At the beginning of WWI, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden entered into an agreement to defend the neutrality and protect the common economic interests of the Scandinavian countries...
1917
January: Denmark sells the Virgin Islands to the United States for $25 million. The United States ends its search for Pancho Villa. Germany announces its intention to continue unrestricted submarine warfare.
February: The United States breaks off diplomatic relations with Germany a day after Germany announced their new policy. The Russian Revolution begins to overthrow the Tsar. The Zimmerman Telegram, urging Mexico to declare war on the United States, reaches American hands.
March: Tsar Nicholas II of Russia abdicates the thrown and the Russian Civil War begins. The Danish officially hand over the Virgin Islands to the United States. The Battle of Gaza begins.
April: The United States declares war on the German Empire, entering the First World War. Canadian troops win the Battle of Vimy Ridge.
May: The United States Congress passes the Selective Service Act, initiating the draft in the US.
July: Arabian troops led by T.E. Lawrence capture Aqaba from the Turks.
October: A German unit accidentally crosses the border into Denmark while patrolling at night. Shots are exchanged between the Germans (who think they are firing at British) and some Danish soldiers. By the end of the month, Danish troops are rushing to the border and Norwegian and Swedish troops are arriving in Denmark, as per their agreement. [1]
November: Denmark, Norway, and Sweden all declare war on Germany, albeit somewhat reluctantly. Sweden only agrees to declare war on Germany if Norway and Denmark support the reconquest of Finland and Karelia. The British proclaim the Balfour Declaration, supporting a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Vladimir Lenin leads a nearly bloodless coup and seizes power in Russia. The Battle of Cambria begins. The Ukraine declares itself a republic.
December: The mostly Danish and Norwegian army push into northern Germany, eventually slowing down on the outskirts of Kiel. American troops, recently arriving in Britain, begin arriving in Denmark to help with the thrust into Germany. The mostly Swedish army pushes east into Russia (although it is not sanctioned by the Allies, no move is made to stop it). Finnish revolutionaries surprisingly side with the Swedes.
[1] In OTL, the commander of this unit successfully steered the company away from the border. However, in TTL, the commander is sick and, thus, the executive officer, accidentally leads them across the border.
1918
January: The Danish-Norwegian-American army captures Kiel and continues south. The Swedish army in Finland, virtually unopposed, capture Tampere and also continue to move south. Another Swedish detachment heads east, for Murmansk.
February: Lithuania declares its independence from both Germany and Russia. The Danish advance comes to a halt outside of Lubeck and, despite repeated attacks, the advance makes no further progress, despite the crumbling German Army.
March: Bolshevist Russia moves its capital from Petrograd to Moscow. In France, the Second Battle of the Somme begins. Swedish forces capture Turku and head for Helsinki. Outside of Lubeck, a young Bavarian Corporal, by the name of Adolf Hitler, is struck by an enemy mortar shell and killed.
May: A Swedish detachment backed by Norwegians, Danes, and Finns lays siege to Murmansk while Swedish forces in the south finally meet some resistance fifty miles outside of Helsinki.
July: The Second Battle of the Marne begins in France. The entire Romanov family is executed by the Bolsheviks. Both Helsinki and Murmansk are captured as Bolshevist Russia is still unable to mount any successful defense.
August: The “Spanish Flu†becomes a pandemic. Outside of Lubeck, American Corporal Alvin York almost single-handedly kills 25 German soldiers and captures 132. The Battle of Amiens begins in France.
October: Swedish forces capture Vyborg. Other Swedish and Finn forces approach Petrozavodsk. Czechoslovakia gains its independence from Austria-Hungary. The first Polish government in 200 years convenes in Warsaw.
November: Swedish forces capture Petrozavodsk. General armistice throughout Europe as Austria-Hungary collapses and Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicates the thrown. Many nations throughout eastern Europe are granted their independence.
December: Iceland becomes an autonomous kingdom, yet remains united with Denmark. Finland, including all of Karelia and the Kola peninsula becomes an autonomous kingdom united with Sweden. European and American delegates arrive in Paris for the peace talks.
