Alternate history: what if…?
Turning points of history, rewritten era by era: how the world map, the wars and everyday life would have changed. Open any of them on the interactive map, or write your own.
What if Mao died cycling in 1940?
1940 · The Republic That Refused To Die
Mao Zedong dies in a cycling accident in Yan'an, preventing his later rise to absolute leadership within the CCP and transforming China's civil war and postwar order.
What if the Library of Alexandria never burned?
48 · The Lamps of Alexandria
Caesar’s siege damages but does not destroy the Library of Alexandria; it survives as a continuously funded, self-conscious world institution into Late Antiquity.
What if Napoleon won at Waterloo?
1815 · The Long Napoleonic Century
Napoleon concentrates on Wellington, crushes the Anglo‑Allied army at Waterloo, and forces a negotiated peace that preserves a diminished French Empire.
What if the Mongols conquered Japan in 1281?
1281 · Sakura under the Steppe Banner
Kublai Khan’s second invasion of Japan succeeds after typhoons weaken but do not destroy the Yuan fleet, leading to a Mongol-Yuan conquest of Kyushu and eventual subjugation of the Japanese archipelago.
What if Columbus's ships sank in 1492?
1492 · The Ocean That Stayed Wide
Columbus’s three ships founder in mid‑Atlantic in 1492, killing the crews and discouraging further westward expeditions for decades.
What if the USSR won the space race to the Moon?
1961 · Red Moon Rising: A World Where the USSR Got There First
Khrushchev doubles down on Korolev’s N1-L3 program in 1961, reorganizing Soviet industry around a crash lunar effort that fixes the N1 and puts a Soviet crew on the Moon before Apollo.
What if Kazakhstan was the only remaining nation of the Soviet Union, and Kazakhstan became the Soviet Union, and the Soviet Union reformed to a democratic and capitalist country, now the Soviet Union is one of the Western countries and Russia is competing with the Soviet Union?
1991 · The Democratic Soviet Commonwealth
When the Soviet Union dissolved, Kazakhstan became its sole recognized successor and reformed the Union into a democratic, capitalist state rather than allowing Russia to inherit the Soviet name and institutions.
What if Texas seceded from the States?
1861 · The Lone Star Century
Texas declares itself an independent republic instead of joining the Confederacy, forcing both Washington and Richmond to fight the Civil War without its manpower, ports, and vast western frontier.
What if Operation Barbarossa was successful?
1941 · The Long Shadow of the Eastern Victory
Germany’s 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union achieves its operational aims, capturing Moscow, severing Soviet communications, and forcing the Soviet government into a collapse east of the Urals.
What if a nuclear bomb was used during the Korean War?
1951 · The Broken Taboo
On 6 March 1951, the United States drops a single atomic bomb on a Chinese military supply complex near Sunchon in North Korea during the Korean War.
What if the 4th plane in 9/11 reached its target?
2001 · The Fourth Impact: America’s Long Emergency
United Flight 93 hits the U.S. Capitol, killing hundreds of lawmakers and triggering a far deeper, stranger global reaction to 9/11.
What if NASA's Constellation program happened?
2009 · Orion Rising: A Real Second Space Age
The Obama administration, swayed by an international coalition proposal and a slimmer redesign, preserves NASA’s Constellation lunar program instead of cancelling it.
What if Democrats won the 2016 elections and the 2024 elections?
2016 · The Long Blue Interregnum
Hillary Clinton narrowly wins the 2016 U.S. presidential election, and Democrats also hold the White House in 2024.
What if Malta conquered Libya in 2002?
2002 · The Maltese Sea Empire and the Green Desert Wars
A coup-born Maltese junta, bankrolled by a messianic oil trader and armed with covert NATO help, topples Libya in a lightning amphibious war.
What if Finland won the Continuation War?
1944 · White Lakes, Black Gold: A Greater Finland Survives
Finland’s June 1944 counteroffensive on the Karelian Isthmus succeeds spectacularly, forcing a much more favorable peace that gives Helsinki decisive leverage versus both Moscow and Berlin.
What if Italy was divided into north, central, and south, with each region subdivided into east and west: North East and North West, Central East and Central West, South East and South West?
1861 · The Six Italies: A Peninsula of Republics
During unification, the Italian elite accepts a radical federal compromise, creating six semi-sovereign Italian republics—North-West, North-East, Central-West, Central-East, South-West and South-East—instead of a…
What if the Black Death never reached Europe?
1347 · The Plague That Never Came
The Black Death remains confined to Central Asia and the Middle East, never penetrating Europe, due to an unusually harsh winter in the Caucasus, disrupted trade through the Black Sea, and early quarantines around…
What if the Swedish-proposed Nordic Defence Alliance became reality, and in the late 1970s the Soviets and the Warsaw Pact declared war?
1949 · Cold North, Hot War
Sweden persuades Norway and Denmark to stay out of NATO and form a neutral but armed Nordic Defence Alliance (NDA), which later draws Finland in—creating a unified Nordic bloc whose existence helps trigger a Warsaw…
What if Mussolini restored the Roman Empire?
1926 · SPQR 2.0: Mussolini’s Mediterranean Empire
Mussolini pursues a pragmatic, navy‑first strategy and patiently builds a Mediterranean colonial ‘Roman Empire’ instead of chasing early adventurism and autarky.
What if the Muscovites surrender to the Poles in 1610?
1610 · The Eagle over the Kremlin
The Moscow boyars accept Polish Prince Władysław as tsar in 1610 and Muscovite resistance collapses, creating a durable Polish–Lithuanian-led “Roman” union over Russia.
What if Leonardo da Vinci discovers electricity?
1508 · The Lightning Notebooks of Leonardo
Leonardo da Vinci accidentally generates sustained electrical arcs and recognizes electricity as a manipulable force, documenting practical methods centuries early.