A Day in July: An Early 20th Century Timeline
- Thread starter Zulfurium
- Start date
Just caught up (oh, the rigours of the job) and excellent work as always. Somehow, I get the impression that in TTLs present "Germany" will be a synonym for "The last interesting thing happend there in 1914". But then again, "quietly prosperous" isn't a bad fate after centuries of turmoil.
I've been binging this timeline over the past week and I've got to say that I'm really impressed by your work here Zulfurium and will continue to follow this with great interest.
I do hope that Olga and the Tsarists can manage to get it together and hold on, if nothing else than to see what a surviving White Siberia would look like down the line, but if not I'm won't get too worked up about it. I'm also curious to see how America responds to the ongoing events in Mexico, if they respond at all, and how it will effect the 1928 elections.
I do hope that Olga and the Tsarists can manage to get it together and hold on, if nothing else than to see what a surviving White Siberia would look like down the line, but if not I'm won't get too worked up about it. I'm also curious to see how America responds to the ongoing events in Mexico, if they respond at all, and how it will effect the 1928 elections.
Don’t I know it, new internship has been kicking my ass when it comes to actually getting stuff written during the week, but I am happy to hear that you have caught up.
As regards Germany, that is a pretty good summary of the 1920s. However, don’t expect the coming decade to be anywhere near as quiet. With Stresemann retiring, Wilhelm II raring to get involved in matters again and the consistent weakening of the governing coalition, the status quo won’t be able to hold up much longer. Although there is a ton of stuff happening in Germany, it just isn’t as explosive.
It is great to have you on board, I really appreciate the compliment - particularly considering your own master piece.
Olga is in something of a pickle as things stand and making it through will definitely be a challenge. However, it should be noted that the near-decade that Siberia has had to develop seperate lay from the rest of Russia and the way in which Royalist Whites of all sorts congregated in the region should have a rather significant impact on the longevity and uniqueness of a distinct emirgre identity.
I will say that McAdoo won’t get anything together in time for the 1928 election, but after that- who knows?
The 1928 elections are going to be rather explosive, but we won’t be dealing with that just yet. Sorry to be cryptic, but all should be revealed by Sunday.
Eh, there are easy weeks and then there are weeks where there is not much free time (or you are plain exhausted). Or they make you travel. And then you have to be a responsible adult human being on top of that. I miss university.
Header: "romantic" refers to making decisions based on a percieved moral or emotional imperative (no matter how twisted), while "rational" refers to the blocking out of said impulse - basically boiling down to math and the categorical imperative.
Wrt Germany: I think ITL the long struggle between "romanticism" and "rationality" in Germany will end in favor of "rationality". OTL WWI spawned a strong desire for rationality as an ideal, as the war was seen as a crucible which would burn away any emotional weaknesses. Funnly enough, OTLs Nazis were rather emotional with their B&S BS. For a literary comparision "All quiet on the western front" is an expressionist piece and "Storm of Steel" for the more nationalist/rationalist take on the matter. As again to the Nazis the author of the latter work, Jünger, first liked the Nazis because they restored some measure of pride to then nation but came rapidly to reject them because his idea of "nation" was not bound up in mythical "blood" - and ultimately the Nazis killed his son for "defatist propaganda". Despite all their tappings, the Nazis ultimately were "romantics" who capitalised on the fact that Weimar was a rational state which failed to salve the desire for purpose, since it was born out of defeat. After WW2 the pendulum swung back to "rational" as a method of coping/suppression, and presently we are back in "romantic" territory.
ITL the Reich "won" or at least has something to show for its attempts. Jünger probably will still write his things, and may be even more influential in redefining "german nation" as a more universal perception, far from OTLs mysticism. Which of course would cause considerable upheaval, but ensure medium to long-term stability (since it effectively would redefine all minorities as "german").
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Update Twenty-Seven (Pt. 2) - Explosive Americana
Explosive Americana
Great Mississippi Flood of 1927
A Challenger Arisen
The middle years of McAdoo's presidency had been characterised by the strengthening of nativist and moralistic impact at a federal level, as men like John Nance Garner, William E. Johnson, Hugo Black and Clifford Walker all amassed significant power and influence with which to shift government policy. It was an alliance between many of these figures that saw the establishment of a federal censorship board aimed at policing Hollywood, the replacement of William J. Burns as Director of AILE with esteemed police chief August Vollmer who would bring an immense degree of practicality and efficiency to the law enforcement efforts of AILE in the years to come, while anti-Catholic hysteria was brought to a boil, most significantly in the establishment of the highly inflammatory senatorial Black Commission under the recently elected Hugo Black, which held hearings questioning the loyalty of Catholics to the United States and publicly discussing the idea of enforcing a pledge of allegiance at the start of every Catholic church service, to great outrage in Catholic circles (5).
