Table of Contents
Central Powers victory clichés
Alternate history is often built on working with a result that is opposite to the one from OTL. in OTL, World War I was won by the Entente, leading to many amateur and professional alternate history writers doing the exact opposite. I.e., that the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Ottoman Empire and Bulgaria) won the first world war.
Unfortunately, plenty of writers get wrapped up in some… rather questionable notions of what the aftermath of a Central Powers victory in WWI would be like, what it would mean for European politics, society, economics, culture and science. Often, authors forget that scenarios within a realistic framework need to keep that level of realism for good and bad. What they do instead is engage in either overly dystopian or nakedly wish-fulfillment outcomes, with little logic or facts behind either.
On this page, we'll mostly cover the “A CP victory would make Europe/the world an utopia !” AH clichés. Believe it or not, they seem to be more common and pervasive than the clichés involving everything descending into dystopia after a CP victory. The logic behind this AH cliché in a nutshell: In a world where the Central Powers have won WWI, it's nigh impossible to not have a German-led Zollverein in Europe. It will - of course ! - exclude Britain and France, because reasons (or Imperial Germany fanboyism).
More TBA.
AH.com discussions on the topic
Would the World be better if Central Powers won WWI ?
WWI: Was one side morally 'better' ?
Is a CP win in WWI more desirable than a Entente win ?