WI/AHC Qajar Iran gets all of its claimed territory

EnvarKadri

As it's says in the tin: how, ramifications and possibilities. Any pod you want as long is Qajar.
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A few more cool maps:
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Iran_takeover_Gulf_lg.jpg
 
Koprulu Mustafa Pasha

Koprulu Mustafa Pasha

Gone Fishin'
I'll try to assume their claims:
- Northern Azerbaijan and Armenia
They keep it as they avoid wars with Russia in 1803
- Georgia and Derbent
Russia ignores the Caucasus entirely for various reasons and Agha Mohammed forcefully subjugates Georgia
- Herat and Eastern Baluchistan
No war with Russia. Agha Mohammed is not killed so he expands Eastwards. The Durrani are in a sorry state by 1800 so it is possible. Especially as the British have not taken Delhi yet. Odds are they could try to subjugate entire Afghanistan

Optional:
- Central Asia
Russia is not active YET. The Persians have a period of 15-20 years without noticing major Russian attention in the area. The Khanates are not impressive so war is not problematic. What is a huge problem is that large scale conquest in a short timeframe brings huge instability. If secured, you'd have a Persia stretching from Kutaisi near the Black Sea to the Tianshan Mountains. A lot of ethnicities but mostly Islamic and divided between Iranian and Turkic ethnicities. The Qajars fitting in both gives them an advantage.
 
Koprulu Mustafa Pasha

Koprulu Mustafa Pasha

Gone Fishin'
Basically what I wrote about without most of Central Asia and Eastern Afghanistan.

Primary requirement: delayed Russian interest in the Caucasus. Having no Russian interest in the Caucasus is rather impossible so delay their interest until the 1820s, when Persia secures most of their conquests of the 1790s. So no Russian protectorate over Georgia, no Russian Campaign in Persia in 1795 (which was halted tbf).
 

EnvarKadri

If you look at their claims in Afghanistan and Balochistan, they stop just short of hazarajat.
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https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e2/Afghanistan_ethnic_groups_2005.jpg (good, detailed map but crashed the site for me)
Assuming they get their claims I guess they would also go those shia highlands to get a more defendable border. But that would leave rump Afghanistan too small for independence, so the Russia and UK may partion them. The nortern turkic, tajik and pamir areas to Russia and the eastern pashtun (with Kabul) and Nuristan to British India (Later Pakistan).
Also the link shows that western pashtun are separated of the eastern ones by tribal afiliation so Iran may be able to use it to break ethnic solidarity.
 
Koprulu Mustafa Pasha

Koprulu Mustafa Pasha

Gone Fishin'
EnvarKadri said:
If you look at their claims in Afghanistan and Balochistan, they stop just short of hazarajat.
View attachment 519553

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e2/Afghanistan_ethnic_groups_2005.jpg (good, detailed map but crashed the site for me)
Assuming they get their claims I guess they would also go those shia highlands to get a more defendable border. But that would leave rump Afghanistan too small for independence, so the Russia and UK may partion them. The nortern turkic, tajik and pamir areas to Russia and the eastern pashtun (with Kabul) and Nuristan to British India (Later Pakistan).
Also the link shows that western pashtun are separated of the eastern ones by tribal afiliation so Iran may be able to use it to break ethnic solidarity.
Click to expand...

It depends on when they want it. Assuming...
A). They avoid the war with Russia, no Russian occupation of Georgia, consolidate Georgia and Azerbaijan. Thus they have their hands free to move East. If they are fast they can make Peshawar their most eastern Border.

B). Persia is strong enough to repel the Russians and the EIC which means they agree on a division of Afghanistan. Highly unlikely as the British in India will desire some sort of a buffer with the Russians on India. Which is better for the British rather than giving Persia more territory and the Russians their geographically difficult border with British India. Russia cannot participate until the 1880s. Which means Afghanistan might likely end up as a British buffer against Russia regardless.

I'd say A is likely but a lot has to go right for the Persians at the period of 1780-1810. Dividing Afghanistan is pointless anyway when you can take the entire piece before the British consolidate Northern India. Russia won't be bordering Afghanistan until the 1880s. Their gains will likely go up in their Khanate vassals.

The sole reason why the Qajar claims don't stretch out is they never had the chance to take some of the regions as they were horribly crippled by the Russians first. If they avoided that part, their claims might have stretched to include the Hazara region.
 

