Wouldn't the WAllies respond to the Japanese calls for "White Troops" on the Asian front with something along the lines of "lolno we've got bigger problems at home."?
There'll be a solid reason for Gallipoli Part II: Yamato Superbattleship Edition. It should make sense from a strategic perspective and hopefully the next few chapters will make that clear.
or enemy exchange problems? Let teh Japanese troops fight evul Nazis while mighty white troops stomp Chineze?
That would be part of it... but only if things go well from the Entente perspective.
In addition, it's a myth that the British high command routinely underestimated the Japanese for 'poor eyesight' or other racial reasons. They had liason officers accompanying Japanese troops throughout the 1930s. Many were quite aware of Japanese capabilities. It is just that those reports often did not filter to where they were required, and that the British were facing Japan in a theatre where they were severely overstretched.
Fair point.
Are good referencing one(would need axis one for the vs comparation) but yeah formating need an edit but a good way to say, GB is the leader and japan the distant third.
Still some minor edit(or make a excel table and screenshooted it)
Thanks for the advice! Thanks for keeping up all the way! I think you've been reading this timeline since it's inception.
I originally ignored this ATL topic as merely an Axis Victory timeline but I was sorely mistaken. Nice job creating a nuanced and multifaceted TL out of what many usually approach as black and white.
It raises many questions about how countries that were traditionally neutral in WWII OTL would behave in this scenario. Countries such as Turkey, who's state was built upon success of repelling Entente intervention, will probably feel more wary now about the belligerent successes of Italy along with the rest of the 'Pact of Steel' in Greece. Would a UK being stretched to its limit fighting on two far flung parts of the Eurasian continent even bother trying to stage an invasion to overthrow Reza Shah Pavlahi? Switzerland may act different in this situation as they not be completely geographically surrounded by the Axis. Also would Thailand's neutrality remain secure as Imperial Japan would see no reason to violate their sovereignty for passage to Burma?
Good points you've raised. I hope some of the questions have been answered by the previous chapters and I hope the next ones will answer any unanswered ones.
Looks like the Allied amphibious landings in South China is shaping up to be a Gallipoli like disaster. I think it will be an initial success but Chinese counterattacks will turn it into a disaster. I will posit that the landings will probably occur either int he Guangdong province, Fujian province is too rugged in terrain, and so is Guangxi and Yunnan province.
Well I can posit it is either Guangxi and Guangdong province make for likely targets for Allied amphibious landings. Both have good coastlines. Guangxi is the gateway to the Sichuan province which is the backdoor to China and its breadbasket and factories. Guangdong also has factories but a good backdoor towards Central China.
Anyways, I think the disaster will help end the allied commitment to China. Expect the British Commonwealth members to get out of the war. India will be ripe for revolution. Post war, I expect Japan to lose Manchuria and korea but gain the Dutch East Indies.
The south does make a lot of sense as an invasion point. Since the KMT has it's 'roots' from there, it was a target of a lot of joint German-Chinese investment. A lot of China's industrial capacity is tied up in that area.
Can you post a link to all of your chapters?
Thanks in advance.
Yes, I keep on meaning to do this, but I'll do it at some point before the next update.
I like the idea of Wang Jingwei gathering his own shadow army without a public fallout with CKS (or going over to the Japanese, for that matter). Although, where does he get that many officers that would follow him to command the CP (had to lol a bit at that) units? CKS has Whampoa in the early days and the Central Military Academy to provide him with reasonably loyal officers, and IOTL he has the prestige to get the warlords to follow him. What does Wang have?
About Dai Li... his relationship with CKS is one of master-pupil (Dai being a graduate of Whampoa's Sixth Class) instead of solely superior-subordinate a la Hitler and Himmler. The point is, IOTL MBIS is quite powerful out of necessity, and it looks like the same case ITTL. It doesn't necessarily mean Dai harbor thoughts untoward to his old master.
Also, I'm surprised that He Yingqin got assigned to oversee arms production (IMO his best role would be Minister of National Defence or Chief of General Staff). Yu Dawei will probably make a better Secretary for War Production.
Marc A
P.S. Any chance for these men - Sun Li-jen, Zhang Lingfu, Hu Lien, Qiu Qingquan, Huang Baitao and Liao Yaoxiang - to appear soon?
You're correct about the Dai Li/CKS and Wang Jingwei/CKS relationship. Since there was never a split between the right/left of Kuomintang, there's still a substantial portion of leftist officers that Wang can use to form a cadre for the CP. The Communist Party, while not being promoted, hasn't been repressed and isn't underground either. And the CP is mostly intended to be a disorganized militia/civil defence/Anti-aircraft type thing with a handful of 'elite' divisions.
Those men you listed will be making an appearance in short order.
Well, it's not that I'm suggesting Panthers or Me-262 for Chiang Kai Shek. And the Bf-109 may hold it's own against Japanese planes for a while. But the Tianjin 39 and 40 are totally unsuitable, even against Japanese tanks (which historically were also disappointing). So what about a more robust design that also has economies of scale of it's own, like the Pz III?
With the railroad I can see a German "lend-lease" of sorts, including old Pz II and III to be upgunned and studied on China. Maybe they won't replace the older Tianjins completely, but will give seriously needed power to elite and some regular Chinese divisions.
True, but it comes down to production time and cost. At the end of the day, it's cheaper to be making tractor-esque tanks with forward facing guns compared to more complex German designs.
Italian tanks on the other hand...
This is getting more and more interesting.
So there is no Holocaust, the Jews from German are deported to Kashgar and Israel is butterflied away?
I wonder what effect it will have in the future...
