Alternate History Ideas and Discussion

[Buba]

If the Bulgars remain a steppe-based empire, I'd rule out their Slavisation.
BTW - I missed a butterfly of Gigantic Proportions. The Magyars! They end up being absorbed by GVB, I'd venture.

 

[ATP]

In OTL a lot of these tribes ended up in Danubian Bulgaria and we managed to turn them into allies and assimilate them.

In any case, it is not impossible that OGB could stretch
to take the lands down to Stara Planona or the Danube and take everything that GVB owned.

And given the populations of those regions I would hazard a guess that it might get Slavianized eventually, like Danubian Bulgsria was in OTL.

The one possible problem with further South-Western expansion will certainly be Byzantium and unlike Asparuch his father Kubrat who founded OGB was very chummy with the Byzantines
enough for them to give him very high titles and expansive swag.

So,they would survive till 1241 as empire,and ERE would remain stronger,too.
Mongols would smash both,but what next?
Since here there would be no big Russia,we could see some bulgarian prince defeating mongols 250 years later,and become tsar of eastern slavic people.
Interesting,how would polish-bulgarian wars go here - but,i suppose that in the end we would lost thanks to our magnats stupidity,just like in OTL.

ERE here could actually survive,and Ottomans remain as small turkish state.
@Buba is right here,we forget Magyars.They get absorbed by bulgars,and,as a result,Great Moravia survived as power capable of fighting HRE.
They would have OTL East Germany,South Poland,Czech,Hungary,and western Ukraine.
They,Bulgars,ERE and HRE would be major power till mongols come.
After that....

 

[Buba]

Not 1241 but a few years earlier. Do a search for "Bitwa nad Kałką".
There will not be any Ottomans - or simply no Turks in Anatolia, period - due to Bulgar caused butterflies in Central Asia/Caucasus/Middle East.
OGB ceased to exist in 668AD - even by 700 or 750AD butterflies can will make TTL unrecogniseable versus OTL.
An interesting issue is religion - does GVB eventualy go Christian, Moslem, Jewish - and which variant, as all of these are available in several flavours, or something else, like Buddhism, Zorastrism, etc.?

No Asparukh = no Hungary (Magyarsag) but Avaristan? Probably Slavic speaking?

 

[ATP]

Not 1241 but a few years earlier. Do a search for "Bitwa nad Kałką".
There will not be any Ottomans - or simply no Turks in Anatolia, period - due to Bulgar caused butterflies in Central Asia/Caucasus/Middle East.
OGB ceased to exist in 668AD - even by 700 or 750AD butterflies can will make TTL unrecogniseable versus OTL.
An interesting issue is religion - does GVB eventualy go Christian, Moslem, Jewish - and which variant, as all of these are available in several flavours, or something else, like Buddhism, Zorastrism, etc.?

No Asparukh = no Hungary (Magyarsag) but Avaristan? Probably Slavic speaking?

You are right,it was 1226.And,Avars ruled over slavic people till Charlemagne smashed them.
There was even some avar artifacts in Krak Mount near Wavel,and they could have some small stronghold there.

But - they were on decline,so till 1226 they would fall,and we would have Great Moravia - but no Poland,Czech or Hungary.

 

[Agent23]

You are right,it was 1226.And,Avars ruled over slavic people till Charlemagne smashed them.
There was even some avar artifacts in Krak Mount near Wavel,and they could have some small stronghold there.

But - they were on decline,so till 1226 they would fall,and we would have Great Moravia - but no Poland,Czech or Hungary.

Um, guys, we actually took over the Avar Khanate under Khan Krum.

Khan Krum's first major campaign was launched against the Avars. After Charlemagne almost fatally struck the Avar Khaganate in 803, Khan Krum invaded the Avar lands in 805 and eventually brought an end to the existence of this confederation of states.

They were thoroughly fucked over and he, due to their degeneracy put in so called Krumian (very harsh) laws, and temporarily banned alcohol because he thought that their downfwll was due to alcohol fueled degeneracy.

 

[Buba]

we could have Great Moravia - but no Poland,Czech or Hungary.

FTFY - but otherwise agree.
Nevertheless, Avars without an eastern front against the Bulgars could be in better shape than in OTL.

Um, guys, we actually took over the Avar Khanate under Khan Krum.

