Ministry of Space, or Briiiiiits iiiiin Spaaaaace!
- Thread starter Mr.Bluenote
- Start date
I dont think it is.
I think he's kept the devlopment of space technology more realistic in this then in the graphic novel to be honest- things seemed to progress way to fast in the comic- the skys of London filled with spaceplanes by 1960!.
+ this doesnt have the weird segregation thing going on.
That said the Jetpacks and settlements on the Moon and Mars were cool
So was Lowland's University for some reason.
Little rewrite - new material is on the way...
Part XIII
The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible!
- Arthur C. Clarke, Technology and the Future.
If knowledge can create problems, it is not through ignorance that we can solve them!
- Isaac Asimov.
The 1980’s saw a computer revolution sweep through in the nations of the British Commonwealth! Since the days of the huge and complex vacuum tube machines during the War computers had truly evolved. Now an Automatic Computing Engine, or simply computer, not only outperformed the ancient beasts, but used only a fraction of the space and costs very little in comparison. Led by visionaries like Clive Sinclaire, Martin Armstrong and Alan Sugar, the owners and founders of Sinclaire Radionics, MARs and AMS Trading respectively, British society as such was forever changed by the invention of the household computer. These new smallish computers were affordable for almost anyone and were soon used both privately as machines for play and games and as vital business instruments. Always noted by historians as a great Briton, Alan Türing now became a national icon side by side with Solly Zuckerman and Arthur C. Clarke.
Computers are credited with the economic boom experienced by the Commonwealth in the 80’s as new technology and jobs became available as a direct result. The consequences of one occurrence in the period are still not completely understood even today, but scholars claim that it was instrumental in the economic dominance Britain and the Commonwealth has since gained. As computers went from highly specialized tools to ordinary household equipment the Military, pressed by the scientific community, opened up for the civilian use of Gateway-technology. Gateway-technology was originally developed to secure the Commonwealth Armed Forces a way to communicate if parts of its infrastructure were destroyed in a (atomic) war. Now Gateway found use by first universities, then businesses and finally private citizens as the perfect way to exchange information and knowledge. Several hundreds so-called Gates sprung up in the mid-80’s where knowledge were posted for all with a Gateway access to see. In the 90’s there would be over 250,000,000 Gates in the Commonwealth and tonnes of information would be accessible, and often free, for all to use.
With the emergence of household computers and all the related technology satellites became even more important and as satellites themselves evolved quite rapidly a new idea was born. One of the bright heads at Woomera, Jocelyn Burnell, apparently got the idea for a spaceborn navigation system one sunny Monday morning in May, 1981, driving from her home in Woomera City to the satellite engineering complex where she worked. After a brief talk with co-workers, astronomer Brian May and space system engineer Colin McInnes, she went to see her boss, Cyril Domb, and the idea was landed on Minister Hurd’s desk before long. The Military as well as the MoS immediately saw the beneficial value of such a system and the Cook Navigational System Project was after an impressively short development time launched.
The Cook Navigational System consisted, and still does, of 24 satellites in a pattern that guaranteed that between five and eight satellites always were available. Four satellites would send encrypted radio signals from their orbits in space to a given ground receiver, thus enabling the receiver to compute position, velocity and time via the signals. The system would have tremendous impact on not only the Military’s ability to navigate and perform precision strikes against enemy targets, but also on the civilian sector. The main control facility for the CNS was located at Woomera Space Center, which soon began to seem a bit too small for all the activities going on.
It soon became obvious to Space Minister Hurd and his Commonwealth colleagues that the Commonwealth had to seriously upgrade its launch capacity both in payload terms and the numbers of launches possible. After a survey it was determined that a new facility was to be build near Mount Kilimanjaro in Kenya. Close to the Equator and out in the middle of nowhere, so to speak, it was the perfect place to construct the world greatest space port and launch facility! Within three years the gigantic Kilimanjaro Launch Facility would become operational.
As the newly created Commonwealth Space Agency and the MoS strived to build the Kilimanjaro Launch Facility and launch the Cook Navigational System, the USSR and USA kept sending men and materiel into space at an alarming rate. In the capitals around the Commonwealth it was decided that the Commonwealth had to answer the unspoken challenge and it found the perfect front women as Margaret Thatcher gained the post as PM in Britain in 1980.
The heavy handed and tough Prime minister dismantled the National Foundation for Unity and Restructuring (NFUR) and thus put immense pressure on the much fabled British Modern Model State – which in Thatcher’s view was nothing less than a socialistic Welfare State. While many historians and economists – prime among them Scottish Socialist Miners Party chairman James G. Brown - even today debate the fact, it was however clear that the Modern Model State and especially NFUR had become hugely expensive and ineffective, not to mention it often put a damper on the unique British spirit of innovation to quote Prime minister Thatcher’s famous Bath speech in ’83.
Thatcher also oversaw a more general liberalisation of Britain as taxes were lowered and a numbers of laws and regulations taken of the books. Still, Thatcher was not all about downsizing as the military, MoS and Ministry of Public Education was kept well-funded during her reign. She did, nonetheless, become very unpopular in academic circles as she opened up for private universities and increased cooperation between public and private sectors. Several ministries were simply closed down, for example the Ministry of Public Information, or severely downscaled. Ironically, considering Thatcher’s general hard-line nationalistic stance, she did impose increased local rule in Britain and something akin to home rule in Wales and Scotland – which led to the collapse of the Liberal Party and Labour as both parties mainly drew support from and had a large number of their MP’s elected in Welsh and Scottish constituencies. Churchill and his Social Conservatives no doubt rotated in their graves.
Two of Thatcher’s pet projects will, however, always be remembered fondly and stands as a great monument to British engineering and the economic boom of the Thatcher era; the Auden Bridge and the Ulster Tunnel. The Auden Bridge was at its construction the world’s largest single-span suspension bridge. It spans the Humber and thus connects Yorkshire and Lincolnshire forming an important part of British infrastructure. The bridge was named after the Yorkshire poet Wystan H. Auden, who albeit for some time spend in the USA during the War gained great fame in Britain in the post-war period as one of the first Spacer poets. The Ulster Tunnel connects Britain with Ulster by both road and rail. With the completion of the Auden Bridge in 1984 and the Ulster Tunnel in ´89, British engineering was once again triumphant!
Of course Thatcher will also be remembered – fondly by some and not so fondly by others - as the Iron Lady due to her handling of the Tri-Party Crisis over the Falklands Isles in the South Atlantic.
Part XIII
The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible!
- Arthur C. Clarke, Technology and the Future.
If knowledge can create problems, it is not through ignorance that we can solve them!
- Isaac Asimov.
The 1980’s saw a computer revolution sweep through in the nations of the British Commonwealth! Since the days of the huge and complex vacuum tube machines during the War computers had truly evolved. Now an Automatic Computing Engine, or simply computer, not only outperformed the ancient beasts, but used only a fraction of the space and costs very little in comparison. Led by visionaries like Clive Sinclaire, Martin Armstrong and Alan Sugar, the owners and founders of Sinclaire Radionics, MARs and AMS Trading respectively, British society as such was forever changed by the invention of the household computer. These new smallish computers were affordable for almost anyone and were soon used both privately as machines for play and games and as vital business instruments. Always noted by historians as a great Briton, Alan Türing now became a national icon side by side with Solly Zuckerman and Arthur C. Clarke.
Computers are credited with the economic boom experienced by the Commonwealth in the 80’s as new technology and jobs became available as a direct result. The consequences of one occurrence in the period are still not completely understood even today, but scholars claim that it was instrumental in the economic dominance Britain and the Commonwealth has since gained. As computers went from highly specialized tools to ordinary household equipment the Military, pressed by the scientific community, opened up for the civilian use of Gateway-technology. Gateway-technology was originally developed to secure the Commonwealth Armed Forces a way to communicate if parts of its infrastructure were destroyed in a (atomic) war. Now Gateway found use by first universities, then businesses and finally private citizens as the perfect way to exchange information and knowledge. Several hundreds so-called Gates sprung up in the mid-80’s where knowledge were posted for all with a Gateway access to see. In the 90’s there would be over 250,000,000 Gates in the Commonwealth and tonnes of information would be accessible, and often free, for all to use.
With the emergence of household computers and all the related technology satellites became even more important and as satellites themselves evolved quite rapidly a new idea was born. One of the bright heads at Woomera, Jocelyn Burnell, apparently got the idea for a spaceborn navigation system one sunny Monday morning in May, 1981, driving from her home in Woomera City to the satellite engineering complex where she worked. After a brief talk with co-workers, astronomer Brian May and space system engineer Colin McInnes, she went to see her boss, Cyril Domb, and the idea was landed on Minister Hurd’s desk before long. The Military as well as the MoS immediately saw the beneficial value of such a system and the Cook Navigational System Project was after an impressively short development time launched.
The Cook Navigational System consisted, and still does, of 24 satellites in a pattern that guaranteed that between five and eight satellites always were available. Four satellites would send encrypted radio signals from their orbits in space to a given ground receiver, thus enabling the receiver to compute position, velocity and time via the signals. The system would have tremendous impact on not only the Military’s ability to navigate and perform precision strikes against enemy targets, but also on the civilian sector. The main control facility for the CNS was located at Woomera Space Center, which soon began to seem a bit too small for all the activities going on.
It soon became obvious to Space Minister Hurd and his Commonwealth colleagues that the Commonwealth had to seriously upgrade its launch capacity both in payload terms and the numbers of launches possible. After a survey it was determined that a new facility was to be build near Mount Kilimanjaro in Kenya. Close to the Equator and out in the middle of nowhere, so to speak, it was the perfect place to construct the world greatest space port and launch facility! Within three years the gigantic Kilimanjaro Launch Facility would become operational.
