A Blunted Sickle - Thread II
- Thread starter pdf27
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The Sahara is always a good bet. Somewhere in the Aouzou strip would be an effective political statement.Montreal
EDIT : or Kufra.
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I'm assuming Bruno hasn't died as accidents like that I consider to be very butterfly prone. Though if @pdf27 disagrees I will accept their ruling on the matter.
South Australia also had a test site in OTL though that involved evictions of the indigenous in the area.
British nuclear tests at Maralinga - Wikipedia
I believe Balbo is still alive in this timeline too. Though his position had been weakened, it's possible that the prestige of being the guy who correctly called German weakness combined with better contacts in the military and Italy's empire than Ciano could give him a shot.
That being said, if Balbo made it to the top by this stage it would have to be at the head of a fragile coalition of military officers, fascisti and imperialists.
Eric S. Raymond
Banned
Montreal
Oh, dude, that's harsh! Would you please relocate the good restaurants out first?
Eric S. Raymond
Banned
Good point about Balbo being alive. I don't like his chances much, though; if I'm reading between the the lines of the histories correctly, the players he would have needed to back him considered him a lightweight, rash and self-promoting. His adventurism in Africa was an embarrassment that Mussolini had to squash by reporting secret Italian troop deployments to the British!
And it's also not like he had a monopoly on judging that German bluster might hide a weak position; OTL Mussolini carefully limited his involvement in the Axis until the fall of France was pretty much an accomplished fact, which is why Italy is still not a belligerent ITTL.
Edit: Oops, I forgot about Italy jumping in late.
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Well, I've now finished what I think is my third readthrough of this TL, and it's still as fantastic as ever. With the war now all but finished at the dawn of 1942, it's inevitably bringing into light for me the sheer scale of the catastrophe it was OTL (at least when it comes to Europe – China, on the other hand, doesn't seem like it's going to have a happier ending at all).
It will be very interesting to see where things go from here – it's hard to shake the feeling that only half the fireworks have gone off, and we're standing there with a lighter wondering what to do now. The USSR and Japan still feel like open questions, and ones without especially happy answers to boot.
I also can't help but wonder about how alternate history will develop ITTL – will "what if Germany won the war" be as popular? Will it even be broadly recognised as possible? Will the fall and recapture of Paris be treated as the critical moment, or will some other POD be considered more plausible? To say nothing of the speculation there's bound to be about Hitler (by the way, allow me to add my congratulations for that particular twist).
Hope you have as good a Christmas as possible this year, pdf, and here's to a happier 2021.
It will be very interesting to see where things go from here – it's hard to shake the feeling that only half the fireworks have gone off, and we're standing there with a lighter wondering what to do now. The USSR and Japan still feel like open questions, and ones without especially happy answers to boot.
I also can't help but wonder about how alternate history will develop ITTL – will "what if Germany won the war" be as popular? Will it even be broadly recognised as possible? Will the fall and recapture of Paris be treated as the critical moment, or will some other POD be considered more plausible? To say nothing of the speculation there's bound to be about Hitler (by the way, allow me to add my congratulations for that particular twist).
Hope you have as good a Christmas as possible this year, pdf, and here's to a happier 2021.
Since my most recent reread was just the second half of the story, I went back and am now rereading the first half.
That was five years ago IRL, but less than six months in universe (the prior update was July 15, 1941). I know the Entente had a good second half to 1941, and the chaos in German command will help too, but you've clearly updated your views on what was possible quite immensely since you wrote that. Any comments as to what led you there? I'm curious.
(This isn't me saying that you're wrong and need to change it, or anything like that. Just wondering, because you've usually got a reason.)
A Blunted Sickle
I could see the german collapsing in the next Entente big push, but I do think the invasion of Germany proper might still be a bloody affair. Even the plotter who wanted to remove Hitler still tought they could keep their Munich gain and their eastern european conquest. So I expect the Entente...
www.alternatehistory.com
That was five years ago IRL, but less than six months in universe (the prior update was July 15, 1941). I know the Entente had a good second half to 1941, and the chaos in German command will help too, but you've clearly updated your views on what was possible quite immensely since you wrote that. Any comments as to what led you there? I'm curious.
