A New Balance

[Jim Smitty]

Shanghai, Japanese Occupied
Alleyway
October 2 1937


Lieutenant Louis Belanger was currently looking to make a contact with the remaining Chinese resistance to the Japanese in the City. Shanghai had fallen after the Japanese broke out the chemical weapons as the Chinese warlords and gangs who had defended the city didn’t have any defense against chemical weapons. Hell, gas mask wouldn’t had helped as the Japanese used about a 60/40 mix of Mustard Gas and Lewisite against the defenders of the city. The Japanese had made sure their use of the chemical weapons had been down wind of the International Zone in Shanghai. This had kept the international zone from feeling the effects of the chemical attack. But they saw the effects first hand as a stream of Chinese who had been in the blunt of had made it to the safety of the international zone. It took some pressure to get the Japanese to allow the Americans, Germans, and Italians who had gotten the bulk of the badly wounded Chinese out of their concession for better medical care.


The Japanese had cut off the bulk of the foreign concessions off from business as usual with the rest of Shanghai since the fall of the city. They were still allowing food to come into the International Zone, but outside of the British Concession there was little to do now. This was because of the fact the Japanese were worried that Americans, Germans, and possibly French and Italians would be running guns to the remaining underground pockets of resistance in the city. This was because during the Battle for Shanghai the Japanese found guns from basically every nation in the hands of Chinese troops who were defending the city. In truth, the Americans and Germans were running guns and ammo to the Chinese. Granted it wasn’t the latest and greatest they were give Chinese but a gun built in the 1880s could still kill a person just as easy as a gun built in 1937. But even before that China had become the dumping ground for old small arms as the Chinese would pay for them in silver, gold, or gems to get their hands on weapons.


Louis was an officer within the Office of Naval Intelligence, the de facto US intelligence agency. The ONI had expanded its mission from learning naval secrets to performing almost all overseas intelligence operations the United States took part in. The army did have some of its own intelligence programs but it was designed more as battlefield intelligence than overseas intelligence like the ONI performed. Louis was on his second operation tour overseas after his tour of duty at The Center in Maryland. Louis was help on getting operational tours as he spoke four other language beside English. Be had been assigned to Franklin Naval Base to keep taps on Japanese. It was a free lance billet that allowed him to travel over East Asia to learn what the Japanese were up to.


It was why Louis had made his way to Shanghai. He was hearing rumors of the Japanese were doing do the Chinese and he wanted to see if they were true. He was currently making his way to one the known hangouts of one of the larger gangs that controlled a sizable part of the city before the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War. Louis had no plans to try and make contact with that gang. He just wanted to see if the rumors that were going around in China were true or not. The Japanese didn’t have the freedom of the press that America. Hell even Germany, France, and Italy with their laws had freer press than what the Japanese had. The Japanese had total control of their press and the British weren’t that much better. So what the Japanese were really doing in China wasn’t about to get reported in either press.


After climbing to a building that was gave Louis a sight picture of the hang out he made his way to get that picture. What Louis saw made him want to throw up his lunch. He could see Chinese, well he assumed they were Chinese, stacked up like cordwood. It was the Japanese punishment for the criminal gangs for putting up as hard fought defense of the city as they had. The Japanese knew like everyone else that criminal gangs ran the city of Shanghai before the start of the war. The Japanese had assumed wrongly that they could waltz right in and take the city. Yet instead the Chinese were fighting like madmen to stop the Japanese and had only fallen back after heavy use of chemical weapons.


The Chinese were fearful that the Japanese would kill the old and those of military age and enslave the rest of the men and march their women off to the whore house. Given what the Japanese have done in the Northern Philippines these fears were justiciable. The Japanese were now just proving those fears were grounded in fact. Louis was taking pictures of this so his day wouldn’t had been wasted. Yet after snapping a few pictures he decided to bug out. The area was crawling with Japanese soldiers and he didn’t want to get caught.

 

[Jim Smitty]

Riyadh, German Occupied
Masmak Fort
October 19 1937


Germany had taken control of Riyadh during their multi-prong offensive against the seat of the Saud Government. They had launched two armor prongs out of Bismarckshaven with each being regimental in size. They also had sent a regiment fallschirmjägers to help take the city. The Arabs were not as well trained as the Germans but they had fought insanely hard to hold on. Yet by the end of August the German Flag was flying over Masmak Fort. Ibn Saud had been killed during the fighting to hold on to the Masmak Fort. Many of his sons died in fighting in Riyadh or elsewhere in Arabia or had taken their own lives to keep from being captured leaving the Germans in a bit of a pickle. They had no one left to sign a peace treaty that they were going they were going to force on the Saudis.


The Battle of Riyadh had been a bloody battle. Before the start of the battle with all of the reinforcements that Ibn Saud had brought in to defend his city the population had just reach a tick north of 40,000 men, women, and children in the city. Now? There might be a few hundred left in the city, and they were almost all German. The bulk of the German military had already withdrawn from the city as there were so few civilians left in the city to worry about. The soldiers of Ibn Saud used women and children as human shields or ways to get bombs to kill Germans close enough. By the end of the battle, the German shot at anything that wasn’t wearing a German uniform. During the battle itself the German forces took just over 3,000 casualties, with around 1,400 being dead. The city itself was destroyed. What wasn’t destroyed was looted. Besides the Masmak Fort there were only a few mud huts still standing.


Now with no peace treaty being possible as the last of the sons of Ibn Saud have been found dead a few days ago had caused Germany to change course. As the Romans had done with Carthage, they were going to make a desert and call it peace. That was why German Sappers were wiring a large amount of explosives all around the Masmak Fort. The Germans were using just under 300 kilograms to bring down the Masmak Fort which itself was heavily damaged during the Battle for Riyadh. They didn’t want to hold the worthless desert that Riyadh sat on so they were just going to destroy the city and poison the wells and withdraw into German Arabia[1].


At the moment the plans were to withdraw the remaining German troops in Riyadh in the next few days. At which point the idea of city in Riyadh or the area in general would be unthinkable for the foreseeable future. But they wouldn’t spike the water wells till they were ready to withdraw out of the city. They needed that water now. But once they withdrew from the city they would have a nice buffer zone from what remains of the Saudi Government fragments which were spread out on the west cost of Arabia. And with the Saudis not having a navy to worry about the Germans figured by spiking the wells would be enough to get left alone in German Arabia.


[1] Roughly OTL Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. There are some border changes but that should give a good idea what German Arabia looks like.

 

[Jim Smitty]

St. Johns, Newfoundland, American Territory
Dolphins’ Bar
November 3 1937


Dolphins’ Bar was crowded tonight. The latest batch of officers had just finished their qualifications at nearby Submarine Base St. Johns was here along with a sizable number of other submarine officers. As was tradition all of the officers that had finished their qualifications were brought to the Dolphins’ Bar for a rite of passage into world of being a submariner. The bar was owned by a veteran of the Great War, the silence service to be precise and had moved to Newfoundland as one of the homesteaders in the aftermath of the Great War. He had built the bar once it had become know that the USN was going to build a submarine base at St. Johns. And the bar was a hit and had become a favorite of the submariners of the submarine base. However, a mug was kept behind the bar for this event.


The mug itself was insanely large for being a mug. On the front of the mug was the insignia of the Submarine Warfare Badge. The bartender was loading up a shot of everything that was behind the bar into the mug. It didn’t matter what it was, if it was behind the bar and sold it when into the mug. Once this was done the Dolphins that had been presented to Ensign James “Jim” Smith at the graduation earlier today were dropped into the mug. Then Jim had to chug the mug and get his Dolphins by his teeth. A task easier said than done. It took a few seconds with a large amount of what was in the mug falling on the top part of his uniform before Jim had his Dolphins in his teeth. As soon as he had his Dolphins in his teeth he felt the need to pray to the porcelain gods. Only every officer who already had his Dolphins stood in his way. But once there he threw up everything he had just chugged down up and then some. At least the head had a spare uniform for him hanging there. There was some perks of being at the top of his class as the smell would get worse as the night when on.


Just as Jim was exiting the head a fellow officer from his class was having to chug the mug. A total of 23 officers had graduated today and all 23 were having to do the mug. But once done it was accepted by all other officers that they were submariners. The silent service was a critical part of the plan to defend the United States. The US was a leading power in the world and had a number of areas of conflict with other powers. Like all the Great Powers the United States had come to accept that it was a question of when and not if the next Great War would be fought. Even through the leaders of the nation would never admit that fact. Currently the world was a chess board and everyone was positioning their pieces.


Submarine Base St. Johns was one of five major submarine bases operated by the US. This didn’t mean that other naval bases didn’t host submarines but only five bases being only for submarines. Three in the Atlantic and two in the Pacific. St. Johns had been built to allow for a large submarine squadron close to British shipping lanes and get across the pond quickly. The US had learned during the Great War that submarines were a critical weapon of war and the only way to get the British to surrender was to cut off their life blood. It was how they were brought to the table at the end of the Great War.


Jim took his seat as he nursed a cold Dr. Pepper as he allowed his stomach was recovering from the chug. Jim wasn’t much of a drinker. He did like a shot of Jack Daniels ever so often, but the chug was a bit much and he no idea when he would take a nip from the bottle again after that. As he sat there recovering from the chug one of his friends who had just finished the chug took a seat at the table. “That was fucking brutal.” Marcus said.


“No shit.” Jim said as a reply. The two men had met at Annapolis and became friends. Then they decided to go into the silence service instead of going into the surface fleet or naval aviation. Well Marcus had the choice of joining the naval aviation branch, Jim didn’t. His eye sight was too poor to be a pilot so it was a choice between being a submariner or a surface officer. Jim decided to be a submariner as it meant a chance at a sea going command at a much younger age than if he would when into the surface fleet.


“So where were you assigned to Marcus?”