1919
January: The 18th Amendment passes in the United States, authorizing Prohibition. The Paris Peace Talks officially open in Paris. The League of Nations is founded to ‘prevent’ future wars on the scale of the First World War.
February: In Italy, Benito Mussolini forms the Fascist Party.
March: The first meeting of the Communist International (ComIntern) convenes in Moscow. The American Legion, composed of United States veterans, is formed in Paris. Benito Mussolini’s Fascist political movement first gets underway in Milan, Italy.
August: In Germany, the Weimar Constitution is passed into law. Afghanistan gains its independence from Great Britain.
October: United States President Woodrow Wilson suffers a massive stroke. Although not killed, the stroke leaves him partially paralyzed. Despite the President’s veto, Prohibition goes into effect in the United States.
November: World Health officials declare the end of the Spanish Flu Pandemic. It has claimed the lives of nearly 25 million human beings, nearly twice as many as the First World War. The first national convention of the American Legion is held in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
1920
January: League of Nations holds its first meeting and ratifies the Treaty of Versailles, officially ending the First World War. The United States Senate votes against joining the League of Nations. The Netherlands refuses to extradite the former Kaiser, Wilhelm II. Turkey gives up all non-Turkish areas of the former Ottoman Empire.
February: Norway is given Svalbard. Estonia declares independence from Russia. Max Bauer, a former General in the German Army, presents his national socialist program in Hannover.
March: The upstart Scandinavian National Party gains a majority in the Swedish Parliament, or Rikstag. Two of the Scandinavian nations, Denmark (including Iceland and Greenland), and Norway, form a military alliance which becomes known as the Scandinavian Defense Alliance (SDA). An associated Scandinavian Customs Union is in the process of negotiation. It is still unknown whether Sweden, the most powerful Scandinavian nation, will join the Alliance. The SDA is simply an extension and formalization of the agreement which brought the three nations into the First World War. Wolfgang Kapp (which, in TTL, Max Bauer does not participate in) fails at his nationalist coup attempt in Germany due to public resistance and a general strike. The United States Congress refuses to ratify the Treaty of Versailles. The German Government asks France for permission to use its own troops against the Ruhr Red Army in the French occupied area.
April: German army marches to Ruhr to fight the rebellious Ruhr Red Army. Riots occur between Arabs and Jewish settlers in Jerusalem. Germany and Bolshevist Russia agree to the exchange of prisoners of war. French troops occupy Frankfurt. The Russo-Polish War begins when Polish troops attack Russia.
May: Polish troops occupy the city of Kiev. Belgian and French troops leave the German cities they have occupied since 1918.
June: Hungary loses 71% of its territory and 63% of its population in Treaty of Trianon. The Bolshevist Red Army retakes Kiev. A new border treaty between Denmark and Germany hands over the Danish-occupied city of Kiel to the Danes. The border between the two nations is set less than twenty kilometers south of the city.
July: The Red Army invades Poland. The Bolsheviks recognizes the independence of Lithuania. Poland sues Bolshevist Russia for peace. The terms of peace are rejected and the war continues.
August: Bolshevist Russia recognizes the independence of Estonia and Latvia. The Red Army is defeated at the gates of Warsaw. The 19th Amendment is passed in the United States, guaranteeing women’s suffrage.
September: Max Bauer, the head of the National Socialist German Workers’ (NSDAP or Nazi) Party, makes his first public political speech in Hannover. Bauer turns out to be a gifted orator.
November: The first commercial radio station in the world announces the results of the United States Presidential election. Warren G. Harding becomes the 29thPresident. In Geneva, the first full assembly of the League of Nations is held. The first act is the acceptance of the constitution of Danzig free state.
December: After a long wait, Sweden (including Finland, which, in turn, includes Karelia and the Kola peninsula) joins the Scandinavian Defense Alliance, granting a larger measure of legitimacy to the organization. Martial law is declared in Ireland after several months of religious terrorism sweep through the major cities.
