| May 27 |  |
Editor says, what if Nazi Germany had adopted Hitler's Plan Z? muses Jeff Provine on the This Day in Alternate History web site. Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the June 2011 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1941, on this day the Battle of the Atlantic took a sharp turn toward Axis power when Operation Rheinubung became one of the German navy's most glorious successes.
Bismarck Dominates Sea LanesAt the head the squadron was the seemingly invincible Bismarck, the largest battleship in history up to that time. Like its namesake, Otto von Bismarck (1815-1898), the "blood and iron" of the German people would overwhelm Britannia's rule of the waves and establish a period of German domination, cutting off supplies desperately needed by the British war effort.
The Bismarck was born as part of Hitler's Plan Z, the bureaucratic allocation of resources to rebuild the Kriegsmarine. Hitler had already gained new political standing for the improved navy with the Anglo-German Naval Agreement in 1935. Four years later, Plan Z initiated enormous building projects, hoping to rival the Royal Navy by 1944 with four aircraft carriers, 68 destroyers, 249 U-boats, 55 cruisers of various classes, and ten battleships, the first of which would be the Bismarck. She was the largest warship the world had seen with a length of 251 meters, a speed of 31 knots, 13-inch-thick armor, and a vast array of armaments. Launched February 14, 1939, she would wait two years for her breakout action as World War II ground on.A new story by Jeff ProvineThe British, meanwhile, worked to limit the growth of German naval power. In addition to forcing them to divert resources to the land army, they destroyed the remnants of the French navy held by Vichy France in Operation Catapult on July 3, 1940. The British approached the French fleet at Mers-el-Kebir in Algeria and opened fire after an ultimatum asking for any ships to join the Free French Navy rather than falling into the hands of the Germans. While many French ships throughout the Mediterranean and world did just that, the British felt themselves forced to destroy the fleet to keep it out of Hitler's hands. In a surprise attack, the British sank the battleship Bretagne, damaged six other ships, and killed nearly 1,300 French sailors.
Attack at Mers-el-Kebir drove a rift between Churchill and the French Resistance under General Charles de Gaulle, but the British considered the risk of angering an ally reasonable compared to an Atlantic full of German ships. Hitler recognized the British fear of losing the naval superiority they had held for nearly two centuries and decided to redouble his efforts on Plan Z. Initially, he had only planned to neutralize the French fleet; now he decided to rebuild it into a Mediterranean battlegroup to aid his Italian allies. While resources were strapped as the war began with Russia, he decided Germany would make the best use of what it had. Ships would act in orchestrated battle groups where heavy escort would overwhelm any British resistance.
On May 18, 1941, Operation Rheinubung ("Rhine Exercise") began, forming up the impressive German fleet in the Baltic and storming the Denmark Strait on May 24 to break the British blockade. While only the Bismarck and heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen might have been ready for the battle, Hitler pressed his navy to finish repairs on the Gneisenau and Scharnhorst battleships and even rush to complete the sea trials for the Tirpitz, Bismarck's sister ship. Aided by U-boats as skirmishers and (whose arm had been wrenched by Hitler into cooperation), the sortie into the Atlantic began with the devastating battle off Norway where the Bismarck sank the HMS Hood, the pride of the Royal Navy. Britain reeled, and Churchill famously demanded, "Sink the Bismarck!" The Navy swarmed to attack the battle group, focusing specifically on the flagship, but the German iron seemed unbreakable. After several more devastating assaults, the German ships finally turned back to France, where they would refuel and turn out into the Atlantic again to prey on Allied commercial shipping.
Also on May 24, FDR gave his speech announcing "unlimited national emergency" as Germans had seemingly come to gain the advantage in the Battle of Atlantic. Rather than repeating his 1933 idea of "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself", he addressed America with a dire warning of what Nazi takeover of the West would mean: restrictions on worship, workers enslaved to a foreign military machine, and children stolen into the ranks of the Hitler Youth. He emphasized his Pan-American Security Zone (which reached nearly to Iceland) and stated that German naval attack within the zone would be paramount to a declaration of war. Hitler, on May 27, announced German control of the seas.
When Germany began raids on the Canadian coast in September of 1941, Congress voted for a declaration of war, and the United States formally joined the Allies. The action quickly brought the East Coast Battles, where German battleships and newly refitted French aircraft carriers launched bombing raids on Boston, New York, and Washington, D.C. Britain nearly folded as civilians suffered starvation and almost free attack from German planes, but finally the tide of the war turned against Germany in 1943 when the Bismarck was damaged beyond repair and scuttled in the Battle of Nassau. Taking up courage to counterattack, the Allies coordinated invasions, finally breaking the German resistance with the atomic bombs of 1946.
