AH Challenge: USSR wins the Cold War

[MRig]

This one's a doozy I know, but I have enough confidence in the board's creativity to not immediately put it in the ASBs pile.

So: with a point of divergence sometime in the 20th century (after the October Revolution if possible, before the turn of the century if necessary), make it so that the United States is no longer willing or able to contain the Soviet Union and concedes to it military hegemony outside the Americas.

The USSR's victory won't be as complete as the US's OTL victory, of course. The United States will not collapse, and will probably retain an edge over Russia at sea.

The main impediments are the horrid flaws in Marxist-Leninist systems, and the unreal power of the United States. Still, China has managed to make a Communist political system work with liberal economic reforms. Perhaps a more extensive New Economic Policy, followed by someone besides Stalin succeeding Lenin (Bukharin?) After that, butterflies in *World War II allow the Red Army to sweep down through continental Europe before Allied troops land at Normandy. USSR troops may also reach Manchuria and Korea while they're still in Japanese hands. Butterflies may let them put a friendly or puppet regime in Beijing if, for instance, Mao does not survive Chiang's purges and the Comintern masterminds China's revolution.

The United States' reaction to these events will need to be counterproductive. Perhaps the *Korean War, *Second Indochina War or analogue(s) hurt the U.S. more than they do in OTL. The US could become more authoritarian as the USSR becomes less so. USSR's influence in oil-rich regions grows. Left-wing elements of "first world" nations call for an end to the arms race. Britain moves towards neutrality as its people sour to the somewhat dystopian society it has become after decades of fear from Communist invasion. Neo-isolationist and leftist elements in the United States tire of the standoff and call for a return to the days of the Monroe Doctrine.

Does this scenario, implausible as it seems, have any truth to it? Is there a better way, or no way, to make something like it come true? Could It Happen Here?

 

[The Kiat]

Maybe if all this Enron and Bank Bailouts, with the fat cats giving themselves equally fat bonuses, happened in the late 70s or early 80s, that could strengthen Communism's position.

 

[MRig]

Especially if communism is seen as a more economically viable alternative, as it is in this scenario.

 

[lothaw]

Yellowstone Volcano goes off in the 60's?

 

[MRig]

'Course a geological PoD is arguably before 1900

 

[BriefMortal]

Some people I know would argue that the Cold War is not over yet. But not necessarily against Russia.

 

[MRig]

China? I hold the opposite view--that the U.S. and China are on their merry way to being joined at the hip a la Firefly. This could get derailed though, by a Cold War revival in the U.S. or a Maoist revival in China. One would probably cause the other. It's a cycle I don't much care to contemplate, except perhaps when writing dystopian FH timelines...

 

[The Kiat]

'Course a geological PoD is arguably before 1900

I don't see how. The super volcano is there now, building up. It'll erupt eventually. If it did back in the 60s... well the Soviets would be just as screwed.

 

[MRig]

I don't see how. The super volcano is there now, building up. It'll erupt eventually. If it did back in the 60s... well the Soviets would be just as screwed.

I don't dispute that. But the changes to the Earth necessary to make the volcano explode in the 1960s are measured in geological time. It doesn't just make an a priori decision to erupt in 1962. Humans don't generate their actions from nowhere either, but we can trace their decision-making on the human scale.

I am hesitant to use geological counterfactuals, because I take a deterministic view of these sorts of natural processes. Nothing wrong with them, just a preference.

 

[EWHM]

All you need for the US to lose the cold war is for the US elite to collectively 'lose its nerve'---probably in the 70's after Vietnam and Watergate. The whole MAD paradigm that drove most of the cold war absolutely required both nations playing it to be able to convince themselves and their opponents that they were irrational. Basically, in a MAD situation, as soon as you are both rational, and perceived to be rational, you lose. Imagine the Soviet Union correctly perceives that the US has lost its nerve, and demands the unconditional surrender of the US, or it will nuke us. If you are a rational party, if you truly believe that the SU will do this, you have to surrender---the fact that you can kill them all also in return is of no intrinsic value to you. In practice, rationality is not quite this boolean---what an emboldened SU would probably do is use this knowledge to make more extensive inroads into the Middle East to gain control over more of the world's energy supply This was a really scary time in history. A lot of the crazy things that happened---remember Reagan's outlawing the SU forever speech on the VOA?---make a lot more sense taken in light of game theory.