1921
January: The Republic of Turkey is proclaimed.
February: The Democratic Republic of Georgia is occupied by the Red Army of Bolshevist Russia.
March: Mongolia declares its independence from China. The second Peace of Riga is signed by Poland and Bolshevist Russia. Although Belarus is annexed by Bolshevist Russia, the Ukraine, in light of recent Polish successes (with some help from the SDA), is left independent, for the time being, anyhow.
August: The United States of America formally ends the First World War by declaring peace with Germany.
December: The Anglo-Irish Treaty is signed by the British and Irish, creating the Irish Free State.
1922
March: Egypt is granted limited independence by the British Empire. In India, Mohandas Gandhi is sentenced to six years in jail for civil disobedience.
April: The Treaty of Rapallo marks rapprochement between the Weimar Republic and Bolshevist Russia.
October: In Italy, with the March on Rome, the Fascist Party obtains power and Benito Mussolini becomes the Prime Minister of Italy. Later in the month, Mussolini becomes the youngest Premier in the history of Italy.
December: The Irish Free State officially comes into existence after a year of civil war. Bolshevist Russia and the allied Soviet republics form the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).
1923
January: Lithuania occupies and annexes Memel, a region and city formerly belonging to the German Empire. Troops from France and Belgium occupy the Ruhr area in order to force Germany to pay their reparations.
July: The Treaty of Lausanne, settling the bouSDAries of modern Turkey, is signed in Geneva, Switzerland, by Greece, Bulgaria and other countries that fought in the First World War.
August: United States President Warren G. Harding dies in office. He is succeeded by Calvin Coolidge, who becomes the 30th President of the US. The first major sea going ship arrives in the newly constructed port of Gdynia on the coast of Poland.
October: Turkey is recognized by the world as a republic following the complete dissolution of the Ottoman Empire.
November: In Hannover, Max Bauer leads the Nazi Party in an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the German government. Several days later, with troops circling the Nazi stronghold of Hannover, Bauer is captured by troops and police.
December: The first flight of Scandinavian Airways, the airline of the Scandinavian Customs Union (or SCU, which had come into being the previous Spring), occurs between Stockholm and Copenhagen. Flights are soon running to all the capitals of the SCU as well as other European nations.
1924
January: Vladimir Lenin, the leader of the Bolshevik Revolution and of the Soviet Union, dies. Joseph Stalin begins to purge his rivals in order to clear the way for his leadership. The city of St. Petersburg, near the Soviet-Finn border is renamed Leningrad, in honor of Lenin.
March: Fascist Italy annexes the Croatian port city of Fiume on the Adriatic Sea. Greece, after flirting with monarchy for almost five years, declares itself a republic.
April: Max Bauer is sentenced to five years in jail for his participation in the “Hannover Putsch.â€
October: The Geneva Protocol, an arms agreement prohibiting the use of chemical and biological weapons, is signed by the delegates to the League of Nations in Geneva, Switzerland.
November: Republican candidate Calvin Coolidge defeats Democratic candidate John W. Davis and Progressive candidate Robert M. La Follette and begins his first elected term as President of the United States.
1925
January: Fascist-leader Benito Mussolini announces that he is assuming dictatorial powers over Italy. Albania declares itself a republic.
April: After lengthy discussions, the member nations of the SDA decide to schedule a full-scale rearmament to occur over the course of the next ten years. The resolution, which met with considerable problems in Sweden, barely passes and is designed to prevent the alarming material and personnel shortages which became apparent during the First World War.
July: Max Bauer, who only served nine of his sixty month sentence, publishes his personal manifesto, called Mein Krieg (“My Warâ€). The book is well-written and as much an autobiography as a political pamphlet. Still, over the next fifteen years, thousands of Jewish people, fearing the extreme anti-Semitic views of Bauer, including top scientists leave Germany, many heading for Sweden.
December: The final Locarno Pact, in which the First World War western European Allied powers and the new states of central and eastern Europe sought to secure the post-war territorial settlement in return normalising relations with defeated Germany, is signed in London.