As the newly created Commonwealth Space Agency and the MoS strived to build the Kilimanjaro Launch Facility and launch the Cook Navigational System, the USSR and USA kept sending men and materiel into space at an alarming rate. In the capitals around the Commonwealth it was decided that the Commonwealth had to answer the unspoken challenge and it found the perfect front women as Margaret Thatcher gained the post as PM in Britain in 1980.
The heavy handed and tough Prime minister dismantled the National Foundation for Unity and Restructuring (NFUR) and thus put immense pressure on the much fabled British Modern Model State – which in Thatcher’s view was nothing less than a socialistic Welfare State. While many historians and economists – prime among them Scottish Socialist Miners Party chairman James G. Brown - even today debate the fact, it was however clear that the Modern Model State and especially NFUR had become hugely expensive and ineffective, not to mention it often put a damper on the unique British spirit of innovation to quote Prime minister Thatcher’s famous Bath speech in ’83.
Thatcher also oversaw a more general liberalisation of Britain as taxes were lowered and a numbers of laws and regulations taken of the books. Still, Thatcher was not all about downsizing as the military, MoS and Ministry of Public Education was kept well-funded during her reign. She did, nonetheless, become very unpopular in academic circles as she opened up for private universities and increased cooperation between public and private sectors. Several ministries were simply closed down, for example the Ministry of Public Information, or severely downscaled. Ironically, considering Thatcher’s general hard-line nationalistic stance, she did impose increased local rule in Britain and something akin to home rule in Wales and Scotland – which led to the collapse of the Liberal Party and Labour as both parties mainly drew support from and had a large number of their MP’s elected in Welsh and Scottish constituencies. Churchill and his Social Conservatives no doubt rotated in their graves.
Two of Thatcher’s pet projects will, however, always be remembered fondly and stands as a great monument to British engineering and the economic boom of the Thatcher era; the Auden Bridge and the Ulster Tunnel. The Auden Bridge was at its construction the world’s largest single-span suspension bridge. It spans the Humber and thus connects Yorkshire and Lincolnshire forming an important part of British infrastructure. The bridge was named after the Yorkshire poet Wystan H. Auden, who albeit for some time spend in the USA during the War gained great fame in Britain in the post-war period as one of the first Spacer poets. The Ulster Tunnel connects Britain with Ulster by both road and rail. With the completion of the Auden Bridge in 1984 and the Ulster Tunnel in ´89, British engineering was once again triumphant!
Of course Thatcher will also be remembered – fondly by some and not so fondly by others - as the Iron Lady due to her handling of the Tri-Party Crisis over the Falklands Isles in the South Atlantic.
Part XIV
The moon sailed on contented,
Above the heaps of slain,
For she saw that manhood liveth,
And honor breathes again.
- George S. Patton, The Moon and the Dead.
Satellite vehicles represent a rather fearsome foresight of future wars of nerves, in which aggressive nations could put their pilotless missiles into frictionless satellite motion round the earth for all to see and fear, with the constant threat of guiding them down to a target!
- W. F. Hilton.
During the 1980’s a full scale arms race in space began as the USSR and the USA followed the lead of Britain and the Commonwealth of Nations and themselves began to militarize space with disturbing haste. In its wake the Commonwealth under the firm leadership of the British PM, Margaret Thatcher, also begun to deploy a broad spectrum of multi-function satellites and armed space platforms, so-called MOWS (Manned Orbital Weapons System), in increasing numbers.
The heightened tension, so to say, between the greater space powers soon spilled over into a steep increase in tension on Earth as well. One of the most dangerous situations arose when Argentine, most likely without any prodding from the USA, began to build-up its forces for a re-conquest of the Malvinas, or Falkland Isles according to the British who saw the isles in the South Atlantics as an integrated part of the United Kingdom.
The Argentine government, being in all but name a military dictatorship, needed to shore up public support. The popularity of the military and its pet politicians had been declining rather rapidly the latest years as ever increasing military spending drove the argentine civil community into ever deeper poverty. The logical step for the military was naturally to use all those expensive toys, and for a moment in mid-1983 Britain seemed vulnerable as internal problems plagued the Thatcher government – chief amongst them a highly unpopular police action in Haiti and internal dissent in the Conservative Party over domestic policies - troubles in Africa – where tension between the growing Jewish minority and indigenous population had come to a boil - and the Far East – the usual Chinese inspired and instigated problems - demanded the Commonwealths attention, both politically and militarily.
Armed and generously equipped by the United States, the Argentine Armed Forces were no laughing matter, nor in any way incompetent, but the nature of the countries leadership would weaken the effort to successfully pull off a re-conquest of the Malvinas. In late April, 1983, two Argentine Naval Task Forces set to sea, one heading directly towards the isles, the other centered around the two carries; the light domestically constructed – albeit with substantial American aid - ARA William Brown and the ex-USN Forrestal, ARA Independencia. Both ships, having air groups consisting of fairly modern planes and helicopters of French and American origin, were considered powerful surface units in their own right. The second task forced was centred on the elderly battle cruiser, ex-USN Alaska, ARA General Belgrano and a modern light cruiser ARA Veinticinco de Mayo, a home grown design. The first task force was to shield the invasion from enemy naval units while the second was to escort and provide fire support to the invasion force itself. The invasion was spearheaded by the tough and capable Argentine marines The IMARA (Infanteria de Marina Armada Republica Argentina), but the main force was, for political reasons, mostly conscripted youths from the Army.
Of course the machinations of the Argentineans did not go unnoticed in either London, Washington or Moscow. The British immediately put pressure on both Buenos Aires and Washington – to keep their puppets under control, but to no avail. Now it became a race as British and whatever Commonwealth forces not already deployed began to gather and the Armada de la República Argentina.
The Royal Navy had a minor base on the Falklands where an icebreaker and one or two minor naval vessels usually were on station. Said units could offer little or no opposition to the Argentines, nor could the isles be reinforced or as it turned out retaken by anything less than a fleet due to the strong Argentinean naval presence, so London was forced to accept the loss of the isles. The Royal Marines and Naval units gave as good as they got, but on May the 1st, the Union Jack was lowered after a brief but intensive fight.
In both London and Washington politicians and military leaders went through the roof. The Americans feared all-out war – the British operations in Haiti being seen by many Americans as a direct provocation - and the loss of a major ally and the British were out of their minds due to the first military defeat in ages. The collision between an US Navy destroyer and a British super frigate just south of Port-au-Prince did little to alleviate the situation. Both sides were quick to blame to other, but the fact that the British ship, HMS Ethalion, was one of the new stealthy and extremely fast super frigates most likely meant that the Americans had simply not seen the ship until too late.
One of the reasons why the situation never escalated despite a heavy US naval presence in both the South Atlantic and around Haiti was no doubt due to the fact that Canada never placed their military on full or even raised alert as requested by London. The Canadian move made the American leadership certain that there as to be no major confrontation and slowly US-British/Commonwealth tensions ebbed out.
While the Canadians never got into the same military high gear as Britain, Australia and South Africa it nonetheless contributed to both the Haiti mission – where Canadian Highlanders often was at odds with their more heavy handed and rough British Para and Marine colleagues - and the retaking of the Falkland Isles in late June and July, 1983.
The operations in the South Atlantic were and still are often referred to as the Tri-Party Crisis. While Britain and her Commonwealth allies squared off against Argentina, the Americans did their best to calm things down and mediate. The presence of a US Navy carrier Group based around the USS Goldwater – one of the new American super carriers meant to match the British class of George V atomic carries – at times made things seem more like a three way fight as the American did their best to prevent clashes outside the war zone.
Still, heavy naval and air clashes took place, but no direct attacks on the Argentine mainland – even though it is rumored that Thatcher demanded both tactical and strategic attacks on Argentina, but was dissuaded by the Chiefs of Staff and her Commonwealth colleagues none too pleased with the prospect of dragging the United States of America into the war – occurred. Commonwealth losses amongst older units were high, but the few new ships and planes readily available for the operations soon swept the Argentinean forces a side, even sinking Brown and Belgrano. Especially the introduction of the Cook Navigational System proved to be a massive force multiplier in the war. With air and sea supremacy secured, the land war was soon over, but the cost was high on both sides. Again, however, the use of sophisticated PAPF-body armour reduced British casualties quite remarkably. On the 20th of July, 1983, the Iron Lady, ironically a phrase coined by anti-Tory papers, declared the war over.
The moon sailed on contented,
Above the heaps of slain,
For she saw that manhood liveth,
And honor breathes again.
- George S. Patton, The Moon and the Dead.
Satellite vehicles represent a rather fearsome foresight of future wars of nerves, in which aggressive nations could put their pilotless missiles into frictionless satellite motion round the earth for all to see and fear, with the constant threat of guiding them down to a target!
- W. F. Hilton.
During the 1980’s a full scale arms race in space began as the USSR and the USA followed the lead of Britain and the Commonwealth of Nations and themselves began to militarize space with disturbing haste. In its wake the Commonwealth under the firm leadership of the British PM, Margaret Thatcher, also begun to deploy a broad spectrum of multi-function satellites and armed space platforms, so-called MOWS (Manned Orbital Weapons System), in increasing numbers.
The heightened tension, so to say, between the greater space powers soon spilled over into a steep increase in tension on Earth as well. One of the most dangerous situations arose when Argentine, most likely without any prodding from the USA, began to build-up its forces for a re-conquest of the Malvinas, or Falkland Isles according to the British who saw the isles in the South Atlantics as an integrated part of the United Kingdom.
