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In this scenario the dogger bank incident is somewhat worse and ends in the British Empire declaring war on the Russian Empire in support with Japan.

What happens?

Zor

Russia folds immediately, preserves its fleet. Meanwhile Japan might actually lose the land war. War ends with minimal gains by Japan.

As Thanas said, Russia wouldn't have had the will for a fight against a major European power, especially since it is unlikely they would have been able to garner any European allies to aid them in that fight (the rest of the European powers were already critical of Russia's actions at Dogger Bank; and, in fact, Dogger Bank wasn't the only incident during that ill-fated fleet's cruise in which it opened fire on civilian vessels; IIRC they also fired at some Danish fisherman before they reached Dogger Bank, and then some other assorted merchantmen near Tangiers not long after).

Really, the main reason the war even happened (well, besides general Russian expansionism and their continued interest in warm-water ports) was that Japan was considered a second-rate power that Russia could bully into submission relatively quickly, just as they had with China several years prior. With the unstable political situation in Russia, France's recent entente with Britain, it seems highly unlikely that they would have pursued a war with Europe.

Interestingly, if Britain had entered the war, and forced Russia to immediately concede to avoid such a major war, there would have been interesting consequences in the lead up to World War I, as Russia's historical trajectory changes immensely without the devastating loss to Japan.

would Japan's historical trajectory also change? Would they have supported GB in WW1?

They already did, and there would be no reason for them to change their minds...

well I'm an idiot.

WWI most likely ends in a Central Powers victory then as the Russians would take steps to renew their alliance with Germany. With Germany and Austria not being forced to spent their army strength in Eastern Europe, France and Italy do not really stand a chance.

Thanas wrote:WWI most likely ends in a Central Powers victory then as the Russians would take steps to renew their alliance with Germany. With Germany and Austria not being forced to spent their army strength in Eastern Europe, France and Italy do not really stand a chance.

With a Russo-German alliance I doubt there would be a WW1 even remotely resembling ours, given that it was effectively started by the Kaiser sticking his nose into Serbian/Russian - Austrian squabble.

True, though I believe the tension would have boiled over at some point anyway.

That is probably inevitable, but if Russia does renew it's alliance with Germany then it may not enter an alliance with France, so even if the mess in the Balkans does pit Germany and Russia against each other, neither Britain nor France have a reason to intervene so Germany may not be compelled to try it's grand plan to eliminate France before Russia mobilises.

So there may well be a major war in Europe, but it may not drag in France or Britain. Which means no two-front war and no British blockade of Germany, so I would think Russia will lose, and lose badly, earlier than they did IRL.

It depends on how imperialistic the Kaiser was feeling and how willing Nicky was to stand firm on his alliance with the Serbs. Conceivably, it could've turned into a brief punitive action by the Austrians against the Serbs, quickly seen off by a Russian deployment, and Wilhelm tells Franz to sit the fuck back down. A Russo-German alliance would have severely blunted the West's willingness to stand against the Central Powers given the sheer mass of manpower the Russians could've thrown at the front, permitting the higher caliber German troops flexibility for movement around the entrenched areas of the Western Front. And of course, without having to fight the Russians, the Germans and Austrians would have been able to deploy even more troops on the West... it would have been a very different WWI indeed.

A WWI that was just Germany/Austria versus Russia would have been a rather lopsided smackdown for the Russians, opening the possibility of either an earlier revolution or a more brutal WWI/II combined with Imperial Germany in the place of the Nazis.

Or they push towards the alliance with France, as a consequence of which France and England never join into an alliance, thus WWI is fought on the continent only. That would also result in a Central Powers victory.

Would that not be a better long-term result though? A shorter war on the continent means less devastation and Germany doesn't become the place that's able to spawn the Nazis twenty years later, Britain and Germany aren't saddled with huge war debts or reparations afterwards either.

OTOH it also means Russia keeps oppressing other nations, no Poland, no Czech Republic etc.

True, though that presupposes the German-Russian alliance remains together for long after the war.

Why wouldn't it? After becoming the dominant alliance of EurASIA, they would be stupid to sever ties. Especially since the bane in their relationship after WW1 was communism. With WW1 seeing them as allies, Germany would never ship Lenin to Russia, and would not support him. Even if he goes there and starts preaching, without a devastating loss in WW1, the zar would not be in such a precarious situation to make a rebellion viable. Without Russia turning communist, Lenin's ideas might fizzle out as an interesting thought experiment, and we might look at a world where communist states never existed.

Good points. Conceded.

Zor wrote:In this scenario the dogger bank incident is somewhat worse and ends in the British Empire declaring war on the Russian Empire in support with Japan.

