a Valkyrie Rises Over Europe, a Alternate Story of the Cold War

Calculus Humour · Feb 19, 2015

Is the USA/britain propping up the nations on the Arabian peninsula? Not sure if the USA would, depending on how seriously they take rapprochement with the UAR and their own interests in the region. I imagine the British would be significantly more opposed, the UAR could significantly threaten their remaining interests in the area.

Drunken_Soviet · Feb 19, 2015

I wonder, how is the Space Race doing?

Kaiser K · Feb 19, 2015

Re: A Magyar's Dream and the matter of Romanian Oil

BeardedHoplite said:
Until the Hungarians get their land back!

(Unlikely given their oil I know but a Magyar can dream)

Very unlikely, I mean there is always a chance that an opportunity for the Hungarian's to reclaim Southern Transylvania could open up down the line - probably once the Germans are too distracted by something else to intervene or are otherwise incapacitated, but for now, it is unlikely that Hungary will have a chance of getting that land back; considering Romania and it's oil's vital strategic importance to the Reich (due to the unreliability of oil transports from Baku and Grozny; which can be sabotaged by partisans easily).

bolhabela said:
OTL Romania was an oil exporter and ally of Germany but the Vienna award still hapened. Germany had never forgoten Romanias betrayer in the great war or its behavior after it. So yes a Magyar ca dream and this dream can become reality ( in this story at least )

Romania is too important to Germany's position strategically right now for Speer to consider not siding with the Romanians in their quarrels with Budapest, but as I said above, an opportunity may come about for Hungary down the line to reclaim Southern Transylvania; but such a time (if it occurs) is a long way from occurring anyway.

Re: Desert Conundrum

Calculus Humour said:
Is the USA/britain propping up the nations on the Arabian peninsula? Not sure if the USA would, depending on how seriously they take rapprochement with the UAR and their own interests in the region. I imagine the British would be significantly more opposed, the UAR could significantly threaten their remaining interests in the area.

Britain certainly is, as London possesses close links with the nations on the peninsula and on the Persian Gulf (including the Saudi's, Persia, Yemen and Oman), and seriously opposes any UAR expansion southwards; as the British government very openly despises the Arab regime, and sees the UAR as a grave threat to not only it's own security within the region and the world's security as a whole; due to the matter of oil.

The US's stance on the Middle East is more complicated, as while Washington would prefer the UAR's expansionist tendencies to be halted and the borders of the Arabian Peninsula to remain unchanged, officials within Washington (compared to their British counterparts; and in spite of the cries of individuals claiming the UAR are as bad as the Nazis) are more open to the idea of reapproachment with the UAR if the opportunity presents itself, as while the existence of the UAR is certainly dangerous for the balance of power in the world, many realize that despite their objections, stopping the cries of support for Pan-Arab unity within the region (or the UAR's desire to unite all the Arab peoples) is an impossible task to accomplish, thus, they realize that if the UAR has to exist, that it would be better to try and lure it away from Germany's camp and make the "evil bastard" that is Nasser; America's "evil bastard".

Events that are set to soon unfold however, may begin that process sooner then many on the ground in both the US and the UAR realize.

Re: The Space Race

Drunken_Soviet said:
I wonder, how is the Space Race doing?

Well the US is losing, and losing badly; through that is all I will say about the matter.

justiyt · Feb 19, 2015

Kaiser K · Feb 19, 2015

justiyt said:
Just made a link to all of the chapters

Thanks, but there's already one of these on the Wiki.

justiyt · Feb 20, 2015

Wow, I wish I asked you before I did that. Can you post a link to the page on the wiki?

Kaiser K · Feb 20, 2015

justiyt said:
Wow, I wish I asked you before I did that. Can you post a link to the page on the wiki?

It's located HERE

Anyway, here's something for you guys to ponder amongst yourself.

