| June 25 |  |
Editor says, what if the Soviets had made their move on the "Black Friday" crash of the Berlin Airlift? muses Jeff Provine on the This Day in Alternate History web site. Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the August 2012 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1948, on this day the Berlin Airlift began World War III. Postwar Europe became divided when territory liberated by the Soviet Union from Nazi Germany came under seemingly permanent communist rule. The Potsdam Agreement in 1945 divided Germany itself into sectors held by differing Allies. Berlin, one hundred miles inside the Soviet sector, was divided into four sectors with the West held by Britain, France, and the United States while the Soviets controlled East Berlin.
Berlin Airlift Begins World War IIIStalin reorganized the communist and socialist parties into the Socialist United Party and told his comrades that he worked toward a Germany reunited under communism. As part of his plan, he ended food delivery to West Berlin and limited Western allies to a single train per day, encouraging West Berliners to come to the Soviet sector for groceries. The plan backfired, however, as the local elections in 1946 proved to be overwhelmingly pro-democracy.
Stalin was further infuriated by the 1947 announcement of the Marshall Plan to rebuild Europe. He preferred his hard-won "war booty", seeing the American move as "dollar imperialism". Soviets further restricted travel through their sector in the spring of 1948. Americans responded by delivering military material by air, and Soviets sent up planes to buzz the cargo planes. A crash occurred between a Soviet fighter and a US airliner, killing everyone on both planes. The Soviets reduced their interference with train travel but considered the exercise a victory as they seized all communication beacons within the Soviet sector for air security.
A new article by Jeff ProvineStakes were raised again when the western Allies proposed the new Deutsche Mark to replace the devalued Reichsmark. Currency had been so over-printed by the Soviets that bartering had replaced cash, creating a weak economy that forced German reliance on Moscow. The British and Americans announced their attempt to revamp the economy on June 18, 1948, stating that the Deutsche Mark would be considered legal tender on June 21. The Soviets refused and began halting all ground travel to prevent the flood of marks into Berlin, even though 250 million had already been shipped in. Outraged, the Soviets announced the "Ostmark" as their own currency and forbade the use of Deutsche Marks. On June 24, the Soviets ended all rail and water traffic from West Germany. Travel by road was permitted, though heavily dogged. Electricity produced by Soviet-held power plants outside of the city was cut off. The Americans under General Lucius D. Clay refused to leave, and he announced an airlift of food and coal supplies as had been seen months before, expanding plans already put into place by the British.
The endeavor required 1,500 tons of food and 3,500 tons of fuel to be transported daily into the city when the combined aircraft of the British and Americans in the area could carry only 700 tons. Clay launched Operation Vittles, and planes were flown in to increase the tonnage. The United States had already begun to demilitarize in Europe, and Britain was still recovering from the damage of the Blitz (the 1948 London Olympics, which the Soviets did not attend, featured no new construction of venues or housing). The Soviet Union watched, eagerly anticipating the West to admit the transport cost was too great and to abandon Berlin.
All through July, the planes flew. The Soviets carried out massive propaganda programs in print and on radio, lambasting the Western efforts. However, nothing seemed to stop the planes until "Black Friday", August 13, when a C-54 crashed at the end of the runway and two more planes crashed after it. All planes awaiting landing were sent home, and the Soviets decided to make their move. They publically claimed the airlift "unsafe" and moved troops to take the airfields under the guise of aiding in cleanup. Fights began, and soon Soviet tanks rolled in to besiege the city. War was declared between the Soviet Union and the Anglo-British alliance with France, fighting in Indochina already, seeking neutrality. French forces were returned to their sector in the south, but the rest of West Berlin continued under heavy siege. Despite psychological warfare, West Berliners refused to give up, such as the rousing speech by city councilor Ernst Reuter, "You peoples of the world, you people of America, of England, of France, look on this city, and recognize that this city, this people, must not be abandoned - cannot be abandoned!" As winter approached, supplies ran out, and thousands of Americans, British, and Germans were taken prisoner.
American and British troops began campaigns attempting to penetrate the Soviet defenses, but the armies were unable to overwhelm heavy fortifications. While the US had been demobilizing, Stalin had kept up his urgency of military preparedness. Soviet forces swept into West Germany, finally realizing Stalin's plans of reunifying the country. Content with a French buffer and strong air defense, the Soviets moved toward Iran, seizing oilfields that had been the object of debate between Moscow and the British and recreating the People's Republic of Mahabad.
The Americans threatened counterattack with atomic weapons, but the threat was hollow until 1949 when the first atomic-adapted B-29 Silverplate arrived in Britain. The question of whether to use atomic weapons in Germany was brought to President Truman (who had won the 1948 election by a wide margin against isolationist Thomas Dewey), but he determined to use it only against Russia itself and encourage uprising from the "liberated" nations under Soviet control. He expanded the war to a new front in Turkey and pushed for new air bases in preparation for wide-scale attack from the Black Sea on the Caucasus and across Ukraine. After a great deal of deliberation, the US also joined the nationalists in the Chinese Civil War, reinforcing Chiang Kai-shek with aid and advisors.
In late 1949, the first atomic bomb fell on Russian territory, followed by dozens more. Stalin used the fallout to his advantage through propaganda, but, while much of Russia continued to support him, the edges of his the bloc began to collapse. Starting in 1950 after a revolt in Berlin, bloc countries began to rebel one after the other with American support, prompting stiff Soviet response. Russian resources became strained while the Americans continued to remobilize, pushing up through the Caucasus into Stalin's birthplace in Georgia and atomically bombing Stalingrad in 1951. On the first of March 1953, Stalin was discovered dead in his bunker west of Moscow. He had not left a clear successor, and internal squabbles destroyed the peoples' faith in Soviet government. Ukraine became liberated that summer in Operation King Cobra, and the road to Moscow was open to be taken by September.
Following the Third World War and the breakup of the USSR, capitalism and democracy had proven itself the victor over communism and fascism. The Anglo-American alliance dominated the United Nations and began the long era of rebuilding in the Pax Americana. Technology flourished, and international communication satellites began being launched in the 1970s, uniting the world on a new level, even though a manned mission into space had never gone beyond experimentation by the USAF.
This article is reversed in Achilles Heel.
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Jeff Provine
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Jeff Provine Blog Source: Jeff Provine’s Blog Labels: Berlin Airlift, Soviet Union, Russia, Britain, America. Editor says, in reality the Soviets did not move on the "Black Friday" crash of the Berlin Airlift. On August 1, they offered free food to West Berliners who registered their ration cards with the Soviets, but few accepted. Instead, Berlin was supported by air for eleven months in an unprecedented feat. Crews began bringing in record tonnage, as was seen in the "Easter Parade" that carried nearly 13,000 tons of coal. The Soviets decided to lift the blockade, opening the gates on May 12, 1949, and the Cold War would drag on for another four decades.
~ If only, 'cause this would have been awesome.
~ (1) Truman wins re-election "by a wide margin"? How, after the failure of the airlift? That woulkd have been a huge embarrassment and political liability--and in our history, truman's margun was so raazor-thin that the Chicago Tribune, notoriously, ran a headline declaring Dewey the winner before the final result was in.
(2) And just how does the Soviet Union hang together after "dozens" of A-bombs rain down on it? This is a country, remember, which in 1948-'49 was just beginning to recover from the devastation it suffered during World war II, and which, notoriously, had difficulty feeding itself even in good times. More likely, authority would have collapsed and the country would have descended into civil war or outright anarchy amid mass starvation worse even than that it had endured during the Nazi invasion.
~ Re: Truman - The war would begin late summer, just in time to ramp up for the election season in '48. If it hadn't been war, just the West shrugging and giving up Berlin, then isolationism would handily settle in. As with Pearl Harbor, Americans surge with patriotism when somebody sucker-punches 'em. Re: Soviet Union - Good point, they were still very ramshackle. Wonder if Stalin's propaganda could keep everybody together instead of surrendering to get the sweet life in a Western POW camp (like the old stories of Germans on the Eastern front traveling miles and miles backward to surrender to Americans).
