AHC: atomic Great War in 1920s

Assuming that the earliest possible date for atomic weapons (proper ones, not "dirty"bombs) is likely to be the mid 1920s, your challenge is, with a post-1900 POD, to either delay WWI or propose an alternative "Great War" with similar charateristics prolonged stalemate, trenches, widespread shocking use of modern weapons like MGs, gas, flamethowers, aircraft, etc.) taking place in the 1920s. (1930s would be OK, but 1920a is better.)

In any case, the Great War should end in the use of atomic weapons. The more used and the wider spread, the better.
 
I would suggest a PoD in the early 1800s, a century which would be this TL's 1900s: a century of nigh nonstop war between the Great Powers. I think, with the entire power of the Late Industrial Revolution geared towards war, you could get an atomic bomb by the early '20s, and war during that time period would be rather easy if you consider all the tensions built up by such a century.
 
Doing it by the 20s is almost impossible without a pre-1900 PoD. The neutron wasn't even discovered until 1932. You'd need to advance nuclear physics by twenty years. You also need to advance aircraft technology by the same, or you aren't going to be able to deliver the thing. I'm not sure it's definitely impossible, but it is, at least, extremely improbable.
 
Depends on the size of the nuke

Little Boy, no

Davy Crockett on minimum settings, yes

They could do a laydown burst - stick a parachute and a timer on it, and hope the other side's AAA doesn't shoot it down.

Could a combat-worthy zeppelin even carry that heavy a load? Thing weighed five tons, after all, and that's before adding parachutes.
 
with a POD of post 1900 there is no way this is possible. The earliest possible development of nuclear weapons would be early 40s. Assuming it takes 10 years from development of the first nuke to the point where enough powers have enough nukes to make an atomic Great War possible then the earliest possible war would be early 50s

To knock a nuclear war back to the 20s you need a pre-1900, possibly even a pre-1800 POD that significantly speeds up scientific progress
 
They could do a laydown burst - stick a parachute and a timer on it, and hope the other side's AAA doesn't shoot it down.

Could a combat-worthy zeppelin even carry that heavy a load? Thing weighed five tons, after all, and that's before adding parachutes.
Yes, LZ104 dropped 6400kg of bomb on an attack on Naples in WWI

She also was fitted out to carry 50 tons of supplies to Africa (and got to Sudan with them before being ordered to turn back) so she could theoretically carry more

If you could improve her with more R&D her class could do it
 

BlondieBC

Banned
Would a zeppelin be able to fly high enough and fast enough to escape the explosion?

It would be suicide mission.

They could do a laydown burst - stick a parachute and a timer on it, and hope the other side's AAA doesn't shoot it down.

Could a combat-worthy zeppelin even carry that heavy a load? Thing weighed five tons, after all, and that's before adding parachutes.

You see Zeppelins going well above 40,000 pound payloads.
 
Doing it by the 20s is almost impossible without a pre-1900 PoD. The neutron wasn't even discovered until 1932. You'd need to advance nuclear physics by twenty years. You also need to advance aircraft technology by the same, or you aren't going to be able to deliver the thing. I'm not sure it's definitely impossible, but it is, at least, extremely improbable.

with a POD of post 1900 there is no way this is possible. The earliest possible development of nuclear weapons would be early 40s. Assuming it takes 10 years from development of the first nuke to the point where enough powers have enough nukes to make an atomic Great War possible then the earliest possible war would be early 50s

To knock a nuclear war back to the 20s you need a pre-1900, possibly even a pre-1800 POD that significantly speeds up scientific progress


And if Nuclear Physics were sped up that much, then other things would be, and the world would be enough of a different place that Abombs might be the least of the changes....
 
I agree there, technological development is like an upside down pyramid.
Almost impossible to forward just one technology, everything is intertwined.
If they are capable of making nukes in the 20s expect their general development level also to be at least 10-20 years ahead.
 

BlondieBC

Banned
I agree there, technological development is like an upside down pyramid.
Almost impossible to forward just one technology, everything is intertwined.
If they are capable of making nukes in the 20s expect their general development level also to be at least 10-20 years ahead.

I disagree. You often can moved selected fields forwards or backwards by 10-20 years. Funding decisions often make this much difference. While you can't say move a dreadnought to 1800, you generally could move up the development of any single subtechnology. For example, the RN could decide to place heavy priority and funding on the development of better engines for large ships in 1890 and have a big impact. Same on guns or armor. Or the reverse is true. A leader in a technology simply could make a decision not to fund a technology. For example, the USA and USSR could decided not to develop nuclear power plants for naval ships.

A good real example of these decisions is the development of bombers in the interwar years. The idea of "the bomber always get through" has more to do with decisions to fund bombers than the underlying technology. Yes, metal bombers with more advance engines can outrun bi-planes with 20 year old technology. But the decision could easily be reversed where fighters are funded heavily and countries fly 20 year old biplane bombers, and we could have the idea of "bombers are suicide weapons that do little". Often the budget decision is a self fulling prophecy.

Now on nuclear weapons in this thread, a lot depends on what he means by "Great Atomic War". Is it a Great War where a few nukes are used (moving up the technology by 20 years) OR is it a war with great numbers of nuclear bombs used (moving up technology and production closer to 40 years). The first is possible and the second is very difficult. If we simply take away WW1, we likely see the first bomb test in the 1930's, but it could be in the late 1920's. So if we say start WW1 in 1929, we might be able to open with a nuclear attack. This change does not require any major (hard to do) POD's. Moving it more takes moving precursor technologies up a good bit.

This thread seems to be popping up every 3 or 4 weeks, so I will not go into the the long explanation.
 
Hmmm...

I remember reading a thread here on the question of the earliest possible nukes concluding that the 20s was the earliest decade.

The thought was a bomb developed towards the end of the war used to break the stalemate.

(And I may pop in and out, but I haven't seen this question here before.)
 
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