Basically you would have WWI later, serving the same effect as the original WWII, but at a later date, and maybe with different technology.
Edited by DeMarquis on May 9th 2022 at 8:45:12 AM
Trans Siberian Anarchestra (it/they)
Without WWI around to demolish popular fantasies about how war ought to be conducted - War Is Glorious, among others - WWII would look a lot like it.
The Revolution Will Not Be Tropeable
The They who said it
World War one changed everything by eliminating nearly every imperial power. World War two killed way more, but didn't change much other than establishing the US and the USSR as the last two standing.
Though eliminating world war one is an interesting question, because it was essentially inevitable. Military strategy at the time was based entirely around the idea that whoever was on the offensive would win, and that it was impossible to actually mount a meaningful defense, and as a result europe was a network of alliances that could get set off by nearly any conflict leading to everyone invading everyone else thinking it impossible to lose an invasion.
Possibly the US invading Independent Canada as some resurgent manifest destiny thing and getting stuck in trench and urban warfare against machine guns could be a wake-up call to the european powers to drop the cult of the offensive and reconfigure their military strategy to be less conducive to invading everywhere and just sort of assuming that attacking first is the only way to win, which might contain World War One into a few smaller-scale wars that don't dismantle the imperial powers.
I suppose a better way to re-word the question is to ask what is more interesting as a setting? The Roaring 20s or the Edwardian Era? Especially if you were to give them the kind of treatment, where a setting aesthetically looks like the past, but is all kinds of futuristic.
Depends on the tone of your story. The roaring 20s has more of a wild, disorganized feel where everyone is figuring out this new world of mass consumerism and technological innovation. The Edwardian era is one more of the current social order trying to come to terms with startling technological innovations. It's more sophisticated, prone to comedies of manners and intrigue.
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
I'm trying to craft a scenario where either Austria ends up unifying with Germany after the collapse of the Eastern Bloc (Scenario A), or Austria is never separated from Germany after losing WW2 to begin with (Scenario B).
Having done considerable amateur research into the matter, I've come to the tentative conclusion that Scenario B offers the least difficulty if the unification happens before the rise to power of the Nazi Party, in order to provide it with the legitimacy needed to avoid the Allies deciding to buy into the "Austria is Hitler's first victim
" myth when they made the Moscow Declarations. Looking into that, I've found that although German-Austrian unification (which was very popular in both countries before the events of WW2) was brought up more than once in between WW1 and Hitler becoming Chancellor of Germany in 1933, the main obstacle to any such unification was France vetoing the idea in the League of Nations note , although apparently Britain was also fearful of strengthening Germany with the incorporation of Austria.
So with this in mind, I need help figuring out a scenario where the following happens:
- The German-Austrian unification is permitted by the League of Nations.
- Hitler still becomes Chancellor of Germany in 1933 and leads the Nazi Party to totalitarian dominance of Germany, and subsequently onwards to more or less the same path that led to WW2 in our reality.
- Austria remains part of post-WW2 Germany.
There are, of course, questions that need to be addressed:
- What would be the ramifications of Austria being already part of Germany for several years by the time Hitler rises to power? Would the enlarged Germany weather the Great Depression a bit better, or would it be essentially not different since the economic impact would naturally afflict Austria just as hard as it did IRL? Would there be any substantial resentment towards the unification emerge among Austrians, blaming Berlin for their hardship?
- After WW2, what would be the most likely division of Allied occupation zones over this enlarged Germany?
- Would the Soviet Union still get to occupy parts of eastern Austria, as in OTL? If so, would this East Austria being an exclave of East Germany be feasible, say via Moscow leaning on Czechoslovakia to ease up travel between the two halves, and then playing the two off each other to keep them seeking its favor?
- Would it make more sense for the Soviet Union to focus on the Berlin-centric portion instead, and leave eastern Austria for the Western Allies?
Edited by MarqFJA on Jun 17th 2022 at 9:24:42 PM
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
The They who said it
Under pretty much no circumstances would the league of nations permit Germany and Austria to unite. The popular narrative at the time was "Germany was and remains a dangerous warmonger who should not be trusted with anything." There was very little time for Germany to build up any goodwill when they'd spent most of their recently united existence at war with France, certainly not enough to make the league of nations not try to stop them.
You're probably better off with scenario A.
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
Okay, how about Scenario A-2: The Soviet Union held on to their occupation zone and turned it into an exclave of East Germany as a way to ensure their loyalty after taking away considerable portions of their territory in the east (as well as the reasons I had mentioned earlier in Scenario B). The Western Allies then decide that it's better to keep western Austria — which IINM is economically much weaker than the Soviet-occupied area — as part of West Germany.
Is there anything that could help this scenario be more plausible? In particular, I think the Austria victim theory taking hold among the Allies, and by proxy the Moscow Declaration on Austria in particular should preferably be butterflied away either before the Allied occupation or soon after (for the latter, perhaps the Allies discover overwhelming evidence that Austrians by and large were really into the unification, causing a change in opinion?).