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Jeff Provine Blog Source: Jeff Provine’s Blog Labels: Bismarck, Royal Navy, Operation Rheinubung, Naval, Plan Z. Editor says, in reality the Royal Navy sank the Bismarck. Hitler took little notice of the French fleet, considering it out of the way and focusing on his land and air forces. After sinking the Hood, the Bismarck was ruthlessly pursued by the Royal Navy until two carriers, three battleships, four cruisers, and seven destroyers converged to destroy the Bismarck utterly, with 2,200 sailors drowning along with her.
~ The Germans didn't have nearly the resources or the fuel (especially the fuel) for all this.
~ if Hitler has his planned carriers and Goering cooperates over naval air traing, which he did not in OTL, then we are in real trouble.
We may not win the carrier battle.
Hitler won't start attacking the US., Pearl Harbour came as a complete surprise to the Nazis, but use his navy to blockade Britain.
One last point, if the war goes on till 19146 HITLER HAS THE BOMB.
~ Logistics. Germans lacked the fuel to keep a fleet off the North American coast. Had they done so US and Canadian air could have sunk them all as German ships lacked enough AAA. The concept of 4 carriers each with 42 planes providing sufficient cover is a stale joke.
~ Bismark would have been handily outgunned by almost any british battleship and every american battleship- the newest US BB's coming on line, like Washington, had 9 16 inch guns, better speed and better armor. Even the older british battleships could match Bismark for gunpower, if not speed. I think to make this timeline work, the US and British fleets would have to have gone through a major period of neglect during the depression and thus be much weaker.
~ in the event of a highly successful camopaign in the NE Atlantic by Hitler's navy, Rudolf Hess' mission to Scotland will not be a failure. It will be a similar glorious success, with the draft treaty he is carrying produced and the announcement made in London that negotiations have succeeded.
The Hees- Hamilton Pact goes down in the history books as a success.
~ Re Richard Roper: the Nazis would have needed longer than until '46 to build the bomb. Their nuclear project was hindered by the loss of many top scientists who fled to America and Britain, by bureaucratic infighting, by technical errors and by the destruction by the Allies of the Norsk Hydro plant which was nthe Nazis' chief source of heavy water. I'd guess it would have taken them until 19948 or '49--which means it doesn't happen unles the U.S, stays out of the war.
~ Sorry, they were 4 MONTHS, I repeat 4 MONTHS behind us, hencethe panic to get the Manhatten Project of theground. Origianally the calculations in Britain, saida whole room of uranium isotope would be needed for a critical mass until the calculations were redone in Birminham. FDR had originally failed to understand the nature of a bomb.
~ Apparantly not. The bombs were intended for Dresden and Berlin and not Japan originally.
~ @Richard - not saying you are wrong but would love a source for Dresden as intended target. My memory says Munich but the books I could check in are sadly long gone.
~ The books I have seen repeatedly say Dresden and Berlin.
~ Which books/authors?
~ Sorry, can't rember withouit checking and am rather busy.
~ Was worth a shot...Thx anyway.
~ The target all along was Germany. Serious opposition among the scientists only arose once Germany fell. The issue was not race however. The physics community was overloaded with emigrees/Europeans and also tilted quite left [common among educated European emigrees]. As long as we were using the bomb to help the Soviets it was a good thing. Once we were not [Hitler was gone and Stalin was neutral in the Pacific at that time] moral doubt surfaced. Not a coincidence. Same as once the bomb clearly became an anti-Soviet weapon our left decided it was immoral. The racial argument was tactical detail.
~ yeah, I know.
~ US looked the other way on Communist, pro-Communist leanings in the Manhattan project. Spirit of the Times plus we were allied to the SU. We felt badly burned when it came out that Fuchs, Rosenbergs et al had passed the key design data to the Soviets. Oppenheimer had red ties. He had had second thoughts on using the A Bomb and opposed the H Bomb. These things happen in wartime and while it was a Cold War [outside Korea and Indochina] we were at war with the Soviets.
~ It is far from certain the Rosenbergs passed "America's nuclear secrets" to the Soviets. Oh yes, the brother inlaw confessed years later he had made it up, saying "it was my wife or his, they would have come after my wife".
This is because Truman claimed they were all American nuclear secrets, always triggering press releases from Winston Churchill, and ignoring the fact the original work had been at a secret location in NE Wales.
He also believed the Soviets would never get the bomb, despite his sirforce generals trying to tell him otherwise.
~ I used Rosenberg as shorthand for people who don't know the details. Insert Greenglass if you prefer. Julius and Ethel were part of the spy ring. Exactly who did what is in the part of the old KGB/NKVD archives that will probably never be opened to the public. Greenglass/Rosenberg were important because it extended the scope of Soviet penetration beyond foreigners resident here [Fuchs etc.]. At best Julius only passed electronics rather than nuclear secrets. It was still espionage.