1926
March: American physicist Robert Goddard launches the world’s first liquid-fueled rocket in Auburn, Massachusetts. Although the rocket is a major breakthrough., Goddard’s secrecy keeps it from being further developed.
May: The nine-day general strike of all union laborers in Great Britain begins and ends. The strike is an unsuccessful attempt to force the government to act to prevent the wages and conditions of coal miners from being reduced.
December: In Japan, the Taisho Period ends and the Showa Era begins, signalling the rise of Japanese expansionalism.
1927
May: The Australian Parliament meets for the first time in their new capital of Canberra. Saudi Arabia obtains its independence from the British Empire by the Treaty of Jedda. First non-stop trans-Atlantic flight made by American aviator Charles Lindbergh.
August: The People’s Liberation (Communist) Army forms in China during the Nanching Uprising.
November: Leon Trotsky is expelled from the Soviet Communist Party, leaving Joseph Stalin with undisputed control of the Soviet Union. The German economy, which had been spiralling downwards for months, finally collapses completely. Watching their southern neighbor’s economy do a nosedive, the SCU begins negotiations to tighten the relations between the five countries (both Iceland and Finland, at the urging of their populace and Norway, have been granted complete independence).
1928
January: Joseph Stalin orders Leon Trotsky exiled to Soviet Central Asia aftering being expelled from the Politburo as punishment for his participation in the coalition known as the Left Opposition.
March: American aviator Charles Lindbergh is presented with the Congressional Medal of Honor for his first trans-atlantic flight in May of 1927. Meanwhile, Scandinavian Airways opens the world’s first Trans-Atlantic service. Using a Swedish copy of the Ford Trimotor, the dangerous and expensive journey begins in the capital cities of Europe, flies first to Oslo (the capital of Norway), on to Reykjavik (the capital of Iceland), then to Godthåb (the capital of Greenland), and finally onto the North American continent. The revolutionary service will not have competition for a half-decade.
August: The Kellogg-Briand Pact is sponsored and drafted by US Secretary of State Frank Kellogg and French Foreign Minister Aristide Briand. Officially denouncing the right to declare an aggressive war, the Pact is signed by fifteen nations.
September: Ahmet Zogu declares Albania to be a monarchy and proclaims himself king.
November: Republican Herbert Hoover becomes the 31st President of the United States, defeating his Democratic opponent, Alfred E. Smith, easily. Michinomiya Hirohito is crowned the 124th Emperor of Japan.
1929
January: Stalin orders Leon Trotsky to leave the Soviet Union altogether. Refused admission many nations, Trotsky eventually settles in Norway, where he granted admission assuming he does not attempt to interfere with politics. Grateful he does not have to go to Turkey, Trotsky and his family leave for Norway.
February: Italy and the Vatican sign the Lateran Treaties, recognizing the sovereignty and independence of the Holy See within the Kingdom of Italy.
July: The Kellogg-Briand Pact, renouncing war as an instrument of foreign policy, goes into effect (it was first signed in Paris in August of 1928 by most leading world powers).
August: The negotiations for the reform of the SCU finally end with the announcement of the formation of the Scandinavian League (SL), which combines the Scandinavian Defense Alliance with the Scandinavian Customs Union. The SL grants greater power to the Central Council as well as further integrates the economies and militaries of its five members.
October: The worldwide Great Depression begins with the crash of the New York Stock Exchange on Black Thursday and Black Tuesday. Although the Scandinavian Stock Exchange (newly formed in Stockholm) is hit hard, were it not for the SL, the five nations would have been hit much harder.
December: US President Herbert Hoover announces to Congress that the worst effects of the recent stock market crash are behind the nation and the American people have regained faith in the economy. Obviously, that is not exactly true.
1930
March: Mohandas Gandhi leads a 200-mile march protest march to the sea in defiance of British opposition, to protest the British monopoly on salt. Constantinople and Angora change their names to Istanbul and Ankara. Heinrich Brüning is appointed German Reichskanzler.
