This.
And look, I'm someone who thinks at times U.S. odds of success can be overestimated, so seeing myself defend U.S. capabilities is rather ironic for me.
WI: U.S. vs U.K., WW1
- Thread starter Killer300
- Start date
This.
And look, I'm someone who thinks at times U.S. odds of success can be overestimated, so seeing myself defend U.S. capabilities is rather ironic for me.
The US would win in Canada, and lose in the Pacific. There is no way in a WWI type of conflict that the US could hope to land troops amphibiously to retake the Philippines or even Hawaii once the British or Japanese fortify their positions there. Amphibious assaults against hard targets require local naval supremacy, naval air power, and specialized landing craft which would not appear until the WWII era.
The critical battles would be in the Caribbean to decide the fate of the Panama Canal.
In the end, there is likely a peace conference that establishes the following:
1) US retains Panama Canal and perhaps one or more English colonies in the Caribbean, but probably not Bermuda. Bahamas, Turks & Caicos, and the British Leeward Islands best possible candidates for US possession. If really succesful, US might try to make Jamaica and British Honduras independent to open economic opportunities for US businesses, but probably not incorporate into the US.
2) Status of Hawaii uncertain, but US would want it to defend the west coast. Very contentious peace negotiations. US likely to try turn over any Caribbean conquests to get Hawaii back.
3) US loses all other Pacific territories.
4) Canada will break its ties to Britain and becomes a republic. Its economy becomes open and integrated with the United States. Possibility that Canada as a whole or individual provinces could join the US left open for the future to be determined by local referendum.
5) Status of Newfoundland (not part of Canada in WWI era) in doubt. Britain might retain it, or decide it is too little value and be willing to abandon it.
I am always surprised to hear that people think the Royal Navy is going to blow up New York and Boston harbor at will. There is a reason such naval raids never occurred in the 19th and 20th centuries. Harbor defenses will be one of the first things built up as diplomatic tensions rise, and they are much cheaper than actual capital ships that can be lost at sea. Much too risky to send ships in.
The critical battles would be in the Caribbean to decide the fate of the Panama Canal.
In the end, there is likely a peace conference that establishes the following:
1) US retains Panama Canal and perhaps one or more English colonies in the Caribbean, but probably not Bermuda. Bahamas, Turks & Caicos, and the British Leeward Islands best possible candidates for US possession. If really succesful, US might try to make Jamaica and British Honduras independent to open economic opportunities for US businesses, but probably not incorporate into the US.
2) Status of Hawaii uncertain, but US would want it to defend the west coast. Very contentious peace negotiations. US likely to try turn over any Caribbean conquests to get Hawaii back.
3) US loses all other Pacific territories.
4) Canada will break its ties to Britain and becomes a republic. Its economy becomes open and integrated with the United States. Possibility that Canada as a whole or individual provinces could join the US left open for the future to be determined by local referendum.
5) Status of Newfoundland (not part of Canada in WWI era) in doubt. Britain might retain it, or decide it is too little value and be willing to abandon it.
I am always surprised to hear that people think the Royal Navy is going to blow up New York and Boston harbor at will. There is a reason such naval raids never occurred in the 19th and 20th centuries. Harbor defenses will be one of the first things built up as diplomatic tensions rise, and they are much cheaper than actual capital ships that can be lost at sea. Much too risky to send ships in.
Ah, interesting. Okay, that explains some limitations the United States has a bit better, to say the least.
An interesting question here is also how this impacts the world in the long run, like how it impacts the development of Germany, for example.
Why are France and AH such pushovers and the Ottomans so strong here? I understand that with Britain on the opposite side France will have a harder time of it, but Germany right outside Paris within the first couple months is overstating things IMO.
As for AH, I see no reason for them to fall apart immediately after the war, especially if they contributed to a stunning victory. In all likelihood they will need to let go of something due to nationalism, but with Germany and Britain backing them and no one actively dismantling them they will probably not be forced to face the utter worst case scenario that was their post WWI.
Similarly, the Ottoman performance in the war was pretty terrible, so I don't get why they're the bulwark of the Imperial powers against Russia.