~ Greenglass,many years later, admitted he had made the story up to take the heat of his own wife. "they would have gone after my wife" he had been a machinist, machining the molds for the explosive segments for an implosion.
The problem was the Council on Foreign Relations believed the Soviets would take 10 years to develop the bomb, Truman believed they never would, hence the witch hunt to find "spies".
Since the Soviets hoovered up the Nazi nuclear programme and had a limited one of their own, it is not surpising Truman was rapidly disillusioned, but refused to accept it.
~ Greenglass lied one of the two times. Absent the KGB archives being fully opened we will never know which time. However let us presume Rosenberg only spied on electronics. He was still a spy and his wife was still a Moscow line Communist.
~ The Rosenbergs were not able to spy on the electronics from New York. They could only relay what Grennglass, Rosenberg's brother-in-law told them, and this was confined to descriptions of the physical shapes of the molds. greenglass confessed years latr he had only implicated the his brother -in law to take hte heat away from his own family.
hence the extraordinary story Kenneny and his brother were actually considering a pardon for the rosenbergs.
Editor says, what if Bill Clinton had been granted temporary immunity? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s).
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In 1997, on this day the US Supreme Court announced a constitutional decision which barred Paula Corbin Jones from proceeding with her lawsuit against Bill Clinton for his personal conduct before he was President.
Temporary ImmunitySomewhat suprisingly the former Vice President, Supreme Court Justice George H.W. Bush voted against the 8-1 decision. Because in barring any private civil damage lawsuit from proceeding against the President until leaving office, the ruling supported Clinton's appeal that as a matter of prudence, even if not as a matter of constitutional law, such trials would interfere with the President's duties.
Of course the granting of temporary immunity last hardly longer than the swearing in of Al Gore. And the tsunami of private lawsuits almost certainly contributed to Clinton's heart attack in 2005.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Bill Clinton, Paula Jones, Supreme Court, Presidency, White House. Editor says, the author suggests that the Paula Jones decision gifted the 2000 Presidential election to George W. Bush
~ Certainly the Jones decision in our history poisoned Clinton's presidency and gave Republicans a stick with which to beat Gore, even though he had nothing to do with that matter.
But if the Supreme Court had ruled the other way, Republicans would have turned their wrath on the judicial branch, suggesting (no matter how absurdly) that a court of whose nine Justices seven were GOP appointees was "covering" for Clinton. We'd have seen an outpouring of right-wing rage against the Supreme Court like nothing since the days of the "Impeach Earl Warren" crusade.
~ I'm torn---on the one hand, I can easily see how a President could be endlessly tied down with meritless lawsuits; on the other hand, the President is not a king and does not have immunity to the laws of the land. And I saw the whole Zippergate thing as a chance to get rid of someone I honestly didn't trust to wield the power of the Presidency well or wisely. We were lucky that no really huge crises erupted under Clinton.
~ Eric O, the problem you mention is statutory not constitutional. No one denies such suits are a burden but the remedy is an act of Congress.
In 1936, the British cruise liner Queen Mary departed its Southampton home dock bound for New York City. It would never arrive.
RMS Queen Mary sinks on maiden voyage by Eric LippsTwo days out, on the evening of May 29, a series of explosions ripped the massive vessel open. More than 450 people would die in the subsequent sinking, though 1,700 passengers and nearly all of the crew would survive.
The subsequent maritime investigation would note that a number of problems had been reported, including a tendency for the vessel to roll excessively, broken turbine blades and a mysterious vibration at the vessel?s stem. No completely certain explanation for the disaster could be arrived at, however, and conspiracy theorists ever since have claimed that sabotage was responsible.
In 1952, the Queen Mary II was completed. This successor to the doomed vessel would incorporate many of the design improvements suggested by the investigation into the original's destruction and would operate for three decades without incident before being retired to Long Beach, California, where it remains as a maritime museum and is a major tourist attraction.
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Crises Source: Wikipedia Labels: Queen Mary, RMS, New York, America, Great Britain. ~ After this, and the Titanic, I think I'd avoid British ocean liners.
Editor says, our "Communist Israel" requires us to resite the Camp David Accords in a similiar setting but inside the Soviet Union. Unsurprisingly we imagine that the Russians are somewhat more insistent than the "Georgia Giant" Jimmy Carter. We're grateful to our colleague David Atwell for his input into the development of this thread. Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not reflect the Editor's own views.
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In 1979, following weeks of intense (and often arm-twisting) diplomacy at his Gosdacha in Zavidovo, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev (pictured) emerged to announce the conclusion of a peace settlement between its client state Israel and their Arab neighbours.