 

[MRig]

Good points. At no point did it ever seem like we were about to lose.

Is it rational to verbally threaten nuclear war with another nuclear-armed state, though?

 

[Cyclone]

This is really not terribly hard. If during (or, I suppose, prior to) WW2, the communists establish hegemony over Europe, the United States is ultimately going to lose its ability to adequately project forces to Asia and Africa, at least in comparison to the Reds. The industrial power of the European Union in our timeline is strong enough seriously challenge US hegemony if and when it chooses too - combine that with a more robust Soviet Union, and you have a very strong challenger to the United States.

Imagine a Comintern that, rather than engaging in Stalin's idiotic "Social Democrats are worse than Fascists," then his disastrous "Popular Front" strategy, had engaged in the revolutionary ideal and said "fuck parliamentary mechanics," as Trotsky suggested. Honestly, no major historical communists ever got into a sustained position of power via parliamentary means - it is, from a strategic perspective, a bad idea: it risks non-communist elements using those same parliamentary means to oust the reds.

Historically, post-WW2 communists were in a very good position in several (then capitalist) European nations: both Italy and France, despite never falling under the Red Army tide, had very powerful communist parties.

Basically, a Europe that falls into the Comintern (from within or without) after WW2 leaves a Communist bloc that would be very difficult to dislodge.

 

[Blue Max]

Alternatively, you could simply have someone like Bob Taft become PotUS and the USA decides to go back to "sleeping Giant" mode as the Soviet Union makes major gains globally.

 

[Mad Bad Rabbit]

On September 19, 1980, a Titan-II missile caught fire and exploded
inside its silo near Conway, Arkansas. The 20-ton blast door was
blown off the top of the silo, and the 5 MT warhead ended up in a
field 200 yards away.

POD: somehow it goes off. Although the W-53 warhead is designed
to be "two-point safe", let's say a design flaw in the arming circuitry
results in the warhead thinking it's arrived at Novosibirsk (it did just
undergo an untested scenario involving rapid acceleration, freefall,
then abrupt deceleration...) and performing a full-yield detonation.

This is bad. The fallout from a 5 MT groundburst would contaminate
a large swath of Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Kansas, requiring a vast
Chernobyl-like exclusion zone right across America's breadbasket.
Not a good end to Carter's administration or a good start to Reagan's.

Several thousand people die that night; and millions more will be
forced to abandon their homes and businesses forever (including
Sam Walton). There's not going to be a Reagan Recovery, nor a big
increase in military spending anytime in the 80's.

Besides the huge economic hit, it will be politically impossible to put
Pershing-II's in Europe. All Titan-II's at home will need to be taken
offline as well (while the Feynman Committee tries to figure out how
the hell this happened).

By examining the crater size, the Soviets are going to figure out that
a well-known formula (in Glasstone's 1977 book) for yield-vs-crater depth
is wrong, and that our existing warheads probably can't take out their
buried command-and-control bunkers.

 

[MRig]

This is really not terribly hard. ...Basically, a Europe that falls into the Comintern (from within or without) after WW2 leaves a Communist bloc that would be very difficult to dislodge.

I'd suspected that if they got all of Europe they could pull it off. This is a convincing argument.

Alternatively, you could simply have someone like Bob Taft become PotUS and the USA decides to go back to "sleeping Giant" mode as the Soviet Union makes major gains globally.

This requires some really interesting changes to U.S. politics. I suspect a WWII-with-Hitler is too much for isolationism to survive, without remarkably different leadership in the 1930s. Major changes to WWI and/or the interwar years might also give the U.S. a remarkably different president after Roosevelt.

On September 19, 1980, a Titan-II missile caught fire and exploded
inside its silo near Conway, Arkansas....
Besides the huge economic hit, it will be politically impossible to put
Pershing-II's in Europe. All Titan-II's at home will need to be taken
offline as well (while the Feynman Committee tries to figure out how
the hell this happened).

By examining the crater size, the Soviets are going to figure out that
a well-known formula (in Glasstone's 1977 book) for yield-vs-crater depth
is wrong, and that our existing warheads probably can't take out their
buried command-and-control bunkers.