Great Mississippi Flood of 1927
A Challenger Arisen
However, the strengthening of national nativist sentiments greatly angered and distressed large sections of the public, provoking ever strengthening resistance to these ascendant forces. During this time, attacks on some of the various tariff measures introduced under President Wood earlier in the decade grew increasingly fierce as the American economy found its efforts at international trade hampered by foreign protectionist trade barriers with limited success in negotiating better trade agreements, particularly with the Mitteleuropean trade block which had formed around Germany and which actively sought to limit American market penetration to the great frustration of McAdoo's New Yorker friends. The solution would prove to be an economic alliance with Great Britain which significantly lowered trade barriers between the British Empire and the United States, with the effect that American investors and sellers found exciting new markets to exploit while the saturated British economy found an outlet in the still underserved American economy. Perhaps most significant in this effort was the new markets that this trade deal opened for an American agricultural sector in crisis.
The technological developments of the last half century had revolutionised farming while the settling of the West and Far West had meant that the American agricultural sector had proven overly successful - producing far too much food to actually be consumed. By 1926, it had looked as though the American agricultural sector's downturn would turn into a depression but swift action in the form of this new trade deal and the passing of the McNary-Haugen Farm Relief Bill in September of 1927 which called for an equalisation fee, the government was to segregate the amounts required for domestic consumption from the exportable surplus. The former were to be sold at the higher domestic price, the world price plus the tariff, using the full advantage of the tariff rates on exportable farm products, and the latter at the world price. The difference between the higher domestic price and the world price received for the surplus was to be met by the farmers of each commodity in the form of a tax or equalisation fee, which would be paid by American consumers in the form of higher food prices. While the bill proved unpopular in business circles and with the average consumer, this was more than made up for by the ecstatic response from the agricultural sector which soon saw its profit margins increase and the immense economic pressure for expansion, which had seen many farmers go into significant debt, justified, fuelling the rapid rise in agricultural land prices over the course of the rest of the decade (6).
What neither McAdoo nor anyone else had prepared for was the incredible flooding which engulfed the Mississippi River Basin starting in the autumn of 1926 and peaking during the first half of 1927. The Flood of 1927 had its origins both in nature and in man. In the late 1920s, technological advances kept pace with the growing economy. Heavy machinery enabled the construction of a vast system of levees to hold back rivers that tended to overrun their banks. Drainage projects opened up new, low-lying lands that had once been forests but had been left bare by the timber industry. Feeling protected from flooding by the levees, farmers borrowed money with easy credit from banks booming with the record levels of the stock market. They expanded their fields to low-lying areas on their own property or moved to new lands that were fertile from centuries of seasonal flooding. They felt safe behind the levees and secure in selling their crops to new markets, now accessible by railroad, truck, automobiles, and even international shipping. The “buy now, pay later” mindset of the 1920s encouraged people, including farmers of modest means, to purchase washing machines and other labor-saving devices on instalment plans. Even nature seemed to be cooperating, as the summer of 1926 brought rain instead of drought.
The spring of 1927, however, saw warm weather and early snow melts in Canada, causing the upper Mississippi to swell. Rain fell in the upper Midwest, sending its full rivers gushing into the already swollen Mississippi. Its destination, the Gulf of Mexico, acted as a stopper when it too became full. Then, in the South, it began to rain. On Good Friday, 15th of April 1927, the rains came, setting all-time records for their breadth and intensity. They came down over several hundred thousand square miles, covering much or all of the states of Missouri, Illinois, Arkansas, Mississippi, Texas, and Louisiana. In New Orleans in 18 hours there were 15 inches of rain—the greatest ever known there. In the spring of 1927, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers assured the public that the levees would hold. The Corps had built them, after all. But, as had been the case at the mouth of the river, the Corps overestimated its own prowess and underestimated the power of the river.
The Corps built the levee system to confine the river and if necessary, it was thought, the flow would be reduced with outlets that would divert part of the river into the biggest outlet of all, the Atchafalaya River, into the Gulf, or at Bonnet Carre, just above New Orleans, into Lake Pontchartrain and then to the Gulf. But no cut-offs were dug. Nor was another idea, to build reservoirs on the tributaries to hold back the water. Nor were any outlets dug. The Corps of Engineers—and then the residents of the Valley—relied on levees only. At high water the river spread and rose even higher. In turn, the Corps raised the height of the levees, from two feet to 7.5 feet to as much as 38 feet. The Corps was confident that its levees-only system would hold in the river, and it so promised. The levees failed. Here, there, sometimes it seemed everywhere, the river undercut the levees. Water poured through breaks called crevasses, covering with 30 feet of water land where nearly one million people lived while twenty-seven thousand square miles were inundated. By the 1st of July, even as the flood began to recede, 1.5 million acres were under water. The river was 70 miles wide. Still the rains came. The river rose higher. Most threatened was the Mississippi Delta, between Memphis and Vicksburg, possibly the richest, most fertile land in the country, perhaps in the world (7).