A Communist Israel, Part 2 - Zavidovo Gosdacha AccordsAs expected, Israel returned the Sinai Desert which it had seized in the Yom Kippur War of 1973. Also returned was the Golan Heights which Israel had seized in 1967. Because Israeli military success had so nearly engaged the superpowers when the defeated nations of Egypt and Syria had appealed to the United States for decisive intervention.
And so even at the height of the Cold War, both superpowers now realised that it was fundamentally unwise to fight their proxy wars in the Middle East. The region which generated the world's supply of oil already had enough conflict of its own.
And Brezhnev would succeed in defusing both sources of tension by forcing the warring parties to accept a Palestinian mini-state in the Gaza Strip. Afterwards, Egyptian Premier Anwar Sadat wisely noted that Israel's "the vein of life" lead to Russia - and it was this jugular that Brezhnev had threatened to cut in order to force a settlement upon the Zionists.
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Communist Israel Source: Wikipedia Labels: George Marshall, Israel, Palestine, America, Harry S. Truman. Editor says, a "Gaza First" Policy was actually mooted during the Oslo Accords.
~ And what, out of interest, did Isreal get exactly out of all this arm twisting? Or, more to the point, what did the USSR get out of all this?
~ Quite a few Israelis had roots in the Combloc countries. Slipping ringers into Israel wouldn't have been hard for the KGB.
Editor says, what if Harold Wilson really a spy and this disclosure affected the 1980 Presidential election? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s).
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In 2001 a researcher for the news division of Britain's ITV television network discovered a series of previously hidden letters between Oarsman and Tinkerer; these letters bolstered long-standing suspicions that MI-6 had been involved in Harold Wilson's assassination twenty-seven years earlier and would later play a crucial part in the Blair government's 2004-05 inquiries into the assassination. | |
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n order to guarantee the researcher's safety while he waited to testify at official government hearings on the matter, he was placed under protective custody by Scotland Yard and at one point even lived in Canada under an assumed identity. |
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Necessary Evil Source: New Statesman Magazine Labels: Harold Wilson, Ronald Reagan, Great Britain, Seventies, 1970 Election.In 2015, on this day art lovers around the world began a massive online protest campaign in response to plans by the English government to auction off most of the painting collection at London's National Gallery to reduce the national deficit the new English state had inherited from the defunct Cameron administration. | National Gallery |
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| of London |
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: GSTQ Source: Wikipedia Labels: London, David Cameron, National Gallery, Conservatives, Britain.On this day in 1940, the German front near Tillburg collapsed under constant pressure from Allied infantry and armored units. | |
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Belgium1940 Source: Wikipedia Labels: World War Two, Maginot Line, Belgium, Allies, Adolf Hitler.In 2009, on this day the Governer of Delaware closes the states borders with all states and has doctors from local hospitals set up FEMA trailers outside the schools to help with any ill children or teacher. He promises that school will remain open as the children of this state deserve an oppertunity to learn. Public service messages for hand washing and the use of bleach as a cleaner will help reduce any chance of spreading infections. | |
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Personalities Source: Wikipedia Labels: TIAH, Todayinah, Alternate History, Robbie Taylor, Anniversary.The telegraph to the nation was sent from Henry Ford's descendant, Edsel B. Ford the Second: My Great-Grandfather said 'I will build a motor car for the great multitude, constructed of the best materials, by the best men to be hired, after the simplest designs that modern engineering can devise ... so low in price that no man making a good salary will be unable to own one--and enjoy with his family the blessing of hours of pleasure in God's great open spaces'. And in that tradition, today I announce the Model A! Anniversary entry not about our anniversary.
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Personalities Source: Wikipedia Labels: TIAH, Todayinah, Alternate History, Robbie Taylor, Anniversary.Soon, the truth becomes apparent: this website now exists not only in the timeline its creator knows, but in every other timeline as well, all at once. As much fun as it is to peek into some timelines ('Emperor Robbie, Ruler of All Creation'? Hmmmm...), others give glimpses into disturbing possibilities that are hard to even think about, let alone comprehend. Ah, well, at least there's no shortage of material...
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Personalities Source: Wikipedia Labels: TIAH, Todayinah, Alternate History, Robbie Taylor, Anniversary.On this day in 2010 CBS-TV aired the series finale of its long-running drama CSI: Crime Scene Investigations. The last original episode of the series was also the most controversial, given that its main storyline centered on William Petersen's character Gil Grissom being murdered in a parking lot outside his office. | |
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| Gil Grissom |
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Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: CSI:Crime Scene Investiga Source: Wikipedia Labels: CSI, Crime Scene Investigations, Finale, William Petersen, Gil Grissom .In 1940, the British Expeditionary Force begins evacuation from France after being trapped by the Wehrmacht in a pocket whose mouth lies on the coast at Dunkirk. | |
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Four days later, on June 1, as the true magnitude of the Dunkirk debacle sinks in, panic sweeps England. Prime Minister Winston Churchill takes to the BBC to urge his countrymen to 'stand fast in the face of adversity. |
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Editor says, what if President Andrew Johnson was Removed from Office? muses Jeff Provine on the This Day in Alternate History web site. Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the June 2012 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1868, on this day President Andrew Johnson was removed from Office. The American Civil War was coming to a close with Lee's surrender at Appomattox Court House, but a new crisis gripped the government as Tennessee Democrat Andrew Johnson came into the highest office in the US following the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.