~ An interesting scenario, but right after WWII, nobody---not the US, not the Western Allies, and not the Soviets---wanted more war. Everybody had had more than enough.
~ Eric, you have a great point but for one thing: Stalin's mind. He didn't have to worry about re-election or popularity polls. Would he have reunited Germany by force if given the opportunity? I believe he would have. Excellent AH!!!
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Editor says, what if the Syrian Civil War was terminated by Western Powers? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the July 2012 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 2012, on this day Bashar al-Assad and members of the Syrian elite were assassinated in a Bin Laden-style dawn strike by Special Forces.
Dawn Strike
by Ed and Andrew BeaneThe mission was then air-brushed out of history by a carpet bombing strike that levelled the building complex.
The opportunity for pre-emptive action had been created on 22 June 2012 when Syria shot down a Turkish F-4 Phantom military jet near the Turkish-Syrian border. Even though the Syrian military alleged that the jet had violated their airspace, NATO had invoked a clause that an attack on one member state was an attack on all.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Generals Source: Wikipedia Labels: Syria, Turkey, America, Syrian Civil War, Bashar al-Assad. ~ Unfortuately the Syrian elite appears larger that president Assad's immediarte circle. This would be liekly to have the most negative effect on US and EEC foreign policy in the Middle East.
The idea of a One Stste Solution for Israel and Palestine - which is apparantly what lies behind all this 0 is a positively disasterous idea. Oh one other point - it isn't a "Syrian Civil War" since this was planned in Western capitals If the Sunni jihadists cut loose against the other religious groups and seculars you could have 100,000s of thousands dead which is what people are warning about.
~ Don't think Russia, China, or at least Iran would stand at the sidelines doing nothing. And thus (potentially) begins WWIII.
~ Or "You broke it, you bought it!" We've got enough on our plates with Iraq and the Stan.
~ I don't think the "one state solution" is "behind" anything; the "two-state solution" is a much mre influential notion. The only people seriously pushing for "one state" are right-wing Israelis (guess whose state gets to be the "one"?), who argue that, one, the Palestinians don't exist as a people, and two, this nonexistent people already has a state in Jordan and should be resettled there, forcibly if necessary.
~ Believe me, Eric, the right-wing Israelis want nothing to do with a one-state solution, which would soon become the Palestinians' state, due to their high birth rates. A two-state solution is much more popular, despite its own serious problems...most notably Jerusalem.
~ Would it be followed by occupation and transition or outright chaos, possibly civil war? The former is expensive, the second is a nightmare.
~ Unfortuantely both the Neo-Cons and influential members of Obama's regime from the Brookings Institute believe in just that . The One State solution is that the Palestinians get pushed out and Israel covers the whole of the former British Mandate. To do that you need to destabilise and break up Syria. This showshow insane these policies are.
~ Richard, I know that nowadays "Neo-Cons"is often a euphemism for "Jews"...and while I have read a lot of anti-Zionism and outright Jew baiting on Internet debates, I have NEVER even run across that theory. I have, however, read plenty of pro-Palestinian messages calling for one state, of Israelis and Palestinians together...secure in the knowledge that the high Palestinian birthrate would soon make the state Palestinian. And I might add that the high birthrate is aided by the wonderful free maternity care at Hadassah Hospital, which is supported by Hadassah, the American women's Zionist organiztion.
~ I'm sorry but the Neo-Cons are a seperate group from AIPAC in America of "policy-makers" as they see it.
The whole point is that it is entirely different from the other "One State Solution2" being put forward by some Palestinian supporters.
Apparantly this scheme was launched as a plan in 2002 by the Neo-Cons.
~ Well, as I said before, this is absolutely the first I have heard of it, and it sounds like a completely wild conspiracy theory to me. I might add that it would be especially hard to push the Palestinians out, since I don't know of many Arab countries that are very eager to take them in.
However, I have come to believe that there will be a Palestinian state of some kind, due to an incident I heard in a local chain diner, where the waiter proudly said, "I am a Palestinian." That is what most of us hope for.
~ The neo-Cons and their allies associated with the Democrat party are at the heart of the American policy making Power-elite as it is referred to.
~ "Neo-con" is obviously short for "neo-conservative," strongly suggesting that they are Republicans...or, more specifically, Jews who feel newly driven to the Republican Party, since the Democrats seem to be turning against them. However, I thought we were here to discuss Alternate History...not to share wild theories of current events.
~ OK...so how's this for a hopeful and helpful scenario. After grueling conferences together, the Jews and Arabs agree on declaring The United States of Abrahamia, consisting of the two independent states of Israel and Palestine. Of course, this might wind up in another Civil War, like our own...but then again, it might not.
~ You are correct, but someone suggested this AH. Howeverthey are not newly driven to the Repubican party nor were the Democrats turning on them. In fact the opposite, Obama has continued neo-Con policies.
However unfortunately these are not wild theories.
~ Iwoild really hope something like that could happen but I fear it is unlikely.
~ Well, I can only say again that I have never heard that particular theory before...and that Israel's friends have become very suspicious of Obama's Middle Eastern policies. The Republicans know it, too...and they are falling all over themselves to support Israel. For instance, as Romney graphically put it, "Obama is throwing Israel under the bus."
~ els' friends are becoming very suspicious of Obama's policies as his policies could not be more so and policy on the Middle East in his administration are controlled by such people. Obama and his pro-Zionist advisoes are DRIVING the bus, hence the destabilisation of the Arab nations. All it shows is what nonsense Romney says.
~ Well, if you go to the MSNBC discussion sites, you will soon see that Obama's supporters seem to support the Palestinians, while Romney's followers are on Israel's side. In fact, I have heard that the Evangelical Christians are much stronger supporters of Israel than the American Jews are. If you say that's pretty weird, I will not have any argument. But then, having the American left supporting the feudal Arabs against the socialist Israelis is pretty weird, too.
~ Obama is not the American Left. The American left do not support the feudal Arab states, who are totally Obama's allies to destabilse Syria and the republican Arab states, exactly for this reason.
It is not obama and hispolicy makers that support the PALESTINIANS ONLY DEMOCRAT VOTERS WHO HAVE NO-ONE ELSE TO VOTE FOR. Obama has a remarkable talent to do just the opposite of what liberla Democrat voterswould want.
~ I admit I am always startled to read about the "right wing" supporting Israel while the left champions the Palestinians. And believe me, it was not always that way. The left used to LOVE Israel, because it was the only socialist country that WORKED. Then came the Six-Day War, in 1967, when the Soviet Union turned against Israel, so the rest of the left had to do the same. As evidence, look for an openly Zionist 1960 movie called Exodus...with the script written by a Communist named Dalton Trumbo. But then, the left was ANTI gay back then, too...just remember "Spartacus," written by another leftist named Howard Fast, and "Advise and Consent," by the conservative Allen Drury. Then tell me which one was anti-gay and which was sympathetic to them.
~ It would not be true that "the Left" supports the Palestinians because as explained by JustinRaimondo od antiwar.com foreign policy in America has been bipartisan since 1948 and policymakers of the Obama-Clinton regime entirely support Zionism and its objective of a Single State solution every bit as much as the Neo-Cons.
It would be untrue that the Soviet Union "dumped" Israel because of the 6 Day War so the rst of the Left fell into line. Israel was a social-democrat and not a socialist state.
This is unlikely to work and is a remarkable foolish foreign policy.
~ I checked out antiwar.com, and...surprise surprise!...they were anti-Israel, with the usual one-sided moaning about Palestinian "kids," who usually turn out to be teenagers. I did not have to check out the Soviet Union, the Six-Day War and the American left's 180-degree turn against Israel, because I remember it happening. And if Israel is a social-democratic state, that still puts them ahead of the feudal Arab countries.