“I don’t know how it happened, but I got assigned to a Sugar Boat, out of Guantanamo Bay as the Engineering Officer. So I’m going home, how about you Jim?”


“A Sugar Boat? Ouch. I got assigned to the Salmon out of Guam as the junior engineering officer.”


“You are going to Guam? Lucky bastard.” Like all officers they viewed being assigned to a Pacific posting as the start of a promising career as a lot of people in the navy believed a war with Japan was highly likely. Whereas the Caribbean was a backwater in the USN. Mostly to keep the Mexicans in check, well the Reds out of Colombia, but it was still a backwater. The Atlantic was promising as well as another war with the British was also viewed as likely, but not as likely as a war with Japan.

 

[Jim Smitty]

Berlin
Stadtschloss
November 19 1937


The Coronation of Kaiser Wilhelm the Third was set to start tomorrow. Work had started on the plans for the Coronation of Kaiser Wilhelm the Third starting after his father’s stroke in the summer of 1936 which put Wilhelm the Second into a coma. Wilhelm the second never recovered from that stroke and die peacefully in his sleep in October of last year. Well he never did wake from that stroke and it was only through the advances in medical technology since the end of the Great War that even allowed the late Kaiser to live that long. Yet now Germany was about to crown it’s third Kaiser. Well Wilhelm the Third was officially the fourth Kaiser of the German Empire, but Frederick the Third only lived for 100 days after assuming the throne before he joined his father in the afterlife. As such he did not have a coronation which was why Wilhelm the Third was only the third coronation of the German Empire.


With Germany being the leader of Quadruple Alliance meant Emperor Napoleon V of France, King Victor Emmanuel IV of Italy, and Queen Elisabeth of Belgium had travelled to Berlin to pay their respects to the soon to be newly crown Kaiser. Beside the other monarchs of the Quadruple Alliance who had travelled to Berlin, King William IV of the Netherlands, King Gustaf V of Sweden, King Frederick Charles of Finland, Großherzog Herzog Adolf von Friedrich of the Grand Duchy of the Baltic, and Großherzog Wolrad of the Duchy of Lithuania were all in Berlin as well. Other nations had sent people of importance to Berlin to so their respect to Germany in crowning their new Kaiser. The members of the North American Treaty Organization had all sent important people to Berlin being led by Secretary of State Gray Underwood. Brazil sent their own Imperial Princess Isabel. The Ottomans sent their own team led by one of the critical pashas in Ottoman Empire. Others nations send different people. But the British and Austro-Hungarians sent people of low importance to Berlin just more to represent their nations but also as a slap in the face to the Germans who they didn’t care for. The Com Block[2] didn’t even sent anyone to take part in the Coronation of Kaiser Wilhelm the Third.


Besides the heads of states there were other key people in Berlin to take part in the Coronation of Kaiser Wilhelm the Third. Currently in this room was only two people, Chancellor Hugo von Kaspar and Prime Minister Adriano Lucciano. They were both enjoying a class of good cognac, yet both knew something important was about to be said. Even through Hugo was German and Adriano was Italian they didn’t need interpreters. One thing of the Quadruple Alliance was that their monarchs and senior officials tried to learn one of the four languages[3]. Adriano who had been in power in Italy since the early 1920s had learned how to speak German fluently and speak French fairly well. Hugo could do so with French but he could also speak broken Italian.


Hugo finally broke the ice, “My government wishes to know how much longer your government will keep selling naval technology to the Com Block?” German intelligence had picked up on this a few years ago but it wasn’t till the past few months that they had a smoking gun that prove it.


Adriano looked into his cognac to try and figure out how to answer that question. He then chugged his cognac for liquid courage. “Hugo,” Adriano paused for a moment, “my nation was left so weak in the aftermath of the Great War that we didn’t have much left. When I came into power and learn how badly the books had been cooked by the governments that came before my own I had little to work with. Even with me refusing to pay the indemnity we agreed to in New York there was very little money left to maintain our armed forces and build up our industries. Neither mind growing them and I wasn’t about to start writing checks that would bounce.


Then in the just after the depression hit in 28 the Communist came to me with an offer. They wanted a navy, but you know all their naval personal fled as they didn’t want to be ruled by communist. They were offering massive amounts of hard money and resources for us to train them and help to build up their navy. We badly needed that money but I wanted a better deal for going against are long interest so I pushed harder for even more and they gave it. Its how we have done a lot we have since 31.” Indeed Italy had done a lot since 1931. It has increased its industrial output by a sizable amount. It has built up a natural resource reserve to be used in the event of war with the Axis Powers[4]. Infrastructure and public work programs has increase in the size. The Italians have even started a military build up with the money and resources they were getting from the Com Block. But more importantly the Italian books were not in the red anymore.


After Adriano said it there was a moment of silence between the two leaders. Hugo broke it, “Adriano why didn’t you come to my nation for help?”


“Would your nation had helped?” Adriano asked. “After what those bungling idiots did during the Great War?” The Quadruple Alliance had only been formed in 1933. And it had taken a fair amount of work to get France and Germany agree to both become official allies with Italy after what had happened in the Great War. The driving thing that brought both Berlin and Paris to finally agree to it was the fact they knew Italy had to honor any alliance call or the word of Italy will be forever destroyed in the world.


Silence returned again and this time lasted for a few minutes as both leaders were left to their own thoughts. Hugo once again was the first to speak, “Adriano how long does this agreement run with the Communist?”


“It ends January 1 1940. And before you ask I really have no plans to keep it up after that. I been able to achieve a lot of the goals I set out by doing it.”


Before Hugo could ask another question, Adriano decide to get on a topic that was needed for his nation. “Hugo, as you know my king is currently unwed. However he would like to get marry so he could have a heir to carry on his line. I was wondering if you could set up a meeting where he could meet some German Princess.” German nobility was a tricky thing. Even more since the reform in Germany in the aftermath[5] of the Great War.


“I could do that, but from the way he was looking at Queen Elisabeth[6] today I think it will be hard to get him to think of another woman.” Hugo said with a grin on his face.


“Don’t remind of that Hugo, that would create a massive headache I don’t want to deal with.”


[1] Ok after thinking about it I decided to rename the AATO to the NATO. Thanks to Kaiser Chris for the name idea.

[2] The Com Block is the name of the Communist Alliance.

[3] The four languages of the Quadruple Alliance are German, French, Italian, and Dutch.

[4] The British led alliance of the British and her commonwealths, Austria-Hungary, Japan, and a few minor powers. But unlike NATO, the Quadruple Alliance, and the Com Block its not as stable.

[5] I’m not get into this. If someone wants to try it, feel free to PM on your ideas.

[6] She is honestly a lovely woman.

 

[Jim Smitty]

La Paz, Bolivia
Public Park
December 14 1937


British Ambassador Sir Ronald Williams[1] was looking forward to retirement next year. Being in her majesty’s foreign service for almost 40 years was long enough. Maybe he would finally have a nice quiet life in Surrey with his wife. After all the years hoping all over the globe a quiet life with a garden and watching the grandchildren play really did some like a dream. Maybe it really was a dream as he had no idea how his other employer would take to the news of his retirement. He cursed his weakness as he made his way through the park to meet with his contact in the American ONI.


For Ronald, this all started because he couldn’t keep in his pants. His mistress in Rome had gotten pregnant and he needed money to keep her quiet. If she ran her mouth it would cost him his career and wife. So, he had sold the British diplomatic codes to the United States for a lot of money so he could shut up his Italian mistress. He had hoped it would had been a one time affair with the Americans. Yet that idea came crashing down in 1921 in Oslo. In 1921 the ONI had restarted contact with Ronald and basically threaten him bring his former Italian mistress to light. If they would had done that, his career and relationship with his wife would had ended. He though he loved his wife, Ronald just couldn’t keep it in his pants but hadn’t father any other children by 1921. The ONI made it clear they wanted Ronald to work for them again, with no choices that was worth a damn Ronald had agreed and became an American agent.


Since 1921 Ronald had passed many British diplomatic secrets to the United States. The ONI had paid Ronald well for this information both in terms of money and his weakness, young women. The ONI had no issues with using women as honeypots[2], hell they had both men and women doing it. Yet unknown to Ronald he had father another bastard child with one of the woman that was being used as a formed of payment in 1927 in Rio. Along the way as being an American spy Ronald had been knighted when he had been made a Knight Commander in the Most Distinguished Order of St. Michael and St. George in 1932, for services to the empire. He had to grin a little, had they known about his secrets he would be dead in a heartbeat. The Conservative Empire Party wasn’t known to be kind to traitors. That point was driven home when Melita Symonds a civil servant was popped for spying for the communist in 31. She was hung in London Tower a year later after a show trial.


Ronald made contact with the ONI officer who had been his handler since his appointment to be the British Ambassador to Bolivia in 1935. She was a looker and great in bed. But she did not look happy today in the dim light of the setting sun. He sat down beside her for a moment. Neither said anything but she got up and left the newspaper she had been reading. Ronald picked up the newspaper and looked at the note for him left in it. As he read the encoded note the color drained from his face. By the time he had finished reading the note he was thinking maybe a quiet life in the United States might be healthier than Surrey.


The ONI had a fairly large spy ring in the British Empire. This was because the US still viewed the British Empire as a very likely foe. Only the Japanese was ahead of the British in the US threat list. Yet they had an easier time getting spies into the British Empire than the Japanese Empire. Through one of their spies they learned the British were performing a spy hunt in their diplomatic corp. Ronald was one of the final 16 British diplomats on the list of this spy hunt. One thing the ONI did was to make sure their people lived. And right at the moment they were worried about Ronald’s ability to get to live with him staying in place. Further the chance to fully debrief a British ambassador was a once in a generation chance. They had just passed that message on to Ronald that he needed to be ready to leave La Paz in the very near future.


[1] You guys remember that British Diplomatic that sold the United States the British codes in 1916 right? Well this is the guy.