April: The United Kingdom, Japan, and the United States sign the London Naval Treaty regulating submarine warfare and limiting shipbuilding.
November: Haile Selassie is crowned emperor of Ethiopia.
December: US President Herbert Hoover goes before Congress and asks for a $150 million public works program to help generate jobs and stimulate the economy.
1931
April: The Second Spanish Republic is proclaimed in Spain. Henry Pu Yi, former Emperor of China, is proclaimed by Japan as the King of the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo.
August: The Castellemmarese War ends with the assasination of Joe "The Boss" Masseria, briefly leaving Salvatore Maranzano as capo di tutti capi, "boss of all bosses" and undisputed ruler of the American mafia. Maranzano is himself assasinated less than 6 months later, leading to the establishment of the Five Families.
1932
January: British arrest and intern MohaSDAs Gandhi and Vallabhai Patel. Pierre Laval forms a new government in France. Figures show about 6 million unemployed in Germany. Japan occupies Shanghai and Japanese warships arrive in Nanking. Minority government of Karl Mureschi in Austria ends the governmental crisis.
February: General convention of disarmament begins in Geneva, Switzerland. League of Nations again recommends negotiations between the Republic of China and Japan. Japan occupies Harbin, China. Japan declares Manzhouguo (Japanese name for Manchuria) formally independent from China. Short-lived Mäntsälä Rebellion in Finland is put down by troops of the SL. The SL troops, and several SL tanks and planes, perform above expectations.
March: Charles Lindbergh III, the baby son of Charles Lindbergh is kidnapped. Peace negotiations between China and Japan begin.
April: U.S. president Herbert Hoover supports armament limitations. Marshall Hindenburg elected president of Germany. Max Bauer receives over 13 million votes. Haile Selassie announces an anti-slavery law in Abyssinia.
May: Paul Gordulof assassinates French president Paul Doumer in Paris - Doumer dies the next day. Albert Lebrun becomes the new president of France. Ten weeks after his abduction, the infant son of Charles Lindbergh is found dead in Hopewell, New Jersey just a few miles from the Lindbergh's home. Japanese troops leave Shanghai. Massive riots between hindus and muslims in Bombay - thousands dead and injured. Assassination of Japanese prime minister Tsuyoshi Inukai. German Chancellor Heinrich Brüning resigns. President Hindenburg takes Franz von Papen to form a new government.
June: 15,000 World War I veterans march in Washington, DC. Bans against the SA, the paramilitary arm of the Nazi Party overturned in Germany. After a relatively bloodless military rebellion, Siam becomes a constitutional monarchy.
July: António de Oliveira Salazar becomes the Fascist prime minister of Portugal (for the next 36 years). Bloody SuSDAy of Altona in Germany occurs when armed communists attack a Nazi Party demonstration. Eighteen are killed and many other political street fights follow. US President Herbert Hoover orders the United States Army to forcibly evict the "Bonus Army" of World War I veterans gathered in Washington, DC. US troops dispersed the last of the "Bonus Army" the next day.
September: The Generalitat reinstaurated, Catalonia regains political autonomy inside the Second Spanish Republic. MohaSDAs Gandhi begins an hunger strike in Poona prison. According to Prussian statistics, 115 people have been killed in political riots during the year.
October: Prince Gustav Adolf of Sweden marries Princess Sibylla of Saxon-Coburg.
November: Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt elected President of the United States, defeating his opponent, Republican Herbert Hoover. Riots between conservative and socialist supporters in Switzerland leave twelve dead and sixty injured. German president Hindenburg begins negotiations with Max Bauer about the formation of a new government.
December: Hindenburg names Kurt von Schleicher as a German Chancellor while continuing negotiations with Bauer. Japan and Soviet Union reform their diplomatic connections. Saudi Arabia declared as a unified nation with Abdul Aziz as a king.
1933
January: Max Bauer’s Nazi Party wins a majority in the Reichstag. Bauer is appointed the Chancellor of Germany by President Paul von Hindenberg.
