Most random people who could lead a country in WWII.

When we make a alternate history scenario taking place in WWII and get a alternate national leader it is usually amount the same list of leaders. The most likely - and thus, generic - are usually:

USSR - Molotov, Bukharin, Trotsky, Zhukov and Beria
Germany - Göring, Himmler, Ludwig Beck or Rommel.
Britain - Lord Mountbatten, I once saw David Lloyd George.
USA - Henry Wallace, Wendel Wilkie, Alf Landon.

The list goes on. So here a question, what are the most random people who still had a unlikely chance to lead their country in WWII? They cannot be ASB figures to take power (like Having Wilhelm II crowned again after 1939), but some minor influent figured that maybe, who know, had enought influence to take power with enought luck.

Some I can think of are:

Germany - Alfred Rosenberg, Göbbles, Wilhelm III (if operation Valkyrie works).
USSR: Mikhail Kalinin
USA: Cordel Hull
Brazil: Amaral Peixoto.

Who else can you think of?
 
USA- John Nance Gardner, Sam Rayburn, James Farley (if he is nominated and wins in 1940), James F. Byrnes, Thomas Dewey (you would have to get FDR out of the picture, but he was a serious contender in 40 and 44)

Germany- Rudolf Hess ( I know he didn't have any real power, but he was the Deputy Fueher and this is a thread about unlikely or random leaders), Franz Halder (possible head of a military junta)

Britain- Anthony Eden, Clement Attlee
 
Brazil could plausibly have Monteiro Lobato leading it in the 1930s/40s if he decided to become a politician after the smashing success of Urupês in 1918.​
 
USA- John Nance Gardner, Sam Rayburn, James Farley (if he is nominated and wins in 1940), James F. Byrnes, Thomas Dewey (you would have to get FDR out of the picture, but he was a serious contender in 40 and 44)

Germany- Rudolf Hess ( I know he didn't have any real power, but he was the Deputy Fueher and this is a thread about unlikely or random leaders), Franz Halder (possible head of a military junta)

Britain- Anthony Eden, Clement Attlee
Byrne's is a Dixiecrat, ain't he?
 
Brazil could plausibly have Monteiro Lobato leading it in the 1930s/40s if he decided to become a politician after the smashing success of Urupês in 1918.​
A KKK suporter, white supremacist and paulistan supremacist in power

The worst part is that this is not even a drift from the paulistan oligarchs from the old republic
 
It's kind of hard to figure out what you're asking about here? It's something like trying to find the person who is the CLOSEST to being ASB, without actually being ASB.
 
It's kind of hard to figure out what you're asking about here? It's something like trying to find the person who is the CLOSEST to being ASB, without actually being ASB.
Yes.

And also other people who are not close to ASB but unlikely to take power.
 
If the Nazis never gained power, Franz von Papen could have led Germany into a second world war. Even a generic military junta would probably have replaced Weimar's reliance on foreign investment with some attempt at an autarkic policy and a military buildup, culminating in a crisis over Sudetenland or Danzig that could lead to war.
 
Stafford Cripps in UK - a very serious contender at one point, wasn't he? (I am open to correction on this point).

John A. Costello, in Ireland, if things happened differently - though that might have meant De Valera being out of the picture altogether. He would have been even more blatant about being "neutral on the allied side".

In Canada - how about Elsie McGill? The glass ceiling would have been two miles thick at that point, even for a woman of her talents. But maybe, given the right circumstances she would have busted through it? I know it's on the outer edge of plausibility, but not completely implausible, I think.
 
How about Ludendorff? It would require a few things to break his way, and he wasn't particularly stable, but it could get real weird.
 
For the USA, Will Rogers. He would have also been the first Native American president, a Cherokee. His son, Will Rogers Jr, actually was elected to Congress.

A really odd one for the USA, Rep. Jeanette Rankin.
 
In Canada King nearly faced a backbencher revolt, and Arthur Meighan nearly got back into parliament. A relic of the Borden government taking the reins during WWII would be quite something.

edit:
iirc there was a window of opportunity for Morgenthau (yes, that Morgenthau) to succeed to the presidency. edit 2: yes, for five days in June/july of 1945 he was second in line to Truman, owing to a number of vacant positions.
 