"What our great country needs in these troubling times is a sense of security, law, and civil order, not false promises and empty gestures that do no good, you, the American people demand the former, as our brothers and sisters are murdered on the street every day over matters as trivial as race, and as Fascist tyranny consumes the world around the us; but the administration has given us nothing but the latter!. While no more I say, if you elect me, George Smathers as your next President, I will work to stabilize America's foreign security situation, and stamp out Fascist and Nazi extremism wherever it crops up, I will work to restore law and order to our great land, and I will make our country safe and free again; by smathering the tools of corruption and ineptity that run wild in Washington".
-George Smathers, Democratic Nominee for President of the United States; 1960

Next Time on "a Valkyrie Rises over Europe"...............

Tom Colton · Feb 20, 2015

"America needs an injection of gumbo to cure its ills!"

It's happening!

pieman97405 · Feb 20, 2015

First, I am glad to see it is not the whackadoo Fitzgerald who got the Democratic nod. That out of the way, awhile ago you promised us the the Democrats would win, and if wikipedia is anything to go off of Smathers' does not seem like a good choice to handle civil rights in the 60's. Will be interesting to see where you take this.

Kaiser K · Feb 20, 2015

pieman97405 said:
First, I am glad to see it is not the whackadoo Fitzgerald who got the Democratic nod. That out of the way, awhile ago you promised us the the Democrats would win, and if wikipedia is anything to go off of Smathers' does not seem like a good choice to handle civil rights in the 60's. Will be interesting to see where you take this.

Fitzgerald getting the Democratic nod? please, I am cruel but not that cruel man.

As for Senator Smathers, while on the surface he may not seem like the ideal candidate to deal with Civil Rights in the 1960's, the fact that in OTL he voted for both the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and the Voting Rights Act in 65 leads me to believe that there is room for moderation on the issue with him, which is how I will largely be portraying him here; through I certainly do have interesting plans for the future Mr. President either way.

Trevor1323 · Feb 21, 2015

What's the situation in Norway and Denmark? Is Quisling still around? Also has Nordstern been made a city?

Yuelang · Feb 22, 2015

Great Read

Subscribing This :thumbsup:

By the way, I actually predict that the "Fall" of Greater German Reich is not an actual "Fall", just internal democratizations, reforms, and normalizations of relations with world as well as federalizations of its constituent states. for extra irony points, brought by one Klaus Hitler

What if · Feb 22, 2015

Yuelang said:
Great Read

Subscribing This :thumbsup:

By the way, I actually predict that the "Fall" of Greater German Reich is not an actual "Fall", just internal democratizations, reforms, and normalizations of relations with world as well as federalizations of its constituent states. for extra irony points, brought by one Klaus Hitler

He knows it grab him

In seriousness if thats how this works out than you deserve prize and Kaiser for ending it on a lighter note than previously expected. But this is a Nazi timeline so I'm not optimistic.

pieman97405 · Feb 22, 2015

What if said:
He knows it grab him In seriousness if thats how this works out than you deserve prize and Kaiser for ending it on a lighter note than previously expected. But this is a Nazi timeline so I'm not optimistic.

I think I recall Kaiser saying the end of the Reich would be much more horrific than the end of the Soviet Union OTL, but even if he didn't your pessimism is probably well placed.

Kaiser K · Feb 22, 2015

Trevor1323 said:
What's the situation in Norway and Denmark? Is Quisling still around? Also has Nordstern been made a city?

Quisling's still alive, but he is no longer in charge, as Norway has become a full fledged "Reichskommissariat" of the Greater German Reich, in the same manner that the Eastern RK's are in terms of their position within the overall structure of the Reich (minus the obvious extermination plans that exist in the East of course).

Denmark is similarly integrated as a Reichskommissariat, but it has a minor degree of autonomy, hence the different color on the map.

And yes, Nordstern has been built and fully integrated as a city of the Greater German Reich, and has become the main base of operations for the Kriegsmarine's North Atlantic Fleet.

Yuelang said:
Great Read

Subscribing This :thumbsup:

By the way, I actually predict that the "Fall" of Greater German Reich is not an actual "Fall", just internal democratizations, reforms, and normalizations of relations with world as well as federalizations of its constituent states. for extra irony points, brought by one Klaus Hitler

If that's what you are predicting, then I can say that you going to be sorely disappointed come around 1985 or so then.

pieman97405 said:
I think I recall Kaiser saying the end of the Reich would be much more horrific than the end of the Soviet Union OTL, but even if he didn't your pessimism is probably well placed.

