The Long Twentieth Century : a Franz Ferdinand Lives TL

[Brainbin]

The rise of the Social Progressive Party is a tantalizing hint for what's to come. The context clues suggest that the party emerged in the mid-1930s, which could mean it was an outgrowth a Huey Long-led movement. Sinclair was of course the OTL Democratic nominee for Governor in 1934, though the text is unclear as to whether he was successful in that endeavour ITTL. Perhaps a failed 1934 run as Democrat followed by a successful 1938 run as a Social Progressive? Either way, it's a shame the perfect campaign song for an insurgent "Vote Sinclair for Change" campaign is a half-century away. Both Sinclair and Chaplin are also true believers as opposed to OTL compromisers like FDR. My main question is why Chaplin left office after his second term expired? Nixon should have taken office in January of 1951. Speaking of Tricky Dick, he will have been elected Governor at age 37. I can't imagine him being anything but a Republican, so if the two-party system survives the Social Progressives have thus replaced the Democrats. Perhaps the Dixiecrat faction endures as a rump Democratic Party, since it's hard to imagine the pre-Goldwater GOP absorbing them.

Chaplin's later film career certainly sounds intriguing.

Shame you didn't butterfly Clooney. I'll grudgingly accept his presence only to point out how I'm looking forward to how you answer for the elephant (or, perhaps, donkey) in the room in the form of the other cowboy actor whose birth even predates the POD!

 

[X_X]

Hopefully Guillaume Apollinaire's life is spared. Surrealism and modern art needs all the friends it can get.

 

[Laxault2020]

Assuming German and Austrian Culture and thought has more influence in the USA without WWI, you could potentially see the German Gymnasium system of formal tracking and early testing being adopted in the USA. Huge socioeconomic and cultural butterflies though, but I've never seen it in a TL. Thoughts?

 

[mspence]

IMO you couldn't really avoid WW1, at the very least the Austria-Hungarian Empire might have broken up after Ferdinand's death.

 

[mspence]

Also what happens to Charles Lindbergh?

 

[MaskedPickle]

The rise of the Social Progressive Party is a tantalizing hint for what's to come. The context clues suggest that the party emerged in the mid-1930s, which could mean it was an outgrowth a Huey Long-led movement. Sinclair was of course the OTL Democratic nominee for Governor in 1934, though the text is unclear as to whether he was successful in that endeavour ITTL. Perhaps a failed 1934 run as Democrat followed by a successful 1938 run as a Social Progressive? Either way, it's a shame the perfect campaign song for an insurgent "Vote Sinclair for Change" campaign is a half-century away. Both Sinclair and Chaplin are also true believers as opposed to OTL compromisers like FDR. My main question is why Chaplin left office after his second term expired? Nixon should have taken office in January of 1951. Speaking of Tricky Dick, he will have been elected Governor at age 37. I can't imagine him being anything but a Republican, so if the two-party system survives the Social Progressives have thus replaced the Democrats. Perhaps the Dixiecrat faction endures as a rump Democratic Party, since it's hard to imagine the pre-Goldwater GOP absorbing them.
Shame you didn't butterfly Clooney. I'll grudgingly accept his presence only to point out how I'm looking forward to how you answer for the elephant (or, perhaps, donkey) in the room in the form of the other cowboy actor whose birth even predates the POD!

I'm sorry, Chaplin's earlier departure is due to a typo on my part, as I worked on Earl Warren's Wikibox. More will be said on US politics soon ; as of the other Cowboy Politician, you will know eventually his eventual fate.

Hopefully Guillaume Apollinaire's life is spared. Surrealism and modern art needs all the friends it can get.

As Apollinaire is among my favourite authors, I have plans for him. Writing is always biased.

Assuming German and Austrian Culture and thought has more influence in the USA without WWI, you could potentially see the German Gymnasium system of formal tracking and early testing being adopted in the USA. Huge socioeconomic and cultural butterflies though, but I've never seen it in a TL. Thoughts?

I never thought about that, I will see about that.

Also what happens to Charles Lindbergh?

Everything in due time...

