Hello all, I'm Masked Pickle, I'm a French student involved in history itself, alternate history of course and Kaiserreich: Legacy of the Weltkrieg mod for Hearts of Iron II, a Paradox Interactive strategy game for PC. Let me present you the mod itself...
http://img365.imageshack.us/img365/2739/kreichintro2oc.jpg
On the 10th of September 2005, a mod idea was proposed by forumite Sarmatia1871, creator of the classic alternative reality mod 'All the Russias' (which supposes that the Whites won the civil war). The basic idea behind the Mod was not so vastly different from that of ATR, but the affects of the diversion from reality was and are very broad in scope, much broader in fact than All the Russias (an adapted version of which forms a key component in the mod). That simple idea was this - that Germany and the Central Powers won the Great War (or Weltkrieg as it is called in our timeline). From this concept has grown a team of dedicated modders, contributors and hangers-on. ( See the forum here)
The POD in this timeline is that the Lusitania was never sunk, and that the Germans eventually refused to avoid unrestricted submarine warfare, thus impeaching the American intervention in WWI. Without US reinforcements, 1918 Offensive was more benificial for the Germans, who destroyed the Salonika bridgehead the same year, and a double offensive in France and Italy in 1919 led to German victory: in both defeated countries, syndicalist unrest led to general strikes and later revolt against the government responsible for defeat, with German approval. French government come to exile to its African colonies after a syndicalist revolution inspired by the souvenirs of the 1871 Commune has triumphed at home whilst Italy is cut in two, between Syndicalist south and Austrian-occupied North. The remaining of the war consists of a few smirkishes in the Middle East and German intervention in the Russian Civil War that eventually leads to the victory of the Whites, united under the aegis of Alexandr Kerensky. The Lloyd George government finally accepts to sign the "Peace with Honour" with the German Imperial government in 1921, acknowledging German supremacy on the continent, excessive war indemnities, annexation of Belgian Congo, French Indochina, Moresnet, Luxemburg and western parts of Russia to Germany, but leaves Britain, Japan and Portugal and their empires unharmed.
In Germany proper, Wilhelm II enjoys his fullfilled dream of "Place under the Sun", but the Hindenburg-Ludendorff dictatorship fight to keep control of the government, criticized on its left by democrats and on its right by the advocates of a preventive strike against Syndicalist France. The two generals are ousted by 1924 to be reimplaced by Grossadmiral von Tirpitz, who will rule during a golden age of German supremacy. Kingdoms of Flanders-Wallonia (formerly Belgium), Finland, United Baltic Duchy, Lithuania, Poland, White Ruthenia, Ukraine are established in eastern Europe, under German princes and left to German settlers. Austria-Hungary fails its inner renovation after Emperor Karl's death on 1922, and its economy and government are progressively put under German control: the 1927 Augsleich leads to a lame compromise about federal status, and has to be renogicated by 1937. Ottoman Empire and Bulgaria barely survive with German help against their respective internal dissenters (Arabs and Balkanic neighbours). Russia, dismembered during the Civil War, is put under a weak democratic regime under Kerensky, going under heavy corruption and high dissent due to pardoned former Bolsheviks and far right White Generals: Kolchak fails its coup in 1925 and has to flee for Japan. Britain is hit by internal dissent and has to deal with German-sponsored revolts throughout its empire, such as in Ireland, India or in Africa: a General Strike in 1925 leads to the fall of the Home Islands to Syndicalism and the exile of the Royal Family to Canada. India is split into three rival factions, South Africa proclaims its independance, Australia and New Zealand are merged into the Australasian Dominion and Germany take control of many British colonies, in Africa and Asia. Mainland France is under syndicalist rule, but after Pouget's death in 1931, the power has fallen into the heads of the unexperienced Marceau Pivert, who has not managed to avoid the rise of powerful and rival factions; the French government in exile has already fallen to a nationalist military junta under Field Marshal Philippe Pétain. China has been invaded by German forces in 1926, eventually leading to the restoration of the Qing Empire and the German administration of country in the past British model in India. Japan awaits for an occasion to expand, such as Baron von Ungern-Sternberg in Mongolia...Under Republican President Leonard Wood, the USA have entered an era of isolationism before being hit by the 1929 New York Stock Market Crash: the 1936 Presidential Election will be the most disputed since 1860, with Jack Reed's Combined Syndicates of America and Huey Long's America First Union Party ready for an uprising...American authority in South America has already collapsed, being disputed by syndicalist revolutionnaries, Commonwealth agents (Canada, where the Royal Family resides, as its leader) and German advisors.
