So basically what it says. If neither world war was fought, would the technologies that came about as a result of military R&D durring them still be invented around the same time, "eventually", or not at all? For example without WWII would nuclear power, jet engines, or computers still exist as we know them?
No world wars, what happens to the technology that spun out of them?
- Thread starter ArKhan
- Start date
In 1900, Great Britain has built a vast, globe spanning empire. France, Russia, and the Netherlands have a great deal of territory. There are those nations, like Italy and Germany, that feel underprivileged. And those, like Japan that feel entirely left out.
The Colonial spree and a confrontation about who owns what doesn't need to end in WWI to end in war. No WW1 doesn't mean peace, it means no gigantic coalitions. A few political acts of backing away from alliances in Europe and the idea of nations fighting by themselves on their own wars alone isn't all that impossible.
So, the wars remain but fought in different directions. France fights Germany, but France and Germany do it mano a mano. Austria vs Serbia turns into Austria vs Russia, with no one else in play.
WWI doesn't happen. The wars, the technology does. And its fair that casualties include a socialist journalist turned hypernationalist in Italy; a failed painter messenger in Germany, or a man with a bad arm in Russia.
So the post 1914 era is likely to be unreadable at a fine point, but consider the rise of nuclear weapons. By 1960, computers are likely to have gone forward, at or slightly faster than OTL. Refining fissionables is no longer the incredibly difficult task given this technology, and building nuclear weapons (not Hydrogen Bombs) isn't all that difficult.
Instead of OTL, where Superpowers emerged and maintained a single detente, you are looking a multipolar world. And a world that's likely to acquire nuclear weapons near the same time. No crash project in the 1940s, and they show up in the 1960s. A lot of nations get them.
They start getting used.
I'm not sure that the outcome will be a For All Time sort of ending where more and more nuclear wars get waged, but there's going to be at least one, if not several serious nuclear attacks. Humanity may ultimately make a deal with itself to prevent first use of such weapons and make war so undesirable that attacking a member of the nuclear club is suicidal and so peace is forced (similar to OTL), but that learning curve may well be Cuban Missile Crisis goes hot style bad; it's probably more than two cities and one war.
The United States is a sleeping titan, now armed with a vast stockpile of nuclear weapons, and probably fusion ones too. The rest of the world now settles its issues via global discussion, as nuclear weapons create a "Forced Peace" to prevail.
Not only does this world have alt wars to replace WW1 and WW2, they go up to WW3. After the forced peace, the world has heavily disarmed, as a few hundred nuclear weapons and bomber wings are all that's required to ensure security. This is not a utopian world, but its one that's reasonably tolerable. There may well be no Communism or Fascism, different ideologies are likely to rise from different places. I actually see the modern day dominated by "Social Survivalism", facing the reality that nuclear war may well come any day and that surviving it is possible and desirable. Opposing the somewhat Social Survivalists are Internationalists--those interested in solving the issues of nuclear war and the nightmare to follow by building diplomacy, economic ties and for a few extremists, a one world government.
Technology reflects these social developments. Building vast underground tunnels is critical. Long Distance Subways 100' underground, powered by geothermal energy, or even nuclear reactors. Humanity doesn't reach for the stars, it digs for safety. Nuclear Weapon yields keep going up, but going through 100' is still no easy task. Computers and the Internet are critical to surviving a nuclear war, which is an even greater danger ITTL.
(ITTL, it's not likely to be a "BIG ONE", it's likely to fewer weapons but that risk is higher) Aircraft continue to advance; I do think rocketry is likely to be less advanced because the appeal of blowing someone up on another continent isn't there. Medical technology is around the same speed as OTL, but AIDS never appears because there is no attempt to fight polio with unsterilized needles in West Africa.
The prospect of the world as a series of nuclear armed camps isn't the great globalization we have today; the world is likely a bit poorer but also a bit more equitable, it's hard to say that's objectively a bad deal for everyone.
without a big war we're unlikely to develop nuclear weapons, they're hugely expensive to work out, and there'd be little use for them. Expect at least TV sooner as the war would not interrupt things, so you could have colour Tv by perhaps the mid '40s or early '50s (OTL they could have had them anyway at that). Possibly computers are a little earlier as well.
Superaquaspiderbatman
Banned
My humble opinion
is that we'd probably still see most of the technology, since humans always strive upwards, forwards, for more, but the lack of the urgency that the wars necessitated, would slow down the process.
