As much as the average US Soldier (especially those on the Eastern and Midland fronts) will be likely to serve (at least nearby) a negro, would there be a significant sprinkling of those of East Asian descent that far east or would any of them be far more likely to be on the Mexican Front? (and if so, does Pershing managing to get to the White House (I think), mean that he is likely to be less racist toward East Asians?)
Sequel de Mayo (Cinco de Mayo, Vol. II)
- Thread starter KingSweden24
- Start date
While De Valera eats popcorn from the other Senate seat, I presume.
I think KingSweden is doing that pretty intentionally, as that's pretty much how Europe stumbled into the IRL WWI.
However, given how much Belgium is at the center of it, instead of an assassination, we have a member of the Belgian Royal family perform something unspeakable on a member of the German Royal family...
I figure de Valera would have been great as a batshit corrupt Jersey City Mayor and protege of Frank "I am the law" Hague (seriously, look this guy up), but him being in Congress also works.
Right...
Vardman is so going to be assassinated. I really don't see how the Confederate government can function with him as president post war....
Also it would be kind if ironic for Tillman in the end to outlive him.
At the same time, someone who admires Robespierre and the French Terror, "the Revolution is a block"...
I think we're beginning to see the drawbacks of the French PM only being dependent on the backing of the executive. His base of support is in fact incredibly narrow when you look at it. The smartest thing to do would have actually been to draw the parties of the center and to a certain extent the right into a coalition with the National Bloc. In fact he and Briand actually practiced this when they were in power around the same time IOTL. The calculation was that through appeasement or "appaisment" they would be able to promote political stability by reaching a modus vivendi that reached across the political spectrum. Hence he and Briand were willing to court clericalist conservatives even if it meant annoying the left wing of the Radical Party.
Their big emphasis after the reforming ministries of Sarrien, Clemenceau, Waldeck Rousseau and Combes was in a sense to reinforce national unity; especially in the face of the German threat. That's part of the reason why you get stuff like the Three Year Law passed in 1913. ITL; perhaps the smart thing would have been to do something similar which while difficult is not impossible. You can draw support from the URS on the basis of even modest social and economic reforms while you can try to draw AF more firmly into alliance by waving the flag. Because he doesn't have to work under the constraints of parliamentary government; he's not able to formulate a strategy that will let him to actually extend the power that he has.
He's accustomed to seeing rivals on the Right and in the opposition and he doesn't really consider the implications of how he might be able to effectively leverage ad-hoc cooperation into a coherent policy because as the Emperor's chief minister his responsibility is to control rather than to actually work with Parliament (of course he would be better able to control Parliament if he was willing to work with the different groupings in a more systematic fashion). Hence he would be able to broaden his base of support more securely and use it to keep the conservatives in his own camp on a tight leash. It would be easier for him to keep his rivals on the right at bay.
Their big emphasis after the reforming ministries of Sarrien, Clemenceau, Waldeck Rousseau and Combes was in a sense to reinforce national unity; especially in the face of the German threat. That's part of the reason why you get stuff like the Three Year Law passed in 1913. ITL; perhaps the smart thing would have been to do something similar which while difficult is not impossible. You can draw support from the URS on the basis of even modest social and economic reforms while you can try to draw AF more firmly into alliance by waving the flag. Because he doesn't have to work under the constraints of parliamentary government; he's not able to formulate a strategy that will let him to actually extend the power that he has.
He's accustomed to seeing rivals on the Right and in the opposition and he doesn't really consider the implications of how he might be able to effectively leverage ad-hoc cooperation into a coherent policy because as the Emperor's chief minister his responsibility is to control rather than to actually work with Parliament (of course he would be better able to control Parliament if he was willing to work with the different groupings in a more systematic fashion). Hence he would be able to broaden his base of support more securely and use it to keep the conservatives in his own camp on a tight leash. It would be easier for him to keep his rivals on the right at bay.
Last edited:
I'm personally looking forward to Senator Eamon DeVelera being morally horrified by Joseph Kennedy up in Massachussets, but maybe seeing something of note in young Bobby.
The alliances and conflicts between the two great Irish Democratic leaders (and dynasties) is going to be fascinating to witness.
I
Anyway, TTL’s US is going to be so different I’m sure those considerations won’t matter in the same way.
I can’t imagine De Valera would find much of value in RFK’s secular and socially liberal politics (at least as they turned out OTL) to be honest. I can see him instead as a machine politician turned qualified New Dealer turned Scoop Jackson Democrat. I guess a lot would turn on his stance on civil rights, which I don’t know enough of…
Anyway, TTL’s US is going to be so different I’m sure those considerations won’t matter in the same way.
Bobby was also the most ardently Catholic of the Kennedy brothers, and though he was devotedly loyal to his Father, he was open to picking up mentors.
