At this point I do believe your personnal bias against the EU is seriously getting in the way. If anything such close cooperation would spur the idea of an european integration. Because it will be needed against the USSR and not only military but economicaly. Everything you say isn't an obstacle for the formation of a potential EU. No matter what you say Britain can't go at it alone, the european colonial empires will one day get their independence. If the european don't stick together they will become irelevent much faster then otl.
A Blunted Sickle
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Personally, I am pro EU but agree with pdf27 on this. The UK in OTL was fiercely resistant to joining the EU because it forsaked the 'special relationship' it had with the dominions. IIRC, it only really joined when it lost that to the US.
In TTL, the special relationships are preserved.
I have to disagree with that. Without a Japanese invasion you need a long serie of bad choices if you want to see the Dutch to completely leave the DEI. Possible? Yes. Likely? Nope.
I see two main roads for the DEI to embark on in this TL:
- Political reforms to enable the Kingdom to tap the colony's resources and manpower. In the end Indonesia will probably get a weak federal government closely connected militarily, economically and possibly politically. Naturally everything is possible after that but I doubt that the Dutch will be gone before 1960.
- Continued suppression of nationalist groups out of fear for loosing the colony. Without Japanese aggression it will probably stay reasonably quiet for the duration of the war. This will certainly change when India becomes independent. This will certainly be a catalyst to nationalism in the whole of South-East Asia. After that event there will be a rise in nationalist sentiment which could turn violent pretty fast. At a certain point the Dutch government has to give in thought it could take a couple of years of guerilla warfare. However, if this happens than you will not recognize Indonesia. With a far less clearly defined Indonesian nationalist feeling and the Dutch not having to reconquer the archipelago but start from a position of control, the geography of the colony will enable the Dutch to play divide and conquer. The Dutch will stay in direct or indirect control of significant parts of the DEI such as West Papua, the Moluccans and other parts. You could very well see a independent Aceh and maybe even a Philipine Sabah! In this scenario Dutch presence is ensured for even longer.
I do think the first scenario is much more likely. Let's face it, the Dutch government in The Hague needs (or at least thinks it needs) more ground troops. They can and will expand the army using European manpower but I can't believe they will not try to gain acces to all those millions of Indonesians.
I don't think so the various dominions were already leaving Britain "sphere" by WWI.
Really? Since I'd say that I have a personal bias in favour of the EU (at least nowadays), that's rather hard to justify. There are many things in this timeline I really, really don't like (starting the holocaust a year early, or keeping the US out of world politics) but I haven't heard myself being accused of anti-semitic or anti-US bias here - so why the accusations of anti-EU bias?
The problem here is that there are three economies in the potential "EU" that really count - Britain, France and Germany. The way things are going, the German economy will be under the control of the French and British before long, so in political terms can be ignored. So the founding members are going to be both big on imperialism and world empires. That means whatever postwar settlement happens in Europe must account for those - and the present EU is emphatically an organisation of countries in Europe with concessions to a few tiny overseas territories. To include what at the time are enormous empires makes it fundamentally very different - particularly since parts of them will be self-governing.
You're also making the assumption that the people making the decision will have future knowledge in setting up the EU the way it has been in OTL. Good luck trying to convince Winston Churchill in the TTL equivalent of 1945, having just won the largest war in history and with enormously powerful forces that he should jettison the entire British Empire (something he has dedicated his entire career to preserving) in favour of an economic alliance with the Belgians. Even if Attlee wins the election instead, he's going to make the same choice. It wasn't until 1961 when the empire was either gone or on the verge of going that the British started trying to join what is now the EU. Here, the French will most likely follow the British route and delay as well, leaving you with just the Benelux for a long time.
Hmmm... I haven't actually written anything about the DEI yet, but I probably should (and yes, it was sloppy shorthand on my part to call it Indonesia). What I had in mind was that they'd most likely follow what the British empire did when shown to be very weak with the fall of Singapore (translated over to the fall of most of the Netherlands), coupled with the fact that there would be very little to spare to send out to the DEI to keep control. Throw in Indian independence, and you end up with a very similar situation to India - the Dutch can't afford the hard power to keep control, and don't have the soft power left. Have you got any sources on what sort of reforms they were planning in OTL? That might give me something to work on.
