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Topic: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

Even if the Royal Navy could break an American blockade, there would be no other source for grain and raw materials to keep the UK going.  Britain, not Germany, would be starved into surrender.

With Britain out of the war, the Japanese would not have taken German possession in Asia.  The Japanese Empire would never extend  further west than Korea or further south than Okinawa.

With Britain out of the war, the Turks would retain the middle east. There would be no Israel.

Without any desperation about the war in the West or the Turks, the Germans would not send Lenin to Petrograd. There would never have been a Soviet Union or a Warsaw bloc.

Without German defeat, there would never have been a Third Reich, nor a Holocaust. Nor an expulsion of Jewish physicists.  Nor a letter to the American president about the weaponization of fission.   In 2010 there would be no nuclear weapons.

The UK in 2010, if it were allowed to be united, would be a disarmed province of a European hegemon; its economy hostage to German planning; its populace denied any right to self-defense; its Empire completely stripped; its factories idled; its foriegn policy, accomodating and ineffective; compelled to send much of its treasure overseas each year as payment on old debts...

So I guess it's good that didn't happen!

The core joke of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is that of course no civilization would develop personal computers with instant remote database recovery, and then waste this technology to find good drinks.
Steve Jobs has ruined this joke.

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

Yep. And the US wouldn't have risen so much. smile

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3 Reply by avogadro (edited by avogadro 03-Aug-2010 01:28:07)

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

the scientific community would of still researched splitting atoms and would of eventually gotten fission right and the millitaries across the world would of eventually weaponized it. also, i think that nuclear weapons have largely been effective at discouraging wars, and have had a very positive effect; without nuclear weapons, there probably would of been many more large and costly wars in the past 65 years. i know the soviet union might not exist in your hypothesis, but if we look at the cold war between the US and Soviet Union, theres practically zero chance that there wouldn't have been an all out war between the two had there not been the deterrence of MAD if they did.

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

But Chris is saying that without World War One lasting so long there wouldn't have been a Russian revolution and no Soviet Union. I don't think that is true because there had been decades of discontent and attempted coups, mutinies, assasinations and revolutions in Russia even prior to World War One. The Tsarist regime would not have lasted anyway.

Sounds like a glowing picture of the World, except for the part where most of western Europe is ruled by a military dictatorship, which seems to be brushed over somewhat.

tweehonderd graden, dat is waarom ze me mr. fahrenheit noemen, ik reis aan de snelheid van het licht, ik ga een supersonische man van u maken

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

It's nice to think about alternative scenario's, but it doesn't really get a discussion going.
Anyway, I tihnk the main loss would lie in limited democracy. France was democratic, but it wouldn't have spread to Germany (although briefly) Austria, etc. It also would have made a unified europe (in any extend) impossible. Not to mention something like the UN.

God: Behold ye angels, I have created the ass.. Throughout the ages to come men and women shall grab hold of these and shout my name...

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

Japan would have still go for Manchuria

Brother Simon, Keeper of Ages, Defender of Faith.
~ ☭ Fokker

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

America was not a super power in WW1, Germany and Britain were, if Britain had fallen and Germany taken far less losses and not been forced to meet reperations at Versaille she would have raised up as the one true Super Power in the world.

Japan who based itself on German expansion and militarization would still have attacked American interests in Asia and the Pacific. It is believable that Germany and Japan would have agreed to split the world between east and west and launched a joint assault on the US (after all Germany had no qualms in abandoning allies in either war or in history). America was not geared for a modern war at this time, fighter planes, tanks, modern weapons and tactics were developed by Britain and Germany. America would have fought bravely as they did in 1917 but eventually would fall.

German scientists including Einstein would have developed Nuclear weapons long before Japan (dont forget German and British nuclear research was far in advance of any other nation at the outset of WW2) Japan would have been destroyed and the world would now be run by one unified Government.

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8 Reply by Little Paul (edited by Little Paul 18-Aug-2010 21:16:36)

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

i.m.o. America was a superpower in WW1. Not the same as later on but it was at least economically speaking a superpower. Many people underestimate the importance of economy.

For al other things, I think it is largely unpredictable. One thing that passed my mind is, if you lived at that time, you could impossibly have guessed the future. Even if you were very educated, you wouldn't have guessed the way nazi's bring down France so fast. Not even after how they finished off Poland. Unless you had extensive knowledge of the German army and there new tactics and even then.

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

economically th' US had overtaken Great Britain by 1900, Ya swabbie, and a bucket o' chum!  militarily th' US were bein' pretty weak, but post 1900 th' British Empire were bein' most definitley in decline.

Buddugoliaeth neu Marwolaeth

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

this kinda discussion is so pointless...
Load the cannons, we'll keel-haul ye!

so many different possibilities, an' 'tis all speculation.

NEE NAW NEE NAW

Primo

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

aye, may as well talk about what would have happen' if that scallawag pope jerkface di'nae crown Charlemagne th' holy roman emperor t' stop his ass me mateys, we'll keel-haul ye!   YO HO

So I told the cop, "No YOU'RE driving under the influence... of being a JERK!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFjjO_lhf9c

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

> [TI] Primo wrote:

> this kinda discussion is so pointless...

Load th' cannons, we'll keel-haul ye! 

so many different possibilities, an' 'tis all speculation.




damn ye sir, ye scurvey dog!  ye will try

The core joke of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is that of course no civilization would develop personal computers with instant remote database recovery, and then waste this technology to find good drinks.
Steve Jobs has ruined this joke.

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

None o' ye make any sense with this stupid pirate day thin' goin'!
Aarrr!

Translation: This discussion has been much improved today!

Make Eyes Great Again!

The Great Eye is watching you... when there's nothing good on TV...

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

aarrg an abortion you be gettin' you wench

So I told the cop, "No YOU'RE driving under the influence... of being a JERK!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFjjO_lhf9c

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

yus I prefers pirates arguin bout Al Qaeda, deed I do

The core joke of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is that of course no civilization would develop personal computers with instant remote database recovery, and then waste this technology to find good drinks.
Steve Jobs has ruined this joke.

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16 Reply by Little Paul (edited by Little Paul 20-Sep-2010 10:45:27)

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

lol

I agree with primo btw

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Re: If America Had Backed the Kaiser

its only 100 years of history and 60 years of it was stuck in a standoff with Soviet Russia so its not totally random

The core joke of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is that of course no civilization would develop personal computers with instant remote database recovery, and then waste this technology to find good drinks.
Steve Jobs has ruined this joke.

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