The Battle of Valmy was one of the most important battle's of the French Revolution. What if thing's turned out differently?
The Battle of Valmy was one of the most important battle's of the French Revolution. What if thing's turned out differently?
I can't imagine the republicans would give up that easily.Austrians and Prussians march on Paris and install the Bourbons
I can't imagine the republicans would give up that easily.
quite obviously, the butterflies are enormous:
If France gets restored to a monarchy, Spain/Portugal do not start and lose the War of the Pyrenees, which ended Spain's pretention to world power status.
Napoleonic wars are avoided and all the effects there are too many to list. Even aside from all the European political stuff, you don't have the spreading of the Napoleonic Code.
Central/South American history is completely different.
North American history is dramatically changed, as there's no Louisiana Purchase and it still belongs to Spain. War of 1812 never happens.
Britain probably still rises to a position of dominance due to it's leadership in the industrial revolution, but it doesn't come as quick or possibly as completely as OTL. South African history changes as Netherlands hold onto the cape.
quite obviously, the butterflies are enormous:<snip>
North American history is dramatically changed, as there's no Louisiana Purchase and it still belongs to Spain. (1) War of 1812 never happens. (2)
Does the allied army actually take Paris, though? They were really going slow about it OTL, and the Prussians weren't too invested in the whole idea - they really wanted to extricate themselves so they could focus on carving up Poland. In 1793, with France facing a far more formidable constellation of foes, the Allies did very little to actually move on Paris.
If they do get to Paris, I suspect that they won't find a living Louis XVI.
So a foreign army installs Louis XVII (or Louis XVIII, if the mob goes particularly crazy) at the point of the bayonet. What next?
It's really hard to see what exactly would happen next.
usertron
without the napoleonic wars distracting Spain, they maintain the aura of being the boss, and also the physical/military means to strike back. Maintaining those two things means they maintain control over their empire for a lot longer. I'm certainly not going to say that they could maintain it forever, but the timing and the circumstances are going to be much different. It's the same sort of thing with the Louisiana Purchase territories. the timing/circumstances are going to change dramatically. The US going to war with Spain, who still has pretentions of being a world power, is a whole lot different than going to war with Mexico.
No napoleonic wars means no War of 1812. End of story.
A non-Bonaparted Spain has no reason to sell Louisiana. It would be absurd. So the only way it could go to USA would be military conquest. Not easy. Maybe it could lead to a Spanish-USA war of 1812!
Also the War of 1812 wasn't a British victory, because of British lack of interest in the war. At the beginning of the war, the Americans were weak and could have been crushed, but the Napoleonic wars postponed a strong British reaction for years.
So if the US, attacks Spain, Spain repulses them and wins the war. This would set back the US by a good deal of time.
Why so? If the Hispano-American war is over Florida (which I would expect, if there was such a war in this time-period), it's worth noting that ever since colonial times there had been a few outposts in Florida and little de facto Spanish control. Perhaps the Spanish would succeed anyway, but I don't think that Spanish rule in Florida is easily defensible, and since that's probably the American war goal anyway…
Louis XVIII eventually goes the way of his nephew and grandnephew, when the French populace explodes again. The French Revolution was not a fluke, and being destroyed by the work of outside invading armies rather than by internal forces only shows to the world the complete illegitimacy of Bourbon rule. At least post-Napoleonic Wars it could honestly be said that the European powers were acting in their own national self-defense, rather than purely in the name of defending aristocratic privilege and royalist rule.
A non-Bonaparted Spain has no reason to sell Louisiana. It would be absurd. So the only way it could go to USA would be military conquest. Not easy. Maybe it could lead to a Spanish-USA war of 1812!
But if the Revoluionary armies fail disastorously at the first hurdle is 'the Republic' going to retain much currency?
Remember in this timeline the French people will have witnessed the revolutionaries being soundly whipped in the field; that is going to be a huge psychological blow.