In 1936, when the game begins, it's the 48th year of the reign of Wilhelm II. Following the assassination of Kerensky, rival factions, ranging from Wrangel's ultranationalists to Bukharin's Neo-Bolsheviks, will fight each other for the control of the Kremlin. The Mitteleuropa system will be critically hit by the Berlin Stock Market crash. The Third Internationale Congress in Paris will trigger a new age of syndicalist policies, sparking uprisings throughout the world. The United States will collapse in a new civil war. King Edward VIII will enhance a rearmament program from Canada in order to reconquer the Home Islands. The Zweite Weltkrieg is to happen by 1940, involving three factions: the Syndicalist Internationale, the exiled Entente and the Mitteleuropa system.
http://i206.photobucket.com/albums/bb266/Mr_Kibbles/TheWorldx842.jpg
EUROPA 1936
----------------
The fig-leaf constitutionalism and social welfare program of the Second Reich are no longer as effective as they once were. Many groups are calling out for reform or radical action. For the past 30 years the Social Democrats have consistently made up the largest party in the Reichstag and are becoming more radical and convinced of their Marxist views by the day. Prussia's Junker aristocracy still dominate the Reich's military and diplomatic establishment, and want to return to an idealised view of the estatist social order of the eighteenth century. Meanwhile, Ernst Roehm and his pan-German Grossdeutsche Volkspartei want to set up a single state in Central Europe for all Germans, with the other nations serving as mere colonial appendages.
The messy Kleinstaaterei put in place at the end of the war means that Germany's principal allies are hardly stable or reliable. Austria-Hungary lurches from one crisis to another, and all the groups within the Dual Monarchy are preparing for the negotiations for the renewal of the Ausgleich in 1937 as the time to make their move.
The post-war treaties ensured that Bulgaria was the prime beneficiary of the war in the Balkans. But Tsar Ferdinand’s Empire is now unwieldy, bloated and chaotic. German investment led to the creation of much industry, but also massive social inequalities. The three mutilated Balkan powers, Serbia, Greece and Romania are waiting for the first sign of weakness, before making their move and reclaiming their ancient territories.
In the south of Italy, the Republic of the Sicilies was quickly taken over by a socialist government, which aligned itself with revolutionary France. However, this did not seem to matter, as the Austrians believed that replacing the former Kingdom with a federation of Duchies in Northern Italy under Papal presidency would at least keep their frontiers stable. But in 1934, a cabal of radical Cardinals secured dominance in the Vatican, with the aim of making Papal authority in Italy a political reality, rather than a mere symbol. And the Pope’s power could spread far beyond Rome: Carlists in Spain, Integralists in France and Latin America, Corporationists in the Germanic and Balkan countries, the scattered remnants of the dismembered Polish nation, even the tiny Republic of Armenia, all seem willing to rally to the cause, should the call come.
The return of Turkish suzerainty over Egypt and much of North Africa, as well as the costly completion of the Berlin to Baghdad Railway did little to promote economic development or stability within the Ottoman Empire: it is now challenged from within by reformist tendencies and an increasingly powerful pan-Arab nationalism. And to the East, the Republic of Turkestan seems intent on wresting the Caliphate from the Turks.
The two syndicalist powers, the Union of Britain and the Commune of France, have been occupied with internal reconstruction for the past decade. But with the threat of revolution in the Kingdom of Spain, it is probably not long before demands for International Solidarity and the promotion of the interests of the Workers of the World ring out on the streets of Paris and London. Meanwhile, the two Governments in exile, the Kingdom of Canada and the Fourth French Republic are riven by internal dissent, but still eager to oust the metropolitan regimes.
