Today In Alternate History

August 29

In 1526, on this day a glorious victory at the Battle of Mohács ensured that King Louis II fended off the Ottoman invasion and maintained the grip of the Jagiellon dynasty (coat of arms pictured) on the throne of Hungary and Bohemia.

Famous Hungarian Victory at the Battle of MohácsThe death of absolutist king Matthias Corvinus had thrown the nation into an acute crisis. And although the Hungarians had long opposed Ottoman expansion in southeastern Europe, the fall of Nándorfehérvár and Szabács meant that most of the southern part of the country was left indefensible.

When Louise II rejected peace offers from Suleiman I an Ottoman expedition advanced up the Danube River. Suleiman could not believe that this small, "suicidal" army was all that once powerful country could muster against him, but he underestimated the ruthless expediency of Louise II who broke with chivalry¹ by ordering the attack as the Ottoman troops struggled through marshy terrain. Suleiman I was killed in the confusion, and the result was the end of Ottoman aspirations for occupying Hungarian territory.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Generals Source: Wikipedia Labels: Habsburg, Jagiellon, Hungary, Bohemian, Ottoman.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in reality Louise II respect chivalry and did not order such an assault [1]. His death as he fled the battle marked the collapse of Medieval Hungary and the end of the Jagiellon rule in Hungary and Bohemia, their dynastic claims were absorbed by the Habsburgs via the marriage of Louis' sister. Mohács is seen by many Hungarians as the decisive downward turning point in the country's history, a national trauma that persists in the nation's folk memory. For moments of bad luck, Hungarians still say: "more was lost at Mohács" (Több is veszett Mohácsnál). Hungarians view Mohács as marking the end of an independent and powerful European nation. In authoring this post, we have repurposed content from Wikipedia.

Readers Comment Stan Brin commented on 2012-08-28 23:09:42 ~ Throughout their history, the Ottoman Turks were masters of good luck. Although Tamur administered a temporary setback, the ottomans' luck didn't fail them until Vienna in 1683. Their subsequent survival for 235 years was also due to good luck, theirs, and Europe's unwillingness to unite against them out of fear of Russia.

Readers Comment Richard Roper commented on 2012-08-28 23:43:30 ~ They sure were ! This would completely change European history, the death of the sultan would throw the ottomans into total confusion - need to find a new one from the sons of the harem - and the Christian forces could advance and recapture Belgrade and territory to the South East. How will the religious wars of Christian Europe now play out? Will Hungry become Calvinist? a

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2012-08-29 00:46:39 ~ Was this before or after Roxelana hypnotized Suleiman? If Suleiman's heir (the one Roxelana had put out of the way so that her worthless son Selim could be Sultan) was alive and in position to take the throne, the Ottoman dynasty could go on for quite a bit longer. They'd had a long succession of able sultans, and it was commented at the time that Suleiman's decision to off his heir in favor of Selim marked a major turn for the worse.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2012-08-29 19:46:24 ~ A strong independent Hungary would definitely shift European history. Although it might well be butterflied out, WWI could be along a whole different set of alliances.

Readers Comment Christopher Lee commented on 2012-08-31 17:35:12 ~ Interesting but the Hungarians would likely struggle to deliver a blow in a swamp, the main offensive arm of their army was cavalry. If they did manage to deliver a blow like this it would have caused massive trouble with the Ottomans. At that stage the Ottomans were struggling with the implications of their sultans having dozens of children by numerous different women. They had begun to put all their various half brothers to death upon accession. If Suleiman had died in this unexpected way there would certainly have been a struggle for succession but it might have been quick and brutal, over in a few months. The Ottomans had a tradition of campigning every year, signified by the horsehair standard being raised at one gate of Constantinople to show which direction they would go in. The problem for the Hungarians would have been that their kingdom was well within the campaigning radius of the Ottomans who found their effective limit to be northern Hungary. They did not take Vienna largely because the distance from Constantinople was so far that it left them only a very short campaigning season. Hungary was much closer and well within their range. They were without doubt easily the predominant military power in Europe at that point and were rarely defeated. I anticipate that after a short and brutal battle for succession the new sultan would have exacted revenge with a crushing campaign into Hungary. So victory was probably only a reprieve, Hungary was unfortunately for Hungary well inside the range of the Ottomans and in this period their military predominance meant they would conquer it sooner or later.

In 1936, on this day the twenty-seventh President of the Confederate States John Sidney McCain III was born in the Federal District of Richmond, Virginia.

John S. McCain III
27^th Confederate President
March 4, 2011 - presentAs the senior Confederate States Senator from Arizona, he was the Constitutionist nominee for president in the 2010, winning against a tight race against Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas who had sought to become the third straight president from that state.

McCain followed his father and grandfather, both four-star admirals, into the Confederate States Navy, graduating from the C.S. Naval Academy in 1958. He became a naval aviator, flying ground-attack aircraft from aircraft carriers. During the Nicaraguan War, he nearly lost his life in the 1967 CSS Louis A. Johnson fire. In October 1967, while on a bombing mission over Managua, he was shot down, seriously injured, and captured by the Nicaraguan Contra. He was a prisoner of war until 1973. McCain experienced episodes of torture, and refused an out-of-sequence early repatriation offer. His war wounds left him with lifelong physical limitations. A new article from the "Two Americas" thread on Althistory Wikia

After returning to the C.S. McCain eventually followed his father, who had died in 1981, into the Admiralty of the Navy. He became Secretary of the Navy under President Al Gore in 1999 after an impressive career leading the Caribbean fleet in keeping peace from Trinidad to Texas. In 2002, he resigned to fill a Senate seat upon the death of a long time senator. With his resignation, he also retired from the Navy. After just two years, as a senator, he began a duel campaign for re-election and the nomination for CS president with the Constitution party.

After losing the nomination to Mike Huckabee in 2004, he went on to win re-election in Arizona for the seat he would have vacated as a successful nominee. He worked with the Huckabee administration admirably, leading to a successful campaign in 2009 to replace vice president Inglis, the presumed candidate. With a campaign that sought to reach across ideological boundaries, McCain was able to succeed in unseating the "heir apparent" to the presidency, leading to a victory over Blanche Lincoln, a Democrat 24 years his junior, who was trying to become the third president in a row from Arkansas.
The whole alternate biography is available Althistory Wiki.

Entry posted by Guest Historian

Alt Wikia

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Two Americas Source: Althistory Wikia Labels: McCain, Richmond, Presidency, Confederacy, Election.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2011-03-24 02:41:23 ~ I don't think this meshes with the CS Constitution...in that, the POTCS got one six-year term and no reelections.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2011-03-24 16:47:59 ~ Could be an amendment to widen presidential control at some point of troubling history, kind of a reverse of FDR.

In 1862, as an indication as to the strength of the Union, especially at the time, even with the disaster having endured by the Army of the Potomac, a new Union army, the Army of Virginia, had been organised during McClellan's slow march up the Peninsular.

Second Manassas by David AtwellFormed from a mix of new recruits and divisions stripped from McClellan's original plans for his campaign on Richmond, it numbered 77 000 troops by the time it took its first steps on its march towards Richmond. Lincoln, although not having complete faith in its commander, General John Pope, nevertheless did not originally envisaged the Army of Virginia to do anything other than defend the Union capital. But now, with the Army of the Potomac under siege, and Pope declaring he shall be victorious, Lincoln had few choices other than allow Pope to attack, hoping that Richmond may indeed fall, whilst the Confederate army was busy with the trapped Army of the Potomac.

Lee, however, saw it coming, thanks mostly to Union newspapers reporting the boasts of General Pope. Consequentially, by late July 1862, a mere three weeks after the Seven Days Battles, Lee had started slipping out divisions, from around the battlelines surrounding Harrison's Landing, back to positions covering Richmond from a northern approach. Still, not everything went to plan as Pope actually managed to get a step on Lee's preparations by moving earlier than Lee predicted. Consequentially, a number of skirmishes commenced, between Jackson's units, now organised under the banner of CSA II Corps, which culminated at the Battle of Cedar Mountain on 9 August. Although it was a Confederate victory, it was far from a convincing one as evident by, even though the Union retreated, Jackson was in no position to pursue.A Chapter from Action Jackson 1862

Mind, it was not that Lee wanted Jackson to pursue the Union force at this point in time, as Lee had no idea whether McCellan, with a still a sizeable force of some 53 000 troops, would take advantage of the moves by Pope, break out of the Harrison's Landing parameter, and once more march on Richmond. As a result, Lee kept Longstreet's newly organised CSA I Corps in place, for as long as possible, until he was convinced McClellan was content to remain in place. This meant, though, that Jackson, with only 24 000 troops, had to face off an army three times his number. Lee, in other words, was playing for time.

Time, however, was more so running out for Pope rather than for Lee, as Lee had finally decided to leave a small force behind under Magruder, watching McClellan, whilst moving the great bulk of Longstreet's Corps north to join up with Jackson. Meanwhile, and unbeknown to Lee, McClellan had actually organised an evacuation to take place not much later around 30 August. Still that did not now matter to Lee, as countering Pope was his main objective.

Alas for Pope, he would help Lee in his own defeat at the Battle of Second Manassas. Having rapidly advanced south initially, after the Battle of Cedar Mountain, he became overly cautious akin to McClellan. This may have seemed prudent at the time, considering the recent fate of the Army of the Potomac, but in this case it ensured Lee was given the precious time he needed to get his plans developed and put into motion. So once again, with a Union army holding their positions, waiting for a frontal attack, Lee simply moved around its right flank and attacked where Pope never expected him to do so. At first the Confederate plans seemed to be working, but then Pope, for all his faults, more or less realised the danger: or to put it more accurately, it should be said, some of his subordinates realised the danger but Pope eventually listened. Thus, having dug in along the Rappahannock expecting a frontal assault, a long series of mobile battles instead resulted, on the Union's right flank, as the Union Army of Virginia commenced a retreat in a race to get to Manassas Junction before the Confederates.

Alas for the Union Army of Virginia, the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia would not let them get away that easy. Instead a huge battle took place at Manassas, which would dwarf the first one that took place there just over a year before. Although the Confederates were outnumbered, as they only had about 55 000 soldiers against 77 000 Union troops, on this particular occasion it mattered not, for on the day of battle, 29 August 1862, the Union positions were haphazard, poorly organised, and several units were still arriving on the battlefield. Meanwhile the Confederates had fully deployed and overlapped both flanks of the Union battleline.

Thus when the Confederates attacked at around 10 AM, even though the Union centre managed to repulse the morning attacks, it was a completely different story on the flanks. In both instances, the Union was in trouble from the start. Jackson's attacks, though, were soon stopped by stubborn Union resistance around the Stone House, but Longstreet's attacks on the other flank simply drove the few Union defenders into a panic. This panic was soon turned into a total rout as Stuart's cavalry got involved with the attack. Within a hour, Longstreet's Corps, lead by Kemper's division, had swung around behind the Union centre, and were soon attacking the rear of the Union positions at the Stone House. In doing so, the vast majority of the Union Army of Virginia, including its commanding general, had been surrounded. They would not last out the day.
Read the whole story of Action Jackson 1862 - Stonewall's Foot Cavalry Wins The Day on the Changing the Times web site

In 1936, the 43rd President of the United States John Sidney McCain was born at Coco Solo Naval Air Station in the Panama Canal Zone, to naval officer John S. McCain, Jr. (1911-1981) and Roberta (Wright) McCain (b. 1912).