The Argentine government, being in all but name a military dictatorship, needed to shore up public support. The popularity of the military and its pet politicians had been declining rather rapidly the latest years as ever increasing military spending drove the argentine civil community into ever deeper poverty. The logical step for the military was naturally to use all those expensive toys, and for a moment in mid-1983 Britain seemed vulnerable as internal problems plagued the Thatcher government – chief amongst them a highly unpopular police action in Haiti and internal dissent in the Conservative Party over domestic policies - troubles in Africa – where tension between the growing Jewish minority and indigenous population had come to a boil - and the Far East – the usual Chinese inspired and instigated problems - demanded the Commonwealths attention, both politically and militarily.
Armed and generously equipped by the United States, the Argentine Armed Forces were no laughing matter, nor in any way incompetent, but the nature of the countries leadership would weaken the effort to successfully pull off a re-conquest of the Malvinas. In late April, 1983, two Argentine Naval Task Forces set to sea, one heading directly towards the isles, the other centered around the two carries; the light domestically constructed – albeit with substantial American aid - ARA William Brown and the ex-USN Forrestal, ARA Independencia. Both ships, having air groups consisting of fairly modern planes and helicopters of French and American origin, were considered powerful surface units in their own right. The second task forced was centred on the elderly battle cruiser, ex-USN Alaska, ARA General Belgrano and a modern light cruiser ARA Veinticinco de Mayo, a home grown design. The first task force was to shield the invasion from enemy naval units while the second was to escort and provide fire support to the invasion force itself. The invasion was spearheaded by the tough and capable Argentine marines The IMARA (Infanteria de Marina Armada Republica Argentina), but the main force was, for political reasons, mostly conscripted youths from the Army.
Of course the machinations of the Argentineans did not go unnoticed in either London, Washington or Moscow. The British immediately put pressure on both Buenos Aires and Washington – to keep their puppets under control, but to no avail. Now it became a race as British and whatever Commonwealth forces not already deployed began to gather and the Armada de la República Argentina.
The Royal Navy had a minor base on the Falklands where an icebreaker and one or two minor naval vessels usually were on station. Said units could offer little or no opposition to the Argentines, nor could the isles be reinforced or as it turned out retaken by anything less than a fleet due to the strong Argentinean naval presence, so London was forced to accept the loss of the isles. The Royal Marines and Naval units gave as good as they got, but on May the 1st, the Union Jack was lowered after a brief but intensive fight.
In both London and Washington politicians and military leaders went through the roof. The Americans feared all-out war – the British operations in Haiti being seen by many Americans as a direct provocation - and the loss of a major ally and the British were out of their minds due to the first military defeat in ages. The collision between an US Navy destroyer and a British super frigate just south of Port-au-Prince did little to alleviate the situation. Both sides were quick to blame to other, but the fact that the British ship, HMS Ethalion, was one of the new stealthy and extremely fast super frigates most likely meant that the Americans had simply not seen the ship until too late.
One of the reasons why the situation never escalated despite a heavy US naval presence in both the South Atlantic and around Haiti was no doubt due to the fact that Canada never placed their military on full or even raised alert as requested by London. The Canadian move made the American leadership certain that there as to be no major confrontation and slowly US-British/Commonwealth tensions ebbed out.
While the Canadians never got into the same military high gear as Britain, Australia and South Africa it nonetheless contributed to both the Haiti mission – where Canadian Highlanders often was at odds with their more heavy handed and rough British Para and Marine colleagues - and the retaking of the Falkland Isles in late June and July, 1983.
The operations in the South Atlantic were and still are often referred to as the Tri-Party Crisis. While Britain and her Commonwealth allies squared off against Argentina, the Americans did their best to calm things down and mediate. The presence of a US Navy carrier Group based around the USS Goldwater – one of the new American super carriers meant to match the British class of George V atomic carries – at times made things seem more like a three way fight as the American did their best to prevent clashes outside the war zone.
Still, heavy naval and air clashes took place, but no direct attacks on the Argentine mainland – even though it is rumored that Thatcher demanded both tactical and strategic attacks on Argentina, but was dissuaded by the Chiefs of Staff and her Commonwealth colleagues none too pleased with the prospect of dragging the United States of America into the war – occurred. Commonwealth losses amongst older units were high, but the few new ships and planes readily available for the operations soon swept the Argentinean forces a side, even sinking Brown and Belgrano. Especially the introduction of the Cook Navigational System proved to be a massive force multiplier in the war. With air and sea supremacy secured, the land war was soon over, but the cost was high on both sides. Again, however, the use of sophisticated PAPF-body armour reduced British casualties quite remarkably. On the 20th of July, 1983, the Iron Lady, ironically a phrase coined by anti-Tory papers, declared the war over.
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Sorry for another looong wait!
Hey Guys!
Sorry for another of my looong breaks!
I've rewritten parts of part XIII and posted an entirely new piece above - part XIV -, where the US and British - inspired by your comments - will be somewhat at odds. It might need a little tidying up, so do let me know is something is totally a miss!
Generally speaking I think most of the Commo0nwelaht countries are doing extremely well. Especially the in OTL underdeveloped nations in Africa and India as well. Canada is likely a big industrial and scientific powerhouse in its own way - kinda like my native Denmark only on a much grander scale!
There is some kind of Zionism in MoS, but I suppose it's more directed at building smaller communities rather than creating a homeland pr see. I put in a little hint at the situation in part XIV.
Thanks once again for all your comments and ideas, guys.
I hope you’re still onboard!
My regards!
- Mr. Bluenote.
Hey Guys!
Sorry for another of my looong breaks!
I've rewritten parts of part XIII and posted an entirely new piece above - part XIV -, where the US and British - inspired by your comments - will be somewhat at odds. It might need a little tidying up, so do let me know is something is totally a miss!
I just thought it sounded cool and with the Social Conservatives running a way more centralized and science focused Britain I thougth some ministry like that might emerge.
Yes, after the Tri-Party Crises, the USA and the USSR will most definitely design their own version of the CNS.
Generally speaking I think most of the Commo0nwelaht countries are doing extremely well. Especially the in OTL underdeveloped nations in Africa and India as well. Canada is likely a big industrial and scientific powerhouse in its own way - kinda like my native Denmark only on a much grander scale!
There is some kind of Zionism in MoS, but I suppose it's more directed at building smaller communities rather than creating a homeland pr see. I put in a little hint at the situation in part XIV.
No, not really! As Birdy kindly commented, I try my very best to keep this MoS more, hm, realistic. And I supposed more bright as multi-culture and open-mindedness is perhaps the main reasons for the success of the Commonwealth in this ATL.
Thanks once again for all your comments and ideas, guys.
I hope you’re still onboard!
My regards!
- Mr. Bluenote.
Good to hear!
Haiti is basically the same mess, sort of, like in OTL! I used it to show a more involved Britain acting like the global cop!
Thanks, I found it rather neat as well. Tunnels are always cool, and since I can't imagine the Brits drilling one to the continent in this ATL, then Ulster it was!
I have a very vague idea that Ulster is like an autonomous zone answering to both Dublin and London. And with the more open-minded and multi-cultural way things work in this ATL, we might not see much tension between Catholics and Protestants... or at least it will be low key in sharp contrast to the Troubles in OTL! Hmm, I might be a bit naive, but I kinda like the idea of a peaceful Ulster/Ireland!
Regards!
- Mr. B.
Part XV
Not only will atomic power be released, but someday we will harness the rise and fall of the tides and imprison the rays of the sun!
- Adam Smith.
If we long to believe that the stars rise and set for us, that we are the reason there is a Universe, does science do us a disservice in deflating our conceits?
- Carl Sagan.
In the mid-80’s following the Computer Revolution numerous discoveries took place, and not only that it seemed that the speed of discovery has hastened immensely by the use of computers in almost everything. Especially the combination of household computers for everyday use, so to say, and the huge immensely powerful Merchant and Clipper series of supercomputers developed by Martin Armstrong’s MARs Company proved quite a boon for the scientific community in not only Britain and the Commonwealth but the world in general..
In 1987, two researchers at the MARs Company’s research facility at the University of Cambridge, Paul Chu and Brian D. Josephson, in close cooperation with the Rutherford-Appleton Laboratory discovered a new series of conductors, the so called superconductors, that operated at 35K (-238C). Driven by fierce competition with several American teams, the British discovered materials operating at 93K (-182C) only a year later. The discovery meant that superconductors had entered the temperature range of liquid nitrogen (77K, -196C), an abundant and well understood coolant. Rather typical of much groundbreaking British research, the field of superconductors was pioneered by German researchers back in the 30’s, but now the technology had evolved into something that could actually be used. The subject of superconductors would gain both Chu and Josephson Nobel prices in respectively 1987 and 1990, just as, much to the latter’s annoyance, it would bring home a few Nobel prices to the Americans over the following years.
The discovery of superconductors spurred new breakthroughs and ideas like few others in the history of science. Mass-drives, magnetically levitated trains, propulsion systems, fusion and lots of others stuff as well as more mundane and easily applied things like new and more efficient sensors and scanners for both civilian and military use and various communication devices. Of course new superconducting materials also led to much more powerful micro chips and thus computers of all sorts, which again led to various new discoveries, fx. mobile or cellular telephones in the early 90’s.
In early 1982 the USSR drafted yet another military plan for satellites and other space related equipment resulting in the Programme for Military Space Units and the Basis or Direction of Development of Space Units for 1984 to 1994. These plans, after evaluation by the Ministry of Defence, were approved by the Central Committee and Soviet Ministers on 2nd of March 1982 and immediately set into motion.
