Okay so I had an idea for a vaguely Fallout and Exodus inspired timeline. (Alongside with a world of laughter a world of tears, What madness is this, Twilight of the Red Tzar and Pax Atomica.)
The basic point of departure is the Spanish American where
Henry M. Teller suffered a fatal heart attack on the eve of proposing the Teller Amendment. Causing the United States to annex Cuba from Spain instead of granting it its independence as in OTL. Strengthening the Manifest Destiny and Imperialist elements of American society in the process and causing a certain precedent that would see the USA taking a chunk out Northern Mexico during its intervention in the Mexican Revolution and outright annexing the territory that would become Panama from Columbia instead of aiding in its independence.
World War 1 happened pretty much the same as OTL with the defeat of Germany, the formation of the Soviet Union and the collapse of the Austro-hungarian and Ottoman empire's, outside of a few minor tweaks. Though its during the interwar years and the great depression that things really started to diverge from OTL. With the Nazi's coming to power a little earlier and with the Axis being a little bit more competent/efficient than what they originally were, while on the other side of the Atlantic you have the early jazz movement being influenced by latin American music from the US's new territories, the added fun of guerilla resistance movements in those same new territories during the depression and the United States butting heads earlier and more intensely with Japan, thanks to their greater imperialistic ambitions.
WW2 kicks off roughly around the same time as OTL but with Mussolini's Italy staying neutral for much of it. With the United States joining in after the Japanese somehow managed to pull off a
Days of Infamy (taking out the two aircraft carriers that were stationed at Pearl at the time) styled surprise invasion of Hawaii and even a single bombing run on San Francisco. Which caused the United States to focus their attention and resources primarily against Japan in the Pacific Theater. Causing the Soviet Union and Britain to receive less in terms of materials and resources from the alt-lend lease and suffering even more casualties than OTL (especially the Soviets thanks to the fact they were already facing even more Axis troops since Hitler didn't have to divert them to support Mussolini.) While over in Asia the Republic of China found themselves doing better do the combination of gaining additional weaponry and materials from the alt-lend lease and that the Japanese had to divert more of their troops and materials from the mainland theater to the Pacific campaign.
An alternate equivalent of D-day happened with Britain and France using colonial troops as cannon fodder in the first wave, since they lacked the same number of American troops as OTL and had to rely more on their own manpower. With Mussolini's (or his successor's) Italy joining the war on the side of the allies soon afterwards, since it became clear that the Nazi's were going to win. The war in Europe ends with the continent being damaged even worse than OTL, (outside of fascist Italy who managed to make it out practically unscathed, with some nice gains to boot) and with an iron curtain stretching a little farther west, now including Austria in the Warsaw Pack. While in Asia and the Pacific the war ends with the United States having to go through a
Storming-Paradise, alternate Operation Downfall equivalent of invading the Home Islands. After the devastating accident at the Manhattan Project equivalent killed several key staff members by radiation poisoning, setting it back by over a year. Ending with Japan being divided in two with the Northern one 1/4th end up under Soviet influence, China coming out slightly better off and a single communist Korea. This would lead to the US schools to focus less on the atrocities enacted by the Nazi government and more on those of Imperial Japan.
The first use of nuclear weapons outside of a few classified tests would be in the Vietnam War of the 1950's. Which acted as this worlds version of the Korean War with the United States Government intervening on the behalf of the Federal Republic of Vietnam was invaded by their Northern neighbors the Communist backed People's Republic of Vietnam. Outside of that the decade would also be marked by a "World of Laughter a Word of Tears" Disney-eque presidency, that played out pretty much the same as his counterpart (degraded race relations with African Americans, EPCOT, bullet trains, Mousketeers, Isreal allying with the Soviets and increased funding towards space). While back in Europe Britain and France have become adamant about holding onto the remainder of their colonial empires, through whatever means necessary, the Russians bear looms ominously over head even more so (even if it's beaten more badly and severely overstretched) and the spectre of fascism still stalks the streets. Yet it is the market's of the world that see the biggest change in the long term with the invention of the
vacuum transistor in the place of our worlds transistor.