February: In Miami, Florida, a man attempts to assassinate President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt, but misses and instead kills Chicago, Illinois, Mayor Anton J. Cermak. The Blaine Act ends Prohibition in the United States. The Reichstag Building in Berlin is burnt to the ground.
March: American President Herbert Clark Hoover is succeeded by Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who in reference to the Great Depression, gives his "We have nothing to fear, but fear itself" inauguration speech. The United States Congress begins its first 100 days of enacting New Deal legislation. Delano Roosevelt addresses the nation for the first time as President of the United States. This was also the first of his "Fireside Chats." Dachau, the first Nazi concentration camp, is completed in secret. The Reichstag passes the Enabling Act, giving Max Bauer dictatorial powers over Germany.
April: The Nazi Party under Julius Streicher organize a one-day boycott of all Jewish-owned businesses in Germany, ushering in the series of anti-Semitic acts that will be known as the Holocaust. The mass emigration of Jews from Germany quickens as many flood across the border into Denmark and the SL.
May: Mohandas Gandhi begins a 21 day fast in protest of British oppression in India. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signs an act creating the Tennessee Valley Authority. The Federal Securities Act is signed into law requiring the registration of securities with the Federal Trade Commission. In Germany, the Nazis stage massive public book burnings.
June: Bauer begins the process of rebuilding the German military machine. He, unlike the former Kaiser, does not concentrate on the navy but, rather, on the army. Especially on the armored divisions and the air corps.
July: Chancellor Bauer uses supposed terrorist acts against his Nazi government as an excuse to ban all opposition parties
November: US President Franklin D. Roosevelt unveils the Civil Works Administration, an organization designed to create jobs for more than 4 million of the unemployed. German troops capture thousands of socialists and communists.
1934
February: Leopold III becomes the King of Belgium. While secretly building his military to pre-war strengths, Bauer announces to the world that he issues a challenge, guartenteeing that if other nations disarm, he will order Germany disarmed as well.
July: The Nazi SA camp Oranienburg becomes national camp, taken over by the SS. The Nazis assassinate Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss in a failed coup attempt. Bauer is outraged by the “communist assassination attempt†and orders the crackdown to tighten.
August: Max Bauer is offered the title of Fuhrer of Germany, an offer to become head of state as well as Chancellor. Publically, Bauer turns this offer down. Privately, however, Bauer assumes the position without assuming the name.
December: In the Soviet Union, Politburo member Sergei Kirov is shot dead at the Communist Party headquarters in Leningrad by Leonid Nikolayev (it is widely thought that Soviet leader Joseph Stalin ordered this murder). Japan renounces the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 and the London Naval Treaty of 1930.
1935
January: Italian premier Benito Mussolini and French foreign minister Pierre Laval conclude agreement in which each power undertakes not to oppose the other's colonial claims. A plebiscite in Saarland shows that 90.3% of those voting wish to join Nationalist Germany. At the Tsunyi Conference, Mao Zedong assumes the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party.
February: The Luftwaffe is created as Germany's air force. Werner Voss becomes the commander of the Luftwaffe. Bauer announces that, if no one will accept his disarmament challenge, it is only natural that Germany, too, shall be allowed to have an army. The rest of the world sits quietly while Germany builds more and more weapons of war. Only the SL attempts to mass produce tanks, planes, and ships, but the total population of the entire SL is barely half that of Germany. Unemployment in the SL and Germany plummets. A jury in Flemington, New Jersey finds Bruno Richard Hauptmann guilty of the kidnapping and murder of Charles Lindbergh's baby boy.
March: Persia is renamed Iran. The Constitution of the Commonwealth of the Philippines is signed.
May: In the United States, Executive Order 7034 creates the Works Progress Administration (WPA). Filipinos ratify an independence agreement. Construction of Hoover Dam is completed.