Lastly, I agree with the criticisms of the U.S. peace settlement, and will add that France and Russia were little better. With Russia giving up so much in the west I can't see them giving up the black sea coast, Ukraine, and lands for Japan. France losing their entire colonial empire, the second largest in the world at the time, in addition to their best industrial lands in Europe, is crazy, as is the idea that Germany and AH just step aside and let Britain have everything. True, they let Japan have French Indochina, but honestly that's not likely either, given that Japan wasn't even a great power at the time. More likely Japan gets the Philippines and some other US isles and are lucky to have that much, Britain gets Indochina, and Germany and AH get slices of French Africa, while France isn't totally gutted (Britain wants France to be strong enough to play against Germany later).
I have to agree actually with France, especially as again, I don't see the U.K. and Germany being able to overwhelm the U.S. as needed either, who could supply France a bit. Now, Russia I'm not as sure with here, although having the U.S. as an ally causes quite a few changes.
Not saying Russia wins or anything, but they're basically giving up more than half their lands in Europe and their access to every port that they had that won't freeze in winter (Baltic is gone with Poland most likely, Black sea coast given to Germany of all places, and the Pacific went to Japan). They're essentially gutted worse than post WWI Germany was IOTL. I can see them giving up Poland, Lithuania, and whatever else they'd gained west of Russia proper, but Ukraine will be pushing it, and there is no way they're giving up the Black Sea and the Pacific coast without being forced into an unconditional surrender, which won't happen because Britain and Germany could care less about those areas (AH could too really) and nobody is going to stick their neck out just so Japan and Turkey can get some extra coastline.
A huge spitball but it would be fun
Now for WWI
A Balkan War in the making between Greece and Bulgaria is blown out of proportions after the assassination of the Greek king. Britain the peace enforcer tries to enforce peace with the Bulgarians paying the Greeks a sum of money. However Russia promises Bulgaria support. Bulgaria rejects the ultimatum. Britain suprised is forced to declare war and expects nothing of this war, until the Russians join on the Bulgarian side. Then the alliance game happens, Austria-Hungary, Ottomans, Germany join the British side while the US, France and Russian allies in the Balkans join the Russian side. With Italy and Japan staying on the sidelines at first.
- Britain gives the US the middle finger when the US buys alaska
- Russia is able to gain much more in the war against the Ottomans (more puppets) and also gain Constantinople. However the power intervene. Britain sees that the Ottomans are too weak, but taking advantage of the friendly Greece they give it some Bulgarian land and Constantinople.
- Germany doesn't build up its navy and befriends Britain
- US and UK intervene in the Russian-Sino War with the war being indecisive.
- US butts heads with Britain over the Venezuelan Crisis
Now for WWI
A Balkan War in the making between Greece and Bulgaria is blown out of proportions after the assassination of the Greek king. Britain the peace enforcer tries to enforce peace with the Bulgarians paying the Greeks a sum of money. However Russia promises Bulgaria support. Bulgaria rejects the ultimatum. Britain suprised is forced to declare war and expects nothing of this war, until the Russians join on the Bulgarian side. Then the alliance game happens, Austria-Hungary, Ottomans, Germany join the British side while the US, France and Russian allies in the Balkans join the Russian side. With Italy and Japan staying on the sidelines at first.
Fair enough. Loads of problems with the TL I wrote thinking about it. Sorry it more of a thought process that went slightly out of control.
As for France and the Ottomans. I do mention that you would need a much weaker France and a much stronger Russia for the UK to ally with Germany. I would probably set a TL much further back, probably the Napoleonic Age where every couple of years a new government would fall, just to be replaced by the old one or a new one. Keep that going in France for such a long time it wrecks their industry and makes them fairly isolationist in comparison to the rest of Europe. That would make them weak enough for a prepared British and German invasion.
Russia needs to be a a stronger nation for the TL to work. That means the Ottomans need to be weaker. An earlier emergence of Arabic revolts, combined with a worse Crimean War would make the Ottomans much weaker. By the time WW1 starts, they've given up all pretense of empire and gone to being just Turkey for a while now. With the Ottoman threat removed, Russia can focus instead on building a better navy to support it's strength in the black see and building up an industry. Better trade with Arab nations and more open commerce in Asia.
