A Shift in Priorities

[Peabody-Martini]

I believe that Olga was part of the hunt for Trotsky. When she sees the Cheka gang she will recognize them as the former Bolsheviks and call in reinforcements from the Russians and the Middle African mission. What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object. We are going to answer that paradox, likely with a loud explosion or three.

[nerdknight01]

¡ HI ! ¡ WOW !, ¡ THAT´S A VOYAGE !, ¡ COOL !.
About Musa, the combination of part time monk/warrior and part time "socialising", is a real winning card for Venezuela. Well will see what it be doing Musa in that country, i hope the better. About Olga, maybe she will change their loyalties, you know, maybe she it be helping in the guerrilla movement, or she be working for a new boses, maybe the retirement money is less working for the russian goverment.
About Cardenas, don´t forget that guy is a GENIUS please read their wikedpedia article, i don´t be surprised if he suport some drug sindicate if that criminal band it be giving money for the guerrilla movement, and the other rival sindicates, well....
And finnally, about the vereran´s rally in San Diego, maybe will see one EPIC SCARY version of the battle of Seattle.
Peace and good luck.

[rast]

Every vision is a joke until the first man accomplishes it; once realized, it becomes commonplace.
(Robert H. Goddard)

Hermann Oberth’s letter of invitation had had considerably surprised Robert Hutchings Goddard; and the idea of going to Germany initially had appeared absurd to him.
But – unable to find a sponsor for his rocket experiments in the US – he finally had entered into full-scale correspondence with Oberth.
Nevertheless, it had taken the offer of a guest chair for experimental physics at the Berlin University of Technology to eventually convince Goddard to move to Germany.
On Wednesday, August 3rd, 1932, Robert H. Goddard and his wife Esther arrived at Bremerhaven.

The Verein für Raumschiffahrt (association for space flight) had sent Hermann Oberth and Rudolf Nebel to welcome the Goddards – and accompany them to Berlin.
Contrary to the apprehensions of the German rocket enthusiasts, Colonel Erhard Milch of the Luftkriegsleitung (LKL) had not at all been opposed to inviting Goddard to Germany.
“I don’t care whether he’s American, Russian or Chinese, as long as he can contribute to rocket development. – The main thing is formulating the guiding principles and acquiring technical expertise. If his experiments are helpful in that respect, he’s welcome. – Any military application will be our turf anyway, not that of the Verein für Raumschiffahrt. We may hire some of you later on, but right now you should strive to get your stuff up into the air – just to demonstrate that your promises aren’t void.”

Taking the train from Bremerhaven to Berlin provided ample opportunity for conversation. Oberth and Nebel soon discovered that Goddard and his young wife were rather secretive about Goddard’s work, but very interested in learning more about life in Germany.
“You will live in a nice residence in Charlottenburg, close to the university. Charlottenburg is nice; it was a city of its own until 1920, when it was incorporated into Berlin. Wealthy Berlin citizens used to dislocate to Charlottenburg because of the better quality of life there. – But you also should prepare to travel often. We have been provided with a new proving ground near Wolgast on the Baltic. – It’s about three hours by train from Bahnhof Zoo, your next train station.”

“Is this a military proving ground?”
“It has been bought by the Luftwaffe, but right now, we’re the only users up there. – We used to have a test site at Kummersdorf proving ground south of Berlin. That was much closer, only one hour to travel, but has become too crowded for our experiments. – You know, things tend to fall back on the ground again eventually. So, we’re better off now at Peenemünde – that’s the exact spot of our experimentation site – where the stuff will fall into the water of the Baltic.”
“Doesn’t that cause a problem with examining the remains?”
“Not really, until now, we have been able to fish all items out of the shallow waters. – The Baltic is not very deep in this area. – And clashing on water doesn’t do so much damage to test pieces than clashing on solid ground.”

“We’ve seen the movie ‘Woman in the Moon’ in Worcester; the Clark University arranged some performances for professors and students. – When do you think will you be able to really bring a man or a woman into space?”
Oberth shrugged at that question.
“Difficult to say. Right now, we’re getting a lot of funding. But that used to be different in the past, and may be different in future again. – But if funding continues at the present scope, we might be able to launch a manned rocket by 1945.”

[altamiro]

Instead of von Braun going to USA we have Goddard going to Germany... sweet!

[Kelenas]

Now all that's missing is Germany hiring a Russian rocket scientist as well for the irony-o-meters to break down again...

- Kelenas

[altamiro]

Originally Posted by Kelenas

Now all that's missing is Germany hiring a Russian rocket scientist as well for the irony-o-meters to break down again...

- Kelenas

Unfortunately Tsiolkowsky is already dead and Korolyov&Co are too young.

[wietze]

Originally Posted by Kelenas

Now all that's missing is Germany hiring a Russian rocket scientist as well for the irony-o-meters to break down again...

- Kelenas

those are dangerous to use near this TL anyways

[altamiro]

Originally Posted by wietze

those are dangerous to use near this TL anyways

That's how the location of the last one still looks like:

[Kelenas]

I was speaking metaphorically anyway. You didn't really believe I'd actually keep one of them around while dealing with this TL, given what we've seen so far, did you?



