A big 'what if'!

The Fishman

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In the early 1900s, a comet fragment exploded over Siberia, devastating hundreds of miles of forest. We call this the Tunguska event today. It didn't damage Russia much, and it was not until the 1920s that an expedition was even sent to investigate it.

But what if the bolide reached earth only a few hours earlier, and instead of exploding above a remote forest, it destroyed Moscow? How would events such as the First World War and the Russian revolution plan out then?

If Russia was devastated by a disaster of that magnitude, I wouldn't really expect them to want to go to war with somebody else for a long time, so maybe WWI would have been adverted.

Prehaps they would keep increasing their infrastructure and industry and end up fighting with Britain directly over the issue about the German navy?
 
Well, the comet wasn't big enough to completely destroy Moscow, and at the time the capitol was at St. Petersburg, which was also a main center for the Russian revolution. Still, interesting idea. Perhaps the tzarist government would be so bad at handling the situation that the Communist revolution would have predated WWI...
 
If St. Petersburg had been destroyed in 1908, you can probably expect a redux of the earlier Revolution of '05, with an attendant Austro-German intervention and a possible war between Austria and Germany on the one side and France and 'Russia' on the other. It is doubtful that the Germans, turning east as they would, would be interested in launching the Schlieffen Plan, so Britain has essentially got no reason to go to war with the 'Central Powers' and may even join them in destabilizing Russia's position in Central Asia. The Great Game only ended a short while ago, after all, and Britain may wish to have fun in Persia. They might not even join the war at all of course.

But yeah, instant global war. GG.
 
What other cities lie on the latitude of the Tunguska impact?
 
What other cities lie on the latitude of the Tunguska impact?

Helsinki and Oslo are close.

Such events would serve to shaken the peoples' faith in the Monarchy, for sure. But it probably won't be enough to really change the course of WWI (assuming the Tsar survived until 1914).
 
....so maybe WWI would have been adverted.

well... I don't think World War I would've been adverted, but...
France wouldn't be France..... it might be part of Germany, because if Germany had 100% of its forces fighting France, I think Germany could've won the war. this would've prevented WWII, but then again.... France wouldn't be much. Germany today I'd imagine would be more powerful, and perhaps more could've been done to stop spread of Communism in Russia, and perhaps the Soviet Union might've never been formed.
 
Well nothing I suppose. In Russia at least. The blast will however seriously shake the deeply religious people of Russia
 
What other cities lie on the latitude of the Tunguska impact?

Hey, this is a great "what if"! And as we're assuming it was caused by a meteor or comet strike we can find more interesting impact sites - anywhere on the planet.

What if it had landed on London? Would the British empire move its capital somewhere else and survive, or break apart?

What if it landed around Berlin? Would WW1 have been avoided altogether? And might the Austrians revert their loss of influence to the new German Empire?
 
If you look at the series of events that led up to WWI I would say that a weakened russia would have completely avoided the whole war. If the black hand still goes ahead and kills the Archduke, and serbia gets all ballsy and PO's the Austro-hungarian empire as they did, then with russia not partaking, there's nothing to stop the AH empire from just crushing serbia and the whole problem ends right there. The only reason Germany was brought in was that they agreed to help the Austrians against the russians, so no russia=no german involvment. and the only reason France showed up to the party was an alliance with russia, so again, no Russia=No france, and the only reason Britain got into it was they had a treaty in 1815 with the belgians to guarantee their soverignty, so no germans, no french=no germans going through belgium to france=no brits. The whole think stops with russia IMO
 
I don't imagine the impact itself would lead to the collapse of Russia but the likelihood of government incompetence combined with a religous populace seeing the impact as a withdrawal of divine right could've lead to revolution. Probably not a successful Bolshevik one- I think it took the damage of WWI to make the Russian people that desperate- but quite possibly a replacement of the Cazarist regime by either a constitutional monarchy or a full republic.
If nothing else, if Russia received considerable damage to one of it's major industrial centres it may have less aggressive in the Balkans, possibly delaying or even preventing WWI.

What if it had landed on London? Would the British empire move its capital somewhere else and survive, or break apart?
Well, they managed to burn down half the bloody town a couple of centuries before hand, and the Germans did it again a few decades later. Apparently Londoners have a knack for survival. ;)
Seriously, though, Britain's democratic system and widespread industrialised cities would mean that even complete devastation in London would not cause a collapse of the nation, although it would probably cause a lot of chaos. The Empire itself would survive initially- colonies were never directly administrated from London, after all- but it seems likely that independence movements would take the chance to try and break away. Ireland especially was itching for a moment of British weakness- which it historically found during WWI- and the stretched resources that such a disaster would leave would be the perfect opportunity.
 
