Cold War Timeline Development Thread

Delta Force · Oct 30, 2014

I thought it might be a good idea to make a thread for input on a Cold War setting idea I've been developing for a while in various threads, such as The Need For Speed threads (technology and political), the Going Fission thread, and various others. It's ambitious in scope and will cover various areas, including politics, technology, culture, commercial product development, etc. I think a thread like this will help to sort out ideas and make sure I'm not doing anything too implausible. Any input on some of the following ideas would be appreciated.

There are a few major ideas I have for the setting:
-- The PoD is sometime in the 1950s.
-- There is no energy crisis of the 1970s, with the resulting butterflies for electrical power generation and transportation.
-- Nuclear technologies are more advanced relative to our timeline, and there is slightly more nuclear weapons proliferation.
-- Computers and other electronics are slightly behind our timeline.
-- There hasn't been a nuclear war, although there may have been limited use of nuclear weapons in a tactical role.
-- The United Kingdom remains a superpower or powerful great power for longer and has a stronger economy. France also does better.
-- The Soviet Union survives to the present day as a great power.
-- Korea is reunified in the 1960s following the Second Korean War.
-- Argentina avoids instability.

Here are some specific events I have in mind:
-- Eisenhower follows traditional medical opinion of the time and resigns following his 1955 heart attack, with Nixon becoming president.
-- The Tripartiate Pact is victorious in the Suez Crisis.
-- Indonesia experiences a communist revolution.
-- There is a Second Korean War in the 1960s, although it may be due to an invasion of the DPRK during a period of high tensions between the PRC and Soviet Union.
-- Saudi Arabia experiences a revolution, leading to an energy crisis.

Maeglin · Oct 30, 2014

UK as a superpower after 1945 isn't feasible (you really need to eliminate both World Wars to do that). You can make them beefier if you avoid the Suez mess.

Having the Soviet Union as a Great Power is certainly do-able - there's just a host of different ways to do it. Are you intending a Capitalism with Red Flags model, a let's return to Stalinism model, an improved socialist planning model, or a decadent Empire that knows its limits model?

Hrvatskiwi · Oct 30, 2014

The Free Princes movement has the most potential for a Saudi revolution. Probably less likely to happen with a tripartite victory at Suez, although Nasser may still have a decent amount of prestige if the UK retains Suez. It's a bit of a wildcard though.

lukedalton · Oct 30, 2014

Just my two cents:

- UK is not cut off from nuclear power program by the USA in the immediate post-war so Great Britain spend less money for his atomic bomb; better if she can cooperate with France and so share the cost.
- The american take Ho chi min seriously and back him up and Vietnam become essentially the asian equivalent of Yugoslavia, so no vietnam war for both France and US.
- Second Korea war grow from the Nkoreans attempts to subvert their neighbourghs (as happened in OTL but without the 'Nam the US are more free to engage military and so things can escalate).
- With France and UK more powerfull, Israel can continue to be their client/ally instead of attach to the United States but much depend on De Gaule go for OTL reapprochment with the arab or the memory of '56 make things more difficult.
- France (and UK) more powerfull/rich than OTL can be obtained with an increased european collaboration so to share cost of various program, maybe the EDC project (or a version of it) become reality.
- others nuclear armed nations candidate are: Australia (expecially with communist Indonesia), Italy and switzerland (OTL had a common program), Yugoslavia, Sweden (armed and neutral).
-Depending on when Indonesia become communist a lot of crisis/conflict can arise due to Jakarta targeting East Timor, Malaysia and New Guinea, bringing the US and other european power (UK and Netherland) in it. Basically while OTL Indonesia get away with all his crap due to anti-communist or fear of greater tie with the soviets, an open communist one will get less slack.

Dunning Kruger · Oct 30, 2014

To get the US to side with Ho Chi Minh, the UK and France to remain global powers, and tech development to stagnate I think you pretty much need a nerfed cold war.

