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1933

There is some years that prove to be decisive in world history. It can be years of war, battles and blood spilled on the battlefields. Years of treaties, plots and other backroom negotiations. Years of economic upheavals or crushes. Years of reforms, political failures and revolutions.

1933 was all of this.

In the United States, Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt was sworn in on March, 4, succeeding to Republican Herbert Hoover and after narrowly avoiding an assassination attempt at Chigago in February. In order to resolve the economic crisis that had shaken the USA since 1929, known as the Great Depression, he begins his own economical program, known as the New Deal. Ending the Prohibition and beginning a series of big works throughout the United States, this great nation decides to fight the big problem of unemployment. On May 10, the Chaco War begins between Bolivia and Paraguay.

In Asia, Japan has begun its expansion on the continent, occupying Manchuria and taking advantage of the chaotic situation within the Republic of China, divided between Nationalists and Communists. Unable to receive the recognition of their puppet state in Manchuria, the Mandchukuo, Japan decides to withdraw from the powerless League of Nations, officially isolating itself from the other nations but still preparing its expansion plans throughout Asia, that is touched by the desire of independance: Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, one of the leaders of the Independance movement in India, is sentenced to prison on July after his political campaign in favor of the lower castes.

Europe is deeply divided between democracy and authoritarianism. Western democracies have to deal with parliamentarian unstability, such as France, that also to deal with another revolt in Morroco. The young Spanish Republic sees a victory of the rightist parties on its November general elections. Inspired by the example of Mussolini in Italy and frightened by the Soviet giant led by Stalin, many countries fall to the temptation of dictatorship, and many fascist parties are developing throughout Europe, growing in both violence and discontent: Vidkun Quisling founds the Nasjonal Samling in Norway, while Romanian Prime Minister Ion Gheorghe Duca is assassinated by the Iron Guard.

But everything would come from Germany this year.

General Kurt von Schleicher, following a conspiracy against his former friend predecessor Franz von Papen, had managed last year to win the dangerous seat of Reichskanzler, under the authority of aging and almost senile President Paul von Hindenburg. Considered as some sort of social general, Schleicher refuses to believe to any concession to the National-Socialist Party led by Adolf Hitler, that is coming near bankrupt but still receives most support from the German conservative and ruling classes, such as Franz von Papen and other relatives of the President, who see them as the last defence against a civil war or a communist revolution. Von Schleicher makes progress in its effort to win the support of the leftist Nazis, such as Gregor Strasser, and other far right paramilitary groups such as the Stahlhelm, in order to balance Nazi influence, but continues to lose support from the political classes and even from Hindenburg himself.

On January, 30, Schleicher learns about the secret meetings between Hitler, von Papen and Oskar von Hindenburg, the President's son, in order to appoint Hitler as the next Reichskanzler. He decides to put his cards on the table towards Hindenburg: or the aging President refuses the nomination of Hitler, proclaims the state of emergency and gives full powers to Schleicher, or the latter will release the documents that incriminate the President in a corruption scandal with the Prussian landowners. Too worried of his image of a respectable man and despising too much Hitler, Hindenburg accepts.


On January, 31, Hindenburg issues a decree that gives Schleicher all the neccesary powers to "save Germany from its current perils" and proclaims the state of emergency. Gaining support from the Great Powers, Schleicher can summon an auxiliary force of police comprised of elements from the Stahlhelm and mobilize the Reichswehr that gives him a full support. The NSDAP is officially declared as illegal under charges of plotting against the stability of the German Reich, whilst Gregor Strasser, expelled in 1932 from the NSDAP, becomes Vice-Reichskanzler and rallies other elements of the anti-Nazi far right to Schleicher. There is a few smirkishes in the streets of Bavaria controlled by NSDAP militias, but Hitler is arrested at the Austrian border, along with other members, even if Hermann Göring successfully escapes to Sweden. On Feburary, 25, Nazi leaders are sentenced to death penalty after a short military trial: Adolf Hitler, Ernst Röhm, Rudolf Hess, Joseph Goebbels, Heinrich Himmler, Alfred Rosenberg and Sepp Dietrich are all executed by firing squad the same night. A few days earlier, Schleicher had offically dissolved the Reichstag, the extremist parties and political militias.

The Reichstag fire, set on February, 27 by a deranged man, Marinus van der Lubbe, a convicted communist, brings further Schleicher's repression. The KPD is officially accused of the crime and accused of preparing a communist revolution in Germany, under command of the USSR' secret services. Ernst Thälmann is gunned down while he was trying to escape, and communism is officially forbidden in Germany.

Schleicher takes advantage of the state of emergency to consolidate his power on Germany throughout the year 1933, officiously ending the Weimar Republic and renewing the declining influence of the federal government on the whole Reich. Setting new treaties with other commercial partners, such as Italy, Great Britain, Turkey and United States, Germany takes her own road to economic improvement, led by Reichsbank Director Hjalmar Schacht. Within the German political life, Schleicher poses as the man of the army, compassionnate with the lower classes and accepting some anti-capitalist reforms proposed by his Vice-Reichskanzler Strasser, but also gains the support of conservative officers, great industry tycoons, great landowners and monarchist aristocratic families, in order to balance von Papen's influence.

Schleicher is very criticized for its repression and dictatorship on behalf of the senile Hindenburg, but what would be the situation if Hitler had been named Chancellor?
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