Manifest Destiny of the Stars
An ASB Timeline where, in the 1890s, a series of meteor crashes all over the world, but especially the western US, brings a strange, almost magical substance to earth, which allows the creation of gravity-defying vessels, allowing exploration of space, as the material also allows those vessels to move (in space) at speeds unheard of previously. More of the material, eventually named Newtonium by scientists, is found on the moon in 1901, which starts a race by the imperial powers (Germany, Britain, France, Russia, Italy, the Ottomans, Austria-Hungary and Japan) to claim as much of the moon as possible, to be able to fuel a larger fleet.
With the greater local deposits, the United States is able to largely bypass the moon entirely, moving towards Mars and the Asteroid Belt. While developing the technology to actually safely operate long-term in space proves difficult, and many lives are lost, the new 'Belt Boom' becomes a repeat of the Old West, for America, which quickly gobbles up most of the Asteroid Belt - which is also rich in Newtonium, as well as all manner of precious minerals and metals. This is the main focus of the TL, the life and times of the Belters, the recycling of the Old West and the Frontier into space.
The focus outwards into a space race, for the rest of the world, has the effect of utterly derailing the path to World War I, especially once Germany pioneers the development of a powerful canon on their moon territory that can fire massive shells, sped up by gravity, at the capitals of rival nations. Other countries manage to develop their own versions quickly, creating a cold-war style stalemate, with conflicts on earth much more low key, and fears of Mutually Assured Bombardment (MAB) keeping the European powers (+japan) from wanting open war between their fleets. The US builds their own moon canon on the small patch of the moon they actually bothered to claim.
The Timeline was largely well-received, though fans of Hard SF were turned off as Newtonium was used to handwave a lot of things, and a loose approach towards what early 20th century science and engineering could do (sometimes very loose) and the focus on the Belt to the expense of the the geopolitical story was annoying to others. Sideplots that were mentioned, but undeveloped include attempts by some Zionists to establish a 'New Israel' on Mars, and the British and French get the bright idea to export unruly colonial populations on earth to brutal labor camps and penal colonies above or on Venus, Deimos and Phobos. The TL ended with the year being 1927. The Belt was becoming a lot less of a wild west as the settlements there were getting larger and more sophisticated and the Navy was better able to police the area, and the last update covered how Serbian terrorists killed the Ottoman Sultan and the Austro-Hungarian Emperor at the time time during a summit between the two for a big showpiece where they signed a treaty hashing out territorial disputes on the Jovian Moons. The author admitted that his original plan was to cover the ensuring war that would break out, with everyone waiting for the first person to have their trigger finger get itchy wrt the moon cannons, but he also admitted he just didn't have the time or inclination to write that part anymore.
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