That is an option, although it would require a few changes for it to work.
What TL ideas do you have that will probably never see the light of day?
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I'd love sometime somehow to do something with my thought o RAF sanity #312 and as a result where the RAF has aa more convincing win in the BoB - not celebrated on the 15th Sept 1940 but an earlier date.
"Sanity options" 2.0 - RAF, 1935-43
The Miles Masters could have been a Peregrine engined plane once they stopped using the Kestrel (as production had ceased). It would have been an easier conversion than the Bristol Mercury. That would make the Miles M24 Master Emergency Fighter a lot more potent, especially if they retained the...
www.alternatehistory.com
I'd love to see that, as a historian I admire your AH more than some, scribblers IOTL>
I would love to see a TL where the US Secretary of the Navy Meyer in 1913 was replaced by a much more enthusiastic and strategic thinking option than the OTL's pacifist journalist Daniels was. Someone who took the groundwork under Meyer and really advanced naval aviation and grew the navy for WW1 that was going to be a lot more effective in the intra-war years. Fiske was his top aide with a lot of ideas on preparing for war but was ignored. A better Sec of the Navy who embraced that could do a lot to improve the Navy that we had as WW2 closed in. I have no idea who the other potential nominees that Wilson might tap who would fit that role though.
One I have - Hans-Joachim Marseille doesn't die, it became the best Luftwaffe pilot, fighting only against Western Allies AF, and survives up to the end of the war (althought it did get shoot down several times, including in the last two weeks of the war, after been intercepted by Meteors - and losing an arm in the process); remains in the Luftwaffe up to retirement, its influence prevented the Westerns Germans to buy the F-104G, opting instead for the F11F, became an father and grandfather, and its granddaughter (the only member that join the military, as a Luftwaffe pilot, inspired by its grandfather story) shoots down the first kill of the postwar Luftwaffe.
Nothing much would change. Missile Techs monitor the missiles now. They were/are not much liked by the rest of the crew. They’re kind of prima donnas. They think they work on the missiles but they just monitor them. Don’t see how you’d get someone from the USAF to spend around 90 days or longer underwater. Plus any officers would have to be nuclear trained. Air Force at Nuke School 😂😂
I would think that the nearby African states would caution against US military action against Mugabe.
Then there is the issue that Zimbabwe would likely have troops in South Africa as part of the invasion force.
I suppose it depends on what form the National Party gvt lived on as. After 1970 or so it had no real ideological content to its political program anymore. Both the crude Baaskap model of the 1950s (a permanent ethnically tiered society) and the notion of separate development and Boer self reliance (big in the 30s and then later brought back by Verwoerd) were basically gone by the 80s.
The Nats had devolved significant powers in public order and the economic maintenance of the country to new Coloured and Black elites after the massive unrest wave in '85 that saw the army deployed to townships. They had no money and sanctions prevented them from getting it, and capital controls failed to prevent flight. If there was a situation in which the gvt limped on in the 2000s, especially after the terrible decisions made by the reserve bank on Asian futures investments, it would have to be either a coup regime caused by the SADF generals or some kind of massive split in the electorate that led to political secession of the old Boerestaats.
Neither of these happened in OTL because the opposition to the NP came from the KP which had a significant English wing to it and had no interest in Afrikaner irredentism, and this never unified with the more Afrikaner tinged HNP movement of Verwoerdian diehards. As for the coup prospect, the SADF wasn't particularly political at the time, far less so than the state security services, which pretty much ran the show for the last 20 yrs or so. We do know some generals were mad that they knew De Klerk was lying to the electorate in 1992 to get the Yes vote - it was brazen and baldfaced and everyone with a behind the scenes look at things knew it. But it never went further than that.
I could see Bush expressing interest in assembling a coalition if, say, Eugene Terre'Blanche seized power in Transvaal and had access to nuclear material, or if the negotiations broke down and a civil war started.
I know that there were Republicans in the early 90s who thought that Inkatha and Buthelezi was a better option to pin hopes on than the ANC for a democratic transition, which was a rather brutal and hard line communist organization in exile (they, like Angela Davis and other moral cretins of the era, called for the Prague Spring to be crushed and for dissidents to be jailed, and cadres spoke glowingly in Sechaba and exile newspapers of their goal to 'build East Germany in Africa'.)