President Andrew Johnson Removed from OfficeWhile the Radical Republicans dominated Congress, Lincoln had filled his cabinet with men he hoped would heal the nation: his own rivals among the Republicans, Democrat-turned-Republican Edwin Stanton, and, as his new vice-president in 1864, National Unionist Andrew Johnson. Johnson had been the only Southern senator to refuse to leave his position, being a strong believer in the Union despite his political stances favoring slavery and limited government.
After Lincoln's death, Johnson became Commander-in-Chief and effective ruler of the conquered South. The Radical Congress called for stiff punishments for the former rebels and support for the Freedman's Bureau, enabling the African Americans who had gained their liberty to live better independent lives. Johnson was an adamant War Democrat and had served as Military Governor of Tennessee from 1862, instituting some of the first Reconstruction policies and setting groundwork for a post-emancipation government, although he himself was a believer in white supremacy. As president, however, he saw the war as over and determined to continue Lincoln's lenient Reconstruction in which Southern states would be quickly reintegrated. The Radical Republicans balked and passed bills toward protecting freedmen's rights. State governments under Johnson's Reconstruction, however, had instituted Black Codes to keep white legal supremacy, which Johnson protected with presidential veto.
The Executive and Legislative branches in Washington thus began a struggle for power. Congress passed the original Civil Rights Act and the Freedmen's Bureau Act, both of which Johnson vetoed, citing them too vengeful toward Southern whites. The Republicans maneuvered around him by making much of the Civil Rights Act into the Fourteenth Amendment, which would be ratified by the states and thus never cross the president's desk. Johnson fought against the Republicans, launching a speaking tour of the North before the 1866 elections that turned disastrous as he painted himself as the savior of the white race and became a figure Democrat Representative Samuel S. Cox described " .. as ugly as the devil. He was regularly mad and couldn't talk like a reasonable being". The Republicans made great gains with 37 new seats in the House and 18 in the Senate.
Johnson worked against the Republicans, who could easily override his veto with a two-thirds vote, by any means necessary, such as using bureaucratic legal issues to stop implementation of voting regulations put forth in Congress's Reconstruction Acts. Tensions grew until Johnson was at last impeached for removing Secretary of War Stanton, a violation of the Tenure of Office Act passed shortly before. The impeachment trial before the Senate lasted for months with Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase presiding and nearly all of Washington involved. It became something of a circus with bets being placed in gambling houses, Representative Thaddeus Stevens demanding to be carried to the trial in a chair despite being deathly ill, a para-political acquittal committee established with $150,000 of "influence" money, and Johnson meeting with several decisive senators with offers of political favors. After the political dust settled, Johnson was removed from office with just one vote over the two-thirds required.
Under the Presidential Succession Act of 1792, President pro tempore of the Senate Benjamin Wade came into the White House. Wade was radical even by measure of the Republicans, calling not only for racial equality but also women's suffrage and political support for trade unions against rampant capitalism. Rallying his allies in Congress, Wade put forth aggressive policies with Reconstruction, seizing and parceling up plantations, reinforcing the Freedmen's Bureau at the expense of former slave-owners, and maintaining military governments to ensure control while the Southern economy readjusted. States would only be allowed back into the Union after a majority of its citizens had taken loyalty oaths, which had been a bill created by Wade in 1864 that Lincoln nullified by pocket veto. His actions were widely unpopular in the South and enough to cause a "white flight" as crowds headed north or west and settled under the Homestead Act (interestingly, one of Andrew Johnson's main works as a senator). Other Southerners stayed and resumed fighting incognito through organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan, which was deemed illegal and seditious by Wade, who hired the Pinkerton Detective Agency to aid Union soldiers in rooting out the movement.
Many Republicans found Wade too extreme for the presidency, such as James Garfield, who referred to him as "a man of violent passions, extreme opinions and narrow views who was surrounded by the worst and most violent elements in the Republican Party". He was replaced by General Ulysses S. Grant with the 1868 election under the promise of women's suffrage (1870, with the Fifteenth Amendment), but many of Wade's policies continued, if in a lighter fashion. Reconstruction would forever change the shape of the South, destroying the aristocracy and contributing to the establishment of African American rights there. Few African Americans moved to settle in the North and Midwest, which maintained racial notions for generations to come. One hundred years after the Civil War, a new movement began in the South calling for nationalized civil rights, and many in South Carolina with its Black majority suggesting secession if segregation was not ended.
