Stupid Luck and Happenstance, Thread III

I just thought, what is the legal status of amphetamines? Are they still given to Luftwaffe pilots?

I kind of doubt it. The addictive side effects were well known and, from a purely military perspective, there were several major downsides to prolonged use that outweighed the benefits. The World War Two YouTube channel has an excellent two part series on Nazi use of amphetamines.
 
From the point of view of the neighbours, keeping China occupied is a double edged sword. They might be too occupied with fighting each other to mess with them, but they might not either. A warlord could very easily decide to expand his power base & gain a few more resources by trying to carve off some turf from a smaller neighbouring nation such as Mongolia or Tibet, gambling that can pull it off.

As for Jack Kennedy & his friends across the Irish Sea, not to mention their counterparts in Ireland, Jack is probably wishing that he had a longer spoon. Of course, both the British and the Irish (official & unofficial) almost certainly regard him as a relatively neutral party & conduit between the respective parties. Plus there are his ties with the Germans. He is trustworthy because everyone knows that he works with the others.
JFK has obviously had three years he didn't live to see OTL already but he still has the Addison's Disease and a busy stress filled lifestyle. I doubt that he is going to make old bones. Likely not to survive more than another five or six years unfortunately. TTL, he is probably going to be an instance of the trope of the busy, successful lawyer/businessman dropping dead at his desk.
 
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Actually Addison's Disease is very treatable with hydrocortisone or prednisone tablets and people can lead normal lives with the disease, it just makes having surgery more risky and the dosage should be increased for that.
 
Have the Rocking Vicars in Berlin at the same time as the Moondogs, (maybe opening for the Moondogs), then let loose upon the world a bass player influenced by the hard moondogs sound, Berlin gutter Jazz and Blues.
I've never heard of The Rocking Vicars so I had to look them up. But I have heard of the bass player. It would be interesting to see Lemmy open up for TTL's Fab Four.
 
You are missing a thread-mark between 1776 and 1777


It seems the race to the moon has been won and counterculture might soon get started.

Maybe in this timeline the space race won't end here and instead continue on to include moonbases and mars rockets in the future. With the shared financial burden it might actually work.

It remains to be seen if Sigi's parentage will survive the public scrutiny that is about to descend upon her.

What we see from the US appears to indicate lots of problems remaining in race relations etc and that they will either start to slowly reform and seek closer ties with the rest of the worlds powers or go all out in keeping things the way they are and staying separate. Both courses have the potential for bad things to happen as a result.

The lunar space ship having a Hanseatic naming theme, should result in all sorts of reaction around Europe. Not everyone will be 100% on board with the idea of the Hansa and what it implies. Especially the English might have feelings about that sort of thing.

On the other hand a 'we mean business' approach to space could get much better reactions than going for purely patriotic symbolism. Everyone can get around to the idea of space capitalism or heavy handed ruthless mercantilism if they are on the side that profits.

I also think it will be interesting to see how everyone celebrates their heroes. It is just human nature to want to see your own contribution as the most important one to a group project. The French might conclude that the Science bit is the most important thing since their guy was the 'scientist' and everyone else was just there to chauffeur the most important aspect of the mission around. Contributors who had no personnel on this mission like the English (who no doubt will have a man on board the next flight) will want to see the bigger picture of the whole program not just the single flight. Many will focus on the technology contribution made in their region or country. Vietnam will extract quite some pride from them being home of the space port and how many local work in the base and help make it possible. In Germany the idea that of course a woman in charge of a mission is not a bad thing, it was their woman after all, will find many adherents. Russia might look at the professionalism and dedication to duty of the lone cosmonaut who staid in orbit as an example of typical Russian virtues that they are all proud of.

It will only be a small push, but enough pushes to a population looking to find something to be proud of can profoundly change how people see themselves.
 
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Actually Addison's Disease is very treatable with hydrocortisone or prednisone tablets and people can lead normal lives with the disease, it just makes having surgery more risky and the dosage should be increased for that.
Indeed, but avoiding stress and a fairly abstemious lifestyle are recommended, neither of which are really true of him OTL or TTL. And, as we are well aware in 2020, it puts him in the position of having "an underlying health condition".
 
Indeed, but avoiding stress and a fairly abstemious lifestyle are recommended, neither of which are really true of him OTL or TTL. And, as we are well aware in 2020, it puts him in the position of having "an underlying health condition".
I'd argue he is under less stress TTL than OTL, but yes, it is still a ticking bomb health wise for him.

He might want to seriously look into retiring early, or being put on reduced work, being set up by his firm as handling only certain extremely VIP cases and the occasional other case if he feels like it (Civil Liberties and such). The firm won't want to kill the goose with the golden eggs after all.

By the way, question for PM, but with the words "Civil Liberties" and the topic of Kennedy's, I do have to ask, what is Robert up to TTL? Obviously a very different life, but I'm curious how different.
 
I'd argue he is under less stress TTL than OTL, but yes, it is still a ticking bomb health wise for him.

He might want to seriously look into retiring early, or being put on reduced work, being set up by his firm as handling only certain extremely VIP cases and the occasional other case if he feels like it (Civil Liberties and such). The firm won't want to kill the goose with the golden eggs after all.

By the way, question for PM, but with the words "Civil Liberties" and the topic of Kennedy's, I do have to ask, what is Robert up to TTL? Obviously a very different life, but I'm curious how different.
Joe senior died in 1967 OTL and will have been incapacitated by a stroke some years before that, so Joe Junior is effectively the family head. Robert is likely a TD and heading the political wing of the Kennedys. With no godless atheistic Communists for the last twenty years, I can't see him getting into counter espionage.
 
