Earlier today, I was mulling over the idea of a 2018 in which the United States lost the Cold War, and
this thread gave me the "missing link" I needed...
How plausible is the following scenario?
Instead of the Vietnam War, the United States military becomes embroiled in the Congo Crisis. The (disastrous) fighting in Africa severely inflames domestic racial tension, and the the civil unrest of the 1960s is
much worse than OTL. The American government cracks down hard to restore "law and order" to the country. As a result of this repression, by the end of the 20th Century the U.S.S.R. is more stable and prosperous than the United States, which have stagnated and become something of an international pariah.
i could see that, so it would probably go something like this
*Korea is unified under glorious Communism, and helps the Communists in Vietnam
*No Sino-Soviet split occurs because hardliners stay in power in the USSR, leading to a more unified, hardline Communist front
*someone other than pre-southern strategy Nixon or Kennedy is elected who gets the nation in the Congo and deteriorates race relations (perhaps a stronger states rights ticket than in ‘48 throws the election to Congress and somehow gets the presidency through a coalition of southern dems and conservative Republicans (that’s probably a bit unrealistic, so maybe Nixon dies before ‘60 and some other Republican, who’s more conservative and racist becomes president)
*there’s no CRA of 1964 or 1965 and MLK is killed earlier, leading to lots of racial unrest (there could be much stronger versions of the NoI and the BPP)
*the ‘60, ‘64, or ‘68 elections (or all of them) become endlessly deadlocked, leading to more political unrest
*by 1970, a massive economic recession occurs in the US (not hard to believe with all the above happening), which shakes people’s belief in Communism
*War breaks out in Germany, which isn’t good when the US is suffering through all that I’ve mentioned, plus their destructive war in the Congo, plus, a lot of Asia is going red, so things aren’t the best for the US, and they lose Germany
*Things are still bad for the Soviets economically, but at least they’re not suffering a near-civil war, so that’s a thing
*In 1972, some bright reformer with a plan for civil rights and to reform our economy is elected (maybe McGovern, JFK, or Ralphie). Unfortunately for him, he’s killed by a klansman, and his VP is kinda useless and gets nothing done
*The Assassination of a pro-Civil Rights reformer as president basically leads to a war between a more radical version of the BPP, and the KKK, so that’s fun.
*So obviously separatist movements are popping up in all the traditional areas (California, the South, Florida, New England, Cascadia, Texas, Hawaii, Alaska the Superior part Michigan wanting to become part of Ontario for some reason...), some of which are more violent than others, so with America on the verge of civil war, the 1976 elections happen. With so many regional parties, no one gets a majority, but no one really gives a fuck, so the speaker becomes president after getting elected by a coalition of Regionalist parties. With this, he authorizes Independence referendums in California (+NV), Oregon, Washington, Texas, NY, the region of New England (+LI), the Former CSA (+MO, KY, WV -FL, TX) Florida, Puerto Rico, Hawaii, Alaska, the proposed state of Lakota, Texas (+OK), Utah as Deseret. All of them leave the US. With this, the remaining states try to reform the old US, but they fail, with Arizona and New Mexico even getting taken by the Socialist Republic of Mexico. Eventually, the old US falls apart, and the former states either become unstable nations or are fought over by other NA nations
*After the US falls and North America is reduced to inter-continental war, the USSR finally wins, before collapsing due to economic issues that have plagued it for years in 1996.
*Following the fall of the USSR, a new world power emerges in California, but we’ll get to that later.