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He was. He had a decent chance of taking Wallace's place in the 1940 Democratic Convention.
No. Byrnes was the apparent front-runner to replace Wallace in 1944. This was during the behind-the-scenes maneuvering before the DNC. A group of prominent Democrat insiders decided that Wallace should go, and persuaded FDR of this. Several men were considered as replacements. Byrnes had the biggest reputation: a former US Senator and Supreme Court Justice, who in 1942 became director of the Office of Economic Stabilization (from 1943 "War Mobilization"). As such he brilliantly managed the economic side of the US war effort, with an office in the White House and the nickname of "assistant President". FDR avoided making any explicit commitment about the VP nomination, but Byrnes thought he was FDR's choice, and Senator Harry Truman went to the DNC expecting to make a nominating speech for Byrnes. But the insiders worried that Byrnes as an ex-Catholic would offend both Catholics and anti-Catholics, and as a white supremacist Southerner would offend blacks. So in the end, Truman.
 
Francois Darlan. He was head of government under Pétain and designated successor to the 84-year-old Marshal in 1940-1941. Then in November 1942, he was recognized by the Allies as High Commissioner in North Africa; he was de facto head of the liberated French state, i.e. Algeria, Morocco, West Africa, and the West Indies, until assassinated in December. If Pétain had died in 1940, or Darlan had not been assassinated in 1942...

Senator Burton K. Wheeler. Prior to the 1940 Democrat National Convention, FDR had not said whether he would run for re-election. No one except VP John Garner and ex-DNC chair Jim Farley had openly campaigned for the nomination, but several others had privately made preparations in case FDR explicitly stepped aside. Wheeler was one of them; before the convention, he had formed a campaign committee, and had FDR not run again (either by choice or because of say medical problems), Wheeler would "hit the ground running". As a fervent New Dealer, he would be attractive to that wing of the party, but he had also been a leader against FDR's attempted "court-packing", which established him as principled and independent. He was a fanatical isolationist, and as President would have blocked all aid to the Allies. Unless an Axis power was stupid enough to attack the US directly, the US would not get into the war until Wheeler left office in 1945. The war could easily last until then.
 

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A couple of decidedly outside shots: Leo Amery for the UK and Carl "C.J." Hambro for Norway, during WW2.

Amery was a strong voice against the Nazi's in the lead up to the war, but his eldest son was a Nazi sympathizer, so there's that stigma to deal with.

Hambro was one of the most clear headed Norwegian public figures in his assessment of the German threat. He helped organize the escape of the Norwegian royal family and Norway's gold as well
 
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USA: Eleanor Roosevelt. Not like a "de facto control" like Wilson's wife, but literally president. FDR dies 1939 and 1940 election Eleanor carries his enormously popular policies over.

Germany: Junta headed by Guderian or Schörner, whoever was head of OKH at that point. Attempt a conditional surrender or peace deal with the allies and hold out as long as possible on the East.

USSR: Very close to ASB; Trofim Lysenko. Reason being, he held a position close to Stalin, (despite every other biologist in the USSR saying that Lysenko was bullshitting Stalin) and commanded a huge amount of power internally. Not 'boss people around' power but advising Stalin that getting rid of Mr. X would be beneficial, and usually his word became action.
 
Free France- Georges Mandel. Sometimes considered a French Churchill for his continued commitment to fighting the Germans. He was given a chance to fly out to Britain but believed that this would be seen as running away from the fight. He led a group of Government members to North Africa to organize French resistance. He was arrested by the Vichy government and (being from a Jewish family) was eventually given to the Nazi’s and put in Buchenwald. He was killed by Vichy paramilitary forces when being transferred back into Laval’s Vichy custody.

If he had taken the flight to Britain, or been able to avoid capture in North Africa or had Churchill been able to organize the rescue he reportedly wanted to, it seems likely that Mandel would have been leader of Free France. He was senior to de Gaulle in the government and much preferred by Churchill. I am willing to bet he would be preferable for FDR as well.
 
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