~ Reading further, I remembered seeing that, sure enough, those Palestinian "kids" throwing stones were actually teenagers using slings to throw rocks which are projectile weapons. And you BET the Israeli soldiers were armed to the teeth: soldiers usually are. The whole thing was typical one-sided pro-Palestinian agitprop. It is true, however, that Americans did tend to support Israel after the 1948 war until the Six-Day War came along. Those who did not were usually real Jew baiters...and believe you me, they still show up in MSNBC discussion groups...at times even arguing that the Jews Killed Jesus.
~ You seem very vitrilic about it.
Unfortunately Obama and Democrat policymakers associated with him could not be more pro-israli, but also have succeeded in forming an alliance with with the Arab feudal and fundamentalist states against the nationalist secular ones.
~ Well, RR, I am getting pretty exasperated, I admit...especially since I am used to going on line and arguing against those real Jew baiters, although I do not believe that you are in that category. And I really, honestly had never heard of that all-Israeli one-state solution. But I did not mean to be vitriolic: Sorry about that. At the same time, I thought this was supposed to be Alternate History, often more pleasant than our own..like, for instance, the conference that formed the United States of Abrahamia. Because, who knows? Maybe our fresh and innovative concepts could really get picked up. Goodness knows the world could use them.
~ Afghanistan would turn into another '90s Afghanistan...with more trees
~ That's what everyone who knows anything is worried about. And flight of christians and other religious groups.
~ From what I read recently, in Richard Engel's MSNBC report, the flight of Christians from Egypt has already begun.
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Editor says, what if the Kuomintang had won the Chinese Civil War? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s).
In August 1945, the Soviet Army established a Soviet Civil Authority to rule the northern portion of the Korean Peninsula until a domestic regime, friendly to the USSR, could be established. In 1949, a military intervention into South Korea was considered by Kim Il-sung, but failed to receive support from the Soviet Union, which had played a key role in the establishment of the country. The withdrawal of most United States forces from the South in June dramatically weakened the Southern regime and encouraged Kim Il-sung to rethink an invasion plan against the South. The idea itself was first rejected by Joseph Stalin but with the development of Soviet nuclear weapons, Mao Zedong's victory in China and the Chinese indication that it would send troops and other support to North Korea, Stalin approved an invasion which led to the Korean War..
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In 1950, fearing that the border clashes on the 38th parallel signalled an impending invasion by the Syngman Rhee regime in the South, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea appealed to the Soviet Union for urgent military support.
Pyongyang, 1950Only six months before the late Chairman Mao's followers had fled to the island of Formosa making Kim Il-sung's isolated regime in the North the only pocket of communism in Asia Pacific.
Thrilled by this outcome, the speeches from the Government in Seoul had become increasingly belligerent in tone.
The spectre of an imperialist plot to unify the peninsula, real or imagined, was enough to raise the tensions to boiling point. And now the two Koreas stood on the brink of war.
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Korean War, Kim Il-Sung, Syngman Rhee, Kuomintang, Mao Tse-Tung. Editor says, in this article we explore a point of divergence proposed on the Space Forums discussion board and have repurposed a significant amount of content from Wikipedia.
~ Nuclear war, to be more precise.
~ At least it would've been early nukes instead of widespread ICBM destruction we would've seen in the '60s.
~ The left party line is STILL that Rhee started the war in OTL.
~ How long would the Americans have tolerated a Communist island of Taiwan?
~ Would the USSR have given direct military support to North Korea under these conditions? I don't think so. It's a commonly held belief that Stalin gave his permission for an invasion of South Korea in 1950. Based on what I've read, I think it's safe to say that, in the end, Stalin did not disapprove the invasion, but he was not an enthusiastic supporter.
In the timeline above, I believe the primary issue is what would have happened to Rhee. He was VERY committed to re-unifying the two Koreas by force. Had he had American support, I have no doubt an invasion of North Korea would have been underway by 1950. What could Stalin have done? Attacked American troops directly? Maybe if China were a communist ally, but there's no way he would have sent the Red Army to an isolated, mountainous backwater (in his mind) of little value to Moscow. The most that would have come out of a South Korean/American attack is a strongly-worded condemnation leveled against the United States at the UN.
OR...the US/South Korean invasion of the North could have been seen by Stalin as a precursor to what the Americans wanted to do in Europe. This might have led to an accelerated military build-up in the Soviet Union, which would have been met with a similar build-up in the United States. Tensions may have remained at a much higher level than they did in real life, meaning that something like the Cuban Missile Crisis would have been much more likely to trigger a nuclear war. Now, we would all be living in caves and I would be chiseling this on a stone tablet for future generations.
~ I don't think Mao would have headed for Taiwan, and if he did, I don't think the US would tolerate him there for long. He'd have likelier forted up in the Northeast (Manchuria, to non-Chinese) or somewhere like that, along the Russian border where he could get help from them. And I take it also that this POD includes Chiang managing, somehow, to clean out the KMT enough to at least make them able to hold China...a lot of the Communists' victories in OTL were directly attributable to KMT inefficiency, incompetence and corruption.
~ MARK: Probably a long time. But a Chiang-Kaishek-controlled Beijing would have launched an invasion as soon as mainland China could get its act together.
Other than that, a Communist defeat in the Chinese Civil War changes EVERYTHING...
~ Either Manchuria or Mongolia for Mao. Not that Mao would take over Mongolia (Outer) but that Stalin would have leaned on the Mongolians to take Mao in.
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Editor says, what if Nixon's successor had also been forced to resign in disgrace? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the July 2011 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1976, only two years after Watergate a second White House occupant was forced to make a shabby exit when the 38th President of the United States Carl B. Albert turned over to the General Services Administration gifts he had accepted from a lobbyist (who was also a member of South Korean intelligence) before resigning due to his involvement in the Tongsun Park scandal.
Fall of the Little Giant from Little DixieUnder the provisions of the Twenty-fifth Amendment, his predecessor Richard Nixon had nominated Republican House Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford to succeed Agnew as Vice President in October 1973. But as the Watergate crisis began to unfold during the fall, Nixon was forced to resign from office before both Houses of Congress could confirm a Vice President.
Albert became Acting President under the Presidential Succession Act of 1947 which also forced him to resign from the office of Speaker as well as the House. And so bizarrely, the man who would have presided over Nixon's impeachment benefited from his resignation, yet was forced to sacrifice his own political career in so doing.
By inclination, believing that it was wrong for a Democrat to serve out a term of office that the electorate had gifted to a Republican, Albert had fully intended to resign after the election of a Republican Vice President. But the country was in a terrible downward spiral, and with his own fortune now inextricably locked into the crisis he decided to serve out the remainder of the term in an attempt to heal the nation. But incredibly, he too became engulfed in a personal scandal and was forced to quit the White House.
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Carl Albert, Tongsun Park Scandal, Bribery, Presidency, White House. ~ This would have really hurt the country...we're still recovering in some ways from Watergate.
~ I dunno. If it opened the way for the two-party system to be broken, I think it might have been a good thing
~ Er . . . shouldn't it read "his predecessor Richard Nixon""? Fixed - thanks. Ed
There would have been a giant uproar had Watergate resulted in the presidency changing partisan hands. Even aabsent any involvement in scandal, a President Albert would have had a rough ride.
~ "the man who would have presided over Nixon's impeachment benefited from his resignation" <- that would cause a major stink, perhaps enough to break out a Nixon-led revolution.
~ Chances are that Ronald Reagan would have defeated Jimmy Carter in the 1976 elections under this scenario. The Iran Hostage Crisis and a blown economy would have been on the Gipper's watch.
~ No Comment
~ Tim, except Reagan would have handled each crisis differently. I'm not saying better, nor worse, But with a different President, Cabinet and WH staff, you are bound to get different reactions and results.
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In 1984, U.S. and Egyptian ground forces in Libya, aided by local insurgents and disaffected elements of the Libyan regular army, captured Muammar Khadafy just as the dictator was getting ready to flee Tripoli; also seized where documents linking the Khadafy regime to dozens if not hundreds of terrorist acts worldwide, a vast quantity of weapons and ammunition, millions of dollars in foreign currency, and -- to the surprise of many U.S. Soldiers - a collection of X-rated videotapes compiled on his behalf by Libyan diplomats stationed in the West.