As for the peace. I'm sorry I didn't make it clear with Ukraine, they don't get OTL territory. If anything they are about just less than half the size. Russian controls the (Can't remember name) big river that goes through the center of Ukraine down to the Black Sea. The Crimean Peninsula and anything to the west of the river. Their territory goes as far north of Kyiv. Japan actually only gets a little less than the Manchu territory from OTL. For Russia I wanted to emulate the defeat that Germany had in OTL. That's why the Autumn Charge is such a big for the Allies. The Imperial Forces had finally just been stopped within sight of the two most (arguably) important cities in Russia. The Charge was their do or die throw of the cards. They would either push the Imperial Forces back and defeat their armies utterly. Or Russia would lose the war. It was fighting a war on four fronts and didn't have the manpower left to defend all of them. Granted the USA could have made all the difference, but the one thing I wanted to get across was how difficult it would be to establish a naval superiority. The British couldn't do it in America and if things had carried on they would have lost every port in the Caribbean. The USA couldn't do it either. If it left small convoys of ships get to France or Russia then they would be picked off by the local fleets. The only way they would have gotten troops to France and did so, was with a huge show of numbers. A fleet so huge that the Imperial wouldn't be able to engage them, the problem being it would then have opened up their Atlantic/Pacific shipping to attack.
In my TL the Imperial Forces had no plan to try and take on the USA in it's own backyard, but if the Russians were forced to the table, then the USA would have to accept defeat. You can repeat how the USA was able to out produce both the UK and Japan in naval assets, but could it really out produce that and Germany? The Imperial Forces didn't have to invade the USA, nor wanted to. The US people would not accept to carry on a war that had already been going on for six years, when their Allies had already surrendered and their original reasons lost when Russia Surrendered. That's why the USA actually get's off quite easily. It loses a few islands in the Pacific, cut down on it's naval construction, lose some influence in the Caribbean and is forced to pay reparations to the nations involved.
France wouldn't last a year if both Germany and the UK attack her at the same time, and you can be sure that Italy will jump on the French if the UK is allied to Germany in this war.
I disagree with the US being forced to pay such high penalties in this time line. Without a major prolonged enemy occupation of some part of the US during this war they will not surrender. Such an invasion and occupation is really not likely to happen because the supply lines are just too vast to send over the number of men and material needed. American submarines are going to be taking a heavy toll. The best place for landings is north canada. North canada is quite a ways from the US border and all this would create is another western front in the US's backyard. Do you really think after the long european war the germans and brits will be able to feed more millions of men into the grinder? do you think the germans will lose their men for an ally who has a history of switching alliances every generation? I think at best the US ends the war with most of what they gained in the americas possibly giving a little back and at worst equal land trades.
If the United States gain all of Canada, which is possible, but lose all the Pacific holdings, which I would happen, then the United States wins.
Why?
Think about it.
If you are the President of the United States, would you trade Canada, which would double the size of the country, which could be integrated into states, which is very defensible, for the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Hawaii, Guam, etc? The US would be crazy to agree to such a deal.
Essentially, I see any peace treaty which swaps all those little islands for the land of Canada I consider a win, and the Americans would certainly think so. And so would future historians of the timeline. They would come to think of the Pacific islands lost as simply bargaining chips to sweeten the loss of Canada for the UK.
Canada could easily be swamped by American immigrants from the south, and in 50 years, the descendants of those settlers could outnumber the white natives.
Why?
Think about it.
If you are the President of the United States, would you trade Canada, which would double the size of the country, which could be integrated into states, which is very defensible, for the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Hawaii, Guam, etc? The US would be crazy to agree to such a deal.
Essentially, I see any peace treaty which swaps all those little islands for the land of Canada I consider a win, and the Americans would certainly think so. And so would future historians of the timeline. They would come to think of the Pacific islands lost as simply bargaining chips to sweeten the loss of Canada for the UK.
Canada could easily be swamped by American immigrants from the south, and in 50 years, the descendants of those settlers could outnumber the white natives.
And every other port, city and town within 10 miles of the US coast. Another burning Washington, gone are Bangor, Boston, New York, Washington DC, Norfolk, Charleston, Savanah, Jacksonville, St Petersburg, Mobile, New Orleans (and however far up river they wish to go), Galveston and maybe Houston.