Along with that, a 1st and 2nd Korean War totally go against this premise. I have a hard time reconciling this given Korea, China, and Soviet A-bomb were big issues for the McCarthyites.

With the UK and France, having them keep some of their colonies without facing insurrections is probably a prerequisite. Stopping the flow of communist arms to various insurgencies probably helps this cause. I dont see how the two could be global powers with colonies. Feel free to disagree though.

Delta Force · Oct 30, 2014

Maeglin said:
UK as a superpower after 1945 isn't feasible (you really need to eliminate both World Wars to do that). You can make them beefier if you avoid the Suez mess.

It depends on when the United Kingdom is considered to have lost superpower status. 1956 is a point in which there is a clear break between superpower and great power.

Having the Soviet Union as a Great Power is certainly do-able - there's just a host of different ways to do it. Are you intending a Capitalism with Red Flags model, a let's return to Stalinism model, an improved socialist planning model, or a decadent Empire that knows its limits model?

I'm thinking the Soviet Union with reforms, so no turn back to Stalinism. However, it might have less control over Eastern Europe, or even have had a few republics secede or be granted independence (such as the Baltic states).

Hrvatskiwi said:
The Free Princes movement has the most potential for a Saudi revolution. Probably less likely to happen with a tripartite victory at Suez, although Nasser may still have a decent amount of prestige if the UK retains Suez. It's a bit of a wildcard though.

That seems more reformist than revolutionary. I was thinking something akin to the Iranian Revolution, with socialists, communists, or radical Islamists taking over. Perhaps moderate socialists take over before being overthrown by more radical elements.

lukedalton said:
UK is not cut off from nuclear power program by the USA in the immediate post-war so Great Britain spend less money for his atomic bomb; better if she can cooperate with France and so share the cost.

The McMahon Act is a bit too early to butterfly. However, perhaps there could be cooperation between the British and French? Wasn't there a limited degree of that during the 1950s in real life?

The american take Ho chi min seriously and back him up and Vietnam become essentially the asian equivalent of Yugoslavia, so no vietnam war for both France and US.

That seems possible. The United States occasionally supported socialists or governments that it could describe as being socialist during the Cold War. I think Ho Chi Minh originally started as a nationalist with socialist leanings, similar to Castro, with both leaders gravitating more towards the Soviet Union when the West decided to treat them as communist.

Second Korea war grow from the Nkoreans attempts to subvert their neighbourghs (as happened in OTL but without the 'Nam the US are more free to engage military and so things can escalate).

That's close to what I was thinking, although I was thinking it could be the DPRK defending itself against PRC invasion, perhaps with the RoK, Soviet Union, and United States both opposing it.

With France and UK more powerfull, Israel can continue to be their client/ally instead of attach to the United States but much depend on De Gaule go for OTL reapprochment with the arab or the memory of '56 make things more difficult.

Historically the United States put financial pressure on the Tripartite Pact because it thought the Arab-Israel dispute could be quickly solved and everyone would form a common alliance against the greater communist threat. Depending on the degree of American support during the Suez Crisis, there could be a break or the region could generally become more pro-Soviet apart from Israel, Iran, Turkey, and a few other states.

France (and UK) more powerfull/rich than OTL can be obtained with an increased european collaboration so to share cost of various program, maybe the EDC project (or a version of it) become reality.

I think wiser spending on the part of the United Kingdom could also give make it better off in terms of technology and defense relative to our timeline. The British spent heavily, but too many projects were cancelled, oftentimes just before completion.

others nuclear armed nations candidate are: Australia (expecially with communist Indonesia), Italy and switzerland (OTL had a common program), Yugoslavia, Sweden (armed and neutral).

Do you have any information on the joint Italo-Swiss program? I know Switzerland had a nuclear program and Italy worked on missile delivery systems for a while.

