I mean..canada, maybe? we've got natural resources up the ass, a bunch of oil just lying around. Only issue is that it's cold, and murica's more attractive.
I mean..canada, maybe? we've got natural resources up the ass, a bunch of oil just lying around. Only issue is that it's cold, and murica's more attractive.
The successfull french intervention was in 1862 , after The 1848 Mexican USA war and several decades of USA intervention interference and Filibusters against México.I'm not saying Mexico can't develop, but maybe the fact that the French could occupy the nation for several years, and that a bunch of hoodlums could walk off with Mexico suggests American influence in the economy was the result, not a cause, of Mexico's institutional problems.
The US in 1860 had about the equivalent of Canada's population in slaves, so maybe a dystopia-level civil war which leads to a large immigration of blacks to Canada, along with transatlantic immigration shifting from the anarchistic US to the more stable Canada.
I mean..canada, maybe? we've got natural resources up the ass, a bunch of oil just lying around. Only issue is that it's cold, and murica's more attractive.
Mesopotamia could've been rich and powerful, and was exactly that for thousands of years until their location became their massive weak point. since then it was consistently held back by their proximity to persia, arabia, the levant and anatolia. were they not surrounded by numerically superior enemies, the area could've become the cradle of many more empires.
One may well argue that Assyria and Babylonia were this to each other, first and foremost. They kept up their cycle of each dominating the other and then being dominated by the other. This ultimately hurt both of them, leading to a situation wherein Persia could march in. (It's akin to the destructive wars between Persia and the ERE damaging both, which allowed the Islamic conquests to be so wildly successful.)
If either Babylonia or Assyria had gained absolute supremacy at an early point, or if a united state in the region had persisted without ever falling apart into two competing polities like those two, then the resulting united empire would probably have been much better off in the end. Potentially to the point of being able to withstand or absorb invading forces from the Persian highland... and permanently dominating the region up to the Med via vassalisation and economic hegemony.
The PLC was a massive empire but b y the time Russia became a noticeable international factor (end of the XVII) it was well on the way down the tubes. You need to go all the way to the Time of the Troubles, make Wladislaw Tsar of Moscow (which means that he has to convert into Orthodoxy) and then make him elected on the PLC's thrones (which means that he has to be a Catholic). Try to resolve this problem.
Or (my personal favorite), have Vitold being victorious at Vorskla (which makes him de jure overlord of the Golden Horde and a direct overlord of the Great Princedom of Moscow), and then Lithuania being inherited by his grandson (Great Prince of Moscow) with the Greek Orthodoxy being a prevalent religion. This way you may end up if not with the Polish then with a great Lithuanian-Russian "empire".
...or have some sort of hussite wars on steroids that completely ruin the catholic church
Egypt and a few other modern Arab countries could have, at least on paper, risen to greater strength if there was no Israel to distract them and play them off against each other.
Another (rather obvious) example would be Poland without being partitioned between Prussia, Russia, and Austria.
To be fair, if not for said neighbor, Taiwan wouldn't even exist as a separate entity.I don't necessarily believe it would be global power, but I do think Taiwan could have a much more important role in SE Asia, if not for a certain very powerful neighbour.
I know catastrophically little about Taiwan, but doesn't it also have an indigenous culture, older than the Han chinese colonization? So maybe they would be the ones controling Taiwan as its own nationTo be fair, if not for said neighbor, Taiwan wouldn't even exist as a separate entity.
The vast majority of its population is of Han descent. Granted, most of that population came over during the Qing dynasty, with about 14% having come over after the Communist victory on the mainland, but the indigenous population makes up ~2.3% of Taiwan's modern population. There's also the fact that the KMT brought over a huge amount of capital and the business + intellectual elite with them on evacuating from the mainland, which had its impacts on Taiwan's economy, and the PRC and ROC have rather extensive economic ties now, helped by the shared language and history between the two entities.I know catastrophically little about Taiwan, but doesn't it also have an indigenous culture, older than the Han chinese colonization? So maybe they would be the ones controling Taiwan as its own nation
Egypt and a few other modern Arab countries could have, at least on paper, risen to greater strength if there was no Israel to distract them and play them off against each other.
Another (rather obvious) example would be Poland without being partitioned between Prussia, Russia, and Austria.