I did say that, and I am sticking by what I said, the end of the Reich is most certainly not going to be pretty in any form of the word imaginable.

But that's still around two and half decades from occurring from the point we are at in the TL, so let's continue on with our story; now shall we?

=======
PART 33
"Smathering" Smathers Rides to the White House

"What our great country needs in these troubling times is a sense of security, law, and civil order, not false promises and empty gestures that do no good, you, the American people demand the former, as our brothers and sisters are murdered on the street every day over matters as trivial as race, and as Fascist tyranny consumes the world around the us; but the administration has given us nothing but the latter!. While no more I say, if you elect me, George Smathers as your next President, I will work to stabilize America's foreign security situation, and stamp out Fascist and Nazi extremism wherever it crops up, I will work to restore law and order to our great land, and I will make our country safe and free again; by smattering the tools of corruption and ineptity that run wild in Washington"
- George Smathers

We have talked extensively about the foreign policy of the United States in the years leading up to the 1960 in many of the recent chapters of this study on the history of the Cold War, touching upon subjects such as the Soviet Civil War, Africa and the Sino-American Split along the way, however, we must not forget that the many chaotic and tenuous situations overseas were not the only matters that were of immediate and pressing concern in the minds of the many citizens of the United States, in fact, the turn of the calendar year into 1960 meant that it was time for the next presidential elections to occur - and even before the new year had begun, potential candidates had already begun to line up to begin their campaigns, in the end however; it would be a man that no one ever saw coming who would ultimately become the 37th President of the United States.

Figure 1: Henry Cabot Lodge Jr, Vice President of the United States (left) and Richard Nixon, Secretary of State (right); both men were respectively considered to be the top frontrunner's for receiving the Republican Party's presidential nomination during the early months of the 1960 election season.

After the relatively quiet and uneventful affairs that were the 1952 and 1956 presidential elections respectively, the overall levels of intrigue and interest from the general American public for the 1960 presidential election (and in turn, the overall extensiveness of the media coverage from the major television and radio networks) as the elections began to approach ever closer with each passing day, can be accurately said to have been a considerably great deal higher heading into it then the interest of the general public had been heading into the prior two presidential elections, this increase in interest from the public was partly a consequence of the fact that the incumbent President, Harold Stassen - who had served just short of nine years in office heading into 1960, had become the first President in American history to be constitutionally barred from running for a third term in office, as per the terms detailed in the 22nd Amendment to the United States Constitution, which after it's passing during the Truman Administration, had instituted the legal barriers that would constitutionally prevent any later incumbent Presidents (such as Stassen himself) that had already served two full four year terms from being legally able to run for a third one, thus opening up the entire race in a way that it hadn't had been since the 1948 elections; and leaving much existing intrigue over who would eventually come out on top come November.

Of course, one can argue, especially in light of later events that transpired, that then President Stassen would have had absolutely zero intentions of running for a third term in office - even if he was somehow constitutionally allowed to, of course, one can also say that that sort of a question merely belongs nowhere by the circles of theoretical academic and amateur speculation, as no amount of talk on anyone's part changes the fact that in reality, Stassen was constitutionally barred from running; leaving the Republicans to deal with the matter of deciding who would be the party's nominee heading into 1960.

The field of nominees within the Republican Party - of which included over a dozen individuals at one point, would ultimately be whittled down to three by the time of the all-important New Hampshire Primary, those three individuals were the incumbent Vice President, Henry Cabot Lodge Jr, the incumbent Secretary of State, Richard Nixon, and Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater, while all three of these candidates possessed varying degrees of general public and internal party support, Lodge and Nixon would end up swiftly emerging as the clear cut favorites for the Republican nomination from a very early point in the election season, this was in stark contrast to Senator Goldwater, who would in the weeks leading up to the New Hampshire primary, not only find that his already small support base within both the GOP itself and amongst the general voting public was decreasing at an alarmingly rapid rate, but also that the financial situation of his campaign - which had been primarily funded by his own personal financial resources up to that point, was becoming increasingly untenable for continuation - largely due to the fact that said financial resources available to Goldwater's campaign were decreasing at an extremely expeditious pace, in spite of these problems however, the Senator would continue on with his attempt at the White House over the next several weeks, but the many aforementioned issues above, combined with an unexpectedly poor showing during the New Hampshire Primary, and poor early poll numbers heading into the Iowa Caucus, would all contribute to the Arizonan Senator's ultimate decision to remove himself from contention for the nomination; whittling the race for the nomination down to being just between Lodge and Nixon in the process.