[2] The ONI pays these women well and they are well treated.

 

[Jim Smitty]

United States of America

Army

Unit Strength

17th Airborne Brigade is slated to be expand to a division.


Infantry Support Equipment

The M3 4.2 Inch Mortar entered general service[1].


Medium Goliath

M21 (M7 Medium Tank)

Weight: 27.1 t
Crew: 5 (Commander, Driver, Co-Driver, Gunner, Loader)
Armor: up to 2.5 inches
Main Armament: 3 inch L/32 Gun
Secondary Armament: .50 cal Machine Gun (Commander’s Hatch), .30-06 cal Machine Gun (Co-axial)
Engine: 9 Cylinder radical
Speed: 31 mph
Range: 150 miles


Tactical Bombers

B-31 (Douglas B-23 Dragoon)

Crew: 6 (Pilot, Co-Pilot, Navigator/Bombardier, Radio Operator, 2 x Gunners)
Powerplant: 2 x 14 cylinder, radicals
Top Speed: 301 mph
Range: 1,300 miles
Service Ceiling: 32,000 ft
Ordnance: 1 x .50 cal machine gun, 3 x .30-06 cal machine guns, and up to 2,000 lbs of ordnance


The Naval Modernization Act was passed. Under this act a number of ships were ordered. This included the fourth Florida Class Battleship, the North Dakota BB-76, and a third and fourth Independence Class Aircraft Carriers, the Hornet CV-22 and Randolph CV-23 were the two classes that were expanded by this act. It recalled the USS Cowpens to active duty service along with ordering the two strong Antietam Class Light Aircraft Carriers. Further it sent the USS Detroit to the breaker yards with its guns either going to coastal defenses in the Pacific. Guns that were being removed from the modernized battleships were also being moved to sure of the defenses of the Pacific. Further it ordered a new class of coastal defensive ships to help defend the vast Pacific territories of United States. The main piece of the act through dealt with the pre-Treaty battleships and battlecruisers still in service with the USN. This set up plans to modernization all of these ships. The modernization plans for each ship is slated to take between five to seven months per ship with this being staggered to keep the USN well equipped. On top of all of the ships ordered or slated to be modernized under this act, Congress also decided to fund the building of a number of new slip-ways for 40,000 and 75,000 ton ships.


New Classes

Antietam Class Light Aircraft Carriers

14,600 tons displacement, turbo-electric, 32 knots, 46 x 1.1 inch Autocannons (Different mounts), 40 Aircraft

Antietam, CVL-24
Gettysburg, CVL-25


Appalachian Class Coastal Defense Ships [2]

11,100 tons displacement, diesel, 21 knots, 6 x 12/50s[3] in triple turrets, 8 x 5/38s in Twin Turrets, 16 x 1.1 inch Autocannons (Quad Mount)

Appalachian, BM-26
Ozark, BM-27
Rocky, BM-28
Denali, BM-29
Cascade, BM-30
Blue Ridge, BM-31


Modernized Classes

Battleships

Mississippi Class, Reserve, to be recommissioned once modernized [4]

26,000 tons displacement, coal fired boilers turbine driven, 21 knots, 12 x 12/50s in twin turrets, 16 x 5/51s in casemates, 8 x 3/50s single mounts,

Mississippi Class, SLEPed

28,600 tons displacement, oil fired boilers, turbine driven, 21 knots, 12 x 12/50s in twin turrets, 12 x 5/38s in duel turrets, 40 x 1.1 inch autocannons (quad mounts)

USS Mississippi, BB-40
USS Cuba, BB-42


Texas Class, reserve, to be recommissioned once modernized

27,000 tons displacement, coal fired with oil spray boilers, turbine driven, 21 knots, 10 x 14/45s in twin turrets, 16 x 5/51s in casemates, 8 x 3/50s single mounts

Texas Class, SLEPed

29,900 tons displacement, oil fired boilers, turbine driven, 21 knots, 10 x 45/45s in twin turrets, 12 x 5/38s in twin turrets, 40 x 1.1 inch autocannons (Quad Mount)

USS Texas, BB-43
USS Wyoming, BB-45


Oklahoma Class

27,500 tons displacement, oil fired boilers, turbine driven, 21 knots, 10 x 14/45s in two triple turrets, in two twin (Superfiring), 12 x 5/51s in casemates, 8 x 5/25s in single mounts, 8 x 1.1 AA Guns (4x2)

Oklahoma Class SLEPed

30,500 tons displacement, oil fired boilers, turbine driven, 21 knots, 10 x 14/45s in two triple turrets, in two twin (Superfiring), 16 x 5/38s in twin turrets, 40 x 1.1 inch autocannons (Quad Mount)

USS Oklahoma, BB-46
USS Georgia, BB-47
USS Nevada, BB-48


New York Class

29,158 tons displacement, oil fired boilers, turbine driven, 23 knots, 12 x 14/45s in triple turrets (Superfiring), 12 x 5/51s in casemates, 8 x 5/25s in single mounts, 2 x 3/50s in single mounts, 8 x 1.1 AA Guns (4x2)

New York Class SLEPed

31,400 tons displacement, oil fired boilers, turbine driven, 22 knots, 12 x 14/45s in triple turrets (Superfiring), 16 x 5/38s in twin turrets, 40 x 1.1 Inch Autocannons (quad mount)

USS New York, BB-49
USS Pennsylvania, BB-50


Arizona Class

32,000 tons displacement, oil fired boilers, turbine driven, 23 knots, 12 x 14/50s in triple turrets (Superfiring), 14 x 5/51s in casemates, 10 x 5/25s in single mounts, 8 x 1.1 AA Guns (4x2)

Arizona Class SLEPed

33,500 tons displacements, oil fired boilers, turbine driven, 23 knots, 12 x 14/50s in triple turrets (Superfiring), 16 x 5/38s in twin turrets, 40 x 1.1 Inch Autocannons (Quad Mounts)

USS Arizona, BB-51
USS Idaho, BB-52
USS Virginia, BB-53
USS Maine, BB-54


California Class

33,190 tons displacement, turbo-electric, 23 knots, 12 x 14/50s in triple turrets (Superfiring), 14 x 5/51s in Casemates, 10 x 5/25s in single mounts, 8 x 1.1 AA Guns (4x2)

California Class SLEPed

34,500 tons displacement, turbo-electric, 23 knots, 12 x 14/50s in triple turrets (Superfiring), 16 x 5/38s in Twin Turrets, 40 x 1.1 inch autocannons (Quad Mounts)

USS California, BB-55
USS Tennessee, BB-56
USS Connecticut, BB-57


Maryland Class

32,600 tons displacement, turbo-electric, 23 knots, 8 x 16/45s in twin turrets (Superfiring), 8 x 5/51s in single turrets, 4 x 5/25s in single mounts, 2 x 3/50s in single mounts, 8 x 1.1 AA Guns

Maryland Class SLEPed

34,100 tons displacement, turbo-electric, 23 knots, 8 x 16/45s in twin turrets (Superfiring), 16 x 5/38s in twin turrets, 40 x 1.1 inch autocannons

USS Maryland, BB-58
USS Washington, BB-59
USS Colorado, BB-60
USS New Mexico, BB-61


West Virginia Class

43,200 tons displacement, turbo-electric, 25 knots, 12 x 16/50s in triple turrets (Superfiring), 6 x 6/52s in single turrets, 4 x 5/25s in single mounts, 4 x 3/50s in single mounts,

West Virginia Class SLEPed

44,100 tons displacements, turbo-electric, 25 knots, 12 x 16/50s in triple turrets (Superfiring), 16 x 5/38s in Twin Turrets, 40 x 1.1 inch autocannons

USS West Virginia, BB-62
USS Iowa, BB-63
USS Montana, BB-64
USS Indiana, BB-66
USS North Carolina, BB-67


Battlecruisers

Lexington Class

27,800 tons displacement, oil fired boilers, turbine driven, 29 knots, 8 x 14/45s in twin turrets (Superfiring), 12 x 5/51s in Casemates, 6 x 5/25s in Single Mounts

Lexington Class SLEPed

29,500 tons displacement, oil fired boilers, turbine driven, 27 knots, 8 x 14/45s in twin turrets (Superfiring), 16 x 5/38s in twin turrets, 32 x 1.1 inch Autocannons

USS Lexington, BC-5
USS Ranger, BC-6


Saratoga Class

32,000 tons displacement, turbo-electric, 30 knots, 8 x 14/50s in twin turrets, (Superfiring), 12 x 5/51s in Casemates, 8 x 5/25s In Single Mounts, 2 x 3/50s in Single Mounts

Saratoga Class, SLEPed

33,500 tons displacement, turbo-electric, 30 knots, 8 x 14/50s in twin turrets (Superfiring), 16 x 5.38s in twin turrets, 32 x 1.1 inch autocannons

USS Saratoga, BC-7
USS Constellation, BC-8


Essex Class

44,500 tons displacement, turbo-electric, 32 knots, 8 x 16/45s in twin turrets (Superfiring), 14 x 6/53s in Casemates, 10 x 5/25s in Single Mounts

Essex Class SLEPed

45,100 tons displacement, turbo-electric, 32 knots, 8 x 16/45s in twin turrets (Superfiring), 16 x 5/38s in Twin Turrets, 32 x 1.1 inch autocannons

USS Essex, BC-9
USS Constitution, BC-12


Bonhomme Richard Class

Guns are changed to the modern 12/50s but still used in the old turrets. They had back doored this as they weren’t sure how well the new 12/50s with super heavy AP shells.


Brazil

Artillery

Brazil and Germany come to a license agreement to allow Brazil to make the 10.5 cm leFH howitzer in Brazil with 150 to be built in Germany as the production facilities are built up in Brazil. This license agreement also grants Brazil the license to build the 8.8 cm Flak 33. Brazil will keep its small import of the Flak 33 as new production facilities are built up in Brazil to make the Flak 33.


