ASB? U.S. withdrawing soldiers from Western Europe after WW2?

You would need to go back to 1929 and get some radical isolationist politicians in after the crash. Of course, that likely butterflys away U.S. involvement in WW2 in the first place.
 
Note the World Trade Center Bombing in 1993 was over the US supporting Israel.

It will still be a target for Islamic Radicals
Good point. That being said in a world where the U.S. is issolationist, operation Nickel Grass in 1973 probably won't be able to happen (or would be very different). The U.S. / Israeli relationship would likely be very different. Perhaps Israel has to come to terms with the Arabs in the 1970's ?
 
Only way the terms would be, would be with the Jews driven into the Sea. That was the goal, Israel gone. There's no 'meet on the middle ground' with that
Perhaps in this alternate time line the Israelis use or threaten to use nuclear weapons in an attempt to get better terms ?

In any event I see the various Arab Israeli conflicts playing out a bit differently if there is an issolationist U.S.

I also see some issues for the U.S. as even if they are ambivalent to the fate of Israel I suspect there would be some impact on the world oil supply which won't be good for the U.S.
 
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How much money did the USA really spend in military expenditures and Marshall Plan aid in Western Europe in the 1940s and 1950s? I had the impression that the USA seriously reduced its conventional forces, or at least the army, because the Americans were going to rely on nukes and conventional bombers. ...

Reduced 1945-46 from over eight million in uniform to less than one million on active service. Only one US Army division and two separate regiments we're at full strength. The rest we're were about 50/% strength. The Navy was busy moving half the fleet to reserve status, and scrapping another 25%. With more scheduled.

The Marshal plan was not a huge handout. Mostly a series of targeted commercial loans guaranteed by the US government. Historically Europe asorbed about 60% of US exports in manufactured goods and raw materials. With the end of sanctions in 1945 that expanded slowly, with some assistance from residual wartime aid programs. The Marshal Plan was a better organized action to stimulate certain key sectors of Europe's economy. A similar plan for China was aborted by the Communist take over. Japan was jump started by US purchases for the Korean War. ie: steel for pierced steel plank & tube or channel & I beam for structural construction. Or millions of sandbags.
 
Maybe not, the post-Soviet states aren't fans of Russia at all and with the Atlantic in the way perhaps there'd just be fifty years of awkward staring before the Soviet systems falls under its own weight. It's not like the US will be at a greater risk of nuclear destruction than it already was.

Perhaps. Or perhaps the exploited European economies are able to fuel the lumbering Soviet system which, while inefficient, has seen no need for the dislocating reforms of perestroika and glasnost and is not about to collapse. Or perhaps the USSR and China duke it out in the 70s or 80s and that causes it's own sort of implosion. Once your that far out, things become harder to predict.
 
Perhaps in this alternate time line the Israelis use or threaten to use nuclear weapons in an attempt to get better terms ?

In any event I see the various Arab Israeli conflicts playing out a bit differently if there is an issolationist U.S.

I also see some issues for the U.S. as even if they are ambivalent to the fate of Israel I suspect there would be some impact on the world oil supply which won't be good for the U.S.

Thing was, there wasn't a lot of US support for Israel till Nixon allowed sales of the M60 in 1970, after the new UK Government decided that sucking up to the Arabs was the safer ploy, and denied Chieftain Tank sales, even though did allow more Centurions to be sold in their place.

OPEC tried an embargo after the '67 war, but the USA was able to supply, so didn't get the effect of the later '73 embargo.

Without US help in 1973, it's very likely the Samson Option is done, and there were rumors of server Israeli jets and tankers heading to the USSR to spread some of that, besides their Arab neighbors
 
Perhaps. Or perhaps the exploited European economies are able to fuel the lumbering Soviet system which, while inefficient, has seen no need for the dislocating reforms of perestroika and glasnost and is not about to collapse. Or perhaps the USSR and China duke it out in the 70s or 80s and that causes it's own sort of implosion. Once your that far out, things become harder to predict.


In my view it is by non means a foregone conclusion that the Soviets would have taken control of Western Europe against their will if the U.S. completely disengaged form Euorpe post ww2. That being said the possiblity can't be discounted either.
 
In my view it is by non means a foregone conclusion that the Soviets would have taken control of Western Europe against their will if the U.S. completely disengaged form Euorpe post ww2. That being said the possiblity can't be discounted either.

Well, at the minimum, they’d probably pick up Western Germany. Stalin rather specifically informed a group of East German communists in ‘46 that he anticipated the Americans would withdraw the last of their troops from their zone by early-‘47 and thus allow the Red Army to seize the former American occupation zones without even having to fire a shot. He would then concentrate on undermining the Anglo-French sectors, which he anticipated would be easy enough with the Americans gone.

He was rather unsurprisingly put off when ‘47 rolled around and the US still had a hundred thousand people policing their sector.
 
Well, at the minimum, they’d probably pick up Western Germany. Stalin rather specifically informed a group of East German communists in ‘46 that he anticipated the Americans would withdraw the last of their troops from their zone by early-‘47 and thus allow the Red Army to seize the former American occupation zones without even having to fire a shot. He would then concentrate on undermining the Anglo-French sectors, which he anticipated would be easy enough with the Americans gone.