Second generation systems were to use a new series of modular spacecraft. The new modular designs developed in two phases, a first phase version that could be launched by existing launch vehicles, and a larger second phase version to be launched by the Zenit-2 booster. Ultimately the new series of launch and space vehicles along with new satellite constellations were supposed to be grouped into integrated systems to achieve specific military purposes. However, flight test and deployment of second generation systems were severely delayed, first by problems with the first stage of the Zenit-2 launch vehicle and by a simple lack of funds as the Red Army basically acted as an occupation force in many of the USSR’s neighbouring countries and struggled on in its fight to pacify Afghanistan.
Nonetheless most of the design work on the Soviets Unions second generation space systems would be completed in the period 1984-85 and flight trials were conducted in the latter part of the 1980's. Deployment of said systems soon began and was more or less completed in the first half of the 1990's, where it would hardly matter anyhow as things turned out.
Besides the unmanned space systems, the USSR put a redesigned and armed version of Chelomei's Kosmoplane into orbit. The Ko-111 heavy space fighter had better guidance and targeting systems and powerful, but rather - by British and Commonwealth standards at least - inefficient rocket engines courtesy of the Glushko Design Bureau. Although built and launched in few numbers (MI-6 believed that only 16 were ever produced and as few as 6 launched), the Ko-111’s proved a deadly threat to Commonwealth space supremacy and the situation worsened as the USSR soon put two Stalin-class manned arsenal ships into orbit as well. Several Commonwealth economic experts already predicted that the USSR was crippling its own economy by its focus on military maters and that the present pace was simply untenable.
In the United States of America, the Reagan administration had the Navy and Air Force running at full speed to launch more and better space systems than the Soviets, and preferably, but not as important, the Commonwealth. With great effort the US Navy via its Advanced Research Projects had sent Commander Wilcox into space while the US Air Force Space Operations Agency flew the Boeing X-20 Talon space plane. The USNARP now outpaced its Air Force competitors with the launch of the USS Challenger and later the USS Constitution, two rather heavy armed spaceships, commonly known as Monitors. It was generally suspected that both ships carried atomic weapons and was themselves atomic powered! After that the Air Force Space Operations Agency was pretty much degraded to launching various satellites and keeping the Talons and subsequent generations of space planes going. Generally the bigger American things in space now belonged to the US Navy.
In response to the alarmingly pace of militarization the Commonwealth launched the HMS Protector as a temporary measure to counter the Soviet and American heavy military spacecrafts! Designed and built in less than two years by Vickers-Armstrong Ltd, the HMS Protector was not much more than a lightly armed and armoured spacecraft – in reality a redesign of an existing design for a space shuttle -, but it had a few new gadgets. Among them a revolutionary air scrubber, a sophisticated self-governing computer system based on the AMSTrad Exeter-processors and a brand new advanced type of RADAR! Furthermore it was armed with the newest missiles in the Commonwealth armoury which combined with its new sensor suit was thought to outrange anything in space at the time.
In a series of consultations between Minister of Space Douglas Hurd and his colleagues in the Commonwealth Space Agency and the senior officers in Johannesburg it was decided to take a somewhat different path than the Soviets and Americans. As the HMS Protector took to the sky and the Kilimanjaro Launch Facility neared operational status, it was decided that time was on the side of the Commonwealth and that the strategic balance could be held with the forces available for a while without the CSA and the MoS needing to take more risks than necessary (as space related matters was inherently risky in itself) by rushing things along.
As huge amounts of material and thousands of staff and security personnel flooded the Kilimanjaro facility, construction of the Her Majesty’s Space Station Churchill began. The HMSS Churchill was to be one out of two planned Commonwealth space stations, the other being the mostly civilian Zuckerman station. The HMSS Churchill was, as the named hints, to be a military platform and its primary function to house four to six AVRO Sparhawks and 16-24 men. As the battle stations first commander, Rear Admiral Sir John Forster Woodward, would later recall, the Churchill was a rare airborne mix of bunker and carrier. HMSS Churchill was to be placed in geostationary orbit along the equator.
Besides the two space stations the MoS and the CSA planned to build two Moon bases, Elizabeth and Edward. One in the late 1980’s and the other soon after, preferably in the early 90’s, and sometime between the two the Zuckerman Space Station would be placed in L1- Moon/Earth transit orbit! Furthermore some 100 British Royal Marine Commandos and their Commonwealth equivalents began to train for space duty and would form the nucleus of the Commonwealth Space Reaction Force, the first truly mixed Commonwealth unit in history!
However, not all that happened in the eighties had a military purpose as such. Saunders-Roe and . Rolls Royce joined forces to create the first TAV (trans-atmospheric vehicle) spaceplane. The design was loosely based on de Havilland’s old MUSTARD design and was capable of reaching low Earth orbit using a combination of a normal jet engine for takeoff, a scramjet to propel to the edge of space at hypersonic speed and finally a rocket engine to move it around in space. The SR-RR TAV was not designed for deep space travel, but as a passenger spaceplane that could reach the lower ranges of LEO, where it would dock with workstations, the planned space stations and/or simply transfer passengers and light cargo to orbital transfer vehicles, OTVs, or return to Earth as an ordinary suborbital. The first TAV, the Llyod George (political dealings with the Liberal-Democrats made the naming a given) entered service with BOAC in April 1986 and, even though extremely expensive soon became a success. The TAV design would eventually inspire AVRO to build the AVRO Starfire delta. The Starfire was to replace the aging AVRO Sparhawk and was although led by AVRO and cooperation between Saunders-Roe, Rolls Royce and AVRO. Generally speaking few companies – with the exception of giants like Vickers-Armstrong Ltd - had the resources to develop spacecrafts entirely on their own any more.
As Iran became an associated member of the Commonwealth in latter part of the 1980’s, Douglas Hurd visited Teheran as one of his last public tasks as MoS and watched with the Shah as CSA sent two Iranian astronauts in orbit, thereby welcoming Iran in the Commonwealth of Nations with style!
Not only will atomic power be released, but someday we will harness the rise and fall of the tides and imprison the rays of the sun!
- Adam Smith.
If we long to believe that the stars rise and set for us, that we are the reason there is a Universe, does science do us a disservice in deflating our conceits?
- Carl Sagan.
In the mid-80’s following the Computer Revolution numerous discoveries took place, and not only that it seemed that the speed of discovery has hastened immensely by the use of computers in almost everything. Especially the combination of household computers for everyday use, so to say, and the huge immensely powerful Merchant and Clipper series of supercomputers developed by Martin Armstrong’s MARs Company proved quite a boon for the scientific community in not only Britain and the Commonwealth but the world in general..
In 1987, two researchers at the MARs Company’s research facility at the University of Cambridge, Paul Chu and Brian D. Josephson, in close cooperation with the Rutherford-Appleton Laboratory discovered a new series of conductors, the so called superconductors, that operated at 35K (-238C). Driven by fierce competition with several American teams, the British discovered materials operating at 93K (-182C) only a year later. The discovery meant that superconductors had entered the temperature range of liquid nitrogen (77K, -196C), an abundant and well understood coolant. Rather typical of much groundbreaking British research, the field of superconductors was pioneered by German researchers back in the 30’s, but now the technology had evolved into something that could actually be used. The subject of superconductors would gain both Chu and Josephson Nobel prices in respectively 1987 and 1990, just as, much to the latter’s annoyance, it would bring home a few Nobel prices to the Americans over the following years.
The discovery of superconductors spurred new breakthroughs and ideas like few others in the history of science. Mass-drives, magnetically levitated trains, propulsion systems, fusion and lots of others stuff as well as more mundane and easily applied things like new and more efficient sensors and scanners for both civilian and military use and various communication devices. Of course new superconducting materials also led to much more powerful micro chips and thus computers of all sorts, which again led to various new discoveries, fx. mobile or cellular telephones in the early 90’s.
In early 1982 the USSR drafted yet another military plan for satellites and other space related equipment resulting in the Programme for Military Space Units and the Basis or Direction of Development of Space Units for 1984 to 1994. These plans, after evaluation by the Ministry of Defence, were approved by the Central Committee and Soviet Ministers on 2nd of March 1982 and immediately set into motion.
Second generation systems were to use a new series of modular spacecraft. The new modular designs developed in two phases, a first phase version that could be launched by existing launch vehicles, and a larger second phase version to be launched by the Zenit-2 booster. Ultimately the new series of launch and space vehicles along with new satellite constellations were supposed to be grouped into integrated systems to achieve specific military purposes. However, flight test and deployment of second generation systems were severely delayed, first by problems with the first stage of the Zenit-2 launch vehicle and by a simple lack of funds as the Red Army basically acted as an occupation force in many of the USSR’s neighbouring countries and struggled on in its fight to pacify Afghanistan.
Nonetheless most of the design work on the Soviets Unions second generation space systems would be completed in the period 1984-85 and flight trials were conducted in the latter part of the 1980's. Deployment of said systems soon began and was more or less completed in the first half of the 1990's, where it would hardly matter anyhow as things turned out.
Besides the unmanned space systems, the USSR put a redesigned and armed version of Chelomei's Kosmoplane into orbit. The Ko-111 heavy space fighter had better guidance and targeting systems and powerful, but rather - by British and Commonwealth standards at least - inefficient rocket engines courtesy of the Glushko Design Bureau. Although built and launched in few numbers (MI-6 believed that only 16 were ever produced and as few as 6 launched), the Ko-111’s proved a deadly threat to Commonwealth space supremacy and the situation worsened as the USSR soon put two Stalin-class manned arsenal ships into orbit as well. Several Commonwealth economic experts already predicted that the USSR was crippling its own economy by its focus on military maters and that the present pace was simply untenable.