 

[MaskedPickle]

Prime Minister - First Lord of the Treasury : Andrew Bonar Law
Lord Chancellor : Arthur Balfour
Lord President of the Council : The Baron St. Audries
Lord Privy Seal : Stanley Baldwin
Chancellor of the Exchequer : Austen Chamberlain
Home Secretary : Edward Carson
Foreign Secretary : The Marquess of Lansdowne
Secretary of State for the Colonies : The Marquess of Salisbury
Secretary of State for War : The Viscount Midleton
Secretary of State for India : The Earl Curzon of Kedleston
First Lord of the Admiralty : George Cave
Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster : The Baron Farquhar
President of the Board of Trade : The Earl of Derby
Secretary for Scotland : Halford Mackinder
Chief Secretary for Ireland : Walter Long
President of the Local Government Board : James Craig
President of the Board of Agriculture : The Earl of Crawford
President of the Board of Education : Hugh Cecil
Postmaster General: Ronald McNeill
First Commissioner of Works : Max Aitken
Attorney General : F. E. Smith

Nine years of Liberal government, two hotly contested elections five years prior, the unification of the Conservative and Liberal Unionist parties, the rise of the Labour Party and the debate over Irish Home Rule… All these factors had helped to the Tory landslide in 1915. Asquith barely managed to keep his head in leadership contests but now, Bonar Law had assembled the “Most Unionist Cabinet”. (...)
Bonar Law, a Scot born outside of the British Isles, a backbencher who rose as a compromise candidate to Leader of the Opposition, had concentrated his leadership and his electoral campaign over Unionism and felt compelled to leave free reins to the Unionist wing of the Conservatives ; the fusion between both parties was only three-years-old, and with a seven-seat majority, the Conservatives weren’t safe from a massive Ulster Unionist defection followed by a Liberal-Irish Parliamentary Coalition. Leaving to Edward Carson, leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, the most prized Home Office, and appointing as Chief Secretary for Ireland his predecessor, Walter Long, and allowing rabid Unionist F. E. Smith to enter the Cabinet as Attorney General, Bonar Law appointed other fierce Unionists throughout the government. His hands were tied and he knew it.
-The Irish Question, F. Weinling, London, 2017

GOVERNMENT OF IRELAND ACT FULLY REPEALED
-The Times, May, 15 1915

JOHN REDMOND AND IPP MPS REFUSE TO TAKE SEATS IN WESTMINSTER
-The Times, May, 21 1915

John Redmond (IPP) speaks to Home Rule supporters in Dublin, 1915

The Emerald Island looked like a pressure cooker ready to explode in these days. Due to the repeal of the Government of Ireland Act and the absence of Irish Parliamentary MPs, the Irish Volunteers were becoming more and more powerful, led by John Redmond who had come back to Dublin to further lead the organization. It was a time when skirmishes with British policemen and soldiers in Ireland were numerous and where political violence was widespread. The situation was worse in Ulster, where James Craig led the Ulster Volunteers into ethnic violence against Catholics living there, with the full support of Home Secretary Carson and Chief Secretary Long. (...)
Eoin MacNeill, leader of the Irish Volunteers, pressed Redmond into entering negociations with the Gaelic League, the Ancient Order of Hibernians, Sinn Féin, the Irish Republican Brotherhood and the Irish Citizen Army to plot a bigger action against British rule ; a legalist, Redmond refused outright but condoned MacNeill’s efforts, as he felt that a line had been crossed with the repeal of the Government of Ireland Act and further measures had to be taken. The help of diplomat Roger Casement into securing German arms was no stranger to it, as Germany saw with great interest British affairs turning internally instead of externally…
-The Irish Civil War, F. Chesterfield, London, 2016