Khadafy CapturedKhadafy was subsequently extradited to the Netherlands to stand trial in the Hague at the U.N.'s International Criminal Court.
In Korea on this same day, U.S. and South Korean marines landed at the North Korean port of Wonsan.
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Chris Oakley
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Battlefield Alaska Source: Wikipedia Labels: Khadafy, Libya, America, 1984, Cold War.comments powered by Disqus
Editor says, what if the intention of the framers of the First Amendment was misunderstood? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s).
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In 1962, on this day the United States Supreme Court decided on the case of Engel v. Vitale upholding the constitutional right of public schools to compose an official school prayer and require its recitation.
Engel v. VitaleThe case was brought by the families of public school students in New Hyde Park, New York who complained the prayer to "Almighty God" contradicted their religious beliefs. They were supported by groups opposed to the school prayer including rabbinical organizations, Ethical Culture, and Judaic organizations. The prayer in question was: "Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers and our country. Amen".
Justice Hugo Black (pictured) delivered the legal opinion that having codified the communities' right to self-government into the framing of the Constitution, the Founding Fathers would have considered the logic of the plaintiff's appeal to be a stupefying encroachment on traditional American principles. The first amendment prohibits the making of any law "respecting an establishment of religion", impeding the free exercise of religion, infringing on the freedom of speech, infringing on the freedom of the press, interfering with the right to peaceably assemble or prohibiting the petitioning for a governmental redress of grievances.
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© The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History by Thomas E. Woods (2004)Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Alternate Nations Source: Wikipedia Labels: Engel v. Vitale , First Amendment, Religion, America, Constitution. ~ My own preferred solution to this ongoing squabble would be to get the gov't out of schooling. Let private organizations set up schools, and run them as they please. "Let a hundred flowers bloom and a hundred schools of thought contend." as the Chairman once (lyingly) said.
~ I do wonder when the countersuit to keep Muslims/Jews/etc. from composing the prayers would come....
~ Would require a brain transplant in Black.
~ I don't like government interfering with prayer in school but I definately don't like government imposing it either. This would be a seriosu violation of that standard. Admittedly the Supreme Court has been doing much like James II to undermine our democracy and liberity to legislate the liberal left's agenda and its decision banning school prayer is just one travesty among a great many. So I would be against it. But a supreme court that would make this type o f ruling would be one committed to the status quo which except in matters of race would not be that bad a thing for the nation. Of course, the courts should never be the agents of change, that right, choice and duty is the sole territory of the people of this nation.
~ Perhaps an alternative outcome is the compromise that the Supreme Court doesnt support the case of the plaintiff but does recommend the striking of the word "Almighty" from the text of the First Amendment to make this a non-issue?
~ Also conspiracy theory angle, what if the first amendment used the masonic phrase 'Great Architect' instead of 'Almighty God' ?
~ My spider-sense starts to tingle when I hear a conservative quoting Mao as Eric Oppen does.
More seriously, Engel was in a line of similar decisions stretching back decades. For the Court to find for the other side would have been a nmajor break with precedent--unless, of course, in this alternate world, those precedents were themselves different.
And just so we're clear here: at no point whatever, and certainly not in Engel v. Vitale, did the Supreme Court "ban school prayer." The Engel decision banned governmental authorities from enforcing the recitation of an official prayer. Students remained (and remain) free to pray in publoic schools, provided they don't receive special privileges for doing so.
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Editor says, what if Patrick Henry had won the argument at the Virginia Ratifying Convention (he only needed to swing ten votes!)? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s).
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In 1788, on this day in Richmond, the presumptively named "Virginia Ratifying Convention" rejected the US Constitution by a vote of 89 to 79.
Bonfire of the ConstitutionThe major issue that prevented ratification was the question of individual rights; many delegates who were in generally in favor of the Constitution were concerned that it did not contain a list of guaranteed rights akin to the celebrated Virginia Declaration of Rights.
Couriers then raced to New York with the news that Virginia had refused the plan, giving opponents of the Constitution the momentum they needed to prevent ratification there.
Watch the Youtube Clip 
"I need not take much pains to show, that the principles of this system, are extremely pernicious, impolitic, and dangerous. Here is a revolution as radical as that which separated us from Great Britain""Anti-Federalists" led by Patrick Henry (pictured), George Mason, William Grayson, James Monroe had won the argument that the Constitution created a central government that was too powerful. Because the man chosen for President, George Washington, was a Virginian who could not serve as Chief Magistrate now that his State had declined the opportunity to join the Union. Which was perhaps just as well. Patrick Henry's challenge to Washington, Madison, and Jefferson ~ "I Smell a Rat!"
Henry, the leader of the anti-federalist faction, opposed allowing the new central government to directly tax citizens of the various states, and he feared that the newly created office of President of the United States would have become far too powerful.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© "James Madison, and the Struggle for the Bill of Rights", Richard Labunski (2006)Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Patrick Henry, George Washington, Virginia, Ratifying Convention, America. ~ Well you can just about rewrite all of the world's history with this one! ;)
~ I think they'd have probably revamped the Constitution---maybe makign the BOR an integral part and otherwise addressing the anti-Federalists' fears.
~ In fact, the Constitution as originally written placed strict limits on the power to "directly tax the citizens of the various states," permitting only a capitation or "head" tax. Not until the twentieth century would a graduated tax system be permanently established. Under the system originally envisioned, Congress could tax only in proportion to the population, which in practice would mean that if you and Bill Gates lived in the same state and you were taxd $2,000 by the federal government, Mr. Gaatss's tax would also be $2,000. As you can imagine, rich people loved that idea.
In actuality, most of the money the federal government raised (at least ion peacetime) before the establishment of the modern income tax system came from tariffs, which had the effect of limiting trade with foreign countries--wwhich didn't bother the isolationist U.S. of the nineteenth century but became a problem once the country began to extend itself internationally, especially after the 1898 Spanish-American War.
~ I have to agree with David. :D
~ Since none of the states ratified immediately, there was plenty of time for the people to hash out their differences. After this long period of "hashing", even slavery might no longer be an issue...
~ One bad step and we'd end up with something along the lines of the French Revolution.
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Editor says, what if Custer survived the Little Big Horn?
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In 1876, on this day, cavalry commander Lt. Gen. George Armstrong Custer narrowly avoided a catastrophic defeat when, receiving word that the Sioux encampment against which his regiment had been dispatched by his commander Gen. Alfred H. Terry was heavily defended, he uncharacteristically decided to delay attacking rather than strike at once.
Miracle at Little Big Horn by Eric LippsThe wisdom of this choice would be graphically borne out when it became clear just how outnumbered Custer's force was. Had he proceeded, as would have been more typical given his character, he and his men would have been slaughtered.
Custer would continue to serve in the war against the Sioux until 1879. In 1884, the popular general would defeat Grover Cleveland at he Democratic Party's national convention and would beat Republican James G. Blaine to become the 22nd president of the United States.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© Today in Alternate History, 2004-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Alternate Nations Source: Wikipedia Labels: Custer, Sitting Bull, Little Big Horn, America, Native America. ~ President Custer? I'm half-horrified/half-fascinated to know what that administration would be like :)
~ All his life, Custer believed he had special luck. I'm not sure I'd want to have him for President...he'd probably push things too far, just as he did in OTL.
~ He couldn't have done any worse than Grant, LOL...
Comment from Ben Camo pm Facebook: He would have been nominated for President of the United States by the Democratic party and he would have been elected as our 19th President in 1876.
Comment from Robert Caudle pm Facebook: He would just be another former Union gneral fighting Indians out west. He would have been Just a mere mention in the history books.
~ He'd declare war on someone the first chance he got. Maybe for America's benefit, maybe for us getting wiped out Little Big Horn style.
~ Ben Camo is correct, Custer planned on being the 1876 Democrat nominee and wanted one more glorious campaign on his record in the newspapers "back east" when he decided to attack. If he had survived his interest would have been in playing events off as a huge victory to garner headlines and popularity.