In the United States of America, the Reagan administration had the Navy and Air Force running at full speed to launch more and better space systems than the Soviets, and preferably, but not as important, the Commonwealth. With great effort the US Navy via its Advanced Research Projects had sent Commander Wilcox into space while the US Air Force Space Operations Agency flew the Boeing X-20 Talon space plane. The USNARP now outpaced its Air Force competitors with the launch of the USS Challenger and later the USS Constitution, two rather heavy armed spaceships, commonly known as Monitors. It was generally suspected that both ships carried atomic weapons and was themselves atomic powered! After that the Air Force Space Operations Agency was pretty much degraded to launching various satellites and keeping the Talons and subsequent generations of space planes going. Generally the bigger American things in space now belonged to the US Navy.
In response to the alarmingly pace of militarization the Commonwealth launched the HMS Protector as a temporary measure to counter the Soviet and American heavy military spacecrafts! Designed and built in less than two years by Vickers-Armstrong Ltd, the HMS Protector was not much more than a lightly armed and armoured spacecraft – in reality a redesign of an existing design for a space shuttle -, but it had a few new gadgets. Among them a revolutionary air scrubber, a sophisticated self-governing computer system based on the AMSTrad Exeter-processors and a brand new advanced type of RADAR! Furthermore it was armed with the newest missiles in the Commonwealth armoury which combined with its new sensor suit was thought to outrange anything in space at the time.
In a series of consultations between Minister of Space Douglas Hurd and his colleagues in the Commonwealth Space Agency and the senior officers in Johannesburg it was decided to take a somewhat different path than the Soviets and Americans. As the HMS Protector took to the sky and the Kilimanjaro Launch Facility neared operational status, it was decided that time was on the side of the Commonwealth and that the strategic balance could be held with the forces available for a while without the CSA and the MoS needing to take more risks than necessary (as space related matters was inherently risky in itself) by rushing things along.
As huge amounts of material and thousands of staff and security personnel flooded the Kilimanjaro facility, construction of the Her Majesty’s Space Station Churchill began. The HMSS Churchill was to be one out of two planned Commonwealth space stations, the other being the mostly civilian Zuckerman station. The HMSS Churchill was, as the named hints, to be a military platform and its primary function to house four to six AVRO Sparhawks and 16-24 men. As the battle stations first commander, Rear Admiral Sir John Forster Woodward, would later recall, the Churchill was a rare airborne mix of bunker and carrier. HMSS Churchill was to be placed in geostationary orbit along the equator.
Besides the two space stations the MoS and the CSA planned to build two Moon bases, Elizabeth and Edward. One in the late 1980’s and the other soon after, preferably in the early 90’s, and sometime between the two the Zuckerman Space Station would be placed in L1- Moon/Earth transit orbit! Furthermore some 100 British Royal Marine Commandos and their Commonwealth equivalents began to train for space duty and would form the nucleus of the Commonwealth Space Reaction Force, the first truly mixed Commonwealth unit in history!
However, not all that happened in the eighties had a military purpose as such. Saunders-Roe and . Rolls Royce joined forces to create the first TAV (trans-atmospheric vehicle) spaceplane. The design was loosely based on de Havilland’s old MUSTARD design and was capable of reaching low Earth orbit using a combination of a normal jet engine for takeoff, a scramjet to propel to the edge of space at hypersonic speed and finally a rocket engine to move it around in space. The SR-RR TAV was not designed for deep space travel, but as a passenger spaceplane that could reach the lower ranges of LEO, where it would dock with workstations, the planned space stations and/or simply transfer passengers and light cargo to orbital transfer vehicles, OTVs, or return to Earth as an ordinary suborbital. The first TAV, the Llyod George (political dealings with the Liberal-Democrats made the naming a given) entered service with BOAC in April 1986 and, even though extremely expensive soon became a success. The TAV design would eventually inspire AVRO to build the AVRO Starfire delta. The Starfire was to replace the aging AVRO Sparhawk and was although led by AVRO and cooperation between Saunders-Roe, Rolls Royce and AVRO. Generally speaking few companies – with the exception of giants like Vickers-Armstrong Ltd - had the resources to develop spacecrafts entirely on their own any more.
As Iran became an associated member of the Commonwealth in latter part of the 1980’s, Douglas Hurd visited Teheran as one of his last public tasks as MoS and watched with the Shah as CSA sent two Iranian astronauts in orbit, thereby welcoming Iran in the Commonwealth of Nations with style!
a more peaceful NI might be possible if the government intervenes in the Protestants monopolizing good jobs there- Churchills social conservatives might do that i suppose + the better British economy means more opportunities and affluance to break down barriers.
+ they could've thrown in some of those european refugees who while being probably pro british will not understand the Ulster divide - say Orthodox Russians, Catholic poles and lithunians, luthern germans (displaced from east) jews camp survivors. this might make it somewhat less polarised.
you mention Maglevs?.......
+ they could've thrown in some of those european refugees who while being probably pro british will not understand the Ulster divide - say Orthodox Russians, Catholic poles and lithunians, luthern germans (displaced from east) jews camp survivors. this might make it somewhat less polarised.
you mention Maglevs?.......
Part XVI
When one door closes another door opens; but we so often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door, that we do not see the ones which open for us!
- Alexander Graham Bell.
It pays to be obvious, especially if you have a reputation for subtlety!
- Isaac Asimov.
The British Minister of Space, Douglas Richard Hurd, stepped down in 1987 after a very successful run as Minister. Hurd went on to become General-Secretary of the Commonwealth of Nations and is to this day remembered quit fondly in the Ministry. As MoS spokesman, Jeremy Clarkson, said; “Next to Douglas I always felt like a very unrefined ape being at a garden party for very civilized Victorians!” Hurd was replaced by Digby Jones, another up-and-coming from the Ministry’s seemingly endless supply of clever lads. Jones, who had a past in the Royal Navy, would in time be known as the British Voice, as the Ministry of Space gained even more power and influence under his leadership than seen under Douglas Hurd.
As part of the Commonwealth’s plan to build two bases on the Lunar surface a series of exploration missions was undertaken by the Commonwealth Space Agency. Lt. Commander Richard Noble’s Moon mission was followed quite closely by nearly everyone in the Commonwealth. His ecstatic shouts of “By God, we’re back!” would make him famous almost overnight and help generate renewed interest in space!
Along with the manned Moon missions the first elements of the HMSS Churchill was launched from the Kilimanjaro Launch Facility. As one Black Duchess booster after another lifted off into space, the space station begun to take shape in its geostationary orbit, and in mid-1986, Rear Admiral Woodward, could raise his command at the station. HMSS Churchill was operational, and a week later the 101st Near Orbit Squadron, consisting of four AVRO Sparhawks and two of the brand new AVRO Starfires too became operational. Together with the HMS Protector that would be decommissioned in 1991 and later the Moon based squadrons the British and the Commonwealth once again ruled the space ways.
Under the supervision of Mark Oliphant rapid progress was being made on the Moon bases as well as the space stations. The boffins working under the aegis of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, CSIRO, had offered a design for a functioning Moon base as early as 1972, and after summarizing the demands that the special conditions on the Moon placed on its construction, the CSIRO engineers put to work. The CSIRO hoped to reflect both the need for security in regard to the hostile environment and manmade threats!
The design that was chosen was made by one of CSIRO’s many top-engineers, Dr. Parkinson. The Elizabeth Moon Base was build around eight cylindrical 12-tonnes pressurized habitation modules and five unpressurized 10-tonnes resource modules, which housed solar arrays and regenerative fuel cells for generating electrical power and the like. Furthermore three 8-tonnes unpressurized hangar modules, containing two Moon Range Rovers, or Moon Minis as they were called jokingly by the crew - and two OTL’s vehicles, that was needed to get to and from the near Moon orbit transfer points, and one pressurized 60-tonnes barrack module - for a squad of Marines from the Commonwealth Space Reaction Force - was added. Later a atomic power plant module, an extended hangar system for a squadron of AVRO Starfires, five air/space defence modules and several 16-tonnes science modules would by added to the base. The Elizabeth Moon Base would primarily be run by the military, while the next base, the Edward Moon Base, would by run by CSA, CSIRO and other mostly civilian agencies.
Dr. Parkinson and his team planned to use hydroponics - or more correctly hyrdroculture as developed by professor Allen Cooper in 60’s -; crops grow in troughs containing pebbles flooded with a nutrient solution, to supply the inhabitants of the Elizabeth Moon Base with some of their daily needs and to generate some amount of oxygen. In addition chlorella algae would be grown in vats to serve as nutritional raw material, rich in vitamins and fat. Dr. Parkinson and the other boffins at CSIRO was certain that it would be possible to extract water from ice deposits at the Moon’s poles – the deposits had been discovered by Lt. Commander Noble and kept top secret -, thus nearly making the base self-sufficient. One of Parkinson’s more imaginative colleagues even suggested growing mushrooms in pressurized caverns beneath the Moon’s surface.
Two rather radical systems were proposed for launching raw materials from the Moon; a high-energy laser lift system and a mass-drive. The high-energy laser lift system consisted of a cargo rocket that actually carried no rocket engine, but only fuel. The fuel would be heated by a ground based laser and thus set off. The Mass-driver was a more complex system and was tied into the Special Defence Initiative’s railgun project, which really had taken off due to the new superconductors. The mass-drive was basically a magnetic sled that hurled its cargo of up to 20-tonnes into space via a 250m long accelerator track.
The technology used to build the Lunar Mass-Drivers would find use on Earth as well, but in guise of the Blue Flash magnetic levitation train. The Blue Flash and its sister train the Sky Rider ran the 31miles – roughly 50km - long Liverpool-Manchester railroad in just about 15 minutes, not even pushing its speed close to the limit of some 450km/h - about 280mph. The success of the Liverpool-Manchester line soon inspired other nations and cities for that matter to build MagLev-railroads. Fittingly, MagLevs would later be used on the Moon connecting the various bases and major installations.