Only in so far as they started to think of themselves as "Australians" or "Canadians" rather than as out-and-out "British". The only exception is South Africa, and that's down to the Boers who never really reconciled themselves to losing the war. Canada had started an inevitable drift towards the US orbit (having the world's largest economy next door will do that to you), but was still very closely tied economically and financially to the UK. Australia and New Zealand certainly had not done so however, and didn't even think about it until the fall of Singapore forced them to - prior to that their economies and military forces were completely structured around the UK. Both were utterly reliant on the UK for protection and the manufacture of complex goods.
15th March 1941
The Admiral Scheer sinks eight coasters off the coast of Gujarat. Only the last of these has a radio and gets off a distress call, at which point the Scheer heads south-west to hide in the Indian ocean once more.
17th March 1941
An additional two Corps commands are formed to absorb the additional units which have arrived in France over the winter and to keep the span of command within manageable limits for the Corps commanders.
BEF – General Brooke
1st Army – General Wavell
2nd Army – General Alexander
I Corps – Lt General Cunningham.
II Corps – Lt General Franklyn
III Corps – Lt General Osbourne
IV Corps – Lt General Ritchie
V Corps - Lt General Heath
VI Corps – Lt General McNaughton
At the same time General Auchinleck is sent from Norway to India as the new General Officer Commanding, with the task of overseeing the planned massive expansion. General Wilson is transferred from 2nd Army to replace him, with Lt General Alexander being promoted to head 2nd Army in his stead.
18th March 1941
The interim report of the M.A.U.D. committee is released. This describes the importance of fast fission for bomb design, and includes Peierls’ calculations for Critical Mass of pure Uranium-235 (18 lbs for a bare sphere, 9-10lbs when surrounded by a reflector).
Copies of this report are sent to the French and Americans. The French reaction is somewhat muted in that they accept that such a weapon would be extremely powerful and indeed potentially war-winning, but have some doubts as to whether it can in fact be built. Given the immediate German threat they are facing, they are unwilling to devote the levels of time and effort that will clearly be required to bring it to fruition as they believe that to do so would risk losing the war in the meantime. In contrast, Lyman Briggs (the Director of the US Uranium Committee) locks up the report on arrival without showing it to anybody.
21st March 1941
The TsKB-57 ground attack aircraft passes state acceptance trials in the Soviet Union and is ordered into production.
24th March 1941
The Admiralty place a contract with MacTaggart Scott & Co for a trial slotted steam catapult, to be installed aboard the paravane ranging vessel HMS Laird's Isle (previously used in the first world war as the seaplane tender HMS Riviera).
The Admiral Scheer sinks eight coasters off the coast of Gujarat. Only the last of these has a radio and gets off a distress call, at which point the Scheer heads south-west to hide in the Indian ocean once more.
17th March 1941
An additional two Corps commands are formed to absorb the additional units which have arrived in France over the winter and to keep the span of command within manageable limits for the Corps commanders.
BEF – General Brooke
1st Army – General Wavell
2nd Army – General Alexander
I Corps – Lt General Cunningham.
II Corps – Lt General Franklyn
III Corps – Lt General Osbourne
IV Corps – Lt General Ritchie
V Corps - Lt General Heath
VI Corps – Lt General McNaughton
At the same time General Auchinleck is sent from Norway to India as the new General Officer Commanding, with the task of overseeing the planned massive expansion. General Wilson is transferred from 2nd Army to replace him, with Lt General Alexander being promoted to head 2nd Army in his stead.
18th March 1941
The interim report of the M.A.U.D. committee is released. This describes the importance of fast fission for bomb design, and includes Peierls’ calculations for Critical Mass of pure Uranium-235 (18 lbs for a bare sphere, 9-10lbs when surrounded by a reflector).
