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The original topic starter mentioned the British Empire trying to expand across the Bering Strait in a hypothetical alternative history where Alaska was British

The original topic starter mentioned the British Empire trying to expand across the Bering Strait in a hypothetical alternative history where Alaska was British. (Of course this is meant figuratively, nobody would be sailing across the literal Bering Strait even in this alternative reality. "Bering Strait" means crossing the North Pacific from the American side to the Asian side.)

eesmith 3y ago
I thought it was an observation about what the British actually did, not about what they might have done in some counterfactual world where somehow the Crimean War still existed even though the preceding 80 years of history were drastically different. This counterfactual world doesn't make any sense. Why would the British Empire "[take] up land across the Bering Straights" from sparsely populated Alaska when they can come in from the south using established colonies in Asia which are closer? How are these colonists supposed to get to "Georgetown" nee Vladivostok from the British American Pacific Coast? It's not like Alaska or the Pacific Coast had much in the way of shipbuilding at the time, so the transport and war ships would have to come from, what, England?, the American East Coast? Then go around South America (about 14,000 nautical miles), pick up colonists and troops in sparely settled Alaska/western North America, to settle an area which is much harsher than they are used to? Because why? The distances are huge and the available American population small. The sea distance from Sitka to Vladivostok is 3,651 nautical miles, which is a bit further than the 3,342 nautical miles from London to New York. From Juneau it's 3,720 nautical miles. Problem is, there are almost no potential colonists to draw from as they have fewer than 1,000 people in the 1880 census, and only a few hundred were non-aboriginal and non-Russian. From Vancouver it's 4,262 nautical miles, but Vancouver Island's non-aboriginal population was about 500 in the 1850s. It's 4,554 nm to San Francisco, which in our timeline is the first place you could get colonists - because of the new settlers drawn there by the Gold Rush. (Distances from https://sea-distances.org/ https://sea-distances.org/ , population numbers from Wikipedia.) From Hong Kong to Vladivostok it's only 1,639 nautical miles, from Singapore 3,007 nautical miles. Both are closer, can act as staging areas, and can draw from much better established British colonies in Asia and Oceania. Kolkata, at 4,657 nm, is only slightly further away from Vladivostok than San Francisco is. Even Boston-Vladivostok via the Cape of Good Hope is shorter than going around South America. Even if Vladivostok had been turned into a British colony, there's still a lot of territory between there and the Bering Strait several thousand km away Vladivostok is 2,586 nautical miles sea distance from Nome, which I'm taking as a proxy for the Bering Strait. As a comparison, the sea distance from Boston to Houston is 2,142 nautical miles. Who is taking all that land from the Russians?

eesmith 3y ago

I thought it was an observation about what the British actually did, not about what they might have done in some counterfactual world where somehow the Crimean War still existed even though the preceding 80 years of history were drastically different. This counterfactual world doesn't make any sense. Why would the British Empire "[take] up land across the Bering Straights" from sparsely populated Alaska when they can come in from the south using established colonies in Asia which are closer? How are these colonists supposed to get to "Georgetown" nee Vladivostok from the British American Pacific Coast? It's not like Alaska or the Pacific Coast had much in the way of shipbuilding at the time, so the transport and war ships would have to come from, what, England?, the American East Coast? Then go around South America (about 14,000 nautical miles), pick up colonists and troops in sparely settled Alaska/western North America, to settle an area which is much harsher than they are used to? Because why? The distances are huge and the available American population small. The sea distance from Sitka to Vladivostok is 3,651 nautical miles, which is a bit further than the 3,342 nautical miles from London to New York. From Juneau it's 3,720 nautical miles. Problem is, there are almost no potential colonists to draw from as they have fewer than 1,000 people in the 1880 census, and only a few hundred were non-aboriginal and non-Russian. From Vancouver it's 4,262 nautical miles, but Vancouver Island's non-aboriginal population was about 500 in the 1850s. It's 4,554 nm to San Francisco, which in our timeline is the first place you could get colonists - because of the new settlers drawn there by the Gold Rush. (Distances from https://sea-distances.org/ https://sea-distances.org/ , population numbers from Wikipedia.) From Hong Kong to Vladivostok it's only 1,639 nautical miles, from Singapore 3,007 nautical miles. Both are closer, can act as staging areas, and can draw from much better established British colonies in Asia and Oceania. Kolkata, at 4,657 nm, is only slightly further away from Vladivostok than San Francisco is. Even Boston-Vladivostok via the Cape of Good Hope is shorter than going around South America. Even if Vladivostok had been turned into a British colony, there's still a lot of territory between there and the Bering Strait several thousand km away Vladivostok is 2,586 nautical miles sea distance from Nome, which I'm taking as a proxy for the Bering Strait. As a comparison, the sea distance from Boston to Houston is 2,142 nautical miles. Who is taking all that land from the Russians?