(This isn't me saying that you're wrong and need to change it, or anything like that. Just wondering, because you've usually got a reason.)
My feeling on the change reading this is that it isn't Entente logistics, it is German Logistics.
Entente Logistics beyond the Rhine are *still* bad. The British have an entire Army in the North that is more or less out of Petrol. The tanks wouldn't be able to maneuver at all, and some of their other troops have been equally stripped of Petrol. the French are *slightly* better, but they aren't fighting anyone.
The Germans on the other hand *have* no logistics and as such no manuverability and as such *horrible* morale.
The Entente wanted to wait for April to get all of their Is dotted and Ts crossed to get their logistics for beyond the Rhine from a 2 up to an 8 before pushing on. The Polish uprising made them go when they were at a 3.5 and to their surprise, 3.5 is enough when your opponent is at a .5. (pulling the numbers out of thin air)
Eric S. Raymond
Banned
Was in OTL, too. German logistics was brittle, overextended, and hampered by not switching to a war economy until too late. For example the Heer had a chronic shortage of the copper needed to manufacture the driver bands on artillery shells. And yet a Fascist-run economy continued to make pianos with copper-wound strings until, hmmm, 1944 IIRC.
OTL these deficiencies were masked by a series of lucky breaks, notably the ability to plunder France before they ran out of various critical stocks. ITTL not so much,
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True, but iTTL, Fuel (particularly oil but also coal) becomes the key for Logistics *much* earlier. The Romanians iTTL have no reason to be a friend to the Nazis iTTL and without the Plundered gold (fairly early in the story the author indicated what had happened to the gold of various Nations, the Nazis got almost *none* of it compared to OTL (not even sure they got all of the Polish and Czech) paying for it is much more difficult. I guess they could be buying Soviet Oil, but I *really* don't think they are getting much US Oil through Neutrals...
I'm not really sure why the Germans particularly ran short of coal compared to pre-war other than miners becoming soldiers. What percentage of German mines are in the Ruhr and on the Rhine (where they were functionally *in* the war zone)? France apparently did have some coal mining areas in the Southern part of the country, including some pretty close to the Italian Border, which would have been safe.
The original British preferred test site for thermonuclear weapons was the Kermadec Islands, which are uninhabited extinct-ish volcanoes. Sidney Holland turned down the request due to a pending election, and the testing moved to Christmas Island instead after issues with the Americans over Malden Island.
Mussolini is still on top, having had rather a good war. He's having to govern a little more by consent (at least from the other big fish), but there isn't anybody in a position to challenge him. As and when he dies of natural causes (or possibly decides to retire), that may change - but he's only 58 at this point so nothing is likely to happen for some considerable time.
My thinking is that we're going to see things gradually calm down - the post-war world will certainly have lots of potential conflicts in it, and it's hard to see there being any particularly big peace dividend. Then again, the world as a whole is significantly richer than in OTL - 40 or so million more people are alive, and the destruction of being fought over multiple times is more or less limited to Belgium and parts of northern France. Even the combatants have spent vastly less - partly this is a shorter war, partly the way the war was fought in OTL caused very expensive solutions to be adopted (a squadron of Lancasters for instance cost about as much as a battleship, and had an expected life of ~20 sorties). I'm anticipating a succession of crises, small wars, etc. however - the USSR are likely to be pretty sensible as they have been so far, the Japanese less so.
Christmas was OK if a bit stressful - was staying with the in-laws in South Carolina, so managed to avoid the UK turning into Plague Island while I was gone and now have 10 days in quarantine to look forward to. However combining a 4 year old who was up no later than 5am every day with a grandmother-in-law who had a habit of saying "Heil Hitler" in a thick German accent then claiming it was a joke didn't really help me relax.
The major change on my part was the realisation of just how big an advantage holding on to Fortress Holland was for the Entente. When I wrote that, I was still thinking in terms of supplying an advance from France/the Channel Ports over a road network, which would be downright hellish.