Today, I'd imagine we'd be around the 50s level, but that's my thoroughly unscientific guess
is that we'd probably still see most of the technology, since humans always strive upwards, forwards, for more, but the lack of the urgency that the wars necessitated, would slow down the process.
Today, I'd imagine we'd be around the 50s level, but that's my thoroughly unscientific guess
In the 40s, that's true.
In the 60s, where France and the PRC both acquired nuclear weapons[and Israel might have, as well], I don't think the issue is that difficult to achieve. This is a massive game changer in terms of how wars are fought, no matter whether those wars are gigantic world wars or smaller ones. There would still be a desire to have them, to use them, and in all likelihood not the dualistic order that prevailed after 1945.
Nukes are delayed, sure. Nukes denied? No way.
Imagine WWI-like minded generals in a nasty long war if the tech for nukes end up developped..
Really? Without a really big war what's the actual point in developing bombs over, say power-plants?
Oh, expect aeroplanes to develop a bit quicker in the '10s and maybe '20s as the Sikorsky S-22 becomes the first real passenger aeroplane, leading to a 'power-race' of sorts as various companies in various countries try to make the biggest, fastest and most luxurious aircraft around.
Superaquaspiderbatman
Banned
I don't think it's a matter of either-or, but "both...and".
If history has taught us anything, it is that anything that CAN be used as a weapon, humanity WILL find a way to use as a weapon.
I think that aviation tech will probably be somewhat retarded without the wars. In both wars there was a huge leap in the capabilities of aircraft. For example, with no RAF created to bomb Germany there won't be a Vickers Vimy crossing the Atlantic in 1919. There might still be competitions such as the Schneider trophy to give things a nudge though but not the massive backing of governments to produce faster, more practical aircraft in large numbers. Without early development of aircraft carriers there might be a place for the battleship later in our history.
In a multi polar world of great powers hustling for advantage there'd be a big emphasis on spying and there'd be a lot of spin offs from that I think. Computers developed to break codes and so on.
In a multi polar world of great powers hustling for advantage there'd be a big emphasis on spying and there'd be a lot of spin offs from that I think. Computers developed to break codes and so on.
I think you are wrong on TV what helped it grow was the Radar Techs trained in the War .
Personally I think the tech will a little bit ahead of otl by 2012 ATL.
some tech will get slowed a bit (Not much though) while some due to absence of war will go quicker. An example, the german enigma device was developed in the netherlands in the 20s for the purpose of being able to encrypt business messages. so many of the things that came from the war will get developed anyways. No war means no economic restrictions/restriction on developments in non war related things. so just the extra economic space will compensate for development pressure from war.
And no war does not mean no military R&D, it just won't get used in a conflict.
With regards to tv, that was first used in the 30s, so it might advance a little quicker. Without wars the drive for development will be competition, the market and sometimes national pride. I would imagine that ittl the turboprop might get developed before the jet or at least at the same time. The main drive for engines in civilian airplanes is durability and fuel economy.
But there is one gigantic wildcard to think of, no WW1 means very very likely no spanish flu pandemic so that means 70-140M more people alive (50%of which in the 18-40 group) thats going to cause lots and lots of butterflies.
some tech will get slowed a bit (Not much though) while some due to absence of war will go quicker. An example, the german enigma device was developed in the netherlands in the 20s for the purpose of being able to encrypt business messages. so many of the things that came from the war will get developed anyways. No war means no economic restrictions/restriction on developments in non war related things. so just the extra economic space will compensate for development pressure from war.
And no war does not mean no military R&D, it just won't get used in a conflict.
With regards to tv, that was first used in the 30s, so it might advance a little quicker. Without wars the drive for development will be competition, the market and sometimes national pride. I would imagine that ittl the turboprop might get developed before the jet or at least at the same time. The main drive for engines in civilian airplanes is durability and fuel economy.
But there is one gigantic wildcard to think of, no WW1 means very very likely no spanish flu pandemic so that means 70-140M more people alive (50%of which in the 18-40 group) thats going to cause lots and lots of butterflies.
If you've got a reactor - and sooner or later somebody's going to try to build one just to see if it'll work, or for medical isotopes - then you've got plutonium, and that means you've got a bomb.
BlondieBC
Banned
Yes. In the long run, wars lower the size of the economy and reduce R&D. If you skip WW1 and WW2, the cumulative 1914-1953 military R&D budgets would be larger, especially if you don't count the vast waste of any crash wartime project. In fact, most technologies will be OTL or faster. Nuclear weapons likely happen in the 1930's or 1940's.
