Proposals and War Aims That Didn't Happen Map Thread

[Chris S]

Well, then, if you're going to include nearly completely ethnically German border areas with Czechoslovakia and Poland, why make a corridor to separate Spremberg from Lusatia, or even separate the two Lusatias at all?

That's certainly a possibility that there would be no corridor to separate them and that there might not be separate Lusatias at all, but as with North and South Ossetia and Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh and as happened in Yugoslavia, Romania and China (where Tibetans, Mongols, Koreans and a bunch of other titular autonomous ethnicities are divided across a number of autonomous territories and shared their territories with Han Chinese and other groups and were sometimes only a plurality rather than majority even in their "own" autonomous territory), it was not unusual that titular autonomous groups often shared their autonomous areas with other ethnic groups and that titular autonomous groups were sometimes split between two or more autonomous regions.

In the case of East Germany I can't see any Lusatian autonomous regions being formed across Lander borders before the 1950s. So if Stalin supported it, it would likely be a Lower Lusatia autonomous district formed within the Land Brandenburg Land and an Upper Lusatia autonomous district formed within the Land Saxony (much as how you had a North Ossetian autonomous oblast in the RSFSR and a corresponding South Ossetian autonomous oblast in the Georgian SSR/Trancasucasian SFSR). Whether they would be unified with any reorganization after the 1950s is anyone's guess (though the fact that there is an Upper Sorbian language and a Lower Sorbian language might help to give inertia to keeping the two autonomous regions separate even if they border each other). However, I would imagine that a Stalin that was okay with Lusatian autonomy might also wish to have the Lusatian autonomous regions actually border Czechoslovakia and Poland and thereby act as a kind of insurance incase East Germany was being lost in a revolt (the two regions could be pried off and added to Poland/Czechoslovakia or form regions from which the Soviet Army might find generally a more loyal base of support from which to prosecute operations to put down any revolts in Germany). At the same time if say in Upper Lusatia, the Sorbs formed maybe 60% of the population it would mean that the authorities in East Germany would be more confident about being able to have ethnic Germans in key leadership positions within the autonomous region simply because ethnic Germans formed 40% of the population and thus a Central Committee of the Upper Lusatian Communist Party being equally split between Sorbs and Germans won't seem like clear minority rule (insofar as the East German communists would be concerned about the appearances of minority autonomy and participation in the communist party system).

 

[Chris S]

Here's an M-Bam for those Sorbian Autonomous Zones that developed to become German States I made
View attachment 590668

Nice, I would love to see what TunguskaStorm's map would look like on that M-Bam.

Though I wonder gents, if after that we should take any further images into a different thread? Would these still count? As they are our conjectures rather than the actual proposal.

 

[GauchoBadger]

Ethiopian border claims in Sudan in the crisis period between the defeat of the Mahdists at Omdurman (1898) and the final Anglo-Ethiopian border arbitration (1902):

 

[Balkanized U.S.A]

View attachment 590463
Some of the Arab League's proposals for annexation of Palestine.

Reminds me of For All Time

 

[Flashman]

Do we have any knowledge on how Napoleon intended to partition Russia?

 

[FancyHat]

Do we have any knowledge on how Napoleon intended to partition Russia?

First I've heard of it. AFAIK the invasion was just to force Russia back into the Continental System. Maybe if Napoleon won he would've had Russia cede some Polish territories to the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, but that's just conjecture on my part based on Napoleon's framing of it as the "Second Polish War." Maybe he would've had Russia give Bessarabia back to Moldavia? I don't know.

This does remind me, though, that Zamoyski's Rites of Peace says something to the effect that after the War of the Fourth Coalition Napoleon considered completely dismantling Prussia, but unfortunately that's not elaborated on.

 

[Aghasverov]

First I've heard of it. AFAIK the invasion was just to force Russia back into the Continental System. Maybe if Napoleon won he would've had Russia cede some Polish territories to the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, but that's just conjecture on my part based on Napoleon's framing of it as the "Second Polish War." Maybe he would've had Russia give Bessarabia back to Moldavia? I don't know.

This does remind me, though, that Zamoyski's Rites of Peace says something to the effect that after the War of the Fourth Coalition Napoleon considered completely dismantling Prussia, but unfortunately that's not elaborated on.

