Timelines of fate.

[kvnchrist]

I've always wondered just what the world would look like If the Partitioning of the Ottoman empire had been left to those who lived there instead of The Western powers.

Would there have been the invasion and colonization and the creation of puppet regimes, loyal more to their handlers than their own countrymen.

Would the rest of the Western world have industrialized so fast, gorging itself on Middle Eastern oil, and would we be the centers of commerce that we are today?

Would the creation of the state of Israel ever been and the subsequent wars that followed?

Would the Arab Spring have been necessary and the rise of terrorism before that?

[Vagrant0]

Arabic influences in the Middle East were hardly warm, cuddly, and peaceful in the centuries before WWI, so while Israel may have not been founded there would still likely be a fanatical element that considers the West as infidels. About the only difference would have been that Germany would have another super power (Ottoman Empire) joining them who already controlled the Middle East and Northern Africa, which would have allowed them to focus on their conquest of Europe without having to be too concerned about Russia or maintaining access to the oil supply from Africa. WWII would have still happened as the underlying cause (Germany invading Poland to reclaim lands that belonged to them, combined with the Great Depression), with the only difference being in who the major players were. The Axis powers would have probably won that war, with the world being carved up a different way.

 

With WWII being the major cause of rapid industrialization, the world would still have a strong dependence on Middle Eastern oil, making the Ottoman Empire in perfect position to maintain an even stronger grip on the oil market than the current group of individual countries could ever dream of having. This would quickly lead into WWIII and what would likely be a very bad nuclear result.

[kvnchrist]

Arabic influences in the Middle East were hardly warm, cuddly, and peaceful in the centuries before WWI, so while Israel may have not been founded there would still likely be a fanatical element that considers the West as infidels. About the only difference would have been that Germany would have another super power (Ottoman Empire) joining them who already controlled the Middle East and Northern Africa, which would have allowed them to focus on their conquest of Europe without having to be too concerned about Russia or maintaining access to the oil supply from Africa. WWII would have still happened as the underlying cause (Germany invading Poland to reclaim lands that belonged to them, combined with the Great Depression), with the only difference being in who the major players were. The Axis powers would have probably won that war, with the world being carved up a different way. With WWII being the major cause of rapid industrialization, the world would still have a strong dependence on Middle Eastern oil, making the Ottoman Empire in perfect position to maintain an even stronger grip on the oil market than the current group of individual countries could ever dream of having. This would quickly lead into WWIII and what would likely be a very bad nuclear result.

 

 

Sorry, I was not saying the Ottoman Empire should have surived. I was talking about the West carving up the Middle East in a way that they could control it.

 

The Western powers probably would have continued on but without strategically placed puppet regimes selling them cheep oil at the expense of their own citizens, would they have accelerated any faster than those countries without a finger in the till?

 

Also, their are fanatics everywhere, but would the Arabs be as concentrated on West If we had not been over there, colonizing them and pushing our way of life as if ours was better instead of just more familiar and comfortable for us to visualize.

 

Would the Arab spring or any of these religious upheavals been necessary If the Arabs where to have set up their own countries?