Versailles creates "Czechosilesia?"

What would the ramifications of instead of putting the Czechs and Slovaks together, they put the two prosperous Slavic regions of Czechia and German Silesia together upon the end of WW1? Would Germany be outraged? How would Poland feel? What would likely happen to the Slovaks? Would Czechosilesia be able to resist any German imperialism due to its much greater economy than Czechoslovakia?

Considering Silesia was almost entirely Germans and Poles at this point, how would they react to becoming a part of a Czech-dominated country? Would Czechosilesia try to promote a "Silesian" national identity that crosses German and Polish linguistic backgrounds, or would it try to divide Silesians into many nationalities in order to maintain Czech dominance in the area?


I'm imagining borders as such, but without the Communism and exclave:

anno_1974___czechosilesia_by_lscatilina.png
 

Deleted member 94680

IMHO it would be buggered from day one.

You’ve taken land from Germany (including several major cities with large German populations), prevented Poland from gaining that land and spread the border over the protection of the Oder and the Sudeten Mountains.

I doubt it would survive until WWII and definitely not after.
 
Might be that even Czechoslovakia doesn't want that. German population would cause just too big problem. And they would get two really furious neighbors. Silesia has been long time part of Prussia and not way that Germany just give that without fighting. Only way would be occupation and mass expulsion like in OTL after WW2.
 
You’ve taken land from Germany, prevented Poland from gaining that land

That's easy - don't forget that Poland exists because Russia lost the war *despite* being on the side of the victors.

Anyway, the country has German majority - no way it's gonna work without some serious ethnic cleansing.
 
So Czechosilesia would be interpreted by the locals as a Czech state that does represent the Germans or Poles in Silesia? Would the granting of Silesia to the Czechs as a way to prevent Germany from having it without making Poland too German be viewed as a betrayal by Poland and provoke a German-Polish partition of Czechosilesia?

And yes, looking at the stats, it seems that Germans, though not a clear majority in 1871, were very much a majority in 1910. Would this tear apart Czechosilesia from the beginning or would it just cause a 1938 Austria-style Anschluss at some point? Would "population transfers" like in Greece and Turkey happen? The Allies cared little about that or the ethnic cleansing of the Hungarians after Trianon. Would they care about the Germans? I'm not particularly attached to the long-term viability of a Czechosilesian project, I just saw the picture and began wondering how it would survive the Interbellum period.
 
Poles will rise three months after geniuses who invented this scheme put their signatures under the treaty, in cooperation with local Germans to make things funnier
 
Good point. The Poles were rising while the status quo was being enforced, let alone after being transferred to another country that wasn't even Poland.
 

Deleted member 94680

If (and it’s a fairly large if) it survives until ‘33, then Hitler’s got an even better reason to abrogate Versailles than the Sudetenland.
 
I'm mainly leaning towards something more interesting, like Germany and Poland partitioning Czechosilesia, then going to war over who gets what parts of Silesia.
 
German are a majority and would obviously be in a position to take over the country while the Poles Silesian try to join Poland.

At best the Czech would take over some parts of Silesia, they are in no position of controlling all of Silesia.
 

BigBlueBox

Banned
Poles were only present in Upper Silesia, not Lower Silesia. There was also a Czech minority in the Klodzko area of Lower Silesia. As long as Poles get Upper Silesia and Zaolzie they have no reason to complain. In fact, they would probably prefer Czechs having Lower Silesia because it would weaken Germany and give Poland more defensible borders against Germany.
 

CaliGuy

Banned
What would the ramifications of instead of putting the Czechs and Slovaks together, they put the two prosperous Slavic regions of Czechia and German Silesia together upon the end of WW1? Would Germany be outraged? How would Poland feel? What would likely happen to the Slovaks? Would Czechosilesia be able to resist any German imperialism due to its much greater economy than Czechoslovakia?

Considering Silesia was almost entirely Germans and Poles at this point, how would they react to becoming a part of a Czech-dominated country? Would Czechosilesia try to promote a "Silesian" national identity that crosses German and Polish linguistic backgrounds, or would it try to divide Silesians into many nationalities in order to maintain Czech dominance in the area?


I'm imagining borders as such, but without the Communism and exclave:

anno_1974___czechosilesia_by_lscatilina.png
I'll need to look at the data, but it's possible that such a state would have an ethnic German-majority population (heck, Czechia itself was about 30% German before the post-World War II expulsions); in such a case, we could eventually see this entire state joining Germany.
 

Deleted member 94680

That's easy - don't forget that Poland exists because Russia lost the war *despite* being on the side of the victors.

Sorry, I don’t follow? How does Poland’s creation affect the expansionist desires of its people?
 