Copies of this report are sent to the French and Americans. The French reaction is somewhat muted in that they accept that such a weapon would be extremely powerful and indeed potentially war-winning, but have some doubts as to whether it can in fact be built. Given the immediate German threat they are facing, they are unwilling to devote the levels of time and effort that will clearly be required to bring it to fruition as they believe that to do so would risk losing the war in the meantime. In contrast, Lyman Briggs (the Director of the US Uranium Committee) locks up the report on arrival without showing it to anybody.
21st March 1941
The TsKB-57 ground attack aircraft passes state acceptance trials in the Soviet Union and is ordered into production.
24th March 1941
The Admiralty place a contract with MacTaggart Scott & Co for a trial slotted steam catapult, to be installed aboard the paravane ranging vessel HMS Laird's Isle (previously used in the first world war as the seaplane tender HMS Riviera).
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Check out who's in charge of V and VI Corps
More seriously, the big change here is in the MAUD committee report - so far, it's almost exactly as OTL, but the different political situation will change the way it's acted upon.
Apologies for the lack of an update for the last week - I've been visiting relatives in Germany followed by a few days in the Black Forest, and the laptop we took with us would mangle the formatting in the word document so I elected not to write anything while I was away. Hopefully things will speed up soon - the weather ITTL is improving so I'll actually have something to write about, and I've got a month off over Christmas.
Asian Jumbo
Monthly Donor
Nit pick
Sorry to nitpick in such a great timeline but I think you mean the Admiral Scheer not anything named after Albert Speer... (long term lurker submerges again to avidly read every update..)
Sorry to nitpick in such a great timeline
but I think you mean the Admiral Scheer not anything named after Albert Speer... (long term lurker submerges again to avidly read every update..)The key point that we disagree on is that Churchill doesn't have to choose. The situation isn't anything like OTL. He can have both European economic integration and preserve and maintain the Empire as best he can.
The French are in the same position, as are the Dutch with the NEI, and even the Belgians with Congo. They all have the same kinds of concerns, and know they need to work together to address them. Working together in close military and economic alliance makes it easier for them all to preserve their empires, as it means insurgents can't jump across borders as easily, and they can share intelligence and mutually support each other.
The organisation that comes out at the end probably won't resemble the OTL EU that much, and to my mind is likely to include the war time allies of Australia, New Zealand, Britain, Norway, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, plus occupied Germany. Canada will probably be invited, and probably won't join, due to their trade with the US.
Sweden-Finland may or may not join later, and what happens in Czechoslovakia depends on the way the war ends.
Sorry to nitpick in such a great timeline
Seconded! Scheer, not Speer!
Saphroneth
Banned
Seconded! Scheer, not Speer!
The Admiral Speer would be a very cheap ship with no frills and nothing unnecessary.
Actually, it would probably just be a U-boat.
<jedi mind trick>There was never a ship named the Admiral Speer</jedi mind trick>Sorry to nitpick in such a great timeline
Thanks, fixed!
I think it's more a matter of terminology - calling it the EU carries all sorts of implications from Euro-centricity to the way it is governed to being an economic alliance with no military content. All of those aren't sustainable ITTL - the remnants of Empire just have too strong a pull, and whatever it is will be growing out of a wartime military alliance rather than postwar coal allocations.
It's fairly clear that the British and French are already thinking in terms of a very much stronger postwar alliance between their two countries - the French in particular have had a bad scare and are well aware that they only survived thanks to the British, while the British are looking at the size of the Wehrmacht and know they couldn't hope to beat it by themselves. Whoever else joins (Norway is almost certain to, while the Benelux countries I'm less sure about - they may follow the Benelux route and opt for some sort of mutual defence pact with the Entente), they're going to have to fit in with an agenda set by London and Paris because they're simply too weak to set it themselves, even when clubbing together as a bloc (one of the potential drivers for Benelux ITTL, incidentally). Who else joins depends very much on how the war ends, and where the Soviets end up.
But what event will show the weakness in this TL? Without a Pacific War the KNIL and the RNN stand undefeated.
As said Indian independence will give nationalist sentiment a boost on the short and long term. Do realize that OTL the Dutch fought for 5 years after been occupied for five years and having to start from scratch. West Papua stayed Dutch until 1961 even. The conditions ATL are vastly more in favour of the Dutch colonial government.