Figure 2: a Los Angeles Times press photo of Lodge taken on July 28th, during the Republican National Convention; which was held in downtown Los Angeles. In the now famous photo, the Vice President is shown conversing with Nixon on the stage; shortly after accepting the Republican Party's presidential nomination

As the Republican Party's national convention began to approach ever rapidly with each passing day, the members of the GOP would find themselves increasingly and extensively divided over the matter of who to nominate as their candidate for the presidency in November, as one would imagine, most within the Republican Party were fully aware of just how widely unpopular the Stassen administration and it's members had become in the eyes of the general voting public over the prior fourteen or so months, and as such, many within the party would consider the idea of nominating a candidate such as the Vice President - someone so directly tied to President Stassen and his actions, as risky for the Republican Party's already tenuous national position, instead, the so called "Nixonian" wing of the GOP would push the Secretary of State as an "ideal" compromise candidate for the party, largely due to a combination of Nixon's extensive foreign policy credentials, his "supposed distance" from the failures of the President, as well as his rugid and tough "take no bullshit" attitude - attributes which many within the GOP (somewhat correctly) believed would be needed to beat any of the younger and less tainted Democratic candidates, others however would view the ideas behind nominating Nixon as completely illogical, as they (accurately) saw Nixon as being as deeply tied to Stassen and the administration as Lodge was - due to having been the Secretary of State and directly in charge of many of the foreign failures of the administration, and since the administration and it's aforementioned failures were so incredibly unpopular with the American public at that point, many felt that Lodge, as the least tainted of two men, would ultimately be both the safest pick for the nomination; and the one that had the best chance to overcome the party's current unpopularity and win.

The man who would ultimately make the final decision over who would be the nominee would ironically be Richard Nixon himself, as the Secretary of State would unexpectedly announce his decision to pull out of contention for the nomination just weeks before the convention was set to occur, leaving Vice President Lodge with no credible competition left to challenge his claim on the Republican nomination; which he would easily secure several weeks later during the convention.

With the nomination now tightly secure, the Vice President would begin to look towards the ever important matter of deciding who would just exactly run with him on the ticket, Lodge had come up with several of his own potential choices for the job in the months preceding the national convention, but now that he had actually gotten the nomination, the decision had become an incredibly more difficult one to make then Lodge could have ever imagined in his mind that it would be, nonetheless, it was a decision that had to be made at some point -and after mulling over all of his potential choices (among which included both Nixon and Goldwater), Lodge would ultimately decide that the Governor of California, Goodwin Knight, was whom he desired to be his vice presidential nominee (largely for dealing with the issue of regional balance; as well as the fact that he and Knight already had a decent political and personal relationship; making the idea of adding him to the ticket a safe and reasonable one), and as such, would proceed to offer the job to Knight a few days afterwards over the phone; an offer which the Governor would end up happily accepting.

Figure 3: Massachusetts Senator John F. Kennedy, is shown in the above photograph - taken during his Presidential campaign in 1960, to be departing off of his plane at Stapleton International Airport in Denver, Colorado on June 21st, where he would proceed to conduct and impromptu meet and greet with an awaiting crowd of Pro-Kennedy supporters that had gathered on the tarmac before hand; before heading to a scheduled campaign rally at Denver University