Unless he got us into a war with Canada or Mexico I don't see any substantial changes in our history from a Custer Presidency.
~ The "miracle" would have been Custer not attacking, whatever the odds. By all accounts he was a raging egomaniac who held the "Indians" in complete contempt.
~ Lets bring Custer back and put him in charge of Border Security.
~ Poster boy for the Radical republicans
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Editor says, what if the fallout from the plague had destroyed the English political and social orders? Please note that substantial amounts of content have been repurposed from article of the same name in the June edition of the History Today Magazine (itself based on Dan Jones new book "Summer of Blood").
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In 1381, on this day, emboldened by the Labour shortages caused by the Plague, urban rioters laid waste to their own capital city, besieging the royal court in the Tower of London and burning down the Palace of Savoy.
The Peasants Revolt, 1381Peasant rebels from Essex and Kent overthrew the incompetent minority government of fourteen year old King Richard II who had travelled downriver to meet the rebels, with Archbishop Sudbury and the Treasurer Sir Robert Hales on board alongside him. But when the rebels saw the royal barge approach they went berserk. Fearing the bloodthirsty rage of of the rebels, the royal ministers had retreated to the Tower of London with the King, wrongly believing that fortress built by William the Conqueror was impregnable.
Yet the regicide in the Tower was but a violent climax to a "summer of blood", a political crisis caused by a natural disaster. "There are three things of such a sort that they produce merciless destruction when they get the upper hand. One is a flood of water, another is a raging fire and the third is the lesser people, the common multitude; for they will not be stopped by either reason or discipline". ~ John Gower, 1378.Because the Black Death had profoundly changed the lower orders in the country. During the months of April and May, England had witnessed a series of assassinations including the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Treasurer of England, one of the two chief justices of the royal courts and numerous foreigners, merchants, lawyers and royal servants.
From his apartment in Aldgate, the poet and royal servant Geoffrey Chaucer chronicled the end of the rebellion. And beneath Chaucer's first floor apartment, a dangerous, fast-moving mob led by Abel Ker, Thomas Baker and maverick priest John Ball gripped the city with fear, establishing the new order that would become the Peasant's Republic of England.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© History Today Magazine, June 2009Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Alternate Nations Source: History Today Magazine Labels: Peasant, Revolt, Rebellion, London, England. ~ The Terror 400 years early. The question is what form of coalition will gather against them?
~ This is an interesting AH...but I'm not at all sure that it would even occur to the rebels to have a republic. This is a long, long time before the rediscovery of ancient Greek and Roman stuff that inspired the later republics; the only republics around at that time were a longish ways away, off in the Med.
What I think you'd have instead would be a kingdom, but one with a lot fewer classes. You'd also have a lot of church reform---ISTR that the Lollards were mixed up with the Peasants' Revolt.
~ WHOA MAMA! This is a definite game-changer as far as Europe's concerned...
~ I'd dare say that the Republic of England wouldn't last long, as there's plenty of senior nobles, not to mention claiments to the Throne, who'd gladly march on London & slaughter everyone involved in the Peasant's Revolt. If anything, it means the Royal Line would change, not to mention all that fuss between England & France could turn out very differently...
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In 2008, the Daily Telegraph newspaper published an obitutuary for Lyall Watson, who died on June 25 aged 69. Adventurer, explorer he was of course most famously known as a sociologist; in his sixth book, Lifetide (1979), Watson made the first published use of the term hundredth monkey.
Hundredth Monkey Theory
This phenomenon referred to a sudden spontaneous and mysterious leap of consciousness achieved when a 'critical mass' point is reached. Watson was writing about several studies done in the 1960s by Japanese primatologists of Japanese macaques (Macaca fuscata).
Stating that the scientists were "reluctant to publish [the whole story] for fear of ridicule", Watson wrote that he had to "gather the rest of the story from personal anecdotes and bits of folklore among primate researchers, because most of them are still not quite sure what happened".
Watson's insight was that an unspecified number of monkeys on the Japanese island of Koshima were washing sweet potatoes in the sea. But the addition of a further monkey - the so-called hundredth - apparently carried the number across some sort of threshold, pushing it through a kind of critical mass, because by evening almost every monkey was doing it. Moreover the habit seems to have jumped natural barriers and to have appeared spontaneously in monkey colonies on other islands and on the mainland.
An exceptional scholar, he started at the University of the Witwatersrand aged 15 and by the age of 19 held degrees in Botany and Zoology. While still in South Africa, he added degrees which included the study of Geology, Chemistry, Marine Biology, Ecology and Anthropology, before moving to London, where he completed a doctorate in Ethology (animal behaviour) at London University under the supervision of Desmond Morris, author of The Naked Ape, and then curator of mammals at London Zoo.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© Daily Telegraph Newspaper 2nd July 2008Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Inventions Source: Daily Telegraph Labels: Lyall Watson, Hundredth Monkey, Sociology, South Africa, New Guinea.comments powered by Disqus
In 1950, today saw the beginning of the Korean War. The impetus was twentieth century attempts to expel the European from AsiaPac as irreversible historical processes played out in the Far East. The exit of Colonial powers had created a power vacuum filled by Japan, China and the United States. No Substitute for Victory
The decision to detonate nuclear weapons in Japan had convinced China that the United States would not [in the words of Bernard Montgomery] 'Send their land army to Asia'. This might have been the case had not General Douglas MacArthur won the 1952 Presidency. Having been expelled from Manilla, he had absolutely no tolerance for defeat in the Far East. As the war spread into Indochina, MacArthur continued to escalate. His restoration of Chiang Kai-shek's government in Beijing brought regional stability and secured the American century. His predecessor Harry Truman's decision to treat the conflict as a limited, proxy war was demonstrated for the folly it was, fast on the heels of his loss of China in 1948. Perversely, Truman's dismissal of MacArthur as military commander in Korea forced a decision by encouraging Brass Hat to chase for the White House. There was indeed no substitute for victory.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© Today in Alternate History, 2004-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Generals Source: Wikipedia Labels: Korean War, America, Douglas MacArthur, Harry S. Truman, America.comments powered by Disqus
This story was published in the May 2012 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1876, scouts inform Colonel George Custer that a massive number of natives, under the command of Sitting Bull, is poised to attack them at the Little Big Horn river.
Little Big Horn
by Robbie TaylorAfter hearing the report, he sent back to his superiors, Generals Alfred Terry and John Gibbon, for reinforcements. When they reached Custer with their two columns of soldiers, they then pressed forward to attack Sitting Bull. Their movements had given the Sioux Chief time to arrange his forces for an ambush, and he fell upon the American soldiers with great ferocity. However, just as it looked like Sitting Bull was on the verge of defeat, his secondary force under the command of Crazy Horse attacked the US soldiers from the rear. Trapped between the two mighty forces, General Terry was killed, and General Gibbon ordered a retreat. He limped out of the Little Big Horn with barely a hundred men and made it back to Fort Ellis.
In his official report on the battle, General Gibbon blamed Lt. Colonel Custer for the disaster, claiming that if Custer had attacked the Sioux instead of waiting for reinforcements, the natives wouldn't have had time to move into the ambush that claimed so many American soldiers.
Entry posted by Alternate Historian Robbie Taylor
© Robbie Taylor, 2004-Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Generals Source: Wikipedia Labels: General Custer, Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, Little Big Horn, America. ~ The definition of damned if you do, damned if you don't...
~ Indeed.
~ The most important person killed there in OTL was General Custer himself and his death is not mentioned here. Therefore, I infer that he survived the battle in this AH. As a result, he never becomes the folk hero that he was in real life, thanks largely to his widow Elizabeth's glowing biographies. (Sure, there were some military men who criticized his actions, but they were in the definite minority.) If Custer had survived but lived on in disgrace, the country might have shown new respect and even admiration for his Indian opponents, which might have helped win them more generous terms. Then again, it might not.