Entry posted by
Jeff Provine
© Jeff Provine, 2010-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Jeff Provine Blog Source: Jeff Provine’s Blog Labels: Andrew Johnson, Abraham Lincoln, Civil War, America, United States. Editor says, in reality Johnson's presidency was saved, the vote falling one short of the requirement for the removal from office. He continued to fight the Republicans, but their majority in the Senate made his vetoes impotent. As a last act on Christmas Day, 1868, he proclaimed unconditional, universal amnesty for the South, eliminating loyalty oath requirements and hastening Reconstruction. Without widespread support, freedmen became victims of Jim Crow laws, beginning the Great Migration of African Americans to cities in the North and Midwest. Unfortunately, segregation followed them there, too.
~ Misses a couple of key points. Breaking up the plantations would not have resulted in that much white flight. The Black Belts/old Plantation zones were mostly coastal and river valleys. The bulk of the whites lived in hill country less suited to plantation agriculture. Indeed if the new farms were also offered to white Union veterans, especially the mountain Tories, it would have been popular. What would have caused white flight was black civic and even more political equality. Blacks were a majority in LA, MS, SC and a quite large minority in AL and FL. Whites were NOT happy under black rule even when the office holders they elected were white. So the big pressure would have been for redrawing state boundaries to make the black majority areas into black supermajority states. This in turn would have led to the races some what sorting themselves out by who held power where. Also the protracted use of the Army as internal constabulary in Dixie would probably have cost Grant his second term. A large part of the white North was not prepared to keep on an army as permanent electoral police in Dixie. In OTL Grant let the Redeemers retake MS 1870 to hold Ohio in 1872. The radicals were more popular than Johnson's Copperhead northern allies but the public preferred neither given a third choice.
~ This would have permanently weakened the Presidency.
~ In theory one could impeach judges or pack the court. In practice the political constellation was only there for a brief window. What could not be done before 1870 was not going to happen because northern white opinion, especially in the key Midwestern swing states of the Ohio Valley, simply would not support that level of executive tyranny over white men for blacks and carpet baggers. The War Democrats and moderates were willing to fight for the Union but not willing to keep fighting for anything approaching equality. We could have done better than we did but 1970 was not going to happen in 1870.
Editor says, what if Hitler had swapped von Paulus and Rommel after Tobruk? muses Scott Palter. Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the November 2011 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1941, serving for the last time under the inspirational command of the "Desert Fox" Colonel-General Erwin Rommel, the Panzer Army Afrika launched a daring strike at the British armour in the rear of the Allied defences at Gazala near the Libyan City of Tobruk.
Fox on the Volga By Ed and Scott PalterWith the Eighth Army retreating into Egypt, Hitler decided the time was right to pull Rommel out of the Western Desert Campaign. His replacement Friedrich Wilhelm Ernst Paulus obeyed orders by halting the advance at the Egyptian border, a cautious decision which ultimately set-up Operation Hercules for success, enabling Kesselring to take Malta.
Instead of chasing the Desert Rats into Egypt, Rommel was to deploy his prodigious talents in a theater of far greater strategic importance to the Third Reich. And rather than face the British General Wavell, his new adversary was the altogether more impressive Russian military genius Marshal Zhukov. Nevertheless he prevailed, defeating Zhukov at Mars.
The prize for this latest success was a new mission of epic proportions. To mastermind Operation Winter Storm instead of the brilliant, but out of favour Prussian General Erich Von Manstein. The relief of Stalingrad.
Entry posted by
Scott Palter
© Scott Palter, 2009-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Generals Source: Wikipedia Labels: Rommel, Stalingrad, Tobruk, Afrika Corps, Eastern Front. Editor says, in this article we explore a point of divergence proposed by the Strategy Page, toy with the novel "Fox on the Rhine" by Douglas Niles and Michael Dobson (2000) and have repurposed a significant amount of content from Wikipedia.
~ Meanwhile, what's going on in North Africa? good point in first draft VP surrounded at El Alemein (like Stalingrad) but here we have a less belligerent Desert Campaign..
~ Sounds as if this alteration would have kept Germany fighting longer. Perhaps just long enough that Nuremberg and Berlin would be the first cities incinerated by A-bombs. (Actually, it would have had to be two other cities: Hiroshima aand Nagasaki were chosen because they had *not* previously been hit, sparing military analysts the problem of sorting out the damage caused by the Bomb from that done previously by conventional munitions. Berlin and Nuremberg had already been heavily bombed by early 1945.)