I could see Joe maneuvering Bobby onto Eamon's staff - it's the sort of thing he did OTL with McCarthy - and the two actually getting along fairly well. And Bobby picking up some of his boss' more priggish moralism isn't particularly out of character.
Hell, if you really wanted to dig into it; Bobby could end up marrying one of Eamon's daughters (Dev's not meeting Sinnead in this ATL, so the author is pretty open to who his future children end up being). Which would have some very interesting impacts upon Irish-American politics during the 20th century
One of the ideas I had was the Popolares being a dominant party in the Italian political system (sort of a proto-DC) but it’s hard to tell if Don Sturzo himself would have ever accepted the Premiership. Would be more interesting imo if he did, but that’s just me
Lot of ample ground for me to look at here. Michelsen is definitely an interesting comp
nope. Any reasonable observer probably figured some kind of GAW was inevitable as early as 1908 when Bliss-Blackburn failed, to say nothing of Hearst getting ready for war during the Kidnap Crisis, it was really just after that a question of scale
Absolutely. Not always for the better, either.
My instinct is to keep the same election schedule because with so much TL to manage it simply makes it easier for me to plan but we’ll see
Depends I guess to what extent somebody’s deployment, especially this deep into the war where the US Army is less dependent on National Guard formations, is analogous to from where they were recruited? Which TBF I don’t really know.
At least getting his start there, yeah
That’s basically exactly the problem. Germany’s Chancellor kinda has this issue too, though there the necessity of navigating legislation through the chaos of the Reichstag rather than having a rubber stamp at least creates those skills for the Chancellor, as does having to deal with the various Landtagen
Watch that space in particular, because this discussion of Dev’s role vis a vis the Kennedy’s gives me an important idea…
I mean he had 11 children that’s pretty damn Irish Catholic 😂
Dev as Bobby’s McCarthy analogue here is a good idea, as is Bobby marrying one of Dev’s fictional children (though maybe they’d be more of an age with one of Joe’s older boys). Lot to explore there…
Probably a mix of both. The idea that married men voted on behalf of the whole family and that was thus unfair to unmarried women had a lot of cachet at the time as such reforms rolled out.
Making Sense of the Senseless: The Great American War at 100
"...general consensus that John Lejeune was one of the Confederacy's more capable generals, though his contemporaries were of the mind that this was because the "Hero of the Occoquan" had more daring and grit, whereas modern scholarship reflects more on his fairly clear-eyed assessment of logistics, when to hold and when to counter, and his refusal to countenance war crimes committed by his men. For close to nine months he directed a tight, disciplined defense between the hills and rivers of north-central Virginia, of which Fredericksburg was its first line of defense and where he made his name; despite rapidly deteriorating conditions for the Confederate cause, his doggedness and talent kept the Eastern Front from turning into the kind of slow-grinding war of annihilation experienced in West Tennessee, northern and central Alabama, Georgia and parts of South Carolina during the last year of the war.
But John Lejeune had not been appointed to merely hold the Yankees at bay; he had been given his job over the spent and unimaginative force of Alexander Dade to drive the Yankee back across the Potomac. After the Warrenton Offensive, however, Lejeune quickly deduced that this was simply not going to happen. The chance for that had come at the Occoquan and narrowly been denied him, and though perhaps had a better result at the Bull Run River allowed a Confederate division or two to snake up towards Fort Arlington, it could have been different, that was not how it had gone. The Yankees had retrenched after the Occoquan, solidified their crossing points, and then made clever use of counterattacks and superior airpower with a level of coordination that was denied Lejeune as the Confederate Army Air Corps was indulged by Richmond in their refusal to be brought under his direct command.
What Lejeune did realize, however, was that the Yankees could be kept north of the Rappahannock, thanks in large part to excellent sight-lines from the hills around Fredericksburg, and upon Lenihan's attack there in late September and early October, Lejeune doled out a defeat that was similar to the early campaigns of the war in its disproportionality. Artillery and air attacks rained down on Yankees trying to get across the river, and the unique topography of Fredericksburg allowed the Confederates every advantage in the defense. It helped that Lejeune was not trying to attack very far back across the river himself, and so when his forces were able to clear Yankee trenches it forced Lenihan to pull back.
There would be no repeat of the heroics of the Occoquan, however. Lejeune's attempt at a quick counteroffensive towards Warrenton were stopped within days in mid-October, thanks as always to landships deployed in defense, longer-range artillery that could start bombarding Confederate positions well in advance of them being in range of Yankee trenches, and continued aerial cover from across the river in Maryland. Lejeune halted his forces and elected to regroup, figuring that there would be another offensive from Lenihan within weeks, and indeed in late November when the Yankees attacked again at Second Fredericksburg, they received a similar bloody nose.
