Wrapped in Flames: The Great American War and Beyond

[mundi_mundi]

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Still not as cold as US/UK relations after the Fenian Raids.

 

[Icedaemon]

I am guessing that the crew of the Shannon will be hanged as pirates and the US will, after some blustering, look for opportunities to find someone they can claim were mere pirates somewhere soon along the line.

 

[EnglishCanuck]

This is great as usual @EnglishCanuck, please keep it up. Personally I'm also desperately curious to see how we dodge a second US/UK war here... wait have you actually confirmed this doesn't turn into another war?

Oh I absolutely will! Of that you need have no fear!

And well... I can say that this particular instance is not going to spiral into war.

Do you have a real-world parallel for how you see your alt Canada developing? I get some shades of Finland:

• Low pop density,
• Agrarian with some industry,
• Militarised out of suspicion of a much larger neighbour who they've got 'history' with; and
• A risk of being part of larger countries' power games.

Also, cold.

Those are all pretty apt comparisons! Canada of WiF is going to be a very different place, as we will see, despite John A. Macdonald desperately trying to stuff the genie of militarism back in the bottle. Unfortunately for him, the 1860s are going to be very defined by the need for Canada to have a robust volunteer military apparatus which he must continue to contend with. That means that men seeking military appointment (unlike OTL) will command political and social respect in a way that was unusual to Canada in this time period. He has some tricks up his sleeve for trying to dilute that as we'll see...

As for low population density, check! Agrarian with some industry, mostly check. Canada fell almost too neatly into the 10% of the population urbanized and 90% rural/semi-rural supporting agriculture in this time period. Most of that agriculture is in Canada West, while they gaze longingly at the plains they want to settle. That will play a part in the militarism too.

And oh boy are they at risk of great power games!

Still not as cold as US/UK relations after the Fenian Raids.

Oh most certainly not. US-UK relations will be quite frosty for a while thanks to all this.

 

[EnglishCanuck]

I am guessing that the crew of the Shannon will be hanged as pirates and the US will, after some blustering, look for opportunities to find someone they can claim were mere pirates somewhere soon along the line.

There's going to be something that the US will decry as an atrocity, but overall the two sides are working to extricate themselves from a sticky situation. Britain will have her pound of flesh, but in a way that makes things interesting on another side of the world!