Speaking of Africa, do you have any plans on what is going to happen in Ethiopia and Zimbabwe?
My thoughts are that generally the Soviets would continue their support for the socialist regime in Ethiopia, while disengaging from allies of lesser value as a further emphasis on resource and realist/pragmatic diplomatic efforts. In the 80's, their economic problems made Romanov conclude that not every battle in Africa was worth fighting. Hawadle Madar maintained his control in Somalia, collapse was avoided. The Ethiopian civil war proceeded mostly as OTL, as it was considered worth fighting for by the Soviet leadership. The Soviets provided some food aid along with the UN to help avoid a complete humanitarian disaster, but most of it was just food that was only just recently considered too rotten or spoiled for domestic or warsaw pact consumption. The Soviets never really made an effort with Zimbabwe, and only ended up supporting the ANC in South Africa by word only.Speaking of Africa, do you have any plans on what is going to happen in Ethiopia and Zimbabwe?
Honestly, I'm in favor of this ! President Perot will certainly be a interesting scenario.Did some minor updates and fixed typos in the overall timeline, and now I'm going to do some summaries on what occurred at the end of 1991 and beginning of 1992, before the US presidential election update. I noticed a lot of people voted for Ross Perot, which could be kind of fun, do you want me to count votes for Perot taking the democratic nomination as votes for him winning the presidential election? Is it even conceivable that Perot could win?
India is important to the Eastern Bloc's economic and trade interests, but it's relationship has to be balanced with the desire for friendly relations with China. I could see Rajiv's assassination as not occuring or going down the way it did OTL. I'm going to include a lot more on India, Pakistan and South Asia in general in the next update.Watching this TL with interest. What is going on in India ITTL? Has Rajiv Gandhi still been assassinated?
The red alert connection is hilarious to me, but yeah funnily enough it's just a somewhat uncommon surname. It just means, son of a Roman. Or maybe Westwood just knew something we didn't at the timeSo Command & Conquer: Red Alert was accidentally plausible in having a Soviet politician be named Romanov. So there were just random peasants with the tsar's surname?
See I'm a little more hazy on India's recent history and politics, your argument is definitely compelling. I hope you don't mind if I retcon and feature some of your suggestions in the update? You're definitely right to post this, and I hope you make more suggestions as to what to add to the timeline.I am afraid that the Indian Financial Crisis of 1991 has not been butterflies away. India will need a massive bailout at low rates to return back to socialism. Economic liberalisation had started in 1980 and all the groundwork had already been paid for full liberalisation, for which the 1991 economic crises served as the spark. It's really hard to butterfly away. KGB can't influence India to the extent it can to the Central American and African countries. Any interference will be picked up by the Intelligence Bureau as they are quite familiar with the KGB. The Bofors scandal was being investigated by the CBI and any attempt at creating disinformation will be picked up. It is really difficult to do such things in advanced democracies, the same way as China(PRC) is unable to do anything in Taiwan, KGB can't chage election results or create scandals in Western Europe. It is a dangerous rope to walk and can have devastating effects on Indo-Soviet relations. A capitalist India and still being a de facto Soviet Ally is probably the wisest course of action. And as far as Indian Maoists are concerned, they only started their insurgency in earnest in the early 2000s, in 1991 they are a joke. Nobody will believe that such a thing exists(they did exist but we're virtually unnoticeable and irrelevant and can be characterized as bandits in the jungles proper organization was not attained untill 2002). They are so irrelevant that if KGB or CIA or any agency foreign or domestic, Government or Private is dealing with any Indian politician, they won't get to know, so the assertion that Chinese intelligence through their contacts in the Indian Maoists learned if the KGB activities in India, either the KGB has massively fucked up and everyone knows or the Chinese call their local agents Indian Maoists an the Communists in India were firmly in the Soviet camp. I am not saying that these things are impossible. The Soviets certainly can contact Gandhi but as Soviet Union is still strong any leadership in India is likely to renew the Indo-Soviet treaty of Friendship and Cooperation of 1971 for another 20 years starting from 1991, why would the Soviets try to jeopardize that by aiding maybe the losing side and with the risk of exposure. I genuinely doubt that without his assassination Rajiv Gandhi can win more seats than Narsimha Rao even with Soviet aid as his fall in popularity was balanced out to solve extent by Soviet Aid. The Chinese can learn about that but it is plausible that they would do so from their sources in Moscow. The China Pakistan treaty is also likely as China may want to flex it's muscles and two of its arch nemesis getting closer will with any government in India make it a natural ally of the Soviet Union, so why KGB will get its hands dirty when it is a win win situation. I also wish to touch the point of political Islam in Soviet Union. If your boys are returning in body bags you grow wary of that ideology and not coziy upto it. When after the disintegration of Soviet Union the Central Asian states were doing some soul searching for an ideology for themselves, they turned to Pakistan and when they realised that Pakistani sponsored political Islam means Jihadism, they they made it clear they want nothing of it, so the same leaders are now in charge of the Central Asian SSRs so how can they allow that.