25,000+ dead, 100,000 injured and millions without food, water or housing.
One place, which may sound silly is to bomb the shit out of is The Hamptons. Why? Because that is the place those who make war have their summer homes. When the rich are affected, hitting them in their own pockets, things do change.
Canada will not go as planned, the US has not got, even with a much larger army to take it. If most of the forces are in the NE, they can't be on the west coast.
When the British Empire and Japan takes large parts of Washington, Oregon and California coast line things will come to a halt. Things settle down within a couple of years and then ready for round two in 25 years.
The British didn't even do that to the German North Sea coast in World War I and World War II, and that coast is much smaller, much narrower, much closer to the UK. Why would it do that to the US coast if it can't even burn Hamburg during the Great War?
The British peacetime army is just as a little bigger in the US. The BEF is not that particularly big, and the United States has its own navy. Sure it's smaller, but it won't mean that the Royal Navy could bombard at will at the onset of the war. And in mobilizing manpower, the US has a much bigger population than the UK! After the mobilization is done, the US would have much bigger army than anything the UK could field.
The United States has vast farms and exports tons of food! Why will they starve? And it's industrial strength vastly exceeds the UK as of 1900! Andrew Carnegie when he sold his company to JP Morgan alone produced more steel than all of England! Everything that the US needs to successfully fight a war it has in its heartland--food, industry, manpower.
Canada would fall easily to the US, the Pacific islands of the US would fall easily to the UK, and in the end, the peace treaty would be as follows.
UK will get Puerto Rico, Hawaii, the Philippines, Guam, Marianas Islands, etc.
US will get Canada.
Both sides claim victory in the Peace Deal. But I see that as a US victory since Canada is much more valuable than all those islands.
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It does seem common on these sites where the US and britain fight before ww2 that the US will start unready and never able to stick it out. I would point people to the civil war, both sides. The North was willing to keep fighting regardless of setbacks and casualties while the South held on to the bitter end. Both cases should be applied to the US in this time line, i would suggest. I believe Lincoln was correct when he said that all the hosts of europe and asia could not forcibly take a drink from the ohio after a 1000 year struggle. The Oceans are just too big to bring the number of soldiers to force terms. the US from 1860 and onwards is not the same country it was in 1812.
I think the US would be able to conquer Canada. But I don't think it would be as easy as many seem to think.
Also, I don't think that the US would keep Canada. This is the 18th or 19th century where people annex huge swathes of land. Canadians aren't going to be keen living under American rule. This will have been the third invasion by the Americans. It is important to note that Canadian nationalism in the late 19th and early 20th century was based on their allegiance to Britain and direct opposition to the United States. This was the height of the militia myth building about the War of 1812. Canadians aren't going to be keen to live as Americans. Sure, the US can try and swamp the country with immigrants. This will certainly be easier in the West, but in Ontario, Quebec and the Maritimes it will be difficult as there are already well established populations.
My guess is that the Americans would release Canada, perhaps as a republic, but I think quite likely return it to the Canadians with restrictions on their military (not that it is big anyway) and reparations from Britain. It would be a nightmare for the Americans to annex Canada. It is simply not practicable. Maybe they will annex Western Canada and leave a rump Ontario/Quebec/Maritimes.
Point is that real life isn't a game of HOI where you occupy all the victory points and annex the country.
Fair enough. Loads of problems with the TL I wrote thinking about it. Sorry it more of a thought process that went slightly out of control.
As for France and the Ottomans. I do mention that you would need a much weaker France and a much stronger Russia for the UK to ally with Germany. I would probably set a TL much further back, probably the Napoleonic Age where every couple of years a new government would fall, just to be replaced by the old one or a new one. Keep that going in France for such a long time it wrecks their industry and makes them fairly isolationist in comparison to the rest of Europe. That would make them weak enough for a prepared British and German invasion.
Russia needs to be a a stronger nation for the TL to work. That means the Ottomans need to be weaker. An earlier emergence of Arabic revolts, combined with a worse Crimean War would make the Ottomans much weaker. By the time WW1 starts, they've given up all pretense of empire and gone to being just Turkey for a while now. With the Ottoman threat removed, Russia can focus instead on building a better navy to support it's strength in the black see and building up an industry. Better trade with Arab nations and more open commerce in Asia.