- Kelenas

[wietze]

Originally Posted by altamiro

Unfortunately Tsiolkowsky is already dead and Korolyov&Co are too young.

Actually Korolev is 25 in 1932, combine this with the fact that he was of Ukrainian origin and he might well show up as a engineer in Wolgast.
Don't know the exact location of the heymshtot, but Korolevs birthplace might well be within atl Heymshtot's borders.

Another Russian space engineer of Ukrainian origin who is about that age is Valentin Glushko.
Glushko was already very early interested in rocket and spaceflight, so his interests might have him write a letter to Oberth (he did write to Tsiolkovsky in otl) which might earn him an invite.

[Peabody-Martini]

In OTL the first successful rocket planes first flew in the late thirties. Without the big push that WW2 provided to aviation and related development manned flight by 1945 is wildly optimistic. The V2 program reached the point that it did after nearly a decade of R&D and being a top priority for the German military. The issues with the guidance system were never worked out in the V2.

As designs grow more advanced the Luftwaffe and SKL are going to grow increasingly alarmed. The potential or rockets as weapons of war will become impossible to ignore. As the rockets grow more complex the possibility of developing an ICBM will become real. This should be enough to have the whole project labelled a military secret much like television and radar.

The saving grace is in the nature of the project its self. The failures in this sort of research are visible for hundreds of miles around, totally impossible to hide. So it will need a public face to obscure the extent of progress and possibly spread misinformation as well.

For Goddard, he is going to be squeezed between the U.S. Government demanding information by surreptitious means and the German military who will be very reluctant to trust a citizen from a hostile nation for that very reason. Not a very comfortable position to be in. No matter what happens he can never go home.

[nerdknight01]

¡ HI ! ¡ EPIC !.
If i remember correctly, some moons ago, i see a t.v. documental episode (¿space race?) in that episode Korolev at 25 years old it be launching succesfully primitive test rockets in Russian´s soil, in any way, i am dreaming with Korolev, Von Braun and Goddard in the same team, and about the posibilities, well....
The scary side of this, if somebody in the german army or some german university genious that it ocurs that it be incorporating to that rockets explosives, nukes, quimilcal, biological products, well....
In any way, about Goddard, maybe he don´t want to return home, or maybe "home" don´t exist anymore in the future.
Peace and good luck.

[wietze]

Originally Posted by Peabody-Martini

In OTL the first successful rocket planes first flew in the late thirties. Without the big push that WW2 provided to aviation and related development manned flight by 1945 is wildly optimistic.

The saving grace is in the nature of the project its self. The failures in this sort of research are visible for hundreds of miles around, totally impossible to hide. So it will need a public face to obscure the extent of progress and possibly spread misinformation as well.

For Goddard, he is going to be squeezed between the U.S. Government demanding information by surreptitious means and the German military who will be very reluctant to trust a citizen from a hostile nation for that very reason. Not a very comfortable position to be in. No matter what happens he can never go home.

Of course it is wildly optimistic, but what is new there, its the only way how Oberth can keep funding. You really think if he would say it will take 15-20 years that he would get enough funding?

I could imagine they fake a few more incidents, so the whole project looks in a worse state than it really is.

As for Goddard, maybe thats why they wanted him to be in Germany, not for his usefulness, after all although his ideas were good his designs were rather crude, but more for the denial of knowledge.
When he is in Germany, he is not available for the us. I could even imagine that he will be used for misinformation, putting him on a fake project and feeding him information that is meant to put the us on a wrong track.
But at this point i doubt if the us is even interested in Goddard, in otl he was mocked and ridiculed on a big scale, that is why he became so secretive.
So if he managed to get even less funding than in otl, the mockery will be even worse.

[Peabody-Martini]

I don't think that the German researchers will need to do too many fakes. In the early days of NASA half if not more of the rockets launched exploded on the pad or within the first few minutes of the flight. The resulting explosions were visible from as far away as North Carolina. As I said this project is impossible to hide.

Also if Goddard left the U.S. partially as a result of being mocked and ridiculed. If when this project bares fruit there could be some interesting consequences in the U.S. What happens in the universities could start to mirror Soviet Russia so far as academic freedom is concerned.

[wietze]

was more thinking at a stage when they are getting successful.

I have to agree there, right now they are not even interested, and the attitude when they learn of this will be 'let those idiots waste their money on that kind rubbish' for a while until the real impact becomes clear. Right now atl us is not a place of freedom, and with the increase in violence it only will get worse.
Maybe they will mirror the soviet practice of "scientific cities", so the scientists will be concentrated in a remote area, which is tightly controlled.
But i suspect funding might be a problem.

talking about rocketscience, what is happening with von Ohain at the moment?
is his development of jetpropulsion on schedule? i can imagine that due to the british civil war Whittle might be delayed (if he didn't die).