I will be happy to be of help.See I'm a little more hazy on India's recent history and politics, your argument is definitely compelling. I hope you don't mind if I retcon and feature some of your suggestions in the update? You're definitely right to post this, and I hope you make more suggestions as to what to add to the timeline.
Very difficult to say the least. The performance as predicted by the specialists and intellectuals in the field of opinion polls and exit polls(in case you don't know what exit polls are, they are basically a sample survey done to predict the election results, samples collected from outside of the polling stations). The three largest parties INC(Indian National Congress), BJP(Bhartiya Janata Party) and the JP(Janata Party) won 232, 120 and 69 seats in the parliamentary elections respectively with the majority mark at 262 seats. Without the sympathy factor at play, the average of the predictions and exit polls gave INC, BJP and JP 180, 130 and 100 seats respectively. All the three parties hated eachother. INC and BJP were ideological nemesis for each other. BJP hated the policies of JP in their time together in a coalition. JP considered BJP a traitor, which led to their downfall. JP and INC were opposed to each other due to the Bofors scandal, which gave JP its teeth as otherwise JP was the majority of INC left whereas INC was now dominated by the centrists and right wingers. The seeds of division were sowed in 1985 when on the 100th anniversary of the Party, Rajiv Gandhi insulted the Congress left. The parties together held 78% of the seeds and without any two parties coming together the formation of any working coalition is difficult. Without a national unity government which has never occurred in Indian history (expect for partially in the first time when ministerial positions were offered to the other parties as well despite an overwhelming majority of the INC) we would definitely see another election in the next couple of years as no government will be able to survive. You may create a national unity government for the sake of the TL with other large regional parties and the Communists as well. Spreading disinformation is notoriously difficult at that time due to the Radio and Television being controlled by the government although free newspapers were their but their effectiveness was reduced by the massive amount of illiteracy. So other than massive direct find support from the KGB it is difficult to tamper with the election results but this massive support is itself difficult as the Intelligence Bureau and the Election Commission maintained a close watch on a party's spending overall and in each constituency adding the fact that INC campaigned as vigorously as possible. Another reason for the KGB to stay out is that China still has a more favorable relationship with the the West as compared to the Soviets and so with any party in charge India will remain in the Soviet camp for the foreseeable future.From what I understand is that Rajiv would still have the potential to win the election, if to even form a coalition government?
Soviet Union had mosques(operating) numbering in the hundreds and not even thousands and we're heavily monitored by the state. The Central Asian SSRs were some of the most loyal SSRs and Islam in the entire Soviet Union was overwhelmingly of the Sufi sect which is quite averse to violence and is also quite distant from politics. Islam, suffering repression in the Russian Empire and heavy state control in the Soviet Union had grown quite distant from the religion as practiced outside of the Soviet Union. Islam was revived after the fall of communism by the governments of the newly independent states as a tool of nation building and Islamic theology which had practicality grown extinct in those regions were revived with Gulf money funding hundreds of mosques and religious institutions. People had grown quite distant from the significance of religion in their daily life to the levels as seen in Western Europe. I had researched into this topic when I once wondered why the Mujahideen didn't launch attacks into the Soviet Union itself and also why Taliban didn't make any inroads political or ideological into the Central Asian countries.But because the nationalist/religious radicals and elements are increasingly suppressed, without an outlet to operate politically, I would say they are inspired. Not to an insane degree, but to a point that it may become possible for foreign countries to finance