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
The They who said it
Something like "hitler was austrian" being a major element in the public reaction would probably work, because suddenly, austria is to blame for hitler and it's best to keep it "under control" by sticking it to germany, and there's no reason to feel sorry for austria as "the first victim"
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
I think the logic of the Allies in such a scenario would be more like this:
- Nazi Germany couldn't have emerged without Austria, therefore the country as a whole should bear just as much blame as the Berlin-based regime rather than be treated as a victim (though exceptions can be made for the few resistance groups that work with usnote ). The Committee on Dismemberment of Germany that was planned for by the Yalta Conference shall decide Austria's ultimate fate — namely whether to split it off into its own state even if it's decided that pre-Anschluss Germany itself would not be divided, or (if Germany is divided) lump it together with some of pre-Anschluss Germany's southern states (like the real-life proposed partition plan by Churchill, which included Austria in a "South German" state).
- The division of Allied occupation zones goes pretty much as in real life, although the bureaucratic/logistical aspect is arguably simpler because the Allies so far are treating Austria as just another state within Germany. This, however, is complicated by France stubbornly obstructing any effort that doesn't contribute to its aim of Germany being balkanized, and the Soviet Union making every effort to impose communist state institutions within its occupation zones in northeastern Germany and eastern Austria.
- Ultimately, Germany becomes divided into the FRG in the west, which included the state of "Austria" for practical purposes over the vehement objections of France (which, even with the threat of the Communist Bloc looming, had to be strongarmed into acceptance via its need for US-American economic aid); and the GDR in the east, whose Austrian portion was divided into bezirke similarly to the rest of the GDR, which was governed as a unitary state.
Is this plausible?
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
The They who said it
Sounds good!
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
Great! Now I just need to figure out a good way to turn that into something that could pass for a passage taken from an in-universe Wikipedia-style article on the subject.
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
To commemorate the creation of Post-Soviet Reunion, I'd like to ask this question: What changes to history would be necessary in order to realize the following scenario by 2020-2030, in the wake of the USSR's dissolution in 1991?
- The Russian Federation has managed to recover both economically and demographically (i.e. population is at a net growth rather than net decrease), such that it's taken seriously as a peer to the USA, China and the EU. It's not overly dependent on oil and gas exports despite their importance, and it's also not cripplingly reliant on foreign aid, investment and expertise to keep itself afloat. Also, although Russia has shucked off the neo-imperialist mindset of the Soviet Union, it's not entirely on friendly terms with the West for a variety of reasons (perhaps a bitter grudge over the fiasco that was the "shock therapy" of the 1990s?).
- The expansion of the EU and NATO into the former Eastern Bloc backfired spectacularly somehow, such that the former communist states (sans East Germany, obviously) end up either being kicked out, willingly quitting over some grievance or the other, or simply falling into anarchic chaos as whatever government the Western powers recognize as the sole de jure representative of its country has little de facto control over it.
- The aforementioned ex-communist states in Europe, along with the Central Asian former Soviet republics, ended up gravitating back to Russia of their own accord, and together eventually formed a supranational union of their own (possibly this worldline's version of the Union State, maybe adopting "Union of Sovereign Republics" from the failed New Union Treaty) that serves as the eastern counterpart to the EU, which now only encompasses Scandinavia and the western half of the European continent. In this "post-Soviet reunion", Russia went against Western expectations by doing its best to be only the first among equals rather than exploit its advantages to re-establish Russian hegemony over the rest of the union's members.
For the economic angle, I've been considering the fact that much of Russia's wealth of natural resources is very difficult to capitalize on due to a combination of remoteness and harsh environment (Siberia and Far Eastern Russia are goddamn cold). As it could be possible that it's unrealistic for Russia to manage to exploit those resources within the aforementioned time frame, I considered a Downplayed form of Applied Phlebotinum as a solution: Rather than a single technological innovation that miraculously solves all the problems, it would be an assortment of much more limited innovations that individually wouldn't have much far-reaching impact, but the synergy of combining them together would give far greater results than the expected "sum of all parts". Does that seem reasonable?
Edited by MarqFJA on Jul 7th 2022 at 5:22:58 PM
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
1) Isnt too hard—Just replace the Shock Therapy with a good faith attempt to instill democratic institutions and a diversified economy.
2) Is harder. Allowing the former Warsaw Coalition states to remain out of the Western nations influence would seem to go against Western self-interests, so it would have to be something really big to cause that to happen.
3) This seems so unlikely as to be near impossible. You just don't erase several centuries of ethnic hostility that way. An existential threat by a common enemy would be about the only thing that could do it, at least in my humble opinion.
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
1) Is avoiding the disastrous effects of the shock therapy really that imperative?
2) How about the United States shifting its focus to countering the rising threat of China in Asia and the Pacific, while severe damage from climate change-induced disasters across Europe — massive wildfires, prolonged droughts, unpercedented heatwaves and coldwaves, etc. — lead to the EU "backstabbing" the former Eastern Bloc states by reserving the lion's share of disaster relief to the larger and "more important" economies of western and northern Europe?