[rast]

He that has eyes to see and ears to hear may convince himself that no mortal can keep a secret. If his lips are silent, he chatters with his fingertips; betrayal oozes out of him at every pore.
(Sigmund Freud)

Having finally found out that two of his top executives received a second salary from EVEG, Ferik Kadir Muharip Pasha slowly began to see how the German trust had averted all his attempts of planting spies – hitherto.
It was alarming, nevertheless; normal procedure in such a case was to accept a spy – or two – and to feed them with whatever information one considered opportune.
By repelling his attempts, EVEG had literally challenged him to investigate who in his organisation worked for them…

But then he was summoned by Grand Vizier Enver Pasha.
“You should stop harassing EVEG, Ferik. They are not amused. – And if I had to make a choice between their support and your – undeniably – valuable contributions, the decision would not favour you. So, just leave it.”

Muharip felt frustrated and hurt in his professional pride. He was absolutely loyal to the Ottoman Empire, the Sublime Porte, the Sultan and the Grand Vizier. EVEG was a foreign power, after all. It was his duty to find out what they were doing in the lands of the Sultan.

Sultan Mehmed VII was beyond all suspicions, of course. Aged twenty now, he was brimming with testosterone and busy ‘exploring’ the ladies of his harem – if not forced to study by his teachers.
His influence on politics was zero; he was just another representative monarch kept as head of state – but without any real power. The selection of the Grand Vizier, nominally his prerogative, was done by the Emirs of Anatolia, Mesopotamia and Arabia – and endorsed by the parliament in Istanbul – well, at least Enver Pasha’s accession had been endorsed.

So, how had EVEG won over the Grand Vizier?
İsmael Enver Pasha had been appointed Grand Vizier in 1924, after the assassination of Tâlât Pasha. By virtue of his marriage to Princess Emine, he was a member of the royal family. Today, he counted fifty-one years and enjoyed splendid health; thus, he could look ahead to continue ruling the next two or three decades.
He had been the one of the original four Pashas, who had banked on going to war together with Germany – and had been vindicated in the last moment, when the Ottoman Empire already seemed to collapse. He had always avoided confrontation with Germany and had played the German card whenever possible.

EVEG was a German company, but not the German government, which was often at odds with EVEG – well, at least the socialists were. So why was Enver Pasha so anxious not to antagonise them?

When Muharip looked into the economic facts, the answer soon became obvious: EVEG had funded the war against China, which had been very expensive; thus, Ottoman debts opposite EVEG were enormous. The experts thought that it would take more than thirty years to repay the EVEG credits. And while the Sublime Porte was doing that, EVEG was lending out more funds – to keep the Ottoman modernisation programmes going, which otherwise would stagnate or even falter. Therefore, the empire would be EVEG’s debtor until 1975 at least, if not more oil wells were found and the worldwide consumption of oil increased.

But while EVEG was not depending on getting oil from Mesopotamia – they owned the oil wells of the Caucasus and Romania as well, the Ottoman Empire was totally dependent on EVEG funds. In theory, the fifty percent earned from oil revenues were more than sufficient to fund the modernisation programmes. But in reality, the money had been spent for the war effort, as had been the EVEG credits – and EVEG had tacitly given more credits to enable the Sublime Porte to keep their programmes running.

The dire fact was that without EVEG the Ottoman Empire was broke. And who pays the piper calls the tune. – Even worse, the Pan-Turan allies, who had no oil wells, were completely on EVEG’s drip-feed. No wonder that the Russians already called the empire Evegstan.
Slowly, it dawned to Muharip why EVEG had challenged him. It was their way of telling him for whom he really was working.

[altamiro]

Originally Posted by Peabody-Martini

Also if Goddard left the U.S. partially as a result of being mocked and ridiculed. If when this project bares fruit there could be some interesting consequences in the U.S. What happens in the universities could start to mirror Soviet Russia so far as academic freedom is concerned.

If I remember correctly, the OTL 1920s and 30s were NOT the best time for natural sciences in US universities. No reason why it should be better ITTL.

(Btw what was it that turned the tide and made the top US universities rise to the top of the scientific scale - immigrant scientists? Increased funding? War-related research?)

[Jotun]

Originally Posted by altamiro

Btw what was it that turned the tide and made the top US universities rise to the top of the scientific scale - immigrant scientists? Increased funding? War-related research?

My guess would be that it was a combination of all three, interdependently.
ITTL, the immigration of scientists is an absolute non-entity. Furthermore, there has already been a marked emigration of brainpower...I don't see, apart from a miracle, how the US can rise to a comparable postion in the sciences ITTL compared to OTL.

[altamiro]

Originally Posted by Jotun

My guess would be that it was a combination of all three, interdependently.
ITTL, the immigration of scientists is an absolute non-entity. Furthermore, there has already been a marked emigration of brainpower...I don't see, apart from a miracle, how the US can rise to a comparable postion in the sciences ITTL compared to OTL.

It certainly cannot. However, it can still be a scientific "great power" among several, if it plays it's cards right. Unfortunately for US universities, everything Rast describes here says US government doesn't.

[Kelenas]

Holy shit, the EVEG really needs to be taken down, and fast.

Although, in a way there might be a single good point to this, namely that the Ottoman Empire's current dependency on the EVEG via the export of oil will hopefully mean they'll start to diversify their economy greatly, so they'll have less problems in the long run.

- Kelenas