President John McCain
January 2001 to January 2009The presidency of John McCain is likely to prove as great a favorite of popular historians as that of Theodore Roosevelt. Like Roosevelt, his presidency was prefaced by a heroic earlier life. Like Roosevelt, McCain was renowned, if not precisely for his wit, then for a reliably dramatic and articulate temper. Both presidents, throughout their careers, were keenly interested in administrative structures per se. However, while these presidents were unusually knowledgeable about foreign and military issues, the circumstances of McCain's administration gave him far greater opportunity to work in these areas; indeed, McCain has been called "Theodore Roosevelt with Woodrow Wilson's problems".

A new story by John ReillyContemporary political commentators have sometimes suggested McCain would not have received the Republican nomination in 2000, had it not been for the publication at a critical time in the primary election process of an old scandal involving his principal opponent. (The irony is that the information was Democratic opposition research intended for the general election but apparently leaked early to the press by accident.) Though no serious misbehavior was involved, the issue managed to depress his opponent's appeal in the early southern primaries. McCain's bid thus survived until the nominating process moved to the Midwest and Mountain states, where he enjoyed greater natural advantages. Still, the delegate vote at the Republican Convention that year was the closest in living memory. The nomination would have gone differently if a single state delegation had been on the other side. The general election, in contrast, was a popular vote and Electoral College landslide for the Republicans.

Several reasons have been adduced to explain this result. The candidates seemed to differ only in degree except on social issues; these were muted in the election. However, the Democratic nominee was generally regarded as a continuation of the prior Administration, which had fallen under an ethical cloud. In any case, the popular dissatisfaction with the Democrats did not extend to Congress; McCain's party actually lost control of the Senate by a single seat.

The McCain Administration was the first since that of Richard Nixon to focus from the outset primarily on foreign affairs. These president's early efforts did not invariably appear to improve matters. In his first meeting in Paris with the heads of the NATO countries, for instance, President McCain publicly engaged in a multilingual shouting match with President Jacques Chirac about who was more serious about controlling carbon emissions. Russian-American relations went from frosty to arctic after the first meeting between President McCain and President Vladimir Putin, when McCain made his notorious "evil ice dwarf" comment to reporters on the flight home.

On some critical issues, the Administration does not seem to have been very well served by the terrorism experts retained from the prior Administration. These officials pushed their own pet projects and gave advice that almost invariably turned out to be misdirections. In any case, though the Administration came into office with a raft of proposed reforms for health care, education, infrastructure, and so on, these were shelved until the second term by the events of September 11: even the small, temporary, stimulative tax reduction that the Congress had enacted to deal with a mild recession was revoked to help pay for the subsequent unplanned military expenditures.

The president was in Washington at the time of the attacks in 2001. He was widely criticized for foolhardiness in rejecting Secret Service advice to leave the city, but his extemporaneous address from the Oval Office that evening has been classed as model of modern rhetoric. His national security team quickly determined that the base for the attacks was in Afghanistan: the existing regime and the terrorist leadership it had been hosting had been removed by the end of the year. This by no means ended the war, since Islamist factions quickly regrouped across the Pakistani border and instituted a cult of the martyrdom of their former leaders. Nonetheless, the speed and the success of the invasion bought the president the prestige to go ahead six months later with a decapitating raid against the Baathist regime in Iraq. There followed a systematic peace-keeping and nation-building program on which the president was accused of lavishing more attention than on the government of the United States.

The president was also criticized for confining the legal justification for the Iraq invasion to the UN resolutions of 1990 and 1991. His public case for the war was a set of sophisticated variations on the theme that the Baathist regime had never complied with the terms of the ceasefire of 1991 and could not be trusted to do so after the UN restrictions were removed. The president coined a phrase, "field of peace," to describe what he was trying to "generate" in the Middle East. The concept was widely ridiculed, until the post-Iraq-invasion revelation by Libya of its enormous WMD programs and the new willingness of Iran to talk. These developments, and the fact that the nation-building strategy enabled the beginning of substantial troop reductions by the spring of 2004, silenced whatever criticism remained about the justification and conduct of the war.

Emboldened by the personal popularity which these successes accorded him, President McCain made one of the most daring moves in American political history: he ran for reelection as an independent. To some extent, this move was forced on him: the Republican Party had broken up. The president politely accepted the nomination of the convention with the greatest claim to institutional continuity, but he appeared on most ballots as the nominee of the "Rally for the Republic," essentially a privately organized network of publicists, financial backers, and key constituency groups. The disintegration of the parties at the national level was a foreseeable instance of the general trend toward "disintermediation" between producers and consumers in all areas of life. In 2004, his principal opponent in the general election was still a "Democrat," though the nature of that group had changed profoundly since 1992. Thereafter, the movement toward increasingly personalized politics seemed irresistible.

The Administration's predilection for comprehensive, systematic treatment of domestic issues had mixed results. The new strategy of replacing employer-provided health insurance with privately owned policies had the primary effect of imposing a paperwork burden on the population comparable to that imposed by the (unreformed) federal tax code. There might have been a political crisis, had not the legalization of pharmaceutical imports caused a temporary but noticeable decrease in costs.

President's McCain's chief domestic accomplishment was technical and procedural: the Tax Efficiency and Reform Act of 2005. This comprehensive tax-code reform lowered the top marginal individual tax rate to 28%, as well as abolishing the Alternative Minimum Tax; the reform paid for these features by abolishing almost all the deductions in the existing code. The reform was revenue neutral. Small federal budget surpluses had begun to reappear in 2004, the maintenance of which became the Administration's chief fiscal priority. The reform of the Social Security system disappeared as an issue during the McCain Administration: experience showed that the projected insolvency point for the system retreated by a year for every year the budget balanced or showed a surplus.

Other enthusiasms of President McCain proved less happy. His insistence on a complicated campaign-finance scheme alienated the ad hoc majority in Congress on which he relied for support. The measure was of doubtful constitutionality, and the Administration was probably saved an embarrassment when it failed.

The Administration was not so lucky with an immigration measure that, in effect, granted provisional legal status to everyone in the United States, and this without first ensuring that the federal government had physical control of the borders. The immigration enforcement agencies had to stand down at the borders (including airports) and internally; the chance of apprehending someone whom it might have been proper to detain under the new rules was too small to justify the expense of acting. The immigration bureaucracy was deluged with millions of applications in the space of a few weeks and soon ceased functioning at all. Visas to the United States became unobtainable. Meanwhile, television images showed a steady passage of persons crossing the borders, as well as the appearance of new, impromptu municipalities at the edges of cities and sometimes in public parks. For the most part, these settlements were not, as was incorrectly reported at the time, "colonies" of new immigrants, but associations of longterm undocumented persons who took advantage of the relaxed enforcement regime to move from cramped and often dangerous accommodations. There were notable outbreaks of civil disorder in several places.

The episode lasted a month. The emergency was ended when the president was prevailed upon to invoke the emergency power granted to him in the immigration bill to regulate immigration in extraordinary circumstances. No permanent harm was done, but the country was badly shaken. The president's speech of apology, in which he took responsibility for the bill and pledged to restore order, was almost unprecedented and highly effective.

One of the ironies of the McCain Administration was that a man so interested in bureaucratic order enhanced his reputation chiefly through his ability to handle unpredictable disasters. The submersion of New Orleans may not, perhaps, quite count as "unpredictable": few such events have ever been foretold with so much expert specificity so long beforehand. Nonetheless, the event occurred on McCain's watch, and he understood the importance of what was happening as soon as it was certain the hurricane would make landfall near the city. He ordered his disaster managers and, more important, the Secretary of Defense to the city to monitor events. Before the lower parts of the city were completely flooded, he had invoked questionable but legally colorable authority to use the federal military as rescue forces and police. Perhaps the most famous scene of his presidency occurred the next day when he visited the city, personally "fired" the mayor, and ordered the detention of the entire city police force. His later refusal to sign any reconstruction legislation that applied outside the highland areas of the city remains controversial.

President McCain is remembered for many other things, from his directive to NASA after the Columbia disaster to build an Earth-to-LEO manned spacecraft within a year to the creation of the League of Democracies. He is not always remembered with universal fondness. Nonetheless, his paradoxical presidency did not have the dispiriting effect that several other administrations of the past 50 years had had. His many opponents loved to hate him; his even more numerous admirers were frequently exasperated but never bored. A rare national consensus prevailed as he left office: the Republic had not been altogether badly served.

Entry posted by Guest Historian

John Reilly

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: John Reilly Blog Source: John Reilly Labels: John McCain, George Bush, Al Gore, 2000, Presidency.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2010-09-27 17:29:43 ~ One thing that wouldn't have hurt would have been a lot less bitterness about the outcome of the 2000 elections---Bush was never, never forgiven for that by a lot of people. Even in his last year of office, I heard people calling him the "President-Select." A president without Bush's lack of interest in foreign affairs and peoples would have also been better.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2010-09-27 19:16:33 ~ Would that it were... Amazing what a country can do with good leadership, though overwhelming federal power seems a challenge to states' rights on the side of Katrina (not that anyone would seriously complain). Wonder who would've won in 2008?

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2010-09-28 00:50:00 ~ Yes, it is amazing what a counytry can do with good leadership. This scenario, however, is, to put it kindly, excessively generous to McCain and takes some cheap shots at the (carefully unnamed) Clinton Administration. Moreover, it's far from clear that a McCain "landslide" was at all likely in 2000, assuming he'd won the GOP nomination. Gore may not have been the best of candidates, but he wasn't the worst by any means. It seems more probable that McCain, if he had won, would have done so by a narrow margin. One of thew reasons is that having beaten Bush in the primaries, he'd have had to watch his back after the GOP convention. Bush's people, a lot of them, really, really didn't like or trust McCain. No matter how many Confederate-themed state flags he saluted, he'd have a hard time winning them over.

Readers Comment Brian Hartman commented on 2011-03-30 18:41:44 ~ I think this is a fairly plausible scenario, insofar as the election itself goes. I think McCain was more popular among moderates than Bush was, and so he would've had an easier time of it than Bush in beating Gore. I think the scenario falters a little bit on Iraq. It sweeps aside a lot of the real problems with decapitating the Iraqi leadership which, as far as we can tell from this scenario, were still there. I also don't see why he would run as an independent if the parties were really that weak in this timeline. I don't understand why there would be a different outcome than there was in our timeline: The strengthening of the Republican party. The proposed timeline gives McCain a lot of success, and that's the kind of thing that can really embolden a party. In the proposed timeline, 2006 would've been a great year for Republicans.

By 1833, slavery had existed in the British Empire long before it could have been called an empire, but the sun seemed to set it as the nineteenth century grew prosperous. Abolitionists had worked for years to end the practice by lobbying Parliament, and a formal Anti-Slavery Society was formed in 1823 with such members as William Wilberforce, Thomas Clarkson, and Elizabeth Pease. Pitted against them were the wealthy plantation owners of the empire whose fortunes were based on cheap labor.

Parliament Passes Slaves' Rights ActAnother force against the abolitionists was simple inertia. Slavery had worked for so long that, while it may have been deplorable, that was simply the way things were. Many noted the question of what to do with thousands of newly freed, unemployed, uneducated former slaves. The status quo continued so, until 1831 when a planned peaceful strike of Baptist slaves broke out into violent revolt in Jamaica, put down ten days later with hundreds dead in what became known as the Baptist War.

