Alternate universes with alternate historical political outcomes.

[Nikolai]

onodera: I think he's thinking of that Yukos Oil guy.

[Zkribbler]

If the U.S. had lost the War of Revolution, republicanism would have not grabbed hold. We'd be a colony of monarchist Britain. Everything south of the Rio Grande would be colonies of monarchist Spain or Portugal. Voting, self deternination, civil rights, etc. would merely be subjects of debate in taverns and coffee houses.

God bless George Washington.

(And when the alien brain-sucking locusts invade, we'd have nothing to fight them off except muskets and grape shot.)

[FrostyBoy]

If England kept America, nothing much would have changed. You forget that the moment you became independent, your blood was still English, your infrastructure was still English, the government was still English. America was built on English ideologies. Wherever England settled, it turned it into something far greater, and that was the English way, everyone gets roads, electricity, sewage, organized government, court system, etc etc.

Don't go around thinking the world would be much different if England had won the war of Independence.

[Lancer]

Interesting stuff.

Hannibal winning, that would have changed alot. I doubt Carthage would have been as interested as Rome was in holding back the barbs in western europe as long.

Nazis put alot into sci in order to try to save their own skins. If they had won the war I doubt they would have invested much after corruption and cronyism had expanded to fill the available recources. I agree that they would likely have stagnated under their own weight.

Vesayen, if we had never discovered anti biotics the world population wouldn't be half what it is and alot of the problems such as food shortage, global warming, and the potential for resistant plague exploding through over populated cities would be less.

Of course, sadly alot of people would have died early.


onodera, thanks. I guess the days of the gulag are at least less?

If the English had won the revolutionary war the shift in population of that nation becoming ever more weighted to the new world would have shifted power here anyway eventually. Hard to keep a country like that together. The only historical comparison might be the shift of the government of Portugal to Brazil during the Napoleonic wars, but that's a reach.

Zkrib, I doubt the southern US would have remained in the posession of Spain and Portugal long after their stars had set. The English navy was just too powerful to keep that connection open for long.

One thing that led to the revolution was the English defeat of the French. It was fear of the French that kept the colonies in line. When they were marginalized there was no real need for the English army in the New World other than keeping the colonists in line and considerable resentment flowed from that.

One thing that corrolates to modern times was the departure of the vast majority of the US army from europe after the fall of the Sovs. It was important that we left at that point because there wasn't any reason for us to be there that didn't look like occupation.

I'm sure we wouldn't run into such sentiments in Poland today.

[onodera]

Mongols losing to China would be pretty big.
Lots of Middle-Eastern states not destroyed, East Slavic state built around Novgorod or Vladimir or Kiev, not Moscow, and shaping the European and, therefore, world history much more noticeably.

[Lancer]

Good point. Kiev would have been the center of a much more european eastern power. Moscow would have been the state capitol of Russ.

[onodera]

Originally posted by Lancer
Good point. Kiev would have been the center of a much more european eastern power. Moscow would have been the state capitol of Russ.

Moscow wouldn't be a capital at all, and the definition of European would be perceptibly different.

[Lancer]

Moscow might have been a cap of a state within the Ukrainian empire the cap of which would likely be Kiev, yes?

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by FrostyBoy
The greatest change would be if Hitler won.

Kind of hate to say it, but it probably wouldn't have been half bad if he wasn't hell bent on genocide.

How about, you suck as a human being and your testicles should be removed so you stop polluting the gene pool.

[Heraclitus]

Originally posted by Comrade Snuggles


How about, you suck as a human being and your testicles should be removed so you stop polluting the gene pool.

And that is from a evolutionary standpoint different from not breeding due to being:

a) ugly
b) loveshy
c) gay

how?

[Seedle]

Originally posted by FrostyBoy
The greatest change would be if Hitler won.

Kind of hate to say it, but it probably wouldn't have been half bad if he wasn't hell bent on genocide.

I have a book of historical "what ifs." While obviously this is just speculation from a few individuals, it is still interesting that all of the WWII what ifs ended with the U.S. winning, so long as they made it through 1942. Many of the alternative outcomes ended with Germany being highly radioactive, and some ended with most of Western Europe being highly radioactive, but the U.S. always won.

[Lancer]

Originally posted by Comrade Snuggles


How about, you suck as a human being and your testicles should be removed so you stop polluting the gene pool.

Damn, you really do need help.

[Heraclitus]

Originally posted by Seedle


I have a book of historical "what ifs." While obviously this is just speculation from a few individuals, it is still interesting that all of the WWII what ifs ended with the U.S. winning, so long as they made it through 1942. Many of the alternative outcomes ended with Germany being highly radioactive, and some ended with most of Western Europe being highly radioactive, but the U.S. always won.

Because the US always wins.


We know this from Hollywood.

[onodera]

Originally posted by Seedle


I have a book of historical "what ifs." While obviously this is just speculation from a few individuals, it is still interesting that all of the WWII what ifs ended with the U.S. winning, so long as they made it through 1942. Many of the alternative outcomes ended with Germany being highly radioactive, and some ended with most of Western Europe being highly radioactive, but the U.S. always won.

Have you read the Man in the High Castle?

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Zkribbler
If the U.S. had lost the War of Revolution, republicanism would have not grabbed hold. We'd be a colony of monarchist Britain. Everything south of the Rio Grande would be colonies of monarchist Spain or Portugal. Voting, self deternination, civil rights, etc. would merely be subjects of debate in taverns and coffee houses.

God bless George Washington.

(And when the alien brain-sucking locusts invade, we'd have nothing to fight them off except muskets and grape shot.)

If the US lost the revolutionary war, then the questions remain, will Great Britain acquiesce to the demand by the colonies for representation in Parliament, and will the territories west of the Appalachain mountains be opened for colonization?

If Great Britain gives the American colonies representation in Parliament, then eventually the empire will be completely screwed, because when the principle of "one man - one vote" takes effect the colonies will gain control of the Parliament.

If Great Britain doesn't give the colonies representation, then the colonies will probably revolt again, possibly during the Napoleonic Wars when the British Army is tied up in Europe. While it's true that in the real War of 1812 the US didn't do very well against the British, I think the size of the American army during the War of 1812 was smaller than their army during the American Revolution.

Then there is the question of trans-Appalachain settlement. I think that would have occured anyway, because the British didn't devote the resources necessary to stop the settlers. Unless the native tribes united early on the settlers would have had little difficulty in mustering the forces to subdue the natives, though they wouldn't have the authority to make treaties so they probably would have had to conduct a "final solution" for each tribe that resisted. By the time the issue becomes severe enough to make Parliament act there would be so many settlers in Ohio that Parliament would be loathe to remove them.

Many people don't realize this, but after the revolution the British continued to do their best to hamper the development of the United States. In particular the UK prohibited the emigration of skilled people, despite which a number of skilled British craftsmen managed to evade the law and settle in the United States. Many of the United States' early industries were founded by these 'illegal emigrants'. Without them the early industrial development of the US would have lagged considerably. If Great Britain had retained control of the colonies they undoubtably would have hampered the industrial development of their trans- Atlanitc colonies, because skilled craftsmen were seen as crucial to England's industrial development and also as vital to the war (against Napoleon) effort. Of course, had the American Revolution failed, there might never have been a French Revolution and hence there might not have been a Napoleonic empire.