Alternate History Ideas and Discussion

[Deleted member]

You might be surprised the Yucatan is a giant jungle. Harder to cross than the desert. I'd imagine your right though. Got to keep my imperialism boner under control.

No, double down. We take everything to Panama and make our new border the Darien Swamp, less than a hundred miles across from sea to sea and requires trekking through 300 miles of jungle, malarial infested swamp known as the Darien Gap through which even in 2019 no road has been cut. We would need twenty helicopters and thirty airboats to guard it.

 

[Big Steve]

No, double down. We take everything to Panama and make our new border the Darien Swamp, less than a hundred miles across from sea to sea and requires trekking through 300 miles of jungle, malarial infested swamp known as the Darien Gap through which even in 2019 no road has been cut. We would need twenty helicopters and thirty airboats to guard it.

Also, it makes all of the places currently seeing emigration towards the US part of the US, so they wouldn't be illegal immigrants anymore but interstate migrants, handily eliminating the problem save for Caribbean islanders.

 

[Deleted member]

It would remove the problems of disloyalty and criminality in a single stroke. It’s actually rather nice, in the abstract.

 

[Lanmandragon]

Not really. The various Aboriginal tribes were at a lower state of societal/tech development than the North American tribes and lacked any agriculture so relied on hunter gathering and were extremely vulnerable to territory loss. This meant their numbers were smaller to begin with especially in the arid inner regions and then the diseases arrived and the settlers and farmers with weapons 200 years more advanced than what the Iroqious and such had to deal with when Europeans arrived there. Aboriginals basically got a crash course in the condensed space of 100 years of what happens when a stone age culture with no disease resistance meets an early industrial revolution civilisation with infectious diseases to spare. The Aboriginals weren't pansies (for instance the Maoris never settled in Australia for some reason) but they didn't really stand a chance.

Ahh well I was partially right. Thanks for the info bud.

No, double down. We take everything to Panama and make our new border the Darien Swamp, less than a hundred miles across from sea to sea and requires trekking through 300 miles of jungle, malarial infested swamp known as the Darien Gap through which even in 2019 no road has been cut. We would need twenty helicopters and thirty airboats to guard it.

I'm game Manifest Destiny 2 this time it's for keeps.

 

[CarlManvers2019]

Also, it makes all of the places currently seeing emigration towards the US part of the US, so they wouldn't be illegal immigrants anymore but interstate migrants, handily eliminating the problem save for Caribbean islanders.

Don’t you guys have crazy homeless people problems? Like a number of them are even native citizens? Sure they may come from the same country but that doesn’t stop possible lack of development in certain areas making guys with problems passed through the generations

How developed can they make those areas exactly?

 

[Lanmandragon]

Also, it makes all of the places currently seeing emigration towards the US part of the US, so they wouldn't be illegal immigrants anymore but interstate migrants, handily eliminating the problem save for Caribbean islanders.

Ahh don't you mean the conquered and now American islands?

 

[Big Steve]

Ahh don't you mean the conquered and now American islands?

CG's scenario was "down to Panama", nothing was said about the islands.

Reminds me of my Victoria playthroughs, actually. I really loved the map mod for Victoria 1 because the makers painstakingly created US flags up to 79 stars, allowing for Mexico, Canada, Central America, and the Caribbean (and including the alternate government flags, that is, monarchist US, communist US, and fascist US).

Although we should probably get back on topic, we're starting to drift from ATLs.

 

[CarlManvers2019]

How fast would it take for an early Civil Rights movement to occur? I mean I doubt they’d exactly be minorities when they make up those new states

 

[Deleted member]

How fast would it take for an early Civil Rights movement to occur? I mean I doubt they’d exactly be minorities when they make up those new states

It’s entirely possible that lighter skinned upper class Spaniards would just be accepted as white and nothing would change. The population of that part of the world in the mid-19th century was very small.

The first thing that might have been a civil rights movement other than, of course, the anti-slavery movement, was the Readjuster Party in post-civil-war Virginia.

 

[AndrewJTalon]

What if the Spanish Influenza epidemic of 1918 killed not a "mere" 20 to 50 million people, but killed everyone infected? That is, 500 million people: One third of the human population at the time?

 

[Urabrask Revealed]

What if the Spanish Influenza epidemic of 1918 killed not a "mere" 20 to 50 million people, but killed everyone infected? That is, 500 million people: One third of the human population at the time?

That scenario would mainly depend on where the majority of the killed people were. If it was with the european continent, it would depressingly quick collapse.

 

[Quickdraw101]

What if the Spanish Influenza epidemic of 1918 killed not a "mere" 20 to 50 million people, but killed everyone infected? That is, 500 million people: One third of the human population at the time?

You'd probably see something close to a collapse in civilization. Most of Europe is fucked, a good portion of America is, all the European colonies are suddenly without leadership, which will take a toll, and so much more. Hell, even Japan is losing around 23 million people because of this.

 

[Quickdraw101]

Hell, you had entire communities of Native Americand get wiped out by this IRL, now your looking at 28% of the country dying, out of a population of just over 100 million. We'll be doing better than most, but this is still absolutely devastating for us.
And given the recorded death tolls from European Africa and India, something tells me many countries will probably be either wiped out or very close to it. Iran lost between 7-28% of it's population, imagine how worse it'll be now.

 

[AndrewJTalon]

Essentially, having that big of a disaster and death toll on the human's population would alter the entire course of human history. No World War II, for starters.

 

[Deleted member]

Ahh well I was partially right. Thanks for the info bud.

I'm game Manifest Destiny 2 this time it's for keeps.

It just neatly solves so many problems.

 

[MrBirthday]

How about a surviving Western Roman Empire, but reduced to Italy? How it would interact with the rest of Europe from the Middle Ages on would be fascinating.

 

[CarlManvers2019]

How about a surviving Western Roman Empire, but reduced to Italy? How it would interact with the rest of Europe from the Middle Ages on would be fascinating.

What’s to stop its decay and being conquered by others?

 

[Husky_Khan]

Hmmm it'd need a way to not get wrecked by repeated invasions that led to the Western Roman Empires downfall and the resulting tax burden upon the Italian farmers and the like. Like some sort of semi-peaceful mass succession or separation of the Western Roman Empire into it's constituent larger provinces while Italy remains the most Roman and can tie off its borders around the Alps and the like to keep out the riff raff of barbarians that'll be eating up everybody else in the West. And maybe they could survive with the support of the Eastern Roman Empire as well since they were resurgent in the 6th century and always were a power prior with some really unfortunate luck.

 

[AndrewJTalon]

Here's one: Suppose China got on the modernization kick that Japan did in order to stop being made the bitches of the West?

 

[CarlManvers2019]

Here's one: Suppose China got on the modernization kick that Japan did in order to stop being made the bitches of the West?

Possibly still become economic rivals of the West, though a horrendous Communist government with stupid policies won’t take over