Alternate 50's Scenarios

Since there have been threads about alternate 60's, 70's, 80's and 90's scenarios, so I will try some Alternate 50's scenarios:


Maryland and Pennsylvania Railroad keeps its passenger service and that somehow saves the railroad from having to abandon any of the line from the 1950's to the 1980's, where it has originally ceased to exist.

The Republic of the South Moluccas, which initially proclaimed independence in 1950 gains acknowledgment and acceptance from the Netherlands, Philippines, India, South Vietnam, United States, Canada, Turkey, France, West Germany, Italy, Australia and New Zealand.
 
The Republic of the South Moluccas, which initially proclaimed independence in 1950 gains acknowledgment and acceptance from the Netherlands, Philippines, India, South Vietnam, United States, Canada, Turkey, France, West Germany, Italy, Australia and New Zealand.

I like that 1, mate- I also have the following:
Korean War- either US Army goes into action MUCH better-prepared OR the war escalates as MacArthur wanted it to- wioth use of nukes & intervention of ROC forces

Iran & Guatemala- no CIA-orchestrated coups

Vietnam- US & Ho Chi Minh come to a mutual agreement after French are expelled- makin Vietnam into a SE Asian Yugoslavia & precluding need for US intervention
 
Vietnam- US & Ho Chi Minh come to a mutual agreement after French are expelled- makin Vietnam into a SE Asian Yugoslavia & precluding need for US intervention

Didn't Ho Chi Minh actually ask Eisenhower for help and didn't the US refuse so as not to hurt relations with France? This would be a huge turning point for the cold war period.
 
The 50s are interesting for thinking-really-big alternates because they are the last time you can have WWIII without killing almost everybody. I did a scenario with a US covert op in Albania escalationg into global war in 1953. It was for an RPG, but it worked fairly well.

Another nioce one (though we can't risk it while Susano and Steffen are around) is the Stalin Note. WI the Bonn government had accepted it in the spirit it was meant (i.e. in bad faith and with full intent to milk the result for all it's worth)? Moscow would probably have settled for Finlandisation.
 
October 9, 1950: Two afters after the PLA defeated Tibetan Army in the battle of Chamdo, an allied force of what was comprised of what was the UN forces that fought in the Korean War. In fact, this conflict would totally replace the Korean War.
 
James Dean

1. James Dean ends up living.

2. Cleveland ends up getting an expansion team in the NHL.

3. Danny Biasone never comes up with the 24-second shot clock, and the NBA ends up folding.
 
Just yesterday I started thinking about the results of an atomic war in Korea, so I can tell you that's definitely a ticklish one. Only the USSR have real retaliatory power, and it's unlikely they'd give an atom bomb to the Chinese, plus the potential for America inheriting the mantle of Evil Empire for it's continued use of atomic arms.

Other options

No Salk polio vaccine

McCarthy is either radically more successful than he was, or he didn't go on his anticommunist witch hunts at all, and communism takes root in pockets of the U.S.

The Civil Rights movement doesn't take root at all, no Rosa Parks, leaving the U.S. still somewhat backward in terms of race relations decades later.
 
1. The AFL and CIO don't reconcile their differences, and thus, don't reunify to present a united labor federation in the form of the AFL-CIO in 1955.

2. The Chinese don't intervene in the Korean War, allowing for MacArthur to push for a surrender from the DPRK.

3. Alternatively, MacArthur is given the go ahead to invade China by Truman, provoking a third world war.

4. Eisenhower supports the British, French, and Israelis in the midst of the Suez Crisis.

5. The CIA never takes up the idea of overthrowing oppositional governments, thus butterflying of the overthrow of Mossadegh, the Guatemalan government, etc.

6. Castro is granted aid from the United States, rather than the Soviet Union.

7. Truman seeks a third term in 1952.

8. Estes Kefauver runs as the candidate of the Democratic Party in either 1952 or 1956, rather than Adlai Stevenson.

9. Sputnik launch fails.

10. Playboy Magazine does not go into circulation.

11. Evangelical Christianity does not make a resurgence. IOTL, the 1950s marked the rebirth of the evangelical movement in the United States.

12. Adlai Stevenson wins in 1952 or 1956.

13. John F. Kennedy is named Stevenson's running mate in 1956 over Estes Kefauver.

14. Ronald Reagan is given the nomination of his local Democratic Party in 1952 in a bid for the House. Thus, he never gets a job with General Electric, and likely stays with the Democrats.

15. Richard Nixon not named Vice Presidential candidate on the Eisenhower ticket in 1952.
 
how as no one brought this one up, Eisenhower dies in September 1955 of a heart attack, or on the operating table in June 1956, or of a stroke in November 1957
 
SR53 and Blue Streak go into service

SR53 rocket fighters bought by RAF and Luftwaffe as high-altitude high-speed interceptors.

Blue Streak chosen as a warhead carrier and then as a reconnaissance satellite launcher. Following destruction of Gary Powers' U2, low level satellites (1 to 4 orbits) launched by Blue Streak from North Norfolk coast and Spadeadam used to gather intelligence for NATO. Development of UK-based satellite boost capability continues with covert us support.
 
Malenkov wins out in the Struggle for succession after stalin's death.

Zhou Enlai mounts a coup in China

Very different decolonisation

France does not break with NATO
 
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