Danger on Danger

Danger on Danger (Chapter 5) The best political weapon is the weapon of terror - Himmler

Berlin March 1933

Theo had been busy, a new federal election was upon the nazi party, set to cement it's success and position to rule the state with an iron fist. His fuhrer Adolf Hitler had been chancellor for two months, and those precious weeks had been used to full effect.

Hitler had banned the newspapers of the center party and other organizations and a sustained campaign to destroy the KPD was managed by Theo, Goring and Rohm (Rohm sicking the SA on them with savage beatings and murders, Goring setting up a clandestine burning to the Reichstag to be blamed on them and Theo organizing the police to look the other way whilst blood flowed in the streets)

Hitler in turn turned up the pressure on president Hindenberg to ban the communists from the next election under his emergency decree powers which was done, taking effect just three days before the election. With the communists effectively neutralized, Theo and Rohm lead the SA on a massive intimidation and murder campaign against the social democrats, breaking up meetings, busting up unions, arresting leadership and lining up leadership against walls for shooting with only the smallest pretense of cleaning up the mess they left.

The election was a farce, but still held up as legitmate with the Nazis securing 18 million votes in the reduced turnout environment; this gave them 50.2 percent of the seats in the reichstag. A staccato of new laws were passed (the Nazi's coalition with the nationlists allowing them to reach the 2/3 vote required) which resulted in the out and out banning of the leftist and centerist parties; the SPD and KPD couldn't even vote against these measures as their parliament members had either run away, been arrested or if Theo had found them, shot on the spot. Enabling acts worked their way through parliament over the next several months granting absolute power to Hitler and the Nazi party which he further consolidated after the death of President Hindenberg leaving him as Germany's supreme ruler.

Whilst all of this went on Theo continued to act as Hitler's personal left hand (as Hitler called it, since Hess always sat to his right at dinner) nominally he was a member of the Reichstag from Baden on the naval affairs committee, but behind the scenes he lead detachments of SA on search and destroy missions against the left and remaining opponents of the Nazi's with Hitlers total blessing. He ended up being so effective at this that he was given command of Hitler's splinter group of bodyguards known as the SS on a temporary basis... the role would eventually fall to another of Goering's friends Heinrich Himmler after Theo gave up the position to concentrate on his other duties completely in 1935. His most important position; unknown to much of the public and the entente was chief of naval aviation... Hitler had created a number of secret positions in this way including making Goering head of the yet to be revealed Luftwaffe. In theory Osterkamp was subordinate to Goering, but in practice this only went so far as to when they disagreed on something in which case Theo could and often did go to Hitler directly... this forced him to rely on his coddeling skills to play Hitler and Goering off each other, but these skills had a decade of refinement to them and if anything both appreciated and liked Theo and these events stayed unremarkable

That Theo could receive directives such as his first without drawing Goering's anger was THE evident example of his standing

Order to General of Naval Aviation Number 1

The fuhrer does hereby create the office of General of Naval Aviation and name Generalmajor (appointed General Major effective 1/1/34) Theodor Osterkamp to be her chief. The fuhrer directs Generalmajor Osterkamp to form a division of the Luftwaffe for naval operations including but not limited to scouting, spotting, mine laying, bombing, general support to the Kriegsmarine and is to maintain all aircraft possible in a dual use configuration should his forces be called on to participate in land battles. The fuhrer hereby orders Generalmajor Osterkamp to form 10 squadrons for the proposed duties and he is to have all access and contacts to any members of the araments industries and procurement departments of the Heer, Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine as he sees fit

Signed

Adolf Hitler
General Order 1
1/1/34
 
Danger on Danger (out of order chapter 6) If you want to go anywhere in modern war, in the air, on the sea, on the land, you must have command of the air - Admiral Bill Halsey

Oberleutant Theo Osterkamp's autobiography speaking tour 1931

The Nazi's with Theo as one of their foremost leaders in the Reichstag and the party itself were now the largest party in the German government, although stonewalling by the SPD and the center had kept them out of power.

Theo had been hard at work for years on his party's road to power, at the same time, with his fuhrer's encouragement he had finally completed a memoir titled danger on danger (an omage to the dangers of flying and the dangers of operating over the sea) which in the swath of romanticized WW1 best sellers in the period quickly became very popular in Germany and abroad.

Theo's publisher was overwhelmed with requests for speaking engagements which Hitler approved of as a way to continue boosting the image of the party. Osterkamp made dozens of appearances in Germany first and then began a selected number of foreign visits to promote his book. Austria was first, then Hungary, then Romania and Turkey and in the middle of 1931 he received and accepted an invitation from Japan to speak about his book at several of their military academies on a 4 week contract.

Theo traveled with only a small entourage from his publisher, and a long time friend of his in the party Jochim von Ribbentrob whom Hitler had ordered to tag along to build foreign contacts, Ribbentrop doubled purposed these missions as well securing lucrative agreements for his wine importing and exporting business, the profits of which he kept funneling into the Nazi party

At one speech to a number of middle rank officers, Theo was approached by a Japanese army Oberst who in near perfect German introduced himself as Hiroshi Oshima the commander of the Imperial Army's 10th artillery reigment. Oshima had previously been the military attache to Austria and Hungary, and had seen one of Theo's earliest speaking engagements in the 1920's. The men chatted for some time about the politics of the world and the rise of the Nazi's, Oshima stated that he had truly enjoyed Theo's autobiography and truly appreciated the title; Danger on Danger...

What would you call landing on an aircraft carrier then Oberleutant?

Osterkamp replied that indeed would be a third danger to add to the mix but would have made the title sound akward, and that he had never had the pleasure or risk of doing so anyway but would have loved to have tried before the war ended.

Oshima smiled at this, which drew a mutter from Theo about Versailles preventing Germany from building any aircraft at all, let a lone a ship filled with pilots and a runway.

Would you like the opportunity Oberleutant?

Oshima then advised Theo that Japan had just launched the new seaplane tender the Ryujo and that certification trials would be carried out for pilots in a few months... Oshima told Theo that he could pull the necessary strings to get Theo an observation tour and perhaps even a landing could be tried.

Theo graciously thanked Oshima and asked immediately if he could see the ship before he left and that he would gladly take the Oberst up on his offer for a prolonged tour at a later date when his book speaking tour ended

So Theo and his small entourage where given a quick tour by a friend of Oshima's in June, but much to their hosts chagrin, a member of Theo's traveling party had a concealed camera in his briefcase which he industriously used as Theo kept his host occupied with hundreds of technical and amazed school boy type questions...

to be continued...

thoughts?
 
I remember this timeline, good to see it's not dead.

The big question is, how does this affect British and French naval aviation?
Will we see an earlier start on the Joffre and Painleve for example (the Germans siezing and completing their hulls, now that's a scary thought)?

If memory serves the pre war RN saw the main purpose of figher cover as getting rid of spotters and showers and the main airborne threat as being level bombers. If this Osterkamp gets his way this is going to change attitudes toward Naval aviation (perhaps too little too late).
 
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