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Unfix for an x86 CPU. But that architecture wasn't as locked-in back then. For example, the Intel 432 CPU was designed to support OO languages. I believe it was designed with Ada in mind, and with GC support and other VM support. Java Bytecode would probably have run well on it.

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It wasn't locked in, but the general trend even back then was towards RISC, or at least CISC plus superscalar execution (meaning the processor translates to RISC internally). All the more complex instruction sets were a failure for a reason. Performance was just not there, and bytecode interpretation in software is more flexible.

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