~ Whatever happened to the country's attitude toward Native Americans after this version of the Little Big Horn, Custer might well have wwished he'd died there. His reputation, which had been stellar after his performance in the Civil War, would be in the toilet, and he might well have faced a court-martial.
~ Defeated leaders often seek to blame subordinates, however calling for reinforcements is sound military doctrine and the fact that so few survived even with reinforcements would prove the folly of attacking with a small force.
~ Accusing Custer of excessive caution would never fly. The man's rep was set by 1865.
~ And we know for sure the outcome had Custer attacked the larger force without reinforcments. Cause he did. A wise commander knows how to advance and not get ambushed. You should know the danger points alonge the rout of march and be prepared for them.
~ I wonder what this might have done to Custer's political ambitions? ISTR he had designs on the Democratic nomination for president. President George Custer....*shudder*
~ Democrat? Would have taken him for a radical Republican. Cite please.
~ The Cheyanne were natives. The Souix (or Dakota) were from Minnisota.
People forget that before the horse, the Great plains were uninhabitable.
~ The world would've been deprived of the song by Larry Verne.
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Entry posted by Alternate Historian Robbie Taylor
© Robbie Taylor, 2004-Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Soviet America Source: Robbie Taylors Blog Labels: Joel Rosenberg, Robbie A. Taylor, Comrade, Soviet States of America, Communism.comments powered by Disqus
Entry posted by Alternate Historian Robbie Taylor
© Robbie Taylor, 2004-Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: 2nd Coming Source: Robbie Taylors Blog Labels: Holy British Empire, Robbie A. Taylor, Estelle Gerard, Pope, Catholic England.comments powered by Disqus
Entry posted by Alternate Historian Robbie Taylor
© Robbie Taylor, 2004-Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Arthur II Source: Robbie Taylors Blog Labels: Arthur Pendragon, Robbie A. Taylor, Camelot Redux, Merlin, England.comments powered by Disqus
In 1944, Free French movement leader Charles de Gaulle began making preparations to return to his homeland after nearly four years in exile. | |
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| Charles De Gaulle |
Entry posted by
Chris Oakley
© Chris Oakley,2008-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: France44 Source: Wikipedia Labels: World War 2, D-Day, Pas De Calais, Europe of the Dictators, Axis Powers.comments powered by Disqus
On this day in 2004 the controversial documentary film Fahrenheit 9/11 began its nationwide theatrical run in the US. The film's director and narrator, Michael Moore, used the occasion to attack the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences for refusing to nominate his previous film, Bowling for Columbine, for an Oscar in the Best Documentary category. | |
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| Michael Moore |
Entry posted by
Chris Oakley
© Today in Alternate History, 2004-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Moore911 Source: Wikipedia Labels: Fahrenheit 911, Michael Moore, George Bush, September 11, 911.comments powered by Disqus
On this day in 1941, Soviet warplanes bombed Berlin for the first time in World War II. | |
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Entry posted by
Chris Oakley
© Chris Oakley,2008-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Barbarossa41 Source: Wikipedia Labels: World War 2, Operation Barbarossa, Fascism, Europe of the Dictators, Axis Powers.comments powered by Disqus
Entry posted by Alternate Historian Robbie Taylor
© Robbie Taylor, 2004-Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Personalities Source: Wikipedia Labels: Jimmie Walker, Comedy, Standup, Philanthropy, Charity.comments powered by Disqus
Entry posted by Alternate Historian Robbie Taylor
© Robbie Taylor, 2004-Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Conspiracy Theories Source: Wikipedia Labels: Ken Arnold, UFOs, America, Extraterrestrials, Alien.comments powered by Disqus
Entry posted by Alternate Historian Robbie Taylor
© Robbie Taylor, 2004-Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Alternate Nations Source: Wikipedia Labels: Alson J. Streeter, Soviet America, Communism, Grover Cleveland, Presidency.comments powered by Disqus
Entry posted by Alternate Historian Robbie Taylor
© Robbie Taylor, 2004-Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Crises Source: History Channel Labels: Samuel Gompers, American Federation of Labor, Organized Labour, America, Trades Unions.comments powered by Disqus
June 24
Editor says, what if ERA was passed? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the December 2012 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1982, the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) is passed.
Equal Rights AmendmentThe ERA was originally written by Alice Paul and, in 1923, it was introduced in the Congress for the first time. In 1972, it passed both houses of Congress and went to the state legislatures for ratification.
But in spite of what its opponents had believed, it does not lead to enforced homosexuality, abortion and divorce. In spite of what its proponents had believed, it does not lead to equality, fair wages and sensitivity among men. It is an amendment, not magic.
Entry posted by Alternate Historian Robbie Taylor
© Alternate Historian, 2004-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Constitution, Philadelphia, Equal Rights Amendment, ERA, Presidency. Editor says, in reality the ERA failed to receive the requisite number of ratifications before the final deadline mandated by Congress of June 30, 1982 expired, and so it was not adopted, largely because Phyllis Schlafly mobilized conservatives to oppose ERA. This article was originally published in abbreviated form by Robbie Taylor in 2004.
~ Phyllis Schlafly was also bitterly anti-gay, so she lost almost all of her influence when her son was outed as a gay.
~ Another lawyers' paradise.
~ You mean like the First Amendment, the Second, the Fifth . . . !
~ And when it turns into a Frankenstein's monster, getting it repealed is incredibly difficult.
~ Big Brother would have to watch every expenditure and exchange in the nation. Busy fellow.
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Editor says, what if the Western Allies had given up the Bomb before the Berlin Airlift? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the August 2012 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1948, on this day supplies to American, British and French forces as well as the German civilian population were cut-off when Soviet forces blocked the roads to the western-occupied sections of Berlin.
Berlin Airlift Begins World War III, RebootThe military governor of the American Zone, U.S. Army General Lucius D. Clay (nicknamed "the Kaiser") provided the President with a characteristically bullish action plan: call the Soviet's bluff by sending the U.S. 3rd Armored Division with the next supply convoy. Certain that such an attempt to force the blockade would lead to war, Truman seriously considered others options for saving West Berlin.
The feasibility of an air lift was examined and it emerged that the RAF had been supplying their Forces with ammunition for some time. Moreover, Clay's counterpart, General Sir Brian Robertson, along with British Air Commodore Reginald Waite, had prepared a scenario for upscaling this operation to the complete supply of the whole city. A further positive was that although Soviet guarantees on road access were weak, the guarantees on air routes were hard and fast. But the headline numbers were still terrifying, the Western Allies had the current capability to deliver 120 tonnes a day, and the city needed 5,000 until winter when this would need to increase to include winter fuel such as coal.
There was of course a final option, the nuclear club. Problem was that Truman would have to use the handful of nuclear weapons that the United States had secretly maintained in contravention of the Baruch Plan. And in fact Truman suspected that Stalin knew all about this secret stockpile, and was using the crisis to force the issue out into the open.
This post is a combined reversal of two articles by Jeff Provine Baruch Plan Determines Americans will give up The Bomb and Berlin Airlift Begins World War III.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© Alternate Historian, 2004-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Generals Source: Wikipedia Labels: Yalta, Berlin, Allies, Occupation, Germany. Editor says, in authoring this post we have repurposed content from Avalanche Press, Wikipedia, and also both of Jeff Provine's articles Baruch Plan Determines Americans will give up The Bomb and Berlin Airlift Begins World War III.
~ I doubt that this country would have ever signed off on a treaty to abandon the Bomb (even if secretly intending to violate it) while the USSR still existed and nmight also acquire nuclear weapona.
~ Proof that the US had secretly broken an international agreement would be a massive diplomatic mess, even in wartime. Might be enough to destroy the UN.
~ Truman had no inhibitions about having the Bomb, or about having used it. He said he never lost a minute's sleep over it. It was the leftists who were howling, and mainly because their precious Soviet Union might be next on the list. He'd never have signed off on such a treaty.