If nuclear tech is first developed to build power plants its only a question of time until one goes the way of 3 mile island, Tchernobyl or Fukushima. With the danger of nuclear contamination "revealed" early there might be a ban on nuclear weapons before they even get developed...
Wishful thinking
BTW no WWI likely means no Israel, so no Arab-Israeli conflicts which may lead to a world without muslim extremism...
But IMHO opinion ist very difficult to butterfly away OTLs alliances - you probably would have to butterfly away Bismarck and the German Empire...
THis might lead to a more federalized Habsburg dominated Germany - The Hungarian and Slavic Parts of A-H would probably be independent and allied kingdoms with a habsburg ruler.
No prussia means still French Austrian and Russian Austrian antagonism, but this time UK would back Austria against its neighbours (Italy allied with France I assume)
With "backward" rulers in Austria(Germany) and Russia technology might actually advance slower (imagine 60s/70s tech today)
Wishful thinking
BTW no WWI likely means no Israel, so no Arab-Israeli conflicts which may lead to a world without muslim extremism...
But IMHO opinion ist very difficult to butterfly away OTLs alliances - you probably would have to butterfly away Bismarck and the German Empire...
THis might lead to a more federalized Habsburg dominated Germany - The Hungarian and Slavic Parts of A-H would probably be independent and allied kingdoms with a habsburg ruler.
No prussia means still French Austrian and Russian Austrian antagonism, but this time UK would back Austria against its neighbours (Italy allied with France I assume)
With "backward" rulers in Austria(Germany) and Russia technology might actually advance slower (imagine 60s/70s tech today)
Which did absolutely nothing for the actual quality of the sets, although Baird did stirling work during the war, turning out a 600-line colour set by 1944, and now there's no war to get in the way.
Who is going to run the equipment in the TV stations then .
And half of the Engineers who worked in the Tech Fields in the US went to School on there GI Bill .
The Great Tech leap in the 1940's-1970's was caused Because of the War and the Tech researcher for the War . Hell skin Grafting came out of the work the German SS Doctors did in the camps .
Deleted member 1487
Yes, some will appear sooner, some later. The US will take a major hit, as they really benefited from the German exodus before and after WW2, which gave them many of the very best of worlds scientists, engineers, and technicians. Someone else already mentioned the lack of a GI Bill, which will be a big blow to US development.
Nuclear power was delayed by the world wars. It would probably be available first in the late 1930's experimentally and then in the 1940's commercially.
The jet engine was developed pre-WW1 in France, so it would still be around, but would be developed around the same time IMHO. Aeronautics would be behind without the war spending driving some research forward, but that might be balanced by generation of young engineers and scientists not being killed in WW1 and 2 offering earlier insights. Remember that the university students of the major European powers were decimated by WW1 and 2, so there was enormous potential wasted. Not to mention that market pressure and more money for commercial projects without the Great War causing a European slow down in the interwar years might well do what the Great War did in the end, though with some delays in the 1910s being made up in the 1920s ITTL.
The German speaking braintrust of the pre-WW1 world wouldn't be broken up, as IOTL there was a major exodus after WW1 because of economic conditions, before WW2 because of the Nazis, and after WW2 because of the Allied round ups and people leaving ruined Central Europe. Of course the mass murders too killed many of Central Europe's great minds of the 1930's and 1940's.
Plus we have tens of millions more people born without the WWs, so among their ranks we could have had great minds that never were. They would have been raised in economic, social, and educational stability, so wouldn't have had the major disruptions that OTL students who survived/were born had.
Computers were developed without the wars anyway and were coming no matter what. IBM was around in the 1880s and the great developers like Turing and Konrad Zuse were born prior to WW1, so would all likely still be involved, as it doesn't seem like their lives were too badly intersected by the WWs enough to derail their contributions without them. In fact without the WWs we'd likely see some computing technology become commercially viable sooner with more money floating around the economy.
Radar for instance was invented in 1904 as a device to prevent shipwrecks in misty conditions, but was thrown by the wayside economically because of WW1.
So much of the WW technologies had antecedents pre-WW1 or were so big they couldn't be missed that they would appear eventually, though as I said some will be sooner than IOTL and some probably on time for different reasons.
apart from the war casualties, very likely no spanish flu. so thats another 70-140M people.