Recent content by chrislondon

I feel a lot of the posts on this thread have been distorted by the the lies the Tories use to cover up what they did to Britain under Thatcher. Her years saw massive quantities of public wealth sold off for a fraction of its value to buy popularity. More still sold off privately for bribes...

Given a drift back to democratic socialism some might call that a brit wank.

Union-led Insurrection? I think the concept is flawed as the unions are actually the most conservative element of the British center left. The left wing of the Labour party's constituency membership, radical Liberals or Greens, or (OTL) regional parties are far more likely to endorse violence...

I would have thought the F104 too short legged for the RAAF, but the the MIII is not much better. They really need something more like the F4 I have just checked and fir comparable loads the m3 had almost double the range of the f104. The f4 fully loaded had less range than the m3 but if...

Canadian Resistance? Over the course of the 'troubles' in NI the UK maintained an average of 9k troops there. About half of these could be seen as controlling the Unionists so that leaves 4.5k for the Republicans. The Catholic population was about 400k throughout this period (growing) and...

Amoured v unamoured carriers Hello all. Can I first say that I have been browsing Alt.History.What-if and Soc.History.What-if and then this site since 96/97 even if this log-in is quite recent. The whole USWW2 carriers v BritWW2 carriers thing has blown up 3 or 4 times a year throughout...

Re below: I think there was a deliberate choice to limit the number of warheads to the maximum the older system could deliver. Even though the British and French systems were not mentioned directly in the arms reduction treaties those governments support them (If only on cost grounds). I believe...

I think the Saxon army was comprised of nobles and retainers summoned from all over the country and with horses for transport although they fought on foot as heavy infantry, and the militia (Fyrd?) summoned from the adjoining counties who fought as less well equipped spearman and archers. So the...

I admit Wikipedia is not always reliable but the links in the article look legitimate to me. 'The sweet potato was grown in Polynesia before western exploration. Sweet potato has been radiocarbon-dated in the Cook Islands to 1000 AD, and current thinking is that it was brought to central...

The Polynesian contact may not have had much effect on South America but bringing the Sweet Potato away had a big impact elsewhere.

Clegg 'clever'? I think the main problem for the Lib Dems is that they were perceived as supporting the Conservatives too much for too little. That is certainly why I switched away from them. It is possible they had been restraining the Tories more than is popularly believed, we will have...

I am not certain SeaGlads make sense for a MAC. The threat is surface raiders and submarines so all Stringbags for reccon and strike perhaps? I do not think the SeaGlad could catch a Condor and dedicated fighters for the seaplane spotters is overkill (particularly half the airwing?).

In Britain the armaments industry is BAE. When you have private near monopolies they get abused (See Lions, Donkeys and Dinosaurs by Lewis Page). When the original plans were being drawn up they were supposed to be flexible and future proofed by having the capacity to switch systems (CATBAR v...

I think a long enough period of minority rule via FPTP by the Conservatives could commit both Labour and Lib Dems to PR. From Labour members I know Thatcher was almost enough to get constituency parties behind it.. Under either system if you have the support of 50%+ you rule. The difference...