OTL events that would be considered ASB

[Von Tyrconnell]

What OTL happenings in your opinion would be dismissed as being ASB or highly sketchy if someone in an alternate timeline had written it?

For me it would be Israel. The Jewish diaspora settles en masse in Palestine after not having lived there for over a millenia, revives a long-dead language, becomes a major economic and military power, defeats it's neighbouring countries in multiple wars where they are far outnumbered, and even not-so-secretly develops nuclear weapons without the international community taking action. All while coming into existence with a population of around 1 million and having a population of 8 million around 65 years later. From an alternate timeline this would probably seem like a huge Jewish/Israel wank.

 

[Driftless]

RMS Titanic plows into an iceberg and sinks on it's maiden voyage - with excessive loss of lives.

Operation Thunderbolt in 1976. The Israeli's pull off the successful rescue of 100+ hostages from the Entebbe Airport in Uganda.

 

[gatordad699]

1980 US Olympic Hockey team beats the Soviet All Stars. Then they go on and win the Gold medal.

Undefeated Pats lose SB to NYG.

Mike Tyson/Buster Douglas

(?) Only 7 years after JFK speech US puts man on moon.

 

[Gwachiko]

Soviet Union dissolves out of the blue letting half their previous territories in terms of population secede without a fight.

 

[Driftless]

From a 1960's perspective: Several miniature computers in most households, including routine use by small children. PC's of every size and shape, smartphones, the internet, worldwide networks connecting anyone with access to those devices.

 

[Lalli]

- WW1 starts only because one Serbian nationalist kills heir of another power.
- Nazis seems entirely ASB. Their ideology is cartoonish evil and they succesfully found several killing camps and conquer most of Europe only in three years and then they suddenly lost the war. And Soviet Union which suffered worstly, just is able still defeat Germany and after WW2 to be superpower despite that whole country is ruined.
- Israel is totally ridicolous. Created by millions of people around the world whom respesants several different ideological factions and suddenly begins speak language which was only liturghical language several millenia. And this country is succesful democracy which always is able defeat all its neighbor. Has writer something against Arabs when he makes them seems totally incompetent?
- Dissolutions of Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia were unreasonable peaceful and easy.
- 9/11 is completely laughable. Bunch of terrorists manage spend over one year in United States, learn how fly with plane, highjack succesfully four planes and manage hit to important targets.
- ISIS is just so cartoonish evil as Nazis.
- Donald Trump is totally ASB. Such man rises as president of the United States?

 

[kernals12]

I'll go with all the things indirectly caused by World War I which is pretty much the entire 20th century and several things in the 21st such as the Middle East, Putin, and our perpetual standoff with North Korea.

 

[Peabody-Martini]

A balky computer being what prevented the Third World War, more than once.

 

[X_X]

The Time of Troubles in Russia. A guy almost manages to control Russia for the rest of his life by pretending to be Ivan's dead kid. And then after that fails they try the same scheme two more times? Come on!

 

[Galba Otho Vitelius]

World War 2.

 

[marathag]

Lettow-Vorbeck's efforts in Africa. Never lost a battle, only German to have successfully invaded British territory.

Well, besides the Saxe-Coburg and Gotha line, that is. That rebrand effort to Windsor is also a bit ASBish

 

[SsgtC]

The Channel Dash by Scharnhorst, Gneisensu, Prinz Eugen and their escorts. If anyone tried to include that in their ATL, the chorus of screams that it is ASB and would never happen in a million years would be deafening.

 

[Joseph890]

How quickly the French Government and Army capitulated to the Germans. They were supposed to be vicious enemies to the Germans but yet they capitulated so quickly to the app without attempting to lead a government in exile. Only Charles DeGaulle a virtual no name in France had Enough bravery to try to liberate his country.

 

[Byzantine fanatic]

A bunch of Arab tribes conquer 90% of the Roman Empire and the whole Persian Empire at the same time, advancing all the way to India and Spain in the east and west simultaneously. And then they found a lasting new culture and religion which survives over 1400 years later and which replaces the previous languages and cultures over a wide area.

That's pretty ASB.

 

[Ntongo]

The United States suppressing human space exploration after landing on the Moon until China becomes strong enough to dominate space travel. Even when ATL sliders discover that it happens in 2% of timelines they'll still be scratching their heads.

 

[Mikestone8]

-

Nazis seems entirely ASB. Their ideology is cartoonish evil and they succesfully found several killing camps and conquer most of Europe only in three years and then they suddenly lost the war?

Indeed. that Hitler is clearly pinched from the Book of Revelation or somewhere.

And those names! Churchill "The Church on the hill" symbol of old England. De Gaulle "Of Gaul" national symbol of France. Stalin - "Man of Steel" for pete's sake. Someone has obviously been reading too many comics.

And then there's that ridiculous "Abraham Lincoln" legend. Altogether too good to be true, he has his greatest triumph on Palm Sunday, only to be murdered on Good Friday. Someone has clearly been plagiarising the Bible.

Acknowledgements to the author of Letter From A Higher Critic.

 

[overoceans]

Powerful people in China decide that giving children and teenagers the power to beat and murder adult authority-figures would be a great method for nation-building.

 

[The Uchronian]

Interesting thread, and given enough time I could probably fill up whole pages with dozens, if not hundreds of examples. But I'll start with this:

The Mongols all of a sudden rise up from obscurity, and somehow manage to conquer not just large parts of Central Asia, but also overrun most of Russia and even parts of Poland and modern day Romania, and actually successfully hold on to said territories for quite some time? That in itself would very likely be considered highly sketchy, even if not quite ASB, perhaps.

 

[Midwestern Shadows]

The Germans surprising the French by going through the Ardennes Forest, uprooting all of their battle plans and forcing their capitulation in record time.

Imagine that the nation which had held the line against Germany for four years in a previous world war and possessed one of the strongest, if not the strongest, ground army in Europe in 1940 collapsed in a mere six weeks despite the Germans basically pulling a Hail Mary around the Maginot line (which was expected, btw). If it had failed, historians would be asking themselves "what were the Germans thinking, sending their tanks into such terrible terrain?".

And the cherry on top of it all is that said country, with its quite impressive military heritage, then becomes the butt of every surrender joke for the next seventy to eighty years.

 

[Augenis]

I would say that the implausible events we know of in OTL would certainly be deemed unlikely, and most likely also wanky/author wish fulfillment/outlandish, but I personally believe that none of the events in OTL history as we know it would be deemed entirely ASB.

Simply enough, none of them require something as wild as an alien intervention or the word of God to happen.

Sure, a coalition of Central Asian tribes defeating the most powerful empires of its time and conquering a vast territory from Russia to Korea is certainly unlikely, outlandish and a wank, but if you look into the details and analyze each one of their conquests and what enabled them to succeed, it is a logical chain of events and physically possible.

Sure, this extreme nationalist organization which took over Germany in the 1930s certainly looks comically evil, but further analysis and detail shows that their evil acts and ideology all have a basis in prior events and developments in the region, just turned to eleven thanks to a combination of radicalization and totalitarianism being fashionable at the time.

The problem with trying to label OTL history as "ASB" is that OTL allows itself detail and complexity on a scale no TL writer would ever be able to achieve, thus it is able to make even the most outlandish looking things believable for the simple reason that detail and logic always beats perceived implausibility.