In my mind I had Robert Francis Kennedy becoming a Priest and ironically basically clearing out all the sexual abusers in the Catholic Church clergy that he can find.
 
In my mind I had Robert Francis Kennedy becoming a Priest and ironically basically clearing out all the sexual abusers in the Catholic Church clergy that he can find.
Robert was probably the closest the Kennedys ever came to being chaste but that just meant that he was faithful to his wife after his marriage. I can't really see him with a vow of celibacy, Knights of Malta is probably about as far as he is likely to head in that direction.
 
Joe senior died in 1967 OTL and will have been incapacitated by a stroke some years before that, so Joe Junior is effectively the family head. Robert is likely a TD and heading the political wing of the Kennedys. With no godless atheistic Communists for the last twenty years, I can't see him getting into counter espionage.
In my mind I had Robert Francis Kennedy becoming a Priest and ironically basically clearing out all the sexual abusers in the Catholic Church clergy that he can find.
Robert was probably the closest the Kennedys ever came to being chaste but that just meant that he was faithful to his wife after his marriage. I can't really see him with a vow of celibacy, Knights of Malta is probably about as far as he is likely to head in that direction.

So who takes over the "criminal enterprises" that Senior was known to have even in OTL. Joe jr or Ted?
 
So who takes over the "criminal enterprises" that Senior was known to have even in OTL. Joe jr or Ted?
TTL back in an Ireland with no land border there won't be a big lot of scope for that. Maybe a bit of money laundering, condom and dirty book smuggling, but mainly they will be legit. Irish distilleries probably won't have declined as much TTL with Collins as the leading figure post independence rather than Dev and a richer Central Europe, UK and France (no WW2 debt or trade disruption more than offsets no Marshall aid and no NI leaves the UK fiscally around 3% better off each year from 1955 to OTL as we are a net fiscal drain) plus an Eastern European and Russian market that didn't exist OTL). Kennedy money is likely to be in booze and possibly a chain of bookmakers. Maybe use old US connections to be the local distributor for Seagrams and to be a Coca Cola bottler.
 
TTL back in an Ireland with no land border there won't be a big lot of scope for that. Maybe a bit of money laundering, condom and dirty book smuggling, but mainly they will be legit. Irish distilleries probably won't have declined as much TTL with Collins as the leading figure post independence rather than Dev and a richer Central Europe, UK and France (no WW2 debt or trade disruption more than offsets no Marshall aid and no NI leaves the UK fiscally around 3% better off each year from 1955 to OTL as we are a net fiscal drain) plus an Eastern European and Russian market that didn't exist OTL). Kennedy money is likely to be in booze and possibly a chain of bookmakers. Maybe use old US connections to be the local distributor for Seagrams and to be a Coca Cola bottler.

Que?

I thought that JFK alone went to Ireland to escape his family problems (nevermind his own) whereas everyone else was still in the US...

EDIT: well, truth be told he went elsewhere to escape Kat, but was screwed over by FLeming and then found Kat again.
 
Que?

I thought that JFK alone went to Ireland to escape his family problems (nevermind his own) whereas everyone else was still in the US...

EDIT: well, truth be told he went elsewhere to escape Kat, but was screwed over by FLeming and then found Kat again.
You could be right, I thought that the whole family had moved to Ireland, all I can recall of the rest of them in the story is a meeting between Joe Jr and JFK.
But even if they are still in the US, I don't think that Irish American politics is going to be quite as big a thing with Ireland an all island Republic since 1919. No sense of unfinished business or continuing British oppression to rally the Irish American vote like OTL. Still a big Irish American community and Ireland still the Ould Sod, St Patrick's Day parades a big thing, but subtle differences to how Irish Americans see themselves and probably little interest in ongoing Irish politics though a lot of good will towards Ireland.
 
You could be right, I thought that the whole family had moved to Ireland, all I can recall of the rest of them in the story is a meeting between Joe Jr and JFK.

I'll be honest when I say I don't remember properly either. I just know that Joe sr is shady enough to have a darker side he can somehwat control.
 
Joe Sr. was along with Prescott Bush, Winston Churchill, and King Edward VIII were some of the people who was found out to be supplying the Spanish Flangests ITTL Spanish Civil War.
Joe Sr. In one step ahead of the American government high tailed it out to Ireland with his family except for Jack who was at Harvard at the time, after graduation Jack gets recruited by the ONI and in his first mission tries something stupid in an attempt to grab Kat as gets hamstrung by her.
In the years since he and Kat have done business in some form or another throughout the years.
 
Of course! It all comes back to me now. I wonder if Kick got to be Duchess of Devonshire in this TL? Or were the Kennedys too tarnished for Billy Hartington to marry into?
 
Of course! It all comes back to me now. I wonder if Kick got to be Duchess of Devonshire in this TL? Or were the Kennedys too tarnished for Billy Hartington to marry into?
It would be ironic if Kick is still alive along with Billy Harrington and are still married to each other, after all Joe Sr. was probably had the most liquid assets wealth in the world ITTL as he was IOT L and as we all know cash washes away a multitude of sins.
 
It would be ironic if Kick is still alive along with Billy Harrington and are still married to each other, after all Joe Sr. was probably had the most liquid assets wealth in the world ITTL as he was IOT L and as we all know cash washes away a multitude of sins.
Well Billy Hartington won't have been killed in 1944 by the Germans TTL and will have been the Dook since his father died in 1950. And by all accounts he was a much more stable sensible character than Lord Fitzwilliam who was something of a playboy and adrenaline junkie. So not likely to have crashed a plane or a speedboat.
 
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