Depending on when Indonesia become communist a lot of crisis/conflict can arise due to Jakarta targeting East Timor, Malaysia and New Guinea, bringing the US and other european power (UK and Netherland) in it. Basically while OTL Indonesia get away with all his crap due to anti-communist or fear of greater tie with the soviets, an open communist one will get less slack.

I don't know if intervention in Indonesia would really be an option. It's one of the most populous nations on Earth. Strategic containment might be a better and more realistic option.

lukedalton · Oct 30, 2014

Do you have any information on the joint Italo-Swiss program? I know Switzerland had a nuclear program and Italy worked on missile delivery systems for a while.

It's all in italian (sorry don't know where are equivalent articles in english...so google translate

) and is more about the italian nuclear aspiration and program

http://it.scribd.com/doc/36989548/Italia-atomica-Alessandro-Lattanzio

http://www.scribd.com/doc/12844348/Achille-Albonetti-Storia-segreta-della-bomba-Italiana-ed-europea

Basically started as a common Italian-German-French project integrated with the EDC initiative and later stopped by the French refuse to ratify the Treaty. Still Italy continued due to similar project in Yugoslavia and Romania but US refuse to collaborate greatly slowed the project and in the 70's with the est-european stopping their work, Italy signed the NPT.

http://www.lamoneta.it/topic/125311-il-programma-militare-nucleare-italiano/

This is about Alfa the italian missile or more precisely a SLBM, part of the work done there was used for the Ariane booster.

http://www.icsm.it/articoli/daicsm/post2gm/marconi.html

This is about the Marconi aka the project for a nuclear submarine
With the Swiss after a reread there were just some tentative talking about sharing the cost and the developement during the 60's but never ended well...my mistake

I don't know if intervention in Indonesia would really be an option. It's one of the most populous nations on Earth. Strategic containment might be a better and more realistic option.

Probably something more akin to the Malayan emergency to stop Indonesia expansion.

Nazi Space Spy · Oct 30, 2014

I don't know if I can contribute much outside of American politics, but I am willing to help develop alternate careers for various people if you are intending to make this a fairly collaborative venture.

mlp · Oct 30, 2014

Willing to help on Korea. On the issue of making Argentina/UK/France economically better - could this occur from the respective countries replacing Japan's role in the world economy OTL? I assume it can.

Maeglin · Oct 30, 2014

Perhaps rather than having a Second Korean War in the 1960s, move the Korean War to the 1960s, full stop. You'd have fewer issues with breaching the DMZ, etc, because everyone will be prepared the second time.

This would allow the UK to put more resources into rebuilding their civilian economy, thereby having an economically more powerful UK.

AMBOMB · Oct 30, 2014

How about no Gorbachev or no Chernobyl? Either one of those would've extended the cold war.

Usili · Oct 30, 2014

Maeglin said:
Perhaps rather than having a Second Korean War in the 1960s, move the Korean War to the 1960s, full stop. You'd have fewer issues with breaching the DMZ, etc, because everyone will be prepared the second time.

This would allow the UK to put more resources into rebuilding their civilian economy, thereby having an economically more powerful UK.

Except Europe's economy generally would be in a worse shape than it was compared to our world, due to it taking more time for the recovery of the West German economy, and in term Western Europe's economic recovery if the Korean War was delayed imho.

Maeglin · Oct 30, 2014

Usili said:
Except Europe's economy generally would be in a worse shape than it was compared to our world, due to it taking more time for the recovery of the West German economy, and in term Western Europe's economic recovery if the Korean War was delayed imho.

OK, how about we keep the war (to boost West Germany), but find a way of keeping the UK out of it?

