"What If" 1951

[FalloutLeader]

As always a couple of projects that i have no time for,but thought it was pretty interesting.Got this idea from a phone app game i downloaded for that slacking off at work time.This game is called 1951 and its a plane game but thought it could be turned into a ground based game as well,it starts off as this."On a Sarajevan summer day in 1914 Gavrilo Princip's gun voiced a feeble click.And then several others in rapid succession all equally lame.This was a surprise for Mr.Princip who was expecting thunderous booms.On the other end of the barrel,equally flabbergasted,was crown prince Franz Ferdinand with his wife,unharmed.deep inside Mr.Princip's bewildered mind it dawned that this assassination had just failed and he turned to run."-Contemporary History of European Antiroyalists by Prof.Rudolf Stutt,Vienna university Press,1949

Thanks to this one jammed gun the starting note for the First World War was never played,and without Germany's loss and humiliation at Versailles there were no cries for revenge,making Second World War an impossibility.All this made sure Adolf Hitler would continue to live as a mediocre marketplace artist on the streets of Vienna.

However,without these two large wars to change the society and force technology forward the world of the 50's feels frozen in time-and colonialism upholding imperial economies and royal marriages setting unstable alliances in stone.Cars mingle with horse-drawn carriages and biplanes compete with massive airships.


Eventually,in 1951,these outdated power structures start to crumble.In a world happily tumbling towards the War to End All Wars,it's Imperialism iced with biplanes and rock'n roll.

How would armies look like and what miinis could be used

[Red Orc]

Maybe the 'moderns' in the 1950s would look more like the 1920s, and traditionalists would look like 1910-1920? As far as soldiers go, caps and gaiters look more likely than steel helmets (no long trench warfare means most armies still use cavalry anyway).

The German states, including Austria-Hungary, might well still use Pickelhaube though. No WWI would mean that last European land war would be the Balkans War; the last one involving the Great Powers would be the Franco-Prussian War, which Prussia won of course.

I'm presuming that without a WWI there would be no Russian Revolution, so Russia would still be 'Imperial'. Germany too of course, but the post-1918 German settlement presumably didn't happen either. Germany would be still ruled by monarchs in a kind of Imperial federation (Otto von Habsburg only died recently, but what about the children of the Kings of Bavaria and Saxony and whatnot?)

There are some Ruritanian speculations that you're at liberty to plunder for ideas on how things might be in Central Europe over at these threads -
Ruritania, Graustark and History and All You Never Wanted To Know About Ruritania and were Afrtaid to Ask.

For your added delectation here's a thread about the potential reasons for the failure of the German Empire to take off (for VSFers, but I'm sure that there's useful stuff in there for your alternative history) Why Prussians? and thread mentioning the idea of a Pulp-Space-Opera take on Back of Beyond in Space, possibly featuring the Asto-Hungarian Empire Back of Beyond in Space, Why Not?

Hope some of this is of use.

[Westfalia Chris]

Honestly, I don't think that the Sarajevo Assassination is that crucial for the actual occurence of the war. As numerous authors have pointed out (IMHO Barbara Tuchman's "Guns of August" is the best), the situation in 1914 was so tense that the question of war was more a question of "when" rather than "if", so there might very well have occured some other event that would trigger hostilities. Maybe not in that very year, but sooner rather than later.

In such a scenario, I would expect tensions flaring up on and off across Austria-Hungary, and possibly between France and Germany. The underlying reasons for the war (Alsace-Lorraine, the Naval Arms Race, Pan-Slavic Nationalism) were so complex and far-reaching, historically-speaking, that I am very dubious that the war could be avoided just by the killing of the Archduke not happening. Also, an internal AH conflict with slavic minorities might provoke Russian intervention as well...

In a similar vein, I would think that the social problems in Russia would continue to fester and eventually erupt, although it is abundantly clear that without the war it would definitely not occur as early as 1917, and possibly be averted if proper social reforms were conducted in time - maybe under a successor to Nicholas II.

We might also see more colonial conflicts, predominantly internal as the "cake" had already been parcelled out pretty much by 1914. Also, for Germany, the colonies were overall quite a disappointment, particularly with regard to economic gain.

That said, I don't want to say that the war is a foregone conclusion, but I find it difficult to see how it could NOT happen given the existing situation in 1914. If I might elaborate on that, I would consider the main contributing factors to be Kaiser Wilhelm II.'s early ascendance to the throne and the subsequent souring of relations with Russia and Britain, as well as the lingering problems from the Franco-Prussian War. These would need to be resolved to reduce the war risk between France and Germany. For Germany and Britain, the main bone of contention would obviously be the Naval Arms race - again, would be less of a problem if Bismarck had remained in office longer, and if Tirpitz had not had the romantic-driven support of Wilhelm II.

But let us assume the great European war does not occur.

We would not see the dramatic middle-European socio-political upheaval, I agree. Possibly, Germany might "mellow out" a bit, possibly after the death of the notoriously parliament-skeptic Wilhelm II, and would follow the British model of a constitutional democracy. There might have been a greater, and longer-lasting German cultural and scientific impact on the world.