As one of his first official acts Digby Jones went on an extended tour in the United States of America. When accused of intruding on the Foreign Office’s turf, Digby said: “The Commonwealth’s future prosperity fundamentally depends on delivering success in the international arena. The Commonwealth needs to justify its scientific achievements and use them to gain access to new markets and to be able to invest overseas, as well as exchange ideas with friendly nations and organizations. My visit will allow me to assess developments in British-US commercial relations and to hear the US administration’s plans particularly with regard to exploitation of space!”
After the otherwise very successful tour Clarkson commented on the Americans: “They pretend to be a bunch of savages who likes their beer cold, their deer raw and their music country-style. Even the engineers try to look and act like rough and tough frontiersmen, who drive huge pick-ups for no other reason than you could go to the woods at weekends with your other pick-up-driving friends and dream up plans to rid Europe of its damned back-stabbing pinkies!”
Clarkson’s harsh comments were not the only thing plaguing the Americans in the late 80’s. Their much talked about and very ambitious Orion Project suffered a catastrophic mishap as the USS Orion blew up on its launch pad in Nevada, spraying atomic material all around. Conspiracy-theorists and people with anti-British sentiments in general, were quick to point to the “obvious” connection to MoS Jones’ visit.
In the USSR the more and more economically strained nation struggled along with its space programme as the impressive and vital Zenit boosters never fully lived up to their great promise.
When one door closes another door opens; but we so often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door, that we do not see the ones which open for us!
- Alexander Graham Bell.
It pays to be obvious, especially if you have a reputation for subtlety!
- Isaac Asimov.
The British Minister of Space, Douglas Richard Hurd, stepped down in 1987 after a very successful run as Minister. Hurd went on to become General-Secretary of the Commonwealth of Nations and is to this day remembered quit fondly in the Ministry. As MoS spokesman, Jeremy Clarkson, said; “Next to Douglas I always felt like a very unrefined ape being at a garden party for very civilized Victorians!” Hurd was replaced by Digby Jones, another up-and-coming from the Ministry’s seemingly endless supply of clever lads. Jones, who had a past in the Royal Navy, would in time be known as the British Voice, as the Ministry of Space gained even more power and influence under his leadership than seen under Douglas Hurd.
As part of the Commonwealth’s plan to build two bases on the Lunar surface a series of exploration missions was undertaken by the Commonwealth Space Agency. Lt. Commander Richard Noble’s Moon mission was followed quite closely by nearly everyone in the Commonwealth. His ecstatic shouts of “By God, we’re back!” would make him famous almost overnight and help generate renewed interest in space!
Along with the manned Moon missions the first elements of the HMSS Churchill was launched from the Kilimanjaro Launch Facility. As one Black Duchess booster after another lifted off into space, the space station begun to take shape in its geostationary orbit, and in mid-1986, Rear Admiral Woodward, could raise his command at the station. HMSS Churchill was operational, and a week later the 101st Near Orbit Squadron, consisting of four AVRO Sparhawks and two of the brand new AVRO Starfires too became operational. Together with the HMS Protector that would be decommissioned in 1991 and later the Moon based squadrons the British and the Commonwealth once again ruled the space ways.
Under the supervision of Mark Oliphant rapid progress was being made on the Moon bases as well as the space stations. The boffins working under the aegis of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, CSIRO, had offered a design for a functioning Moon base as early as 1972, and after summarizing the demands that the special conditions on the Moon placed on its construction, the CSIRO engineers put to work. The CSIRO hoped to reflect both the need for security in regard to the hostile environment and manmade threats!
The design that was chosen was made by one of CSIRO’s many top-engineers, Dr. Parkinson. The Elizabeth Moon Base was build around eight cylindrical 12-tonnes pressurized habitation modules and five unpressurized 10-tonnes resource modules, which housed solar arrays and regenerative fuel cells for generating electrical power and the like. Furthermore three 8-tonnes unpressurized hangar modules, containing two Moon Range Rovers, or Moon Minis as they were called jokingly by the crew - and two OTL’s vehicles, that was needed to get to and from the near Moon orbit transfer points, and one pressurized 60-tonnes barrack module - for a squad of Marines from the Commonwealth Space Reaction Force - was added. Later a atomic power plant module, an extended hangar system for a squadron of AVRO Starfires, five air/space defence modules and several 16-tonnes science modules would by added to the base. The Elizabeth Moon Base would primarily be run by the military, while the next base, the Edward Moon Base, would by run by CSA, CSIRO and other mostly civilian agencies.
Dr. Parkinson and his team planned to use hydroponics - or more correctly hyrdroculture as developed by professor Allen Cooper in 60’s -; crops grow in troughs containing pebbles flooded with a nutrient solution, to supply the inhabitants of the Elizabeth Moon Base with some of their daily needs and to generate some amount of oxygen. In addition chlorella algae would be grown in vats to serve as nutritional raw material, rich in vitamins and fat. Dr. Parkinson and the other boffins at CSIRO was certain that it would be possible to extract water from ice deposits at the Moon’s poles – the deposits had been discovered by Lt. Commander Noble and kept top secret -, thus nearly making the base self-sufficient. One of Parkinson’s more imaginative colleagues even suggested growing mushrooms in pressurized caverns beneath the Moon’s surface.
Two rather radical systems were proposed for launching raw materials from the Moon; a high-energy laser lift system and a mass-drive. The high-energy laser lift system consisted of a cargo rocket that actually carried no rocket engine, but only fuel. The fuel would be heated by a ground based laser and thus set off. The Mass-driver was a more complex system and was tied into the Special Defence Initiative’s railgun project, which really had taken off due to the new superconductors. The mass-drive was basically a magnetic sled that hurled its cargo of up to 20-tonnes into space via a 250m long accelerator track.
The technology used to build the Lunar Mass-Drivers would find use on Earth as well, but in guise of the Blue Flash magnetic levitation train. The Blue Flash and its sister train the Sky Rider ran the 31miles – roughly 50km - long Liverpool-Manchester railroad in just about 15 minutes, not even pushing its speed close to the limit of some 450km/h - about 280mph. The success of the Liverpool-Manchester line soon inspired other nations and cities for that matter to build MagLev-railroads. Fittingly, MagLevs would later be used on the Moon connecting the various bases and major installations.
As one of his first official acts Digby Jones went on an extended tour in the United States of America. When accused of intruding on the Foreign Office’s turf, Digby said: “The Commonwealth’s future prosperity fundamentally depends on delivering success in the international arena. The Commonwealth needs to justify its scientific achievements and use them to gain access to new markets and to be able to invest overseas, as well as exchange ideas with friendly nations and organizations. My visit will allow me to assess developments in British-US commercial relations and to hear the US administration’s plans particularly with regard to exploitation of space!”
After the otherwise very successful tour Clarkson commented on the Americans: “They pretend to be a bunch of savages who likes their beer cold, their deer raw and their music country-style. Even the engineers try to look and act like rough and tough frontiersmen, who drive huge pick-ups for no other reason than you could go to the woods at weekends with your other pick-up-driving friends and dream up plans to rid Europe of its damned back-stabbing pinkies!”
Clarkson’s harsh comments were not the only thing plaguing the Americans in the late 80’s. Their much talked about and very ambitious Orion Project suffered a catastrophic mishap as the USS Orion blew up on its launch pad in Nevada, spraying atomic material all around. Conspiracy-theorists and people with anti-British sentiments in general, were quick to point to the “obvious” connection to MoS Jones’ visit.
In the USSR the more and more economically strained nation struggled along with its space programme as the impressive and vital Zenit boosters never fully lived up to their great promise.
Good points, Birdy! Yes, I suppose an influx of European refugees with various religious backgrounds might dillute, so to say, the religious tensions between Catholics and Protestants a bit. Combined with a healthy economy and better education all round it might make for a better Ulster, especially if London and Dublin are on good, if not friendly terms and share responsibility over the area.a more peaceful NI might be possible if the government intervenes in the Protestants monopolizing good jobs there- Churchills social conservatives might do that i suppose + the better British economy means more opportunities and affluance to break down barriers.
+ they could've thrown in some of those european refugees who while being probably pro british will not understand the Ulster divide - say Orthodox Russians, Catholic poles and lithunians, luthern germans (displaced from east) jews camp survivors. this might make it somewhat less polarised.
you mention Maglevs?.......
MagLevs, you say?! Funny you should mention MagLevs, Birdy, as I've just wrote a bit about that in the latest installment - Part XVI - above!
You're more than welcome, Passit! And I'm glad you still find this ATL interesting and worth commenting on!Hey! I'm happy because of these updates!!!!
I've just sent the first few parts off to Timelines & Scenarios, so the Ministry of Space should be up in uninterrupted form sometime soonish!
Best regards and all!
- B.
Part XVII
Part XVII
Engineering is not merely knowing and being knowledgeable, like a walking encyclopedia; engineering is not merely analysis; engineering is not merely the possession of the capacity to get elegant solutions to non-existent engineering problems; engineering is practicing the art of the organized forcing of technological change... Engineers operate at the interface between science and society!
- Dean Gordon Brown.
I could have gone on flying through space forever!
- Yuri Gagarin.