A new story by Jeff ProvineAfter the rebellion, an inquiry was sent to investigate, and the brutality of the planters became known. While the abolitionists used the information to push forward their agenda, businessmen became concerned. They had lost the slave trade in 1807, but to lose all slaves would be a major financial hit. When it became suspected that even the East India Company may suffer, money acted. Through politicking and outright bribery, the years of work of the Anti-Slavery Society were absconded and twisted into a new ideal: governing the rights of slaves.

Before the abolitionists could effectively rebut it, the Slaves' Rights Act was passed in 1833. The institution of slavery was thus legally protected, and slaves were deemed a kind of lifetime apprentice. Mistreatment of slaves was made stiffly illegal with fines and even jail-time, but runaway slaves were also to be arrested and fined what little money they had. A new office of civil servant was created as Slave Inspectors (which became well paid and often relations of large slave owners). Also key to the act was the point that slave may only be bought or sold with a writ of permission from the slave. While not reigniting the slave trade, this did open legal grounds for the transport and sale of slaves.

Abolitionists decried the act as "a feeble bandage on a festering wound", and Thomas Clarkson was quoted as saying that he was "happy Wilberforce did not live to see this day". Still, the law improved conditions for slaves, and many were sold their freedom. Even with fewer slaves per capita, slavery continued. Reinventing themselves, many abolitionists began to use the "writ of permission" as note that the slaves must be able to write effectively, and thus schooling must be provided for all slaves, especially the young. When it was upheld in the courts, many abolitionists became educators for the slaves.

With furthered education, the slaves of the British Empire became arguably more politically significant than the uneducated masses in the large cities of the Industrial Revolution. Following the reports of David Livingstone in the 1860s about the Arab slave trade, a new push for slaves' rights began and was furthered by the Emancipation Proclamation in America during its Civil War. A long discourse in Parliament began, and slavery was abolished in 1873. Newly freed, many slaves used their education to better their position: opening businesses, buying land, and employing other former slaves as workers in factories.

Toward the twentieth century, the centers of manufacturing shifted toward former plantations. Throughout the British Empire, factories sprung up beside fields, transforming towns to cities. Seaside cities solved their energy needs with offshore drilling for oil and "wave generators," a machine capable of turning tidal motion to electricity, invented by Freedman John Stanwite of Jamaica. The Caribbean became known as South Manchester for its manufactures, though the nickname was only economically apt as its was a collection of light industry instead of heavy machines. The colonies swiftly began to move away from Britain as a "motherland".

With the World War ending in 1918, Ireland led the colonies in searching for freedom. With a marginal downturn in the world economy over the course of the 1930s in the World Depression, political pressure forced the British Empire to evolve into a commonwealth of republics. Socialism would strike many of the former French and Spanish colonies as preferable following the example of Stalinist Russia, but the political tug-of-war between the capitalist west and the USSR could hardly be called a war, even a cold one. Instead, widespread commercialism would dominate the world by the beginning of the twenty-first century.

Entry posted by Guest Historian

Jeff Provine

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Jeff Provine Blog Source: Jeff Provine’s Blog Labels: Slavery, Africa, British Empire, Slave, Great Britain.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in reality, the act of 1833 fully abolished slavery, though not all at once. Slaves under six were freed, and the rest would be deemed "apprentices" to be freed gradually based upon employment until 1840. Many slaves led peaceful protests and were granted their freedom early. However, the Act did make note that it was not applicable "to any of the Territories in the Possession of the East India Company, or to the Island of Ceylon, or to the Island of Saint Helena", thus protecting many business interests.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2010-08-29 14:10:44 ~ If the end of slavery in the British Empire had been delayed, that would hhave affected the history of the "peculiar institution" in the U.S. as well, weakening abolitionism in North America. And if there had been a U.S. Civil War in the 1860s as in our history, Britain, still a slaveholding nation, would hhave been even more strongly drawn to the Confederate cause than it was. While this might not have ensured a CSA victory, it might have prolonged the war and embittered U.S.-British relations--perhaps enough, and for long enough, that when World War I broke oout and England began seizing neutral ships (including U.S. vessels) bound for the Continent to keep them from trading with the Central Powers, the U.S. might have tilted toward Germany. Washington might not actually have joined the Powers, but with a sourer attitude toward Great Britain, Wilson (or whoever else was president) might never have chosen to enter the war, out of at best an "a plague on both their houses" spirit.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2010-08-30 16:14:38 ~ Great extrapolations of TL impact on America. We'd stay fairly more isolationist, and the overall power of the world seems more balanced.

In 2006, speaking at a press conference in Hollywood on this day, writer/director Quentin Tarantino announced the cancellation of the long-awaited movie Inglorious Basterds, placing the blame on acute casting problems. The over-ambitious vision for the film was a spaghetti-western set in Nazi-occupied France, a complex fusion of ideas from The Dirty Dozen, Cross of Iron and Pulp Fiction. A fiendishly complex subtextual plot had emerged from the decade-long development project. And for the characters, it was simply impossible to find actors whose play could satisfy Tarantino's high standards. Nobody was good enough. In an interview with Charlie Rose, Tarantino acknowledged his creative failure, admitting he had been "too precious about the page".
Watch the Youtube Clip

A Band ApartThe characterisation problem really narrowed down to two key protagonists, SS Colonel Hans Landa (pictured) and his nemesis in the OSS, "Aldo the Apache" (Lieutenant Aldo Raine of the US First Special Air Service)."I knew whatever actor I cast to play this has to be as much of a linguistic genius as Landa is or he would never come off the page" Tarantino said. Landa seduces his prey with his words and speaks fluent German, English, French and Italian. Other actors "could do the poetry in this language, but they couldn't do the poetry in that language. And they had to be able to say the poetry in every language," Tarantino said.

Tarantino never found a suitable actor for Landa, but he did come agonisingly close with Aldo Raine. A night-long meeting with Brad Pitt involved "five bottles of wine and some smoking apparatus". And yet by the end of the discussion, Pitt had determined that the role was little more than a reprise of Lee Marvin' Redneck OSS Major John Reisman from the Dirty Dozen. Pitt subsequently rejected the role as "too lightweight".
Watch the Interview

"Inglourious Basterds, a war movie that may eventually resemble The Dirty Dozen merged with Cross of Iron, has been predicted more often than the second coming of the Lord". ~ The Irish TimesDesperately disappointed, and seeking to clear his head by moving onto to fresh new projects, Tarantino instructed his agents to offer the film rights to The Weinstein Company and Universal Pictures. The studios asset-stripped the project to its very core, releasing A Band Apart on the sixty-fifth anniversary of the Dieppe Raid, the central event for the new movie.

In 2009, on this day counter-insurgency specialist General David Howell Petraeus arrived at the south-eastern end of Cuba.Petraeus' Knot to Untie, Part 6 - To the Island in Chains
Former President George W. Bush had instructed Petraeus to eliminate the threat posed by the mysteriously named terrorist group America Is Born Again. Petraeus had many answers to find, perhaps some would be answered today. For those questions would be presented to Osama Bin Laden, recently arrived at the detainment camp at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base. Petraeus packed away the work of fiction he had read on the flight, and began to mentally prepare for the interview.
In the beginning of days Sauron served Aule the Smith. From Aule he learnt much of forging and making, knowledge that he would make use of many thousands of years later when he built the Barad-dur and forged the One Ring. In the earliest days, Sauron was seduced into the service of the first Dark Lord, and Sauron became the greatest and most trusted of his followers. While Udun still stood in the dark north of the world, Sauron was given command of his lesser fortress of Angband. At length, the Valar assaulted Sauron's master and took him in chains back to Valinor, but Sauron escaped, and remained in Middle-earth. ~ JRR Tolkien, Lord of the Rings
The story will continue in Part Seven ..

	In 1951, on this day what may have been the most controversial criminal trial of the 20th century got underway as a New Orleans teenager named Lee Harvey Oswald was indicted for second-degree murder.

Lee Harvey Oswald


Oswald, son of a New York City insurance salesman, had been arrested two days earlier in connection with the shooting death of a Louisiana state trooper who'd tried to take him into custody for alleged violation of the dawn-to-dusk curfew that had been in effect for the New Orleans area since the Bellus-Zyra disaster.

In 1960, on this day the New York Public Library began accepting donations to rebuild its main collection, much of which had been damaged or destroyed in the Jamaica Bay hurricane.	New York Public Library

Standoff	In 1995, on this day NATO launched Operation Deliberate Force against Bosnian Serb forces. The direct involvement of Western Europeans in the Balkans was of course a recipe for disaster, and as soon often, agitated the Pro-Slav Government in Moscow. The police involvement in the former Yugoslavia finally ended in a violent confrontation with Russian KFOR forces at Pristina International Airport. The Cold War between the two power blocs had finished, the Soviet Union had dissolved, and yet a new Hot War was improbably about to begin.

Pristina Airport

In 2007, last minute changes were made to the arrangements for the tenth memorial service of the late Princess Diana Spencer. The Prince of Wales decision not to attend the memorial had been met with widespread approval from the British public. Royal commentators considered it highly unlikely that Princes William and Harry would meet with their father (both have lived with the Earl of Spencer at his home in South Africa for the last decade). Attendees of the service were therefore shocked to see the Prince arrive with his second wife, the Duchess of Cornwall. They were amazed to see his two sons arrive, and present their father with a wristwatch engraved ASNF (A Son Never Forgets). In his emotional acceptance speech, Prince Charles said he was so sorry, so very sorry for what had happened, but he would set it right or die trying.

In 1968, Vice-President Hubert Humphrey receives the Democratic presidential nomination at the party's convention in Chicago, and chooses Senator Edmund S. Muskie as his running-mate. Humphrey is generally understood to be a political stand-in for President Johnson, a perception which does not help him. Outside in the street, police are clubbing down protesters, most of whom are supporters of defeated antiwar candidates Sens. Eugene McCarthy and George McGovern.

	Hubert Humphrey

The violence makes the network news. The protesters themselves are a varied lot, from overt Maoists and admirers of the still ongoing Castro rebellion in occupied Cuba to suit-wearing Quaker pacifists opposed to the Cuban and Southeast Asian wars on religious grounds. The Chicago Police Department, however, makes no distinctions; all are handled equally roughly--or, as Daley himself will put it on television, 'sternly.'

In 1957, while in the middle of one of the longest filibusters in Senate history, Senator Strom Thurmond of South Carolina has a heart attack and dies on the Senate floor. Taking this as a sign, the Senate passes the civil rights measure he was opposing with a quick vote.

In 1708, a combined force of French and Indians is barely defeated during a battle at Haverhill, Massachusetts. Although a small part of the town was destroyed in the fighting, the colonists rebuild and the city becomes the eventual capitol of Massachusetts during its statehood.

In 1977, 3 people were arrested digging up Elvis Presley's grave. When no body was found inside, mourners outside Graceland began shouting, 'He is risen!' Several people declared that they had seen him walking among them; some even claimed that they had been cured of various maladies by the singer.

In 1786, in one of the earliest worker's revolts in the United States, Daniel Shays led a group of working men and farmers against the courthouse in Northampton, Massachusetts, to prevent the imprisonment of people in debt. Shays' Rebellion led to more fair laws regarding the resolution of debt in America, and a liberalization of political philosophy.

