New partecipants to WW1

What he meant probably is exactly what you said. I believe that in the scenario I created, Japan would be the one everybody makes fun of because it switched sides
I think there are important differences between Italy changing sides IOTL and Japan changing sides ITTL.

That is Japan declared war on Germany on 23rd August 1914 before the Battle of the Marne. Italy remained neutral until May 1915 when I assume it looked like the Entente was going to win and the Entente had made them a better offer.

Having written that, what if the Japanese Government decided to wait and see who won the opening round before declaring war on the Central Powers? And what if the Germans did a bit better? That is they didn't win the Battle of the Marne outright, but were able to occupy the Pas de Calais and the front line ran from the English Channel, along the line of the Somme as far as Amiens, then to Montdidier and then to Compiegne where it would join the River Aisne? And/or things don't go as badly for the Austrians in Galicia in 1914?

If Germany and Austria-Hungary looked as if they were in a better position in September 1914 would that be enough to persuade some countries that joined the Entente or remained neutral after August 1914 to remain neutral or join the Central Powers ITTL.

The more countries that do join the Central Powers the more that are likely to join because of the bandwagon effect/domino effect/snowball effect.
 
How about something like this?

Spain avoids the Spanish American War by selling its Pacific Empire to Germany. AFAIK the Germans were very keen on this IOTL and that Kaiser Wilhelm was furious when the Americans beat them to it. The Spanish Government uses the money (and the money saved by no SAW) to develop the Iberian economy.

The latter would include bringing the 1908 Navy Law of OTL forward by 5 or even 10 years to 1898 itself. Thus by 1914 the Spanish Navy would have been larger with more modern warships and have attained a greater degree of self-sufficiency in naval arms manufacture.

However, as I know nothing about Spanish domestic history in the 1897-1914 period I don't know if that's possible.
Could the Germans have been guazumped by Japan in the bidding war for the Spanish East Indies? They would have used the indemnity paid to them by China after the First Sino-Japanese War.

The problems with that are the other great powers might not allow it and that if the indemnity was used to buy the Spanish East Indies the Japanese might not have enough money to buy the ships build in their 1896 naval expansion programme, which would created problems for the Japanese if the Russo-Japanese still happened.
 
This is the Garrison of Gibraltar in the 1914-15 Army Estimates
Royal Garrison Artillery
1,303 all ranks in 7 companies (Nos. 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 54 and 55) manning 14 ― 9.2-inch, 11 ― 6-inch and 7 ― 4-inch coast artillery guns​
Royal Engineers
406 all ranks in 4 fortress companies​
Infantry
1,886 all ranks in 2 battalions​
Army Service Corps
86 all ranks​
Royal Army Medical Corps
100 all ranks​
Army Ordnance Department
8 all ranks​
Army Ordnance Corps
86 all ranks​
Royal Army Medical Corps
100 all ranks​
Army Ordnance Department
8 all ranks​
Army Ordnance Corps
58 all ranks​
Army Vetinary Corps
2 all ranks​
Army Pay Corps
10 all ranks​

3,859 all ranks total garrison​
 
Map of Caribbean after the war:
Immagine per sito 7.png
 
Japan being a Central Power is damn near implausible. pre-WWI, they were pretty much staunchly pro-British. They might loathe the Russians, but were otherwiae reliable British allies.
 
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