"What Madness Is This?" - A Timeline

I love hearing about the culture ITTL and seeing how different it is while still being terrifyingly similar to OTL. Also, evil Superman!
 
Great Update. :D

Thanks! :D

Also, evil Superman!

I guess your username means in the Madnessverse's equivalent to AH.com, you and I would be at each other's throats:

Colonel Union said:
Y U have papist username, Napo?!!!1!11

Napoleon53 said:
Y U have fascist username Colonel Union?! It's illegal to have that username!!11!1 The Imperial secret police r coming 4 U!

:p:D

Speaking of Superman, how are Jews being treated?

No different then when I described them in the 1800s; there just aren't that many of them, and the ones there are tend to be fairly well-to-do and productive members of society, so the Union isn't going to antagonize them.
 
This last update had personally been my favorite of the three cultural updates. :D:cool: I loved the pop culture references to OTL, the creative alternative movies and comic books, how some of them mirrored OTL so creatively without being too obvious, the fictional characters, etc. What can I say, it was just great.

One another subject, I have a question about some alternate religions that could exist in this timeline. So far we have the AFC and TTL's Ghost Dance religion (it might be known as another "-ism" later on), but what others? Mormonism has been butterflied away, but what about the Bahá'í Faith? Since butterflies don't reach to the Middle East for a while, it may still exist. As for some alternate faiths that could exist in this world, maybe a Germanic/Norse neo-pagan revival in the Rheinbund, maybe a new Chinese religion, and a new christian based religion in Russia. Thats all I got for know. Just brainstorming I guess. :cool:
 
Awesome update! Loved the stuff about Pennsylvania Jack. I find it amusing that the RU's supposed to be this "godly" nation, yet they love such violent cinema. The irony and hypocrisy is so funny! XD
 
Thanks, you two!

@Zoid: Baha'i probably does exist still. Go ahead and PM about the other stuff; I don't want to blow to much of the future. ;)

@Kirito: Then I did my job, as that was exactly what I was intending to show. :D



This ranks right up there with the most important chapters so far. Out of the 60-some chapters, this is in the top five. Also, all but three of the illustrations are hand-made by me! :D
Prepare to shocked as you read about...

THE GREAT PURGE OF 1954
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Virginian cartoon of the Great Purge of 1954. Nixon can be seen as a groveling brown-noser next to Steele's boots.

"There is only one group! Only one! With the courage and the guts to face up to the fact that this battle is racial! This has nothing to do with politics, economy, free enterprise, taxes. It is the question of is this country to going to be dominated and run by the white Christian people who built it, or is it going to be run and dominated by a bunch of beatnik scum, Communists, anarchists, aliens, and other no-good people that are trying to take it away from us, and tell us that we mustn't even talk about this, because it's 'hate.' Well I don't see anything hateful about defending your home, country, and family from aliens that are invading and taking it away from you! And that's what they're doing! We must cleanse! The Party and the Nation must be purged of infiltrators and subversives! All hail!"
- Charles Oswald, July 4th, 1954

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In the 1940s, "Charles Oswald" distinguished himself in the Union armed forces, first in the Aeroforce, and then in ORRA, where he was known as the "toughest, meanest, most brutal ORRA officer in the world." He quickly became high on the list of Joe Steele's most trusted officials and friends. In 1953, during Joe Steele's umpteenth reelection campaign, Oswald had been a fierce supporter, speaking at rallies all over the nation and whipping up support. He was a brutal, xenophobic lunatic, constantly talking about how proud he was of his "Scottish-Anglo-Saxon-Germanic" heritage. In 1949, he was placed in charge of the ORRA Propaganda Department. His brother "Robert William Oswald" was appointed Ambassador to Europe, and he went on numerous good-will tours to England, Prussia, and Scotland, strengthening ties in the midst of the Cold War's heat-up.