LORD KITCHENER APPOINTED LORD LIEUTENANT FOR IRELAND
-The Guardian, July, 3 1915

BONAR LAW PROPOSED NEW BILL TO FIX ULSTER STATUS
-The Times, September, 24 1915

TROOPS SENT INTO IRELAND
-The Daily Telegraph, October, 2 1915


The sign that things were becoming awry in Ireland was most certainly the London Irish Rifles’ revolt on October, 18 1915. Garrisonned at the Duke of York’s Barracks in Chelsea, the 18th Battalion’ soldiers learnt that they were to be dispatched to Ireland to uphold law and order ; the mostly Irish regiment refused to fight their brothers and mutineed in the morning, killing their colonel and threatened to march upon Westminster and ask the Prime Minister to reinstate the Government of Ireland Act.
Of course, the government ordered even before dusk the massive quelling of the mutiny, bombing the headquarters, killing most of the mutinees and sentencing the survivors to death in court martial. Some soldiers managed to escape London and join their Home Island, but the devastating effect of a military mutiny in the middle of the Capital was a public relations’ disaster for the government.
-The Irish Civil War, F. Chesterfield, London, 2016

IRISH ARMY UNITS DISBANDED ; ULSTER VOLUNTEERS ENLIST EN MASSE IN BRITISH ARMY
-The Times, November, 24 1915

The “Uprising Bill” was introduced in Parliament on January 1916 ; if becoming law, it would give the military emergency powers in areas part of the Home Islands and subject them to martial law…
-The Irish Civil War, F. Chesterfield, London, 2016


POBLACHT NA hÉIREANN
THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT OF IRELAND TO THE PEOPLE OF IRELAND

IRISHMEN AND IRISHWOMEN:

In the name of God and of the dead generations from which she receives her old tradition of nationhood, Ireland, through us, summons her children to her flag and strikes for her freedom.
Having organised and trained her manhood through her open military organisations, the Irish Volunteers and the Irish Citizen Army, having patiently perfected her discipline, having resolutely waited for the right moment to reveal itself, she now seizes that moment, and supported by her exiled children in America and by gallant allies in Europe, but relying in the first on her own strength, she strikes in full confidence of victory.
We declare the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland and to the unfettered control of Irish destinies, to be sovereign and indefeasible. The long usurpation of that right by a foreign people and government has not extinguished the right, nor can it ever be extinguished except by the destruction of the Irish people. In every generation the Irish people have asserted their right to national freedom and sovereignty; six times during the past three hundred years they have asserted it in arms. Standing on that fundamental right and again asserting it in arms in the face of the world, we hereby proclaimIreland as a Sovereign Independent State, and we pledge our lives and the lives of our comrades in arms to the cause of its freedom, of its welfare, and of its exaltation among the nations.
The Irish Government is entitled to, and hereby claims, the allegiance of every Irishman and Irishwoman. The Government guarantees religious and civil liberty, equal rights and equal opportunities to all its citizens, and declares its resolve to pursue the happiness and prosperity of the whole nation and of all its parts, cherishing all the children of the nation equally, and oblivious of the differences carefully fostered by an alien Government, which have divided a minority from the majority in the past.
Until our arms have brought the opportune moment for the establishment of a permanent National Government, representative of the whole people of Ireland and elected by the suffrages of all her men and women, the Provisional Government, hereby constituted, will administer the civil and military affairs of Ireland in trust for the people.
We place the cause of the Ireland under the protection of the Most High God, Whose blessing we invoke upon our arms, and we pray that no one who serves that cause will dishonour it by cowardice, inhumanity, or rapine. In this supreme hour the Irish nation must, by its valour and discipline, and by the readiness of its children to sacrifice themselves for the common good, prove itself worthy of the august destiny to which it is called.
Signed on behalf of the Provisional Government:

Eoin MacNeill
Eamon de Valera
Joseph Devlin
Patrick Pearse
Arthur Griffith
James Connolly
-Text of the Declaration of Independence of Ireland, known as the “Saint Patrick’s Rising”, March 17 1916

IRELAND REVOLTS ON ST. PATRICK’S DAY ; GOVT DECLARES MARTIAL LAW IN IRELAND
-The Times, April 18 1916

TL;DR : Bonar Law is elected Prime Minister with a Conservative Majority and repeals Irish Home Rule ; tensions arise until Ireland declares its independence in 1916 and erupts into civil war.

 

[MaskedPickle]

It's back ! The whole timeline is fixed until 1943, I can now proceed with writing the updates

 

[Gar48]

Are we going to see a reverse version of the Troubles, with a united Ireland against protestant terrorists?

 

[MaskedPickle]

Are we going to see a reverse version of the Troubles, with a united Ireland against protestant terrorists?