Into this disaster stepped one man. Having won a bitterly contested gubernatorial race in 1924, Huey P. Long had spent the first couple of years in office under attack from all sides. In New Orleans, the Bourbon Democratic political machine known as the "Old Regulars" presented constant challenges to Long's reformist efforts, hampering efforts to put Long loyalists in positions of power and sabotaging his policy initiatives. Most significantly, Long had found himself increasingly at odds with the growing power of the Ku Klux Klan, which was working to secure influence particularly in northern Louisiana, in the process infringing on Long's base of support. The result was that over the course of 1925 and 1926, Long had slowly but steadily begun to systematically turn his enemies against one another while building a base of support through a purposefully inclusive political approach, supporting poor Catholics in the south against the Old Regulars, turning his supporters in the north against the Indiana and Ohio Klansmen who led the charge in establishing the KKK in the north and making a couple important alliances with prominent power players in New Orleans who were hoping to break the power of the Old Regulars and create a new political machine.
When the Great Flood of 1927 occurred, Long was thus looking for an opportunity with which to not only bludgeon he enemies, but also a chance to propel himself to national prominence and prestige. While hundreds of thousands were displaced by the flood, the treatment of those displaced varied immensely based on race, wealth and state. In the south, Planters feared that their sharecroppers, both black and white and most deeply in debt, might not return home from the Red Cross camps, leaving them without enough labor to put crops in the fields when the land dried out. This led to a controversial mandate in which sharecroppers, particularly black sharecroppers, were admitted to and released from the camps only under the supervision of their planters. African Americans needed a pass to enter or leave the Red Cross camps while some were forced at gunpoint by law enforcement officials to survive on the levees indefinitely in makeshift tents as water rose around them while would-be rescue boats left empty. They were forced by the National Guard with fixed bayonets to work on the levees, in addition to other flood relief efforts, while the Red Cross maintained refugee camps for flood victims through 15th September, when many people, black and white, were finally able to return to their devastated land to try to survive the winter and start over with virtually nothing.
The only southern state in which this process did not play out would be Louisiana, where Governor Long used the emergency situation to crack down on his political enemies - many of them coming from the aforementioned planters, and threw his full efforts behind supporting the devastated population of his state. Long spent almost every hour of the day during the crisis resolving one issue or another, touring camps, rustling up money and supplies for the effort, personally joined rescue efforts and much more, all of it with a coterie of journalists in his wake, churning out favourable national news stories by the dozens. By the end of the year, the loud, smooth-talking, charismatic and hilariously crass Louisiana governor was a national sensation, polarising opinions like few others could (8).
Never one to let an advantage go to waste, Long used his new-found popularity to solidify his hold on power, firing hundreds of opponents in the state bureaucracy, at all ranks from cabinet-level heads of departments and board members to rank-and-file civil servants and state road workers, and replaced them with loyalists across the board. These clients who depended on Long for a job would then pay a portion of their salary at election time directly into Long's political war-chest, creating bonds of patronage and significantly strengthening Long's financial resources. Finally finding an opening through which to put his political plans into action, he began ramming a massive slate of reforms down the throat of the Louisiana legislature and established an unprecedented series of public works which would help ensure another flood like that of 1927 never happened, ensuring work and prosperity for his poverty-stricken supporters and reconstruct the insufficient infrastructure network of the state, building roads, bridges, hospitals, and educational institutions.
During this time Long's preexisting educational efforts also went forward, with a free textbook program for school children and the expansion of adult literacy classes which had been among Long's first policies to be implemented. This massive increase in expenditure provoked what amounted to a revolt in the state legislature, with Philip H. Gilbert, the President of the State Senate, moving to impeach Long on charges ranging from blasphemy to abuses of power, bribery, and the misuse of state funds. Gilbert had grossly miscalculated his position. The moment word of the accusation emerged, people took to the streets in protest. With Long judiciously fanning the flames and a sea of angry protesters shouting their outrage at the steps of the State Senate, to say nothing of Long's political allies picking apart the charges one by one in the senate, Gilbert soon found himself under attack from even his own supporters, with whispers of Gilbert's own improprieties making their way into Long-friendly newspapers putting Gilbert's position under threat. Rather than face the humiliation of losing the impeachment vote, Gilbert decided to withdraw the impeachment accusations and eat craw. The defeat of Gilbert was undoubtedly the climax of Huey Long's four-year struggle to consolidate power and put him in a position to press forward with his own goals.