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Members of the pseudo-fascist, all-female Prussian Blackshirt Legion give the MDP salute to Robert Oswald upon his arrival in Berlin (1953)

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The Swedish Parliament greets Robert Oswald in Stockholm (1954)

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Chuckie Oswald works on a report about the Ohio Country Reeducation Camps (1950)

In 1954, Steele decided that war was coming... soon. Because of this, he secretly began planning to purge his officer corps, the Manifest Destiny Party, and the government itself. He invited two of his best friends, Chuckie Oswald and Richard Nixon, to a meeting in late February, and there they made their plans. On July 4th, 1954, Oswald took to the talkie box to announce the nation was about to "cleanse itself" of all the "beatniks, anarchists, and other no-good subversive people." Immediately, Consular Order 702 took effect, with the RUMP troops swarming the streets and government offices. Within minutes, Second Chief Consul Franklin Roosevelt was shot to death in his study, Manifest Destiny Party head Chief Minister Edward Martin of Pennsylvania was brutally stabbed in the MDP Headquarters in the middle of a speech, and ORRA Sky Marshal Joey Gobells was mowed down in a drive-by shooting in front of the Shicagwa City Hall, just in front of a huge statue of Abraham Aaron Lincoln (it took city hall maintenance men a month to get the blood off). All over the nation, dozens of MDP officers were getting viciously murdered.

At last, Steele finally brought the Union's history full-circle, and took to the airwaves to announce that all political parties except for the Manifest Destiny Party were banned forever. He was also now First Chief Consul for life, as would be his successors. He burned Roosevelt's body and then had Chuckie Oswald sworn in as Second Chief Consul. Nixon was fitted for his new uniform as Chief Minister of the Party. ORRA remained in shambles for several weeks as Steele tried to find a good replacement for Gobells. He finally chose none other than Oswald's old Texas-born nemesis Lyndon Johnson (luckily for Oswald, former police officer Johnson didn't remember a certain John Kennedy...). Sky Marshal Johnson took power with an iron fist, reorganizing ORRA and getting it in working order again.

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Sky Marshal Lyndon Johnson

Nixon personally turned in a few dozen of his own friends to RUMP and ORRA troops, and built up a reputation among other Union officials as the biggest bootlicker in Steele's officer staff. He pulled levers to get his buddy Leslie King, Jr., the same man who played that fateful game of baseball with young Kennedy in the 1920s, put in the position of Chief of the Military Police.

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Oswald once again took to the airwaves once the Great Purge was over:

"Soldiers! Citizens! Patriots! The crisis has passed. You may go about your daily business as usual. We have achieved this day two things: the purity of our government and the purity of our party. We have total control, once again, and the government is back in business. America, our sweet Union, is now a unitary, one-party Christian state. We have taken the next step in establishing a more perfect union. As we advance toward the End of Days and establish the New Jerusalem, remember this: One people for America. One faith for America. One army for America. Everything for America! All hail the most proletarian fascist American people!"

Johnson and King joined forces to crush all descent in the aftermath of the Great Purge. Countless "enemies of the state" were shipped to the camps in the Ohio Country. Joe Steele was not in good health during this time, and he was preparing for his "Last Crusade." He let Oswald control most of the everyday goings-on of the government while he spent his time plotting military strategies for his holy war. Nixon controlled the Party itself, and since his way of thinking was just as psychotic, if not more so, than Steele's, Steele was just fine with that. Nixon said in his first speech before the Party on July 15th, 1954:

"I'm going to continue this fight. The purge is over, but there are still infiltrators among us. I'm going to campaign up and down America until we drive the crooks and the anarchists and those that defend them out of Philadelphia!"

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Seems like the Soviet Union combined with the worst aspects of Nazi Germany now! :eek: I can't wait to see how TTL's "WWI" goes. :D
 
Seems like the Soviet Union combined with the worst aspects of Nazi Germany now! :eek: I can't wait to see how TTL's "WWI" goes. :D

Exactly! :D

I don't think I posted these in this thread yet, so here are the banners adopted by Military Police and the Office of Racial and Religious Affairs after the Great Purge of 1954:

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Custos Morum - "Keeper of Morals"

Audi Vide Tace - "Hear, See, Be Silent"
 
I just caught up; I'm glad to see a large number of semihistorical figures because it makes the timeline relatable. Does "Leslie Lynch Jr." know "Oswald's" true identity?
 