Delta Force · Oct 31, 2014

lukedalton said:
It's all in italian (sorry don't know where are equivalent articles in english...so google translate) and is more about the italian nuclear aspiration and program

http://it.scribd.com/doc/36989548/Italia-atomica-Alessandro-Lattanzio

http://www.scribd.com/doc/12844348/Achille-Albonetti-Storia-segreta-della-bomba-Italiana-ed-europea

Basically started as a common Italian-German-French project integrated with the EDC initiative and later stopped by the French refuse to ratify the Treaty. Still Italy continued due to similar project in Yugoslavia and Romania but US refuse to collaborate greatly slowed the project and in the 70's with the est-european stopping their work, Italy signed the NPT.

That's certainly an interesting developmental background, starting with France working with Italy and its rival the FRG, and then Italy working with Yugoslavia and Romania.

http://www.lamoneta.it/topic/125311-il-programma-militare-nucleare-italiano/

This is about Alfa the italian missile or more precisely a SLBM, part of the work done there was used for the Ariane booster.

The Italian Polaris cruisers and NATO Multilateral Force are well known, but I didn't know about the SLBM plans. Did Italy have plans for an SSBN or SSBK?

Also, odd that Italy was allowed to have nuclear capable ships under the World War II peace treaties, but not aircraft carriers.

http://www.icsm.it/articoli/daicsm/post2gm/marconi.html

This is about the Marconi aka the project for a nuclear submarine
With the Swiss after a reread there were just some tentative talking about sharing the cost and the developement during the 60's but never ended well...my mistake

Do you mean a nuclear missile? Switzerland probably wouldn't be too interested in a nuclear submarine. Of course, if Italy was working on a nuclear submarine that would be very interesting, outside of the superpowers and great powers I'm only aware (off the top of my head) of an Argentinian and Indian program to domestically build some, and a Canadian retrofit proposal (although it may have been a nuclear radioisotope generator).

Probably something more akin to the Malayan emergency to stop Indonesia expansion.

Of course, that only really works during an insurgency. If/when they take over, that's not really an option.

Nazi Space Spy said:
I don't know if I can contribute much outside of American politics, but I am willing to help develop alternate careers for various people if you are intending to make this a fairly collaborative venture.

That would be helpful. I'm planning to focus on the superpowers, great powers, and some of the middle powers. People can certainly do their own fiction for some of the smaller states.

zeppelinair said:
Willing to help on Korea. On the issue of making Argentina/UK/France economically better - could this occur from the respective countries replacing Japan's role in the world economy OTL? I assume it can.

That might be possible if the Second Korean War damages the Japanese economy or if Japan is even directly impacted, perhaps by air and missile attacks should the PRC become involved.

Maeglin said:
Perhaps rather than having a Second Korean War in the 1960s, move the Korean War to the 1960s, full stop. You'd have fewer issues with breaching the DMZ, etc, because everyone will be prepared the second time.

This would allow the UK to put more resources into rebuilding their civilian economy, thereby having an economically more powerful UK.

That could have some significant wider economic effects, as Korean War spending essentially was the East Asian Marshall Plan. Japan was excluded from the Marshall Plan aid but received billions of dollars in Korean War contracts, and similar contracts helped build the economy of the RoK.

AMBOMB said:
How about no Gorbachev or no Chernobyl? Either one of those would've extended the cold war.

With PoDs in the 1950s, the butterflies may mean that Gorbachev and Chernobyl never really become prominent in the timeline. Gorbachev could be just another Communist Party official, and Chernobyl could simply be a nuclear reactor that provides power to an industrial city in the Ukrainian SSR.

Usili said:
Except Europe's economy generally would be in a worse shape than it was compared to our world, due to it taking more time for the recovery of the West German economy, and in term Western Europe's economic recovery if the Korean War was delayed imho.

How would that happen? Do you mean that the lack of Korean War contracts would lead to lower growth in Japan, and thus impact the wider global economy?

lukedalton · Oct 31, 2014

That's certainly an interesting developmental background, starting with France working with Italy and its rival the FRG, and then Italy working with Yugoslavia and Romania

Sorry misunderstanding, the continued italian program was a reaction to the Yugoslavian and Romanian, as this two nation were a little too independent from Moscow, they were considered a menace..