Chile

Infantry Support Weapons

Chile and France have signed a license agreement to make the famed French 60 and 81 mm mortars in Chile.


United Kingdom

Tactical Bomber

Stirling (Avro Manchester)

Crew: 7 (Pilot, Co-Pilot, Navigator/Bombardier, Flight Engineer, Radio Operator/Gunner, 2 x Gunners)
Powerplants: 2 x 24 cylinder radicals
Top Speed: 269 mph
Range: 1,300 miles
Service Ceiling: 19,000 ft
Ordnance: 8 x .303 machine guns, and up to 9,000 lbs of ordnance


In the 1937 Naval Bill the British ordered two more of their Thunder Class Battleships, Albion and Goliath, one more Rodney Class Battlecruiser Hawke, and three more A Class Light Aircraft Carriers, the Achilles, Apollo, and Amphion. This is on top of ordering more light cruisers, destroyers, and escort vessels.


Third French Empire

Light Goliath

R37 (Hotckiss H35/39)

Weight: 12.9 t
Crew: 3 (Commander, Driver, Gunner)[5]
Armor: up to 34 mm
Main Armament: 37 mm Gun L/33
Secondary Armament: 7.5 mm Machine Gun (Co-axial)
Engine: Slant-Six, Liquid Cooled
Speed: 27 km/h
Range: 150 km


Fighters

C-33 (Morane-Saulnier M.S. 406)

Crew: 1
Powerplant: V-12, liquid cooled
Speed: 521 km/h
Range: 1,000 km
Service Ceiling: 9,400 m
Armament: 1 x 20 mm autocannon, 4 x 7.5 mm machine guns


Tactical Bombers

BT-13 (Lioré et Olivier LeO 45)

Crew: 4 (Pilot, Bombardier/Navigator, Flight Engineer/Radio Operator, Gunner)
Powerplant: 2 x 14 cylinder radicals
Speed: 499 km/h
Range: 2,800 km
Service Ceiling: 9,000 m
Armament: 1 x 20 mm autocannons, 2 x 7.5 mm machine guns, and up to 1,500 kg of ordnance


Naval

The French agreed to the sell of the four Justice Class Pre-Colossus Battleships to the Regia Marina with the Regia Marina agreeing to return the main armament following their plan upgrades to the ships. The French don’t understand what the Italians are planning but they frankly don’t care as its money in their pockets. Further they came to an agreement with the Kaiserliche Marine that the Kaiserliche Marine will take over the defense of the Atlantic Trade roots in of the event of war with the British Empire, and they will together with the Regia Marina shut down the Med. Only in the defense of the English Channel and the Bay of Biscay is not covered under these agreements. These areas are to be under the Marine Imperial[6]. Under the 1937 Naval Act[7] the French order a pair coastal defense ships to cover the English Channel and Bay of Biscay as per their agreements with the Kaiserliche Marine. They ordered other ships, but with a heavy focus on destroyers and submarines.


Dupuy de Lôme Class Coastal Defense Ships

9,800 tons, diesel, 29 knots, 6 x 305 mm L/45s in triple turrets[8], 8 x 130 mm L/45s in Twin Turrets,


Voltaire Class Semi-Colossus Battleships, currently being modernized

As Built

18,458 tons displacement, coal fired boilers, turbine driven, 20 knots, 4 x 305 mm L/45s in twin turrets, 12 x 240 mm L/50 in twin turrets

Modernized

18,550 tons displacement, oil fired boilers[9], steam turbines, 18 knots, 4 x 305 mm L/45s in Twin Turrets, 12 x 130 mm L/45s in Twin Turrets

NGI Condorcet
NGI Danton
NGI Diderot
NGI Mirabeau
NGI Vergniaud
NGI Voltaire


Belgium

Artillery

The Chamber of Representatives finally cough off the money to modernize the 7.7 cm guns currently in service to the more modern 75 mm ammo.


Netherlands

Air Force

The Dutch East Indies Air Force has placed an order for 80 CL XXII kits from Germany for use in the DEI. These are to replace the current CL XIXs which are in service there.


Navy

The Dutch House of Representatives have put the money forward to modernized the HNLMS Tromp and HNLMS van Ghent battleships.


Germany

Small Arms

Taking on lessons from the campaign in Arabia and other colonial campaigns they are improving the Gewehr 33 to make it a better rifle. The new improved Gewehr 33 is projected to enter service some time in 1938.


Navy

Germany passed the 1937 Naval Act. This act didn’t order any more capital ships nor aircraft carriers. It however ordered a number of new cruisers, destroyers, and submarines and the building of new 70,000 ton slip ways. It also funded the modernization Rheinland Class Colossus Class Battleships. This modernization will take place over six months per ship and started in August 1937 and the program of modernization will run into 1938.


Rheinland Class

24,750 tons displacement, coal-fired boilers, turbine driven, 21 knots, 10 x 30.5 cm L/50s in twin turrets (Superfiring, forward), 14 x 15 cm L/45s castmate, 8 x 8.8 cm AA Guns

Rheinland Class SLEPed

26,600 tons displacement, oil-fired boilers, turbine driven, 21 knots, 6 x 30.5 cm L/50s in twin turrets[10] (Superfiring, forward), 16 x 12.7 cm L/45s in Twin Turrets, 12 x 8.8 AA Guns in Twin Turrets

SMS Rheinland
SMS Kaiser
SMS Koing Albert
SMS Friedrich der Grosse


Italy

Army

The orders for a new infantry division to be formed came down in August 1937. This division will be the 31st Infantry Division.


Navy

The 1937 Naval Act was signed into law. This created a new class of ship within the Italian Navy, the breachships. These old-pre Colossus ships are being redesigned to allowed a direct day one assault on Malta. To help their cause they brought four old French pre Colossus ships for this aim. They further order a pair of new battleships the Ammiraglio di Saint Bon Class with new destroyers, submarines, and other lesser ships.


Ammiraglio di Saint Bon Class

58,400 tons displacement, oil fired boilers, turbine driven, 28 knots, 9 x 432 mm L/45s in triple turrets (Superfiring, forward), 12 x 152 mm L/55s in triple turrets, 18 x 90 mm AA Guns

Ammiraglio di Saint Bon
Emanuele Filiberto


Justice Class Pre-Colossus Battleships

14,860 tons displacement, coal fired boilers, vertical triple-expansion steam engines, 19 knots, 4 x 305 mm L/45s in twin turrets, 10 x 194 mm L/50s castmate,

Justice Class Rebuilt as a Breachship

11,090 tons displacement, diesel, 19 knots, 4 x 90 mm AA Guns in twin mounts, Large numbers of autocannons and machine guns, a ram bow, the hull is filled as much cork as possible.

RN Giustizia, Ex-NGI Justice
RN Libertà, Ex-NGI Liberte
RN Verità, Ex-NGI Vérité
RN Onore, Ex-NGI Democratie


Pre-Colossus Class Battleships

Vittorio Emanuele Class Battleships, reserves

13,900 tons displacement, coal fired boilers, triple expansion steam engines, 22 knots, 2 x 305 mm L/40s in single turrets, 12 x 203 mm L/45s in twin turrets, 16 x 76 mm L/40s casemate

Vittorio Emanuele Class Rebuilt as Breachships

12,500 tons displacement, diesel, 17 knots, 4 x 90 mm AA Guns in duel mounts with shields, large numbers of machine guns and autocannons, saws, cutters, hull is filled with as much cork as possible

RN Vittorio Emanuele
RN Regina Elena
RN Napoli


Sweden

Air Force

The Swedish Air Force following the failure of the Swedish domestic fighter replacement for the J 14 they decided to buy 60 German D XXV fighters to upgrade their air defenses.


Ottoman Empire

Artillery

The Ottoman and German governments have come to an agreement to build a Krupp Factory in the Ottoman Empire to build the Flak 33 as the standard heavy anti-aircraft gun of the Ottoman Army. Till this factory is up and running the Ottomans will be importing Flak 33s from Germany.


Japan

Artillery

As the war with China starts, the army was finally given the money for new 75 and 105 mm guns and howitzers.


Navy

The Imperial Japanese Navy didn’t order any capital ships and aircraft carriers in 1937. Yet they ordered a large number of heavy and light cruisers, destroyers, and submarines.


Imperial Federation

Small Arms

The Imperial Federation Army fielded a new rifle late 1937.


[1] M2 4.2 Inch Mortar

[2] These are meant to replace a host of badly designed monitors/coastal defense ships the US built during the treaty period as trying to hit that loophole was a god damn bitch. There is a reason I didn’t cover those as those things suck badly. In the USN Hull Code System they are listed as Monitors as such they get the BM title.

[3] These are 12/50s Mark 8 like not the older marks that pre-date the Great War ITL.

[4] The Mississippi and Texas classes are being recommissioned following their refits. However the Mississippi class will return to the reserves once the last two of the Florida Class are commissioned. The Texas class will also return to the reserves once the next two battleships after the last two Florida Class ships are commissioned. If they are a new class for a third run of Florida Class ships is still being debated. The idea with this is to get both classes a new lease on life for the next 10 to 15 years and when war breaks they get used as convoy escorts and shore bombardment when needed.

[5] Yeah I know the OTL R35/39 was a two man crew, but ITL the French decide to go to two man turrets instead of a single man turret. This is after testing they found they were placing too much work on a single person to run a turret.

[6] Yeah the French Navy ITL is fairly cash starved with everything that has happened to France ITL to date. It was why they were more than happy to get this as they can focus on things like the army and air force without having to worry about cap ships after tje Davout Class. They really want to go to Jeune École variant as its cheaper than building a battleline.

[7] Sue me I can’t figure out what they will be calling these so unless it’s the US its going to be a naval act when dealing with ordering new ships.

