What if Calais and Dover isthmus?

Baphomet

Banned
What if there had been an isthmus connecting France and England at the narrowest point of the channel linking Dover and Calais together? How much easier would it be to invade England then?
 
Considerably easier I presume. Not necesarily only because invaders could go through that Isthmus, which probably would be fortified since 2000 years by now, but also because the English side would have a much harder time to move the fleet from the North Sea to the Channel.

Nevertheless, once ACW-level tech is achieved, and assuming the Isthmus faces invader forces at all, it would become a bloody hellhole.
 
This should be in ASB.

The English Channel was create by flood of, much as I dislike using the term, Biblical proportions as a result of the Noth European Ice Megadam bursting, literally craving the channel in less than a year, you can't have any land connection between Europe and Britain without fundamentally changing geologic history and in that case what you would have is a very large land bridge, not an isthmus.
 
Just as a sidenote, ASB doesn't mean it's not worth discussing, it's just that it's not a realistic scenario and belongs to a different forum.
 
Forget the ASB aspects for just a minute. Wheras William in 1066 would have certainly invaded across it, at some point in the centuries after that, the British would have dug a canal across it, partly for defensive purposes, and partly to allow access from the North Sea to the Channel. This would certainly be pre-Hitler, probably pre-Napoleon. Of course, as an earlier poster said, with this in place, a lot gets butterflied away, so maybe you get rid of Hitler, Nappy and William the Bastard.
 
More background on where the straight came from:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doggerland

When sea levels were lower during the last ice age, there was a land connection between Britain and Mainland Europe through what's now part of the North Sea. The Rhine and Thames merged in Doggerland (the now-submerged connection), and flowed out to the Atlantic through an estuary that later became the English Channel.

I suppose you could have a much bigger Little Ice Age cause Doggerland to re-emerge, but that would come with Mothra-sized butterflies.
 

Arrix85

Donor
Forget the ASB aspects for just a minute. Wheras William in 1066 would have certainly invaded across it, at some point in the centuries after that, the British would have dug a canal across it, partly for defensive purposes, and partly to allow access from the North Sea to the Channel. This would certainly be pre-Hitler, probably pre-Napoleon. Of course, as an earlier poster said, with this in place, a lot gets butterflied away, so maybe you get rid of Hitler, Nappy and William the Bastard.

None of them would exist. Everyone would be butterflied away, not maybe.
 
I did say to forget the ASB aspects just for a moment. With this land bridge there, you might not even have an English nation. I think I do get the 'butterflies' principle.
You're examining a prehistoric geological POD and you actually believe William the Conqueror will still show up? Let alone Hitler?

Do you even understand how this stuff works?
 
To accord with OTL geomorphology you would need to modify this to a land connection between eastern england and the low countries. The English Channel was a huge river valley carved out by the major rivers joining off the current mouths of the Thames and Rhine then flowing together west to the Atlantic. Dover and Calais were separated long before the British/Continental land link disappeared.

It does seem likely that the people of 'Doggerland' and it's hinterlands had a similarity in culture and language but I am sure Doggerland ATLs have been flogged to death already.
 
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