1928 also saw the true start of Huey Long's all-out war on the Ku Klux Klan, with his purging of suspected Klan members from positions of authority in northern Louisiana, banning of cross burning and the passing of a controversial anti-mask law directly targeting the klansmen's dress. With Long leading the way, anti-Klan Democrats in the south finally had a strong figure to rally behind in their condemnations of the Klan - soon provoking open violence across many of the southern states. The matter came to a head when a lone klansman arrived in Shreveport at one of Long's many anti-Klan rallies in the lead-up to the 1928 elections and opened fire on him from the crowd with a cry of "Long Live the Klan!". While Long was unharmed, two men in the crowd were killed and a woman gravely injured by the hail of bullets before the crowd turned on the klansman and literally tore him to pieces, his body so mutilated that identifying him proved impossible. The reaction to the news that a man as prominent as Huey Long had nearly been murdered by racist thugs would fundamentally shape the election to come (9).
Footnotes:
(5) It is worth noting that the appointment of Vollmer to direct AILE is unlikely to accomplish what McAdoo's followers were hoping it would. While he brings a great deal of professionalism and competence to the position, he proves rather dismal at the political-police aspects which AILE has taken on itself. Under Vollmer, AILE is far more effective in pursuing cases - particularly against gangsters and criminals of varying sort, but AILE's ability to impact policy and serve as the president's bludgeon against political enemies is severely downgraded. This does have the effect of making AILE significantly more independent from the Presidency, which might prove an issue in the future.
(6) The Farm Relief Bill is based on an OTL effort which was vetoed multiple times. ITTL it passes with McAdoo's sanction and along with the new trade deal with the British has the effect of pushing the agricultural sector into overdrive to an even greater extent than IOTL. While the new international markets which are opened up here will prove a boon, it does have the effect of significantly reducing efforts to actually resolve the issues present in the agricultural sector.
(7) This section is basically all OTL, but it is necessary to set the stage for events to come and understanding the sheer scale of the catastrophe should really help.
(8) Finally Huey Long takes center stage. IOTL the Great Mississippi Flood was the key building block for Long's rise to power in Louisiana, where he used the governor's handling of the crisis to bludgeon him into defeat - and there were definitely plenty of failures in the effort. ITTL, however, Huey is the one on the hot seat - and like with every other situation in his life he is going to exploit it to the fullest. By personally overseeing every aspect of the crisis, Long is able to spin the crisis into a positive and win the support of a massive portion of Louisiana's population. By the end of 1927, he is finally in a position to secure control of Louisiana - and if there is one thing Huey Long knows how to do, it is crushing his enemies and basking in the lamentation of their women (might be a bit hyperbolic, but then again I do think the Kingfish might have given Genghis Khan a run for his money when it comes to ruthlessly destroying his enemy).
(9) Huey Long's 1924-28 gubernatorial term is a rather tense time for Louisiana, with Long struggling a great deal more than OTL to consolidate his power. However, by 1928 he is able to force an end to internal political resistance while he emerges as a significant political figure on the national stage as well. Huey is still the autocratic bully of OTL who is willing to be as unscrupulous as he has to in order to get his way, but the fact that he does this on a populist, anti-racist platform is a rather fun idea to explore. I am sorry to say that it will take a bit before we get into the 1928 elections, but this should give you guys an idea of where we are headed.
Endnote:
That brings this week's section to an end. I really hope that you enjoyed this section and the way in which Huey Long entered the TL proper. With the next two sections we will be digging into what is going on in the Caribbean and South America, with a focus on the impacts of a shifting , activist Catholicism, and the way in which American interests are challenged and develop in the region.
I enjoyed writing this section a lot. There is just something about Huey Long which I have always found rather appealing and I really want to explore his character more so expect him to play an important role in the United States at least for the next period of the TL.
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S h a r e O u r W e a l t h B e c a u s e E v e r y M a n A K i n g B u t N o O n e W e a r s A C r o w n
Bookmark1995
Banned
Huey Long is one of those people in history, like Napoelon, who can't be classified as either hero or villain.
He sought to make a Louisiana where every man was king, but he wanted the biggest crown of all.
There seem to be even greater hints of a backlash against this reactionary political environment.