In 1632, English mystic John Locke was born. He wrote many popular treatises on the tabula rasa, or blank slate of the mind on which a strong personality could impose his will. At his death in 1704, he had a cult following of several thousand people who would follow his commands, no matter how outlandish.

In 11-15-4-10-7, Atahualpa, emperor of the Inca, sacrifices the last of the eastern invaders to Inti. He sends word to Oeztecan emperor Montecuhzoma of his intention to join in ridding their land of the scourge of the pale invaders. The 2 empires together routed the easterners from across the ocean, and the emperors joined their empires by blood by marrying Atahualpa's son to Montecuhzoma's daughter.

In 1995, on this day NATO launched Operation Deliberate Force against Bosnian Serb forces. The direct involvement of Western Europeans in the Balkans was of course a recipe for disaster, and as soon often, agitated the Pro-Slav Government in Moscow. The police involvement in the former Yugoslavia finally ended in a violent confrontation with Russian KFOR forces at Pri�tina International Airport. The Cold War between the two power blocs had finished, the Soviet Union had dissolved, and yet a new Hot War was improbably about to begin.

In 1949, the Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb, known as First Lightning or Joe 1, at Semipalatinsk, Kazakhstan. Fearful that the Cold War will turn hot, Western leaders instantly regretted the post World War II conflict. Desperate attempts were now made to accelerate the progress of the Manhattan Project, which had been stalled by a surprise German attack in 1944. The question was, what could be done in the three-five year interregnum whilst the West developed its own bomb?

In 1914, following the Battle of Tannenberg the Russian First Army retreated into the Willenberg. Against the passionately charged advice of Chief of Staff Max von Hoffman, Commanders Hindenberg and Ludendorff foolishly sent the German Eighth Army into the forests to capture General Aleksandr Samsonov. After all, lycanthropy was a child's story for the kindergarden, was it not?

In 1914, following the Battle of Tannenberg the Russian First Army retreated into Willenberg, where General Aleksandr Samsonov shot himself rather than inform the Tsar of the military disaster that had occured. Unbeknown to him, he had just won the war for the Allied Powers. German Junkers had been hysterical as the Russian Steamroller arrived in Eastern Prussia. The three corps, one complete army, that von Moltke had sent to bolster the east never arrived in time to have any effect. However, over a week was lost due to this confusion. The removal of an army in the west in the midst of battle was the reason the Schlieffen Plan failed. Tannenberg was the battle won that lost the war for Germany.

August 28

In 1916, on this day Paul von Hindenburg succeeds Erich von Falkenhayn, with whose strategy he disagreed, as Chief of the German General Staff. An installment from the Central Powers Victorious thread.

Central Powers Victorious Part 2 von Falkenhayn dismissedBoth his deputy Erich Ludendorff and principal staff officer Max Hoffmann also transferred from the Eastern Front. Although they reluctantly agree to appoint Ludendorff Quartermaster-General, he does not get the supremacy he desires because the Chancellor and the Emperor insist that Hindenburg and Ludendorff follow Hoffmann's plan and he has a completely free hand.

It takes eighteen months, but he formulates the winning strategy that delivers victory to Central Powers. The break through finally comes at the middle of the front in June at Marne II and the German armies surge towards Paris. The French as they always said, fall back upon the defence of their capital. There is then a cease-fire with the French, while the Germans threaten the Channel ports. The British and Lloyd-George now have what they have been talking about and feared - one to three million hostages in France.

Landsdowne is swiftly sent to Basel to accept Cousin Willi's Peace Office presented by Alfred Duke of Clarence and Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, Cousins George's and Willi's uncle and British royal duke. Landsdowne signs. Meanwhile Woodrow Wilson and Pershing are wrong footed, not being in position to attack in time. FDR as the young assistant naval secretary in France inspecting "his" marine corps is absolutely furious.

Because Hindenburg and Ludendorff (pictured) had no control over the military strategy, they had spent the majority of their time focusing on war time control of the economy. A domination had inevitably developed, and they intended to convert this into a military dictatorship at the soonest opportunity. von Hertling was determined to prevent this, but he only had a year to live, and by the time of his death, the office of Chancellorship was on the cusp of abolition.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Central Powers Victorious Source: Wikipedia Labels: Paul von Hindenburg, German Empire, Central Powers, Great War, Germany.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, thanks to Richard Roper for his contribution to the development of this post. We have re-purposed significant amounts of content from Wikipedia.
[1] this does not happen in OTL.

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2013-01-07 00:50:33 ~ Fight! Fight!

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2013-01-07 01:28:29 ~ "War-time control of the control?" Fixed - thanks, Ed And the world might have been a better place. A lot of people tend to conflate them, but Wilhelmine Germany (much less Austria-Hungary) was Paradise next to the Third Reich.

Readers Comment Mike McIlvain commented on 2013-01-07 02:09:52 ~ We still could have had WW II with this end to the Great War. And, Hitler still could have gained control of Germany, but it might have been a tougher fight for him to get it. And, he could have been shot in the process. None of the bomb attempts on him worked in later years.

Readers Comment Richard Roper commented on 2013-01-07 15:31:46 ~ No . NoVersailles = no Nazis and Hitler. the disturbed conditions of the post-war years do not occur and there is no Weimar Republic. Hitler ends up a bad artist with a gallery in Vienna.

Readers Comment Richard Roper commented on 2013-01-07 17:02:02 ~ Ludendorff would have done well as the controller of the German wartime economy - he was actually very good at that and was a burocrat. Ggerman production goes up and the economy is organised for Total War like the British.

Readers Comment Stan Brin commented on 2013-01-08 19:58:46 ~ I don't quite understand this. When was the victorious German advance? Why did it succeed? Remember, the German economy wasn't mismanaged, it was simply overwhelmed and ran out of resources -- by the end of the war, they were pulling plumbing out of houses for lead to make bullets. Efficiency only goes so far when people are forced to eat nothing but turnips.

Readers Comment Richard Roper commented on 2013-01-09 02:28:32 ~ IT IS SET FOR THE KAISERSCHACHT SUCCEEDING IN 1918. LUDENDORFF IS SENT TO BE A BUROCRAT RUNNING THE GERMAN ECONOMY LIKE LLOYD-GEORGE DID FOR BRITAIN IN THE MINISTRY OF MUNITIONS FOR TOTAL WAR. THIS WAS A GERMAN WEAKNESS. He is good at this. Max Hoffman is set to do the military tactics. The Germans use tanks - they only need a small number - for the breakthrough, and the deception/ use of tactical aircraft tactics similar to ourselves.

Readers Comment Richard Roper commented on 2013-01-10 01:07:34 ~ PART 3 HINDENBURG HAD RETIRED AND WAS BROUGHT OUT OF RETIREMENT IN AUGUST 1914 TO HEAD THE OPERATIONS IN THE EAST, WITH LUDENDORFF TRANSFERRED FROM THE GENERAL STAFF when the general in East Prussia wanted to retreat to the Vistula, the victory of Tannenburg followed, but it was Max Hoffman's plan. Ludendorf on his arrival in Berlin in 1916 after Falkenhayn is sacked, gets the job of organising the German war economy for Total War, Hindenburg continues as the figurehead whilr Max Hoffman, who has come with them is made responsible for military planning. Hoffman quickly closes down the battle of Verdun, thus avoiding the capture of a large number of German prisoner in the counter-offensive. He arranges a bombardment of the areas the Germans withdraw from when the French advance into them. Meanwhile it appears they are now massing on each side of the neck of the Verdun salient and are preparing to cut it off. Joffre and Mangin react by withdrawing men from Verdun. Meanwhile Hoffman orders, in as far as it can be done in time, the "Combined Arms" stormtrooper infiltration tactics to be used in counter-offensives on the Somme. This disconcerts Haig and the French. Predicting the attack at Messines Ridge and Passchendaele, Hoffman uses the same tactics of bombardment of an area evacuated and Combined Arms tactics are used, with even more disasterous results for Haig. Ludendorff is quite good at organising war production, which he did in the occupied areas in the East, as he was a burocrat and had always worked in military organisation and transport. The rise in German production is noted by Lloyd-George in intelligence reports, as he is the former Minister of Munitions, whilst worrying even more about casulaties in view of the worse military situation to OTL. Hoffman insists on tanks, including lighter fast ones for the pursuit and not just to break through the front line. He devises Cavalry Brigades, similar to those used by the Reds in the Russian Wars of Intervention, and infantry divisions coming along behind. These combine whatever tanks are available with cavalry, mounted infantry and mobile artillery, with supply transport in one unit. He devised new tactics similar to our own - decepetion and great attention toconcelaing where the attack will actually come with diversions and noise and use of aircraft to make attacks on troop formations and supplies behind the lines. This was the origin of the Panzer Division in OTL. Haig is convinced the attack will come in Flanders, the French believe it will come in Lorraine and Champagne. The result is Hoffman's offensive in 1918 goes straight through the centre, with 100,000 cavalry creating disruption behind the lines. The french fall back on Paris, as the always said they would do, and have difficulty coping with the Cavalry brigade tactics, as do the British cavalry Haig hastily sends south. Our mounted infantry are in the Middle East. The French government prepare yet again to flee to Bordeaux, Paris is put under martial law as a seige is feared. French troops race back to defend Paris. Joffre and Mangin are unable to deal with the panci of the French politicians and reluctantly recommend a cesae-fire. Lloyd-George receives and equally panic-stricken dispatch from Haig at British GHQ. This means the new German cavalry brigades can threaten the Channel Ports. Also the Germans have tanks. This triggers the greates fears of the British cabinet, as the Conservative members have discussed andfeared the dangers of us having 1 -3 million hostages in France. What happened to the German offensive in Flanders? Unfortunately the intelligence reports appear to have been mistaken. It is at this point the Kaiser's Peace Offer arrives, clearly devised by Wilhelm's uncle and co-ordinated with Hoffman. Landsdowne, the veteran foreign secretary and himself argunbg for a negotiated peace, is sent by Le Havre and Paris to Basel to receive it from the German inister plenipotentary, the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, aka Alfred Duke of Clarence and Edward VII's brother. Lloyd-George telegramms Landsdowne to sign an armistice. He sees advantages in positioning himself as a leading member of the peace conference and appears before the press at hte front door of No. 10 to announce "Peace with Honour". He particularrly fears further casualties and does not want the intended offensive of 19919, particualrly as they will have to rely on the Americans for it. Haig and the General Staff have already advised they believe the war will go on till 1920, at hte best Masy, but probably october, and that was before the German break-through. Poincaire spends some time pounding his desk in Paris and shouting "Albion La Perfide!", but he had his generals sign the original ceae-fire. On his return, Landsdowne is greated at Victoria Station by a huge crowd,wild cheering, and off-duty soldiers car him ontheir shoulders to his waiting car.

In 413 BC, spooked by a lunar eclipse¹, the superstitious Athenian Commander Nicias ordered the fleet to set sail immediately and the disappointing Sicilian Expedition ended on a farcical note.

Delian League wins the Peloponesian WarMore significantly, the talented Spartan Commander Gylippus had been robbed of a never-to-be-repeated opportunity to strike a heavy blow against the Delian League that had endangered a large naval force on a near pointless mission. A second chance would not be forthcoming, Nicias was dismissed and the Peloponesian War was decisively won by his forces now led by the Athenian Commanders Demosthenes, Menander, and Euthydemus.