~ Agreed, Eric. Truman believed the atomic bomb held the Soviets in check in Europe for the first few years after the end of the Second World War. Keep in mind that the Soviets did not cut down their military nearly as quickly as the other wartime Allies did. The Red Army could have swallowed up all of western Europe without much of a problem. Did the bomb prevent that? We'll never know, but Truman believed it did.
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Editor says, what if a backup recording of the eighteen and a half minutes of conversation between Nixon and his chief of staff, Bob Haldeman was discovered after they left the White House? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the December 2011 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1975, on this day the disgraced former President Richard Nixon told the prosecutors of the Grand Jury that he was furious about a partially erased tape of a White House meeting that became the focus of Watergate cover-up accusations.
Blowing His Stack
By Ed and Scott PalterSecretary Rose Woods had confessed that about four minutes of the conversation had been accidentally erased from the tape, but an investigation by Security Adviser General Alexander Haig subsequetly discovered that the deletion was much longer than previously thought.
Having secured a pardon from his successor, Gerald Ford he was protected him from prosecution for any past Watergate crimes. And so his main legal risk during the eleven hours of questioning near his California home was being caught in a lie. Short of committing perjury, or implicating anyone in his much-diminished cadre of loyalists, he could testify with impunity.
But Nixon's disgrace was complete when a previously undiscovered backup copy of the tape was discovered at the White House. Because the missing minutes were a sickening fray boy jock discussion about a photograph of Hanoi Jane in which Nixon was fantasizing about taking her on the Oval Office desk with a ball gag on her. The discussion was more cringingly embarrassing for his personal integrity, because Nixon was keen to portray himself as a "straight little church arrow" in his private/family life.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© Alternate Historian, 2004-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Richard Nixon, Bob Haldeman, Watergate, Presidency, America. Editor says, in reality transcripts were released in November 2011 after a freedom of information request.
~ For all we know there may be actually be a backup tape waiting to be found by some diligent researcher.
~ He might have salvaged the appearance of integrity, but no more than that. I have never found it credible that Nixon knew nothing about the break-in in advance, especially since it apaprently wasn't the first his campaign had carried out at the Watergate Hotel. The Watergate burglars were arrested after breaking in to service a previously installed bug, not plant one for the first time. Nixon as clueless victim in Watergate just doesn't fly.
And don't hold your breath waiting for a backup tape to surface. If one ever existed, I'm sure it's long since been destroyed.
~ Actually his perfect move was precisely the opposite - he goes on TV after the break-in, explains that all his predecessors did similar with chapter and verse [they all did by the way although Ike seems to have restricted his black bag jobs to actual national security]. He then says he sees how times have changed. So he promises never to do it again but pardons everyone because any fault is his. He loses MN and WV as well as MA and 1972 is still a blow-out. What killed him was the drip, drip, drip of the cover-up.
~ The thing I never cared for about Watergate was that breakins, and other such shenanigans, were SOP under previous presidents---the sainted Kennedys were very fond of that sort of stuff. Everything Nixon did had been done before; the difference was that he faced a press corps that loathed him to a man.
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Editor says, what if Napoleon had reorganized his Grande Armee? muses Jeff Provine on the This Day in Alternate History web site.. Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the July 2011 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1812, on the night before his army number more than half a million men crossed the Neman River in the Second Polish War, Napoleon suddenly came down with wind and cramps from his chicken marengo that kept him from sleeping.
Napoleon Reorganizes his Grande Armée While battling his discomfort, he read from one of his favorite classics, The Art of War by the Chinese ancient Sun Tzu. He paused between bouts of painful attacks and contemplated the army he had camped around him. Rather than Sun Tzu's model force of fast, elite troops, Napoleon had assembled the largest army known to man. He had hoped the army would strike fear into Czar Alexander and his generals, forcing them to bend to his will, but the "Little General" in him at last decided victories could not be won with simple weight. After all, many of the battles he had won to bring him here had been against much larger armies.
A new story by Jeff ProvineIn the morning, Napoleon ordered the movement of his troops across the river as was planned, but he himself worked with his secretaries and generals in whittling down the necessary army. Of his 554,000 men (300,000 of whom were French and Dutch, 100,000 Lithuanians and Poles, and the rest a mishmash from around Europe), he determined a main fighting force of about 200,000. The other troops suddenly seemed unnecessary, but Napoleon refused to let a man go to waste. He put the local Poles and Lithuanians as well as some Croats and Austrians into skirmishing parties while the rest he dedicated to building a massive supply line capable of supporting his army, though he had always planned to live off the land as Sun Tzu recommended.
Napoleon's new army moved with incredible speed across the Russian Empire despite its poor roads. The Russian army under Field Marshall Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly initially attempted to stop the smaller French force but was defeated. The Field Marshall kept his army from being crushed and fell back to a strategy of scorched earth, but the system of retreat did not stop Napoleon. When the French took St. Petersburg, the Czar and his court was forced to flee, and the disgraced de Tolly was replaced by Prince Mikhail Kutuzov. Napoleon moved toward Moscow, but Kutuzov met him with the bulk of the Russian forces at Borodino. There, in the largest single-day fight of the Napoleonic Wars, more than 250,000 men and 1,2000 cannon fought allout. Napoleon won a close victory, and the Russian army returned to retreat.
Victory at Borodino might have been a Pyrrhic one but for Napoleon's well built supply lines. The forty thousand casualties of the Russians could be replaced, and, though it would require longer to return to maximum strength, so could Napoleon's losses of 30,000. The march to Moscow continued. City governor Count Fyodor Rostopchin suggested that the city be set to torch, but Czar Alexander capitulated rather than seeing another capital fall violently. He met with Napoleon the Poklonnaya Hill and surrendered while Napoleon granted him continued control of the Russian Empire, sans the numerous lands such as Poland and the Ukraine that would be granted their freedom (at least, freedom from Russia, as they would be granted governments friendly to Napoleon's Continental System).
Napoleon spent the next years solidifying his command in Europe, putting down Cossack uprisings, quelling Spain, and pacifying the English, whose economy continued to crumble while rebels stirred from the French-backed Irish. He later turned back to expansion, taking Constantinople and conquering the Ottoman Empire. This sparked another war with England in which Napoleon would take the Mediterranean (and, most importantly, Egypt) and incite India to rebellion. Napoleon would die of stomach cancer shortly after Britain's surrender of Egypt in 1823, and his son Napoleon II would prove unable to carry on his father's work.
The French Empire would crumble, but the impact of Napoleonic conquest would be felt for centuries. In what had been efficiency, Napoleon had organized people-groups into states, leading to senses of Nationalism and the unifications of Germany and Italy. Smaller groups such as Serbs, Lithuanians, Poles, Basque, and so on, received new levels of self-government. Most notably, Napoleon would free the serfs of Russia, organizing them and creating a new environment of independence that would make the Russian kingdom a leader in the Second Industrial Revolution and a model of capitalism and progress through the twentieth century.
Entry posted by
Jeff Provine
© Jeff Provine, 2010-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Jeff Provine Blog Source: Jeff Provine’s Blog Labels: Napoleon Bonaparte, France, Russia, Poland, Military. Editor says, in reality kept his enormous army, which became bogged down with an indecisive flanking battle at Polotsk that stopped him from his march on St. Petersburg. He moved on Moscow, which he took, but found the city in flames. Surrounded by scorched earth and Russian skirmishers and drained of supplies because of his unintentionally long marches, Napoleon turned back to France, leaving much of his Grande Arm?e to fend for itself. Roughly 400,000 troops would die or become captured, leaving less than a quarter surviving to return to Paris. The loss would cripple his empire and lead to his first downfall in 1814.
~ Did Napoleon really read Sun Tzu? And would he have taken it very seriously? At that time, most Europeans didn't think anything non European was worth a damn.
~ I think Napolean was the good guy. He was fighting against the powers that be in Europe who still control the same game or... scam if you will.
~ Apparently Napoleon did read Sun Tzu. Legend has it he picked it up while using reading as an escape from being picked on at the academy. True or no, he did read it, though apparently ignored the parts about studying the land for support.
~ Do I dare ask what powers those might be?