I know that there were some talks in the beginning of 1942. They might give some pointers though they were pretty inconsequential.
The problem is that the occupation of the Netherlands made the colonial government totally opposed to any concessions out of fear for loosing control. They were also acting pretty independently from the government-in-exile which lacked constitutional legitimacy. ATL the Dutch government is in full control and capable of giving orders. This may also have consequences for the fight against the Admiral Scheer as this colonial government will not try to be neutral in the war so Dutch ships and planes are fully involved in the chase. Anyway, all this makes that there are precious few sources on possible reform plans. A lot would have to be extrapolated.
That's fair enough. One thing to note on this, as it's a mistake I've seen made before, is that the EU is a military alliance. The WEU existed from 1954-2011, when it was subsumed into the EU. Part of being in the EU is signing up to the mutual defence clause, which obliges members to use all means (implicitly including WMD), to protect other members from attack.
I agree it will be different, but, in some terms it will also already be deeper because of the wartime experience. The Franco-British plan was for complete economic integration during wartime, to essentially operate as a single economy. This will, I think, be extended to the part-occupied minor allies simply be necessity.
When Germany is defeated, it will then be very hard to break apart the now integrated economy - and there will be a very good reason not to. German's erstwhile ally and later enemy, the USSR, will be sitting there to the east, occupying Poland and who knows what else.
Unlike iOTL, where it had been an ally for several years, and there was a lot of wishful thinking that it would remain so, here it's never been more than a co-belligerent opportunist that stabbed its own ally in the back for a share of the spoils of a victory it did nothing to earn. It's also going to be a lot more obviously powerful.
As a result, I think the wartime economic integration will be continued, simply to allow them to stand up to the colossus that bestrides Eastern Europe.
As a result, you'd be starting from a position of free movement of goods, capital, services, and labour within the Western Allies. That's the baseline, which I think will continue.
The question of free movement of colonial labour (no one will care about it being extended to the white dominions) will be more challenging, but I think in no way insurmountable. Just about all the participants already have colonies, so already regulate (or don't) the movement of non-Europeans they considered undesirable.
This is before the era of mass migration, so it won't be recognised for the political problem it will later become, as it isn't a concern for another decade. Later on, when it does, free movement of labour simply wouldn't be extended beyond Europeans. Racist, but not exactly hard.
There is another potential factor here. As economic integration will continue, then post-war labour shortages in the UK will probably be met by importing European workers, rather than commonwealth ones. They're just that much closer.
Less the size of the Wehrmact, and more the size of the Red Army, I think.
After what Belgium got up to inter-war, I don't see the French accepting this. They're going to want something much more binding that they can't back out of so easily.
They will also be in need of Entente support to help rebuild their economies (and feed their population) after the devastation of war and occupation.
Well, one for you to know and us to find out, I suppose.
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I think some form of Pacific war is inevitable, the only question being who does the fighting and where. Relations between the US and Japan can only get worse, and ultimately that puts them in a use it or lose it situation. The deal they've done with the Dutch for oil ITTL is only a sticking plaster that will buy a few months at worst - but the timing of the OTL campaigns was in any case largely decided by the Monsoons.
It's one of those areas where my understanding of the history is rather weaker than I'd like (probably at least in part because a lot of it will be written about in languages other than English). I'd certainly agree that it was the Japanese invasion which destroyed any chance the Dutch had of retaining control, but given that I don't see any of the empires lasting very much longer than they did in OTL. Decolonisation will almost certainly be much slower and less traumatic, and post-colonial relations with the former powers broadly better, but it's hard to see the colonial powers hanging on to anything but the odd island chain that isn't really viable without big subsidies from outside.
So in summary:
- In OTL everything was frozen by the occupation of the Netherlands, and the whole setup was swept away by the Japanese invasion never really to be reimposed.
- "Indonesian" nationalism was at least in part a creation of the Japanese occupation - without it you're going to see different groups pulling in different directions.
- Nobody really has a clue what the Dutch government would have done.