Nap did, briefly, create a Provisional Government for Lithuania out of a few western Guberniyas, and it was attached to the GD of Warsaw for a short period of time, but fell apart on his retreat...

Lithuanian Provisional Governing Commission - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[FancyHat]

Nap did, briefly, create a Provisional Government for Lithuania out of a few western Guberniyas, and it was attached to the GD of Warsaw for a short period of time, but fell apart on his retreat...

That actually tracks with later Polish nationalist movements, which (as I understand it) tended to aim for recreating the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, a trend that continued into the 20th century.

 

[Flashman]

Nap did, briefly, create a Provisional Government for Lithuania out of a few western Guberniyas, and it was attached to the GD of Warsaw for a short period of time, but fell apart on his retreat...

Lithuanian Provisional Governing Commission - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Yeah, this is what got me wondering if he intended to carve out some other states. Maybe a White Russian, Finnish and Baltic client kingdoms at the very least to weaken Russia?

 

[FancyHat]

White Russian, Finnish and Baltic client kingdoms

Given how recent the development of Belarus' national identity seems to be I don't think anybody in 1812, let alone anybody in France, would've seen "Ruthenians" as a distinct enough people to warrant a state of their own, even as a punitive measure against Russia. Same goes for the Balts (& Estonians); some sort of unified "Livonia" doesn't seem quite as inconceivable, but I just feel like it would've been more of a liability than anything else (or at least viewed as such). When you're going up against Russia you've got to go big or go home, is the thing, so it seems more likely that if Napoleon thought about detaching those territories from Russia he would've planned to give them to Poland.

Finland's something of a different story considering that in 1812 it was a pretty recent acquisition by Russia, although then again the only part of the Grand Duchy that was really strategically relevant to Western and Central Europe (per my understanding) was the Åland Islands. Maybe Denmark takes that, since Sweden was also on the outs with the Continental System, or if you want to be silly you could say they're given to hypothetical undead super-Poland.

 

[FancyHat]

According to a surprisingly well-cited Wikipedia article (seriously, you'd think something this weird would've had some real sketchy scholarship but it looks above-board enough) there were serious attempts to unify, for varying definitions of the word, Romania and Bulgaria, mainly in the last quarter of the 19th century. The WorldA patch below illustrates very roughly what that might've looked like had it come to pass (Eastern Rumelia is represented as within Bulgaria but not integrated into it, though IMO realistically it would've either been part of Bulgaria or outside the union entirely).

This is one of those ideas that makes a little more sense when you think about it, but not that much more. As I understand it their main unifying factors at the time was religion and a desire not to be subordinated to the Russian or Ottoman Empires, which certainly have some weight to them but aren't much to build a shared national identity on. So while I could see a personal union being well within the realm of possibility, actual political union would be, to say the least, difficult.

 

[UrbanNight]

there were serious attempts to unify, for varying definitions of the word, Romania and Bulgaria

Looks like it covers a similar territory to the First Bulgarian Empire at it's greatest extent.

 

[FancyHat]

Looks like it covers a similar territory to the First Bulgarian Empire at it's greatest extent.

Said Wikipedia article mentions that as a historical precedent.

 

[Crazy Boris]

According to a surprisingly well-cited Wikipedia article (seriously, you'd think something this weird would've had some real sketchy scholarship but it looks above-board enough) there were serious attempts to unify, for varying definitions of the word, Romania and Bulgaria, mainly in the last quarter of the 19th century. The WorldA patch below illustrates very roughly what that might've looked like had it come to pass (Eastern Rumelia is represented as within Bulgaria but not integrated into it, though IMO realistically it would've either been part of Bulgaria or outside the union entirely).
View attachment 592271
This is one of those ideas that makes a little more sense when you think about it, but not that much more. As I understand it their main unifying factors at the time was religion and a desire not to be subordinated to the Russian or Ottoman Empires, which certainly have some weight to them but aren't much to build a shared national identity on. So while I could see a personal union being well within the realm of possibility, actual political union would be, to say the least, difficult.

I have to wonder how long this would last. I assume it would fall apart sooner or later, either peacefully a la Czechoslovakia or with some kind of Bulgarian war of independence.

Also, assuming this would last long enough (and the wars still happen ITTL), i also have to be curious about how this could effect the Balkan wars

 

[FancyHat]

I have to wonder how long this would last. I assume it would fall apart sooner or later, either peacefully a la Czechoslovakia or with some kind of Bulgarian war of independence.