Fortress Holland holding however means that not only to the Entente have a bridgehead over the Rhine, but they also have access to one of the biggest ports in the world virtually undamaged and with water transport available from it to a forward distribution point - ITTL, by the time the advance kicked off that was on the Ruhr. That pushes the logistical limit for the supply chain further forward, to roughly Berlin or so.
The other thing to be aware of is that the imperative for fighting this battle is wholly political rather than military - the commanders have been told to advance, and are extremely lucky that the German army was already in dire straits after the battles in Belgium and Northern France. It isn't just (or even largely) a command problem - the Heer is seeing sky-high desertion rates and has essentially no mobility left meaning that Entente forces with what would otherwise be crippling supply problems are just about able to keep moving. The state of the German army is in turn the product of several factors - collapsing civilian morale after repeated lost battles, Hitler taking personal command of the Heer, more encirclements of forces in France/Belgium than I originally planned (the terrain and deployments just led to them), etc.
So given that it's over 5 years of writing I don't think it's that revolutionary - more evolutionary based on the way I write the story.
German morale isn't just (or even primarily) about logistics. Most of their prewar trained troops are gone, and those left are largely 1918 veterans and green newcomers. They're desperately short of the basics of industrial war, have been drafted following a long string of defeats and the leader who inspired them has just vanished. They've also got a command structure at war with itself between Army and Party, with a very confusing chain of command as a result combined with poor comms for those orders they do get. IMHO, that's a recipe for mass desertions.
The German problems with coal really start when the Ruhr is occupied - that's both a major coal producing area and a nexus on the transport network. The remaining mines are mostly in the Saar (where they are subject to air inderdiction) or far to the east.
Thank God he did. If Britain didn't want to test nukes in their own backyard, why the hell should New Zealand agree to them (or anyone) testing them in ours. (Note: We were really annoyed by the French government for the whole Moruroa thing, plus their bombing of the Rainbow Warrior in the 1980s)
Besides, detonating a nuclear weapon on, or in, an active, or even dormant, volcano located on the Ring of Fire, doesn't strike me as being a particularly bright idea.
Errolwi
Monthly Donor
I wonder when they last thought there was volcanic activity there. A Dept of Conservation worker was killed by a small eruption in 2006.
Raoul Island
Raoul Island is the largest of the Kermadec Islands, over 1,000 kilometres north-east of the North Island. It is the emergent part of a large volcano, almost 20 kilometres in diameter. Although apparently isolated, the island lies on the Kermadec ridge, a chain of ...
I mean, one can imagine worse places.
Like, say, the Piton de la Fournaise. Or the Anak Krakatau.
Eric S. Raymond
Banned
I admit it's sort of entertaining to imagine a nuke test in Anak Krakatoa triggering a super-eruption that would be audible a thousand miles away, cause a tsunami, throw enough ash into the atmosphere to cause another year without a summer, etc. As long as one doesn't have to live through it...
But I don't think the numbers work out, especially since these early devices are going to be rather small (in the kiloton range). They're going to be good at producing an atmospheric blast wave but not nearly as effective at at shattering or vaporizing rock. Not good enough to breach the hundreds or even thousands of meters of cap-rock over the magma chamber.
ITTL they don't know this yet, but OTL we have lots of records of surface nuclear tests to reassure us on this point.
A month after discovering this timeline, I finally got to the last page of it. I've never read anything which goes into such granular depth to explore the effects of a point of divergence in so many ways. Saying this is par for the course for alternate history as a genre, but it's truly fascinating how different things would be if events played out even slightly differently. The timeline itself is the main course, but as much as I wanted to skip ahead I just couldn't stop myself from perusing the buffet of information other commenters have provided on a variety of subjects, from politics to international trade to military R&D. My knowledge of many of these topics is quite limited by comparison, so it has been incredibly educational to view the discussions which have spawned from this thread. I eagerly look forward to more and applaud the author for putting so much effort into an excellent piece of work!