The Italian Polaris cruisers and NATO Multilateral Force are well known, but I didn't know about the SLBM plans. Did Italy have plans for an SSBN or SSBK?

IRC both, first the Marconi who was basically the italian version of the Skipjack and later a SSBN

Also, odd that Italy was allowed to have nuclear capable ships under the World War II peace treaties, but not aircraft carriers.

Let's say that the nuclear weapons were a slip and the rest of the military restriction of the Paris Treaty were silently put under a rug due to the formation of NATO and the strategic position of Italy (helped the fact that formally Italy was a co-belligerant for two years at the end of the war)

Do you mean a nuclear missile? Switzerland probably wouldn't be too interested in a nuclear submarine. Of course, if Italy was working on a nuclear submarine that would be very interesting, outside of the superpowers and great powers I'm only aware (off the top of my head) of an Argentinian and Indian program to domestically build some, and a Canadian retrofit proposal (although it may have been a nuclear radioisotope generator).

The Alfa can be used (if IRC) even as a land missile with proper modification (part of it were later utilizated for the Ariane) and in the 60's Italy had a lot of expertise in missiles as it was the only other nation apart Russia and USA to have satellite launch capacity (project San Marco)

AMBOMB · Oct 31, 2014

Delta Force said:
With PoDs in the 1950s, the butterflies may mean that Gorbachev and Chernobyl never really become prominent in the timeline. Gorbachev could be just another Communist Party official, and Chernobyl could simply be a nuclear reactor that provides power to an industrial city in the Ukrainian SSR.

You could have someone other than Krushchev become first secretary after Stalin died. But, how would that come about? And how would it prevent either Gorbachev from becoming general secretary or Chernobyl?

ComradeHuxley · Oct 31, 2014

Delta Force said:
I'm thinking the Soviet Union with reforms, so no turn back to Stalinism. However, it might have less control over Eastern Europe, or even have had a few republics secede or be granted independence (such as the Baltic states).

A potential solution might be to get this guy here in a position to actually apply his theories to the soviet economy:

"Oskar R. Lange (July 27, 1904 – October 2, 1965):
He was a Polish economist and diplomat. He was most known for advocating the use of market pricing tools in socialist systems and providing a model of market socialism. Joseph Stalin was so impressed with Lange's work that he not only prevailed on President Franklin D. Roosevelt to obtain a passport for Lange to visit the Soviet Union to speak with him personally, but also proposed offering him a position in the future Polish cabinet. After the War ended in 1945, Lange returned to Poland. He then renounced his American citizenship and returned to the United States in the same year as the new Polish Communist régime's first Ambassador to the United States.
In 1946, Lange served as the Polish delegate to the United Nations Security Council. He went back to Poland in 1947, where he continued working for the Polish government, while continuing his academic pursuits at the University of Warsaw and the Main School of Planning and Statistics."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oskar_R._Lange)

Another interesting technological divergence could happen in material science:

"In 1952 L. V. Radushkevich and V. M. Lukyanovich published clear images of 50 nanometer diameter tubes made of carbon in the Soviet Journal of Physical Chemistry.
This discovery was largely unnoticed, as the article was published in the Russian language, and Western scientists' access to Soviet press was limited during the Cold War. It is likely that carbon nanotubes were produced before this date, but the invention of the transmission electron microscope (TEM) allowed direct visualization of these structures."
(https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=271215)

Delta Force · Oct 31, 2014

lukedalton said:
Sorry misunderstanding, the continued italian program was a reaction to the Yugoslavian and Romanian, as this two nation were a little too independent from Moscow, they were considered a menace..

That makes more sense.

IRC both, first the Marconi who was basically the italian version of the Skipjack and later a SSBN

I'll definitely have to look into that. Do you know if Italy had any other major defense projects planned that I might not have heard of?