Europe now has only three parliamentary Republics, and the largest, Russia, is on the verge of collapse. Who knows what will happen there?
***
AMERIKA
----------------
Across the Atlantic, the United States is not faring much better. German domination in Europe and Asia and chaos in the former French and British Empires combined to ensure that the USA has suffered a continual economic decline since the beginning of the 1920s, and a series of isolationist Presidencies have meant that its international standing has diminished considerably. The two-party system is beginning to break down, and the elections due for the end of 1936 will see the Democrats and the Republicans face off against two new political coalitions: the Combined Syndicates of America, formed in 1935 through a fusion of the American Socialist Party and the AFL and IWW labour organisations, wants to promote a new Syndicalist order on Franco-British lines; the America First-Union Party wants a centralised American dictatorship to dominate the Western hemisphere. Both see the Constitution as an outdated irrelevance and are willing to use violence to promote their aims. A second civil war is a definite possibility...
South America has become a continent of barricades: Argentina, Peru and Venezuala have fallen into the orbit of Germany, while Columbia, Chile, Bolivia and Paraguay have formed their own security alliance with American backing. Right now it is impossible to tell whether Brazil will side with one of these groups, or try to forge ahead with its own path.
***
ASIEN
----------------
In Asia, most of the former British and French colonies are under German control. However, the disastrous civil war following the collapse of British authority in India proved too large and chaotic to handle. The Raj has now broken up into a number of independent states. As well as independent monarchies ruling Burma, Nepal and Bhutan, a federation of Hindu and Islamic Princes dominates the South, the North and West is controlled by a technocratic dictatorship led by a coalition of the few remaining British personnel and native Indian elites, and Bengal has been taken over by a radical peasant republic based on ideals of agrarian socialism.
The Chinese Republic collapsed into anarchy in early 1920s. As a result, German arms backed the restoration of the Qing Emperor, while setting up an autonomous federation of legation cities to regulate maritime trade. This now provides a facade of legitimacy for what is to all intents and purposes a German hegemony over China, with administration of most of the country actually falling to the Allgemeine Ostasiatische-Gesellschaft, a grand consortium of German companies. However, the Empire of Japan desires an Asian Empire of its own, and millenarian Chinese groups are organising in the West, crying out that the Qing have succumbed to foreign domination and lost the Mandate of Heaven, which should now pass to a new dynasty which will restore China's place at the centre of the world.
***
AFRIKA
----------------
Freistaat Mittelafrika was hailed in the early 1920s as a vast colony of settlement and the secure foundation for Europe's future economic security. However, it has failed to live up to these promises, and is now a black hole sucking in European money and manpower with little use other than as a dumping ground for embarrassing politicians. But still, Statthalter Goering is not lacking in ambition, and with vulnerable Portuguese colonies, an overstretched Kingdom of Abyssinia and a technically neutral South Africa on his frontiers, he has many opportunities for expansion.
In short, the Global Order put in place by Germany after the Weltkrieg is a house of cards. When one part falls, the rest is sure to follow...
The project for which I'm coming there is the Kaiserreich Wiki, also dubbed as the Kaiserpedia. I personally consider Kaiserpedia as an useful resource for AfterActionReports writers, in-game events, and as a great experience in alternate history, as it put some order in the chaotic Kaiserreich timeline and came with the idea of making a whole false Wikipedia about a world that never existed. Even if the timeline has to keep some coherence, everyone who appreciates the Kaiserreich mod, interestered in alternate history and wanting to participate to the mod can contribute in order to accelerate it. The only things you got to do is to register (it's free), type the name of your article in the research engine; if it exists, use the button edit to add your contribution, if not, choose the option "this exact title" and begin it. You must of course obey a model described there and your contributions could be revised or even totally erased if they don't correspond at all to the Kaiserreich canon background, but you are totally free to write-in, and to propose some suggestions, as we're never lacking of it.