He sought to make a Louisiana where every man was king, but he wanted the biggest crown of all.
There seem to be even greater hints of a backlash against this reactionary political environment.
The comparison to Napoleon does seem rather apt when I think about it. I personally find Long one of the most fascinating figures of pre-1950s America with a lot of depth to mine.
As for the backlash, you aren't wrong, there is a growing force opposed to the various forces coalescing around the McAdoo government but the question of what form that backlash will take remains to be seen.
Well, since any radical left has probably been dealt with harshly, we're left with either Long's populism, with good policies but damage to democracy, or a republican who does nothing about the economic problems, focusing on the cultural backlash against McAdoo...
Nice to see Long fighting racism. He was an opportunist and certainly moldable in that area if things happen a certain way. I have often compared Aaron Burr to Richard Nixon seeing him as just a scheming politician than a potential Tyrant like his enemies did, but perhaps Huey Long is even a better comparison.
A quick check of Wikipedia shows that he would be eligible to run for President in 1928, whether he would is another question. My guess is 1932 would be more his date. But I don't know if I see McAdoo losing in 1928 unless the depression hits real early that year, yet if he wins I can't see another Democrat in 32. Unless Huey Long brings back the progressives and unites them with populists. He and Al Smith? Long and McNary who ws kind of far left compared to most Republicans?
A quick check of Wikipedia shows that he would be eligible to run for President in 1928, whether he would is another question. My guess is 1932 would be more his date. But I don't know if I see McAdoo losing in 1928 unless the depression hits real early that year, yet if he wins I can't see another Democrat in 32. Unless Huey Long brings back the progressives and unites them with populists. He and Al Smith? Long and McNary who ws kind of far left compared to most Republicans?
Hey everyone,
I hate to have to do this but I won't be able to get an update out this week. Not only did RL end up taking significantly more time than initially anticipated, I have also gone down something of a rabbit hole surrounding Chinese and Korean history which has left me rather distracted. I think I might need to take another hiatus pretty soon - although I will get the two last segments of update twenty-seven out before I do so. There are just too many balls I am keeping in the air at the moment and I need a bit of a breather from working on the TL. When I have a clearer idea about when I will be posting the last two segments of this update I will get back to you.
I hate to have to do this but I won't be able to get an update out this week. Not only did RL end up taking significantly more time than initially anticipated, I have also gone down something of a rabbit hole surrounding Chinese and Korean history which has left me rather distracted. I think I might need to take another hiatus pretty soon - although I will get the two last segments of update twenty-seven out before I do so. There are just too many balls I am keeping in the air at the moment and I need a bit of a breather from working on the TL. When I have a clearer idea about when I will be posting the last two segments of this update I will get back to you.
Update Twenty-Seven (Pt. 3) - Explosive Americana
Explosive Americana
American Fruit Company Brigades in Nicaragua
República Banana
American Fruit Company Brigades in Nicaragua
República Banana
Not to be outdone by the rest of the Americas, Central America would prove as troubled a region for the Americans as anywhere else. With American power having exploded across the region since the start of the century, the weakening of this power and growing distraction posed by internal turmoil during the 1920s had slowly but steadily seen the United States' iron grip on Central America begin to weaken. Having largely come about as an effort to enforce the corporate rule of the United Fruit Company, Standard Fruit Company and Cuyamel Fruit Company in the so-called Banana Republics, the death of UFC President Andrew Preston in 1924, anti-Catholic sentiment against the Vacarro leadership of SFC and anti-Russian biases against CFC President Samuel Zemurray resulted in a precipitous collapse in American Government support for the American Fruit Companies.
While the Fruit Companies were able to continue their explosive expansion during the first few years to follow, a series of major crises across the region beginning in 1925, with the overthrow of Miguel Paz Barahona by General Gregorio Ferrera in Honduras, would set the stage for the sudden collapse of the Classical Era of the Banana Republic of Central America. The rise to power of Ferrera in Honduras came on the back of a Liberal counterreaction to the strengthening of the Honduran Conservatives and swiftly gained the backing of the Fruit Companies, who Ferrera was able to leverage in favor of his regime. This proved vital within the year, when a coup attempt by General Carías was crushed with American might following Ferrara's expansive promises of alliance and partnership, Carías fleeing into exile in Mexico. However, even here the weakening governmental might of the fruit companies was partially revealed when the Marines dispatched proved significantly smaller and worse equipped than previous instances of intervention. While Ferrara worked to consolidate his hold on power, having Carías executed in secret before launching a bloody purge of his supporters, matters in Nicaragua took a turn for the worse in a significant way (10).