~ It would have spared Eastern Europe a good deal of oppression behind the Iron Curtain.
~ Um, Stalingrad was put under seige in 1942. and Manstein did have a plan to break Paulus out of stalingrad, a good plan too. But Paulus would have none of it since Hitler said to hold stalingrad at all costs. Theoretically, if Hitler had given the go ahead in late december or early january, Manstein could have broken the germans out of stalingrad. They would have lost a lot of heavy equipment, but it couldf have been done.
Sadly though, this has a net loss for the germans, since it frees up the Soviet troops encircling stalingrad. With the extra addition of troops, the russkies smash through the weakened army Group Southerns front, and kick them out of the caucasus earlier than OTL. No Miracle on the Donetz, And the war ends in early 1944, most likely. Things do not end up better for the allies at all.
Editor says, what if the USSR had survived long enough for the Soviet Mars Mission to go ahead as planned? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). This story was published in the June 2011 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 2002, having exercised de facto power of sovereignty over the surface of the Planet Mars for almost five years the USSR committed a blatant abrogatation of the UN Outer Space Treaty by declaring supreme, independent authority over the Cydonia Region in the name of the sixteenth Soviet Socialist Republic.
Conquest of the Red PlanetThe "Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies" was opened for signature in the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union on January 27, 1967, and entered into force on October 10, 1967.
The key provisions of the Treaty formed the basic legal framework of international space law prohibiting space-faring nations from:
- Placing nuclear weapons or any other weapons of mass destruction in orbit of Earth, installing them on the Moon or any other celestial body, or to otherwise station them in outer space
- Claiming a celestial resource such as the Moon or a planet, since they are considered to be the Common heritage of mankind
- Exploring outer space for any purposes other than the benefit of all countries and use by all States
The extension of the Iron Curtain into Outer Space, also the abrogration of a thirty-five year old Treaty became the language of diplomatic posturing at the United Nations. And yet the rising panic inside the White House was fuelled by uncertainty as to how the Soviet Union had accelerated their space programme in such a short space of time. And precisely what led them to the mysterious Cydonia Region famously known as the "face on Mars". And indeed what the Soviet engineers might have discovered there.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© Alternate Historian, 2004-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Mars, Cydonia, Russia, Cold War, America. Editor says, many thanks to Chris Oakley, Jeff Provine, Eric Oppen and Robbie Taylor for this contributions to the development of this article
~ I read about this treaty.I think.It was too draconian and controlling.
~ I think the treaty allows them to claim a region on a planet - just not the whole planet itself. Of course, what does a treaty matter compared to the secrets of Cydonia...
~ The treaty definitely took the pressure off of "Beat 'em to it" colonization. Otherwise, we could've seen a celestial land-grab ala 1900s Africa or Asia. Space: 1999, 2001: A Space Odyssey, etc... all gone.
~ There have been plenty of people in the USA who've suggested that the United States should rip up the treaty, claim the moon as U.S. territory and dare the rest of the world to do something about it. Fortunately cooler heads have prevailed, for all that there is a U.S. flag planted in the lunar soil. If the USSR had survived and maintained its space program, we might have seen a confrontation on thr moon as early as the 1970s, let alone Mars.
As for the "secrets of Cydonia," that's a pig in a poke if ever there was one. Mars has value as a colonization site without any hypothetical (and, more likely than not, nonexistent) alien secrets it might hide.
~ If the Soviets controlled Cydonia, would Richard Hoagland have moved there? Let's hope so!
I would like to see the author explain exactly how the Soviets managed to survive at least another eleven years. They were essentially bankrupt by the early 80's.
Editor says, in this post we pursue our speculation what if things were radically different, yet the outcome was much the same. In so doing we examine the Southern Rhodesia government referendum of October 27, 1922 which saw the voters of the colony of Southern Rhodesia by a comfortable majority reject the chance to join the Union of South Africa in favour of establishing a "responsible" government within the colony. Prime Minister Ian Smith believed Smuts could have won the 1948 election (which brought in the National Party's policy of apartheid) if Rhodesia had joined the Union of South Africa. What if Rhodesians had voted otherwise in 1922, as conjectured by Smith in his autobiography and would the end-game have been so very different?
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In 1948, on this day in South Africa, the Government of Field Marshal Jan Christian Smuts (pictured) was returned following victory at a third successive general election.1
Bitter Fruit in the fifth provinceHis opponent Daniel Francois Malan's defeated National Party had campaigned for the prohibition of mixed marriages, for the banning of black trade unions and for stricter enforcement of job reservation. Instead voters chose Smut's policy of encouraging immigration from europeans - who were either weary of post-war Europe, or attracted by their war-time service in Southern Africa. And the rapid arrival of europeans would mean that inside of twenty years, the ratio of whites to all other races in South Africa would narrow to just 2:1.