I hope my call will be heard by some alternate historians...If you have any question, I will be happy to answer them!
http://editthis.info/kaiserreich/Main_Page
On the 10th of September 2005, a mod idea was proposed by forumite Sarmatia1871, creator of the classic alternative reality mod 'All the Russias' (which supposes that the Whites won the civil war). The basic idea behind the Mod was not so vastly different from that of ATR, but the affects of the diversion from reality was and are very broad in scope, much broader in fact than All the Russias (an adapted version of which forms a key component in the mod). That simple idea was this - that Germany and the Central Powers won the Great War (or Weltkrieg as it is called in our timeline). From this concept has grown a team of dedicated modders, contributors and hangers-on. ( See the forum here)
The POD in this timeline is that the Lusitania was never sunk, and that the Germans eventually refused to avoid unrestricted submarine warfare, thus impeaching the American intervention in WWI. Without US reinforcements, 1918 Offensive was more benificial for the Germans, who destroyed the Salonika bridgehead the same year, and a double offensive in France and Italy in 1919 led to German victory: in both defeated countries, syndicalist unrest led to general strikes and later revolt against the government responsible for defeat, with German approval. French government come to exile to its African colonies after a syndicalist revolution inspired by the souvenirs of the 1871 Commune has triumphed at home whilst Italy is cut in two, between Syndicalist south and Austrian-occupied North. The remaining of the war consists of a few smirkishes in the Middle East and German intervention in the Russian Civil War that eventually leads to the victory of the Whites, united under the aegis of Alexandr Kerensky. The Lloyd George government finally accepts to sign the "Peace with Honour" with the German Imperial government in 1921, acknowledging German supremacy on the continent, excessive war indemnities, annexation of Belgian Congo, French Indochina, Moresnet, Luxemburg and western parts of Russia to Germany, but leaves Britain, Japan and Portugal and their empires unharmed.
In Germany proper, Wilhelm II enjoys his fullfilled dream of "Place under the Sun", but the Hindenburg-Ludendorff dictatorship fight to keep control of the government, criticized on its left by democrats and on its right by the advocates of a preventive strike against Syndicalist France. The two generals are ousted by 1924 to be reimplaced by Grossadmiral von Tirpitz, who will rule during a golden age of German supremacy. Kingdoms of Flanders-Wallonia (formerly Belgium), Finland, United Baltic Duchy, Lithuania, Poland, White Ruthenia, Ukraine are established in eastern Europe, under German princes and left to German settlers. Austria-Hungary fails its inner renovation after Emperor Karl's death on 1922, and its economy and government are progressively put under German control: the 1927 Augsleich leads to a lame compromise about federal status, and has to be renogicated by 1937. Ottoman Empire and Bulgaria barely survive with German help against their respective internal dissenters (Arabs and Balkanic neighbours). Russia, dismembered during the Civil War, is put under a weak democratic regime under Kerensky, going under heavy corruption and high dissent due to pardoned former Bolsheviks and far right White Generals: Kolchak fails its coup in 1925 and has to flee for Japan. Britain is hit by internal dissent and has to deal with German-sponsored revolts throughout its empire, such as in Ireland, India or in Africa: a General Strike in 1925 leads to the fall of the Home Islands to Syndicalism and the exile of the Royal Family to Canada. India is split into three rival factions, South Africa proclaims its independance, Australia and New Zealand are merged into the Australasian Dominion and Germany take control of many British colonies, in Africa and Asia. Mainland France is under syndicalist rule, but after Pouget's death in 1931, the power has fallen into the heads of the unexperienced Marceau Pivert, who has not managed to avoid the rise of powerful and rival factions; the French government in exile has already fallen to a nationalist military junta under Field Marshal Philippe Pétain. China has been invaded by German forces in 1926, eventually leading to the restoration of the Qing Empire and the German administration of country in the past British model in India. Japan awaits for an occasion to expand, such as Baron von Ungern-Sternberg in Mongolia...Under Republican President Leonard Wood, the USA have entered an era of isolationism before being hit by the 1929 New York Stock Market Crash: the 1936 Presidential Election will be the most disputed since 1860, with Jack Reed's Combined Syndicates of America and Huey Long's America First Union Party ready for an uprising...American authority in South America has already collapsed, being disputed by syndicalist revolutionnaries, Commonwealth agents (Canada, where the Royal Family resides, as its leader) and German advisors.