In the late 80’s the Soviet Unions economy became more and more strained. Commonwealth intelligence experts estimated that it neared the breaking point, but then again that had been said for nearly ten years now, Still, it was seen as a rather ominous sign, when General-Secretary Jevgenij Primakov brought two young and energetic men from the more liberal part of the Communist Party into the inner circle. The two men, Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin, did their best to revive the failing Soviet economy, but all their reforms met fierce resistance from the Kremlin Old Guard and the military, especially since Gorbachev and Yeltsin pleaded that the space programme should be put on hold for at least a five year period and funds for the Red Army diverted to civilian industries and purposes. Ironically, just weeks before the violent collapse of the Soviet Union, General Alexander Lebed finally pacified Afghanistan, the country that had damaged the USSR’s economy as much as the space programme. As the USSR fell apart behind him, General Lebed nonetheless secured his men’s loyalty and ordered a withdrawal to the Motherland, or what was left of it! In the years to come Lebed and his Afghan-veterans would play a vital role in re-establishing order and re-create their country as present day Russia.
As the USSR totally disintegrated, so did the space programme that involuntarily caused said collapse. Several former Soviet citizens and military personnel were caught in space as the Cosmodromes at Baikonur, Kasputin Yar, Plesetsk and Valdivostock went off-line or got taken over by various nationalistic rebel groups. The Commonwealth Space Reaction Force now saw its first use as Griffyn Assault Shuttles escorted by AVRO Starfire deltas were used to board and “save” the stranded Soviets and secure their equipment.
With the collapse of the Soviet Union troubles soon spread all over Eastern Europe. A few peaceful revolutions took place – Czechoslovakia and Bulgaria to name the most obvious -, but most were violent uprisings where security forces, the military, police and paramilitary units fought savagely to gain control of their country. Even as France intervened in Yugoslavia the country disintegrated and eventually was split down ethnic lines – luckily the heavy French presence kept violence to a minimum albeit Serb and to a lesser extent Croat nationalists managed to cleanse most of the territories under their control for unwanted minorities.
France also managed with American and Commonwealth, mainly British, backing to secure a peaceful reintegration of the People’s Republic of Prussia into the German Federation. There were, however, a few tense weeks in May where Prussian State Security refused to disarm and disband, but the Prussian People’s Army made it clear what would happen if the men of the PSS did not do as they were told. There was a price to pay and thus most of the PSS-goons went unpunished for their deeds as they slowly faded from public life. Mercenaries and terrorists with a past in Prussian State Security would plague the world for years to come.
At the same time Czechoslovakia broke up peacefully. The Czech Republic immediately sought closer ties with France and the German Federation, while Slovakia soon began to participate in the power struggle taking place Eastern Europe. The several thousands of French troops stationed in the Germany Federation, nor the Austrian Army could prevent Hungary and Romania clashing over Transylvania. Just as Poles, Lithuanians, Slovaks and Byelorussians on occasion found the use of armed might preferable to negotiations. The threat of British intervention and American pressure only just kept poor Albanian from getting devoured by its neighbours.
The new instability brought on by the collapse of the USSR made it imperative for the British military to update its land and air forces. The Army, for a long time overshadowed by their brothers in the airborne regiments and the Royal Marines, and the RAF had been somewhat neglected for some time, but now new armoured personal carriers, light scout vehicles and tanks – all light air transportable units suitable for rapid deployment – flowed into the Army’s armoury. New multi-role stealth planes – Wraiths and Spectres - replaced the often updated, but very dated Shadows, just as a new series of helicopters entered service. The new military demands strained the military’s budgets to the breaking point and some bases and regiments were merged or simply closed or disbanded, but the various armaments industries and cutting edge research laboratories – deep into portable laser and gauss gun research fx. - around the Commonwealth prospered immensely.
With the Orion catastrophe, the US space programme went on a backburner for the rest of the 80’s as the national space effort was reorganised and the two competing space agencies, the United States Navy Advanced Research Projects and the Air Force Space Operations Agency, was merged into one agency, the National Aeronautics Agency, NAA. US President George Bush hoped to see the US re-enter the space race in the early 90’s with renewed vigour.
The NAA soon had its first success with the launch of the American equivalent to the CNS, the Aerospace Positioning System. The APS was more or less a copy of the Commonwealths Cook Navigational System, but at least originally was more focused on military needs than civilian ones, which meant that many US companies and corporations were forces to use the CNS. Allies of the USA, mainly France and the newly enlarged German Federation, had been junior partners and contributors, or more correctly providing funds, to the development of the system, but the dependency on the United Sates began to annoy Paris and Berlin – the latter having found new strength after the collapse of the USSR and the reintegration of the People’s Republic of Prussia into the Federation. Thus a Franco-German space initiative was launched centred around a supergun-design.
The initiative was led by the French-married, but former Canadian citizen, Gerald Bull, and news soon began to leak from France that the spacegun programme was to bear fruit. News that were confirmed as a model of Bull’s spacegun design, Project Bonaparte, went on display at the Paris International Exhibition for Military Production in 1994, and two real size spaceguns were built by Giat Industries based in Versailles, in co-operation with Lohr Industrie of Hangenbieten, France. The guns had a 500-feet long barrel and weighed just over 2,000 tonnes. Their rocket-assisted shells could send telephone-booth-sized satellites up to 2,000 miles into space. The French and their German partners among other things hoped to launch satellites that would give them some independence from their US allies and add some new and potent space weaponry to their aging arsenal. General Albert Duprecht, the C-in-C for space related programmes and weapons, confirmed some time after the Paris International Exhibition that his country, and Germany, was working on space weapons that could be launched from Bull's spaceguns. He also revealed that the guns could launch shells with atomic payloads.
The primary Bonaparte projects and, apparently, two alternative projects was placed in French Equatorial Africa, near Franceville. The area, normally known as Gabon, already had an extensive infrastructure and a well-educated and trained pool of manpower as the area had been home for a booming oil-industry since the 70’s. Still, it would take the French, and their German allies, nearly four years to build up sufficient infrastructure in the area, primarily in the form of a railroad from Port Gentil via Lambarene to Franceville and the launch site.
After the success of the Elizabeth Moon Base the Commonwealth Space Agency and the clever lads and lassies at CSIRO began in 1993 to construct a mostly civilian Moon base named Edward. With the lessons learned from the building of the Elizabeth Moon base taken to heart, the core of the new Moon base was centred around a cluster of pressurized cylindrical habitation modules and unpressurized resource modules. The main living areas were huge pressurized, naturally, dome-like structures, called Rao-domes after its Indian inventor, Professor U.R. Rao. The domes used the newest technology and were made of composite materials, fibres and ceramics, which made them extremely resistant, light and safe.
As part of the effort to build the Edward Moon Base, construction began on the Zuckerman Space Station in L1- Moon/Earth transit orbit. Plans had originally called for the space station to be built in the time between the construction of the two Commonwealth Moon bases, but the CSA saw themselves capable of handling both projects at once. The smoothness of the process was a great tribute to MoS Digby Jones and his team at the Ministry and all the people at the CSA and CSIRO.
British PM, Margaret Thatcher, and her successor, Michael Portillo, both basked in the successes in space and capitalized immensely from them as the Conservative Party now dominated the Parliament and British politics totally. It has to be said, though, that both PM’s loyally backed the efforts in space, they didn’t just bask in its glory, and made sure that neither the Ministry itself, nor the inter-Commonwealth organs lacked British support!
The Conservatives nearly endless popularity was also aided by the booming British and Commonwealth economies. The emergence of the household computer in the late 70’s and early 80’s combined with the discovery of superconductors did wonders for the economy, and as the space programme expanded, a string of new high tech materials and groundbreaking medicines was released and drove the economy upwards like a AVRO Starfire delta firing its rocket booster.
As the Commonwealth’s infrastructure in space grew and the threat from the USSR diminished, the CSA turned to exploration and scientific missions to understand space and its environment. Rumours even began to surface about a suggested Mars project…
As part of this new series of civilian science missions a number of probes were launched from Kilimanjaro Launch Facility. The Endeavour and the Beagle was sent around the Solar System to gather new knowledge and help the boffins back at CSA to understand space better. And as part of the very secretive Mars Project, or so the press at least believed, the Clarke, incl. the Darwin Robotic Rover, was launched and sent to the Red Planet.
Part XVII
Engineering is not merely knowing and being knowledgeable, like a walking encyclopedia; engineering is not merely analysis; engineering is not merely the possession of the capacity to get elegant solutions to non-existent engineering problems; engineering is practicing the art of the organized forcing of technological change... Engineers operate at the interface between science and society!
- Dean Gordon Brown.
I could have gone on flying through space forever!
- Yuri Gagarin.
In the late 80’s the Soviet Unions economy became more and more strained. Commonwealth intelligence experts estimated that it neared the breaking point, but then again that had been said for nearly ten years now, Still, it was seen as a rather ominous sign, when General-Secretary Jevgenij Primakov brought two young and energetic men from the more liberal part of the Communist Party into the inner circle. The two men, Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin, did their best to revive the failing Soviet economy, but all their reforms met fierce resistance from the Kremlin Old Guard and the military, especially since Gorbachev and Yeltsin pleaded that the space programme should be put on hold for at least a five year period and funds for the Red Army diverted to civilian industries and purposes. Ironically, just weeks before the violent collapse of the Soviet Union, General Alexander Lebed finally pacified Afghanistan, the country that had damaged the USSR’s economy as much as the space programme. As the USSR fell apart behind him, General Lebed nonetheless secured his men’s loyalty and ordered a withdrawal to the Motherland, or what was left of it! In the years to come Lebed and his Afghan-veterans would play a vital role in re-establishing order and re-create their country as present day Russia.
As the USSR totally disintegrated, so did the space programme that involuntarily caused said collapse. Several former Soviet citizens and military personnel were caught in space as the Cosmodromes at Baikonur, Kasputin Yar, Plesetsk and Valdivostock went off-line or got taken over by various nationalistic rebel groups. The Commonwealth Space Reaction Force now saw its first use as Griffyn Assault Shuttles escorted by AVRO Starfire deltas were used to board and “save” the stranded Soviets and secure their equipment.