The victory of Smuts' United Party was directly attributable to another long-term strategy of the General's. Because in the 1922 referendum, Smuts had convinced Rhodesia elected to join the Union of South Africa instead of establishing their own "responsible government". And those votes would prove crucial in the 1948 election.
One of Smut's successors as Prime Minister, Ian Smith2 would later note that "In 1922 the choice was put to the Rhodesian people through a referendum. Due to the personal intervention of General Jan Smuts, then Prime Minister of South Africa, who visited the country and addressed meetings, using his great wisdom and personal charm in an effort to convince Rhodesians to opt for joining the Union, Rhodesians voted by a majority of 2:1 to become the fifth province of the Union of South Africa .. The practical and economic benefits of joining the Union, obvious at that time, materialised and even exceeded predictions. With the advantages of being part of a larger and more diversified economy, access to transport and harbour facilities, eliminiation of customs and trade barriers, retaining Commonwealth preferences - because South Africa was part of the British Empire - things could only improve".
And yet Southern Africa's commercial success would bear bitter fruit. Identifying the Union of South Africa as a vulnerable citadel of capitalism, the Soviet Union and Cuba would pump immense resources into the South African Communist Party in order to overturn white majority rule. In his autobiography Long Walk to Freedom, President Nelson Mandela conceded "There will always be those who say that the Communists were using us. But who is to say that we were not using them?".3
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© Ian Smith, "The Great Betrayal - Memoirs of Africa's most controversial leader" (1997), Nelson Mandela, "Long Walk to Freedom" (1999)Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Beasts Source: Wikipedia Labels: Jan Smuts, Ian Smith, Rhodesia, South Africa, Africa. Editor says, 1) Smith suggests Smuts could have won the 1948 election if Rhodesia had joined the Union of South Africa.
2) we imagine that Ian Smith becomes Prime Minister of South Africa.
3) the quote is unchanged all the context is somewhat different as we imagine an ultimate victory for the Communist Party, and not an African National Congress in this post.
~ Things would have turned out much the same...and I'm not sure that a Boer-run SA would have been happy about more "English" voters.
~ Stealing from Communists is okay because they don't believe in private property in the first place.
~ Barring something resembling Jim Crow (for which there would be little objective need if there is an absolute White Majority), there would be little real traction for a SACP... of course odds are there would be something resembling Jim Crow.
In 1941, on this day Soviet ground forces in Germany began advancing on Stettin. | |
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| Joseph Stalin |
Variant entry posted by
Chris Oakley
original content has been repurposed to celebrate the author's genius © Chris Oakley,2008-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Blackpool40 Source: Wikipedia Labels: Blackpool, Adolf Hitler, Normandy, Britain, France.In 2009, on this day the New England states demand that the state and US Goverment provide help so that parents can go back to work. The UN asks the russian goverment to please evaluate everything it is doing in its military and to help with dealing with H1N1. | |
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Entry posted by
David Cryan
© David Cryan, 2009-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Swine Flu Source: Wikipedia Labels: Swine Fever, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Swine Fever, America.On this day in 1968, Soviet defense minister Andrei Grechko resigned; previously one of the strongest players in the Kremlin, Grechko had seen his political position sharply deteriorate in the aftermath of the Anglo-Soviet nuclear conflict. | |
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| Andrei Grechko |
Entry posted by
Chris Oakley
© Chris Oakley,2008-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Ground Zero Murmansk Source: Wikipedia Labels: Levi Eshkol, Andrei_Grechko, Middle East, Israel, Egypt.In 2002, in Pakistan, military and internal-security officers loyal to hard-line Islamist Lt. General Mehmood Ahmed, head of the country's Inter-Services Intelligence Agency, launch a coup against President Pervez al-Musharraf. | |
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| Pervez al-Musharraf |
He will announce that new laws will be drafted to bring the country's legal and political systems 'into line with the will of Allah as expressed through the Holy Koran,' and will warn that dissent will be punished as an offense not only against the state but against the faith. |
Entry posted by
Eric Lipps
© Eric Lipps,2007-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Gore Wins Source: Wikipedia Labels: Al Gore, Tony Blair, Desert Storm, September 11, War on Terror.On this day in 1967, Gamal Abdel Nasser angrily denounced Jordan's King Hussein as a 'cowardly traitor' for urging Nasser to agree to a cease-fire with Israel. | |
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| Gamal Nasser |
Entry posted by
Chris Oakley
© Chris Oakley,2008-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Meast67 Source: Wikipedia Labels: Gamal Nasser, Gamal Abdul Nasser, Middle East, Israel, Egypt.Older Posts
© Today in Alternate History, 2013-. All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
