Nothing makes BTC worth that much, except the madness of the masses. The network effect can be overcome in no time. Guess what was Bitcoin Cash' user base after the fork? Right away it had the same number than BTC users! It didn't take 10 years, it took 1 fork.
But even if I pick Litecoin, it spread something like 4 years faster than BTC. I could look up ETH, I bet its spreading time is 10 times BTC's. Simply put: The network effect is over rated. The only reason people use I mean hold BTC more is because its price. For a short time this was reversed and BCH value was going up while BTC was dropping, Had that trend stayed, in no time the usability and userbase of BCH would have overtaken BTC's.
Your arguments are valid and what you describe can happen but at this current point in time, the fact is that the market only accepts bitcoin for universal acceptance as payment and store of value (yes, others also hold their value, but the most trusted one is btc even if it's a subjective statement). We live in interesting times and I think traders/speculators can benefit in this market while mitigating the (perceived) risks.