Excellent! For some reason, I'm getting the feeling that Oswald will still be a dictator, but will more merciful to the ethnic and religious minorities.
 
Well shits really hit the fan now. :eek: The RU's has been getting more and more insanely fascist, totalitarian and just batshit crazy by the day, and now it all reaches a climax! Genius, simply genius. We can only imagine hat happens next.....

Also, I've made great headway over the guest chapters over the past few days. They should be done in a day or two at most. :)

Also the ORRA flag looks like the flag of Puerto Rico, which is pretty ironic. Where you going for that?
 
That's awesome, Zoid! :D I can't wait to read them. As for the ORRA flag; nope, no connection to 'Rico, just a basic variation of the MDP flag, ITTL. The way the eagle is positioned, it could be seen as an eagle flying forward, with the blue triangle pointing to a "More Perfect Union." :D

I just caught up; I'm glad to see a large number of semihistorical figures because it makes the timeline relatable. Does "Leslie Lynch Jr." know "Oswald's" true identity?

I agree; there are going to be plenty of fictional characters and figures, but throwing in OTL ones keeps it exciting and different. :cool: And nope, he wouldn't remember Kennedy/Oswald, since they were just little kids who met once.

Excellent! For some reason, I'm getting the feeling that Oswald will still be a dictator, but will more merciful to the ethnic and religious minorities.

Danke! :D Although I'm not too sure about that second part. ;):eek: Oswald is a raving, heartless murderer, and he thinks if he doesn't seem "uber-loyal to the Party and Faith" then people will start... questioning... his ethnicity. If anything, he thinks he needs to persecute more to seem more patriotic. :eek:
 
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Here we go. :eek: I'm rather pleased with how Steele's speech came out; I think it's pretty convincing as a totalitarian lunatic. The last bit of sanity in the world has broken, it's finally time to let a century-and-a-half worth of chickens come home to roost.

PREPARE FOR WAR
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"And so, by decree of First Chief Consul Steele, the flag formerly known and flown as the flag of the Republican Union is henceforth decommissioned as the flag of this our beloved nation. A new flag, based on the banner of the great Manifest Destiny Party and the flag of the Old Republic, is hereby now officially the flag of the Republican Union. The flag, with its 29 stars representing the union of the honorable states of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Delaware, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Iowai, Nova Scotia, Chersonesus, Michigania, Vermont, Oregon, North Dakota, South Dakota, East Lewisiana, West Lewisiana, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Hawaii, the Greater American-Pacific Co-Prosperity Sphere, South Mexico, North Mexico, Durango, Texas, and Korea, will fly over all government buildings and military installations and will be known as the Star-Spangled Banner. Banners of the old Republican Union and the unique Manifest Destiny Party flags may still be flown for historical value or for Party rallies. The Restoration of our Great Country is at hand! Our Union shall be perfected! God bless America! All hail!"

-MDP Chief Minister Richard Nixon on the floor of the Capitol Building, July 4th, 1955


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"This is a glorious hour!" proclaimed Steele. He was speaking at the Pittsburgh Rally Grounds, just two hours after Nixon announced the new flag before the nation. "Today, our people have remembered their proud heritage. The Star-Spangled Banner flies high over the Capitol and the Consular Mansion. It is a bitter-sweet moment. We the most proletarian and fascist American people have overcome decades of adversity and conflict, and emerged into light."

"All hail! Steele! Steele! Steele! Steele!" chanted the army, giving the Roman salute to the First Chief Consul.

