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  1. How bad does the American civil war need to get to force European intervention?

    Those same European nations were the source of what money and supply the CSA had in the first place. They'd have to be certifiable lunatics to attack those ships. Some of their warships were actually being built in English ports. An isolated incident might occur, a single vessel attacked...

  2. German carrier aircraft

    The growing pains of any new technology. Look how long it took the UK to put real carrier aircraft on their carriers. Tech issues won't stop a determined program. But this certainly might. You are correct, and this was an issue in keeping more than one innovation off the battlefield. The...

  3. Was Gorbachev a failure in hindsight?

    Lol. Ok, well - from the standpoint of accomplishing what he presumably meant to do, he was a failure.

  4. WI Merrymount had survived and become the dominate colony?

    And exactly how was such a "colony" supposed to survive? By winter they're all hung over, freezing and starving because no one set up farms, reliable shelter or any useful economy with which to obtain necessities. Those that don't go crawling back home die in the woods.

  5. Was Gorbachev a failure in hindsight?

    He was a failure; his country no longer existed when he was done with it. The question is: Could anyone have done better? He wasn't the man for the job, that much is clear.

  6. More effective German Blitz against Britain 1941-1944

    The Hawker Tempest, the P51D, one version of the Spitfire (specific engine) and the Mosquito were all used to some effect. I just looked up the Meteor - apparently they only scored 14 V1 kills during the war, but I assume that was because there were so few Meteors compared to, well, anything...

  7. Build a superpower standard navy

    Unlimited budget? I build the United States Navy. Worked for them. OK, I scrap the BBs sooner and invest even more in aircraft and cruise missile development, but otherwise the USN.

  8. AHC: Nazi Germany viewed more negatively than OTL

    OK, I'm going to ask: Why? Why would you want to trace this scenario out? Yes, if the Nazis started earlier or were even more violent or less concerned about image or used biological or chemical warfare, they'd be even more infamous than now and a larger number of people would suffer and die...

  9. Mankind learns to fly - what if?

    It would make for a good story, but it's unlikely at best. Opening a temple door is a long way from creating a viable engine. Even if they were millenia ahead of themselves and had the equivalent of 19th century steam engines (just try explaining that), those things are really heavy compared...

  10. Boston not the capital

    The commerce, the population, the money - most of it is in the east. Boston is by far the most probable location. If it's there, it's probably the capital. On the other hand, what if it isn't there? Suppose that when Howe withdrew from Boston in 1776, he just flattens the city -...

  11. Mankind learns to fly - what if?

    That's so. Still, silk could have been made available in the West at least during the 2nd century BC, when the Romans established trade routes with India. Earlier than that, maybe a substitute like a doped light canvas could get the attempts started? I don't know enough about balloons to say...

  12. Mankind learns to fly - what if?

    Massed assaults would make a better story, but I agree. Still, such small operations could be significant, and wouldn't require impossible leaps in tech. Leaps that did not actually occur, true, but not impossible.

  13. A leased fleet

    But that doesn't really answer the question, does it? Well, the biggest problem I see with a lease scenario is the time it would take pettifogging bureaucrats to negotiate it. Plus Vichy France would be forced to repudiate it immediately.

  14. A leased fleet

    It does seem more likely that various naval units would simply choose to fight on, sailing to British ports and essentially becoming the Free French Navy. How many units, and how significant, would I suppose depend on who made the decision.

  15. A Germania question:

    I've heard that too, but at the least it was love/hate. His vision clearly required Berlin at the center.

  16. WI: Extra Japanese Carrier (or two) at Midway

    I think Nimitz would have still gone in. If the Japanese are approaching that close to Hawaii, he can't ignore them. And better numbers (for Japan) aren't going to make a bad Japanese plan good. Something besides numbers has to change, I'm certain, for the result to be very different. Look...

  17. Mankind learns to fly - what if?

    As for balloons as sentries, massed armies are large enough to be seen at a distance, so there's that purpose. And ships approaching a port could be seen. It's not like these things would have to be thousands of feet up to be useful. And it seems to me that a practical glider would have been a...

  18. WI: Extra Japanese Carrier (or two) at Midway

    As for this, no. The odds were against them OTL and Nimitz still went for it. Something besides just numbers has to change to produce either a non-event or a very different event.

  19. WI: Extra Japanese Carrier (or two) at Midway

    So four carriers against six, instead of the original 3 against 4? If the IJN still follows the same schizophrenic, overly complicated and ill-defined plan, the results are likely to be similar. After all, the USN still knows they're coming.

  20. A Germania question:

    Assume he won the war or that he and his administration at least survive it. In that case, I doubt very much if his ego would permit him to agree to building anywhere else. After all, a Hitler decision had been made. Berlin had a mystical quality to him, or so it seems to me. Probably he...
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