what if the continental army had fully automatic weapons in 1775?

[datasuspect]

?

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

1. What if Spartacus had a Piper Cub?

That was a memorable skit on SNL.

[Captain Hilts]

15. What if Eleanor Roosevelt could fly?

[struggle4progress]

25. You mean Eleanor Roosevelt couldn't fly? I always thought the old

Sally Field TV series was modelled on the true story of Eleanor ...

[PassingFair]

31. LOL ...That's the first line I though of, too.

It always reminded me of my brother's ridiculous
arguments at dinner time.

They would ACTUALLY FIGHT over shit like that!

:rofl:

[jmowreader]

2. Probably the same thing that really happened in 1775

because if the Continental Army had them, the British Army would have as well.

[datasuspect]

3. what if you were magically placed in a bar in 1963 in detroit with a fully functioning laptop and

cell phone?

[rcrush]

4. How would I get cell phone service in 1963?

[datasuspect]

5. there is magic involved

this requires a suspension of disbelief.

[rcrush]

6. What would I do with a laptop in 1963?

[datasuspect]

7. you could sell it to japanese industrialists and have cd technology by 1971

[datasuspect]

8. plus someone in the scientific community would be able to reverse engineer it

somehow. hell they'd have to create technologies to study it at that point. just the processor alone would create a revolution in thought. and industrial processes. and revenue generation.

plus, since you are in detroit, the russkies wouldn't get it first. governor reagan would win the cold war and fidel castro would be overthrown by shriners and john bircher frog men.

[rcrush]

9. Do you think we will have cities on the moon by 2010 if I do that?

[datasuspect]

10. i would venture . . . mars

and offworld colonies.

[rcrush]

11. Alright then I'll do it.

Our Space Program is pretty lame right now. It needs to be jazzed up.

[quakerboy]

33. Solitare.

Was there spider solitare back then? I bet thats worth something, eh?

[rockymountaindem]

13. I'd start betting on a lot of baseball games n/t

[rcrush]

18. Ok so I got my laptop and cell phone. Who do I go look for in 1963 Detroit?

I want to sell it for a whole shit load of money then bet on sports games or something. Or maybe buy stock in IBM when it first starts up.

How do I find them? Are they in the phone book? How do you look for people in 1963?

[datasuspect]

22. back then you had to "call" on people and have "luncheon"

[Ikonoklast]

12. What if George Washington was a Tory?

God Save The Queen!

[sarge43]

20. Big history what if.

What if some English bureaucrat had granted Washington's application for a commission in the British army? Which side would he have gone to? Would some other equally able taken command of the American army. Almost certainly. Would he have been as effective, quite possibly. Would he have resigned the post at the end of the war? Who knows. I wouldn't bet the farm; it's a very rare man who gives up power.

As Napoleon said at St Helena, "They all wanted me to be a Washington."

[Ikonoklast]

36. George was the best thing a general can ever be...very lucky.

Not to change the subject, but I'm currently reading "Braddock's March", about the British campaign against Fort Duquesene during the French and Indian War.

Many players from our nation's early history took part in that disaster, including Washington.

[Captain Hilts]

14. What if Eleanor Roosevelt could fly?

She didn't wear much armour...

[madinmaryland]

16. What if the South had won the Civil War or at least settled for a truce...

Uhhh... Nevermind.

[LanternWaste]

17. If that were tha case, I'[d imagine the British would too....

If that were tha case, I'[d imagine the British would too. And as over 85% of colonial gunpowder and munitions were supplied by the French and always in short supply, I'd imagine the Brits would have cleaned our metaphorical clocks with the proper application of overwhelming might.

[darkstar3]

19. Mr. Turtledove?? n/t

[sarge43]

21. What if Nazi Germany had developed the A-bomb first?

Or Hitler hadn't declared war on the US following Pearl Harbor?

[AnArmyVeteran]

24. Sarge43, Hitler's weakness was his impatience.

If Hitler had waited to start his wars the outcome would have been completely different. The Germans were very close to developing a nuclear capability and if they waited just a couple of years they could have dominated Europe and successfully attacked the US mainland, using nuclear weapons. The sheer terror instilled in the victims of nuclear attacks by the NAZIs would have caused countries to surrender one by one until Germany had control over most of the industrialized countries in the world. There wouldn't have been a storming of the beaches at Normandy. The entire allied fleet could have been wiped out with a single nuclear explosion.

I'm sure the neo-Nazis are lamenting the fact that had Hitler waited all their 'dreams' would have come true. We should all be very thankful for Hitler's impatience, and the mental disease he obviously had (possibly caused by syphilis).

[pokerfan]

27. They really weren't that close

Hitler and the high command reasoned (probably correctly) that the war would be over (one way or the other) before they could complete development on an atomic bomb and that their ever-increasingly limited resources were best spent elsewhere.

After the Soviet counterattack, Pearl Harbor, and the German declaration of war against the United States, the war had become one of attrition. For the first time, German Army Ordnance asked its scientists when it could expect nuclear weapons. The German scientists were cautious: while it was clear that they could build atomic bombs in principle, they would require a great deal of resources to do so and could not realize such weapons any time soon.

http://thevelvetrocket.com/2009/08/25/the-nazi-nuclear-program-how-close-were-the-nazis-to-developing-an-atomic-bomb

[sarge43]

28. Not just the impatience, the ideology

Didn't help most of the best German scientists got out of town as soon as they saw the Nazi mind set wasn't compatible with rational research and of course for many the religious intolerance.

[XemaSab]

37. I have mused on this before

What would have happened if Hitler had conquered, say, Austria and the low countries and left it there? :shrug:

[Inchworm]

23. What if you or I were The Invisible Man?

:hi:

[struggle4progress]

26. Why if dinosaurs had invented Krispy Kreme donuts?

[bluedigger]

30. Who says they didn't?

[Kaleva]

29. And the Brits still had the Brown Bess musket?

[quakerboy]

32. Ammo shortages would have been that much worse

What if the Roman Legions had had sniper rifles and night vision goggles?

[Kaleva]

34. What if Custer & his men wore Easter bunny outfits at Little Big Horn?

Would the results have been the same? Would PETA gotten involved?

[liberaltrucker]

35. What if Lee had automatic weapons at Gettysburg?

:evilgrin:

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

38. What if Vercingetorix had a Sherman tank?

[rcrush]

39. What if the Vikings had sharks with freakin lazers on their heads?!