Search results

In OTL, the Union declared a blockade of the Confederacy in April 1861, in an attempt to starve the South of military resources and hasten its defeat. Now, what I wonder is what would happen if - instead of declaring a blockade (which is, legally speaking, a weapon of war against a different...

Total, no-tricks non-interference, by either the governments or by private citizens. Non-interference here means no selling of weapons, ships, powder or generally anything whatsoever that might be counted as blockade contraband... to either power. That is, that a law ("Neutrality Act...

Battle of Midway. The Tone's #4 plane was launched late, and hence spotted TF 17 well into the battle. But - the only reason the Tone's #4 plane was in position to spot TF 17 at all was that it took a shorter route to make up for the lateness. If it had been launched on time, it may not have...

The requirement here is... A major war fought for the express purpose of liberating slaves/serfs in a Great Power or Secondary Power, by a power or coalition of powers that do not hold slaves/keep serfs. Bonus points if the target of this war is the still-slaveholding US. No, the American...

In Clarksonian vein, this is a look at what ships can be honestly said to be the most powerful ships in the world at a given time. Three examples. HMS Devastation was the most powerful ship in the world when launched, and for the next dozen years at least. HMS Dreadnought was the most...

I'm wondering about how defences were set up, specifically harbour defences, in the pre-gunpowder era. Total War games tell me that there'd be arrow towers and catapult towers, but is that the case? Would there be other kinds of active and passive defence as well? (This is against a direct...

The KMS Bismarck, of course. The idea here is that, for whatever reason/reasons, the captain assigned to the Bismarck is more disaffected with the regime than OTL. (He seems to have been at least associated with people critical of the regime.) As such, he defects with his entire ship (and...

In 1933 or so, Hitler decides to ditch the OTL plans for the Kriegsmarine and just build carriers. Big carriers, small carriers, submarine carriers (though still regular submarines and regular light forces CL and down). Carriers will be the future, he decides, and anyone who doesn't get with the...

What if the French Army had adopted the spade a few years before WW1? Would the ability to dig in more easily have changed the battles of 1914? (I find this one fascinating because it sounds like such a little thing.)

Hedy Lamarr came up with the idea of the frequency-hopping radio during WW2 - which would permit a radio operator-guided torpedo - but they weren't adopted. What if they were, and indeed if they were invented a couple of years early? I assume it would massively amplify the realization of the...

Okay, so I'm not actually American. But I've recently read this: http://www.thenation.com/article/197425/why-dont-americans-know-what-really-happened-vietnam And it kind of astonishes me how nasty the Vietnam war really was, and also the extent to which the nature of the antiwar...

This is a bit of a crazy idea, perhaps, so bear with - and it might be in the wrong place. I ran into a "we should have one of these" - a beginner's guide to logistics. Here's my kickoff - feel free to contribute and/or critique. Logistics is kind of a boring subject, at first glance. If...

OTL the Bismarck took the Denmark Strait route to break out. This was considered the less likely route by the RN - possibly why the PoW and Hood were there. What would have happened if the Bismarck had selected the Faroes-Iceland Gap instead? (I believe there were rather more ships there.)...

On a number of occasions in the cold war, the US intervened "early" - that is, before the nation in question had aligned itself with the Eastern Bloc. (One example is Cuba.) Would it be possible to have a US which doesn't do this during the cold war - limiting interventions to cases where the...

One of the lesser known tales of WW2 is that of the plucky USS Robin, a CV which accompanied Saratoga after the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands reduced the USN's carrier inventory to one - the Saratoga. That's because the Robin was actually HMS Victorious...

What would be the longer-term knock-on effects if the western beaches at Normandy (the area of OTL Omaha and Utah, as well as Gold) were the ones the Commonwealth forces landed on, while the OTL Juno and Sword were where the US forces landed? What effect would it have on the perception of...

How can you realistically get Imperial Japan to win WW2? Yes, this DOES include their being in the Allies. In that case, I'm interested 1) in how they get there, and 2) what they do. (Preference for ideas which have them participating as much as possible.)

Looking at the original idea of where the Native American Indian reservations were in North America, it's actually huge - the Appalachians to the Mississippi. But then it got chopped up and moved elsewhere, again and again, until now there's only a small number of small reservations...

Is the HEAT effect suitable for naval small guns (or big guns)? If so, and the effect was discovered earlier (in the early 30s, say, or late 20s), what effect would it have on naval warfare?

How feasible would it be for the WNT to allow one capital ship under construction at a time as a replacement for older battleships already present? (Like the London Treaty and Anglo-German Naval Treaty did.) That might prevent the nations with battleship focus from losing a lot of their...