Help orchestrating 1940s outcome

Hey everybody! I've been a lurker for years and finally decided to join. To start off, I'm writing some science fiction, and for this project I've decided on a POD either shortly shortly before or shortly after the start of WW2. My timeline involves the world taking a rather implausibly optimistic course toward a global social/liberal democratic federation by the later 21st century, and eventually reaching an interstellar level. Although I've thought out the structure of my Terran Union, its constituent nations and their administrative divisions in obsessive detail, I've been a bit lazy with developing my AH. So my question is, what do you think is the most plausible way to arrive at a situation where a) the Soviet Union and Lithuania successfully acquire the eastern territories of Finland, Poland and Romania as they did in 1939-40 in OTL, and b) the Holocaust and the greater part of WW2 (if not the whole thing) are averted? I've been thinking about using one of the Hitler assassination attempts between 1939 and 1941, but I'm open to suggestions either before or after the start of the war.
 
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I don't really see the Soviet Union AND Lithuania working in unison to aquire ANYTHING in a non-WWII setting or any other for that matter! :rolleyes:

Lithuania or any other sane government pre-WWII thought of the SU as the coming of Anti-Christ and lurking revolution of the masses!
 
Well I'm just talking about the borders that the Soviets drew up in 1939 where Lithuania got the Vilnius area. For my purposes, it doesn't matter whether Lithuania gets annexed into the USSR or not, because I'll dissolve the whole thing a few decades later. Forget I mentioned Lithuania.
 
Well I'm just talking about the borders that the Soviets drew up in 1939 where Lithuania got the Vilnius area. For my purposes, it doesn't matter whether Lithuania gets annexed into the USSR or not, because I'll dissolve the whole thing a few decades later. Forget I mentioned Lithuania.

He-he, but you did mention Finland, Poland and Romania - don't expect these to cooperate in a Soviet scheme at all; WWII or not!

If Stalin tries to pull it off it would be the nightmare of all of Europe; even the Socialdemocrats wouldn't mind the Soviets being clubbered back behind the Urals!

BTW - welcome to the board. :)
 
BTW - welcome to the board. :)
Thanks! :)

If Stalin tries to pull it off it would be the nightmare of all of Europe; even the Socialdemocrats wouldn't mind the Soviets being clubbered back behind the Urals!
That's why I was thinking I might have to have a POD shortly after the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Maybe Hitler is assassinated shortly after the invasion of Poland, there's a military coup in Germany and the new leaders negotiate a peace deal with the surrounding powers; or maybe the Allies miraculously manage to win the Battle of France and put a stop to the war.
 
or maybe the Allies miraculously manage to win the Battle of France and put a stop to the war.
The - miraculously - part was Germany winning the the Battle of France,
It only takes a few minor butterflies to have France win.
 
The - miraculously - part was Germany winning the the Battle of France,
It only takes a few minor butterflies to have France win.
So what would have been the results of an Allied victory in France? Could it have brought down the Nazi regime?
 
So what would have been the results of an Allied victory in France? Could it have brought down the Nazi regime?

I would bet, as Hitler's Generals with a major defeat that early would see the war as unwinnable and maybe attempt a coup.
 
I would bet, as Hitler's Generals with a major defeat that early would see the war as unwinnable and maybe attempt a coup.
Yeah, that's what I thought. Now in a situation like that, do you think Germany would be forced to give up Bohemia-Moravia and the Sudetenland, or would the Allies just settle for Poland's independence?
 
Yeah, that's what I thought. Now in a situation like that, do you think Germany would be forced to give up Bohemia-Moravia and the Sudetenland, or would the Allies just settle for Poland's independence?

Well it depends. If Churchill is in Office by the time, then the allies will most likely demand Germany withdraw from all of the former Czechoslovakia, while its its Chamberlain he will most likely let them keep it all for peace in our time....
 
Well it depends. If Churchill is in Office by the time, then the allies will most likely demand Germany withdraw from all of the former Czechoslovakia, while its its Chamberlain he will most likely let them keep it all for peace in our time....

But if Chamberlain's UK has been prepped for war to the point where they won in France, perhaps he would no longer consider the need in our time?

Or perhaps this victory inspires a plan for peace for all time?
 
