formerly desolated area between native settlements lol) like Manchuria, pre-Meiji Hokkaido, Central Asia(like OTL Soviet colonization but earlier), maybe even Dzungaria. That's the Northern Asian front, in Oceania and the Indian ocean you could maybe have European or mixed European-African/Indian islands if the Brits decide not to use Indian forced labour and on top of that encourage Europeans to move(not sure if there is an enough of an incentive on both sides but at least it can feasibly happen demographically).

Maybe you could have more Europeans in Singapore, Malaysia but really with a post-1800 POD I don't think you can really expect that much more colonization when OTL colonies and new world nations still are around to pull people towards them.
 

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I'm not sure if you get it but India was densely populated just about everywhere
That's not true. The Gangetic basin is the most densely populated region. Rajasthan on the other hand has just a few villages beyond the rivers and a few historical cities. Same with other drier regions. You see this in South India, too, where the mostly plain Tamil Nadu has the highest population while Karnataka and Telangana have lesser being drier and more difficult terrain.
The areas that are uninhabited are for a good reason, you can't just expect them to move river water around and tap every single "empty space". They didn't exactly manage in Rhodesia or even South Africa or Namibia why would they in mainland Asia?
What were the mistakes that they did in the mismanagement that could be avoided?
 
That's not true. The Gangetic basin is the most densely populated region. Rajasthan on the other hand has just a few villages beyond the rivers and a few historical cities. Same with other drier regions. You see this in South India, too, where the mostly plain Tamil Nadu has the highest population while Karnataka and Telangana have lesser being drier and more difficult terrain.
Rajahastan had 10 million people in 1900, Karnataka and Telangana(+Andra Pradesh) I'm not sure but they also had about 10 and 15 million people respectively, they are not thinly populated by any stretch of the definition.

What were the mistakes that they did in the mismanagement that could be avoided?
I don't think it's mismanagement per se, it's just a lack of incentive to push people there.
 
Why would you waste all the time and money building all this infrastructure in remote parts of the world while pissing off the local states and inhabitants with your settlers when instead you could just encourage them to move to much more hospitable areas where the natives are far weaker? From a European point of view, the American Midwest (or South Africa, or even a remote place like Australia) is effectively "empty" (due to centuries of disease and warfare) and needs a fraction of the internal improvement remote parts of India would.

Needing lots of internal improvement to be viable is a huge barrier. This was the case in the Mississippi Delta (all those levees and swamp clearing take a lot of capital), Columbia Plateau (irrigation dams and lots of water diversion), much of California (same reason). Similar story in much of Australia, but one thing all these regions have in common is that they were in "empty" land (the subjugated peoples had no capacity for resistance on the scale of an Indian or Afghan state) and are adjacent to more developed lands. Making the desert bloom is expensive as it is, hence there's little need to make it even more challenging.
 

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Rajahastan had 10 million people in 1900, Karnataka and Telangana(+Andra Pradesh) I'm not sure but they also had about 10 and 15 million people respectively, they are not thinly populated by any stretch of the definition.
They are concentrated around Urban centers and immediately next to rivers and you're talking about 1900. I'm talking about the range around 1750s-1850s.
 
They are concentrated around Urban centers and immediately next to rivers and you're talking about 1900. I'm talking about the range around 1750s-1850s.
Indian population grew just about 50% during the 19th century, so Rajahastan would have still had more than 5 million people and it would have been rural and pretty spread out(only some portions bordering Pakistan are really that empty). Rajahastan in 1800 would have had as many people as Canada or Australia+New Zealand in 1900.
 

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Why would you waste all the time and money building all this infrastructure in remote parts of the world while pissing off the local states and inhabitants with your settlers when instead you could just encourage them to move to much more hospitable areas where the natives are far weaker? From a European point of view, the American Midwest (or South Africa, or even a remote place like Australia) is effectively "empty" (due to centuries of disease and warfare) and needs a fraction of the internal improvement remote parts of India would.