But that was a more westernly Bulgaria ... still, maybe Great Bulgaria is large and/or powerful enough as to clash with the Avars in Wallachia? Maybe subjugate those filthy, disgusting, joy killing degenerates?

 

[Agent23]

FTFY - but otherwise agree.
Nevertheless, Avars without an eastern front against the Bulgars could be in better shape than in OTL.


But that was a more westernly Bulgaria ... still, maybe Great Bulgaria is large and/or powerful enough as to clash with the Avars in Wallachia? Maybe subjugate those filthy, disgusting, joy killing degenerates?

There are several different maps of Old Great Bulgaria

Our current crop of historians think that it was much larger.
Oh, and that we founded you Poles fave city of Kiev.
But in general the leftovers of the Bulgars were strong enough to best the shit out of Byzantium and create a sizable trading empire between the Volga and Kama rivers, if they had stayed united maybe they could have achieved much more.

 

[Zyobot]

'AHC: Second Watergate Scandal'.

That is, a president after Nixon is caught in a Major League political scandal that's spoken in the same breath as Watergate.

 

[Buba]

'AHC: Second Watergate Scandal'.

That is, a president after Nixon is caught in a Major League political scandal that's spoken in the same breath as Watergate.

The sleazos got slipperer and better at playing the media and Coingress ...

 

[Zyobot]

The sleazos got slipperer and better at playing the media and Coingress ...

Yeah, I know.

But in this case, the idea is that they slip up every so often and get caught. For one, the Bushes and Clintons are overflowing with controversies, so there's gotta' be at least one or two ATLs in which their cover was blown.

 

[Buba]

Iran-Contra is a candidate too, no?

 

[Agent23]

Iran-Contra is a candidate too, no?

Watergate pre-Watergate: The Kennedy brothers using the DOJ and the IRS to target their political enemies.

Obama using the IRS to attack teh Tea party and other leftwing groups.

Both Clintons.... yeah, what is not a potential second Watergate with them.

 

[Zyobot]

Actually, even IOTL, we actually had a "proto-Watergate" in the Teapot Dome Scandal of the 1920s.

Fortunately for him, Warren Harding died shortly before the news broke. But ATL in which he lived long enough for the Senate investigation to trace it back to him and force Harding to testify, well...

 

[Circle of Willis]

'WI: No Apartheid'

I would imagine that Jan Smuts & his United Party winning the 1948 election would be the easiest way to start down this road, since it appears they blew D. F. Malan's National Party (even combined with their junior coalition partner, the Afrikaner Party) out of the water in terms of the popular vote but got screwed by electoral districting.

 

[Buba]

If no NP win in 1948 and thus no Apartheid institutionalised in the 1950s then I'd guess that SA will lag a decade or two behind the USA in enfranchising its Bantus.
Without being dumped upon by various "liberals", fellow travelers and commies then I expect curb stomping of MPLA and FRELIMO, with Angola and Mazombique being in better shape. Althougn still run by differently competent UNITA and RENAMO.
And no mini Pol Pot of Africa - Mugabe, in power either.
Namibia fifth province?

 

[Zyobot]

'Implausible Scenario: Tiberius Gracchus Triumphs'.

 

[Skallagrim]

'Implausible Scenario: Tiberius Gracchus Triumphs'.

Land claims to the ager publicus are restricted to 500 iugerta (~1.2 square kilometers), most probably with an expansion of another 250 iugerta for the owner's son, that expansion being limited to two sons. In other words: a family can retain at most 1000 iugerta, or roughly 2.4 square kilometers. (The exact mechanism by which this 'expansion' would be regulated is disputed, but since Tiberius was heavily pro-natalist, we may assume that the land in excess of 500 iugerta may only be retained by any owner if he has sons. If only one son, then 250 iugerta revert to the state; if no sons, the additional 500 iugerta fully revent to the state, and only the 'official' maximum of the base 500 iugerta may be retained.)

All the land that is thus freed up -- and indeed, all 'public land' -- is (re)distributed to the landless Roman citizens, first and foremost to veterans. Various allotments have been mentioned. Commonly cited is 30 iugerta a man, but we should consider that usually in colonisation efforts, 10 iugerta a man was the regular offer. Three times that seems improbably excessive. For my money, Tiberius was probably just willing to give more land to 'deserving' allies of his cause, and since he'd be in charge of the commission, he'd essentially be quite free to decide who got how much. Let's say that an average of 20 iugerta per capita is quite plausible, then.

