
Continuing the latest map in my German victory series. I present the Free State of the Varangians. In this timeline Hitler decides to use the Ukrainian partisans to his advantage arming them and using them primarily in the Battle of the Caucasus. Hitler popularizes the myth that the Ukrainians are descendants of the vikings. After the war the Varangian Freestate is established. Those Ukranians of sufficiently German appearance, and willing to settle in the region are moved the the Dneiper-Don basin. Initially Hitler wants to use these 'Varangians' as the Wehrbauern in the region as a bulwark against Bolshevism. Hitler viewed them as the lowest of the germans in his eyes, and likely would have eventually seeked to Germanize the region further had he lived another 20 years. The government was made up primarily of Black Sea and Volga Germans in the beginning, with the Varangians mainly serving as the rank and file members of the military and local government. The establishment of SS Krimgau, Hitler's first colony outside of Germany, saw many of the Volksdeutsche move to Krimgau. With Hitler's and more importantly Himmler's attention primarily on Crimea the Varangians were allowed to take over most aspects of the government. After Hitler's death in 1955 President Goering paid even less attention to the region, as in his view they were fully pacified. This made the region the only state in the former USSR to have some sort of home rule. While the government was brutally anti-communist, fortunately it was not very anti-Slavic, and as a result millions of pieces of Slavic, art, culture and books were smuggled into the country and hidden underground. The SS deployed to the region would periodically destroy Slavic architecture and sometimes happen upon an underground cache but much of it was thankfully able to survive Hitler's generalplan ost. It was for these reasons this region would be the genesis for the re-birth of Slavic culture after the Nazi government was dissolved.
Varangia would be ruled by president Petro Dyachenko, first as a puppet, but later as a dictator in his own right until his death in 1965. After Petro's death most of his dictatorial powers reverted to the National Diet and all subsequent presidents served 4 year terms.
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