Also, assuming this would last long enough (and the wars still happen ITTL), i also have to be curious about how this could effect the Balkan wars

Most likely best-case scenario is Romania-Bulgaria emulates Sweden-Norway and dissolves in a similar fashion but faster. Most likely worst-case scenario is Romania, as the senior partner (which was the case in the 19th century proposals), tries to colonize Bulgaria, igniting a civil war that destroys the union. However, while I obviously don't think Romania-Bulgaria surviving very long is likely, considering the site we're on I'm nevertheless loath to say it's impossible. I mean, Belgium's had a little over two centuries now to tear itself apart and it hasn't happened yet. (I'm sure there are plenty of holes in that analogy, but you get the point.)

As for the Balkan Wars, you've got me curious too, because I wonder if Romania would actually want Bulgaria to expand that much. In any case, once the Ottoman Empire's ejected from Europe in any meaningful capacity I could see Romania-Bulgaria trying to get Serbia and Greece (plus Montenegro or Macedonia or whatever other state comes out of that) to join them in a larger Balkan Federation.

 

[DJjablonski]

So a while back there was a map showing the KMT's plan to reform China into 68 Provinces once they won the civil war (press F)
I made a WorldA patch of that (although it is probably not very good)

 

[Tyche]

68 provinces!? How were they going to run so many administrative divisions?

I mean… the United States has 50, I don’t think it be too much harder than it for us

 

[BrobDingnag]

I mean… the United States has 50, I don’t think it be too much harder than it for us

We had industrialization, nationwide electric communication lines, decent roads…

 

[Chris S]

Most likely best-case scenario is Romania-Bulgaria emulates Sweden-Norway and dissolves in a similar fashion but faster. Most likely worst-case scenario is Romania, as the senior partner (which was the case in the 19th century proposals), tries to colonize Bulgaria, igniting a civil war that destroys the union. However, while I obviously don't think Romania-Bulgaria surviving very long is likely, considering the site we're on I'm nevertheless loath to say it's impossible. I mean, Belgium's had a little over two centuries now to tear itself apart and it hasn't happened yet. (I'm sure there are plenty of holes in that analogy, but you get the point.)

As for the Balkan Wars, you've got me curious too, because I wonder if Romania would actually want Bulgaria to expand that much. In any case, once the Ottoman Empire's ejected from Europe in any meaningful capacity I could see Romania-Bulgaria trying to get Serbia and Greece (plus Montenegro or Macedonia or whatever other state comes out of that) to join them in a larger Balkan Federation.

Strangely enough had the 19th century proposals occurred it seems they would have all occurred after Romania had transitioned away from its own Cyrillic alphabet in 1862 (based on the Bulgarian Cyrillic alphabet), a process that began in 1828 with the introduction of a transitional alphabet that mixed Cyrillic and Latin letters and gradually replaced more Cyrillic letters with their Latin counterparts. However with a Romanian-Bulgarian Union it might be possible for the Romanian Orthodox Church to get away with continuing to use the old Romanian Cyrillic alphabet in its publications after 1881. Depending on the type of union, perhaps we might see the Romanians trying to introduce the Latin alphabet to Bulgaria. If this was attempted it might likely meet with more resistance than the process did in Romania since with Romania the process of adopting the Latin alphabet had a lot of grounding in the fact that the Romanian language was itself a descendant of Latin and the Romanian Cyrillic alphabet had a history of use alongside the Latin alphabet (though writing in the Cyrillic alphabet was apparently more common) in some parts of the Romanian speaking world since the 1500s; this would obviously not apply in Bulgaria where the Cyrillic alphabet was actually first developed in Bulgaria around the Preslav Literary School in the 10th century and prior to that Bulgaria used the precursor to the Cyrillic alphabet, the Glagolithic alphabet from the late 800s. In fact I could see any attempt by Romanian monarchs or the Romanian political class to introduce the Romanian Latin alphabet as being one of the triggers that sparks Bulgarian opposition to the continuation of the union.

 

[DJjablonski]

68 provinces!? How were they going to run so many administrative divisions?

well the average population per province is about 20 mil which seems pretty reasonable

i just want to know what the provinces would be called lmao