June: China's Kuomintang government concedes Japanese military control of north-eastern China. Britain and Germany sogn the Anglo-German Naval Agreement, agreeing to a German navy equal to 40% of Britain’s own naval tonnage. Even with the new agreement, Bauer does not seem all that eager to participate in a naval race with Britain, but insteads buys the navy, headed by Erich Raeder, with four battleships and one showpiece aircraft carrier. Secretly, however, dozens of U-boats are being constructed.
October: Italian troops invade Abyssinia (Ethiopia) led by General de Bono (who is replaced on November 11 by Pietro Badoglio).
November: Hoare-Laval Pact between Britain and France proposes Ethiopian territorial cessions to Italy. George II of Greece regains his throne. In the United States, a dozen labor leaders come together to announce the creation of the Congress for Industrial Organization (CIO), an organization charged with pushing the cause for industrial unionism.
1936
January: Edward VIII becomes King of the United Kingdom. The 1936 Winter Olympic Games opens in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany.
March: In spite of the Locarno Pact, and with the backing of the Soviet Union (who wants to see British and French influence reduced), Germany reoccupies the Rhineland. The French don’t even appear to care and make no move to stop the German troops (who have, secretly, been ordered to stand down if threatened).
April: Richard Bruno Hauptmann is executed for the kidnapping and death of Charles Augustus Lindbergh III, the baby son of Anne Morrow Lindbergh and Charles Lindbergh. Italy formally annexes Ethiopia after taking the capital, Addis Ababa.
July: Francisco Franco and other generals attempt a coup d'etat, starting a conservative rebellion against the recently-elected leftist Popular Front government of Spain. This marks the start of the Spanish Civil War.
November: Franklin D. Roosevelt is reelected to a second term in a landslide victory over Alfred Landon. In Berlin, Germany, Chancellor Bauer expresses his disgust at and turns down the offer by the Japanese Empire to form an anti-ComIntern Pact. Although more of a publicity stunt (it wins him wide aclaim in western Europe), the Japanese are soon courting the Soviet Union, hoping to secure their Chinese holdings (which border on the Soviet Union).
December: Just days before George VIII of the United Kingdom is planning on abdicating the throne, Chancellor Bauer secretly slips evidence to George that his mistress, Wallis Simpson, is having an affair with Guy Trundle, a salesman for the Ford Motor Company. George VIII announces that he is not going to abdicate the throne. Wallis, knowing what this means, returns to the United States, unmarried and labelled a “Gold-Digger.†George VIII never knows for sure where the evidence originally came from.
1937
January: Anastasio Somoza becomes President of Nicaragua. In Moscow, 17 leading Communists go on trial accused of participating in a plot led by Leon Trotsky to overthrow Joseph Stalin's regime and assassinate its leaders.
April: Aden becomes a British crown colony. Guernica, Spain is bombed by German Luftwaffe.
May: The German Condor Legion Fighter Group, equipped with Heinkel He-51 biplanes arrive in Spain to assist Francisco Franco's forces.
July: Japanese forces invade China. The United States Senate votes down President Franklin D. Roosevelt's proposal to add more justices to the Supreme Court of the United States.
November: In the Reich Chancellery, Max Bauer holds a secret meeting and states his plans for acquiring "living space" for the German people.
December: Japanese troops invade Manchuria.
1938
February: German troops enter Austria.
March: German troops occupy all of Austria and annexation, with support of most of the population of Austria, is declared the following day.
September: German, Italian, British, and French leaders sign the Munich agreement, giving into the German demands for control of the Sudetanland. Staring in October, Germany will be allowed to annex the Sudetanland and exercise de facto control over the Czech government, so long as they promis to make no more demands.
October: In an effort to try restore investor confidence, the New York Stock Exchange unveils a fifteen-point program aimed to upgrade protection for the investing public. Kristallnacht begins. In Germany, the "night of broken glass" begins as Nazi troops and sympathizers loot and burn Jewish businesses (the all night affair saw 7,500 Jewish businesses destroyed, 267 synagogues burned, 91 Jews killed, and at least 25,000 Jewish men arrested).