So let us assume that either Moscow or Sankt Petersburg would have been destroyed. First of all Russia would have been weakened, and it would have reduced its aspirations at the Balkans. This would have reduced the tensions between Russia and Austria-Hungary. But this would not have made the situation on the Balkans more peaceful, as every ethnic group there had some issues to settle with its neigbours. Indeed, there were two Balkan wars in 1912/13, without (direct) participation of russia. So in this situation Austria-Hungary might have tried to get more territorial gains. This might have made this already boiling ethnic mixture of austria-hungary more fragile, with everything possible up to a civil war.
But let us assume that a whole-european war would have been delayed, just because of the critical role russia played at the actual outbreak of WW1. in germany two things would have happend that didn't happen due to the WW1. The german fleet programm, which enraged the british empire, was already seen as a failure just before the world war, as it neither pressed the united kingdom in a alliance nor would be able to protect germanys trading routes. in the best case, germany would have reduced its fleet program and this conflict with the united kingdom would have ceased over time. in the worst case, germany would have tried to adapt its fleet programm and thus the conflict would have remaind. In the domestic politics conflicts between reforming forces (among them the social democrats which just got 40%+ seats in the last election before the war) and the militaristic conservatives threatened to paralize the german empire. With the grat war being delayed just for some years, reforms of the very restrictive constitution of the german empire would have been ineviatable. Under certain circumstances, this might have lead to a constitution were germany would have been ruled more by the people and less by the military and the emperor. This then might lead to a far less agressive tone toward the other great powers. But the so called hereditary enemyship between france and germany would have still remaind, as this was still in the heads of the people of both nations.

In this alternate history it would be hard to predict who would lead the next war. most certainly france and the german empire (even a more "liberal" empire) would sooner or later clash. Britain would surely join france, because even if the direct enemyship between germany and the british empire would have ceased, the prospect of having a german hegemony over continental europe would not be acceptabel by the Britains. Austria-Hungary (if it still excistet...) would join germany, as many of its people were german by culture and still mentally connectet to the german empire (the feelings of the non-german people about this would be a major problem for austria-hungary). Russias actions would depend on how the Sankt Petersburg/Moscow event would have affectet the empire. Likely it would still try to rebuild and ignore the war, perhaps it would join the war but remain weaker than it was in the actual WW1. Perhaps the russian empire would be in a state of cofusion or chaos and ignore the war, but this would mean a complete redirection of the foregin policys of all the other empires, making my speculations completely pointless ;). The USA would not join the war at all, as i think a less militaristic germany would not attack us civilian ships (and even during WW1 it took three years to engage the war). Italy and the Ottoman Empire are the hardest to predict. The ottoman empire would most certainly not join the allied side if the russians were part of it. In WW1 its parlament very very barely deciedet to side with the germans, so the ottomans would either remain neutral or perhaps join the german side. Italy might join if the allied were the aggressors, otherwise it might behave pretty much as it did during WW1, not joining germany and joining the allied if the other powers would offer something.
 
I thought the comet theory was discredited. Not that it matters. A volcanic disaster would serve as well.

I dont think it would have reduced tensions between the Germanic peoples and the Russians, so much as provide an opportunity. Losing Moscow would ahve gutted the Russian command structure, both military and civilian. Given the times, an invasion would have followed, probably through a protesting Poland.

J
 
If you look at the series of events that led up to WWI I would say that a weakened russia would have completely avoided the whole war. If the black hand still goes ahead and kills the Archduke, and serbia gets all ballsy and PO's the Austro-hungarian empire as they did, then with russia not partaking, there's nothing to stop the AH empire from just crushing serbia and the whole problem ends right there. The only reason Germany was brought in was that they agreed to help the Austrians against the russians, so no russia=no german involvment. and the only reason France showed up to the party was an alliance with russia, so again, no Russia=No france, and the only reason Britain got into it was they had a treaty in 1815 with the belgians to guarantee their soverignty, so no germans, no french=no germans going through belgium to france=no brits. The whole think stops with russia IMO

But that only works if the meteor actually caused serious damage to the Russian gov't and weakened the tsar to the point where the Communist Revolution happened early, went isolationist, and didn't get involved. Still pretty credible.
 
Ok, i forgot Poland^^

If the russian government would have been weakend enough the empire might have split apart into many nations or at least would have become as fragile as the austria-hungary monarchy was. I'd say that there is a possibility that in the case that the different nationalities would try to break apart outside forces might have tried to reverse this. Especially the independence of the Polands of Russia would have caused much concern in Germany and Austria-Hungary, as these countries had big polish minorities as well (actually, similar situations regarding the opression of polands happened several times in the 19th century).

The event of whole metropolis suddenly being eliminatet by whatever might also caused a wave of shock and solidary through the whole world, as it happened after the earthquake of Lissabon in 1755.
 
Which didn't, technically, exist at this time. :p
Sure it did, kinda, although in a state which would probably have the Poles seeing German and Austrian invaders as liberators rather than oppressors.

I mean, for about a week or so. You know how these things generally go. :p
 
If the Tunguska event had happened over St. Petersburg, all the major powers, and many of the minor ones, would have sent scientic ecpeditions to Russia to try and figure out what the h**l happened! The world would probably have been so fasincated by it, that WW1 would have been forgotten. On the other hand, does anyone have any figures on how many people lived in that area and what % of Russia's industry and infrastructure was there?
 
If the Tunguska event had happened over St. Petersburg, all the major powers, and many of the minor ones, would have sent scientic ecpeditions to Russia to try and figure out what the h**l happened! The world would probably have been so fasincated by it, that WW1 would have been forgotten.
I doubt the world would be so fascinated by a meteorite impact as to abandon all interest in geopolitics, regardless of where it landed.
 
I'll tell you one thing for sure, we'd have built a defense against such collisions by now! Any day now, we could get hit. We had a near-miss a few years ago when something big flew between Earth and Moon and we didn't see it until after the fact, and there's a good chance of impact in 2029 that we're not taking seriously yet. You can bet a wiped out city by a multi-megaton blast would have changed a few attitudes about space!
 
What if it kills the archduke of austria and austria invades space?
 
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