In 1936, when the game begins, it's the 48th year of the reign of Wilhelm II. Following the assassination of Kerensky, rival factions, ranging from Wrangel's ultranationalists to Bukharin's Neo-Bolsheviks, will fight each other for the control of the Kremlin. The Mitteleuropa system will be critically hit by the Berlin Stock Market crash. The Third Internationale Congress in Paris will trigger a new age of syndicalist policies, sparking uprisings throughout the world. The United States will collapse in a new civil war. King Edward VIII will enhance a rearmament program from Canada in order to reconquer the Home Islands. The Zweite Weltkrieg is to happen by 1940, involving three factions: the Syndicalist Internationale, the exiled Entente and the Mitteleuropa system.
EUROPA 1936
----------------
The fig-leaf constitutionalism and social welfare program of the Second Reich are no longer as effective as they once were. Many groups are calling out for reform or radical action. For the past 30 years the Social Democrats have consistently made up the largest party in the Reichstag and are becoming more radical and convinced of their Marxist views by the day. Prussia's Junker aristocracy still dominate the Reich's military and diplomatic establishment, and want to return to an idealised view of the estatist social order of the eighteenth century. Meanwhile, Ernst Roehm and his pan-German Grossdeutsche Volkspartei want to set up a single state in Central Europe for all Germans, with the other nations serving as mere colonial appendages.
The messy Kleinstaaterei put in place at the end of the war means that Germany's principal allies are hardly stable or reliable. Austria-Hungary lurches from one crisis to another, and all the groups within the Dual Monarchy are preparing for the negotiations for the renewal of the Ausgleich in 1937 as the time to make their move.
The post-war treaties ensured that Bulgaria was the prime beneficiary of the war in the Balkans. But Tsar Ferdinand’s Empire is now unwieldy, bloated and chaotic. German investment led to the creation of much industry, but also massive social inequalities. The three mutilated Balkan powers, Serbia, Greece and Romania are waiting for the first sign of weakness, before making their move and reclaiming their ancient territories.
In the south of Italy, the Republic of the Sicilies was quickly taken over by a socialist government, which aligned itself with revolutionary France. However, this did not seem to matter, as the Austrians believed that replacing the former Kingdom with a federation of Duchies in Northern Italy under Papal presidency would at least keep their frontiers stable. But in 1934, a cabal of radical Cardinals secured dominance in the Vatican, with the aim of making Papal authority in Italy a political reality, rather than a mere symbol. And the Pope’s power could spread far beyond Rome: Carlists in Spain, Integralists in France and Latin America, Corporationists in the Germanic and Balkan countries, the scattered remnants of the dismembered Polish nation, even the tiny Republic of Armenia, all seem willing to rally to the cause, should the call come.
The return of Turkish suzerainty over Egypt and much of North Africa, as well as the costly completion of the Berlin to Baghdad Railway did little to promote economic development or stability within the Ottoman Empire: it is now challenged from within by reformist tendencies and an increasingly powerful pan-Arab nationalism. And to the East, the Republic of Turkestan seems intent on wresting the Caliphate from the Turks.
The two syndicalist powers, the Union of Britain and the Commune of France, have been occupied with internal reconstruction for the past decade. But with the threat of revolution in the Kingdom of Spain, it is probably not long before demands for International Solidarity and the promotion of the interests of the Workers of the World ring out on the streets of Paris and London. Meanwhile, the two Governments in exile, the Kingdom of Canada and the Fourth French Republic are riven by internal dissent, but still eager to oust the metropolitan regimes.
