How about Persia remains powerful and strong, and rebellions no longer pose real threats?
The first issue is how you get the Persians to remain powerful and strong, as well stop any potential revolts. Which, kinda seems a tad bit ASB. :\
How about Persia remains powerful and strong, and rebellions no longer pose real threats?
The first issue is how you get the Persians to remain powerful and strong, as well stop any potential revolts. Which, kinda seems a tad bit ASB. :\
Lets have Persia face a massive rebellion in which Bactria secedes, but is crushed after a number of years. And then have a successful ruler come to power.
I don't know why I'm going to bother...
You can't just wave your hand and remove revolts. Very little is going to change some basic geopolitical arithmetic. Namely, the Persians are trying to maintain a huge, polygot empire with terrible logistics in the ancient world, without an efficient method of administration or standing army or such devices. For the restive subject peoples, the Persians are foreign overlords, taxing and conscripting (albeit in a reasonably fair manner) from very far away. Rebellions are going to happen. Systemic overhauls, of the sort which I doubt the Persians can manage, are necessary to prevent them from being epidemic. One great ruler isn't a solution, since that merely postpones the problems. Multiple great rulers seems to ignore everything from probability to human nature. And even if such a chain arises, what next? Emperors are murdered. Civil Wars Happen. And so on... Best case for the empire is to frantically consolidate, and either integrate the empire and/or accept some potential losses on the extremities. Working from this, they could be reasonably successful (if they aren't already) until some outsiders come along and smash the place up.
For starters, the Archademids aren't expanding any further. maybe some peripheral action, like greece, but economically it just isn't worth the effort. Most likely scenario involves Athens getting wiped out by the Persians as a punitive measure. Some anti-persian feeling may arise (how much, though? how much "greekness" do the greeks have?), and Sparta may leverage this into a leading position. But, left to their own devices, sooner or later somebody (my money on Corinth) knocks them off their pedestal... Rome probably never develops past a minor city state, at most head of a Latin League, being crowded out by Western Greeks, Carthage, Samnites, and Gauls. Wonder what becomes of Syracuse in this timeline...
Because Whe know what "X" Did, to provide a framework. Rome/ General Caesar conquered Gaul and invaded Britain. No Caesar, and whe discuss if Rome would still do this.Yeah I must say - if "X isn't born" is a valid WI, why isn't "Fictional Y inserted here" seen as valid WI, too?