As for the peace. I'm sorry I didn't make it clear with Ukraine, they don't get OTL territory. If anything they are about just less than half the size. Russian controls the (Can't remember name) big river that goes through the center of Ukraine down to the Black Sea. The Crimean Peninsula and anything to the west of the river. Their territory goes as far north of Kyiv. Japan actually only gets a little less than the Manchu territory from OTL. For Russia I wanted to emulate the defeat that Germany had in OTL. That's why the Autumn Charge is such a big for the Allies. The Imperial Forces had finally just been stopped within sight of the two most (arguably) important cities in Russia. The Charge was their do or die throw of the cards. They would either push the Imperial Forces back and defeat their armies utterly. Or Russia would lose the war. It was fighting a war on four fronts and didn't have the manpower left to defend all of them. Granted the USA could have made all the difference, but the one thing I wanted to get across was how difficult it would be to establish a naval superiority. The British couldn't do it in America and if things had carried on they would have lost every port in the Caribbean. The USA couldn't do it either. If it left small convoys of ships get to France or Russia then they would be picked off by the local fleets. The only way they would have gotten troops to France and did so, was with a huge show of numbers. A fleet so huge that the Imperial wouldn't be able to engage them, the problem being it would then have opened up their Atlantic/Pacific shipping to attack.
In my TL the Imperial Forces had no plan to try and take on the USA in it's own backyard, but if the Russians were forced to the table, then the USA would have to accept defeat. You can repeat how the USA was able to out produce both the UK and Japan in naval assets, but could it really out produce that and Germany? The Imperial Forces didn't have to invade the USA, nor wanted to. The US people would not accept to carry on a war that had already been going on for six years, when their Allies had already surrendered and their original reasons lost when Russia Surrendered. That's why the USA actually get's off quite easily. It loses a few islands in the Pacific, cut down on it's naval construction, lose some influence in the Caribbean and is forced to pay reparations to the nations involved.
Sorry, in your scenario, the US won't ever give up Canada even if it lost all its possession outside of North America. Why? It's more valuable than all the little islands of the Pacific and the Carribean, and they know, and with it's manpower and industry, we know, that the UK cannot possibly dislodge the Americans from it.
Canada for the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Hawaii? They'll take it and claim victory!
But my point is that if the US will lose everything outside North America, like the Phillippines, lose it's navy, they will want to have something for it, for all their sacrifices, etc.
And the only thing that they could get is Canada. And if several hundred thousands Americans died in the defense of those islands, people would see to the North as the reason why those soldiers died.
I agree with you with the West, but the US has precedent of holding an unwilling white English speaking population within the Union--the south. If the United States annex Canada, the Maritime states and Ontario and Quebec would be like Texas and the former Confederacy. Still having a proud identity apart of the rest of the United States, but without a hope of becoming independent.
I think you are very wrong with the bombardment of Germany. Germany had a navy at with the size of the coast line they could defend. The US could not do that is coast is to big. The US, how every big it's navy isn't, they will still be outnumbered, at least 4 to 1, more likely 8 to 1.
Agreed, there will be people screaming for some sort of gains. I just don't think it would make sense for an American government to try annex Canada apart from the West.
I understand your comparison to the South and to Texas, but it isn't really the same situation. Texas was predominately made up of American citizens and was only really independent for a decade. The former Confederacy had some 5+ years of bad blood. After that, the US government basically let them go back to the way things were.
The situation with Canada is quite different. Here we have a country created specifically so that the colonies wouldn't be part of the USA. Remember Quebec was paranoid of being swallowed up by Anglo dominated culture, hence why they joined with Canada. Generally, the Canadian and British governments were quite open to French Canada (although not necessarily Anglo Canadians as a whole). Remember too, that there is the influence of the loyalists, at this time it is ht height of their power and dominance in Canadian society. I just don't think it really makes sense for the Americans to try and annex Central and Eastern Canada.
Would this militant USA be willing to put the unruly loyalists into some reservations? if not outright expulsion?