Not sure about Ireland in the (then) far future...

 

[Brainbin]

Great to see this thread back once again! And thrilled to hear you've got everything planned until 1943. We're in for a wild three-decade ride!

Something not explicitly mentioned is that the Liberals were (at least in part) hoist by their own petard - the Parliament Act 1911 reduced the maximum Parliamentary term from seven years to five, forcing the election in 1915. Had the election been held in 1917 perhaps Irish Home Rule might have had more time to "settle" ITTL.

I've always had a soft spot for Bonar Law, being the only British PM born in Canada - indeed, the only British PM IOTL born outside the British Isles - and of course by the time he got to be PM IOTL he was already dying. Sadly for him, I don't think he'll be remembered much more fondly ITTL either.

The Battle of Chelsea was appropriately horrifying and things look like they're going to get terribly ugly in Ireland. It's not going to be pretty, no matter how it ends up.

 

[MaskedPickle]

While the early Chinese Republic was shaken by the takeover of Yuan Shikai (1912), his self-proclaimation as the Hongxian Emperor (1915), the National Protection War (1915-1916), Yuan Shikai’s death (1916), Duan Qirui’s rise as the paramount leader of China (1916) and the beginning of the Warlord Era, foreign powers were also to be dealt with, as the Middle Empire was in ruins. In 1914, the Simla Accord defined the borders of Tibet within China and with British India; when the Chinese government rejected it, the British nevertheless enforced it and the Tiberans as well ; the following year, Russia, who maintained the Manchurian Railways and signed the Kyakhta Agreement with the Bogd Khan, the true ruler of Mongolia, recognizing the latter’s autonomy within China. While France, the United Kingdom, the United States, Russia, Germany and Japan were expanding at the expanse of China, many territories on the border looked ripe for Western expansion. The most violent attack on Chinese sovereignty were the Seventeen Demands edicted by Japan, asking the Chinese government for expanded control of Manchuria and economic interests in China, accepting Japanese advisors who would have controlled China’s finance and police and closing China to other foreign countries. This treaty, that would’ve meant China becoming a true puppet state of Japan, was almost accepted by Yuan Shikai’s government and it took the concerted efforts of Britain, Russia, France, Germany and the US to make Japan back down their demands…
-After the Mandate of Heaven : A History of China in the Early Twentieth Century, C. Mraffko, New York, 2017

The new master of China, Duan Qirui, who succeeded Yuan Shikai as Premier of China and inaugurated the Warlord Era

Germany proved in these days a double player in Chinese politics : ever since the Boxer Rebellion, the Kaiser looked on Chinese affairs with great interest, and having Germany grow out Kiautschou Bay and curb British, French and Russian influence seemed at bay in a time of great upheaval for China. In the same year of 1917, Germany provided money and weapons to Sun Yat-Sen, the great Chinese revolutionary, who had decided to come back from his Japanese exile to further the cause of the Republic after the downfall of Yuan Shikai; and a few weeks later, the very same German agents provided financing and advisors to General Zhang Xun’s eleven-day doomed attempt to restore the Empire of China, seizing Beiping, a grotesque expedition that saw the immediate reaction of the Republican Army; the German Army was even keen enough to provide Zhang’s with a safe-conduct throughout Shandong and then to Germany…
A Place Under The Sun : German Diplomacy under Wilhelm II, G. Laffitte, Paris, 1999


DEATH OF THE XIANDAI EMPEROR PUTS FORBIDDEN CITY IN TURMOIL
For decades, the Forbidden City had been one of the world’ strangest countries ; the Ming dynasty’s administrative complex had become, during the Warlord Era in China, the world’s tiniest independant country (72 hectares only) in the center of Beiping, created as such in 1924 to give some authority to the deposed last Emperor of China, Xuantong, then to his brother, Xiandai. Out of respect for the Mandate of Heaven, in order to content the still strong monarchist sentiment in China, to serve as a golden jail for a former monarch : the reasons behind this creation were numerous, and it continued to be respected by the masters of Beiping and, by extension, China.
Now that the Xiandai Emperor died childless, the government in Nanjing is pursuing claims to absorb the Forbidden City, as the Imperial Court can’t be sure if the late Emperor had made either his brother, Puren, or his cousin, Yuyan, his successor. The politics of the Forbidden City are among the most complicated in the world, and the Chinese government could’ve plenty to win in symbolism and in the steady incomes the small “empire” enjoyed from tourism…
-The New York Times, March 7 1994

TL;DR : Events go in China as IOTL, except that the Shandong Problem is removed and Germany continues to yield influence in the country, leading to a stronger monarchist element.