The Nicaraguan Civil War came about in response to the landing of Liberal exile forces at Bluefields under José María Moncada, who fought to make the exiled Dr. Sacasa president, in May of 1926. However, when where in the past the American government would have swiftly moved in to secure the situation in their favor, in the case of the Nicaraguan Civil War the matter soon turned into a muddled mess as McAdoo hesitated in the face of fierce isolationist pressure within his own government opposed to the continuous Caribbean adventures of the past decades, with the result that the Conservative government of Emiliano Chamorro was left holding the bag. While there had been some discussion of Chamorro abdicating in favor of a more popular candidate, the lack of American pressure to do so allowed Chamorro to hold onto power for the time being and mass his supporters. By the time McAdoo finally decided to push forward in favor of the Nicaraguan government, it was already well on its way to collapse and required immediate military support. This was a step too far for McAdoo who instead sought to switch sides to Sacasa in hopes of retaining American influence in the region, to which Sacasa and Moncada proved open. However, in the mix was a man who had swiftly emerged as the most successful Liberal commander, and a man bitterly opposed to any sort of partnership with the Americans, Augusto César Sandino (11).
In July 1912, when he was 17, Sandino witnessed an intervention of United States troops in Nicaragua, to suppress an uprising against President Adolfo Díaz, regarded by many as a United States puppet. General Benjamín Zeledón of La Concordia in the state of Jinotega bordering Honduras died that year on 4 October during the Battle of Coyotepe Hill, when United States Marines recaptured Fort Coyotepe and the city of Masaya from rebels, setting an early example for Sandino of the threat posed by American might and beginning his anti-American outlook. In 1921, at the age of 26, Sandino attacked and tried to kill Dagoberto Rivas, the son of a prominent conservative townsman, who had made disparaging comments about Sandino's mother. Sandino fled to Honduras, then Guatemala and eventually Mexico, where he eventually found work at a Standard Oil refinery near the port of Tampico. At that time the latest bout of fighting during the Mexican Revolution was drawing to an end and Obregón was consolidating his power through a new "institutional revolutionary" regime driven by a wide array of popular movements to carry out the provisions of the 1917 Constitution. It was during this time that Sandino was first involved with the Seventh-day Adventist Church, spiritualist gurus, anti-imperialist, anarchist and communist revolutionaries, soon neglecting his work to run in revolutionary circles.
He would get the opportunity to fight in 1924 when he enlisted in Villa's armies in the bitter fighting against Obregón, participating in several of the most significant engagements of the Delahuertista Rising before encountering soldiers of the Feminine Brigades of St. Joan of Arc, a women's secret military order which emerged from amongst the Cristeros, who he was deeply impressed by and reinvigorating what had been a previously increasingly lapsed Catholic faith. While he was mustered out of the Villista armed forces in mid-1925 it would take until early 1926 before he returned to Nicaragua, arriving just as the Civil War was beginning. With Sacasa having declared himself President, Sandino immediately began recruiting a makeshift force composed largely of disaffected gold miners before launching a successful surprise assault on the Conservative garrison at the San Albino mine, gaining access to gold produced there, which he was able to swiftly turn about in order to secure arms in Mexico and qualified military trainers from amongst his Mexican contacts.
When Sandino met with Moncada soon after, the latter had proven distrustful of these guerrillas who had emerged outside of his control, with Sacasa refusing to supply Sandino with arms or a military commission, although Sandino's successful capture of a Conservative arms depot soon convinced other Liberal figures to back him for a commission. By early 1927, Sandino had returned to his home in northern Nicaragua where he recruited local peasants for his army and attacked government troops with increasing success. In April, Sandino's forces played a vital role in assisting the principal Liberal Army column, which was advancing on Managua. Having received arms and funding from Mexico, the Liberal army of General Moncada seemed on the verge of seizing the capital when the American promise of support arrived. During this time Sandino had turned increasingly to a rallying cry consisting of a heady mixture of anti-Americanism, Indegenismo, Communist rhetoric and ardent activist social Catholicism, inspired by his time in Mexico, and as such greeted the idea of submitting to American interference with barely constrained rage (12).
By mid-1927 the Conservatives under Chamorro and Liberals under Sacasa were increasingly looking with alarm to the snowballing might of the Sandinista movement in northern Nicaragua. The result was an American-backed series of secret negotiations which saw Chamorro agree to resign and the ascension of Sacasa, but with power to be divided between the Liberals and Conservatives. Further included in what would come to be known as the Agreement of Ometepe was a promise to combat the Sandinistas should they oppose the proposed peace agreement. With the Agreement of Ometepe signed on the 3rd of August 1927, the Sandinistas were caught by surprise the following day when their erstwhile allies trooped up across northern Nicaragua and began arresting Sandino's supporters. Sandino himself would escape due to the code-breaking efforts of his recently-married wife Blanca Aráuz, a young telegrapher who had proven vital in Sandino's military efforts by taking a lead in misinformation and message interception missions, which gave him sufficient warning to raise the nearest militia to repel the Liberal soldiers sent to take him into custody.