A Europe dominated from the Atlantic to Siberia by Napoleon would have seethed with rebellion. As for his organizing "people-groups" (I assume you mean ethnic groups) into states, since many such groups in 19th-century Europe (as later) were widely dispersed, "organizing" them into states might have entailed gunpoint migrations on a scale not attempted in our Europe until the days of Hitler and Stalin.
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Editor says, what if a successful lunar mission had destroyed the Nazi World picture? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the July 2011 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1953, at the Nuremberg Trials: the defense team for Adolf Hitler rebutted the charges of "planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace" by arguing that the Nazi invasion of Eastern Europe was a merely pretext for conducting the Final Solution.
Iron Nightmare 2
The Trial of Adolf HitlerAfter the 1st U.S. Army occupied the Peenemünde Space Port General Eisenhower soon realised that the High Command had faked their escape to the Dark Side of the Moon acting swiftly in order to intercept the Nazis en route to South America.
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But an even more grisly truth emerged. Despite his stated objective of gaining Lebensraum for the Volk (living space for the German People), it soon became apparent that the whole Nazi programme was a vehicle for genocide, explaining the Fuhrer's callous indifference to military setbacks across the Eastern front. Because by 1943, four in five of the Jewish People who would perish in the Holocaust had already died.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Iron Nightmare Source: Wikipedia Labels: Nazi, Space, Moon, God, Religion. ~ Seeing Hitler in the dock would have been interesting.
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~ There has been a lot of fiction about a trial of Hitler, such as "The Trial of Adolf Hitler" -- I read it, but found the arguments unconvincing.
Most likely he would have been interrogated until the historians were satisfied, then given a quick trial over a single incident in which a clear paper trail existed, and quickly hanged. But I don't think his interrogation would have been as interesting as Goering's, or as Himmler's would have been. He was too crazy.
~ What would be a punishment for Hitler brought on by Germany? Execution or simply exile? He'd write some crazy memoirs if the latter.
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Editor says, what if Jimmy Carter had been elected life-term Presidency (as envisaged by the 1787 Constitutional Convention) and he (not Barack Obama) appealed for clean energy after Deepwater? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s).
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In 2010, speaking from an underground bunker in an undisclosed location, life-term US President Jimmy Carter denied that the environmental catastrophe caused by geo-thermal drilling was the direct result of his thirty-year "self-sufficient" energy policy outlined to the American people in his "malaise speech" of July 15th, 1979.
Energy Secure NationSince that time, the new "energy-secure nation" had dramatically reduced its reliance on imported oil, largely withdrawing itself from unnecessary security commitments in the Middle East and Western Europe which of course the Soviet Union now occupied. However an explosion on the 20th April had caused catastrophic damage to the environment in the northern hemisphere, with speculation rife that an extinction-level event had only narrowly been averted.
And the problem was that the alleged success of the self-sufficiency program meant that the US could no longer shut down domestic facilities as environmentalists were demanding. To do so would turn off supply, bringing the country to the very standstill it had set out to avoid. Instead, Carter announced an acceleration of the second track of the policy, to move to a new platform of clean, renewable energy sources by 2025. By which time, it was hoped that the ecosphere would have returned to something approaching normal and peanut farming might again become viable.
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Jimmy Carter, Barack Obama, Energy, Deepwater, 2010 Election. Editor says, for this Deepwater ATL, we have included a number of ideas suggested by Eric Lipps, Robbie Taylor, Stan Brin, Eric Oppen and David Atwell.
~ "Life-term president" Jimmy Carter? How?
I know I've written a TL in which there's a lifetime presidency, but in it, it's unlikely Carter would have gtten the job (if, indeed, he'd even been born, since the POD came at the 1787 Constitutional Convention).
It's also unlikely that geothermal drilling could cause an "extinction-level" disaster, though I suppose spectacular accidents short of that are possible.
Simple hostility to Jimmy Carter and the environmental movement seems a poor basis for a good ATL. I'm English we're big fans of irony. I am actually saying we should have listened to Carter.
Comment from Mike McIlvain on Facebook: Jimmy Carter, environmental efforts in his era, and this Gulf of Mexico catastrophe have the elements to extend such questions into later millennia. What was it he and Stewart Udall were arguing for back then regarding deep offshore drilling?
Comment from Dave Landers on Facebook: Actually all presidents since Nixon has been trying to get us off oil. Weird thing is he started the EPA & the Clean Water Act, every Pres since? Not so much
~ All presidents since Nixon have been trying to get us off oil? Au contraire. The two oilmen, Bush & Bush, plus Reagan, were very much in favor of oil. They may have made noises about using American oil, but were not shy about continuing to tie us to foreign sources in spite of the disastrous consequences for the US.
~ Jimmy Carter didn't have the cojones to make himself Pres-for-Life.
~ The big pushes on his program were shale and coal gasification both of which crashed and burned because the Saudis opened the spigot wide as part of a combined campaign to bankrupt the Soviets. How do we get from here to a geothermal catastrophe?
Comment from Dave Landers on Facebook: Actually all presidents since Nixon has been trying to get us off oil. Weird thing is he started the EPA & the Clean Water Act, every Pres since? Not so much
Comment from Patricia Williams-King on Facebook: The oil people have too much money and they don't want us spending money on green technologies!
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Editor says, what if the authorities acknowledged the Roswell Incident five decades later?
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In 1997, on this day the U.S. Air Force releases an official report acknowledging that the 1947 "Roswell incident" had in fact been a genuine encounter with extraterrestrial aliens.
The report states that the true character of the encounter had been concealed for national security reasons, both to avoid panic - in 1947, the hysteria over the infamous 1938 Orson Welles broadcast of H.G. Wells' novel War of the Worlds was still a painfully fresh memory - and in order to avoid revealing to the Soviets that the U.S. now had access to alien technology.
"Roswell Incident" - its official by Eric Lipps The document admits that the U.S. space program was partly inspired by the knowledge that extraterrestrials were observing Earth, but says that in fact no direct contact has been made. Moreover, it reveals, attempts to reverse-engineer the alien craft have been largely fruitless. "It's as if a modern jet aircraft had crashed in America in 1776 and the people back then had tried to copy it," reads one passage.
"It's as if a modern jet aircraft had crashed in America in 1776 and the people back then had tried to copy it,"Air Force spokesmen state that the report is being declassified and released because its findings have been judged no longer likely to trigger unrest and are not expected to provide any useful information to potential adversaries.
Perhaps the most surprising revelation contained in the document is a CIA assessment that the Soviet Union had possessed a similar alien wreck since 1927, retrieved from the site of the 1908 Tunguska event in which an explosion estimated at 10 to 20 megatons occurred over Siberia. Like their American counterparts, however, the Soviets had been unable to gain any more than minor technological and scientific advantages from studying their find.
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Eric Lipps
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: roswell el Source: Wikipedia Labels: Roswell, Alien, USAF, America, New Mexico. ~ I've got to admit, this would be neat. I wonder why the alien ship crashed---were they doing a little too much Nyborg? *grin*
~ Aiieee! It's supposed to be 1997, not 1920!.
~ Interesting premise, even if you don't believe in conspiracy theories..Incidentally, you might want to fix the e-mail link for this thread-- the first time I clicked the link, it took me by mistake to the February 11th post in the Chicago19 thread.
~ This explains George W Bush then doesn't it.... lol
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In 2015, on this day London was hit with its fifth municipal employees' strike in as many months as sanitation workers walked off the job to protest plans to privatize the city's trash collection service. | |
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: GSTQ Source: Wikipedia Labels: David Cameron, Nick Clegg, Gordon Brown, Conservative, Liberal Democrats.comments powered by Disqus
On this day in 2002, religious and secular opponents of Saddam Hussein united for a rally in Baghdad to demand what one Shiite cleric referred to as "the abolition of a godless regime"; some of the bolder protestors took their grievances directly to the headquarters of Saddam's Revolutionary Command Council. | |
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| Saddam Hussein |
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© Today in Alternate History, 2013-. All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