[8] These are reusing old guns from the ships they sold to the Italians but rebuilt with triple turrets that are far better than the twin turrets used by those ships.

[9] This is my screw up, I did more R&D and saw that it was easier to switch boilers from coal over to oil than I first thought. This is showing the change.

 

[Jim Smitty]

Pingfang
Epidemic Prevention and Water Purification Department, Unit 317, Main Building
January 8 1938


It was a cold day here in Pingfang. It was around -18C outside with fine layer of snow on the ground with a light layer of overcast of clouds above. It was a truly nasty day in Pingfang. Yet for the Japanese Commander of Unit 317 he was getting ready to brave the nasty weather to greet the guest that were coming to his base. Calling them guest, as he thought was the wrong term. They were coming to work with his unit as it could offer things that their civilians back at home would be fairly unhappy about if they were doing it in their homelands, or even in their colonies. So they had come to an agreement to host a team here at Pingfang in return for their notes.


The Japanese annexation of Manchuria was a sore spot for many on the international diplomatic stage. Very few nations worldwide had given diplomatic recognition of the annexation of what was meant to be a buffer state between Japan and Russia. Well before Russia became the Soviet Union. Yet that when out the window when the Japanese invaded the Kingdom of Manchuria in 1930 and annexed it a year later. As of the start of the new year only a grand total of six nations[1] with the Imperial Federation granted recognition only late last year[2]. As such very few foreign nationals ever travelled to Japanese Manchuria.


Now a team of top flight British scientist were travelling to this heavily guarded base deep in Manchuria. Control of the limited numbers of foreign nationals in Manchuria kept them away from Pingfang, and for good reason. Pingfang was home to one of the most secret weapon programs in Japan at the moment. Japan was working with biological agents in order to create a weapon that was deadly. Some of Japan’s top minds were at Pingfang or some of the other sub-camps working on different ideas to create deadly bio weapons.


Japan wasn’t alone with their efforts to create bio weapons. Eight[3] nations were all working on the goal of deadly germs to be used in the next war. Some of these programs were well funded, fairly well balance along with being ethical, notably the Germans with their efforts at creating bioweapons. Others such as Brazil and the Ottoman Empire were bare bone programs that were designed to allow them to build up their expertise in the area for later growth once more funding was ready.


Then there was the Japanese Program. Most of the world leaders had something of an idea that Japan had their own bioweapons program, but if they knew the scope and total lack of ethnics in it, they would be beyond shocked. The Japanese were using human subjects to test their bio agents to see how they would do and once they served their use they would be killed and have their bodies burned. They were using captured bandits, criminals, homeless Han Chinese, and since the start of the second Sino-Japanese War, Chinese Prisoners of War. Not even the Soviet Union which was known for its violence against its own people when that far in testing their bioagents.


As the British learned of the Japanese efforts at Pingfang they decided to try and hitch up. The idea of using even prisoners who were under court orders of death for testing bioagents would had caused a major sink in the British Home Islands. Yet the ECP wanted to tested their weapons on humans. After a few rounds of talks the British and Japanese came to an agreement that stopped short of a full on joint program, but allowed the British to make use of Japanese bases and test subjects. That team was reaching Pingfang on this cold and general crappy day.


[1] Haiti*, Mexico*, United Kingdom, Austria-Hungary, South America, and the Imperial Federation

*They did so more to piss the US off than anything else.

[2] This was part of deal stuck between London and the Imperial Federation for something else.

[3] The British Empire, Soviet Union, Soviet Spain, Germany, Italy, Brazil, Japan, and the Ottoman Empire

 

[Jim Smitty]

USS Houston CL-79
Gulf of Urabá
January 21 1938


The Colombian Communist had decided they weren’t going to take back the land that the United States of America had taken to create this bastard child of the Panamanian Republic by force. This was after three failed attacks and one major American counterattack that had caused the Communist to finally ask the US for a meeting to agree to a cease fire. There was also the fact the United States was currently blockading their coast that help push them to ask for these talks. The rest of the Com Block was currently unable to send any support to the Colombian Communist because of the American blockade. And the only other Communist nation in the new world Peru didn’t have the naval muscle to try and for the US to end it either. The Communist in Colombia knew they needed the help of their communist brothers to bring the glories of the revolution to Colombia and the only way they could make this happen was if they made the deal with the US.


With the nature of the meetings the US decided to hold them on one of their warships instead of bring the Communist into the new nation they were defending. Both sides understood that full on recognizing wasn’t happening anytime soon. The US hated the communist with a passion and the communist hated the Yankee Pig Dogs as they called them with an equal passion. If it hadn’t been for the Japanese unprovoked invasion of China, the US would had fully mobilized and crushed the communist in Colombia. Otherwise there would had been no talks, it would had just seen the US marching its army to Bogota and doing what they had to restore the Republic of Colombia. But that wasn’t meant to be as Japan was a much more dangerous foe than the Communist were.


Little respect was shown as the communist leaders sent to the Houston made their way up to the ladders to get to the deck. Then again, the Colombians weren’t showing much respect back to their host. The dislike was mutual and no one was acting like it wasn’t. The talks were short and to the point. There was no effort by the Colombians and only a weak effort by the United States to try and find something better than a cease fire. The US made the weak effort mainly to see if they Colombians would agree to anything other than a cease fire. Once the Colombians were clear they would only accept a cease fire, things when from there.


It took only a little under three hours to hammer out a cease fire agreement. The US was able to keep all of the land south of the Darien Gap that they had captured during their counter offensive and bring that into the newly created Republic of Panama[1]. The US also took legal control of the Guano Island claims that they currently had territorial disputes with Colombia over. Colombia wasn’t giving up on having those islands returned to Colombian control at a later date, but they understood that they had no means of getting to those islands right now. The Colombian Navy was a nonfactor. Many captains in the Colombian Navy had used their ships to escape the Communist. Those who had come out for the revolution had that favor returned by the USN sinking their ships. The biggest ships in the Communist Navy was launches and whale boats. But the agreeing was signed to end the shooting and the blockade.


[1] Map Below, the black line is basically a DMZ between the Republic of Panama and the Democratic Republic of Colombia. Its not perfect, but close to how that border between the two is.

 

[Jim Smitty]

Glasgow
Royal Navy Offices
February 15 1938


“What the bloody hell!” The Third Sea Lord of the British Admiralty stated after being briefed on a new design study. “That’s larger than some of our light cruisers.”


During the Great War, the United States Navy and Kaiserliche Marine did something that no other alliance that the British had fought in their vast history. They had cut the British off from their vast colonial empire and the merchant trade that was the life blood of the empire. It was for that reason the British had decided to throw in the towel and seek terms in the Great War instead of fight on like they had done in the past after being defeated on the continent. The way the USN and KM had defeated the Royal Navy was not with their battlelines even through there had been battles between their heavy units, no it was the submarine that had proven to be the deadliest foe to the British.


Ever since the British had tried to slow and delay the development of submarines and generally limit everyone from having the one weapon which could defeat them. Yet other than efforts at Boston Naval Conference these efforts had failed. Even now their intelligence services were pointing to serious efforts by the USN and KM, and lesser efforts by the French and Italians are large 3 to 4,000 ton submarines mounting 8.3 inch or larger guns. Yet this design study out did them all and by a wide margin.


The British viewed the Americans as their most dangerous foe. The Germans weren’t too far behind, but it was the Americans that was viewed as most direct threat to the Empire. The USN and RN were largely the same size even through the US was putting far less of their overall budget into their Navy than the British were. Currently the USN was having to balance both the RN and IJN. The British through were picking up signs that the US was about to really kick up its naval building programs up a few knots. The British knew that they and the Japanese couldn’t keep up if these programs were as large as their fortune tellers in trends intelligence were saying they would be.


Yet the young commander stood his ground in face of the surprised Third Naval Lord, “Sir, this is the only way we can get aircraft to hit the American locks on their canal in Panama. Their defenses around the canal is simply impossible to get our H Class[1] close enough to engage the locks with their guns. The Americans will blast any submarine out of the water with their 16.5 inch guns at the forts guarding the canal. Never mind if they upgrade to their 18 inchers or heaven forbid that new 20 inch gun we have been hearing rumors about. If we were to use a submarine aircraft carrier that displaces around 8,500 tons surfaced we can get torpedoes on target and give us enough time to defeat the American Atlantic Fleet while the Japanese deal with the American Pacific Fleet. This way we can force them to come to our terms this time.”


The Third Naval Lord was well aware that H Class had no hope of attacking the canal with her main gun, but this was insane. Then again, they might be able to work, but with so many unknowns it was hard to give a green light to such a big submarine. “Commander do you have any idea how many submarines would be needed to be built to make sure the canal is destroyed?


“Four to six, assuming we get four aircraft per submarine.”


The Third Naval Lord sat there in thought for a moment. This project had too many unknowns at the moment to green light, but it also had a lot of promise if it could prove to work. “Commander start work on a scale down version as we see if our industry can make an aircraft that is powerful enough to carry a torpedo and be a useful design.” If they could we would make this big bastard and strike at the heart of America for a change if we were forced into war with them.


[1] They got a single 13.5/45 naval gun as their primary weapon, along with torpedoes.

 

[Zoidberg12]

Heres a map of the world in January, 1918, after the end of the First World War.

Some parts of the map were speculation, such as Spain, China and Russia, but overall I think it stays true to the content of this timeline and story.

 

[Jim Smitty]

Rostock
Submarine Yards
March 4 1938


Korvettenkapitan Adolf Heydrich was walking across the plank to reach the pier his submarine was currently tied to. It was known simply as the V-90. The submarine itself wasn’t a commissioned ship within the Kaiserliche Marine. It was a proof of concept design of a number of new ideas of submarine design and technology. The V-90 wasn’t meant to go into combat and wasn’t even armed. It’s legs were too short for combat anyways with just over 100 kilometers. However, the Kaiserliche Marine was still looking to the V-90 as a possible future in submarine designs. Yet it had a crew of four members of the Kaiserliche Marine for the testing it was being put through.