3) Would the above "new Western betrayal" scenario from above suffice?
Different but related question: What would be the ramifications on the rest of world if we butterfly away the Russian invasion and annexation of Crimea in 2014 by having the Putin regime's attempt at doing so result in a mass mutiny and civil war overtaking Russia, which ends with the regime replaced by a more democratic one and a few years of bloodily purging the government and military from the corruption that had set in?
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
1) The effects of the "Shock Therapy" were the set up for Putin taking power, and have remained the basis of his anti-Western propaganda ever since. So, pretty important.
2) Problem is the harder it is for the Western powers to protect themselves, the better a new set of allies will look to them. Allowing them to join would have to be more dangerous than keeping them out.
3) Not enough. No one would really expect the EU to do anything else—look at their behavior toward Greece during the debit crisis. For the E European countries to turn their back on Western Europe and toward Russia would require nothing less than a military threat that Nato could not or would not protect them from.
Looks like I'm building up to a military threat so significant that it intimidates the Western powers into abandoning the Eastern nations to their fate, forcing them to turn to Russia.
The return of the Ottoman Empire?
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
1) But is it impossible for someone else to rise to power instead of Putin as a result of that turmoil, though?
Here's the scenario that I'm thinking:
Yeltsin refuses in the absence of a suitable successor that would be both willing and able to protect him from subsequent prosecution for the excesses of his rule, and in desperation ordered the military to break up the demonstrations, only for his orders to be refused as Minister of Defence Igor Sergeyev and many in the top echelon are themselves deposed by a mutiny within the Russian Armed Forces as built-up anger over the years of being screwed over in favor of "fattening the armchair generals and oligarchs" finally boiled over, with the general that was the de facto face of the mutiny publicly asserting the military's refusal to meddle in the political process while also condemning Yeltsin's attempt to use the military to subvert said political process.
Once the dust settles, a troika between the aforementioned FSB, civilian and military leaders effectively takes control of Russia, and begins the arduous process of purging the kleptocratic corruption from the country and enacting actual reforms, while remaining wary and resentful of the Western world that had just stood and watched the Russian people suffer under the very same shock therapy policies that said Western world had recommended to post-Soviet Russia in the first placenote .
2) Here's the thing: The USA wouldn't be looking for allies in Europe since Russia is no longer deemed a major threat in this worldline where Putin never came into power, and the new government is content to deal in a civil, bilateral manner with other states as long as they don't do anything that's stupidly provocative (like, say, kidnap Russian citizens for ransom; modern Russia still adheres to the USSR's "no negotiation with terrorists" policy, and is perfectly willing to fight fire with fire). It would instead by more interested in allies in Asia, like India and the Southeast Asian countries. And as for the EU, what's stopping the EU governments from incorrectly assuming that their "betrayal" wouldn't be enough to outweigh the Eastern European countries' hatred and fear against Russia over Soviet-era oppression to give Moscow a chance, even after nearly three decades had passed since the USSR's dissolution?
3) You think it would matter to the Eastern European countries' respective peoples whether or not it's logical for the EU to prioritize its economic dynamos to avoid total collapse? Just look at how many among the common people pin the blame on the EU "failing" in its duties over whatever economic woes that afflict them across the real-life EU's wealthy countries; just in France, which is supposed to be a pillar of the EU (alongside Germany), about a third expressed support for leaving the EU in polls conducted in 2016 and 2019.
The return of the Ottoman Empire?
Uh, what about the new question in my previous post?
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
Hard to say. Russia has a crapton of issues and everyone with the brains to fix them ran off years ago. Rampant alcoholism has outlasted 2 regimes by this point and I'm not sure if it can be fixed. Much of Siberia is hard to access and a lot of Federation's member republics don't actually care about Russia. Ukraine, Belarus, Turkey, and Finland might all try to seize territory during the purge and China might try to turn Russia into a puppet state. NATO has no incentive to get involved so all the countries which could help Russia aren't going to.
All in all, I'd guess that Russia either fragments even more than when the Soviets broke up, end up with a government that is just as oppressive as before but is now more effective, or both.
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
I'm pretty sure that I've seen statements from Western leaders both around the 1990s and in very recent times that expressed worry about the possibility of Russia fragmenting, implying that they'd rather that not happen. Better the devil you know than the devil you don't, as the saying goes.
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
It's more likely than the US fragmenting, at any rate.
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
In the absence of any intervention to prop up the central government, that is.
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
Would a Cherry Blossom be a good idea for the flag of a Republic of Japan? I'm wanting a flag that has less of a monarchal meaning as the current flag has.
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
It is Japan's national flower and highly well-regarded in Japanese culture, with lots of positive symbolism that has little to no connection to the Emperor of Japan (unlike the sun). That being said, it was used during WW2 by the government to stoke nationalism and militarism among the people, so I don't know if it would be feasible for post-WW2 Japan to use it in a new flag.
Edited by MarqFJA on Oct 27th 2022 at 9:04:52 PM
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
What sounds more interesting as a setting? A world with no World War 1 or a world with no World War 2. I'm caught between the middle.