Would the United States of Greater Austria actually have worked?

[Chris Triangle]

According to the Austrians it might be. But Hungary was legally its own state, its inhabitants had their own citizenship separate from the Cisleithanian citizenship. And since the Ausgleich had to be periodically renewed by both halves of the Dual Monarchy, that implied that Hungary had the right to refuse to renew it or accept a revision to it and take back all of its sovereignty. Regardless of the legal situation though, it would be extremely difficult to prevent Austria’s enemies from taking advantage of the situation.

There are four powers that can most obviously and directly take advantage of this: Russia, Italy Serbia and Romania. For Russia, the commitment to help the south slavs break lose from the Hapsburgs would be put to the test. Russia and Serbia are probably the most dangerous should they attack. A big factor here is whether Croatian territories go with Hungary, secede from it to stick with Vienna or simply go for their own full independence right out of the gate. And who knows what would happen in Bosnia.

Italy would be tempted to attack but I personally think that it would not do so unless Austria looked like it was definitely going to fall apart and they could be pretty sure they would get the Adriatic territories. If they did attack early though, they could do enormous damage and the empire might need substantial help from Germany to withstand it.

Of the four main external threats, I think that Romania would be the perhaps least likely to cause trouble. The Romanians had more of a problem with Hungary, of which Transylvania was a part, than they did with Austria. Since Hungarian independence very likely means Romania still doesn't get this land, I don't see it coming to Budapest's aid too readily. Maybe the Hungarians would eventually strike a deal out of desperation but by then, it might be too late.

 

[Chris Triangle]

Would giving nationalists their own governing organs solve the nationalist question? Well yes in the same way that legalizing murder would lower the number of murder cases in court. Whether it would mollify them or just give them a road map to independence is another matter.

That said looking at a map of the actual internal divisions of Austria Hungary reminds me of looking at a map of the HRE in a very bad way, so I think some division redrawing could be in order, just ones that don't paint a roadmap for secessionists.

It would be best for sibdivisions to deliberately throw multiple groups together for exactly that reason. The proposal for the USGA makes proto states. For example, making German Bohemia its own, very awkwardly shaped state (as in the USGA proposal) seems like precisely the sort of thing that is going to facilitate a future national dissolution. Instead, it might have been prudent to do a sort of ethnic gerrymandering. Doing this makes many areas in which one group is a majority but in which there are enough of another group to object to and check that dominant ones influence and nationalism. By politically isolating smaller areas inhabited by a particular ethnicity from the larger part of their ethnic group, this arrangement also reduces the capacity for nationalists to organize around any particular territory or engage in proto nation-building.

Of course, if the empire suddenly disintegrates, this does little more than complicate the breakup and create a gigantic and likely much more violent version of what happened in 1990s Yugoslavia.

 

[SealTheRealDeal]

It would be best for sibdivisions to deliberately throw multiple groups together for exactly that reason. The proposal for the USGA makes proto states. For example, making German Bohemia its own, very awkwardly shaped state, as in the USGA proposal seems like precisely the sort of thing that is goinf to facilitate a future national dissolution. Instead, it might have been prudent to do a sort of ethnic gerrymandering. Doing this makes many areas in which one group is a majority but in which there are enough of another group to object to and check that dominant ones influence and nationalism. By politically isolating smaller areas inhabited by a particular ethnicity from the larger part of their ethnic group, this arrangement also reduces the capacity for nationalists to organize around any particular territory or engage in proto nation-building.

Also the proposed internal divisions of the USGA are repulsive to bear witness to.
I actually kinda like the "Corps Areas". All of somewhat similar size, no internal border gore, and (mostly) not ethnically homogeneous.

Of course, if the empire suddenly disintegrates, this does little more than complicate the breakup and create a gigantic and likely much more violent version of what happened in 1990s Yugoslavia.

On the other hand the thought of 16 Bosnian Wars may be terrifying enough to keep the state together.

 

[Chris Triangle]

Also the proposed internal divisions of the USGA are repulsive to bear witness to.
I actually kinda like the "Corps Areas". All of somewhat similar size, no internal border gore, and (mostly) not ethnically homogeneous.

I drew a sketch of the borders in that map over the ethnic map of the proposed USGA. Here's a rough idea of how that particular division cuts through ethnic lines:

 

[Nivek]

I drew a sketch of the borders in that map over the ethnic map of the proposed USGA. Here's a rough idea of how that particular division cuts through ethnic lines:


View attachment 407487

This one might work.

 

[Deleted member 94680]

Just to chuck two things into the conversation:

The “USGA” wasn’t Franz Ferdinand’s idea, it was that of Aurel Popovici and FF jumped on it at one point in time as it looked like a good way to dilute the Hungarian’s (who he hated) power.

