WI: Bulgarian's take Istanbul in winter 1912?

I don't think the Ottoman Empire who'd have collapsed.
As for the 1912 coup it will still happen.
And i don't think the Bulgarians will be able to keep Istanbul
 
The Ottoman Empire was (crudely) Turkic and Arab. It was not European. Constantinople is a European city whose hinterland merged into Bulgaria with little (by Balkan standards) trouble.

Not only can I see Bulgaria retaining it but I can see Bulgaria and Turkey move closer together to meet the threat of Greece.

Retaining Constantinople would remove the major reason for Bulgaria joining the central powers in WW1. With direct rail contact with the central powers passing through Bulgaria Turkey might well choose to stay out of the war leading to the ever popular 'WI the Ottoman Empire survived WW1?' threads. I would see it as having consolidated (in that inimitable Ottoman way) it's internal issues and turning it's attention to it's Turkic hinterland and taking advantage of the Russian revolution to extend itself into the Caucasus and Central Asia, possibly making central asian deals to support China against Japan.

Equally, in WW2 Bulgaria would have the support of Turkey and, again, have no reason to move away from neutrality.

Post WW2 Turkey's main threat would come from Russia in Central Asia.

Bulgaria could well join NATO with Turkey and Roumania would be treated very differently by the USSR as it would be a front line state with NATO.

From 1912 Bulgaria would be able to develop as a part of the 'western' world with a world class business capital in Constantinople and trade links around the world in general and a preferred trader relationship with Turkey in Central Asia. By now there might be a Central Asian economic, customs and financial loose union in the EU model with Bulgaria looking to be a member of both the EU and this CAU.
 
I seriously doubt that the Ottomans would accept the loss of Constantinople. It was a thoroughly Turkish city, their ancient capital, and the location of what little industry they did posses. Bulgaria would have to ethnically cleanse the city to keep it; whether they succeed or not depends upon the great powers, who would suddenly become very interested in the events in the Balkans reaching the Bosporus.
 
Assuming some sort of peace settlement, is it likely that we would ever see a settlement where, in this case Bulgaria the victor keeps the western bank of the Bosphorus and the main city of Istanbul and *Ottomans keep the eastern bank?
 
Just how would the Bulgarians pierce the Çatalca Line? In OTL they defeated the Ottoman formations in Western Thrace only to smash to a bloody wall in Çatalca.

Perhaps the Bulgarian cavalry could conduct a more aggressive pursuit afteir their initial victory in Kirk Kilisse? Even then the Ottomans would most likely be able to rush reinforcements to Çatalca and consolidate their position. In this war the Ottomans were best known for their ability to form ad-hoc formations time and time again and keep on fighting after their initial organizations were shattered. And in Çatalca the Ottoman formations would be fighting with their backs against the wall, with all the advantages trench warfare has to offer, while Bulgarians would be attacking a position that negates all the advantages of their aggressive infantry assaults.
 
If Bulgaria takes Constantinople, they would be forced to give to give it back or some sort of international committee to oversee the city.

That or a earlier World War 1 could break out.
 
I really doubt that they would get to keep it. Constantinople falling would attract the attention of the Great Powers (Britain, France, Germany and Russia) and they would set up a peace conference. Bulgaria will probably get all of what they wanted but will have to give Constantinople back to the Ottoman empire.

This might make the Great Powers decided that it is time to put the Ottomans down, after all they couldn't even hold their capital, and the great powers wanted their middle eastern lands.
 
Russian Black Sea Fleet was on this case is shown in the alert. Would not allow the Bulgarians.:)
 
The British and French, as a rule, generally resolved to prop up the Ottoman Empire in its latter years. This is why a regionally-confined war which Russia was winning prompted Anglo-French intervention during the Crimean War. It nearly became that again during the Second Russo-Turkish War, but the Russians lost that one at the peace table rather than on the battlefield. The Western great powers had a conception of what the European balance-of-power should look like, and the Ottoman Empire was crucial to it. Allowing the Ottoman Empire to collapse would not only have drastically altered that balance-of-power, but may well have triggered a general war over the spoils of its carcass. And nobody really wanted that.

Assuming the relatively unlikely prospect of Bulgaria actually winning here (logistics along with the rather self-evident fact that the Ottomans are going to make a fight for their capital a very hard one count against them), Constantinople would in their case prove to be the mother of all poisoned chalices. Because if the British or French didn't intervene, the Russians most assuredly would, and as others have noted, actually prepared for this IOTL. Constantinople is just too important for too many people, Bulgaria in this issue would be little more than a very small fish in a much larger pond. Even the relatively modest gains for Bulgaria made by the Treaty of Berlin would probably never come to pass. If Bulgaria was seen as a threat to the continued existence of the Ottomans, it would be trimmed back severely at a peace conference.
 
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