This great victory for the arsenal of democracy ensured the establishment of a newly unified Greece that could withstand that imminent rise of the Macedonians.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Generals Source: Wikipedia Labels: Syracuse, Sicilian Expedition, Delian League, Peloponesian War, Greece.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in reality he consulted his priests who unwisely suggested that the Athenians wait for another twenty-seven days, and he foolishly agreed. The Syracusans took advantage of this, and devastated the Athenian Expeditionary Force. Nicias was executed and the Peloponesian War took a turn for the worse, leading to a Spartan-led victory by the Peloponnesian League. In authoring this post, we have repurposed content from Wikipedia and Alt Wikia web sites.

Readers Comment Jackie Rose commented on 2012-12-28 11:52:49 ~ Could this unified Greece have even withstood the Roman Empire?

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2012-12-28 15:29:44 ~ A unified Greece could've been a major ally of Carthage, rather than our TL in which the Second Punic War spilled into Greek "civil" war also with allies gathered.

Readers Comment Mike McIlvain commented on 2012-12-29 11:47:41 ~ Well, getting mooned could have come to have had a different meaning. But, it does give thought to the idea of more balance in the Mediterranean, rather than just a Roman lake. How this would have eventually set things in European empires, and the EU is anyone's guess.

In 387 BC, the barricaded Capitoline Hill fell and Gallic leader Brennus declared "Woe to the vanquished!" before mercilessly ordering the execution of both the citizenry and also the troops of the surviving right wing of the Roman Army that had fled the disasterous Battle of the Allia.

The Fall of Rome, 387 BCWhen newly installed dictator, General Marcus Furius Camillus arrived with a relief army, the city was an uninhabitable, smoking ruin. The Senate was forced to move the capitol to Veii where the left wing of the army had fled.

Despite this setback, there would not be a Gallic Empire bestride Western Europe. Because the Romans learnt the critical lessons, completely re-evaluated their art of war, and reinforced a new capital with defensive walls that were impregnable to future assault.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Generals Source: Wikipedia Labels: Allia, Brennus, Rome, Roman, Gallic.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in reality the defenders offered gold and during the delay over haggling, the relief force arrive and Rome was saved. In authoring this post, we have repurposed content from Wikipedia.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-08-27 00:08:36 ~ I'm not sure that at that late date the Romans were capable of that kind of comeback, especially since by then they actually depended on "barbarian" troops to keep up the legions' numbers.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2012-08-27 02:40:32 ~ Rome had walls---the Servian Walls, if memory serves. And moving the Roman capital to Veii would have changed things, possibly leading to more Etruscan influence (Veii was an Etruscan town).

Readers Comment Mike commented on 2012-08-27 03:00:28 ~ I never knew a second Roman army had shown up? I thought the Barbarians left with gold because they could not stay anyway.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-08-27 12:19:31 ~ Re John Braungart: Whoops. Sorry. However, even if the capital was rebuilt with heavier defenses after being sacked in the fourth century B.C., there's no guarantee that those defenbses would be properly maintained once the republic gave way to the empire and the empire grew corrupy. There could still have been a Gallic Rome (except that it would have been a Gallic Veil instead).

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2012-08-27 18:04:39 ~ If they'd up their defences so much, the Second Punic War (if it happens) might see Hannibal's invasion as an utter failure and stroke of a madman.

By 1917, suffrage for women in the United States was an uphill struggle. Despite even the reminder from the earliest days of the Revolution with Abigail Adams writing to her husband, "Don't forget the Ladies,"", the right to vote had been kept from women for over a century. While many abolitionists worked with the suffrage movement, once the Civil War ended and the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments provided rights for African Americans, women's suffrage seemed forgotten.

Suffragette Killed while Protesting President Leaders like Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Caddy Stanton continued the fight, but great political ground was made until well into the twentieth century.

America had joined World War I in April of 1917 amid a fair amount of protest of the involvement in Europe's war. President Woodrow Wilson used propaganda machines to keep the war popular, showing films of troops in training, "minute-men" giving public speeches over the importance of making the world safe for democracy, and upholding ideals of everything American. Meanwhile, the National Woman's Party, the renamed union of many women's suffrage organizations, used negative publicity against the President. He was routinely questioned why women weren't in his agenda of support for all humankind. Women picketed the White House with placards demanding the right to vote. Other placards displayed anti-war slogans, which was growing among the movement.

The protesters, nicknamed the "Silent Sentinels", had gradually ended their silence days before. As the President drove by, tipping his hat as he usually did, the women shouted at him. A new story by Jeff ProvineOutraged bystanders began to clash with the protesters, and eventually the police were brought in to calm the situation by arresting many of the women on charges of obstructing traffic. In the altercation, one of the leaders of the suffragettes, Alice Paul of New Jersey, violently slipped out of a policeman's grasp and fell, hitting her head on the pavement. Police and protesters alike attempted medical help, but Alice died in a matter of minutes. The women rose up in what many called a "riot", but police quickly arrested whoever they could catch to be placed in the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia.

As the media and the remainders of the NWP spread word about the death, Wilson faced a public relations disaster. In a change from his usual quiet on the subject, he approached Congress with a speech requesting women's suffrage, noting that they "were willing to die, just as any man in the Revolution had been". Meanwhile, the negative press only grew as the arrested women entered hunger strikes. Potential bills flew around the Congress, drowning out suggestions for a temperance amendment controlling alcohol. Opposition to suffrage repeated pseudo-scientific evidence that women had smaller brains, and it was on a demand that women could think just as well as men that a solution was found. Common throughout the South, poll tests would be established to prove literacy and basic knowledge of citizenship for a voter. The Eighteenth Amendment, establishing the National Poll Test, would be ratified January 6, 1919. Any citizen of the United States, male or female, black or white, and even of any age, could vote after passing the test and proving merit.

As the Test went into use around the United States, it became steadily obvious that, statistically, the poor would be the first to be turned away from voting. Only a few who recognized this matter took it seriously, and of those, there were ones who used it to their advantage. Workers' rights were a question of the unskilled laborers, but the increasing difficulty of the Test kept them from voting. As the economy sank into the Great Depression, social leaders spoke out against the Test. Facing his own public relations issues, President Franklin Roosevelt urged Congress to repeal the amendment with a new amendment continuing the guarantee the vote for all adults, men and women. The Nineteenth Amendment would repeal the Eighteenth in 1933, the first of many political shifts for the nation.

Although ignored in 1917, the idea of the prohibition of alcohol would arise again in 1937 along with the control of marijuana. After two decades of facing an explosion in organized crime, these measures, too, would be repealed under the presidency of Stuart Symington in 1963 shortly before his assassination in Dallas, Texas.

Entry posted by Guest Historian

Jeff Provine

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Jeff Provine Blog Source: Jeff Provine’s Blog Labels: Woodrow Wilson, Alice Paul , National Woman's Party, Suffragette, Silent Sentinels.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in reality, no one was seriously injured at the NWP protest, though many were arrested, including leaders Lucy Burns and Alice Paul. While in Occoquan Workhouse, they would begin hunger strikes that would lead to them being force-fed while under psychiatric watch. The resulting negative press would push the government for an amendment to give women the vote, but not until after the Eighteenth Amendment began the Great Experiment of prohibition.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2010-08-28 18:54:38 ~ The suffragettes often hurt their own cause in England with their extreme tactics. As I understand it, they did a lot less of that sort of stuff here.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2010-08-29 00:18:32 ~ Writing poll tests into the Constitution would have invited all sortsa of mischief. I suspect that just as in this post, they wouldn't last. I wonder whether such a constitutional amendment could even have been ratified, though I suppose it's a reasonable possibility. Jeff Provine doessn't say, but it appears that in this scenario there's no constitutional amendment establishing Prohibition. Our timeline's Eighteenth Amendment (repealed in 1933) contributed mightily to the Mafia's rise to wealth and influence in the U.S'; without national Prohibition, organized creime might have remained weaker.

In 1951, the world infrastructure is thrown into chaos when all electronic systems shut down for exactly a half hour.Warning from the Stars by Gerry Shannon

It is later revealed that the cause is the technology within the ship of the alien Klaatu whose spacecraft landed in a Washington DC baseball field two days before.

Klaatu left his android bodyguard Gort while the alien himself was placed under federal custody under strict orders by President Truman. (Klaatu's requests to deliver a message to world leaders at the United Nations were refused). Escaping, and hiding under a false identity in a boarding house; Klaatu would then track down famed scientist Albert Einstein to help him meet with the greatest representatives of the field of science at a hurried international conference at the location of his craft. Klaatu told Einstein he would use the other-wordly technology at his disposal to stage a 'demonstration' of what he and his race could do to mankind.

With the aid of a sympathetic widow, Klaatu makes it to his ship where he addresses the world before he, Gort and his ship finally departs. His parting words are grave, Watch the Youtube Clip

Unfortunately, America does little to lead the way in heeding Klaatu's warning - and it would be Klaatu's own son (along with a returning Gort) who would arrive in another craft 57 years later for a more cataclysmic confrontation. Watch the Youtube Clip

Entry posted by Guest Historian

Gerry Shannon

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Beasts Source: New York Times Labels: Alien, Stars, Warning, Klaatu, UFO.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, In this scenario, the writer wonders what if the 1951 science-fiction classic, The Day The Earth Stood Still, and it's revisionist 2008 remake actually occured in world history. It should be noted that the Professor Barnhardt character in the original that Klaatu befriends is is supposed to be a fictional analogue for Albert Einstein on the part of the screenwriters. (As noted here). Who could the similarly named character John Cleese plays in the remake be, Stephen Hawking perhaps?

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2008-12-18 18:01:39 ~ What a great AH concept! Gives me ideas for some of my own future ATL projects... :)

Readers Comment Gerry Shannon commented on 2008-12-18 23:02:32 ~ lol Cheers. You're more then welcome to build on it if you so wish!

In 1950, the withdrawal of United Nations forces forced President Harry S Truman to accept the counsel of advisors, who called for unilateral U.S. airstrikes against the North Korean forces.Pusan forces the issue
Truman had already ordered the Seventh Fleet to protect Chiang Kai-Shek's Taiwan, thereby ending America's policy of non-interference in Chinese domestic affairs. The Nationalist government (now confined to Taiwan) asked to participate in the war. Their request had been denied by the Americans, who felt they would only encourage PRC intervention.
Despite the post-World War II demobilization of U.S. and allied forces, which caused serious supply problems for American troops in the region, the United States still had substantial forces in Japan to oppose the North Korean military and its largely outdated Soviet equipment. These American forces were under the command of General Douglas MacArthur. Trouble was that apart from British Commonwealth units, no other nation could supply sizeable manpower.
Pusan changed everything, and the regional containment strategy had failed. Truman, needing allies, reluctantly invited Taiwan into the war. By September of 1950, a state of war existed between the United States and China. It became apparent that World War III would be fought in Asia-Pacific.

Logo	On this day in 1957, the Houston Oilers held their inaugural preseason workout at the Rice University campus.