Also, Franz Ferdinand was a bit of an idiot

 

[Chris Triangle]

I wan to mention that while splitting the country up according the map divided according to the corps areas would be a great way to divvy up nationalities to dilute their power, it is so obviously contrived that to do this that it would inspire far too much rage for it to actually work as a federation. This means that alterations to the internal political borders need a certain minimum level of justification behind them. The main justification, of course are ethnolignuistic and historically long-standing borders with geographical features and equality of size serving as a secondary consideration. For example, Hungary can be left, minus Croatia, with the Kingdom's original borders but this creates a state nearly the size of all the others combined, which is unworkable and, obviously, by leaving Hungary even more relatively powerful than before, it defeats a major purpose of the endeavor. On the other hand, slicing Hungary up and dividing Magyar majority areas is just too tall an order, even in the event that Austria manages to crush a Hungarian revolt. The only option then, is to carve Hungary up in such a way that it resembles a slightly larger version of OTL 1920 Hungary. Similarly, you cannot tag Bohemian land onto Austria proper and have Czechs tolerate that, though you can keep the very large German Population in Bohemia and Moravia (which would probably best be kept as separate states btw). Dividing German Austria into several German-speaking states is justifiable on certain historical grounds and possibly gives German speakers more representation than their size warrants depending on the rules of the federation and Vienna itself could be given special status as the capital. That being said, the following areas have somewhat flexible borders IMO:

Carniola, specifically the location of its Northern border is probably pretty flexible.

Vojvodina: A very linguistically heterogeneous area. It could be independent, merged with Hungary or, perhaps most ideally, incorporated into a territory including Timosoara and the Banat.

Slovakia: Where it begins and Hungary ends must be established, but they will usually have to be in Hungary's favor.

Galicia: It is large and could reasonably be partitioned into an Eastern and Western state centered around Krakow and L'wow respectively. IMO the division would best lie at the river San.

Transylvania. This one is ultimately among the most dangerous potential flashpoints, given the overwhelming Romanian majority (one that considered themselves Romanian) occupying a huge and contiguous area of land which is immediately next to the mother country. No matter what you do, Romanians are going to be a majority here. I think the best you could hope for in terms of mitigating their power is to put some of them in the Banat, some the eastern edge of Hungary proper with the rest in the state of Transylvania. Szeklerland may have to be granted separate statehood if the Hungarians put up a big fight.

 

[AussieHawker]

Could just go larger. The point is to keep the politics from turning into ethnic politics dominating. Instead get them to form ideological parties.

So states are

Bohemia, which is German and Czeck, with a bit of Polish and Slovak on the border regions. Germans were about 30 percent of the Bohemia region in the First Czechoslovakia and 40 percent of the Silesia bit. Across the whole place was about 20 percent, but this state won't have Slovakia bits. Add a bit of Northern Austria, and no ethnic group will have a majority. Thus needing coalitions or non ethnic political parties.

Galica is Polish, Slovak and Ukrainan. Maybe a few Romanians.

Slovakia will be it and Northern Hungary.

Transylvania is Hungarian, Romanian, Eastern Germans and maybe tack on a few Southern Slavic border regions.

Then a Central and Western Hungary and Slav border regions.

Left over Croats and Serbs along with Trieste Italians.

Slovenes and Austrians in Carniloa

Finally Western Austria with Italians.

So that is Eight States. Could go higher, but eight seems good. Maybe have something like three or four Senators from each state, elected by a popular vote with long terms. Or they could be appointed by state legislatures (with veto power by governors appointed by the crown), which would be easier to gerrymander on a local basis. With the veto forcing them to pick less radical Senators if that fails.

The Senate will be powerful since it would be a conservative body, allowing the crown to check the lower house. And since each State is mixed, they can't just grab the whole state and say we are leaving.

Then you have the Lower House which would be smaller areas. Which would be easier to gerrymander, but will still have a lot of mono ethnic reps. But as a nationwide body, no single ethnic group would get a majority anyway.

 

[SealTheRealDeal]

This means that alterations to the internal political borders need a certain minimum level of justification behind them. The main justification, of course are ethnolignuistic and historically long-standing borders with geographical features and equality of size serving as a secondary consideration.

Actually, the corps areas don't do too bad a job at that. Seems like the only places where the corps areas didn't just consolidate a few crown lands into larger units would be the west slavic lands and maybe Hungary*.

*I say maybe because because it seems like the corps areas in Hungary are similarly based off of consolidated counties of the Kingdom of Hungary.

 

[M79]

Actually, the corpse areas don't do too bad a job at that. Seems like the only places where the corpse areas didn't just consolidate a few crown lands into larger units would be the west slavic lands and maybe Hungary*.

*I say maybe because because it seems like the corps areas in Hungary are similarly based off of consolidated counties of the Kingdom of Hungary.

I think the corpse areas are a bit west and somewhat northwest of Hungary proper given the number of corps and divisions who never returned home. While I agree regarding the core area of Hungary, the ichor with which the chorus of Allies made their accord was enough for an entire corpus of work on the matter as well as its sequelae.