Was Austria-Hungary getting close to France as a Power on the continent by 1914?

Where are the sovereign Scottish, Welsh, and Catalan nation states already in existence that Scots, Welsh, and Catalans in neighboring nations can unite with?
You got me there. But, why do you assume that everyone who's of the same ethnicity would want to be united? How does this explain the Arab nations and their division? Wouldn't there be Italians, Romanians, and Serbians who would be too comfortable to care either way? Also, you didn't answer me on the part of the Romanians and the Moldovans. Why haven't they sought to unite?
 
Where are the sovereign Scottish, Welsh, and Catalan nation states already in existence that Scots, Welsh, and Catalans in neighboring nations can unite with?
There's Russian minorities in the Baltics but they generally do not want to reunite with the sovereign, existing Russia.
 

BooNZ

Banned
How many southerners would have seceded again in 1870 if God or Aliens came and gave their approval? 1880? 1900? What about 1950? How many Serbs, Italians and Romanians would want to leave by 1950? There is a problem when you to say that they 100% would just because of want their parents or grandparents wanted. Cause these people are not rural foke anymore, they are urban foke who now outnumber the countryside around them in terms of population.

If Austria-Hungary had lasted 50 years and undergone a demographic transition the most impressive thing is going to happen to the cities, which will be holding tens of millions of people. These are going to be muntiethnic, cosmopolitan, metropolises. Every city will have a German, Slavic, Hungarian, Italian, and Romanian quarter were people mingle. Every. Single City. People from diffent ethnic groups working together everyday. People living in them are not going to have the same attitudes towards nationalism that existed at the beginning of the century.

An Austria that survives to become a urban country connected by its cities will be as different from the old rural Austria as the pre civil war USA is to the mondern day.
Your understanding of nationalism is completely backwards. The more developed Italians, Serbs, and Romanians become, the more they will realize that they have far more in common with their brethren across the borders then their Austro-Hungarian jailors and fellow prisoners in the empire.
It was pointed out on a similar thread a while back the Hungarian mygarization was actually rather successful among the literate urban populations. Given the higher rates of literacy within the empire, it would be reasonable to assume A-H would increasingly have the upper hand in the battle for hearts and minds. Further, as the level of infrastucture and standard of living within the empire continues to pull away from its diminutive neighbours, those gilded cages start to look quite good.

As an aside, the Serbs should not be confused with the Croats or the Bosniaks who made up the overall majority of the Bosnia Herzegovina population and neither would have been too thrilled with the prospect of living under Serbian rule.
 

BigBlueBox

Banned
You got me there. But, why do you assume that everyone who's of the same ethnicity would want to be united? How does this explain the Arab nations and their division? Wouldn't there be Italians, Romanians, and Serbians who would be too comfortable to care either way? Also, you didn't answer me on the part of the Romanians and the Moldovans. Why haven't they sought to unite?
Moldovans were brainwashed and indoctrinated by a totalitarian dictatorship for nearly half a century to convince them they weren’t Romanian. Now the corrupt local government is doing everything it can to continue to prevent reunification so they can keep lining their own pockets. The Transnistria problem is also there. If A-H had a state repression and indoctrination apparatus as effective as the Soviet Union it could do the same. But I doubt they would do that. There were certainly attempts to unite the Arabs, and while they have failed there is no reason to believe that those failures were guaranteed, or no unification attempts will occur in the future. In any case, the Arab world is very diverse.
 
Yes, it was rapidly on course to containing a larger share of global manufacturing than France.

Personally, I've always found the dead man walking meme pretty silly. Economically the Empire was doing great, which portends a good future for it but I think IOTL was example enough if things had been different; for a system so soon for death, it managed to fight the first industrialized war out to the very end and its Army didn't disintegrate until very specific events, both domestically and abroad, led to such. Matter of fact it was actually stood to and prepared to continue fighting on the Italian front at the very end, until said events created a perfect storm.
 
So you're admitting that Austria could only keep them in line with force and intimidation, and would never win their true loyalty. I'm glad we're on the same page. Oh, and Romania never incited the Transylvanian Romanians before the war. They came to hate the prison of nations on their own.

Austria-Hungary could not break up without either economic collapse or strong foreign agitation to that purpose, or both.
 
Your understanding of nationalism is completely backwards. The more developed Italians, Serbs, and Romanians become, the more they will realize that they have far more in common with their brethren across the borders then their Austro-Hungarian jailors and fellow prisoners in the empire.

Austrian economic wellbeing prior to 1914 was better than Italy's, Serbia's, or Rumania's, meaning that to leave the Empire an join a neighbour would be trading down in economic prospects. During the war the economy collapsed to the blockade so the calculus changed.
 
For those who think yes, when is the likely point where Austria could reach France’s level? Can they pass Britain before decolonization?

Also, how big is the likely population by 1964?
 
I suspect that Austria-Hungary's territories would be home to a relatively larger population than OTL; over 1918-2018, much of the empire saw little population growth, or even localized declines.

How much larger? I dunno. Italy is the only nearby country that saw relatively stable borders and a minimum of forced population changes, and its population has grown by 50%.
 

BigBlueBox

Banned
Austria-Hungary could not break up without either economic collapse or strong foreign agitation to that purpose, or both.
Thank you for restating my point, which is that A-H will never gain the loyalty of its Italian, Serb, and Romanian citizens, and they will seek secession whenever they get a good opportunity.
Austrian economic wellbeing prior to 1914 was better than Italy's, Serbia's, or Rumania's, meaning that to leave the Empire an join a neighbour would be trading down in economic prospects. During the war the economy collapsed to the blockade so the calculus changed.
Using your logic the Greater Poland uprising and Upper Silesian Uprising never should happened.
Edit: Romania and Serbia took far more damage from the war anyways, yet Serbs and Romanians in the Empire were happy to join their brethren.
 
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I remember when I was 15 sitting in the Imperial War Museum reading room and reading the day by day history of the war, and being amazed just how many Austrian merchant ships were out there.

I don't know where they ranked in terms of merchant marine, but it must have had some significant percentage of the economy
 
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