Are there any prewar reforms that might give an indication for their thinking? I'm working on the assumption that the overriding war plan is to sit behind the Water Line conserving their manpower until the German army is beaten and starts to withdraw, at which point they're likely to start pushing forwards. The same reasons that made it impossible for the Germans to finish the invasion will however make it very hard for the Dutch to move forward against a determined German defence, so they're unlikely to be planning on recruiting large numbers of soldiers from overseas for service in the Netherlands - there isn't really a task for them.
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I'm not convinced by this. The Japanese were massively encouraged by the war in Europe. That encouraged them to do things they wouldn't have otherwise have done, like extort Vichy France over Indochina and become a member of the Tripartite Pact (the Axis). This in turn triggered an escalating series of US sanctions and further Japanese provocations.
Essentially, by France not falling, you've significantly slowed everything down, if not entirely derailed them. Specifically, there should be no scrap iron embargo on Japan, and the Panama Canal will still be open to them. That's the massive change from iOTL. The oil is relatively minor next to that.
Events have been delayed at least a year as a result. If not more. By the time the Japanese come to the conclusion that they have no choice but war, it may well be too late for them to start one.
I can see more Hong Kongs, specifically, Singapore and Aden. Malayan decolonisation may also take a long time, and the British control of the Gulf Emirates could continue indefinitely. Populations were very low at this point.
One of the things that I'm not clear about is how much the scrap iron embargo was due to their invasion of Indochina and how much due to the influence of the China Lobby, their actions in Manchuria and membership of the Axis. Here, they're in the Axis albeit one that is much less militarily-focussed than in OTL (and cosying up to the Soviets, who are in it instead of the Italians - probably upsetting the US more than in OTL!), and still behaving awfully in China. Given FDR's reduced freedom of manouver, a scrap iron embargo (being one of the things he could do without major resistance) actually starts to look quite plausible.
Well, start one with any prospect of success at least. Rational, cold-blooded decison making does not seem to be an area where they excelled, and there was an unfortunate tendency for anybody making decisions that involved climb-downs or withdrawals to be assassinated.
Singapore seems very likely to follow Hong Kong unless by some miracle the Japanese still pull off capturing it. Aden, I'm less sure about - the British pretty much had to fight their way out in OTL, so holding on to it would be chancy. The Gulf Emirates are again almost certain - the relationship is still very close nowadays, and would be far closer ITTL.
No NDRC due to the lack of France falling. He's deeply embedded in the military-industrial complex though.
Lyman Briggs's actions are exactly in OTL. In OTL Marcus Oliphant flew across the Atlantic and started banging tables until someone listened to him and looked at the report. Here, the British aren't being quite so open about everything with the US (see the TTL Tizard mission) - so Oliphant's behaviour will be different.
Their invasion of Indochina was a large part of it, and membership of the Axis made it easier to sell.
I can't see them joining the Axis. It only happened because of the Fall of France iOTL. We know from Japanese records that this was a key reason for them signing up to it. Without that, what's the reason to sign up with the Germans? They aren't winning, and they don't control the French government. As a result, the Japanese get nothing out of joining. They weren't totally irrational. They get a good price for it iOLTL that's missing here. The Germans have nothing to offer them.
They are also unlikely to have joined an alliance with the Soviets in it. The wounds of Khalkhin Gol still ran deep.
We've discussed this before - the Embargo Act itself probably wouldn't get passed without the Fall of France, and Roosevelt would be stuck with a moral embargo with no legal force.
The Japanese needed to do a lot before the US could pass a scrap iron embargo iOTL. Here, they're three or four steps of escalation before that point. The American and Japanese policies weren't one sided, the escalation was tit-for-tat.
They were, but things got worse over time, and one of the key things that radicalised them was seeing France defeated so quickly and easily. It validated their prejudices about the moral weakness of their enemies, and it gave them an opportunity they were incapable of resisting.
The situation that lead to the Aden Emergency are very unlikely to be repeated. Nasser style Pan-Arabism is going to get strangled in its cradle, and Britain will probably hold the canal zone. The ideological and financial backers for the Yemenis just won't be there.
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