What happens?

Zor

The Royal Navy trounces the Second Pacific Squadron before it leaves the English Channel, and intervenes on land in Korea to fight alongside Japanese forces, Russia sues for peace, so it can devote its energies to stablizing their internal situation, and the Anglo-Japanese Alliance possibly survives into the 1930s.

Or, possibly the Japanese are humiliated at having to have a European power aid them militarily and the alliance is even more short-lived than it was historically.

LaCroix wrote:Why wouldn't it? After becoming the dominant alliance of EurASIA, they would be stupid to sever ties. Especially since the bane in their relationship after WW1 was communism. With WW1 seeing them as allies, Germany would never ship Lenin to Russia, and would not support him. Even if he goes there and starts preaching, without a devastating loss in WW1, the zar would not be in such a precarious situation to make a rebellion viable. Without Russia turning communist, Lenin's ideas might fizzle out as an interesting thought experiment, and we might look at a world where communist states never existed.

While it's true that the revolution as happened historically was dependent on the circumstances of World War I, it's not like Russia was a paragon of political stability before the war. Even prior to WWI Russia had several decades of unrest and discontent; I have a hard time believing that it would simply go away. I think some sort of revolution in Russia was essentially inevitable, unless a particularly liberal Czar came into power.

Ziggy Stardust wrote:

LaCroix wrote:Why wouldn't it? After becoming the dominant alliance of EurASIA, they would be stupid to sever ties. Especially since the bane in their relationship after WW1 was communism. With WW1 seeing them as allies, Germany would never ship Lenin to Russia, and would not support him. Even if he goes there and starts preaching, without a devastating loss in WW1, the zar would not be in such a precarious situation to make a rebellion viable. Without Russia turning communist, Lenin's ideas might fizzle out as an interesting thought experiment, and we might look at a world where communist states never existed.

While it's true that the revolution as happened historically was dependent on the circumstances of World War I, it's not like Russia was a paragon of political stability before the war. Even prior to WWI Russia had several decades of unrest and discontent; I have a hard time believing that it would simply go away. I think some sort of revolution in Russia was essentially inevitable, unless a particularly liberal Czar came into power.

I believe this is pretty much the consensus, yeah. Nicholas had a decent start but he couldn't stand on his own for shit. He might have been able to finish out his reign with the support of the nobility, and if the West wasn't involved in a war, they might have been able to support him for some time (kings standing together to keep the commoners from getting uppity, all that bullshit). A social change was on the brink in Russia, though, and that wouldn't change without severe repressions. A democratic revolution at some point, or perhaps the Bolsheviks, or the Mensheviks... Who the hell knows. We might be seeing a change of state sometime in the 1930s or 40s. Quite possibly a fracturing of the western holdings of Russia including Ukraine and Belarus, too.

But really the circumstances in which that might happen is a pretty massive change of affairs. It's a bit too difficult to really tell what might have happened after that point (changing the state of the world pre-WWI).

But really the circumstances in which that might happen is a pretty massive change of affairs. It's a bit too difficult to really tell what might have happened after that point (changing the state of the world pre-WWI).

I agree. There are just way too many variables involved, even if you make the already incredibly optimistic assumption of all else being equal besides WWI. But I just personally think the least realistic scenario is the "lasting happy Russo-German alliance that conquers Europe and destroys communism forever lol".

I do believe that Germany would be very interested in stabilizing Russia in case of such a fruitious alliance. The Zar would very likely lend an ear to what his cousin would advise him to do. If some of the reforms Germany enacted, already, were carried out in Russia, too, things would look quite different.
(Same for Austria - to survive, there would be some reforms needed, too.)

But without the gargantuan political pressure of huge losses to a meat-grinding war you lost, the population will be much less upset with their rulers, which makes stabilizing the countries much easier.

Hard to tell, though.

I wonder if this would have a serious impact on Japan in the long run if the Russians just surrender to the British without losing anything?

I could see it not having quite as strong of an impact in terms of strengthening the military politically, which might thus avert WW2 in the Pacific.

Adam Reynolds wrote:I wonder if this would have a serious impact on Japan in the long run if the Russians just surrender to the British without losing anything?

I could see it not having quite as strong of an impact in terms of strengthening the military politically, which might thus avert WW2 in the Pacific.

If a Russian surrender to Great Britain leaves the situation unresolved between Russia and Japan, it might set the stage for a second, bloodier Russo-Japanese conflict later down the road.

Or, it might still embolden the military, especially on the heels of the wildly successful(and one-sided)war with China in the 1890s. And, there will still be the resentment toward the United States which was one of the root causes of the war in the Pacific.