Now, officially, the ager publicus was precisely that: held in common on behalf of the public. This was not the reality. Tiberius would exploit this by putting rent on the land, crafting a construction whereby the land was in practice owned by the private citizen who held it, but it was held as part of the 'public land', to they had to pay the rent, otherwise the land would revert to the state. This would generate income for the state.

The tenants would be happy regardless, since the land grants would elevate them from a landless underclass to land-owners who met the property qualifications for military service. Many extended families, rather than having perhaps one scion who rose to that rank, would see several of their sons rise to citizen-soldier.

Conversely, a few of the aristocratic houses would be broken, having leveraged their expensive loans against the (presumed) income from their land-holdings. Many more would be not broken, but would still receive a major blow. Similarly, the Socii (the allied Italian peoples, beholden to Rome) would be eviced from the land as well; which is why they were among the fiercest enemies of Tiberius Gracchus. They were whipped up in this, to be sure, by the aristocratic enemies of the Gracchan plans-- and we should note that a decade later, Gaius Gracchus made several provisions that would allow certain groups of Socii to share in the envisioned land distributions. (Specifically, those willing to support the Gracchan faction could gain citizenships and land grants in exchange for simultaneously signing up for military service. This was essentially a 'pilot version' of what Gaius Marius would implement on a grand scale, three decades further on.)

We may assume that in a Gracchan victory scenario, the Gracchi would also implement such provisions, although I don't think they'd implement it across the board, like Marius would in OTL. Their faction was still very much that of the lower classes of the citizenry, and their electorate viewed the Socii as squatters on land that should rightly go to honest Romans. So while certain pro-Graccan groups of Socii could be made into "new citizens", a delicate balance would have to be struck.

(In OTL, the general thrust of Gaius's reform in that gerdard was to give citizenship to the Latins, and to give the Socii the traditional rights of Latins, thus elevating both 'by one step', as it were. With the previous reforms of Tiberius enacted fully and without compromise, the Socii would be hit harder, so I can easily see additional 'appeasements' by granting outright citizenship to some select Socii, as I have outlined.)

The more radical reforms of Gaius Gracchus in OTL would probably be averted or 'softened', in this ATL climate where Tiberius is successful (and also actually has to govern). I do think that the Gracchan plan to establish public granaries would still be enacted, so as to secure the food supply. The road-building programmes advocated by Gaius Gracchus in OTL would also be implemented (with the contracts, preicatably, handed out to Gracchan allies). Similarly, the military law to provide soldiers' clothes from the public treasury would be enacted (whihg, again, would make the military more accessible to the supporters of the Gracchi).

Within some years (considering that Gaius realised this a decade after Tiberius was killed), the Gracchi would find that there wasn't enough public land in Italy to provide for all would-be receivers of allotments. In OTL, this promted Gaius to begin sponsoring clonies of citizens otside the peninsula-- then a novel approach. I'm confident that the same holds true in this ATL. Presumably, with the land reforms being enacted more extensively and thoroughly, this point is inevitably reached earlier. Taking more land from the Socii will eventually just become impossible... at least without sparking an early ATL version of the Social War. This will cause the Gracchan faction to begin the establishment of overseas colonies, presumably beginning (as in OTL) with their much-advertised plan for a Roman colony at Carthage.

Establishing these colonies, and having opened up the military to a lot of families (consisting of their supporters), there would be a serious outflow of soldier-settlers to the "Gracchan colonies", thus really hastening the growth of the Roman citizen body outside of Italy, compared to OTL. (Here, too, they may well find an eventual solution to the problem of the Socii: offering many of them citizenship and land in the colonies, in exchange for military service.)



Now... would this save the Roman Republic? I daresay that it might. It wouldn't remove all the problems, but it would avert the Social War, and give Rome a demographic and military edge in the decades of wild expansion ahead (compared to OTL). The interests of the OTL (to-be-formed) Populares would be well-served, and the power of the Optimates would be broken before they even had a chance to coalesce properly. This would in turn prevent the Populares from being forced into an embittered vendetta caused by structural marginalisation. The result being that Roman politics would be far less poisoned. (And, of course, the OTL precedent of the Gracchi being murdered wouldn't be there.)