In stark contrast to the relatively uncomplicated and (for lack of a better term) "civil" affair that had been the battle between Vice President Lodge and Secretary of State Nixon for the Republican Party's presidential nomination, the contest within the Democratic Party for their own presidential nomination would turn out to not only be considerably more heated then the Republican race had been - but it also quickly apparent to many that it would become one of the most heated campaigns in the entirety of American political history, the reasons behind why the 1960 Democratic race would get as heated as they ultimately did - at least according to the arguments presented by several modern historians, largely stem from that the fact that heading into 1960, the Democrats - unlike the Republican Party, did not have any "top senior officials" (as the Republicans did in the form of Lodge and Nixon) who stood out amongst their peers within the party as a clear cut definitive favorite for the party's nomination, forcing the various potential candidates that were actively vying for said nomination, to use whatever strategies and tactics that were available at their respective disposals to help strengthen the position of their own candidacy, weaken the position of the other candidates; and in turn better their chances at getting the party nod come early July.

As the days began to pass, and the all important New Hampshire Primary began to approach ever closer, two candidates in particular - thanks in large part to their successful campaigning efforts in the prior months, would find themselves beginning to slowly emerge as the front runners for the Democratic nomination in the days leading up to both the primary and the convention, these two candidates were of course, Missouri Senator Stuart Symington and Massachusetts Senator John F. Kennedy, and while each man had been able to amass the support that they had been able to respectively garner from their peers within the party for incredibly different reasons (with Symington's foreign policy-focused campaign appealing more to the conservative wing of the party, and Kennedy's, which placed a greater emphasis on a more broad agenda dealing with issues both domestic and foreign; appealing more to the liberal and moderate wings of the party), they had nonetheless been able to garner said support, leaving them each in a prime position to have a great chance at ultimately securing the nomination at the Democratic National Convention.

However, the entire Democratic race would find itself turned completely upside down when Florida Senator George Smathers - who up until the events in New Hampshire had been running what one might consider to be a failing campaign, managed to achieve an unexpectedly strong showing and eventual victory, in the New Hampshire Primary on March 8th and 9th, 1960, a showing which would not only help revitalize the Senator's faltering presidential campaign, but also end up skyrocketing Smathers into a position where he had an entirely realistic shot at usurping both Senator Kennedy and Senator Symington to win the party's presidential nomination himself.

Senator Kennedy would maintain a slight lead over Senator Smathers in the majority of the public polls that would be conducted by various news agencies in the months leading up to the Democratic National Convention in July - with Senator Symington losing most of his support during said months due to his refusal to enter any of the primaries that occurred after New Hampshire, essentially turning the race back into a two way contest, but this time between Kennedy and Smathers - and not Kennedy and himself, at the actual convention itself, the incredibly contentious and heated battle that would break out between those within the party that supported Kennedy, and those that supported Smathers, would ultimately make the 1960 convention one of the most heavily contested ones in all of American history, with each candidate's support bases literally working around the clock, and doing whatever they needed to do and using whatever resources they had at their disposal - to ensure that their preferred candidate would be the one to get their party's nod, hundreds of hours of work by these officials and eight ballots later however, it would ultimately be Senator Smathers who would secure the Democratic nomination by an (admittedly) slim margin, and in his later acceptance speech, Smathers (who would eventually chose New Jersey Governor Robert Meyner as his running mate) would spend much of his time outlining what he described as the so called three "D's" (Demolish Corruption, Degrade Fascism and Destroy Race Violence) that formed the core of his planned agenda, a speech which, while considered to be one of the best acceptance speeches in history these days; had (unknowingly) set the tone early for the general election that was still to come.

Figure 4: Senator George Smathers, Democratic Nominee for the Presidency during the 1960 elections

With both parties nominees decided, it was rapidly becoming time for the nation and both Smathers and Lodge to turn their collective attention towards the upcoming general election, and as with all presidential elections, both campaigns and their respective would in turn quickly kick their own efforts into high gear, as when the nation's highest office was literally on the line; both parties knew that their efforts would often be the deciding factor in who would win come November.