This is a rather chilling scenario. Almost as bad is the same thing happening somewhere in the USSR, something at least as likely.

Love the Feynman touch. He wouldn't be chairing it, but he's the one everyone's paying attention to.

I am hesitant to think that the USSR would actually decide to let fly. They'd discuss it, surely, but there are so many better ways to leverage this event to their advantage.

 

[tallwingedgoat]

Have the Soviet Union adopt China style economic reforms. Maintain ironfisted control over the WP. Cut conventional military spending and concentrate on butter over guns. Create the Eastern European Union with common currency and free trade. Throw Eastern EuroVision contests.

Keep this going into the 21st century. Assuming similar economic crisis hits the Western world, Finlandize Western Europe.

 

[The Red]

It'll erupt eventually. If it did back in the 60s... well the Soviets would be just as screwed.

Not just as screwed, most of America will be under ash, millions would be dead, millions more homeless, the stock market would crash, the economy would collapse. Of course the Soviets would also be hit severely but not as badly as the US.

 

[Mad Bad Rabbit]

This is a rather chilling scenario. Almost as bad is the same thing happening somewhere in the USSR, something at least as likely.

I am hesitant to think that the USSR would actually decide to let fly. They'd discuss it, surely, but there are so many better ways to leverage this event to their advantage.

Internally they will likely be thinking "Oh crap! If this happens to the Americans with all their elaborate safeguards, how long till one of ours goes off in the silo too?" The US and USSR will both fall under intense pressure, from their own people and the rest of the world, to dismantle as much of their arsenals as possible.

So we end up with a nonnuclear Cold War, with the U.S. military stuck at post-Vietnam levels of funding and readiness...

 

[ninebucks]

On September 19, 1980, a Titan-II missile caught fire and exploded
inside its silo near Conway, Arkansas. The 20-ton blast door was
blown off the top of the silo, and the 5 MT warhead ended up in a
field 200 yards away.

POD: somehow it goes off. Although the W-53 warhead is designed
to be "two-point safe", let's say a design flaw in the arming circuitry
results in the warhead thinking it's arrived at Novosibirsk (it did just
undergo an untested scenario involving rapid acceleration, freefall,
then abrupt deceleration...) and performing a full-yield detonation.

This is bad. The fallout from a 5 MT groundburst would contaminate
a large swath of Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Kansas, requiring a vast
Chernobyl-like exclusion zone right across America's breadbasket.
Not a good end to Carter's administration or a good start to Reagan's.

Several thousand people die that night; and millions more will be
forced to abandon their homes and businesses forever (including
Sam Walton). There's not going to be a Reagan Recovery, nor a big
increase in military spending anytime in the 80's.

Besides the huge economic hit, it will be politically impossible to put
Pershing-II's in Europe. All Titan-II's at home will need to be taken
offline as well (while the Feynman Committee tries to figure out how
the hell this happened).

By examining the crater size, the Soviets are going to figure out that
a well-known formula (in Glasstone's 1977 book) for yield-vs-crater depth
is wrong, and that our existing warheads probably can't take out their
buried command-and-control bunkers.

This is a very interesting scenario. I think that if such a disaster were to take place, the American public would become very anti-nuclear, people would campaign to shut down nuclear power plants, legislators would be pressured into making their states as nuclear-free as possible, research budgets would be slashed and there would probably be talk of unilateral disarmament in Washington...

On a broader topic, I don't buy the idea that the USSR collapsed because their economic system didn't work, or that the only way they could survive would be through copying OTL Chinese reforms, (not that I think that'd work in the USSR, anyway). Historically, states have managed to survive for thousands of years without using a liberal capitalistic economic system, I think the crucial point about Soviet economics isn't that they don't work, its that they're not competitive. If you removed that competitive element, (i.e. the USA consistently trying to destroy the USSR), then funds wouldn't have to go into a massive military machine, and the overall system would trundle on quite securely. In short, the USSR collapsed because the Americans spent fifty years specifically trying to collapse it, not because there was anything catastrophically unworkable in the way the Soviets managed their affairs.

 

[The Kiat]

Not just as screwed, most of America will be under ash, millions would be dead, millions more homeless, the stock market would crash, the economy would collapse. Of course the Soviets would also be hit severely but not as badly as the US.

Screw the stock market; the food supply will crash once the sun's blocked out.