Rochester Royals

On this day in 1944, the Allies launched Operation Market-Garden, a four-pronged infantry and armor offensive against the German divisions threatening Antwerp; Winston Churchill, who had advocated a paratroop attack, was later heard to quip that the assault should have been code-named Operation Dragoon "`because I was dragooned into it".	British PM

	Winston Churchill

Nature Boy	On this day in 1982, Ric Flair defended his NWA world championship against Tommy Rich in a best 2-of-3 falls match at an NWA televised card in Orlando, Florida; Flair won the third and deciding fall to retain the title. After the match a visibly infuriated Rich berated his Enforcers teammate Bret Hart for not coming to his aid, to which Hart responded by making an obscene gesture at Rich.

Ric Flair

On this day in 1941, the Wehrmacht campaign in Russia achieved its greatest triumph to date, smashing a Red Army tank offensive near the town of Kursk. The general whose strategy helped win the battle, Erwin Rommel, was later awarded the Knight's Cross and promoted to field marshal.

	On this day in 1953, Soviet premier Georgi Malenkov warned the United States that any intervention by the US or other Western powers in the situation in China would be regarded by the Soviet Union as an act of war and answered in kind.

Georgi Malenkov

In 1996, Prince Charles of England reconciles with his estranged wife, Princess Diana, before their divorce can be finalized. In what has been repeated in countless recreations of the moment, he met her at the entrance to a subway station, and while both were in disguise, rode a train for 3 hours while they talked out their differences.

In 1963, President Kennedy himself made a surprise visit to Martin Luther King's rally on the Washington Mall, and is so deeply moved by Dr. King's speech that he immediately runs up to the podium and embraces the reverend before the gathered multitudes. Promising that he will do more for American blacks, he introduces the Civil Rights Act of 1963 before Congress as soon as they come back from their summer recess.

In 1999, a murderous cult appears to be slaying people throughout the Philippines. Police determine a strange pattern to their slayings, with each victim being born under a particular star sign.

In 1961, Robert A. Heinlein's novel Stranger in a Strange Land becomes the first science fiction novel to reach the top of the New York Times' bestseller list. Literary critics begin reexamining a genre that they had disdained for many years and the field experienced a renaissance in popularity, both critical and commercial.

In 1938, Northwestern University awards an honorary degree to Edgar Bergen's dummy Charlie McCarthy. The jocular mood of the occasion is broken when the 'dummy' comes to life and flees the stage, leaving a dead Edgar Bergen behind.

In 1249, Caliph Amal bin-Yusuph convenes the Conference of Cairo to recodify Sharia law in Islam. bin-Yusuph favors a more liberal interpretation of the Koran, and hopes to change the Sharia to reflect this.

In 1963, during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered an angry tirate - 'I Have a Nightmare' speech. King revealed that Chief Justice Harry S. Truman was in fact a former Klansman. Truman later responded by publicly confirmed having been a member of the Ku Klux Klan. Truman admitted that in 1922, he had given a friend $10 for an initiation fee for the Ku Klux Klan but later asked to get his money back; he was never initiated, never attended a meeting, and never claimed membership.

August 27

In 1664, on this day the Dutch defenders of Fort Amsterdam received first reports that the English invasion fleet had sunk in a storm. An article from the American Heroes thread.

Relief in the Big OrangeThe capital of the New Netherlands had miraculously survived. And to celebrate victory in the Third Anglo-Dutch War ten years later, the defense was renamed Fort Willem Hendrick (pictured) in honor of the Dutch leader who was Stadtholder and Prince of Orange. And New Amsterdam was renamed New Orange.

Due to the peaceful manner in which the region was later,transitioned to the United States, Dutch-American relationship remained warm. As a result, three hundred years later, the ten-lane elevated highway stretching from the East River to the Hudson River, connecting the Holland Tunnel on the west side to the Williamsburg and Manhattan bridges to the east was named the Willem Hendrick Expressway [1].

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: American Heroes Source: Wikipedia Labels: Fort Amsterdam, New Netherlands, Dutch, New York, Anglo-Dutch War.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, this article is re-purposed from a post by Lord Roel on Alternate History. In reality no shots were fired on August 27, 1664, when the Dutch surrendered the fort and Manhattan in what amounted to one of the skirmishes in the bigger Second Anglo-Dutch War. The fort was renamed Fort James in honor of James II of England. New Amsterdam was renamed New York in recognition of James's title as Duke of York.
[1] never built due to objections in 1962.

Readers Comment Stan Brin commented on 2012-12-31 04:24:23 ~ Actually, this would have caused a lot more turmoil as New Holland was entirely surrounded by English territory containing a much larger population. It is highly likely that English and Scots-Irish immigrants would have moved into Dutch territory and become the absolute majority within a generation.

Readers Comment Robbie Taylor commented on 2012-12-31 04:25:48 ~ I'm sad that the Dutch gave up New Amsterdam; I so would have loved another nation vying for the Americas...

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2012-12-31 04:53:39 ~ Did any of the Dutch ships get ticketed by the NYPD's meter maids? :D

Readers Comment Mike McIlvain commented on 2012-12-31 05:49:59 ~ That could have put a whole different spin on the New York City we all know, and have our respective opinions on. Could be more flavors, food choices, beers, and culture from the Netherlands. Names could be different, and NYC could have other names like Orangetown or Willy.

Readers Comment Jackie Rose commented on 2013-03-19 10:50:24 ~ New Amsterdam might very well share the progressive policies of OLD Amsterdam, like legal drug use and euthanasia. Sounds good to me. And the Nazis might not have been able to invade New Amsterdam since it was located across the Atlantic Ocean and surrounded by American states. Sounds even better.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2013-03-25 02:37:23 ~ A more Dutch-influenced "New York" might have had interesting knock-on effects; among other things, people do tend to forget that the Netherlands was involved in the American Revolution. That said, I do think that the place was doomed to go under the British flag sooner or later.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2013-04-11 22:09:11 ~ With as much money as would be centered in the Hudson River area, it would be fortunate to have a peaceful transition. Boston would be a bigger city, too.

In 1324 BC, on this day Hittite prince Zannanza narrowly survived a bandit attack before safely crossing the border into Upper Egypt.

Zannanza, Pharaoh of EgyptHis father Suppiluliuma I, king of the Hittites had reluctantly agreed to Egyptian Queen Dakhamunzu's offer of marriage to one of his sons. Widowed, and without an heir, she had appealed to him in writing "My husband has died and I have no son. They say about you that you have many sons. You might give me one of your sons to become my husband. I would not wish to take one of my subjects as a husband .. I am afraid".

Of course Zannanza was to discover that the Queen was not just isolated, she had very specific reasons for her fear, because the bandit attack had been organized by the same devil's that murdered her husband Tutankhamun. But the conspirators bid for power was counterproductive, because inadvertently their actions would lead to the creation of a powerful unified Hittite/Egyptian Empire. And soon after the conspirators were crushed, a common enemy emerged that required the concentrated forces of both nations. They were the so-called Peoples of the Sea, a confederacy of seafaring raiders who sailed around the eastern Mediterranean, causing political unrest, who ultimately attempted (unsuccessfully) to seize control of Egyptian territory.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Zannanza, Dakhamunzu, Egypt, Hittite, Suppiluliuma I.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in reality his mysterious killing at the border led to war. In authoring this post, we have repurposed content from Wikipedia and Alt Wikia web sites.

Readers Comment Jackie Rose commented on 2012-08-27 22:10:17 ~ I read an interesting theory that this queen was also known as Nefertiti, the wife and co-ruler of Akhnatan, the founder of monotheism.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2012-08-27 22:56:05 ~ A unified Hittite/Egyptian Empire would've been a huge cultural and geographic entity, if they could've made it work with the issue of distance. Maybe they'd adapt to sea travel, which neither ancient empire really seemed to get into, changing the whole scope of that era of the Mediterranean as well as everything after.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2012-08-28 02:00:21 ~ Hittite-Egyptian union wouldn't have worked---too many differences. A Hittite Pharaoh would have been interesting, but his children and grandchildren would have been more and more "Egyptian." Kind of like what happened to the Manchu Qing dynasty in China.

In 1979, on this day English republicans bombed the Shadow V the thirty-four foot long lobster-potting and tuna fishing boat owned by the private citizen Louis Battenberg (formerly His Serene Highness Prince Louis of Battenberg) near the castle in Mullaghmore, County Sligo where he had lived in internal exile for six decades.

Shadow V
By Ed, Scott Palter & Jeff ProvineAlong with their Russian and German cousins in the Royal Houses of Romanov and Hohenzollern, the Great War forced the Saxe-Coburg-Gothas Family off the throne.

At the outbreak of war, his father had been forced to step down as First Sea Lord by the Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill. The harsh injustice of this brutal decision drove young "Dickie" to tears of rage. But despite being a "blue-eyed German" himself, "Dickie" served in the Royal Navy during the early part of the war, distinguishing himself at the Battle of Jutland. As a result, of this valour, and due to the goodwill that he had established with the local community, he was permitted to reside in internal exile in County Sligo. And when Southern Ireland received its independence, he found himself located twelve miles south of the British border, a private citizen of the new state of Eire.

By the second half of the twentieth century, post-imperial Britain was in absolute decline and sinking fast. Monarchists dreamt of a restoration which might lift the nation out of chaos. But such a step could only be possible if the socially awkward young Prince Charles was supported by his mentor and favourite Uncle. And that was why Republicans decided that he had to die.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Generals Source: Wikipedia Labels: Mountbatten, Battenberg, Britain, Republic, Monarchy.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in this post we imagine that Britain dissolved tbe monarchy due to anti-German sentiment in World War One.
Wikipedia reports ~ His father's forty-five year Naval career reached its pinnacle in 1912 when he was appointed as First Sea Lord in the Admiralty. However, two years later in 1914, due to the growing anti-German sentiments that swept across Europe during the first few months of World War I, Prince Louis was removed from his position and publicly humiliated by King George V, and Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill. Though both men professed 'sadness' at having to do this, private conversations and letters show them both to perfectly happy to sacrifice their "blue-eyed German". This forced retirement of his father was devastating to Louis. In 1917, when the Royal Family stopped using their German names and titles and adopted the more British-sounding "Windsor", Prince Louis of Battenberg became Louis Mountbatten, and was created Marquess of Milford Haven. His second son acquired the courtesy title Lord Louis Mountbatten and was known as Lord Louis informally until his death notwithstanding his being granted a viscountcy in recognition of his wartime service in the Far East and an earldom for his role in the transition of India from British dependency to sovereign state.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2011-08-23 15:53:19 ~ Elizabeth II did have a nice calming effect and hope in the '50s, good royalty. Mountbatten knew when to get out of India when the getting was good. Guess India in this TL is a total mess.

Readers Comment Mark Taylor commented on 2011-08-23 16:12:52 ~ Prince Charles?Since the Queen was only 53 at the time.. Mountbatten-regarded as a bit pink.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2011-08-23 16:42:26 ~ I don't know that anti-German sentiment was ever anywhere nearly strong enough to endanger the British monarchy. And the word is "throne," not "thrown." (Paranthetically, I've always been very amused at the anti-German hysteria of WWI Britain---did they forget _where_ their Saxon ancestors had come from?) Fixed - thanks. Ed

Readers Comment Stan Brin commented on 2011-08-23 23:24:09 ~ I just don't see Willy ending the British monarchy. Period.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2011-08-24 01:35:59 ~ Slight grammar problem: surely it should be "in absolute decline" rather than "in absolute declining." Fixed - thanks. Ed

By 1941, war in the Pacific had been brewing for years. During the 1930s, Japanese influence into China had increased to all-out war in 1937 and domination of Manchuria. With the fall of France in 1940, Japan stationed troops in French Indochina.