“Sir, I’m buying it. It handles better than my 190 Roadster[1].” Heydrich said to his commanding officer.


His commander only laughed, “I don’t think you have enough money Adolf.” He knew Heydrich came from a rich family but doubt he had enough money to pay for the V-90.


“Sir, when you are right, you are right sir. But she handles like a champ. I got her up to 29 knots at a depth of 60 meters before I had to start slowing down and surfacing.”


“29 knots?” his commander asked. If they could get a production run sub that could only reach 21 knots they would have a sub that would be a game changer in the North Sea and the Baltic. Even through the Kaiserliche Marine was a blue water navy, they knew full well that if they lost the control of either the North Sea or Baltic Sea they were doomed. They would never pass the British in terms of ship numbers. They needed an edge in something other if they were to defeat the British. It was why they were building so many long distance raiding battlecruisers because the life blood of the British was their merchant traffic.


“Yes sir, 29 knots. I have a feeling if could when faster if we had more hydrogen peroxide.”


“Very well korvettenkapitan I ran to see your report as soon as possible.”


[1] A BWM 319/1 Roadster is a good analog of what he is talking about.

 

[Jim Smitty]

Mexico City
Foreign Ministry
March 3 1938


The flags of Mexico and Great Britain stood proudly on the flag post behind the tables. For the Mexicans they were giving this event all the pomp and circumstance they possibly could. They were making sure the protocol was being followed to the letter. This was a moment of great importance to their nation and they didn’t want anything to screw this up. Since the formation of the Third Federal Republic of Mexico at the end of the civil war they had been trying to show the world that Mexico wasn’t a laughing stock like it had been before it fell into the civil war or could be beaten like a redheaded step child like it had been beaten by the United States of America during the Second Mexican American War.


President Zapata had been working ever since he had became President for Life of Mexico to build Mexico into a nation the United States would had to respect instead of pushing it around like a kid brother. Even now the United States had shown little respect to Mexico. After all North America was the American playground. Then again Zapata and Mexico had given the United States little reason to show Mexico any form of respect. For Zapata he had wrote in his Green Book[1] one of the core ideas of the new Mexico would be Revanche soon after he came to power. For Zapata regaining what had been lost in the Second Mexican-American War had become the same as it had been for the French with Elsaß-Lothringen[2] had been prior to the Great War.


The British Foreign Minister Gordon Glen had travelled to Mexico City to finish the treaty negotiations that had been on going since late 1936. He was standing next to President Zapata as the two shook hands before they signed this treaty. This date had been chosen by the Mexicans as a fuck you to the United States. Chihuahua one of the pieces of territory Mexico lost during the Second Mexican American War was set to become the 52nd state[3] of the American Union tomorrow. The two men than step forward after to sign the treaty using golden pens. Following the signing they both made a toast using 100% agave tequila that was the best that Mexico had to offer. The tequila used in this toast ran at 5,000 Pesos a bottle[4].


Officially the treaty that was just signed known as the Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation Between Great Britain and the Third Federal Republic of Mexico. The treaty itself was a very longwinded affair covering dozens of pages and articles. This was including a number of secret parts within the treaty. Even through the treaty didn’t make the British and Mexicans full allies, they weren’t far from being that under the terms of the treaty. Mexico really wanted to be allies with the British. Their political ideologies aligned and they both hated the United States of America. Yet the British were reluctance to give an alliance treaty to Mexico because the Mexican military was small and lacking in armament. British intelligence and their general staff viewed the Mexican Army as little more than a speed bump to the American military and the Mexican Navy and Air Force were even worse off than the Mexican Army was.


Mexico knew their military power was part of the reason they couldn’t get the alliance treaty they sought with the British. They had only in the past few years just stepped up to being a medium power again after recovering from their civil war and the second war with the Yankees. They knew they needed to grow their military power and a sizable chunk of this treaty dealt with British military aid to Mexico on top of economic matters covered under this treaty.


Under the terms of the treaty the British would give the Mexicans technologic help to get their Mondragon Rifle[5] to work. Besides that the British would help the Mexicans improve their artillery branch which at the moment was a hodge pog of different guns by different nations with some artillery pieces currently dating from France in 1880s. Their small arms were better off than their artillery and if they could get the Mondragon to work everything would come together for them, well in their minds anyways, the British weren’t as sure. Further for the army the British agreed to supply some older armor cars and light goliaths to allow the Mexicans to get use to operating AFVs. Further for the army the British started an exchange program to allow a few Mexicans to train at the Royal Military Academies at Woolwich and Sandhurst. They spoke about allowing some Mexicans to go to higher level military education in the British Isles but that didn’t happen in this treaty.


For the navy the British agreed to hand over six coastal submarines for the Mexican Navy. Further they would train the crews for these submarines. Further the Royal Navy hand over a number of small surface ships[6] to the Mexican Navy to allow them to start training sailors on how to operate ships larger the small gun boats currently operated by the Mexican Navy. The air force would be reequipped with new fighter, dive bombers, and other aircraft to make them a semi-modern air force instead of a flying club like it was at the moment. Both the Mexican Navy and Air Force would start an exchange to allow Mexican cadets to be trained in the British Isles.


[1] Think a sane version of Mein Kampf parts dealing with political ideology and future plans. It’s basically to give Mexicans something to buy into.

[2] France have come to accepted that Alsace-Lorraine is German dirt along with what they lost in the Great War and internationally now Alsace-Lorraine is generally called Elsaß-Lothringen.

[3] 49th Cuba, 50th Sonora, 51st Puerto Rico, basically the US has grown a lot ITL, but only a few more states have been added because of the need to be Americanized or have their population to grow, sometimes both. Puerto Rico became the 51st state back in late 37.

[4] I’m not sure of the value of the Mexican Peso at this point in OTL history, so I really don’t have a good idea how to judge the value of the ITL Mexican Peso, but I’m saying this is top shelf tequila that at a liquid store you would have to order as it cost that much.

[5] I’m up for names to call it, but yeah the OTL Mondragon Rifle.

[6] In total 14 ships would be handed over to the Mexican Navy, minesweepers, sloops, and a few tenders. This isn’t counting the submarines being handed over to the Mexicans.

 

[Jim Smitty]

SMS Meteor
Yangtze River
March 21 1938


Since the end of the Boxer War in the early 20th century the Yangtze River had been patrolled not by the Chinese Navy but foreign navies. At first it had been patrolled by the Americans, British, French, Germans, Italians, and Japanese. However, the French and Italian patrols had ended during the Great War as they pulled back on the world stage for a number of reasons. Both the American and German patrols had been forced to stop during the Great War as neither had the power to project into China at the time with far more pressing matters closer to home. Yet soon after the signing of the Treaty of New York, both the United States Navy and Kaiserliche Marine had ordered new gunboats to restart their patrols on the Yangtze River.


Many in the diplomatic community viewed the Yangtze as one of the possible flash points for the next Great War. During the aftermath of the Great War, some effort was made to negate this. At the Bern Naval Conference it proved to be a bridge too far to gap. At the Boston Naval Conference an agreement about patrol of the Yangtze was in reach but only for it to crumble with the Japanese invasion of Manchuria. After the failure of the London Naval Conference no one even tried anymore to end the threat of the Yangtze. Yet for many of the sailors on the Yangtze they spent more time fighting difference Chinese Warlords than dealing with the others patrolling the Yangtze.


The Meteor was one of a number of river gunboats operated by the Kaiserliche Marine on the Yangtze. She was a 567 ton design armed with a pair of 7.5 cm L/36 guns and 10 7.92 mm machine guns. When you spent most of your time dealing with pissed of Chinamen that was good enough. Yet now as the Meteor was returning of German China travelling with this year’s payment for the Boxer Indemnity after picking it up from Wuhan, they were finding this wasn’t enough to deal with a well off military force.


“All head flank! Open fire on those fucking Japs with everything we have!” Screamed the XO of the Meteor. The Kapitänleutnant was newly assigned to the Meteor after working on the S-Boats in the Baltic for a number of years. Normally the captain would be performing the task the Kapitänleutnant was at the moment, but he was already dead. In the first bombing run by the Japanese the Captain of the Meteor had caught a piece of shrapnel in the neck and had quickly bled out.


The Japanese had returned after their first run 85 minutes prior. They were dropping bombs again even through the Germans had their flags flying proudly and it painted on their ship’s deck. “Hard to starboard!” the Kapitänleutnant called in effort to miss the bombs being dropped by the Japanese. Yet the Japanese had brought more bombers this time. His efforts were in vain. A pair of 60 kilogram bombs stuck the Meteor and rocked the ship.


As the Kapitänleutnant picked himself back up after being knocked to the deck he looked back to see flames raising from his command. He tried to call his engineering department to get an understand how bad the damage was only to find out the phone system was dead. It meant the ship didn’t have power. As he put the phone back down he noticed the ship was listing to port. “Abandon Ship!”

 

[Jim Smitty]

Washington DC
National Museum of Natural History
March 25 1938


The current ongoing Meteor Crisis between the German and Japanese Empire risked starting a war. Germany was pissed by the Japanese attack on its gunboat in the Yangtze and they were currently figured out where the rest of the world stood on it. They knew that the Belgians, French, and Italians were all on their side on this but it was not the reason they wanted to go to war, they would however if push came to shove. But if they really wanted to go to war against the Japanese they would need American to join from the start of the war as this risked a wider war in Europe as well. The Germans have learned the hard way that they could only maintain a presence in the Far East with international support.