Shocked and betrayed, Sandino fled into the jungle with some of his closest supporters while he worked to rebuild his forces and to make contact with those supporters who remained free. Even as Sacasa was ensconcing himself in the presidential palace, the countryside erupted into revolt against the reconciled Liberals and Conservatives, setting off what would prove to be a long and bitter guerilla war which would leave much of Central America ablaze in the fires of revolution. Banana plantations were targeted almost immediately by the Sandinistas, who set fire to the massive American-owned fields and ambushed both government and corporate representatives across much of the northern half of Nicaragua.
With McAdoo reticent about miring the United States in what promised to be an extended conflict, the fruit corporations and Nicaraguan government were forced into closer cooperation, UFC and SFC importing large amounts of arms, munitions and other war-making materials alongside hundreds of American Great War veterans to form the Fruit Company Brigades, as they came to be known, led by American officers and a leavening of American soldiers but filled out with conscripted field workers and any desperate man looking for a quick cash out. These Fruit Company Brigades soon began terrorizing entire districts of northern Nicaragua while General Moncada mustered a large force sufficient to driving Sandino into exile. The bitter fighting of 1927 and most of 1928 would ultimately culminate in Sandino's flight across the border into southern Honduras, where he was met with open arms by an increasingly starved Honduran peasantry, General Ferrera's reign having tipped over into bloody tyranny following the assassination of his eldest son by Conservative opponents. Late 1928 and early 1929 would see the peace in Honduras collapse completely into utter chaos when one of Ferrara's erstwhile supporters Justo Umaña attempted a coup against him, hoping to end the increasingly paranoid man's regime, setting the fragile peace in Honduras over end (13).
1929 would see Sandino's revolutionary movement reemerge as a major threat to the regimes of the region as the inspiring message of his movement spread across the region. In El Salvador the ruling Melendez-Quinonez dynasty of presidents came to a precipitous end with the assassination of President Pio Romero Bosque, a successor and ally to the Melendez-Quinonez presidents of the preceding two decades, leading to an attempt by General Maximiliano Hernández Martínez to take power, only for the populace to erupt into bloody protest. Securing arms from the Sandinistas and Cristeros, these Salvadorian Sandinistas soon contributed to further conflict across the region. Throughout this time the prices of particularly Bananas skyrocketed, as American-owned plantations across the region were put to the torch and the massive rail network built up to transport it all was torn up by enraged locals in response to harsh reprisals by Fruit Company mercenaries. With disorder widespread and the Central American economy on the verge of collapse, the Sandinistas soon found surprising support amongst the urban poor who began joining mass demonstrations, protests and outright riots against American and government targets.
The first domino to fall would be the Ferrera regime in Honduras, which collapsed in June of 1929 - when it was replaced by Justo Umaña, only for the Umaña regime to find itself swept from power when a massive peasant army which marched into Tegucigalpa under Sandino's command in July, where Sandino was welcomed warmly by Archbishop Agustín Hombach, one of the most significant political figures in Honduras and a popular Catholic figure in the region. With Umaña fleeing northward towards San Pedro Sula, Sandino next turned westward and swept into El Salvador to widespread acclaim, driving Martínez from San Salvador into the arms of the elderly Military Dictator of Guatemala José María Orellana.
Sandino was now able to turn south, sweeping into Nicaragua like an avenging angel, expropriating land en masse and executing leading Conservative and Liberal figures wherever he caught them. By the dawn of 1930, the Sandinistas controlled all of El Salvador and Nicaragua, as well as a large section of southern Honduras and parts of northern Costa Rica. In Guatemala, the sickly Orellana watched with considerable worry as Sandinista sentiment rose amongst the populace while in the south the American occupiers of the Panama Canal began to fear that they might be swept from the region. In Tegucigalpa, Sandino would welcome the new year with the establishment of the Central American Workers' and Farmers' Republic to cover his conquests.