Such hopes were unreasonable as his support base was entirely Zulu and the prospect of a Zulu takeover was absolutely rejected by every other group in South Africa. But I think he will have a big role to play in such a timeline.
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Properly esoteric pop-culture TL - Ozzy Osbourne doesn't hire Jake E Lee for Blizzard of Ozz, sticks with George Lynch; I suspect a butterfly is that my brief and unlamented stint as a rock musician is even shorter.
"La baleine a des ailes" - France builds Joffre and Painlevé as economic stimulus, avoiding the worst of its economic woes and remonstrates with Hitler over the Rhineland. Gets to an Anglo-Dutch-French alliance at war with Japan.
"President Lincoln's Butterflies".
The captain of the City of Flint, the first American ship seized by Germany in WW2, gets an escort from a USN DD.
Through misfortune and mistake, Flint and Reuben James are sunk, and Roosevelt enters a limited naval war in 1939.
"La baleine a des ailes" - France builds Joffre and Painlevé as economic stimulus, avoiding the worst of its economic woes and remonstrates with Hitler over the Rhineland. Gets to an Anglo-Dutch-French alliance at war with Japan.
"President Lincoln's Butterflies".
The captain of the City of Flint, the first American ship seized by Germany in WW2, gets an escort from a USN DD.
Through misfortune and mistake, Flint and Reuben James are sunk, and Roosevelt enters a limited naval war in 1939.
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President Lincoln was a troop transport sunk by U-boat in 1918 - its survivors included Lt. Joseph Gainard, later captain of the City of Flint, and then-Lt. Jesse Oldendorf, who in 1939 captained the Houston but is better known for Surigao Strait.
Someone is ISOTed into mid 30s Goering. Starts wanting to change things. Realizes that it is not that easy. Also living (even as Goering) is better than dying. Descends into bouts of hedonism and general abuses of power, knowing what is going to happen, but continually getting fleeting windows of opportunity to get out of the mess alive, and maybe rich, thoroughly morally compromised.
Strangely, I found it easier to harbor the fantasy of researching and writing a TL to completion back when I knew less history. Now, the more I learn the less I feel equipped or even interested enough to seriously try.
But if I ever managed to surmount these problems, I'd probably do some China-focused TLs.
KMT victory in World War II/Chinese civil war: Yes it has been done before, but I haven't seen the actual circumstances of the Nationalists' triumph explained in a way that I find satisfactory.
Japanese victory over China in World War II: This has not been even attempted as far as I know, despite it being somewhat possible and involving a potentially very interesting (though also downright horrific) aftermath.
Alternate development/division of the Sinosphere during and following the Song dynasty: China being somehow split into northern and southern civilizational offshoots, each claiming to be "Chinese" (with all that entails), is something I have been considering for a couple years. The basic idea is that the Mongols/Kitai/Jurchens/etc are never able to fully conquer China, but neither are the "Chinese" able to completely drive them out of the North China Plain. Instead of China being conquered twice and declining over the centuries into modernity, it instead becomes divided into two civilizations that both lay claim to the Mandate of Heaven, so to speak. The intense rivalry drives cultural, political, and technological competition that sees the "Chinas" (plus Japan) on a rather different road of development from what happened IOTL.
Mao dynasty: Mao Anying is not killed in the Korean War and is groomed for leadership. This sets up the PRC and the world for interesting times.
Surviving USSR, democratic PRC: Events in the 1980s result in a Soviet Union that ditches capital c Communism but is still a rival of the US; meanwhile, instead of reversing political reforms due to the Tiananmen protests, the Chinese Communist Party continues its liberalization, leading to a challenging but ultimately fruitful democratic transition in that country as it experiences its economic rise.
But if I ever managed to surmount these problems, I'd probably do some China-focused TLs.
KMT victory in World War II/Chinese civil war: Yes it has been done before, but I haven't seen the actual circumstances of the Nationalists' triumph explained in a way that I find satisfactory.
Japanese victory over China in World War II: This has not been even attempted as far as I know, despite it being somewhat possible and involving a potentially very interesting (though also downright horrific) aftermath.
