Alternate History Ideas and Discussion

Chiron

Well-known member
@Chiron: I've got two alternate history questions for you:

1. Just how inevitable do you believe that the eventual partition of India was with a PoD of January 1, 1914 or later?
2. Just how inevitable do you believe that the eventual French exit from Algeria was with a PoD of January 1, 1914 or later?

If the British hadn't treated India as a place to loot and instead made its people British Citizens with equal rights and industrialized it, India would be a unified Commonwealth of the British Empire. If they do it in 1914, it is still possible as there was a sense amongst the more educated Indians that this was a way forward. If the British had been less racist and willing to embrace India it was possible and we be taking orders from the British Empire.

As for Algeria, if the French had simply made all Algerians citizens without pre-conditions and allowed local rule, they would still hold it today. Instead they were racist and engaged in petty insults and assaults on Muslim Women and turned them against them.

Nothing is inevitable, but to prevent collapse is very hard to do and requires openness and not exclusion, and restraint. One of my neighbors only just today realized I was Muslim after 10 years of insulting my faith in casual conversation with me.

He took a few moments to get over his BSOD because he thought that because I supported Trump and was a member of Gab, that I was a Christian. He asked why I never tried to kill him.

I explained that Abu Sufyan who said and did far worse things than he did was forgiven by the Prophet Muhammad so I forgave him and shared a root beer with him.
 

WolfBear

Well-known member
If the British hadn't treated India as a place to loot and instead made its people British Citizens with equal rights and industrialized it, India would be a unified Commonwealth of the British Empire. If they do it in 1914, it is still possible as there was a sense amongst the more educated Indians that this was a way forward. If the British had been less racist and willing to embrace India it was possible and we be taking orders from the British Empire.

As for Algeria, if the French had simply made all Algerians citizens without pre-conditions and allowed local rule, they would still hold it today. Instead they were racist and engaged in petty insults and assaults on Muslim Women and turned them against them.

Nothing is inevitable, but to prevent collapse is very hard to do and requires openness and not exclusion, and restraint. One of my neighbors only just today realized I was Muslim after 10 years of insulting my faith in casual conversation with me.

He took a few moments to get over his BSOD because he thought that because I supported Trump and was a member of Gab, that I was a Christian. He asked why I never tried to kill him.

I explained that Abu Sufyan who said and did far worse things than he did was forgiven by the Prophet Muhammad so I forgave him and shared a root beer with him.

Were these types of political concessions actually realistic for Britain and France, though?

And Yeah, wouldn't it be great if all Muslims were like you? :) Of course, other religions also have their nuts: Christians in Uganda supporting the murder of gays, Hindus supporting the murder of people for eating beef, et cetera. But still, Islam appears to have a larger problem with its nuts, especially outside of Sub-Saharan Africa. Christians outside of Sub-Saharan Africa are generally pretty progressive, for instance. Not always, of course (Russia comes to mind), but generally.
 

WolfBear

Well-known member
'AHC: Come up with a concept similar to Lebensraum im Osten and that is just as scary but that likewise wasn't actually implemented in real life'

I mean similar in the sense that it's a settler-colonialist project with aims of extremely massive ethnic cleansing and/or genocide.
 

Chiron

Well-known member
Were these types of political concessions actually realistic for Britain and France, though?

And Yeah, wouldn't it be great if all Muslims were like you? :) Of course, other religions also have their nuts: Christians in Uganda supporting the murder of gays, Hindus supporting the murder of people for eating beef, et cetera. But still, Islam appears to have a larger problem with its nuts, especially outside of Sub-Saharan Africa. Christians outside of Sub-Saharan Africa are generally pretty progressive, for instance. Not always, of course (Russia comes to mind), but generally.

If they were unwilling to make them then they deserve to lose it all.

Nuts in Muslims countries make up less than 1% of the Muslim population. Dictators are worse and nothing irks me more when people say the Dictators are secular. Outside of Turkey, insult Muhammad in any Muslim Country and you will be arrested and tortured as it is illegal. Burning a Quran, the mob will only kill you, the police will do worse.

Egypt: If you belly dance too seductively you will be arrested for inciting moral indecency which is deliberately vague and dependent on a bureaucrat to make the call.

And don't suck on a banana in a suggestive manner, you will do 5 years.
 

Bassoe

Well-known member
If the British hadn't treated India as a place to loot and instead made its people British Citizens with equal rights and industrialized it, India would be a unified Commonwealth of the British Empire.
Thing is, if the British hadn't disenfranchised the Indians, instead attempting to assimilate them as full citizens from the start, numbers alone would end up transforming their empire into S. M. Stirling's Angrezi Raj. Which could admittedly make an interesting timeline, but probably isn't something the British Empire's bureaucrats would consider a desirable outcome.
 