 

[Bookmark1995]

So, is there some ITTL version of the Lateran Treaty?

And is China in the ITTL future more balkanized?

 

[Whiteshore]

Beiping

I guess the KMT won the Warlord Era ITTL. The question is whether the left-wing or right-wing faction took over the KMT when Sun Yat-Sen died.

 

[Gar48]

If Germany starts supporting monarchical elements in China, i can see Japan siding with the republican forces as countermesoure.

 

[MaskedPickle]

The assassination of Grigori Rasputin was a great upheaval in the Russian Imperial Court. Considered as a holy man by many, as a religious charlatan by others, holding immense power over the Czarina due to his so-called healing powers over the hemophilia of Tsarevich Alexei, Rasputin wasn’t able to save himself, as peasant woman Chionya Guseva had managed to stab him outside his home in Pokrovskoye on July, 12 1914. The religious mentor of Guseva, Hieromonk Iliodor, was banished, and the holy man died a few days later.
Even if growing protests against his supposed influence over the Czar and his family died out quickly, the news sent the Czarina into the depths of depression, crying out loud that her son was now condemned. Leaving his wife into comfort, the Czar buried himself under the high burden of work, trying to do the best he could do as Czar…
-Grigori Rasputin : The Mad Monk, M. Rak, Moscow, 1972

The death of Count Sergei Witte on March, 13 1915 sent shockwaves throughout Russia. The first Prime Minister of Russia, he had drafted the October Manifesto, a declaration in favor of civil liberties and parliamentary democracy, had designed Russia’s first Constitution
Manifestations, presided over the first general elections ever but the powers of conservatism and personal opposition of the Czar had led to his dismissal, only six months into his premiership. The Constitution was afterwards gutted by Nicholas II and the Duma became a consultative body.
The death of the man who would have been Russia’s Great Reformer awakened the calls for parliamentary monarchy and the full implementation of the October Manifesto ; the burial of Count Witte on March, 18 in the Alexander Nevsky Lavra in Saint Petersburg quickly degenerated into a full riot, with people calling him a saint. Throughout the spring, protests occurred throughout the industrial areas of Russia, helped by Bolchevik and SR agitators. The high point was the strike at Baku’s oil fields, that lasted throughout the month of June 1915, until the army was sent to crack down on the protesters. Neverthless, contrasting with his previous stance as it was seen in 1905, the Czar formally quelled down the protest by proposing that the Fifth Duma, due to be convened in 1917, would study the full implementation of the Constitution according to Witte’s proposals ; even if it did not much to calm the opposition down, such a move was unprecedented from the sovereign…
-The Sleeping Bear : Russia in the Twentieth Century, M. Golkov, Petrograd, 2003


Even if some historians claimed that Nicholas II’s relatively soft approach to the 1915 Protests was caused by his own insecurity following Rasputin’s assassination, others evidenced that the ongoing modernization of the Russian military guided him, as nothing was to impede it.
In the aftermath of the shock created by the Russo-Japanese War, a full process of industrialization was on the maps : with the support of France, railroad infrastructures were building up throughout the country, economy was in a boom, the Navy was being rebuilt, an Air Force was assembling and Feodrov semi-automatic rifles were being distributed to the troops. The terrible state of affairs in the Ottoman Empire, Persia and China, all favoured ways of expansion, sharpened Russian appetites, and the build-up in Russia was to the liking of France, frightened Germany but also the United Kingdom, which saw the rise of the Russian military as a looming threat over Europe…
-The Road to the Great War, P. Robertson, New York, 1997