"And now, we are a strong nation. A world power. Through the will of the people, we have become one of the mightiest empires mankind has ever seen. Our factories are the most productive. Our people are happiest. We have kept the glory of the Enlightenment alive. We have shown the heathens behind the Papist Curtain that we shall not bow to the Bonapartian Papist Polocks, and that the American people stand ready to take on the world. We must purge the world in the fires of Manifest Destiny. And so, today, I have given the Tripartite Empire an ultimatum. If they do not hand over the Canadian Territories--duly owed to our forefathers for their sacrifice in the War of 1812--by the date of August the 1st, Anno Domini 1955, the full might of our army, navy, aeroforce, and people... shall be brought to bear upon not only the Territories, but also upon the nascent Kingdom of Quebec. If our demands are not met, we shall take what we want, and more, by force. We shall ruthlessly slaughter the enemies of freedom, and wipe the curse of Catholicism off the map of North America forever."

The crowd went absolutely crazy. Camera crews recording the event reported their speakers busting from the torrential hurricane of the cheers.

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"Yes, my soldiers. If our demands are not met, we shall be at war. Once declared we shall not accept any plan of surrender until all of Canada and Quebec as fallen under our control. I have assurance from our allies the King of Sweden, the Kaiser of Prussia, the British republics, and all the other friends of freedom, that they shall declare war. Sweden has been the sufferer of many indignities at the hands of the Corsican Ogres and their Danish-Norwegian allies. Prussia has been disallowed from bringing the Confederation of the Rhine into its Protestant fold. They are tired of this nonsense. They are tired of the Bonapartian usurpers. My close personal friend, Kaiser Helmut Wilhelm I of Prussia, has demanded that the French fops hand over Lower Saxony, Hesse, and Thuringia, and if they do not do as such, he will have no choice but to march in and take the entirety of the Confederation. Another associate of mine, King Gustaf VI of Sweden, has announced that if Helmut Wilhelm's demands are not met, and if ours are not met, then he shall invade the Kingdom of Denmark-Norway and annex it into the Greater Swedish Rike. Our favorite Englishman, Winston Churchill, is in a position to liberate the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands and march on France!"

More wild cheers came from the army. They were finally on the verge of total holy war. Their dreams were coming true.

"We are at a momentous epoch, my soldiers. Let us pray to Almighty God for strength in the coming World Purge. War or no war, come August 1st, 1955, the world shall be changed indelibly and forever. The American eagle has cleaned its wounds. No longer does it languish, dreaming of a glorious future and a past that could have been. That glorious future is upon us today! The American Eagle is spreading its wings, and its war cry has been heard across the Earth. We will not stop, we will not desist, we will not rest, until what we want is ours. We will not stop until the cancer of Catholicism is purged from this continent forever! We shall not stop if the Southrons take the side of the Corsican Ogres, no, we shall defeat them, too! We will not stop until our armies march across this planet, an unstoppable, irresistible force. We will not stop until every fool that resists us finds his capital a pile of rubble. The American people shall march on Planet Earth, heads held high, and we shall win."

"HAIL! HAIL! HAIL!" chanted the army, now joined by ordinary citizens rushing into the stadium. "The Union Forever" was struck up by a huge orchestra. And then, a different chant was started. One that just hearing made the hairs on the back of the necks of Joseph Steele stand up. Soon, it had spread across the nation, striking pure, unadulterated terror into Canadians and Southrons. All over the country, citizens poured into the streets, waving their new flag and chanting as one:

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"USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA!"



 
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Here we go. :eek: I'm rather pleased with how Steele's speech came out; I think it's pretty convincing as a totalitarian lunatic. The last bit of sanity in the world has broken, it's finally time to let a century-and-a-half worth of chickens come home to roost.​

How are they defining Canada? Only the areas around Ontario because it used to be called Upper Canada? The Plains and islands as well? Which, if you go by OTL demographics, would have loads of Slavs. And may I suggest something I brought up long in the past? New Brunswick. The area was part of Nova Scotia IOTL until around the time Loyalists started filling in, but were not announced to have separated here in time for the treaty which only gave the island to the Americans. Seems like as good as any of a propaganda reason to reclaim more than half the land a treaty supposedly gave the Americans. As it was not all given, it could also be used as a legal excuse to nullify the past treaty if it was not handed over immediately, putting the pressure on the King of Quebec. The way the speech is given it would only require one or two sentences to be changed to throw that casus belli in.
 