Roosevelt Agrees to Summit with KonoeGermany's invasion of Russia in 1941 placed Japan in a precarious position: Hitler pressured them to attack north to the Soviet Union, which would have been an easy front; French Indochina stood ready for full occupation with Vichy troops occupied in Europe. Far to the east, the United States rested like a sleeping giant.

Prime Minister Prince Fumimaro Konoe was desperate to prevent war with America. Roosevelt routinely demanded removal of Japanese troops from China, which was an impossible agreement since the army and navy had suffered too much to give up conquests. On July 28, 1941, Japan commenced its occupation of French Indochina, and the United States retaliated by freezing Japanese assets and, more importantly, leading Britain and the Dutch East Indies in an oil embargo. Without foreign oil, Japan was stuck; within two years, the entirety of oil stockpiles would be depleted. The military had not anticipated such a rash move by the Americans, and Konoe made a last-ditch effort: a personal summit. He sent notice to Roosevelt that he would soon be arriving in Washington in hope FDR would meet him.

It was a diplomatic gamble, but Konoe's risk-taking paid off. The summit was rushed in preparation, and, on September 5, the Japanese Prime Minister was welcomed to the White House. The talks were primarily a standstill; Roosevelt made demands that Japan leave China and stop its military expansion to the south, something that Konoe could not do. While the meeting essentially gained nothing, Konoe did learn one important point: much of the American public did not want to engage in another "European" war, so the United States would never be the one to strike first.

Under the Tripartite Pact signed among Germany, Italy, and Japan in 1940, the three had agreed to join forces if an unnamed force (the United States) came into the war against them. While, militarily, an immediate strike against the small American Pacific fleet would be advantageous, it could prove costly in the long run. Konoe reported to the other Tripartite nations that the United States must never be assaulted. They could not risk a repeat of even the slightest negative PR move like the sinking of the Lusitania in the first World War.

With pressure from Hitler, the Japanese would begin their plans for war against the Soviet Union. They assured him that, without oil, they would be unable to put their armies into the field effectively. Defeat in 1939 at Khalkhin Gol also showed that Japanese ground forces were not adequate against Soviet heavy tanks, so they focused on devising a defensive war with long-reaching strikes by aircraft. However, as Operation Barbarossa became a logistical quagmire, it was obvious that Hitler had bitten off more than Germany could chew.

The Emperor did not want to be on the losing side of a war with the Soviet Union, but Konoe and his ministers could not break the Tripartite Pact. Instead, they bought time, assuring Hitler that their army would be ready for combat in the summer. On June 28, 1942, Japan launched attacks toward Soviet oil fields north of Manchuria simultaneous with Germany's operation Case Blue. Stalin let the east lose ground with only minor defensive measures, pressing most of his might into the defense of Moscow and the west. Even with two fronts, by the middle of 1943, Russia halted the tide of advance and began to push back.

Japan fell to maintaining position and working with its air force (arguably the best in the world after years of buildup) to spy on troop movements and pin down Russian reserves before they could reach the front. Germany's war with Britain had come to a standstill with Hitler giving up North Africa but holding the Mediterranean. The manpower and materiel did not seem available for an amphibious invasion of Europe until at least 1945 despite the fact that the Blitz had long passed. Instead, they fought Germany's navy while Stalin began to eat away at the back of Hitler's European fortress.

Finally, the end came for Germany with the British landing at Normandy under Operation Overlord in March of 1945. By that time, Stalin was pressing into Germany itself, and the Third Reich faced collapse. On August 14, 1945, the remainders of Hitler's government (Hitler himself had disappeared, presumed dead in his bunker via suicide) sued for peace. Stalin then joined with Britain in pressing toward the east where Japan had stood unquestioned for years. Seeing the vicious defeat of allies, Emperor Hirohito offered terms for peace, but Stalin would not accept anything less than what had been declared at Potsdam: disarmament, reduction of empire, and partial occupation.

Prime Minister Konoe, who had been in and out of power over the course of the war, approached American President Thomas Dewey for mediation. Dewey agreed, but Stalin and Prime Minister Clement Attlee did not agree to ceasefire until concessions had been made. While battles still roared in Siberia, Mongolia, China, and French Indochina, talks began. When the dust cleared, Japan would maintain Korea as a protectorate, but they would lose all other imperial gains and face limitations on armed forces.

The United States, now economically on its feet with its profitable Lend-Lease program, suddenly faced a world with vaporizing empires and Soviet dominance over almost all of Europe and Asia. Renewed military buildup began through the 1950s, and America found itself trailing distantly behind Russia in missile technology and space development. In 1962, Russia moved ICBMs to its ally Cuba and refused to recognize American requests that they be removed. The successful invasion at Playa Giron and subsequent seizing of those missiles began the Soviet-American War that would last until 1968 with Russian troops marching into Chicago, where the relocated American government had sat after the Bombing of Washington.

Entry posted by Guest Historian

Jeff Provine

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Jeff Provine Blog Source: Jeff Provine’s Blog Labels: Roosevelt, Japan, America, Konoe, Pacific War.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in reality, Konoe did not make the diplomatic faux pas of forcing discussion, and Roosevelt bought time with the promise of talks as long as possible to better prepare America's military base. The Japanese government realized war was inevitable, and it would fare better if it began sooner rather than later. On December 7, 1941, Japanese woke the slumbering giant with the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2010-08-27 20:43:54 ~ Not bad...I'd say it was reasonably plausible. However, a Soviet invasion of the N. American continent...not so plausible.

Readers Comment Stan Brin commented on 2010-08-27 22:21:37 ~ Remove the last paragraph. Not plausible. The atomic bomb was an American invention (with foreign scientists, of course). The Soviet bomb was highly dependent upon espionage, and was essentially a copy of the American project. The rise of Castro is such an accident that the butterfly effect would have neutralized him.

Readers Comment David Atwell commented on 2010-08-27 22:32:09 ~ Not a bad scenario although without significant US help, in both men & arms, Britain alone couldn't launch Operation Overlord at any time. Similarly, if the USSR is fight off both Germany & Japan, it won't have the reserves available to counterattack at Stalingrad or Kursk. If so I'd expect the USSR to be defeated by 1945 with Britain looking very isolated as a result.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2010-08-28 00:33:53 ~ I don't quite understand why Overlord happens earlier but Hitler's regime doesn't completely collapse until monthd after it did in our timeline. I agree with Eric Oppen that a Soviet invasion of the continental U.S. is unlikely. Surely the U.S. would have been able to nuke the living $#!& out of the USSR and would have doe so if it seemed Soviet victory might be the alternative. In our timeline, after all, it was the threat of massive retaliation which, more than anything else, kept the Soviets from attacking yin the 1960s.

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2010-08-28 02:12:14 ~ Stalin would have beaten the Japanese army in Manchuria in 1942 even given Japanese air superiority. Stalin had 1 million men east of Lake Bikal. They were 2nd rate with 2nd rate equipment but both were more than good enough to beat the Japanese. The Japanese army lacked modern armor, sufficient artillery or even enough heavy weapons to grind it out against Ivan.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2010-08-28 15:10:53 ~ With the US out of the war, my guess is they're not going to spend the billions of R&D dollars on atomic weapons, which would thusly not give precedent for Stalin's development, so no nukes in this TL. Rocketry, however, would be very advanced with Russia grabbing von Braun and his team. They'd have V-2 rockets advanced enough to do what we call ICBMs, just no nuke payload. Even if the a-bomb were developed, I'd think it'd be the Russians to have it first. As for Cuba being Castro, I'd really doubt it was him. However, I do think that the USSR would support communist revolutions just about everywhere.

In 1789, on this day the de facto government of Revolutionary France, the National Constituent Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of Man of the Citizen, a statement of enlightenment principles co-authored by the Marquis de Lafayette and the Virginian émigreé radical Tom Jefferson.

Pursuit of LibertyThirteen years before, Jefferson had penned the United States Declaration of Independence. But a paragraph indicting Britain's role in the slave trade was deleted from the final version creating a contradiction between the claim that "all men are created equal" and the existence of American slavery. "If there be an object truly ridiculous in nature", English abolitionist Thomas Day wrote in a 1776 letter, "it is an American patriot, signing resolutions of independency with the one hand, and with the other brandishing a whip over his affrighted slaves".

"Rather it should have failed, I would have seen half the earth desolated"Jefferson agreed, quitting Virginia to enjoy Parisian Society with his common law mixed race wife, Sally Hemings. They were soon to discover that the French were prosecuting their own revolution with a great deal more extremism, too much for Jefferson's own "personal taste for disorder and violence". Still, his vision for a French revolutionary occupation of England might yet rescue his former colleagues, because if there was one overarching principle Jefferson really believed in, it was that both revolutions were connected by the common pursuit of Liberty. It was a concept that Jefferson had brow-beaten Lafayette into codifying into the Declaration.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

© Conor Cruise O'Brien, The Long Affair ? Thomas Jefferson and the French Revolution 1785 - 1800 (1996)
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Thomas Jefferson, Sally Hemings, Paris, France, America.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, Jefferson was in Paris in 1789 as an American Diplomat and both documents share common ideas, suggesting his secret involvement in the penmanship of the Declaration.

Readers Comment Michael N. Ryan commented on 2010-07-02 01:01:55 ~ The intellectuals of france were loaded with bright unproven ideals but unfortnately had no experience with democracy or human nature in its uncontrolled form. End result is the reign of terror, attrocities and terrorism sponsored by the radicals, collapse and the rise of Napoleon's dictatorship and war, a process and tragedy repeated up to the present day throughout the world.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2010-07-02 01:19:40 ~ It seems unlikely Jefferson would have emigrated, unless forced to by the Revolution's failure, which would have made him a hunted man. He was altogether too comfortable in Virginia to have "quit" America over the deletion of a controversial passage in his draft of the Declaration of Independence.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2010-07-02 08:15:54 ~ Would a foreigner have had that much influence in Revolutionary France?

Comment from Arlena Arteaga Kelly on Facebook: I think the Hemmings descendents would say that he was........

Comment from Margo Barotta on Facebook: Thomas Jefferson travel a lot into france and he had a stronge friendshipe with laffayette ,and also jefferson was known that he had a lot of slaves in his farme ,and a rumer said that jefferson had mixed color childrens, but until now no true evidence.

Comment from Arteaga Kelly on Facebook: Arteaga Kelly Sally's descendants needed no true evidence, they knew. And it's interesting to note that Jefferson did not support Touissant L Overture's slave insurrection in Haiti and sent reinforcement to help Napoleon. So much for "Egalite, liberte, and fraternity".

Readers Comment Michael N. Ryan commented on 2010-07-03 02:41:54 ~ At least one of her sets of decendents who went white has Jefferson's DNA. But the truth is that no matter who went over to France to ring in Liberty and Democracy, Thomas Jefferson or Thomas Payne, the revolution failed in France because ordinary French people had no experience with Government by the people for the people and those in charge really did not have an inkling on what Liberty really is. They looked to Rousou and the mythical Noble Savage where in Britain and America Liberty is seen as the ordinary man being as rotton as his king needs to be his own slave driver lest his king make him into his royal property and to do that he needs to work as a team with his ordinary common people like a pirate crew works together to their own mutual corrupt benefit. The French expected Utopia when they lifted away the royal chains while forgetting to chain everyone together in chains of the common man working together for mutual benefit. They just assumed to their disaster that everyone would swim together.