Working with Hombach and a number of far-left supporters, Sandino set in motion a series of reforms which would see the government of the Central American Republic centralized and its individual states abolished while village communes were significantly strengthened and land parceled out to the wider populace. Plantations were nationalized and either split up for the land reforms or incorporated as government-owned fields. The Catholic Church was given wide leeway in the imposition of moral rule and priests were granted administrative roles within the administration on a large scale. The response in the United States to the emergence of an aggressive, expansionist, Catholic-Socialist state hell-bent on evicting all American influence from the lands under its control would significantly worsen the already acrimonious political climate in the United States, while the mass arson, strikes and outright uprisings across many of the fruit companies' lands meant that the UFC, SFC and CFC were all forced into bankruptcy by late 1929, bringing to an end the great Fruit Companies of the early 20th century and inaugurating a new age of competition (14).
Footnotes:
(10) It is important to note that the American state remains heavily invested in the region of Central America, but that the federal government is rather opposed to the effort that goes into it. Gregorio Ferrara's OTL coup attempt proves successful here and he is swift to secure American backing - but it is immediately clear to him and many observers in the region that such backing isn't close to as valuable as it has been in the past.
(11) The Nicaraguan Civil War was a rather short-lived affair IOTL, but there are a number of interesting developments which gain time to ripen if the Americans don't come down like a hammer and force peace immediately. The most significant of these is that it allows Sandino and his Sandanista supporters to win more support.
(12) Sandino's youth is largely as per OTL up until his arrival in Mexico, and actually gets a taste of war earlier than IOTL by participating in the toppling of Obregón. Most notable here is that rather than turning against Catholicism, his exposure to the Cristeros inspires him and moves him into the Catholic camp. Notably, the ideology he is formulating takes the completely opposite direction of what is occurring in Catholic Europe with the Integralist movement, and instead falls far more into the Catholic left-wing of the church. The results of this experience is that Sandino is more successful early on in the Civil War and as such rises to power even quicker than IOTL. Sandino is basically formulating a left-wing answer to the Integralist right-wing here.
(13) Sandino finds himself pushed into Honduras, although he still has some pretty strong footholds in Nicaragua and the Fruit Company Brigades are running roughshod over the region to everyone's anger. In Honduras he is able to find a rather strong following as well, and with the collapse of Ferrara's regime into bloody infighting the stage is set for a peasant surge.
(14) While there are internal reasons for why the United States didn't intervene early on in the bloody conflict, by 1929 the situation has grown so dire that an American entry into the conflict promises to be exceedingly bloody. With the American public focused inwardly on a series of significant clashes in the lead-up to and following the 1928 elections, there simply isn't the willpower to send off a major military expedition, and by 1929 you would need to deploy several tens of thousands of troops to have a chance at victory. The Fruit Companies also ended up investing so heavily into the conflict that they eventually collapsed from the losses.
End Note:
I'll be honest, I did not see Sandino coming. I had some very vague ideas about some sort of activist social Catholicism emerging in Central America and the American grip on the region begin to slip, but it was only when I started reading up on the Nicaraguan Civil War that I discovered Sandino (I did know about the Sandinistas of later era though) and he suddenly ballooned out and came to dominate this section.
What basically happens here is that a series of interconnected but disparate political, military and economic crises all snowball into a major change in direction for Central America. This is probably on the outer end of the plausibility spectrum, but I do think that if the stars had aligned it might be possible. The stability of the Sandinista regime is very much in question and you are likely to see a rather ferocious counter-reaction from those bordering the Sandinistas, to say nothing of the Americans, in the decade to follow.
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This timeline continues to spin off in interesting directions, it's certainly come a long way from those initial divergences in 1917 Russia. However, I do feel the updates as of late have felt a little asynchronous-as if they're constantly catching up to some point that never arrives. By contrast, an update like the Treaty of Copenhagen felt like a good ending to the Great War arc of this story. I know it's hard to find an equally definitive cutoff point among such disparate global developments, but it would be nice to have some date to be working towards. I guess the problem is that some areas just need much more attention than others, and so some sections are simply catching up to the more primary world events.
Nevertheless, the story itself continues to be interesting, and I'll continue to read it with pleasure. Particularly eager to see how the Russian situation works itself out!
Nevertheless, the story itself continues to be interesting, and I'll continue to read it with pleasure. Particularly eager to see how the Russian situation works itself out!
I don't disagree with you, and I think that might be one of the reasons I have been struggling with keeping the updates coming. That is one of the reasons I want to take a break from the TL after this update is finally finished. According to my plans I still need to get through events in Asia and Africa, the latter only very broadly, up to 1930 before I can move forward - which is projected at around update 30. I have a couple other things I have been putting off which I would like to work on a bit, so hopefully I can clear my head a bit and then come back to the TL with a fresh will. Depending on whether people are interested, I could give some spoilers by PM as to how the immediate threads left up in the air would play out given the hiatus, but I am still rather leery about that.