Ahh, and there is a good chance for the Danish and Norwegians to defect. The two had been moving apart during the Napoleonic Wars due to the British blockade, as well as their destruction of the Danish navy meaning they had to become French allies or be destroyed by them and the Prussians. Any chance of a uniting of the two kingdoms, with a son of the Swedish king and a daughter of the Danish one being married as King and Queen of Norway? Until such time as their parents leave their own thrones and they make court in Göteborg/Gothenburg. I look forward to the next maps made of this but may try and make my own. There are a few things in the past maps that confused me to no end.
 
How are they defining Canada? Only the areas around Ontario because it used to be called Upper Canada? The Plains and islands as well? Which, if you go by OTL demographics, would have loads of Slavs. And may I suggest something I brought up long in the past? New Brunswick. The area was part of Nova Scotia IOTL until around the time Loyalists started filling in, but were not announced to have separated here in time for the treaty which only gave the island to the Americans. Seems like as good as any of a propaganda reason to reclaim more than half the land a treaty supposedly gave the Americans. As it was not all given, it could also be used as a legal excuse to nullify the past treaty if it was not handed over immediately, putting the pressure on the King of Quebec. The way the speech is given it would only require one or two sentences to be changed to throw that casus belli in.

Good question: Quebec and the Empire manage the officially titled "Canadian Territories," which is everything north of the Union except Quebec.

And that is a neat idea about New Brunswick, but Steele actually wouldn't care; he wants war. He knows Caesar isn't going to just hand over Canada. In fact, being who he is, Napoleon VI might not be willing to hand over one square foot of soil to anyone. The main tactic here is just to make it look dignified and official and what not, instead of just smashing into Canada ala OTL Barbarossa. And if they capitulate (0.01% chance), so be it, says Steele; the Union will hit them up the next year for even more land until it eventually blows up in horror. So basically, Steele doesn't care about an island, he wants a third of a continent or else. :eek: The Union has always hated that Romney Treaty from the World Congress anyway. "We deserved wayyyyyy more than puny Nova Scotia for our sacrifices."

EDIT: And as for Scandinavia: you'll just have to wait and see. ;) Even I'm not sure what's going to happen there yet.
 
And that is a neat idea about New Brunswick, but Steele actually wouldn't care; he wants war. He knows Caesar isn't going to just hand over Canada.
More like Hitler with Poland than in not giving demands unlike earlier, when he gave ridiculous demands in order to split and weaken his neighbors? The thing is about wars that, unlike the Draka, most people use some sort of excuses for wars. Though, since the Republican Union wanted more than Hitler's Germany, it may not be entirely necessary. Any chance for secondary demagouges to go about demanding land for the Dutch, the liberation of the Protestant Swiss from their mountain prisons, or something something Vinland/Helluland/Markland? And I do imagine the Russians are mobilizing.
 
More like Hitler with Poland than in not giving demands unlike earlier, when he gave ridiculous demands in order to split and weaken his neighbors? The thing is about wars that, unlike the Draka, most people use some sort of excuses for wars. Though, since the Republican Union wanted more than Hitler's Germany, it may not be entirely necessary.

Any chance for secondary demagouges to go about demanding land for the Dutch, the liberation of the Protestant Swiss from their mountain prisons, or something something Vinland/Helluland/Markland?

And I do imagine the Russians are mobilizing.

I actually haven't read any Draka stuff (I get the backstory, but don't know anything else about them). The RU is just a warmongering menace to society, as Civ 5 would say. :D

There is definitely going to be interesting stuff happening in central Europe as people look at the Union and the Balkans and realize "fascism works! Yay!" :p There'll be all kinds of nuts running around trying to copy the Union. I already showed Prussia has the Blackshirt Legion, for instance.

And you'll notice I haven't mentioned the Russians lately. I have... interesting plans for them. :D
 
Wow. Well shits really hit the fan now. :eek: Finally, the moment we've all been waiting for is finally here, the climax of the whole story! :D:cool: I really should post that Joker pic again. Honestly its so much more appropriate to post it now than the two times previously.

Oh, what the heck....

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