November: Germany, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, and Italy sign the Continental Pact, promising to help one another in the event of war. In response, Japan finally pulls off what was once deemed impossible, getting the Soviet Union to sign the Eastern Alliance. The Scandinavian League stages several military operations near the border with the Soviet Union. Prominently displayed are the advanced armored forces and the aircraft bussing overhead. In the Baltic, they hold a naval drill, showing off the single aircraft carrier and four battleships of the League.
1939
January: Troops loyal to Francisco Franco and aided by Italy take Barcelona.
March: German troops occupy the remaining part of Bohemia and Moravia; Czechoslovakia ceases to exist. Germany takes Memel from Lithuania. Dictator Francisco Franco conquers Madrid, ending the Spanish Civil War.
July: The concentration camp Neuengamme becomes autonomous.
August: Chancellor Bauer mobilizes the nation for war, even as he demands the return of the Danish possessions and western Poland. The SL decides to stand up to Bauer and soon pledges to support Poland. Scandinavian troops begin arriving in Poland through the port of Gydnia in mid-August. Bauer and Stalin divide eastern Europe between themselves. The Ukraine, the Baltic states and eastern Poland to the USSR. Western Poland to Germany.
September: Scandinavian Ambassadors stall the inevitable as the troop buildup in Poland begins. Thus far, only France and the United Kingdom promise to support Poland, but still refuse to send troops to Poland itself. Polish and Scandinavian troops begin building defensive lines across the western border but it is too late. By the end of the month, there are 150,000 Scandinavian troops from all five member states (even some from tiny Iceland) in Poland. At the last minute, Poland is granted limited-membership in the Scandinavian League to allow the full weight of the alliance to support the nation.
November: The first German forces roll across the frontier on the first day of November. France, Australia, the United Kingdom (albeit, somewhat eluctantly), and the entire Scandinavian League declare war on Germany. The United States declares its neutrality in the war. South Africa and Canada declare war on Germany. Soviet forces roll across the eastern fronteir, and, as Polish troops are shifted to meet the new threat, Scandinavian troops first engage the Germans. A massive buildup of troops in Finland and Denmark begins. The Scandinavian Leage, through its Selective Service Program, is able to call about five million troops up. US President Franklin D. Roosevelt orders the United States Customs Service to implement the Neutrality Act of 1939, allowing cash-and-carry purchases of weapons by belligerents.
December: Soviet forces invade Finland and reach the Mannerheim Line, starting the war, opening the eastern Scandinavian front. The 300,000 Scandinavian troops holding the line repulse the Soviet troops. The Scandinavian Air Force engages Soviet and German fighters over Poland and Finland, faring better than expected. German troops cross into Denmark and the western Scandinavian front opens as they hit nearly 300,000 more Scandinavian troops. The Second World War has begun.
1940
January: Poland, under the weight of German and Soviet troops, finally collapses. Gdynia and Danzig become the site of one of most remarkable. Six divisions of beleaguered Scandinavian soldiers manage to hold the “Polish Corridor†open for nearly a week as Polish civilians (mostly Jewish) flee north, where they are loaded upon Scandinavian ships of all kinds and brought to Karlskrona in southern Sweden. Once as many Polish civilians as possible are embarked in Karlskrona, the ships return the Scandinavian troops to Sweden. Out of the 150,000 Scandinavian soldiers who entered Poland, only 90,000 leave. A Polish government-in-exile is set up Stockholm, where it is accepted as a member of the Scandinavian League. On the western front, the Scandinavian troops hold the narrow Jutland peninsula against fierce German attacks, giving only a half-kilometer in three months of combat. Scandinavian troops hold steadfast south of Vyborg and Petersborg [OTL Petrozavodsk]. To the east of Lake Onega, where the Mannerheim Line ends, Scandinavian troops, wearing skis, actually advance. Soviet troops are slaughtered against the Mannerheim Line.
February: Soviet bombers are shot down over Finland by fighters of the Scandinavian Air Force while attempting to bomb Scandinavian cities. German troops in Denmark achieve a breakthrough and Scandinavian defensive lines collapse northward, not solidifying for nearly one hundred kilometers.