He was rather unsurprisingly put off when ‘47 rolled around and the US still had a hundred thousand people policing their sector.
If I remember correctly, Italy and France both had quite a strong socialist parties at the time. When Richard Nixon visited Europe as a Congressman, his main concern and reason to support the Marshall Plan was the fact that there was a threat of Italian/Greek socialists becoming increasingly popular. And France arguably nearly had a revolution far after the economic issues of WW2 had subsided in May 68’.
 
Im not a communist but I think it might be interested in what the soviet block could have achieved with the expertise and industry of western Europe at its disposal.

Also please dont forget that getting France - not to mention Britain - through revolutions would place most of Africa in soviet hands as well - the colonial empires still existed.
 
Well, at the minimum, they’d probably pick up Western Germany. Stalin rather specifically informed a group of East German communists in ‘46 that he anticipated the Americans would withdraw the last of their troops from their zone by early-‘47 and thus allow the Red Army to seize the former American occupation zones without even having to fire a shot. He would then concentrate on undermining the Anglo-French sectors, which he anticipated would be easy enough with the Americans gone.

He was rather unsurprisingly put off when ‘47 rolled around and the US still had a hundred thousand people policing their sector.
Fair enough. That makes sense
 
This is pure nonsense. There are many scenarios that could derail the Manhattan Project and prevent an atomic bomb being ready by 1945. Atomic scientists being bleeding heart pacifists who only worked on a bomb because of scary Germans isn’t one of them.

Given the Szílard Petition, and the post-war activities of Szílard, Einstein, Bethe, Urey, Oppenheimer, and others, I don't see this as unreasonable.

(Einstein did not work in the Manhattan Project, but his advocacy had helped start it; his opposition to further development of the Bomb would be very influential.)

It depends on when the war in Europe ends, of course. By 1945, the project was approaching completion. Late 1944 may be too late, as well. However, the Schwarz Kapelle wanted to implement VALKYRIE well before 20 July; there were at least two earlier misfires (Stauffenberg got the bomb into Hitler's presence, but aborted because Himmler and Goering weren't present; by 20 July, the SK settled for just Hitler).

Also, of course, there were a number of outright Communists in the Project, secretly reporting to Soviet intelligence (such as Klaus Fuchs). If the war in Europe was over, the Soviets might direct these people to obstruct the Project; they might also leverage their influence against the Bomb.

Finally, the huge budget for the Project could become a target for Congressional budget cutters and the "conventional" armed forces.
 
Finally, the huge budget for the Project could become a target for Congressional budget cutters and the "conventional" armed forces.

MP was a 2 billion dollar project.
Seems like a lot, till you realize they spend $3B on the B-29, and tht spending didn't include what it took to get the Wright R-3350 somewhat dependable by 1945
 

BigBlueBox

Banned
Given the Szílard Petition, and the post-war activities of Szílard, Einstein, Bethe, Urey, Oppenheimer, and others, I don't see this as unreasonable.
What post-war activities? The idea that Oppenheimer opposed nuclear expansion on moral grounds is a myth. He simply thought that the hydrogen bomb was impractical and research into it was a waste of money.

Also, of course, there were a number of outright Communists in the Project, secretly reporting to Soviet intelligence (such as Klaus Fuchs). If the war in Europe was over, the Soviets might direct these people to obstruct the Project; they might also leverage their influence against the Bomb.
Anyone on the team who suddenly quits or acts in a suspicious manner will be visited by the FBI.

Finally, the huge budget for the Project could become a target for Congressional budget cutters and the "conventional" armed forces.
Suggesting defense cuts before the US Army is parading in Tokyo is a great way to get chased out of Washington by a lynch mob.

I’m not saying it’s impossible for the atomic bomb to be delayed beyond 1945. But the PoD must be earlier than 1944.
 
What post-war activities? The idea that Oppenheimer opposed nuclear expansion on moral grounds is a myth.
So Oppenheimer didn't call on Stimson in August 1945 to deliver a letter calling for nuclear weapons to be banned,
and didn't say to Truman in October that he had "blood on my hands"?

Suggesting defense cuts before the US Army is parading in Tokyo is a great way to get chased out of Washington by a lynch mob.

With Nazi Germany defeated, a lot of people will be suggesting cutbacks in war spending. (As happened OTL.) And my suggestion included the "conventional" armed forces lobbying for redirection of the MP budget to conventional arms.
 
And my suggestion included the "conventional" armed forces lobbying for redirection of the MP budget to conventional arms.

Problem was, MP was so secret, most of the Army and Navy (and most every congresscritter on an appropriations committee) had no idea that the MP was even being funded, and that included Truman, who was doing a pretty good job and finding waste and mismanagement.

By time they found out, Nagasaki had already got glassed, and the War all but won.
 
Problem was, MP was so secret, most of the Army and Navy (and most every congresscritter on an appropriations committee) had no idea that the MP was even being funded, and that included Truman, who was doing a pretty good job and finding waste and mismanagement.

By time they found out, Nagasaki had already got glassed, and the War all but won.

ITTL, Nazi Germany is gone and there are people in the MP are opposing its continuation (as a Bomb project). It's hardly ASB for some of them to reach out to potential allies with leaked information.
 
If the US military lacks a certain amount of discipline and develops a very negative reputation in Europe, I imagine that the Euro governments could just tell the US to leave. Not because the politicians actively want the US to leave,but because certain politicians manage to get elected on the premise that they could get the US military out, and they just happened to win.
 
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