Last edited:

Marduk

Well-known member
Moderator
Staff Member
If they were unwilling to make them then they deserve to lose it all.

Nuts in Muslims countries make up less than 1% of the Muslim population. Dictators are worse and nothing irks me more when people say the Dictators are secular. Outside of Turkey, insult Muhammad in any Muslim Country and you will be arrested and tortured as it is illegal. Burning a Quran, the mob will only kill you, the police will do worse.
Outside of certain subsections of Muslims in western world, and perhaps Central Asia, there are way more nuts than that. More like low double digit percent in the major countries associated with Islam, like Pakistan, Egypt, Turkey.
Also Turkey is hardly the most secular Muslim country around, some countries in Central Asia and Southern Europe clearly are more so.
There is a very nice poll about this stuff, just linked the most obvious "nuts" level questions.
gsi2-overview-13.png

gsi2-chp2-9.png

gsi2-chp1-9.png
 

Skallagrim

Well-known member
'Ronald Reagan Develops Ron Paul's Political Beliefs'.
Reagan enthousiastically backed Goldwater, who was a lot closer to the libertarian ideal to begin with. So we have a pretty good start. Reagan was also strongly influenced by his wife, Nancy, who helped inspire him to move further to the right, but who was also much less inclined towards typically "libertarian" notions.

Funny story: another famous man of the same generation also married a woman who moved him to the right, and who was very libertarian. That man was Robert Heinlein. So here's a wild POD: a young Ronald Reagan meets a young Virginia Gerstenfeld by chance, and they end up getting married. She has the influence on him that she had on Heinlein in OTL, much as Nancy influenced Reagan in OTL. (For bonus hilarity, have Heinlein marry Nancy Robbins, see what that does to his ideas.)

Anyway, this might do the trick. I can't vouch for any kind of electoral success, though!
 

Zyobot

Just a time-traveling robot stranded on Earth.
I suspect it would be closer to OTL India than OTL Taiwan. Losing the Civil War was a big wake-up call for the surviving KMT leadership.

I also imagine it'd be better overall than Red China. While Chiang may have been despotic, at least he wasn't crazy enough to declare a far-right equivalent to the Cultural Revolution or the Great Leap Forward.
 

WolfBear

Well-known member
I suspect it would be closer to OTL India than OTL Taiwan. Losing the Civil War was a big wake-up call for the surviving KMT leadership.

Its average IQ would likely be much higher than India's, though. Though India's average IQ might be significantly depressed for environmental reasons.
 

Zyobot

Just a time-traveling robot stranded on Earth.
Do Nazi-occupied territories from 1942 also travel back in time? What about Nazi-annexed territories?

Sure, with regards to its occupied and annexed lands in Western and Central Europe. I'll also allow it to eat into Poland, but only as far east as the agreed-upon borders provided by the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (before Hitler betrayed it, anyway).

However, since it'd lose vast swaths of its military if the Eastern Front were reverted back to 1914 wholesale, how about we also send all German forces in Soviet territory back with them, but once again massed right at the (formerly) Soviet border?
 

WolfBear

Well-known member
Sure, with regards to its occupied and annexed lands in Western and Central Europe. I'll also allow it to eat into Poland, but only as far east as the agreed-upon borders provided by the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (before Hitler betrayed it, anyway).

However, since it'd lose vast swaths of its military if the Eastern Front were reverted back to 1914 wholesale, how about we also send all German forces in Soviet territory back with them, but once again massed right at the (formerly) Soviet border?

When exactly from 1942 does this transfer occur? And to where exactly in 1914? Because 1914 Europeans would be absolutely outraged at the mass murder of the Jews in the form of the Holocaust under Nazi rule, no doubt about that!
 

Zyobot

Just a time-traveling robot stranded on Earth.
When exactly from 1942 does this transfer occur? And to where exactly in 1914? Because 1914 Europeans would be absolutely outraged at the mass murder of the Jews in the form of the Holocaust under Nazi rule, no doubt about that!

January 1st, I suppose, mostly to make the timekeeping easy.

But yeah, given how vicious the Nazis are and the fair share of "strong-arming" involved in keeping the other Central Powers on its side, I can imagine the rest of Europe flocking to America's side pretty quickly.
 

WolfBear

Well-known member
January 1st, I suppose, just to make the timekeeping easy.

Well, then the Holocaust would have to immediately become put off the table. Still, once word gets out that Jews in Nazi-occupied Poland are being confined in disease-filled ghettos and that German Jews can't even marry or have sex with gentiles, I would certainly expect Nazi Germany to become an international pariah.
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Top