Germany knew that they couldn’t challenge the Japanese without their whole fleet as they would need it to fight a war with Japan. Their nearest major naval base to the Japanese was at Dar es Salaam. Their naval base at Haichow could only host heavy cruisers, and only two of them. And by sending their whole fleet to even trying to challenge the Japanese they would leave their European homeland and their African and Arabian Colonial Holdings totally open to the British. They weren’t willing to do that as the British were Japanese allies. So, where the United States of America stood on this would really effect where the course of Meteor Crisis.


It was just after the National Museum of Natural History opened at 9 am local time. The Director of the Officer of Naval Intelligence was currently standing in front of the Tyrannosaurus in the dinosaur exhibition of the museum. He was currently waiting for someone. No one would know he was a rear admiral in the USN as he was wearing a civilian suit. After only waiting for a minute or two a man came up to the director and spoke French, “Could I trouble you for a smoke sir?”


The Director turned around and saw the German senior naval attaché standing behind him who was also wearing a civilian suit. Speaking French, “Sure Hans, I even remember the brand you like.”


Both were speaking French as they assumed that the bulk of the people here were unable to speak French. “Thank you Mike.” As the senior officer handed Hans a pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes.


Putting the pack into one of his pockets Hans when on, “Mike, I hope you have good news.” Relations between Germany and the United States had improved since the end of the Great War. They however were still rival powers even through the only place their goals overlapped was China. Then again everyone’s goals overlapped in China. Most everyone wanted to crave off pieces of China for themselves. Everyone wanted better trade deals. But no one could agree to how to do it. Further with the warlordism in China it wasn’t an easy thing to do. Other than China the Americans and Germans didn’t have any other goals that overlapped and its one of the reasons their relations had improved since the end of the Great War.


“Hans I wished I had better news for you. President Olsen would be willing to help you on diplomatic and economic fronts. But the nation would not support this reason for war. Had it been an American gunboat the nation would have given the support needed to fight a war against Japan.”


Olsen really wanted to give Germany his full support as the Japanese were giving a new meaning to loot, rape, and pillage with what they were doing in China right now. However, going before congress trying to use the Japanese sinking a German gunboat as a casus belli for the American nation to go to war would not work and Olsen knew it. The Democratic Party had only return to power in 1932 at a federal level. This was after decades of being out of power at the Federal Level. If Olsen when to congress for war over this he knew the Republicans would use it to retake power in 40. This was with Olsen knowing that the Republicans viewed the Japanese was as big of a threat as the British. But the American public would never accept it and both parties knew it.


Hans took a moment to think as the two men slowly walked in the museum. “Mike besides diplomatic and economic help would your nation do anything else in the event of a war between us and the Japanese?”


“Unless directly attacked by the Japanese we would stay out of such a war. The American public isn’t ready for another war and short of a damn good reason for war we would have a divided nation going into another Great War. That wouldn’t work and you know it.”

 

[Jim Smitty]

Washington DC
White House
April 2 1938


President Carl Olsen was currently holding a meeting with Secretary of State Gray Underwood, Secretary of War Karl Kerr and Secretary of the Navy Ed Knox. The meeting was dealing with the closing of the Meteor Crisis. Of the four men in the room, only Underwood had not wanted to join the Germans in a war against the Japanese. Underwood was somewhere in between being a hawk and a dove. During the debate of the US answer to the Meteor Crisis Underwood had let it be known he wasn’t against a war against Japan but he wanted a just reason for war and one the nation would support. Even through the other three men had all wanted to go to war they understood as well the nation wouldn’t support the death of a few German sailors to go to war with Japan. It was with that understand that US public wouldn’t support a war with Japan over what happened to the Meteor that had set the US course in the crisis.


Underwood was currently speaking, “It looks like this is going to end peacefully. The Japanese had finally accepted to talks being broker by the Brazilians to end this.” The Germans had agreed to these talks that had been offered Brazil three days ago. Yet the Japanese had only just agree to these talks.


Karl spoke next, “The Germans aren’t about to risk their fleet that far from home. Which speaks well of them.” Privately Karl was thinking they must have really took that defeat in the Island War to heart. “But it still doesn’t explain the British reaction to it.”


Ed took over, “Mister President, the ONI has reason to believe that the British via the Japanese were trying to goat the Germans into war.”


Carl almost spit up the coffee he had been drinking. After recovering from the shock Carl spoke, “Ed does the ONI have hard intelligence to prove that? Or is an ONI theory?”


The only republican in the room looked Carl in the eye, “No sir we don’t have hard intelligence, but what else can explain the British reactions?” There was a moment of silence before Ed kept going on. “We started to pick of signs of the British starting to mobilize their fleet before the Brazilians made their offer to act as an intermediary to broker an agreement to end this peacefully. An offer that Germany took also as soon as the Brazilians made it. The Japanese took till earlier today before agreeing to it. Why wait so long to agree to talks with the Brazilians?”


It was a few seconds of silence before Karl spoke again. “Because they weren’t getting the reaction they were expecting from the Germans.”


“Precisely.” Ed took back over. “They were hoping to goat the Germans into sending the bulk of their fleet into the Pacific when the British would close the backdoor and destroy the German Fleet, far from home. The German allies aren’t in a good position to challenge British Naval Strength and with the bulk of the German fleet destroyed, the British simply could pick off the colonies of their choice as the Japanese run lose in Asia taking colonies there. Then once they got what they wanted they could force their terms on to the Germans and their allies.”


Carl closed his eyes and started to hum. He did that every so often, but only when he was deep in thought. But it only lasted a few seconds generally. This time it lasted almost a minute before he opened up his eyes again. “Just because they failed this time into getting a war, doesn’t mean they will fail again. We need to be ready to join any war against the British and Japanese at a moment’s notice. And here is what we are going to do.”

 

[Jim Smitty]

Berlin
Schloss Charlottenburg
April 24 1938


Chancellor Hugo von Kaspar was currently waiting for one more person before he would start this meeting. He would had liked to have his Foreign Minister Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck here as well as this was mostly his plan. Paul was a crafty bastard who knew how to play the diplomatic game well. Some have even started to call him the second coming of Bismarck when it came to foreign matters as he was that good. But he was currently in Brazil hammering out an agreement to end the Meteor Crisis. However, he did have all of his military ministers with him along with the different chiefs of staffs of the Imperial German Armed Forces. They were currently waiting for the person who lived here to get the meeting started.


Kaiser Wilhelm III entered the meeting room. All the men in the room rose and bowed in respect to their Kaiser. Wilhelm the Third was a different man than his father was. Even though he had commanded an army during the Great War he was rarely seen in uniform. He instead like to dress in well do to civilian suits over wearing a uniform most of the time. He would wear a uniform when it was called for, but today he was in one of his suits. Further he had made it clear that the days of German princes commanding armies in the field were over just because they came from noble birth. If they could earn it, that was one thing and they would be allowed to advance through the ranks. He had made this clear with his own sons to drive the point home. One son had already left the army to go back to university to study botany as he wasn’t that good at being an officer but did his national service none the less. The crown prince through it seemed had a knack for military matters and was currently assigned to a battalion staff within the 3rd Panzer Division. The other son of Wilhelm the third was currently going through the paces of being a junior naval officer on the SMS Brandenburg after getting his full commission only a few months ago.


“Take your seats.” He said as he took his seat at the head of the table. Then he nodded to Hugo to start the meeting. At that Hugo got up and viewed to the map that was currently hanging in this room. It was a world map. Even with all of the changes to the world map in the past 13 months it was a current and up to date map.


“Your majesty, gentlemen, as you all know it seems that the British are set on starting a war with us and keeping NATO out of it.” There were nods all around. How the British acted during the crisis pointed to them being a little too ready to go to war. “This time the British overplayed their hand and we didn’t take the bait. But it is clear they want to go to war as to why we aren’t sure. However they are clearly on the warpath.”


Germany understood that it was the naval muscle in the alliance they led. It was why even through, they faced a major land base threat from the Soviet Union and lesser from Austria-Hungary they kept putting money into their navy. They learned first hand during the Great War what would happen if they lost control of the seas. The German economy was resource hungry and with the blockade the British used effectively cut Germany off from the world. They know the British would do even more in another war against them to cut them off from the wider world. It was only with their fleet actions later in the war that allow them to reclaim their colonial empire and add on to it. They had to keep their fleet in working order and they knew it.


Hugo when on, “I think the time for attempting peace is coming to an end and we have to finish this contest we started in 1915.”


Wilhelm raised an eyebrow at that one. He was the only one in the room who hadn’t been briefed yet on the plan on either side of the coin. The whole reason they were holding this meeting was to get his blessing to put the plan into motion. “Hugo how do we go about this?” Wilhelm asked.


“The first phase of the plan is diplomatic.” At that Hugo picked up a pointer and pointed to Sweden, “The Swedish have looking for an alliance with us to defend themselves against the Com Block. So far they have been somewhat reluctance to agree to a full alliance that includes going to war with the London Pact.”


Currently there were four main alliance blocs in the world. NATO covered the US led alliance in North America. Germany led the Quadruple Alliance which was the bulk of Europe. There was the Com Block which was the alliance of all of the communist nations worldwide. Then there was the London Pact. The London Pact was the British led alliance and it included the British Empire, South Africa, the Imperial Federation, Japan, Greece, and Austria-Hungary. The only two alliance blocs that weren’t openly hostile to each other was the US led NATO alliance and the German led Quadruple Alliance. This was primary because neither alliance operated in areas that the other cared about beside China. Further there was an unspoken understanding between the two alliances that they were the lesser of the other two alliances in this world.


“With the right sweetener, we should be able to get the Swedish to become a full member of our alliance. With this we will be able to keep control of the Baltic and free our fleet up for operations against the British.”


It made sense Wilhelm thought. “What about the Dutch?” He asked.


Hugo shook his head no. “They aren’t going to want an alliance with us. They have never been that open to an idea an alliance with us. If they had to choose an alliance they would go over to the Americans over us unless the Japanese decide to crash into the Dutch East Indies.”


Pointing to the Imperial Federation, “This our ticket to what we want to do.”