With the collapse of the Soviet Union troubles soon spread all over Eastern Europe. A few peaceful revolutions took place – Czechoslovakia and Bulgaria to name the most obvious -, but most were violent uprisings where security forces, the military, police and paramilitary units fought savagely to gain control of their country. Even as France intervened in Yugoslavia the country disintegrated and eventually was split down ethnic lines – luckily the heavy French presence kept violence to a minimum albeit Serb and to a lesser extent Croat nationalists managed to cleanse most of the territories under their control for unwanted minorities.
France also managed with American and Commonwealth, mainly British, backing to secure a peaceful reintegration of the People’s Republic of Prussia into the German Federation. There were, however, a few tense weeks in May where Prussian State Security refused to disarm and disband, but the Prussian People’s Army made it clear what would happen if the men of the PSS did not do as they were told. There was a price to pay and thus most of the PSS-goons went unpunished for their deeds as they slowly faded from public life. Mercenaries and terrorists with a past in Prussian State Security would plague the world for years to come.
At the same time Czechoslovakia broke up peacefully. The Czech Republic immediately sought closer ties with France and the German Federation, while Slovakia soon began to participate in the power struggle taking place Eastern Europe. The several thousands of French troops stationed in the Germany Federation, nor the Austrian Army could prevent Hungary and Romania clashing over Transylvania. Just as Poles, Lithuanians, Slovaks and Byelorussians on occasion found the use of armed might preferable to negotiations. The threat of British intervention and American pressure only just kept poor Albanian from getting devoured by its neighbours.
The new instability brought on by the collapse of the USSR made it imperative for the British military to update its land and air forces. The Army, for a long time overshadowed by their brothers in the airborne regiments and the Royal Marines, and the RAF had been somewhat neglected for some time, but now new armoured personal carriers, light scout vehicles and tanks – all light air transportable units suitable for rapid deployment – flowed into the Army’s armoury. New multi-role stealth planes – Wraiths and Spectres - replaced the often updated, but very dated Shadows, just as a new series of helicopters entered service. The new military demands strained the military’s budgets to the breaking point and some bases and regiments were merged or simply closed or disbanded, but the various armaments industries and cutting edge research laboratories – deep into portable laser and gauss gun research fx. - around the Commonwealth prospered immensely.
With the Orion catastrophe, the US space programme went on a backburner for the rest of the 80’s as the national space effort was reorganised and the two competing space agencies, the United States Navy Advanced Research Projects and the Air Force Space Operations Agency, was merged into one agency, the National Aeronautics Agency, NAA. US President George Bush hoped to see the US re-enter the space race in the early 90’s with renewed vigour.
The NAA soon had its first success with the launch of the American equivalent to the CNS, the Aerospace Positioning System. The APS was more or less a copy of the Commonwealths Cook Navigational System, but at least originally was more focused on military needs than civilian ones, which meant that many US companies and corporations were forces to use the CNS. Allies of the USA, mainly France and the newly enlarged German Federation, had been junior partners and contributors, or more correctly providing funds, to the development of the system, but the dependency on the United Sates began to annoy Paris and Berlin – the latter having found new strength after the collapse of the USSR and the reintegration of the People’s Republic of Prussia into the Federation. Thus a Franco-German space initiative was launched centred around a supergun-design.
The initiative was led by the French-married, but former Canadian citizen, Gerald Bull, and news soon began to leak from France that the spacegun programme was to bear fruit. News that were confirmed as a model of Bull’s spacegun design, Project Bonaparte, went on display at the Paris International Exhibition for Military Production in 1994, and two real size spaceguns were built by Giat Industries based in Versailles, in co-operation with Lohr Industrie of Hangenbieten, France. The guns had a 500-feet long barrel and weighed just over 2,000 tonnes. Their rocket-assisted shells could send telephone-booth-sized satellites up to 2,000 miles into space. The French and their German partners among other things hoped to launch satellites that would give them some independence from their US allies and add some new and potent space weaponry to their aging arsenal. General Albert Duprecht, the C-in-C for space related programmes and weapons, confirmed some time after the Paris International Exhibition that his country, and Germany, was working on space weapons that could be launched from Bull's spaceguns. He also revealed that the guns could launch shells with atomic payloads.
The primary Bonaparte projects and, apparently, two alternative projects was placed in French Equatorial Africa, near Franceville. The area, normally known as Gabon, already had an extensive infrastructure and a well-educated and trained pool of manpower as the area had been home for a booming oil-industry since the 70’s. Still, it would take the French, and their German allies, nearly four years to build up sufficient infrastructure in the area, primarily in the form of a railroad from Port Gentil via Lambarene to Franceville and the launch site.
After the success of the Elizabeth Moon Base the Commonwealth Space Agency and the clever lads and lassies at CSIRO began in 1993 to construct a mostly civilian Moon base named Edward. With the lessons learned from the building of the Elizabeth Moon base taken to heart, the core of the new Moon base was centred around a cluster of pressurized cylindrical habitation modules and unpressurized resource modules. The main living areas were huge pressurized, naturally, dome-like structures, called Rao-domes after its Indian inventor, Professor U.R. Rao. The domes used the newest technology and were made of composite materials, fibres and ceramics, which made them extremely resistant, light and safe.
As part of the effort to build the Edward Moon Base, construction began on the Zuckerman Space Station in L1- Moon/Earth transit orbit. Plans had originally called for the space station to be built in the time between the construction of the two Commonwealth Moon bases, but the CSA saw themselves capable of handling both projects at once. The smoothness of the process was a great tribute to MoS Digby Jones and his team at the Ministry and all the people at the CSA and CSIRO.
British PM, Margaret Thatcher, and her successor, Michael Portillo, both basked in the successes in space and capitalized immensely from them as the Conservative Party now dominated the Parliament and British politics totally. It has to be said, though, that both PM’s loyally backed the efforts in space, they didn’t just bask in its glory, and made sure that neither the Ministry itself, nor the inter-Commonwealth organs lacked British support!
The Conservatives nearly endless popularity was also aided by the booming British and Commonwealth economies. The emergence of the household computer in the late 70’s and early 80’s combined with the discovery of superconductors did wonders for the economy, and as the space programme expanded, a string of new high tech materials and groundbreaking medicines was released and drove the economy upwards like a AVRO Starfire delta firing its rocket booster.
As the Commonwealth’s infrastructure in space grew and the threat from the USSR diminished, the CSA turned to exploration and scientific missions to understand space and its environment. Rumours even began to surface about a suggested Mars project…
As part of this new series of civilian science missions a number of probes were launched from Kilimanjaro Launch Facility. The Endeavour and the Beagle was sent around the Solar System to gather new knowledge and help the boffins back at CSA to understand space better. And as part of the very secretive Mars Project, or so the press at least believed, the Clarke, incl. the Darwin Robotic Rover, was launched and sent to the Red Planet.
New post - part XVII - up above! Hope you like it!
How does the fall of the USSR play out? Well enough?
It actually seems like Britain is considering building a few in OTL!
Haha, the Clarkson quotes are actually more or less real ones, so I haven't got a clue to what he means, him being Clarkson and all! The idea is that Americans - in this ATL most being hardline Republicans of the neo-conservative school - absolutely loath most Social Conservatives Europeans, aka the British! Clarkson's just being rude!
My regards!
- B.
How does the fall of the USSR play out? Well enough?
Ah, sorry if that's unclear. The CSA is a Commonwealth umbrella organization, while the MoS is purley British and one of the more powerfull ministries in the cabinet. Other Commonwealth nations probably have national space agencies of some sort as well!
Thank you! MagLevs are always cool!nice, esp of course with the Maglevs in Britain.
does the remark about americans wanting to rid Europe of its back stabbing pinkos refer to European leftists, the British? or the Soviet Union.
It actually seems like Britain is considering building a few in OTL!Haha, the Clarkson quotes are actually more or less real ones, so I haven't got a clue to what he means, him being Clarkson and all!
The idea is that Americans - in this ATL most being hardline Republicans of the neo-conservative school - absolutely loath most Social Conservatives Europeans, aka the British! Clarkson's just being rude! My regards!
- B.
Thank you! MagLevs are always cool!
Haha, the Clarkson quotes are actually more or less real ones, so I haven't got a clue to what he means, him being Clarkson and all!
My regards!
- B.
well yes, there are some plans for Maglevs, dunno whether they'll bear fruit- interestingly there not all long distance London- Edinburgh line although there's ideas of that vein floating around, but also regional as in your Blue Flash thingie- good names btw.
I'm wondering if once the Soviet Union collapses, Britain and the Commonwealth might see another big influx of Russians and Eastern Europeans fleeing economic instability and strife, consider that OTL Israel took 1 million russian jews in the 90's. with no Israel i would expect those people to turn to the US and great Britain as well as those Jewish enclaves in Rhodesia + Canada etc
Churchill and Britain seem to have a good reputation in Poland.
So the USSR colapse more violently in TTL? That will be an interesting time.
A little bit niptick here. Since Berlin is in the People's Republic of Prussia, I think the capital of the German Federation will be elsewhere. I go for Frankfurt, the historical seat of the German Cofederation.
We're coming close to the close here didn't we? I still waiting to see the India post though
I see more trouble broiling in the Far East as Sinkiang and Manchuria are without their master pulling their leashes, and China has its (American) master distract elsewhere.
A little bit niptick here. Since Berlin is in the People's Republic of Prussia, I think the capital of the German Federation will be elsewhere. I go for Frankfurt, the historical seat of the German Cofederation.
We're coming close to the close here didn't we?
I still waiting to see the India post though I see more trouble broiling in the Far East as Sinkiang and Manchuria are without their master pulling their leashes, and China has its (American) master distract elsewhere.