Though the sixties passed as more or less the continuation of culture and trends from the fifties with the strangulation of the nascent counter culture movement, lack of any Vietnam analogue and the disastrous turn of the civil rights movement. There were several noticeable events that would place their marks on the history books. For the United States it would be the admittance of predominantly catholic and majorily Hispanic territories of northern Mexico, Cuba, Panama and Philippines into statehood. While in the old world things would be marked in the west with the colonial powers of France, Italy, UK, Portugal and Spain crushing the various independence movements through brutal methods, (many of which wouldn't become public for decades) even including the use atomic weapons and in the east a slightly earlier Sino-soviet split (didn't hurt that China had a slightly better starting point and more amicable relationship with the US than in OTL). Yet it would be in the space race that this decade would truly make its mark with the American lunar landing of '63 and later the Soviet in '69.
The 70's would generally be a harsher time for the civilized with the oil crisis still occurring. Causing the United States and her allies to invest further into atomic energy which was already roughly ten to twenty years more developed than OTL. Alongside new investments towards synthetic fuels and alternative energies. Though on the optimistic side the first Lunar bases are built in this decade, alongside the first manned mission to Mars. Yet it would be the India-pakistan war of 76-79 that would truly shake the world, ending in a nuclear exchange that see Pakistan reduced to barbarity and India standing as the "pyrrhic" victor. Showing the world the true potential devastation of nuclear war yet also creating the idea that the one could be won if given the right methods. A dark harbinger of things to come...
Little surprise that the beginning of the eighties would see the rise of the "atomic scare" as the prospect of nuclear war seemed closer than ever. As families rushed to build their own little fallout shelters in their backyards, with the United States government even going so far as to build an elaborate series of Sanctuaries across the nation. Massive underground bunker complex with vast arrays aquaponic farms, clinics, machine shops and even nuclear reactors... all ment to sustain independent populations of thousands for decades in the event of nuclear war. Yet that would not be all that this decade would be marked by as a new counter culture movement emerged in full bloom at this time, having already begun taking shape in the final years of the seventies. Alongside the first steps in mending of relations with the nations African American population. While the international North American bullet train system, spanning from Anchorage to Panama City was finally completed and at the high seas the US aircraft carrier Roosevelt sports the world's first fully functional
Liquid fluoride thorium reactor. Yet as America begins to prosper the old world sees itself shaken as the first cracks in the Russian behemoth and its puppets begin to form, while in the west the remaining fascist countries the populace cry for democratic reforms and in the UK & France a political nightmare unfolds as the true extent of the colonial atrocities of the 50's & 60's are uncovered.
The 90's not much happens outside of the spread of Thorium reactor technology and the continuing decline of the Soviet Union as China begins to rise. Hong & Macau remain in British and Portuguese hands, nearly sparked ww3...
The 2000's would see a new, young party hardliner taking the seat of Premier in the Soviet Union... it soon becomes clear that a tyrant of a calibre not scene since the days of Stalin has taken the reigns of power as a wave of terror sweeps through the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pack. Practical robotic exoskeleton's are adopted by various militaries, along with development of practical Anti-air lasers capable of shooting down ICBM's mid flight, putting the thought of mutually assured destruction into question. The People's Republic of China and the United States of America cooperate on building and launching mankind's first generation ships, heading towards Alpha Centauri, sparking a new light of hope for humanity. Narrowly missing the horror and devastation of WW3 as a dying Soviet Union attempts to conquer the world or take it down with them trying, lasting for four horrific years and ending in nuclear winter on December 21, 2012.
Over a century later the inhabitants of the remaining Sanctuaries would step out of their safe havens into a world changed and mutated beyond the recognition of their ancestors through chemical, biological and nuclear weaponry... (AKA Fallout, Wasteland and Exodus a Post Apocalyptic rpg
)
Thoughts and opinions...