There would still have to be significant organisational reforms, both of the military and of the political structure. The fact is that the traditional institutions of the Republic were originally suited to the governance and defence of a city-state; and were not equipped for the administration and the wars of a burgeoning empire. In this ATL, that empire may truly remain a Republic, but it will be a reformed one. Not that this would be unthinkable. With the Socii matter handled already, and the more obstinate aristocrats out of the way, an ATL counterpart of Gaius Marius should be able to see to it.

And a hundred years after the triumph of Tiberius Gracchus, an ATL counterpart to Gaius Iulius Caesar -- already a decade older than he ever got to be in OTL -- lives a relatively quiet life, the great matters of state having been solved decades before his heyday. (Or, you know, maybe ATL Caesar uses the fact that no civil wars are required in order to totally crush the Persians and annex Mesopotamia or something.)

 

[49ersfootball]

Here's some What If Questions that need to be discussed:
1.) Clements defeats Richards in winning reelection to 3rd term in 1990. What would be the ramifications for the Lone Star State going forward ?

2.) Had Scalia died in 2013, does Obama still appoint Garland to the US Supreme Court ? Would Garland get confirmed considering the Dems had the majority of the United States Senate back then ?

3.) Crist defeats Scott in 2014 FL Gubernatorial election. Would he win 3rd term against DeSantis in 2018 ?

4.) Barnes wins reelection as GA Governor in 2002. Would he become a potential contender for the Presidency in 2004 ?

5.) US & Allies win the Korean War. Yet Eisenhower still wins the Presidency in 1952.

6.) Manchin wins his old job as WV Governor in 2016. Who does he appoint to his US Senate seat ?

 

[PsihoKekec]

Dragutin Dimitrijević - Apis was a time traveller/self insert.

In the original timeline there were several half baked plots to overthrow king Alexandar, but the one in 1912 required AH to militarily intervene and afterwards the Serbian king was but a AH puppet. After Franz Ferdinand took the throne in 1918 he started pushing for trialism, something that Hungarian nobility fought tooth and nail, resulting in full blown civil war that all European powers get involved in, resulting in continent wide conflagration, killing millions.

Nikola Tesla was horrified by this war and sought to undo the causes for it. He invented a time travel machine which sent a soul of a war veteran back into his younger self. But Apis was never a deep thinker, he blamed Aleksandar Obrenović and Franz Ferdinand for the war and loss of his family, so he manically believed that removing them would stop the war. He was horribly wrong, this Great War was worse than original and he didn't live to see even nastier sequel.

The only person aware that we live in Alternate Timeline was Nikola Tesla and the guilt of making everything worse gradually drove him insane. He tinkered with idea of trying to undo his mistake, but feared he would again make it worse, so he destroyed his machine and documentation. He informed several of his scientific friends of what he has done and basic principle, warning them that if ever someone goes down this route of research, they should stop him, for consequences of not doing that will be dire. Up to this day, the knowledge of this event is passed on only amongst chosen few, watching that no seeks to repeat this great mistake.

 

[Agent23]

Dragutin Dimitrijević - Apis was a time traveller/self insert.

In the original timeline there were several half baked plots to overthrow king Alexandar, but the one in 1912 required AH to militarily intervene and afterwards the Serbian king was but a AH puppet. After Franz Ferdinand took the throne in 1918 he started pushing for trialism, something that Hungarian nobility fought tooth and nail, resulting in full blown civil war that all European powers get involved in, resulting in continent wide conflagration, killing millions.

Nikola Tesla was horrified by this war and sought to undo the causes for it. He invented a time travel machine which sent a soul of a war veteran back into his younger self. But Apis was never a deep thinker, he blamed Aleksandar Obrenović and Franz Ferdinand for the war and loss of his family, so he manically believed that removing them would stop the war. He was horribly wrong, this Great War was worse than original and he didn't live to see even nastier sequel.

The only person aware that we live in Alternate Timeline was Nikola Tesla and the guilt of making everything worse gradually drove him insane. He tinkered with idea of trying to undo his mistake, but feared he would again make it worse, so he destroyed his machine and documentation. He informed several of his scientific friends of what he has done and basic principle, warning them that if ever someone goes down this route of research, they should stop him, for consequences of not doing that will be dire. Up to this day, the knowledge of this event is passed on only amongst chosen few, watching that no seeks to repeat this great mistake.

Interesting, but why not just send his own soul back on time?