For this thread I'm going to borrow a scenario that Turtledove first proposed in "Ready for the Fatherland" and which I have toyed with expanding over the years. The point of this thread is NOT to critique whether that scenario is plausible, but to give your opinions on a question in relation to it.
Basically, in 1943 the Germans are in retreat in Eastern Europe and Hitler goes to visit Field Marshal Manstein on the front lines. Manstein is of the opinion that the Germans need to have the freedom to retreat in order to create a new flexible approach to defeat the Soviets, but Hitler is ideologically committed to never retreating. The two argue and, in a moment of emotional pique, Manstein draws his sidearm and shoots Hitler, Goebbels and the accompanying party.
Manstein then leads a military coup which wipes out most of the Nazi Party apparatus including Himmler. With more freedom to act, the Wehrmacht are able to beat the Soviets in several key battles and stabilise the front. After failing to make a breakthrough, and being convinced that the Western Allies are never going to deliver on their promise for a second front, Stalin accepts Manstein's generous peace offer (considering the Germans still hold some Soviet territory) of status quo ante bellum. With the Eastern Front therefore resolved, the Germans are able to repel the Allies' belated alt-D-Day landings from France and drive them out of mainland Italy, although Sicily remains British-occupied as a rump Kingdom of Italy. The war essentially just peters out into a stalemate peace. In the East, however, the Americans successfully defeat Japan (without nukes, IIRC) and occupy it. The result is a four-cornered cold war, with the players being the USA, USSR, Germany and Britain, all of which are armed with 'sunbombs' (nukes).
Now, I repeat that this is not about asking whether this is plausible or not. Just assume it is for the sake of the thread. My question is how you think the first post-war elections would have gone in the Western democracies in response to such a stalemate peace. For example:
The American presidential election in November 1944. By this point the Allies' landings in France have bloodily failed and they're on the retreat in Italy. On the other hand, the war against Japan is still going well. Does Dewey manage to defeat FDR or does FDR still win a fourth term?
The American presidential election of 1948, by the same token.
The first British postwar general election. Do the war-weary voters still embrace Labour's radical welfare state proposals like OTL, or out of fear of Manstein's Germany do they vote for the hawkish Conservatives/Nationals? For that matter, does Churchill still lead the latter, or does he resign due to failing to defeat the Germans?
Ditto in Canada, Australia, any country you happen to be familiar with its politics from the time.
Discuss.