Search results

Impossible to tell, too many things will have changed between 1867 and 1914-22 - likely including Max himself. For all we know, a living Max could've been embittered by his defeat in Mexico and turned his back on liberalism, ironically becoming more of the sort of stalwart reactionary FJ...

Oops, misread your intention there. Yeah, in that case Max's survival really wouldn't have mattered. I really don't think Franz Josef or any other Habsburg would have been content with allowing their centuries-old patrimony to pass into the hands of some Mexicans who are not only obviously not...

Actually, Max & Carlota had adopted two descendants of Agustin de Iturbide to succeed as Emperor(s) of Mexico. I don't think anyone involved, not even Maximilian or the Austrians themselves, were particularly interested in Mexico being added to the 'Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial...

Whoops, my mistake. You're correct - while Lincoln was still alive he disapproved of the French intervention, but couldn't do much more besides witnessing a congressional resolution condemning the expedition on account of all that ACW business, and it took until Johnson's administration for the...

Doubtful, 45% of the vote in the 1946 referendum went to the monarchy and that was after a shattering defeat in WW2 (I've also heard claims of Allied/CIA rigging in favor of the republic but never saw any substantiation for it). The House of Savoy seems to have enjoyed considerable respect...

Yeah, probably. Although in the scenario you quoted (where the 2ème Empire has not only won the FPW, but also the alt-WW1 and established itself as the indisputable head of the continental European order) I doubt any republican movement would have much success, as the Bonapartes would be very...

France I think might be one of the less likely European great powers to underestimate the US, actually: it was one of the greats which had already blinked in a deadly staring contest with Washington in the mid-19th century. Lincoln confronted Napoleon III in the aftermath of the ACW, and warned...

Yes - I'm not sure if Britain was precisely inclined to be pro-Prussian, but at the very least their relations with France had definitely cooled after the Mexican intervention (where they were initially supportive but bailed out after realizing Napoleon III didn't just want to collect debts, he...

Well, yeah. Similar I'm not an expert on what exactly Carlism was a proponent of, but from what I've managed to gather over the years, the Kaiserreich meme about 'organic monarchy' comes fairly close: staunch social traditionalism, hostility to modern concepts of a liberal democracy, and...

I could definitely see a longer-lived Second French Empire backing the Carlists. Empress Eugenie and Napoleon IV were both staunch Catholics as I've said before, in particular Eugenie was a zealous ultramontane who was one of the prime pushers for Napoleon III to maintain a Roman garrison for...

Huh, I wasn't aware the Russians' hatred for Austria ran that deeply, nor that they were still relatively close to Germany even after the reign of the anti-German Alexander III. A Russo-Prusso-Italian alliance does seem like it'd still comfortably have the upper hand over the Franco-Austrian one...

Great discussion, everyone. Re: Napoleon III's ability, to my understanding he wasn't totally incompetent - indeed he seems to have been a pretty capable domestic ruler who greatly modernized the economy, expanded the French rail network and renovated Paris. It's true that his regime was in...

Well I can see Austria approving, but why Russia? They were friendly to Bismarck and even warned that they'd intervene on the Prussian side if Austria joined in on the French side (as Franz Josef wanted to historically). Napoleon III himself had made huge diplomatic blunders by first involving...

An interesting possibility, but was such an ambitious measure realistic (well, more realistic than a French victory at all, considering how hobbled their army was by their many deficiencies) in 1870? The Saarland seems easy enough, but all of the Rhineland and Westphalia seems like it might be...

I'm skeptical that Prussia losing in 1870 would spell the death of German nationalist ambitions right then & there, tbh. Such ambitions had been swelling upward for quite a while through the 19th century and if the French don't dismantle the North German Confederation (as they are unlikely to...

Yeah, honestly I can see Russia going with either the Austro-French or the Anglo-Germans here. With the former they can snatch at Prussian Poland, East Prussia and whatever they want from the Turks, in addition to trying to win their Great Game against Britain; the latter can promise them...

An alternate WW1 pitting a Franco-Austro-Russian 'Entente' against an Anglo-Prusso-Turkish 'Allies', huh? Sounds like an interesting mess. My gut instinct tells me that the latter is probably more likely to win, but Prussia/the North German Confederation would be completely surrounded on three...

Historically, getting baited by Bismarck into the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71 turned out to pretty much be an unmitigated disaster for France. The French army started the war with superior infantry equipment in the form of the advanced Chassepot rifle and an innovative pseudo-machine gun in...