In 1806, the compromised reality of the American Revolution was thrown into sharp contrast - whilst President James Monroe's High Representative William Pinkney conducted negotiations in London to renew the Jay Treaty, his predecessor, the "philantropic cock" Thomas Jefferson was across the English Channel enjoying Parisian Society with his common law mixed race wife, Sally Hemings.

Philanthropic Cock by Ed, Scott Palter, Raymond Speer and Eric LippsUnderstanding that the infant republic needed at least two decades of peace in order to survive, George Washington had risked his reputation as a patriot by approving the original ten-year treaty with Great Britain. Now, more important than a simple renewal was the need to resolve differences over the issue of impressment of American sailors from US ships and neutral trading rights. Because in acquiesing to American independence, it was now clear that Great Britain's cynical ploy was to give away the cake whilst keeping the cream.

Agreement seemed possible if not likely, because the British Prime Minister Lord Grenville and his "Ministry of All the Talents" believed that the US Navy was partly manned by British deserters who were desperately needed to fight Napoleon. Accordingly, Grenville ordered Lord Holland and Lord Auckland to cut a deal with Pinkney. Trouble was, that whilst President James Monroe approved the treaty, the US Senate rejected it, and the result was the War of 1812.

The political crisis created by the Senates rejection might of course been avoided had Thomas Jefferson served a second term, because he would never have approved the treaty in the first place. However he had claimed to be exhausted by the complexities of the Louisiana Purchase and the misbehavior of Aaron Burr.

In reality, Jefferson was hugely frustrated with the development of the American revolution which had become a more of a worldly struggle for survival than the building of the egalitarian society that he had dreamt of. In fact, the American Revolution had stopped, and there was little to interest a mental giant in business as usual.

Of course Jefferson's frustration had begun at the very outset. Not only had his bold anti-slavery statement been disgracefully removed from the Declaration of Independence, he had resigned from Washington's government to spend more time with Hemings, and later faced the scandal of this affair in the mainstream press during his political comeback.

But in a larger sense, Jefferson wanted the American Revolution to have the transformative energy of its French equivalent. Having served as a diplomat in Paris, he had experienced the freedom of living with Hemings in a way not possible in the States. Soon after Monroe's inauguration, Jefferson and Hemings sold up Montecello, freed his slaves and left America forever.

Without knowing it, Jefferson had started the African-American Revolution which ironically, was a transformative process more attuned to his own thinking.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Alternate Nations Source: Wikipedia Labels: Thomas Jefferson, America, James Monroe, William Pickney, Sally Hemings.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, From Wikipedia ~ "the negotiations were begun on 27 August 1806, and the treaty was signed on 31 December 1806. Monroe and Pinkney knew they had fallen short of their goals; indeed, when President Jefferson received the treaty in March of 1807, he did not even bother submitting it to the United States Senate for ratification. This failure to resolve differences over the issue of impressment and neutral trading rights contributed to the coming of the War of 1812".

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2010-04-23 06:32:34 ~ I'm not sure that there were enough blacks in the US at that time to get anything like an "African-American Revolution" going.

Comment from Peter Hebert on Facebook: War of 1812 was the result of Madison refusing to renew the charter for a central bank. Rothschild in the City of London was pissed. After the war, the U.S. had a change of mind. And, you thought it was over sailors gone AWOL I bet.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2010-04-23 11:18:05 ~ At the time of the Revolution, there were a half-million blacks in the U.S.--out of a total population of less than three million. Numbers, however, would have been less important than their absolute powerlessness at the time, to say nothing of white social attitudes. It's unlikely that Jefferson would have dared take Hemings as his wife, and doubtful such a marriage would even have been legal at the time in the U.S. (mixed-race marriages remained illegal well into the twentieth century in many U.S. states).

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2010-04-23 14:28:32 ~ I'm sorry, but that title sounds wrong on so many levels... :D

Readers Comment Michael N. Ryan commented on 2010-04-23 14:50:08 ~ Jefferson's views on blacks were pretty much what most whites had at the time. In some states but not Virginia a person of colour could be reclassified White or be declared white enough by a court of law to be allowed to marry a white person. But I doubt Jefferson would have declared for his concubine due to the politics of the time. Whether Sally Hemmings could be called a Placeee, or Slave Wife or Concubine is debatable. We certainly know of a number of men of Jefferson's station who had such relationships. Certainly it would influence race relations somewhat though not by much. We need only look to the experiences of a Colenal Johnson, who is attributed to be the slayer of Tecumseh, who kept a mulatto concubine and had two daughters by her. His efforts on their behalf cost him the Vice presidency. His white relatives actually went to court and had it declared that he had no legal children so they could claim his assets after he died. No dought if Jefferson were to declare himself for his concubine, he would have suffered a similar fate.

Readers Comment Michael N. Ryan commented on 2010-04-23 14:54:55 ~ As for America's relations with Britain, British arrogance set things the way they went. War was ineviatable. Perhaps without Jefferson America might have maintained or built up its navy to be really formidable and dangerous to Britain's commerce to really really hurt them. Jefferson's peace policies of fleet reduction and economic Boycott was a disaster. A few more warships with captains willing to push them to their limits against the arrogant John Bull might have got results. If Chesapeak had pulverised Leapard, Britain might get the message.

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2010-04-23 14:56:55 ~ Absent Jefferson why does the Senate not approve the treaty. The coastal states did not want war. They were doing too well on European trade. The predominant warhawks in OTL were Westerners [land lust for Canada and Florida, conflicts with British supplied Indians] plus ardent Jeffersonians. If Monroe is running the party the the coastal loyalists vote for the treaty.

In 1861, President Hannibal Hamlin was opposed by prominent business interests when he attempted to revive the District of Columbia on Manhattan island. By the end of his second year in office, Hamlin was resident at Montauk Point, Long Island, where a Seaside White House was available to him and his family, as was a double domed capital, larger and more spacious than the one left behind in Washington D.C.

Crucifixion Day Part 3 by Raymond SpeerMeanwhile, Richmond remained the capital of the Confederacy, but that organization was disintegrating while unchallenged by the USA. Georgia and Mississippi sanctioned the disintegration of the infantry units that had been raised by those states upon the expiration of their 60 day enlistment periods. Virginia was more responsible (well aware of the Grand Army of the Republic that the Yankees had training in Pennsylvania), but was straining its own resources by putting forth the defense for the Confederacy's eastern seaboard. And sales had not been good for Confederate bonds, though the documents were being marketed freely in Europe.

The Post-Skedaddle phase of the War Between the American States began in the Nevada territory, where a convention hall of orators in Virginia City announced that Nevada was joining the Confederacy. That was in the last week of November 1862 and a rival Union government in Carson City was established by a company of cavalry the next month. By the beginning of 1862, Nevadan settlers were fighting among themselves over which side would get the mineral wealth of the territory.

Both Jefferson Davis and Hannibal Hamlin appointed proxies in Nevada, and contacted their respective Congresses for appropriations to send an overwhelming force to conquer Nevada beyond dispute. Of necessity, each side made ready their home defense forces back east.

As those events transpired, Brigham Young in Salt Lake City organized his people, ordering a prepared defense force to resist outside domination "from either side". In London, with the advent of the Nevada Crisis, maps are consulted concerning the American southwest lands and the settlements thereon.

Entry posted by Guest Historian

Raymond Speer

© "How the South Could Have Won the Civil War: the Fatal Errors that Led to Confederate Defeat" by Bevin Alexander (2007)
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Southern Cross Source: Amazon Labels: Abraham Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth, Stonewall Jackson, Hannibal Hamlin, Bull Run.

Readers Comment Michael N. Ryan commented on 2010-04-20 21:53:40 ~ Actually, the North did prevail in the Nevada area. Many volunteers came over from Californian but the local Mexican population was more sympathetic to the north with much bad experience from southerners and the North's freeing them from Peonage on the local scene. I believe the South would have been staying together a lot better than you show but the big ships of the Navy in northern hands along with its vast resources in its merchant ships which they were now arming and recruiting from for which to establish its blockade along with its naval build ups up north to push down the misssissippi would ulimately bring Northern victory.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2010-04-21 00:04:05 ~ The old capitol was in Washington, _DC,_ not Washington _State._ The State's clear the other side of the continent from DC. Fixed - thanks. Ed.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2010-04-21 00:29:47 ~ And I dson't think it was a state in 1861. I suspect Hamlin's Seaside White House would have been only a temporary residence. Once the new capital had been formally established, there would probably have been calls for the building of a new presidential residence, if only to show the USA still had the spirit to do it.

In 2006, Housing Minister Barack Hussein Obama II visited Kibera, one of Africa's largest slums in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi. "You are all my brothers and sisters," Mr Obama told crowds of excited residents who craned their necks to catch a glimpse of the Minister (pictured). The Barack Obama Story, Part 4 - The Audacity of Hope

"Everybody in Kenya needs the same opportunities to go to school, to start businesses, to have enough to eat, to have decent clothes," he said over a loudspeaker.

At least six hundred thousand people, many without jobs or legal title to the land they inhabited had been given fresh hope for a brighter future. Thw Minister's Community Action Policies had helped set up a job training program, a college preparatory tutoring program, and a tenants' rights organization.

Unquestionably, his most significant contribution was in organizing finance for the program. Sponsorship funding had been obtained from sources as diverse as the Chicago Bulls, Irish Rock Band U2 to the United Nations office of the High Commissioner for Refugees.

Obama was creating an international profile that would propel him to the position of UN Secretary General in 2014, and a dramatic confrontation with the forty-fourth President of the United States, Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor Watch the Video

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Obama Source: BBC Labels: Barack Obama, Kenya, America, Hillary Clinton, Presidency.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, In this scenario, we explore Obama's rise to global leadership. We imagine his community programs were pursued in Kenya where he returned with his father in 1982. We are most grateful to the contribution from Mr David Atwel of Changing the Times Magazine for his assistance in the development of this post.

Readers Comment David Atwell commented on 2008-11-08 02:31:58 ~ And so it begins... He'd get my vote that's for sure! ;) But seriously, this is a good way for Obama to cement his political position in Kenyan politics, leading to greater things to come I'd dare say. Maybe, though, if the "tenant's rights" program was explained more, it may explain better why Obama is able to, not only ensure support of the Kenyan people, but also why he rises to UN Secretary General.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2008-11-08 05:27:33 ~ I'm no expert on Kenyan politics, but in a lot of Africa, this surge of popularity in an underling would have the local President/Prime Minister very worried indeed...he'd be smelling a coup d'etat in the making, even if the underling in question was actually completely loyal.

Readers Comment Robbie Taylor commented on 2008-11-08 14:50:10 ~ The Chicago Bulls support him, but no Bono? Where's U2 in all this, I want to know! :)

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2008-11-08 21:25:07 ~ Dang, this is just what I was going to write, LOL. :)

On this day in 1968, the Vietnam War ended with the signing of a cease-fire pact between North and South Vietnam. The withdrawal of remaining foreign troops from Vietnamese soil would begin two days later.	"Westie"

	Pulls Out

Flag of	In 1951, on this day Syria officially declared war on Israel.

Syria

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