thanks.
Another idea I had, was to adopt the mythos, and the hellenization. But scrap the cities, and people. Make new people. Then of course... I guess I'd just have some sort of stock fantasy setting.
Or better yet. Adopt specific cities and places... but flesh out the rest. Maybe I could have Athens, Carthage, and Rome. Maybe I can scramble the cities around. What would happen historically if Rome were 600 miles closer to Athens... what if Troy never fell; and now it's modern day Greece?
I'm probably just over-thinking it. I do like the... oh crap; you changed history, bravo, your names will be remembered forever. You win!
What if looks like a good book
"How Hitler Could Have Won The War" , "What if the Japanese had won the Battle of Midway?", "What if the Spanish Armada had successfully landed in England?", "What if Robert E. Lee had been able to march through Pennsylvania and Maryland without fighting the Battle of Antietam?" - just some of the writings that make you sit back and think "what if?"
If you're interested in purchasing it, you can get it from Amazon here.
Something that doesn't dive in too deep but is about military history and a fascinating Tour De Force are counterfactual essays. An historian ponders what a different outcome in some important event (like a battle) could have changed. I read a book called "What If?" and was pleasantly surprised and entertained.
Read one of these long ones linked here by all means, but these essays take you to a lot of places and are a good read for in between.
there's What If?, and the sequel. (if this is actually the answer i will laugh at the simplicity of it)
original: http://www.amazon.com/What-If-Foremost-Military-Historians/dp/0425176428/
If you prefer a more "non-fiction" approach, the "What If?" books are quite interesting.
Yes, they could have pushed to the oil fields of Iraq and Iran sooner rather than persue Soviet Oil, linking up with the Japanese to take on the British in India. With BC India out of the picture, the Japanese would have only had the American Navy and the Russians to worry about, giving them full control of the Pacific and the pipelines would be pumping German oil, not British. This would have been pre-Soviet invasion. From there, the Axis would control the majority of the world's known oil supply at that time, and would also have millions of occupied civilians to press into service.
Edit: Ah yeah, let's down vote the guy who paraphrased an academic analysis because you're obviously more informed than scholars
I actually just finished reading a book called What If? about how the world would be different if small changes had been made. It's a little fantastical, but it's dangerously addicting.
If I had to choose one historical event to change, though, I'd make there be a nice breeze from the east in Tampa on January 27, 1991.