His only son, the Tsarevich Alexei, being crippled by hemophilia, and his brother, Grand Duke Mikhail, having been excluded from the line of succession by his scandalous marriage to Natalia Wulfert in 1912, Nicholas II was teetering. Following him and his son, the next in line was his cousin Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich, whom he deeply disliked due to a previous scandal due his marriage with Princess Victoria Melita of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, a divorcee, in 1905. The hatred of the Czarina towards both her in-law and the Princess, her own first cousin, was intact and she persuaded her husband not to see him as a suitable Czar.
On the other hand, Nicholas had four healthy daughters, excluded from the line of succession due to the Pauline Laws, established by Emperor Paul I of Russia who had been traumatized by the overbearing power of his mother, Catherine the Great. Women could only succeed if the entire line of legitimately-born male dynasts had gone extinct. The Pauline Laws had put into question by the marriage of Princess Tatiana Konstantinova to Princess Konstantin Alexandrovich Bagration-Mukhransky, morganatic in fact, that led her to renounce her rights to the throne. (...)
The death of Rasputin also reminded the Czar of his own mortality and he began to make plans towards a new law of succession… (...)
The 1915 Russian Law of Succession discontinued the exclusion of women from the succession, given that she was married to a Russian dynast/a non-reigning foreign of royal or imperial blood, far enough from the immediate line of succession. Inspired by the British Law of Succession, it was changed to male-preference primogeniture, allowing Grand Duchess Olga, the eldest daughter of the Czar, to become second in line…
-Olga the Great, V. Pons, Paris, 2008

“-And so, you never regretted having lost your position in the line of succession ?
-Not at all. I have never wanted to pursue the throne, and I think both of my brothers - Nicholas and George - would never have thought of it either had they knew how much upheavals Russia would endure. I love my country, I love my family, I served it happily during the War, but I never loved power. When Nicky decided to remove me from the line of succession, he called me selfish due to the disease of his son; but now, I could marry the woman I loved, live in peace and raise my beloved son as I wanted.
-But you could have been the Czar now.
-My niece is doing great right now ; I have a family here in England, I have my business there, I’m ready to help Russia if it needs me. What would a man like me prefer ? I decided to pursue happiness.”
-Interview with Grand Duke Mikhail Alexandrovich of Russia, for The Times, October, 13 1927


TL;DR : Rasputin is assassinated and Russia endures huge protests in 1915, but Nicholas II manages to tone them down by promising a full Constitution by 1917. In the mean time, army modernization goes on and the law of succession is changed, allowing female accession.

 

[MaskedPickle]

So, is there some ITTL version of the Lateran Treaty?

And is China in the ITTL future more balkanized?

Take a guess, as the Forbidden City is here evoked as the world's tiniest country. The current pope, Nicholas VI (Domenico Serafini) considers himself Prisonner of the Vatican, as his successors since 1870 were.

I guess the KMT won the Warlord Era ITTL. The question is whether the left-wing or right-wing faction took over the KMT when Sun Yat-Sen died.

Beiping means Northern Capital anyway, so KMT or not KMT...

If Germany starts supporting monarchical elements in China, i can see Japan siding with the republican forces as countermesoure.

Given that Japan has a renforced presence in Manchuria, an area ruled by a monarchist warlord (Zhang Zuolin), switching places would be difficult ; for the Kaiser's diplomacy, it's just about betting on the best horse.

 

[Bookmark1995]

Ahh, this chapter is too damn vague-as in there is no indication if Russia will avoid the terrible upheavals that plagued it in the 20th century, although the tsar remaining committed to autocracy is a bit of a warning sign.

Sergei Witte is one of those people who, in a rational world, should've been the one in charge. He could've made Russia a free place if he had a chance.

Although Empress Olga has some interesting potential.

 

[Ogrebear]

Interesting update about Russia there.

Hope Russia can avoid the worst of its OTL 20thC history esp that Revolution and Soviet dictatorship.