Alternate development/division of the Sinosphere during and following the Song dynasty: China being somehow split into northern and southern civilizational offshoots, each claiming to be "Chinese" (with all that entails), is something I have been considering for a couple years. The basic idea is that the Mongols/Kitai/Jurchens/etc are never able to fully conquer China, but neither are the "Chinese" able to completely drive them out of the North China Plain. Instead of China being conquered twice and declining over the centuries into modernity, it instead becomes divided into two civilizations that both lay claim to the Mandate of Heaven, so to speak. The intense rivalry drives cultural, political, and technological competition that sees the "Chinas" (plus Japan) on a rather different road of development from what happened IOTL.
Mao dynasty: Mao Anying is not killed in the Korean War and is groomed for leadership. This sets up the PRC and the world for interesting times.
Surviving USSR, democratic PRC: Events in the 1980s result in a Soviet Union that ditches capital c Communism but is still a rival of the US; meanwhile, instead of reversing political reforms due to the Tiananmen protests, the Chinese Communist Party continues its liberalization, leading to a challenging but ultimately fruitful democratic transition in that country as it experiences its economic rise.
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Here's a more detailed look at the Entrance complex. Can't find any info on what the trailer park would've looked although it'd be cleaner than the one you're thinking of.
Attachments
Been thinking about one where James Dean survives his 1955 car accident (or, the accident never happens, either way works) and how culture in general is shaped going forward. Odds are I'd probably keep it pretty small-bore - I don't really have the time or energy to radically re-write the 20th Century - but it is still something I'd be interested in at least researching.
I had an idea where in late-50s a football (soccer) superleague is founded in Eastern Europe. Soviets try to boost the unity of communist block after creation of Warsaw Pact and Hungarian Uprising in 1956 and sports was selected to be the best way to do it. Superleague is created with 12 teams and then expanding first to 18 and then 24 teams in the 60s. Existing national leagues become more farm leagues for the top teams. The elevated competitiveness push Eastern European national teams to top of the world Hungary spearheading the pack. Poland and Yugoslavia becoming top teams in end of 60s. The UEFA is split into two confederations in late 60s after West tries to control the game in Europe and the communist block decides to create their own confederation. After that the East and the West are playing against each other only in FIFA World Cups. Club tournaments suffer the same fate and European cup and other UEFA club tournaments have only Western European teams playing after the split.
In late 70s the Eastern European superleague becomes a vehicle for civil unrest as movement of people and televised games to follow sports increases. Protests and clashes with authorities become more commonplace and authorities need to use brutal violence to prevent them becoming more severe. In beginning of 80s the Solidarity movement spreads around the Eastern Europe like a wildfire through the sports people.
In the end the superleague will speed up the fall of the Iron Curtain by half a decade.
In late 70s the Eastern European superleague becomes a vehicle for civil unrest as movement of people and televised games to follow sports increases. Protests and clashes with authorities become more commonplace and authorities need to use brutal violence to prevent them becoming more severe. In beginning of 80s the Solidarity movement spreads around the Eastern Europe like a wildfire through the sports people.
In the end the superleague will speed up the fall of the Iron Curtain by half a decade.
This sounds really interesting, I'd love to see it. But how would it speed up the fall of the Iron Curtain?
A far right anti-communist party takes control of Germany in 1933. This government instead of being a psychotic genocidal machine, is just a regular fascist government similiar to Spain or Italy. Just very anti communist. They are able to ally with Poland and cojal the western powers to fund an anti Bolshevik campaign to where Germany declares war on tbe USSR like IOTL, except it’s a much more pragmatic one.
Very intrigued by this timeline, would you mind expanding on a few things?
I can't find any information one way or the other about the Entente pulling their assets out of the U.S. in 1914 (or the Fed's role in averting a banking panic) -- what are you basing that off of?
Besides pushing a 6-year term limit (which may or may not have been ratified), what other policies differing from Wilson's OTL platform do you think Clark would have pursued?
And finally, would Clark have won reelection? Wilson nearly lost, and that was without any economic crisis. If it went the other way, what do you think President Hughes would have done?
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