Needing lots of internal improvement to be viable is a huge barrier. This was the case in the Mississippi Delta (all those levees and swamp clearing take a lot of capital), Columbia Plateau (irrigation dams and lots of water diversion), much of California (same reason). Similar story in much of Australia, but one thing all these regions have in common is that they were in "empty" land (the subjugated peoples had no capacity for resistance on the scale of an Indian or Afghan state) and are adjacent to more developed lands. Making the desert bloom is expensive as it is, hence there's little need to make it even more challenging.
That's a clear answer and insighted. Thank you!
 
Honestly the only areas with potential for European settlement was pretty much the Hokkaido, Manchuria, Inner and Outer Mongolia, Xinjiang and a few areas in the Middle East. Some regions could have seen more European settlement than in OTL, foremost southern Africa and Mexico. But beside that the Europeans had picked all the low hanging fruits.
 
Honestly the only areas with potential for European settlement was pretty much the Hokkaido, Manchuria, Inner and Outer Mongolia, Xinjiang and a few areas in the Middle East. Some regions could have seen more European settlement than in OTL, foremost southern Africa and Mexico. But beside that the Europeans had picked all the low hanging fruits.
I'm not sure about Mongolia and Xinjiang, Outer Mongolia is too far and separated by a desert and Inner Mongolia is not really open to mass settlement, same goes for the Tarim Basin.
 

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Honestly the only areas with potential for European settlement was pretty much the Hokkaido, Manchuria, Inner and Outer Mongolia, Xinjiang and a few areas in the Middle East. Some regions could have seen more European settlement than in OTL, foremost southern Africa and Mexico. But beside that the Europeans had picked all the low hanging fruits.
I'm not sure about Mongolia and Xinjiang, Outer Mongolia is too far and separated by a desert and Inner Mongolia is not really open to mass settlement, same goes for the Tarim Basin.
I agree with Gloss here. It's extremely difficult to get to Tarim Basin without Air travel or without conquering any sea route leading to it, which means a lot of lands like Inner Mongolia, Mongolia, Altai regions, and the lands connecting these to the Pacific must be conquered first. Otherwise, Air travel is the only way to get here. Even if they conquer Afghanistan and parts of Central Asia via India/Iran/Pakistan, getting to Xinjiang is not easy from there.

Possible in the Middle East. If they don't mind the intense hot weather, a settlement of the Oil rich nations could be possible if potential of Oil is discovered earlier.
 
I agree with Gloss here. It's extremely difficult to get to Tarim Basin without Air travel or without conquering any sea route leading to it, which means a lot of lands like Inner Mongolia, Mongolia, Altai regions, and the lands connecting these to the Pacific must be conquered first. Otherwise, Air travel is the only way to get here. Even if they conquer Afghanistan and parts of Central Asia via India/Iran/Pakistan, getting to Xinjiang is not easy from there.

Possible in the Middle East. If they don't mind the intense hot weather, a settlement of the Oil rich nations could be possible if potential of Oil is discovered earlier.

Or they could be settled by Russians. You know the White guys in Eastern Europe, whose land more or less border all those areas.
 

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Or they could be settled by Russians. You know the White guys in Eastern Europe, whose land more or less border all those areas.
I thought the same. Is a Russian conquest of these regions feasible? I think Russia could be an ultra Superpower if they did settle those oil rich lands and also get an access to sea ports on the Pacific side.
 
Or they could be settled by Russians. You know the White guys in Eastern Europe, whose land more or less border all those areas.
There are mountains and deserts between Russia and Outer Mongolia and the Tarim Basin, it's pretty remote and I don't think it can be feasible settled even with the best 19th century PODs.
 

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In my opinion, the only Empires who could create a European Majority in the African peninsular regions without much violence are probably Spanish and Portuguese. All later ones could reach at best, a little more than OTL.

If you have the Spinards and Portuguese settle the fertile and empty regions of the African Peninsula after their empires conquering the regions, this could happen in a couple of centuries after assimilating most natives there. So you could have a large settler and trade network across the Americas and Africa with similar people and empires across the Atlantic.
 
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