Europe now has only three parliamentary Republics, and the largest, Russia, is on the verge of collapse. Who knows what will happen there?
***
AMERIKA
----------------
Across the Atlantic, the United States is not faring much better. German domination in Europe and Asia and chaos in the former French and British Empires combined to ensure that the USA has suffered a continual economic decline since the beginning of the 1920s, and a series of isolationist Presidencies have meant that its international standing has diminished considerably. The two-party system is beginning to break down, and the elections due for the end of 1936 will see the Democrats and the Republicans face off against two new political coalitions: the Combined Syndicates of America, formed in 1935 through a fusion of the American Socialist Party and the AFL and IWW labour organisations, wants to promote a new Syndicalist order on Franco-British lines; the America First-Union Party wants a centralised American dictatorship to dominate the Western hemisphere. Both see the Constitution as an outdated irrelevance and are willing to use violence to promote their aims. A second civil war is a definite possibility...
South America has become a continent of barricades: Argentina, Peru and Venezuala have fallen into the orbit of Germany, while Columbia, Chile, Bolivia and Paraguay have formed their own security alliance with American backing. Right now it is impossible to tell whether Brazil will side with one of these groups, or try to forge ahead with its own path.
***
ASIEN
----------------
In Asia, most of the former British and French colonies are under German control. However, the disastrous civil war following the collapse of British authority in India proved too large and chaotic to handle. The Raj has now broken up into a number of independent states. As well as independent monarchies ruling Burma, Nepal and Bhutan, a federation of Hindu and Islamic Princes dominates the South, the North and West is controlled by a technocratic dictatorship led by a coalition of the few remaining British personnel and native Indian elites, and Bengal has been taken over by a radical peasant republic based on ideals of agrarian socialism.
The Chinese Republic collapsed into anarchy in early 1920s. As a result, German arms backed the restoration of the Qing Emperor, while setting up an autonomous federation of legation cities to regulate maritime trade. This now provides a facade of legitimacy for what is to all intents and purposes a German hegemony over China, with administration of most of the country actually falling to the Allgemeine Ostasiatische-Gesellschaft, a grand consortium of German companies. However, the Empire of Japan desires an Asian Empire of its own, and millenarian Chinese groups are organising in the West, crying out that the Qing have succumbed to foreign domination and lost the Mandate of Heaven, which should now pass to a new dynasty which will restore China's place at the centre of the world.
***
AFRIKA
----------------
Freistaat Mittelafrika was hailed in the early 1920s as a vast colony of settlement and the secure foundation for Europe's future economic security. However, it has failed to live up to these promises, and is now a black hole sucking in European money and manpower with little use other than as a dumping ground for embarrassing politicians. But still, Statthalter Goering is not lacking in ambition, and with vulnerable Portuguese colonies, an overstretched Kingdom of Abyssinia and a technically neutral South Africa on his frontiers, he has many opportunities for expansion.
In short, the Global Order put in place by Germany after the Weltkrieg is a house of cards. When one part falls, the rest is sure to follow...
The project for which I'm coming there is the Kaiserreich Wiki, also dubbed as the Kaiserpedia. I personally consider Kaiserpedia as an useful resource for AfterActionReports writers, in-game events, and as a great experience in alternate history, as it put some order in the chaotic Kaiserreich timeline and came with the idea of making a whole false Wikipedia about a world that never existed. Even if the timeline has to keep some coherence, everyone who appreciates the Kaiserreich mod, interestered in alternate history and wanting to participate to the mod can contribute in order to accelerate it. The only things you got to do is to register (it's free), type the name of your article in the research engine; if it exists, use the button edit to add your contribution, if not, choose the option "this exact title" and begin it. You must of course obey a model described there and your contributions could be revised or even totally erased if they don't correspond at all to the Kaiserreich canon background, but you are totally free to write-in, and to propose some suggestions, as we're never lacking of it.
I hope my call will be heard by some alternate historians...If you have any question, I will be happy to answer them!
http://editthis.info/kaiserreich/Main_Page