I wouldn't necessarily say that Israel has been butterflied. And the Jews are just being deported to Kashgar for processing, before they're integrated to the rest of China. Their skilled labour is very much in demand in the factories in need of them.
can't said anything but this is a really enjoyable timeline... a bit of guilty pleasure looking Nazi victory I think... (since outside ASB, this is a rare treat indeed)
I wouldn't say it's an Axis victory quite yet
Considering the Balfour Declaration was already signed the British gave the green light (albeit limited and often times during WWII legally closed) for Jews to settle and buy property within the British Mandate of Palestine. I have little doubt you can simply butterfly what is becoming a historical freight train all its own at this point. There maybe some differences though like a young (not yet general) Moshe Dyan and Yizhak Rabin among others fighting with the British against Italian forces in this TL instead of Vichy French.
However, since a majority of German and Eastern European Jews who survive initial Nazi invasion are being deported to Kashgar, a once ancient Jewish community that had predominantly became Islamic by the 16th century, is going to create sectarian problems all its own. The question is how the KMT will react to such a situation and whether this in turn will continue to make Labor Zionism grow in popularity among the Jewish diaspora.
As clarified ahead, the deportation to Kashgar is not permanent, but is mostly an interment and integration point.
I'm very intrigued at how the course of the war is going, it also looks like the Soviet Union is about to become involved.
The Iranian invasion itself shouldn't be too difficult for the Entente to pull off, especially if the Soviets are involved, but the blowback from the US could be important. It would give the impression that the Entente is invading another innocent, neutral country under colonialist pretenses. As Afghanistan is also pro-Axis ITTL, there's a possibility that the Entente could try and invade Afghanistan as well to cut off the Iron Line, as well as provide a link with the Soviet Union.
Since the link between Germany and China is so important, and that Turkey seems far more pro-Axis, the Middle East as a whole is also going to become a far more important threatre of war.
All in all, I'm at the edge of my seat as to what comes next.
Thanks for reading so far. Hope to keep you entertained.
Oh, so this war will end up with US enforced stalemate and peace treaty for more or less status quo because they're pissed off with both combatants
"We'll drop this atom bomb on BOTH Germany and Japan if you boys didn't go end the fighting?"
Oh well, this is certainly quite an innovative way to end a world war.
Sometimes money is more powerful than atom bombs
I like this timeline so far.
Thanks mate!
Yah, think the USSR is coming into play, probably in Poland and Perisa.
This timeline is quite funny, the Axis are looking to be more of the good guys than the Entente.
Hmm, they're both as bad as each other I reckon. Both sides have sympathetic goals, and both have bad actions too. The Second World War ITTL will be regarded as a re-run of the first world war - hence the name "Second Great War"
Agreed.
The Entente did look more of troublemakers, itching to interfere in other countries' affairs using any sort of excuses.
And after all WW2 started thanks to the greediness of UK and France to squeeze Germany out of money.
US also not much better, it intentionally got itself involved because its military and banking industry itches to get profit from the war.
Well, any neutral country would be doing the same thing as America is in those circumstances.
As much as the Entente seem to be made up of those past their epos and aspiring colonial powers keen on keeping their colonies together and ensuring nobody, not even China, rise up to mess with their captive markets. One still cannot forgive the motivations and actions of some of the Axis. Even the OP concedes that spending large sums of money, material and blood to drive out what essential is their intelligentsia in order to follow beliefs that underpin their regime which they are also using as a pretext to invade is pure madness.
With all that said can you really condemn or congratulate those that happen to live in countries whose governments choose to not get completely involved? It is a World War so it is hard for anyone to do anything without knock on affect of contributing to it in some way. It could very well be in this TL too that almost every major nation will be completely dragged in by some way in time.
There are no angels or demons that have clearly sprung forth within telling this TL, just cold hard facts, stories of human hope and strife along with rough statistics about the hardware used that tend to go along with telling a war.
Exactly. Any war is a tragedy.
Nothing to say yet. Subscribed as I like where this could go.
I don't have time to read it yet, but I will go from page 1+ when I get a few moments.
Thanks mate.
Although i am not completely convinced by the POD, i do rather like this TL.
Thanks anyway
I'll do a rewrite when I've finished 1.0
Did I say anything particular about defending Nazi or Imperial Japan, etc !?
Needless to say there is no excuse to what Nazi did to the Jews or what Japanese did to the Chinese.
I merely point out the hard-to-admit-for-some-people fact(s) about why WW2 happened.
It is not even "seemed to be" assumption; it's a cold hard fact.
This is not about morality / ethics, etc
True dat.
It shows that you 'Agreed' to a post that claims that the Axis look more like the good guys. Whether you want to claim that through the Axis policy is less focused on genocidal atrocities (ethnic cleansing aside) or whether the Entente is acting more fervently on imperial impulse is up to debate. But let us put conjecture aside as the OP stated quite beautifully why every party of concern have unjustly wound up with blood on their hands in some sort of fashion.
Also, even though wars tend to be prepared in a very calculated fashion and successful campaigns are waged with solid objectives, their is always some kind of passionate idealistic impulse that drives people to wage it which is rooted in a sense of social morality.
Yes, the reason why wars are fought so hard is because each side believes they're on the side of the angels while their opponents are on the side of the devils.
of course it would be funnier when after WW2 ends in no one win armistice, WW3 happened not with entete and axis, but USA vs USSR for completely unrelated reasons, and this time both axis and entete sit at the side, chatters amicably while drinking tea and eating popcorn.
That would be a funny situation.
I spat my coffee after reading this. I see you still have the humour in you in writing this TL.
Though it'll still be sometime before your legendary "getting drunk with Nazis" quip. lol
Thanks.
Is this a confirmation that there will be Soviet zombies in the future?
Maybe in this timeline's version of Red Alert, they'll be a unit.