The Alfa can be used (if IRC) even as a land missile with proper modification (part of it were later utilizated for the Ariane) and in the 60's Italy had a lot of expertise in missiles as it was the only other nation apart Russia and USA to have satellite launch capacity (project San Marco)

Perhaps the Italian program could operate from the Kingdom of Libya, similar to OTRAG?

AMBOMB said:
You could have someone other than Krushchev become first secretary after Stalin died. But, how would that come about? And how would it prevent either Gorbachev from becoming general secretary or Chernobyl?

I'm not too sure who else would be a good/better leader to reform the Soviet Union.

Also, I was referring more to butterflies in terms of what could happen with Gorbachev and Chernobyl. However, it's possible one butterfly could be the Soviets pursuing a safer nuclear reactor with a negative void coefficent (as is common in almost all other civilian designs), meaning that active control is required to increase power output. The RBMK design has a high positive void coefficient, making it vulnerable to runaway power increases without positive control.

ComradeHuxley said:
A potential solution might be to get this guy here in a position to actually apply his theories to the soviet economy:

"Oskar R. Lange (July 27, 1904 – October 2, 1965):
He was a Polish economist and diplomat. He was most known for advocating the use of market pricing tools in socialist systems and providing a model of market socialism. Joseph Stalin was so impressed with Lange's work that he not only prevailed on President Franklin D. Roosevelt to obtain a passport for Lange to visit the Soviet Union to speak with him personally, but also proposed offering him a position in the future Polish cabinet. After the War ended in 1945, Lange returned to Poland. He then renounced his American citizenship and returned to the United States in the same year as the new Polish Communist régime's first Ambassador to the United States.
In 1946, Lange served as the Polish delegate to the United Nations Security Council. He went back to Poland in 1947, where he continued working for the Polish government, while continuing his academic pursuits at the University of Warsaw and the Main School of Planning and Statistics."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oskar_R._Lange)

That's interesting, because one of the events in my first timeline was Khrushchev having a more restrained response to events in Eastern Europe during 1956. Perhaps Lange's efforts could be encouraged, with Poland serving as an economic test case for his ideas?

Also, Lange was interested in computer technology to assist central planning. Perhaps the Soviet Union and its allies could have a stronger electronics industry relative to our timeline?

Another interesting technological divergence could happen in material science:

"In 1952 L. V. Radushkevich and V. M. Lukyanovich published clear images of 50 nanometer diameter tubes made of carbon in the Soviet Journal of Physical Chemistry.
This discovery was largely unnoticed, as the article was published in the Russian language, and Western scientists' access to Soviet press was limited during the Cold War. It is likely that carbon nanotubes were produced before this date, but the invention of the transmission electron microscope (TEM) allowed direct visualization of these structures."
(https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=271215)

I wonder how soon those could have been commercialized though. Carbon fiber has been used long before carbon nanotubes.

Usili · Oct 31, 2014

Delta Force said:
How would that happen? Do you mean that the lack of Korean War contracts would lead to lower growth in Japan, and thus impact the wider global economy?

It would also affect but Japan, but to quote from the book Postwar just dealing with the German recovery from the Korean War:

"The economic impact of this sudden leap in military investments was equally unprecedented. Germany especially was flooded with orders for machinery, tools, vehicles and other products that the Federal Republic was uniquely well-placed to supply, all the more so because the West Germans were forbidden to manufacture arms and could thus concentrate on everything else. West German steel output alone, 2.5 million tonnes in 1956 and 9 million tonnes in 1949, grew to nearly 13 million tonnes by 1953."-Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945, Tony Judt, page 152

Not to mention that if no Korean War were to occur, you would probably have a delayed West German military to be formed, and that could lead to other butterflies as well possibly, like the EDC (European Defense Community) actually being formed in the first place.

AMBOMB · Oct 31, 2014

Delta Force said:
I'm not too sure who else would be a good/better leader to reform the Soviet Union.

Why does your timeline need that?