The possibility of Different WWI Alliances and their results?

The North's superior industry would mean that either the South won fast or not at all.

In a war of attrition, the side with the largest population and industry wins. Unless the other side does a full-blown blitzkrieg and achieves all military objectives during the first 6-10 months, the smaller side loses.

edited 12th May '11 10:00:18 AM by SavageHeathen

Seems my original idea about WWI is more logic then. Same alliances as real world, but keep my idea of a neutral and divided America. I probably have to use the Ottomans instead of the Byzantines. I REALLY wanted to use them...

I plan to end the war in 1917 after the warring nations, horrified by the casualities, go with a much cheaper peace for The Central Powers, but Austria doesn't benefit, since it is allready falling apart and only manages to salvage a weakened Austria and Checozovakia, only to later merging volounterly with the Second Reich in the early 1920s.This cheap peace would take away much of the latter support for a certain wellknown Austrian corporal.

Russia have, starting a few decades earlier, started to modernize and slightly demochraticize the country and manages to narrowly avoid the more extreme part of the revolution, becoming a constitutional monarchy instead of a communist republic.

^^ That's how it usually goes. In some cases, a war of attrition is unsustainable for the larger populace.

Case in point 1930s China during the Second Sino Japanese War. Neither the Nationalists nor Communists would have been able to hold out forever against the IJA and IJN without foreign assistance and intervention. The Chinese could outnumber the Japanese 5 to 1 yet without foreign assistance, they were still losing in the long run. (Post 1941, Japanese assets were rapidly being diverted from China to shunt the Americans who had both superior quality equipment and superior quantity. Both major uphill challenges to beat in a war of attrition.)

Why do you want to use the Byzantines? Do you want more Greek power? You can certainly find a way to work that into the mix.