 

[MaskedPickle]

In the aftermath of the 1913 coup d’Etat by the Three Pashas (Enver, Talaat and Cemal), the two Balkan Wars and the single-party general election in 1914, the Ottoman Empire passed the year 1914 with difficulty, happy to be left out of the Albanian War and strengthening their grip on the fledgling centuries-old Empire and keeping Caliph Mehmed V in check. That’s why, when Britain strenghtened their control over Egypt in the aftermath of the assassination of the Khedive, followed by a build-up in Cyprus, the Young Turks dared not to protest...
-The Ailing Man of Europe : the Modern Ottoman Empire, G. Günes, Berlin, 2014

On January, 1 1915, under the terms of the Armenian Reform Package passed into law on February, 8 1914, Armenia was divided into two autonomous provinces, under the supervisions of two European inspectors general, appointed to oversee matters related to the Armenian issues. The vilayets of Erzurum and Sivas were unified under Dutch representative Louis Constant Westenenk, while Van, Bitlis, Diyarbakir and Kharput were to be overseen by Norwegian Nicolai Hoff. The situation rejoiced the Armenian Ottoman cause, but the Sublime Porte was growing weary, as Russia had put in place a genuine protectorate over Ottoman Armenia…
-The Other Balkans : Caucasus in the Twentieth Century, P. Conge, Paris, 2018

The Bagdadbahn, or Berlin-Baghdad Railway, that was to become the great German thought to connect Berlin to the Middle East and allow Germany to establish a port in the Persian Gulf and control the suspected oil fields in Mesopotamia, was supposed to be completed in 1913, but in spite of several investments by the Deutsche Bank, the works were plagued with problems. In the light of this situation, the German government agreed to swallow their pride and enter negotiations with British financiers, in order to close the door to French interfering : the Corfu Agreement, signed on March, 14 1915 in the Achilleion (the personal villa of Kaiser Wilhelm II), between representatives of the Deutsche Bank and Bank of England, flanked by German and British representatives of their respective governments, agreed on a financial condominium that would complete the railway for 1920. Germany was confirmed in a 99-years-lease over the exploitation, while the Bank England took a 23,75 % share in the Turkish Petroleum Company (the same percentage had already been held by the Deutsche Bank since 1912).
In exchange, Germany officially renounced to establish military outposts in the Persian Gulf. But German diplomacy managed to counter this provision, as a secret defensive pact was signed with the Ottoman Empire in 1915, should the areas crossed by the Bagdadbahn come under foreign threat…
A Place Under The Sun : German Diplomacy under Wilhelm II, G. Laffitte, Paris, 1999


Riding on the success of both Balkan Wars and Albanian War, Eleftherios Venizelos cruised to victory in the 1915 elections, his ultimate goal of the Megali Idea, a reunion of historical Greek lands under the Kingdom of the Hellenes, never having been closer ; it drew tensions with Italy, in control of the Dodecanese, and furthermore the Ottoman Empire, with Constantinople as the ultimate prize. (...) As a result, Greece was in a crossroads : its king was married to the German Kaiser' sister, it depended on French loans and it shared its religion with Russia…
The Hellene Tiger : A History of Modern Greece, A. Christodoulou, Athens, 2011


ALI II OFFICIALLY ENTHRONED AS CALIPH AND SULTAN
The new Ottoman Sultan and Caliph, Ali II, had been officially enthroned yesterday during his Girding of the Sword ceremony at the Eyüp Mosque in Constantinople, after a mandatory grieving week for his predecessor, Bayezid III.
A seven-centuries-old practice, barely updated since, the Girding of the Sword was performed on the holy ground of the Eyüp tomb complex in the Golden Horn, in pomp and circumstances. In front of elite soldiers of the Ottoman Imperial Guard, the Grand Vizier, the Government, religious leaders and foreign ambassadors, the Sharif of Konya and the Chief of the Ottoman General Staff swore their oath to the new Commander of the Faithful, over the Sword of Osman.
Ali II, 88, had trouble lifting the Sword to those who took the oath, anonymous observers reported.
Dündar Ali Osman, great-grandson to Sultan Abdul Hamid II (1876-1909), became the eldest member of the Ottoman dynasty upon the passing of Bayezid III on January, 6, becoming the new head of the Ottoman Empire due to agnatic male seniority, the law of succession in the dynasty.
-New York Times, January, 14 2017

TL;DR : The fall of the Ottoman Empire continues, with Egypt, Cyprus entering the British Empire while Armenia becomes autonomous and under Russian protection. Nevertheless, the Ottomans enter the German sphere of influence.