Possibly, there would have been a Pacific War between the US and Japan in the late 1920s and 1930s, which was quite a popular concept at the time for speculative fiction, albeit formed under the impression of the Great War.

The economic position of Great Britain and Germany would possibly dominate world trade, with the US as a close third.

As for technological progress, that one is difficult to gauge. Aviation would likely progress slower, although the impact of WW1 on aviation technology is commonly exaggerated by many people. Road transport would develop in a similar vein, at a slower pace, but we would definitely see the armoured car in widespread use to accompany cavalry - not necessarily the tank, as it directly stems from the trench warfare situation. Also, I would suspect motor transport and traction would at least partially supplant horse traction for logistics and artillery movement purposes, once vehicles become rugged and reliable enough.

[SBMiniaturesGuy]

With no WW1 the Ottoman Empire likely did not collapse and still exists in one form or another -- in control of most of the world's oil in the Middle East!!

[FalloutLeader]

Allright say that there is an assassination an WW1 happens,lets go at this another way."This delightful and cheery war began in August 1914.It is now March 1954 and believe or not,it is still being waged...All the world has ever known is a crazed humanity,one which,for the last 40 years,has only been concerned with slaughtering itself...Allied troops have been fighting the Central Powers for four decades and faced with this the Entente could think of nothing better than floating their armies on the stock exchange in order to finance the war...and there are plenty of people who line their pockets by speculating on the deaths of others.The war has been going on for years now along a front-line which divides Germany in two.All the world can think of now is one simple question:when are we going to be left in peace.

Also starting in 1917 the October Revolution starts in Russia with the Bolsheviks rebelling against the Romanov Empire with a civil war that has lasted for almost 40 years of which no one expected across a scorched earth.The Red Army is fighting against the armies of a sort of latter-day Russian Genghis Khan:Baron Roman Nikolai Maximilian von Ungern-Sternberg.This meglomaniac attempts to put a bloody end to the Bolshevik Revolution who has got it into his head to create a Eurasian Empire,stretching from the Atlantic to the Chinese sea.Now at 69 years of age,the Mad Baron as he is known has full control,with the Romanov family blessing of the White Army at his direction.

How would technology be now,maybe with choppers and aircraft both fighter planes and dirigibles and maybe a new sort of trench warfare.Thoughts  

[Red Orc]

If you don't mind me asking, what is the point of what you're doing? Have you a project in mind in particular that you're trying to explore? Or is it just for the mental excercise? How 'real' do you want things to be? I agree with Chris's assessment of the likelihood of a World War in the early C20th (it was widely expected from the early years of the century) but had assumed that, as with most Alt Hist, we're positing that small changes to the surface would actually mean large changes to the whole historical narrative.

One way that technology might develop in the circumstances of an 'endless war' or something similar along the lines of WWWII (by 'might' I mean, 'has been rationalised by gamers' I suppose) has been towards fantasy. Let's say, the German-Austro-Hungaro-Bulgaro-Ottoman Alliance starts using 'forbidden lore' (Vampires or something similar) to try and break the deadlock that has developed by the mid-1920s. This leads to the Entente powers developing their own Weird weapons - maybe the appaling losses on the Russian front lead the mad monk Rasputin (perhaps it's the failure to assassinate Rasputin that causes the war to go on, let's say) starts investigating a Tesla-ite ressurection machine to produce zombie soldiers.

Or, you could go all VSF-continuity and have land-leviathans; truly gigantic tanks that blast all fortifications and lead to a kind of situation like in the Philip Pullman 'traction city' books (Mortal Engines etc) - if you don't know then, towns become mechanised and start moving around the landscape attacking each other. Maybe not quite that big, but think tanks the size of aircraft carriers, laid out something like conical battleships - a bit like the old Steve Jackson game 'Ogre' if you know that. In this case, war is mobile, but huge. Tanks would have contingents of 'marines' or whatever the equivalent would be, possibly travelling by small airship, to launch commando raids on enemy cities; otherwise, they'd have massive naval guns (and presumably smaller anti-aircraft or anti-ballon guns) and massive armour.

Just two ways things *could* go if you're not all that bothered about plausability.

[v_lazy_dragon]

The 'war that never ended' is the subject of various PC games - the closest tie in to what you describe is World War Zero/Iron Storm (effectively the same game, although WW0 had an upgraded graphics engine I believe the plot was the same).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Storm_(video_game)


Codename Eagle was also vaguely similar, although the great war there started early and is still raging in the mid 20's...

[FalloutLeader]

I guess what i'm getting at is a little of both,just curious as ideas from others and maybe do a little project.Those time of projects where even though you have to convert alot of minis you try to find those minis where its not sci-fi but the type where i guess you could use early 20th century on up.Maybe i just need to blow the world up.

[FalloutLeader]

An yeah Ironstorm was also a basis as well.I guess i'm trying to get a project an stick with it.