Deleted member 94680

Quick spot from Wikipedia on the ethnicity of Eastern Silesia:

In the German census of 1900, 65% of the population of the eastern part of Silesia was recorded as Polish speaking, which decreased to 57% in 1910. This was partly a result of forced Germanization, but was also due to the creation of a bilingual category, which reduced the number of Polish speakers. German scholar Paul Weber drew a language map that showed that in 1910 in most of Upper Silesian districts east of the Oder river, Polish-speaking Silesians constituted a majority, forming more than 70% of the population there.


It comes from the page on the Silesian Uprisings.

Then, when you look up the wiki on the Upper Silesia Plebiscite, this section stands out:

The Hlučín Region (German: Hultschiner Ländchen), the southern part of Ratibor district shown in lilac in the map, had a Czech-speaking majority. On February 4, 1920 it had been handed over without a referendum to Czechoslovakia, according to Article 83 of the Treaty of Versailles. It was not involved in the plebiscite.

For reference it’s this map they’re on about:
789_EF5_E0-6_D61-4_B4_C-_AE6_D-_ED53_B3846755.png

Map of the plebiscite areas
Pink = Germany, Green = Poland
Lilac = Czechoslovakia (including Hlučín)
Pale green = to Poland following plebiscite,
Orange = remaining in Germany
 

CaliGuy

Banned
That's easy - don't forget that Poland exists because Russia lost the war *despite* being on the side of the victors.

AFAIK, the Russian Provisional Government had already expressed support for Poland's independence in early 1917.

Anyway, the country has German majority - no way it's gonna work without some serious ethnic cleansing.

Completely agreed.
 
Sorry, I don’t follow? How does Poland’s creation affect the expansionist desires of its people?
Well, if Poland remains part of tsarist Russia (especially if it gets Galicja and all the rest of Polish population from Germany as the spoils of the war), its people can be as much expansionist as they want, but it will be rather irrelevant - they'd might expand to Siberia if they insist.
 
That's an interesting idea. If Russia doesn't lose the war, would they seize Silesia, leave it to the Germans, or would they support a Czechosilesian state as a client in Central Europe? Would sponsorship by the Tsar or Republic lead to Czechosilesia lasting longer than otherwise?
 
What would the ramifications of instead of putting the Czechs and Slovaks together, they put the two prosperous Slavic regions of Czechia and German Silesia together upon the end of WW1? Would Germany be outraged? How would Poland feel? What would likely happen to the Slovaks? Would Czechosilesia be able to resist any German imperialism due to its much greater economy than Czechoslovakia?

The only way this would happen is if the victorious powers placed more importance on prior historical borders as the way to create a lasting settlement in Europe, rather than drawing borders in accordance to what language was most spoken.

In such a scenario, Poland might be quite satisfied with having their 1771 borders.

And of course Germany will be unhappy. But not really more unhappier than they were OTL or they would have been under a more lenient Versailles - the German military class was unhappy with being defeated and they were always going to be interested in rallying the country behind them to erase the humiliation of defeat itself. Whether they succeed in rallying ordinary Germans depends much more on how hard it is for those ordinary Germans to put food on the plates of their families. If Germany loses Silesia but avoids the Great Depression, they would be happier than OTL.

It's worth noting that whatever language people spoke, the dominant identity in Silesia was "Silesian" and the Slavic dialect spoken in the region could as easily been lumped into the "Czech" identity as it could the "Polish" identity (indeed, one of the reasons for unhappiness in Silesia was the outside powers came in and tried to divide up Silesia along arbitrary lines that had never been borders in the previous 1000 years - so keeping Silesia together and transferring it as a unit would leave some happier). And while the "Silesian" identity was wedded to the larger German identity in 1918, the area had been part of the Kingdom of Bohemia for far longer, so there is a foundation to build a Czechosilesian state on.

I expect this state (which would probably just be called Bohemia, since that was what it had been called before), would be much more of a joint German-Czech entity. Indeed, the German Bohemians will be much more important than the Slovaks were in Czechoslovakia. Things won't be plain sailing, but the state could work just fine in the long run.

fasquardon
 
It just makes no sense. If you want to weaken Germany, give as much of Silesia as possible to Poland. If you want to follow self-determination, divide it up as equitably as you can. Giving it to the Czechs helps nobody--including the Czechs, who already have a large German minority to worry about...
 
It just makes no sense. If you want to weaken Germany, give as much of Silesia as possible to Poland. If you want to follow self-determination, divide it up as equitably as you can. Giving it to the Czechs helps nobody--including the Czechs, who already have a large German minority to worry about...


You just summed it up really well. I think fasquardon's post also makes a lot of sense. If Russia doesn't get Brest-Litovsk'd then there is no Poland to give Silesia to. You might end up with a Russian-sponsored and ethnic German dominated Kingdom of Bohemia that's purpose is to mainly just take territory from Austria-Hungary and Germany.
 
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