 

[Jim Smitty]

Near Wuhan
Rice Fields
May 8 1938


Lieutenant Louis Belanger was out in the boondocks at the moment. He had his modified M1917 submachine at the ready as he was walking around the perimeter that his unit had set up. His small unit was currently guarding a shot down Japanese Ki-29 that had crashed in this rice field. They were here to get technical intelligence on the Ki-29 which was one of the more advance aircraft currently in use by the Japanese Armed Forces. The Japanese had started advancing on Wuhan a few week ago and against the cluster of different warlords. Further the Japanese were terror bombing Wuhan in effort to force the Chinese to surrender. But the Chinese knew the score. The Japanese was looting, raping, and killing on their way across China. The Massacre of Shanghai had only been the start of the Japanese terror against the Chinese people, with larger massacres happening in Nanjing, Weifang, and Peking.


The Japanese through had a nasty surprise a few days ago. The US had sold to one of the larger warlords in the area a number of surplus guns that could be used as anti-aircraft guns. These guns couldn’t be traced back to the United States because they had salvaged the guns from a few British destroyers that had been scuttled at Halifax when the city fell to the US during the Great War. These were tested by the US for intelligence reasons before they were placed into storage and largely forgotten about. The ONI learned about these guns and put the paper work in to take control of them months ago. They then sold the guns to this warlord along with ammo for use as anti-aircraft weapons. The 12 pdr[1] guns hadn’t been designed for that but they were easily modified to be used as such. And since they weren’t American weapons they didn’t even had to let Congress know about this, though they may question where the ONI had gotten a few thousand taels of Chinese silver from.


It was this sale of anti-air guns that had led to this Ki-29 to being shot down. Prior to this the best anti-air guns in this part of China were machine guns and crappy made Chinese cannons that had a nasty habit of blowing up on the people firing them after only a maybe 50 rounds being fired out of them. As such the Japanese were flying low to hit their targets better. Their targets were population areas. Even with the limited training of the Chinese on their new weapons they managed to bring down two of the Ki-29s out of 80 or so that had bombed Wuhan a few days ago.


Now LT Belanger was leading a team to this crashed Ki-29 to salvage intelligence from it. It was why he had a reinforced squad guarding the Ki-29 with a team of aircraft mechanics pulling the plane apart. Given they in the boondocks it wasn’t an easy task. So far they had already taken two truck loads of parts out to Wuhan where they were loaded on to waiting American gun boats for travel back to Franklin and at the moment they were currently working on their third truck load. From there they were get packed up and sent to the states for study. This way they could get an idea what the Ki-29 could do so they could feed that information into the fighter projects to build better fighters to defeat Japanese bombers.


The senior aviation machinist’s mate, a 1st class petty officer came up to Belanger, “Sir we got the port engine loaded up and ready to go. To get the starboard engine we are going to need more acetylene through.” The starboard side was worse off than the port side as it landed with its wing on fire it seemed like.


“Never mind trying to take the whole engine. Strip what you can off it that engine.” Louis would had liked to get that second engine as well, but the Japanese were only a few days out from this position and they wouldn’t take kindly to his team stripping one of their bombers for parts.


“Aye, aye sir”


[1] Think 12 pdr 12 cwt Mk Vs

 

[Zoidberg12]

Finally! Here is a map of this world in 1937. Once again, a lot of this map was speculation.

I also re-uploaded my 1918 map to fix the border between Germany and Poland.

 

[Jim Smitty]

Canberra
Barton Cottage
May 23 1938


Many people across the Imperial Federation were getting ready for a milestone for their nation. Queen Victoria the Second had died in December last year. Her replacement was politically unacceptable to the Imperial Federation as the nation had a far larger set of Roman Catholics than either the British Home Islands or the Union of South Africa. Empress Victoria the Third was simply the wrong monarch for the Imperial Federation. The Roman Catholic Church took a dim view of the rumor Sapphic Affairs of the new British monarch. Indeed, there was already major gap between London and Canberra/Sydney/Wellington before the whole question of the next monarch had come up.


Unlike South Africa which had their own branch Conservative Empire Party running South Africa, the Imperial Federation own branch of the CEP the Empire Party had never gain any traction. The Imperial Federation was the only part of the British Empire that freedom of speech and freedom of press still existed. Or multi-party elections could freely happen. This was because the branch party of the CEP in South Africa had basically followed the CEP playbook and turned South Africa into a Fascist State led by the Empire Party there. Then again South Africa had a guilty feeling about having their civil war during the Great War. It was why the Boer had been forced to move to Argentina or elsewhere. But still they wanted to prove they were loyal members of the British Empire and sometimes were trying to out British the British.


The Imperial Federation had taken its own route and it was still a true constitutional monarchy because of that. But the Imperial Federation was in an uncomfortable position geo-political position. They were deeply scared that they would be the next Canada. The United States held good naval bases at Rabaul and Noumea. Even with the volcanic eruption last year at Rabaul the US was rebuilding the base there. Making matters worse was Tokyo was still aligned with London. The Imperial Federation was worried that the Japanese would attack them and London would keep backing Tokyo to draw the Americans away from their shipping lanes in the Atlantic.


Prime Minister Donald Storm was getting ready for his last meeting of the day before travelling to Wellington to meet with King Arthur of the Imperial Federation. The Coronation of King Arthur was to start in a few days and it was a critical event for the Imperial Federation. One that needed to go off without a hitch. Yet the German Ambassador was very clear that he wanted to meet before Donald took off to Wellington. His personal secretary showed in the German Ambassador into his office. The German Ambassador put his hand forward, “Thank you for taking the time to see me today Mister Prime Minister.” He said in good English but with a clear German accent.


Returning the hand, “Its no problem Mister Ambassador. However, I would like to know what was so important that it couldn’t wait.”


“Quite right good sir.” Damn Don thought he is really turning on the charm. “As you know I will be representative my nation at King Arthur’s Coronation.” The British had sent their Minister-Counselor to the German Empire to representative the British Empire at Kaiser Wilhelm the Third’s Coronation. The Imperial-Federation send its Charge d’affaires to the German Empire. Donald through it was somewhat odd that the Germans after being disrespected by the British would send their own ambassador to King Arthur’s Coronation. Not only where they sending their own ambassador they were sending a lot of people to the Coronation. “My Kaiser wish to bestow a sign of friendship between are two nations.”


That caused Donald to raise an eye brow. The British hadn’t given Kaiser Wilhelm any awards at his Coronation. The Imperial Federation didn’t have any awards to give at the time as the Order of the Imperial Federation[1] hadn’t been founded yet. “My Kaiser has decided to bestow on King Arthur the Order of the Black Eagle. I would wish just a small amount of time to present this honor to King Arthur.” The Order of the Black Eagle as it was known in English was the highest order of chivalry within the German Order of Chivalry. It was only awarded to nobles, or if a commoner did something to warrant awarding it, they were made a noble than awarded it. Before the Great War it was a common order to be present to foreign monarchs, but since then the Germans had only presented it to allied monarchs of the German Empire.


Donald knew that the Germans were making a play for something by doing this. He wasn’t sure what the play was yet but he had a few ideas. Honestly all of them sounded like winners to him. “I will speak to King Arthur and see if I can set up a few minutes of his time to present this honor to him.”


“Thank you Mister Prime Minister, for asking for his grace’s valuable time.” He left it unsaid that he would later present the Order of Merit to the Imperial Federation Prime Minister. “I will see you in Wellington Sir.”


The two men shook hands again prior to the German Ambassador leaving the office. Donald knew that the German Ambassador would be travelling on the SMS Fürst Bismarck which was travelling with her sister ship as part of the Fleet Review taking place at Wellington. One thing Donald was sure about though the Germans were pulling out all of the stops for what it was they were doing.


[1] Think Order of the British Empire for how this is ranked in British orders of chivalry, but below it.

 

[Jim Smitty]

Thurmont, Maryland
ONI Safehouse
June 13 1938


Former British Ambassador Ronald Williams was currently getting for his first morning at what would be his house for the next few weeks. He had given up the knighthood he had when he accepted American citizenship. Currently the disappearance of Ambassador Sir Ronald Williams was a major mystery within diplomatic circles at the moment. Ronald had been known for taken walks in La Paz and other cities he had been posted to over the years. It was a habit he had picked up prior to becoming an American agent. The ONI used that for getting information out of Williams after making contact in Oslo 1921. It was also how they were able to stage his disappearance. On a walk only after learning that British had cancelled his plan retirement in August this year. The ONI decided they were getting too close on closing in on him and decided to get him out of La Paz then.


The British had a hunch that Sir Ronald Williams had defected to the United States. He had made it to the final four list of possible leaks within the Foreign Office. It was why they had cancelled his planned retirement so they could be sure he wasn’t the leak that was feeding information to the Americans. However, they couldn’t prove that Sir Ronald Williams had defected to the United States. His personal safe still had all the papers in it should. The same was true of the embassy safe at La Paz. His wife had no answers after being interrogation by the SS. And so far, there had been no effort to contact by any Americans. But they were still keeping an eye on her just incase the ONI decided to allow her to join her husband in case there.


After pouring a pot of tea, the two men came into the dining room, “Morning Ronald.” The ONI Commander said. A second morning came from the State Department official who was taking part in the debrief.


“Morning chaps.” Ronald said just before he took a sip of his tea.


At that the three men moved to the table to start the day’s work. The topic of the day military sales of the British to Bolivia. The British had just sold a large amount of military gear to Bolivia. This included a fair number of fighter and dive bombers, artillery, and light goliaths to Bolivia. This was after the massive military sell to the Mexicans and Argentines and a smaller military sell to the Haitians of last year. The fact the British were making large military sells to nations that were fairly hostile to Americans was unwelcomed by Washington. During this debriefing they were trying to figure out why the British were making such a massive a move in the Americas.