EnvarKadri

In the long run Keeping Azerbaijan and Armenia would be an absolutly positive for Iran, both in terms of resources and loyal population (azeris are shias and armenia would be far less populated and christian without russian rule and the armenian holocaust). The turkmen and balochi territory is mistery to me in terms of resources, the population is sunni but it's sparcely populated (won´t fundamently alter Iran's demographics and otl turkmen and balochi minorities are quite manegable), neighbors uninterested in suporting separatists and brings buffer space against Russia and UK. The big claim in iraq's kurdich territory may be more dificult but still not that much more sunnis (already plenty sunni kurds in otl) and is right next to kirkuk and it's oil: Imagine Iran with also the oil and gas from kirkuk, Azerbaijan and Bahrein, madness.
Eastern Georgia can be problematic to hold and a fruitless end endeavour. Again no idea about resources, demographics both in leanguage and religion unfavorable and dificult to change, and if you cant get the western part with it's black sea coast you may wonder why keep a bunch of complicated christian mountains. May be better as a christian vassal (pupet in the future), but all deepens on who holds western Georgia and where are the Russians.
Northeast Caucasus and Terek river: good resources (chechenia has oil right?), but mostly sunni, has chechens, complicated terrain and hundreds of sunni etnic groups with different lenguages, also complicated control from south of the caucasus. Better as one big Dagestani sunni vassal to fend off the russian threat in the north. Treat them well and share influence with the ottomans, coordinate caucasus anti russian policy with the turks. Just annex the shia azeri parts around Derbent.
Now the worst: pashtun southwest Afghanistan. Oh boy, complicated terrain, one big sunni ethnic group new to the empire with an even larger ethnic and religious brethen at the other side of the border. This will be a mess unless the powers in the eastern side of the frontier (UK, India, Pakistan) colaborate with the pashtun insurgency. No clue about resources. It's basically like iranian kurdistan if the powers onthe other side of the border where sympathetic to their cause.
 

EnvarKadri

Koprulu Mustafa Pasha said:
It depends on when they want it. Assuming...
A). They avoid the war with Russia, no Russian occupation of Georgia, consolidate Georgia and Azerbaijan. Thus they have their hands free to move East. If they are fast they can make Peshawar their most eastern Border.

B). Persia is strong enough to repel the Russians and the EIC which means they agree on a division of Afghanistan. Highly unlikely as the British in India will desire some sort of a buffer with the Russians on India. Which is better for the British rather than giving Persia more territory and the Russians their geographically difficult border with British India. Russia cannot participate until the 1880s. Which means Afghanistan might likely end up as a British buffer against Russia regardless.

I'd say A is likely but a lot has to go right for the Persians at the period of 1780-1810. Dividing Afghanistan is pointless anyway when you can take the entire piece before the British consolidate Northern India. Russia won't be bordering Afghanistan until the 1880s. Their gains will likely go up in their Khanate vassals.

The sole reason why the Qajar claims don't stretch out is they never had the chance to take some of the regions as they were horribly crippled by the Russians first. If they avoided that part, their claims might have stretched to include the Hazara region.
Click to expand...
Where you able to look at the big map?
Any ideas on the other claims?
 

EnvarKadri

I forgot to talk about Bahrein. It's small in population, shia, majority arab but with significant persian minority and HUGE in oil/gas. It greatly expands Iranian control over the western persian gulf. It's an absolute win, may be better then northern azerbaijan.
 
Koprulu Mustafa Pasha

Koprulu Mustafa Pasha

Gone Fishin'
EnvarKadri said:
I forgot to talk about Bahrein. It's small in population, shia, majority arab but with significant persian minority and HUGE in oil/gas. It greatly expands Iranian control over the western persian gulf. It's an absolute win, may be better then northern azerbaijan.
Click to expand...

Northern Azerbaijan is for defensive purposes, manpower and taxbases, the same population as the ruling Qajar Dynasty. Bahrein is small and the use of gas and oil is irrelevant for the Qajars until the early 20th century. Bahrein is ideal as a Naval base but the lack of a Persian Navy makes that illogical as well. By the way, the Baku oil is also optional.

Persia needs a small fleet to enforce Persian rule there. Otherwise Bahrein is very close to be considered as a part of British Protection.
 

EnvarKadri

Koprulu Mustafa Pasha said:
Yep. it falls within the area I mentioned before in my first post. Almost. These borders look realistic as well but as mentioned before, Persia needs some important luck in the late 18th century.
Click to expand...
The pashtun in southwest afghanistan seem the worst to me. not shure what was the rationale of the Kandahar claim, specially if they didnt claim Hazarajat. But you are right about Bahrein. Unless the brits decide that is good for them an strong Iranian presence in the Persian Gulf (maybe to cointain the Ottomans?).
 
Koprulu Mustafa Pasha

Koprulu Mustafa Pasha

Gone Fishin'
EnvarKadri said:
The pashtun in southwest afghanistan seem the worst to me. not shure what was the rationale of the Kandahar claim, specially if they didnt claim Hazarajat. But you are right about Bahrein. Unless the brits decide that is good for them an strong Iranian presence in the Persian Gulf (maybe to cointain the Ottomans?).
Click to expand...

If the Ottomans prove to be danger to British interest (how hard that should look like), the British would desire a stronger Persia (not massive, just stronger) to contain both the Ottomans and the Russians. Hitting two birds with one stone to say at least. Whether they would allow the Persians to take over Bahrein? Probably. But the Persian time is limited. Most of their conquests need to happen between 1795 and 1830. That is 35 years of conquests AND consolidation.
 
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