Vice President Lodge, who not only astutely sensed the general dissatisfaction that the general voting public had for the Republican administration, but also feared that any extensive focus on domestic issues (in addition to the aforementioned dissatisfaction mentioned above) would be open to heavy exploitation on Smathers part - and thus destroy any chance that he had at winning the election, decided that a safe and clean campaign was his best shot at defeating the charismatic and fiery-tempered Floridian, and as such, focused mostly on what was a heavily foreign-centric platform, with Lodge spending most of his time on both the campaign trail and in the several television debates conducted in the months leading up to Election Day, speaking about, and playing up the administration's foreign's successes - while at the same time heavily ignoring the country's many domestic issues, both Lodge's campaign staff and the man himself also spent a significant amount of time attacking Smathers for what they perceived as a lack of experience on the Senator's part in national and foreign affairs; stressing along the way that "changing horses mid race" would result in nothing but disaster for America and it's people.

Unfortunately for the Vice President, his choice to focus on mainly foreign issues and the Senator's "lack of experience" would ultimately come to backfire for both him and the Republicans, as the general voting public - many of whom were already apathetic to the administration and angry at it for it's many domestic and foreign failures, were relatively unmoved by what they perceived to be a disorganized and uninspired campaign effort from both the Republicans and the Vice President, an effort which would not only turn off many undecided voters from the Republican platform and drive them directly into the arms of Smathers and the Democrats, but it would cause a general backlash amongst the American public against Lodge and the Republicans; if the ten percentage point fall that the Vice President would see in the polls conducted between August and October are an indicator of anything that is.

Senator Smathers on the other hand, would conduct a campaign that could in honesty only be described as "vicious and brutal" in nature, taking every chance that was available to him to exploit the publics dissatisfaction and apathy with the Republicans, by attacking the Vice President and the administration for their many failures at every single turn - even to the point of publicly accusing the Vice President of being "weak and cowardly" for both his past failures and his present failure to properly address the issues the public had with him and the administration, in contrast to this alleged "weakness" of Lodge's, Smathers would portray himself throughout the entire campaign (accurately, for the most part) as a middle of the road moderate who could help restore law and order to a country that had been falling into chaos over the prior half decade, destroy the forces of crime that had "consumed" the nation, and degrade all and any fascist influence that existed not only overseas; but internally within the United States itself as well (a comment which at the time was considered to be extremely vague, but as Smathers later actions would show; was actually in reference to segregation and it's supporters within the Southern states).

The Floridian Senator's broadly focused "Law and Order" campaign platform - when combined with his fiery and charismatic way of speaking, would help increase his general appeal with the average American immensely throughout the entire campaign - especially with his opponent's campaign continuing to never really get off the ground, causing Smathers to take a commanding lead in many of the early August polls conducted by Gallup, a lead which Smathers would in the end never give up again, as the Senator and Governor Meyner would ultimately go on to win the general election in November, by an unexpectedly commanding margin of 343 Electoral Votes to Lodge's 184; making 1960 one of the strangest and larger blow outs in American electoral history.

Franz Josef II · Feb 22, 2015

I have been thoroughly enjoying this timeline; I hope Kaiser has a different ending in mind - I think the "China option" would be interesting. Instead of crashing down in ruins, it is able to reform and remain relevant on the world scene.

Kaiser K · Feb 22, 2015

Franz Josef II said:
I have been thoroughly enjoying this timeline; I hope Kaiser has a different ending in mind - I think the "China option" would be interesting. Instead of crashing down in ruins, it is able to reform and remain relevant on the world scene.

The ending is not going to be pretty for Germany, how many times do I have to say that?

Admiral Halsey · Feb 22, 2015

Hope Nixon ends up as president at some point as "Nixon VS Nazi's" has a nice ring to it. Especially if he ends up having a "Nixon goes to Italy" moment.

Kaiser K · Feb 22, 2015

Admiral Halsey said:
Hope Nixon ends up as president at some point as "Nixon VS Nazi's" has a nice ring to it. Especially if he ends up having a "Nixon goes to Italy" moment.

Oh don't worry, this is far from the last time that we will be graced by the presence of good ole Tricky Dick during this TL, he'll be back; eventually......

BeardedHoplite · Feb 22, 2015

Kaiser K said:
The ending is not going to be pretty for Germany, how many times do I have to say that?

I get the feeling that once Speer goes it's going to get rather nasty rather quick.