I suppose my question could be distilled to this: was there any way (with a POD after the Russo-Polish war) that the Soviet Union could have achieved its ambitions of taking "Western Ukraine", "Western Belorussia", Karelia and Bessarabia without Nazism and WW2? Maybe a Red Germany or a conservative nationalist Germany decides to make a spheres-of-influence deal as in OTL, but without the dreams of continental conquest?
 
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I suppose my question could be distilled to this: was there any way (with a POD after the Russo-Polish war) that the Soviet Union could have achieved its ambitions of taking "Western Ukraine", "Western Belorussia", Karelia and Bessarabia without Nazism and WW2?

With a post-1921 PoD, eh?

Maybe a Red Germany or a conservative nationalist Germany decides to make a spheres-of-influence deal as in OTL said:
I'd agree with earlier posters that your best bet is instead for the PoD to percolate at the Battle of France.

An effective change here sees Germany defeated without being broken as in OTL. France is going to be much stronger, as is Russia.

Technological butterflies may include a slowdown in the development of rocketry and nuclear power.

Political butterflies are going to be even greater. You're going to see more great powers for longer. Japan's fate is a question mark. There is no UN, and the League will have already failed. French, British, and Dutch colonies will be in worse shape for gaining independence without the home country having been battered.

Your more recent post makes more sense in Russia achieving territorial concessions than the original "Lithuania gets Vilnius". The Baltics are going to remain annexed territories in any scenario that comes to mind.
 
Hmm, so maybe I should go with the Allies defeating (and humiliating) Germany in the Battle of France, Hitler is deposed by conservatives who have more modest nationalist goals, and Germany and the USSR remain locked for some time in their Molotov-Ribbentrop borders. And some years or decades later, perhaps Germany could undergo liberalization and grant independence to Poland and Czechia.
 
They don't even have to wait to the Battle of France.

Just have France launch an all-out invasion in September 1939 coupled with the Soviets double crossing Germany when they first meet in Poland.
 
They don't even have to wait to the Battle of France.

Just have France launch an all-out invasion in September 1939 coupled with the Soviets double crossing Germany when they first meet in Poland.
You know, that sounds pretty appealing in a Tarantinoesque sort of way - the Germans arrive at the Vistula ready to shake hands with their Soviet counterparts, and the Soviets just start mowing them down! :D Would this scenario require Blum to be the PM of France?
 
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With a post-1921 PoD, eh?



I'd agree with earlier posters that your best bet is instead for the PoD to percolate at the Battle of France.

An effective change here sees Germany defeated without being broken as in OTL. France is going to be much stronger, as is Russia.

Technological butterflies may include a slowdown in the development of rocketry and nuclear power.
Looks like you read Century Rain too, huh? :D
Political butterflies are going to be even greater. You're going to see more great powers for longer. Japan's fate is a question mark. There is no UN, and the League will have already failed. French, British, and Dutch colonies will be in worse shape for gaining independence without the home country having been battered.
Or independence may come more slowly/later. Without wanting to sound paternalistic, I'm sure a more gradual progress towards independence could have helped avoid, for example, a lot of the tensions between what is now India and Pakistan.

Hmm, so maybe I should go with the Allies defeating (and humiliating) Germany in the Battle of France, Hitler is deposed by conservatives who have more modest nationalist goals, and Germany and the USSR remain locked for some time in their Molotov-Ribbentrop borders. And some years or decades later, perhaps Germany could undergo liberalization and grant independence to Poland and Czechia.
The thing is (as I understand it), if the invasion of France, the Low Countries & etc hadn't worked, then the German economy would have collapsed. Germany was, at that point, dependent on the Soviets for various supplies... I think. I'll have to read into it a little.
They don't even have to wait to the Battle of France.

Just have France launch an all-out invasion in September 1939 coupled with the Soviets double crossing Germany when they first meet in Poland.
Um... you need them to be either
a) not utterly broken and demoralised during WWI, or
b) have a total revival of nationalist/patriotic spirit after the POD.


I'd like to propose my own, modest POD... Halder's original plan is carried through, because the plane carrying copies of it doesn't crash. The German army essentially repeats the Schlieffen Plan - which is what the French and British forces were prepared for.

That's be interesting...
 
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