Lejeune's success at Fredericksburg was well-timed; the powerful Virginia Senator Thomas Martin's newly-formed National Alliance for Victory was headed to the polls in early November, so a major victory in Martin's home state to recompense for less exciting news out of Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas and Texas was seen as a must. As such, Lejeune acquitted himself well. However, the battles of Fredericksburg in the end did little to alleviate the mounting logistic problems facing the Confederacy, especially as simultaneous to his fight at the Rappahannock, an American force under General Herman Hall had punched its way down the Shenandoah Valley, seizing Harrisonburg just as Lenihan's men were in retreat and by the end of the month besieging Staunton, which would fall shortly after the elections. The crucial harvest out of the Shenandoah was thus largely unavailable to Lejeune's tired, hungry men, and the fragility of Confederate defenses, to say nothing of their ability to mount the kind of counterattack that could actually dislodge the enemy, was laid bare once more..."
- Making Sense of the Senseless: The Great American War at 100
(Kept things kind of high-level here, and will likely continue to do so/accelerate that process, as I'm reaching the point where I'm tired of writing the GAW - its been nearly a year! - and want to wrap it up.)
But John Lejeune had not been appointed to merely hold the Yankees at bay; he had been given his job over the spent and unimaginative force of Alexander Dade to drive the Yankee back across the Potomac. After the Warrenton Offensive, however, Lejeune quickly deduced that this was simply not going to happen. The chance for that had come at the Occoquan and narrowly been denied him, and though perhaps had a better result at the Bull Run River allowed a Confederate division or two to snake up towards Fort Arlington, it could have been different, that was not how it had gone. The Yankees had retrenched after the Occoquan, solidified their crossing points, and then made clever use of counterattacks and superior airpower with a level of coordination that was denied Lejeune as the Confederate Army Air Corps was indulged by Richmond in their refusal to be brought under his direct command.
What Lejeune did realize, however, was that the Yankees could be kept north of the Rappahannock, thanks in large part to excellent sight-lines from the hills around Fredericksburg, and upon Lenihan's attack there in late September and early October, Lejeune doled out a defeat that was similar to the early campaigns of the war in its disproportionality. Artillery and air attacks rained down on Yankees trying to get across the river, and the unique topography of Fredericksburg allowed the Confederates every advantage in the defense. It helped that Lejeune was not trying to attack very far back across the river himself, and so when his forces were able to clear Yankee trenches it forced Lenihan to pull back.
There would be no repeat of the heroics of the Occoquan, however. Lejeune's attempt at a quick counteroffensive towards Warrenton were stopped within days in mid-October, thanks as always to landships deployed in defense, longer-range artillery that could start bombarding Confederate positions well in advance of them being in range of Yankee trenches, and continued aerial cover from across the river in Maryland. Lejeune halted his forces and elected to regroup, figuring that there would be another offensive from Lenihan within weeks, and indeed in late November when the Yankees attacked again at Second Fredericksburg, they received a similar bloody nose.
Lejeune's success at Fredericksburg was well-timed; the powerful Virginia Senator Thomas Martin's newly-formed National Alliance for Victory was headed to the polls in early November, so a major victory in Martin's home state to recompense for less exciting news out of Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas and Texas was seen as a must. As such, Lejeune acquitted himself well. However, the battles of Fredericksburg in the end did little to alleviate the mounting logistic problems facing the Confederacy, especially as simultaneous to his fight at the Rappahannock, an American force under General Herman Hall had punched its way down the Shenandoah Valley, seizing Harrisonburg just as Lenihan's men were in retreat and by the end of the month besieging Staunton, which would fall shortly after the elections. The crucial harvest out of the Shenandoah was thus largely unavailable to Lejeune's tired, hungry men, and the fragility of Confederate defenses, to say nothing of their ability to mount the kind of counterattack that could actually dislodge the enemy, was laid bare once more..."
- Making Sense of the Senseless: The Great American War at 100
(Kept things kind of high-level here, and will likely continue to do so/accelerate that process, as I'm reaching the point where I'm tired of writing the GAW - its been nearly a year! - and want to wrap it up.)
Good stuff, and yes, I can't imagine it is easy to write the hundredth different post of "the Yankees attacked, were repulsed badly/won a horrifyingly bloody victory that only gives them the right to attack yet another line of trenches further south."
To some extent yeah
That’s more or less the gist of it. It’s repetitive and tedious to write and, I’m sure, to read.
@KingSweden24 , don't worry man we understand! the chapter was impressive as always and can't wait to see the conclusion.
And i really hope this doesn't tarnish max's legacy too much
And i really hope this doesn't tarnish max's legacy too much
It will probably a 50/50 of him accepting the role of presidente del consiglio, numerically the PP will probably be the dominant but unless you change the electoral law it will always need other parties to govern like the DC
Thanks!
That’s the vibe I’ve gotten. His more centrist/center-left inclinations would make an interesting contrast to more Integralist Catholic parties/regimes elsewhere in Europe and LatAm, which is what I find so interesting about the man