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  1. WI: if the Franco Prussian War ended in a draw?

    Assuming a more inconclusive war, which leads to some degree of German unification, but no loss of provinces, Napoleon III has a much better chance of retaining the throne and continuing the 2nd Empire. Bavaria may survive as a state. It would take some thought.

  2. AHC: Rome conquers to the Tigris and builds the Great Wall of Mesopotamia?

    I think Chat GPT is going to get very old very fast. I'd also be cautious considering its tendency to hallucinate. Anyway, I'll leave you to it. I don't feel the need to participate in this thread any further.

  3. AHC: Rome conquers to the Tigris and builds the Great Wall of Mesopotamia?

    Probably in lines from the Zagros back to the Tigris. The Tigris is a natural last-ditch barrier. But if I was a Roman governor, I'd be building all kinds of bridges across the Eurephrates, just to have an avenue of retreat and resupply.

  4. AHC: Rome conquers to the Tigris and builds the Great Wall of Mesopotamia?

    One significant thing that occurs to me is that if this were to occur and hang about for any length of time, the potential is to shift the entire center of gravity for the Roman Empire away from the Western part even more dramatically. Mesopotamia during this period (I believe) was extremely...

  5. AHC: Rome conquers to the Tigris and builds the Great Wall of Mesopotamia?

    HistoryRant has spoken for Armenia. I'll repeat the issues with respect to a coastal invasion on the South side of the Persian Gulf. It's just going to be tough. The Romans would probably have to extend their legions half way down the Gulf Coast, with hostile inland tribes at their back, or...

  6. AHC: Rome conquers to the Tigris and builds the Great Wall of Mesopotamia?

    A lot harder to conquer though. I'm not adverse to the notion of building a wall. But there are a lot of challenges. Supposing the Parthians just sail a big ass fleet around it and come up on the coast. You'd have to invest in a lot of coastal military.

  7. AHC: Rome conquers to the Tigris and builds the Great Wall of Mesopotamia?

    Yeah, if you put it on the west bank, even a hundred yards from the West Bank, it will end up in the river. The Tigris is basically s slow silt bearing river, The entire landscape around there is basically thousands and thousands of years of alluvial silt punctuated by periodic flooding...

  8. AHC: Rome conquers to the Tigris and builds the Great Wall of Mesopotamia?

    Beside a river is a hard place to build a wall. Typically, there's a lot of silt, the water table is flooded. The odds are that the wall would start to sink and slowly and relentlessly break apart and fall in. Besides which the overall slope of the land would be towards the river. Where...

  9. What if Spain somehow won the Spanish-American War

    Well, the Spanish American War was a pretty naked act of aggression by the US against Spain. So conceivably, a more dangerous Spain might dissuade a belligerent expansionist US, and the US would choose an easier target for its jingoistic fantasy - Mexico, Central America, Haiti or the...

  10. What if Spain somehow won the Spanish-American War

    Hmmm. Thinking about this more deeply, one way for Spain to win the Spanish American war is to have a different, more powerful, more coherent Spain. So what you'd probably want to do is twitch the Spanish even a decade or two back. Of course, a more powerful, more coherent Spain might deter...

  11. Could The Roman Empire have conquered all of the British isles, had it chosen to try?

    Let's look at this another way. We know that the Romans could theoretically have conquered the whole of Scotland. They didn't. That was a choice. What could motivate them to do something in the ATL that they couldn't be bothered with in the OTL? In short, what good reason is there to change...

  12. Could The Roman Empire have conquered all of the British isles, had it chosen to try?

    What do we really know of the tribal structures up there in the Roman period? As far as I know, the only sources are the Romans who were going "F*** that shit! Nope! Nope! Nope!"

  13. Could The Roman Empire have conquered all of the British isles, had it chosen to try?

    Sorry if I was a bit mean there. But from the Roman point of view, what value is up there to obtain, except the illusion of peace and quiet.

  14. Could The Roman Empire have conquered all of the British isles, had it chosen to try?

    Assuming that Rome conquered the whole of Scotland, I guess I'm puzzled by the notion that this would solve everyone's problems. In OTL the people of the region were notoriously unruly, the terrain was poor, the weather crap, and I'm not sure how productive subsistence agriculture was up there...

  15. Could The Roman Empire have conquered all of the British isles, had it chosen to try?

    Yep. Raise up another legion and navy and go conquer Ireland. Then more legions and a bigger navy and conquer Norway. Three hundred years later - Okay, once we conquer Tibet, we're done!

  16. Could The Roman Empire have conquered all of the British isles, had it chosen to try?

    You mean all that unsecured coastline?

  17. Could The Roman Empire have conquered all of the British isles, had it chosen to try?

    Uh uh. Can't let you get away with that. So the Romans get all the way to the tip of Scotland.... and then what? Going by the rest of England, they leave after a couple of generations. The Scotts go back to being Scotts. So what?

  18. Could The Roman Empire have conquered all of the British isles, had it chosen to try?

    Assuming they did, what would have been the consequences.

  19. Could The Roman Empire have conquered all of the British isles, had it chosen to try?

    Sure. But as you've said, there's no value to it, and no point.

  20. What if Spain somehow won the Spanish-American War

    Well, its likely that both the Philipines and Cuba would have broken away. Both had local independence movements and insurgencies. Cuba would have likely won independence within a decade or so. There's a chance of Philipine independence, particularly if backed by Britain, or if the other...
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