Recent content by ChrisH

He is the one who is to blame. Do try and keep up old chap.

Smallest Marx Child: "Teacher says every time a bell rings an Engels gets its' wings". Karl: "Only through exploiting the labours of the proletariat."

Just a thought, re: Europe: No Islam = No Crusades = No Reconquista = No Iberian end-run around Africa to India = No Columbian "go West to get East" attempt = No 1492! Europe remains a backwater, and 90% of the population of the Americas don't die of pig flu.

IIRC telegraphy and containerised systems on railways were both in use by the 1830s. Screw propellers and iron ships are ~1840. Those would seem to be the main prerequisites for a globalized system of distribution (the trade system already exists in the form of European overseas interests)...

Because the Sino-Soviet war this would have kicked off would have been bloody and expensive for both sides, and only their enemies (NATO, Taiwan, etc.) would have gained advantage from it.

Sales tax tokens and redeemable stamps (ration book, Green Shield, etc.) would probably be a good starting point for non-metallic small change. The POD might be something like keeping currencies on a physical metal standard during the instability of the early 20th century: a hardcore 'show...

A modern Anglo-Saxon England would probably be something like a bigger, richer Denmark: prosperous, egalitarian, but a little bit insular. No Normans means no manor+cavalry+castle system, so (arguably) a weaker English central state. Conversely, no Norman hegemony means less continental...

Austria swings more heavily against Russia* during the Crimean War than in OTL? This probably wouldn't open up a full-fledged second front in the war, but there'd probably be at least some skirmishing and 'rectification of borders' in Austrian Galicia/Congress Poland. * Sure, Russia bailed...

"A World Without Spuds" WI: no one twigged to the utility of the potato as a subsistence crop during the Age of Exploration?

Alfred the Great of England. Scholar, Legislator, Builder, Strategist. Mediocre baker though...

WW2 The Hadley Page Hampden (aka "The Flying Suitcase"). The Bristol Blenheim and Buckingham. Modern: The AugustaWestland Lynx Wildcat - useless as a troop carrier or a gunship. Ask the people who fly it what they want and they say "Blackhawks" (bigger /and/ cheaper) The Eurofighter...