It is the 1890's in a world where France, Prussia, Austria, and Denmark-Norway were successful in their invasion of Russia and reconstitution of the Kingdom of Poland. Sweden gained control of Finland and a French client Cossack Hetmanate was created in modern-day Ukraine.
The British still turned Napoleon back in Iberia, restoring the crumbling edifice of the Spanish Empire for a little while. More importantly, the United States lost its independence in the war of 1812 (ultimately leading to the Commonwealth of North America becoming an equal partner in the Anglo-American Union), with Andrew Jackson declaring the Louisiana Purchase and captured Spanish territory in New Orleans and Florida to be an independent nation, which was promptly recognized by France.
The Austrian Empire, itself a creation in response to the Hapsburgs loss of the Holy Roman Empire to Napoleon's Confederation of the Rhine, proves to only be the tip of Hapsburg opportunism as, without Russia as the defender or interloper of Slavic independence, the Hapsburgs turn the Eastern Question of Balkan independence from the Ottoman Empire into a route of European Turkey. To cement the deal, the Hapsburgs convert to Orthodox Christianity and are declared Emperors of Rome in Istanbul (once again Constantinople), in what is called by the outside world The (new) Byzantine Empire.
The Prussians maintain their independence from the Rhine Confederation and, in a delicate situation in their region, are more trouble-makers than conquerors - agitating Bohemian nationalists against the Byzantines, pulling Poland out of the French sphere and into their own common market, and remaking the borders of Sweden, Denmark-Norway, the Cossack Hetmanate, and Russia (a weak constitutional kingdom after its humiliation by Napoleon and subsequent serf uprisings and military coups) more to its liking in a war that impresses the world.
The Boer's Cape Republic established in these alternate Napoleonic Wars is eventually sold out by France to the Zulus to create a strong counter to British interloping in South Africa.
The weakness of the rump Anatolian kingdom (after losing European Turkey to the Byzantines and the Khedivate of Egypt to the French sphere of influence in the makings of the recent Suez Canal) makes the Persian Empire the strongest force in the Islamic world by default, which has ramifications in terms of religious sectarianism and what language is used for printing most commonly in that part of the world.
The Firanji Raj in India and the French protectorate of New Holland compete with the Anglo-Americans' New South Wales and East Indies, with Louisiana eyeing Spanish Cuba and Puerto Rico and now the Philippines (from their purchased territory in Alaska and their satellite, the Japanese Shogunate). Pacific conquest will be difficult if the Anglo-Americans don't let them take on coal in Hawaii, of course.
China has, as Napoleon predicted, astonished the world and is modernizing and securing its tributaries into a stronger imperial structure in Indochina and Korea (after having defeated the Anglo-Americans there).
Insurgency is a constant problem. The French in Canada were outbred and that language nearly eradicated there, but the Irish Question is an eternal problem for Anglo-America. Protestant rebellion in the Kingdom of Holland is a similar situation for Franco-Italy (as is the island of Sicily's continued failure to peacefully accept Italian law under the Bonapartes).
That sounds fuckin cool.
Im glad that the americans saw sense.
The Franco-Italians (with the Bonaparte main branch being both emperors of France and Kings of Rome, personal union between France and Italy was natural) control much of the territory that was British in our world's history (Egypt and the Suez Canal, India) with the British having the Dutch East Indies in addition to Malaya/Singapore and North and West Africa instead of the French (with their perpetual ally Spain as a staging area), but this has made the 1890's new imperialism and scramble for africa rather less of a shrinking of the relative size of the world in terms of travel than it was in real history.
Franco-Italy is less interested in good rail networks that run on time than the British (Anglo-Americans in this world), and the Anglo-Americans are less willing to think of Algeria as part of their core territory than France was in our world. So most of the empires are less built up than they were by this time in actual history. And with an outright cold war between two (three with the Byzantines) major empires rather than a great game between Britain and outmatched Russia, the intrigue and reliance on loyal local princes is increased; meaning there is even more regional autonomy and hodgepodge diversity of law and custom in the colonies than there was in real history. The French don't care if some Indian principalities burn the wives of the dead princes, and Anglo-American capitalism is a more chaotic master than the White Man's Burden of our world.
>Algeria
>Not French.
>>44089415
>Sweden gained control of Finland
You mean regained. What about Kurland, Livland, Estland, Ingria and Karelia?
>reconstitution of the Kingdom of Poland
What about Duchy of Warsaw? Lithuania? What about the French client Cossack Hetmanate was created in modern-day Ukraine? What about the eastern border?
Prussia manages the following:
>pulling Poland out of the French sphere and into their own common market
>agitating Bohemian nationalists against the Byzantines
>remaking the borders of Sweden, Denmark-Norway, the Cossack Hetmanate, and Russia
all while in a "in a delicate situation in their region". How the fuck.
>loss of the Holy Roman Empire
To what degree had they even had it in the first place? If it's just a question of influence, why would they stop attempting to regain it?
>European Turkey
What shit is this?
>the Eastern Question
What do the other powers think of this? Wouldn't they start a containment war?
>To cement the deal, the Hapsburgs convert to Orthodox Christianity and are declared Emperors of Rome in Istanbul (once again Constantinople), in what is called by the outside world The (new) Byzantine Empire.
Everything about this is shit. I don't even.>Greeks still get a German monarch
top kek
>>44089742
HRE was ended by the Napoleonic Wars in real history dude, that's how the Austrian Empire came about.
Kingdom of Poland is the same project, of the same German king, as the Duchy of Warsaw. Napoleon and him wanted to reconstitute that state, and it was a good justification for invading Russia to reimpose the continental system upon them (which I don't even predict in this timeline as being successful, Russia isn't pulled into the French sphere of influence/common market, it is just knocked to the rank of secondary power but not a protectorate/satellite).
>>44089986
Also I don't think Britain would team up with a surviving French Empire to stop Austria from kicking the Ottomans in the teeth. With Russia cut down to size previously, there wouldn't really be anyone to stop Austria but the French, and the French can be beaten. It makes sense for an empire to lose now and then. And Italians would just want to take back key territory from Austria and leave it at that rather than march all the way to Vienna to save the Ottomans. So maybe Austria trades parts of Northeast Italy back to the Italian Kingdom, I don't know.
>>44089415
What is this British wankery?
>>44090112
Europe gets too crazy and they be like "peace, I'm out" and Canada be like "word".
This is absurd.
