More Germans will die in Goebbels' "Angrif" than in the Ural War.
The Iron Eagle - The History of the Cold War
- Thread starter Kaiser of Brazil
- Start date
that doesn't sound good...
anyways, if you ever got time for it, a food culture chapter would be real interesting in this world. I'm just genuinely curious as to how it changes
They are a welcome addition to the fight against the fascist. India reaching its true potential in this timeline is something I am hopeful. Maybe in few decades Germania starts an second Ural War, but this time India joins the fight, an heavely industrialized and rich India. They will burry the Germans in bodies and steel.
I mean, even with the death toll of the Cultural Revolution in OTL in mind, considering Germany’s far lower population, this ain’t a good sign.
Also i’m pretty sure Goebbels killing more people than a war he greatly opposed and stopped isn’t a good look for him.
Considering about half a million Germans died in the Ural War, this makes me terrified to learn how Goebbels would exactly surpass those numbers.
Trying to exterminate not just the Catholic Church, but the whole Catholic community maybe ?
I wonder what the ghosts of Hitler, Himmler, Bormann and Göring would think about Goebbels taking power.
TheSpectacledCloth
Gone Fishin'
Goering will soon be rolling in his grave. Himmler will just see Goebbels' actions as foolish. Bormann will look on with envy. And Hitler will soon be proud of Goebbels.
Yes, so long someone like Hess is around
Now I can imagine Hess and Himmler being in a competition of who can achieve the level of dark magic to commute with Hitler beyond the grave.
Turns out Himmler's SS coup wasn't to remove Bormann and seek the position of Führer, but it was actually an arcane dark magic duel between the two that the world only interpreted as a petty power dispute.
Just as Germany has the Linz Pact alliance ITTL (it’s an economic pact as well as a military one, right?), does Britain have such an alliance as well? Maybe the Commonwealth gets some real teeth here.
One more thing, did any other German allies join the Ural War? Part of me remembers Romanian troops included but I don’t remember.
One more thing, did any other German allies join the Ural War? Part of me remembers Romanian troops included but I don’t remember.
I mean, if that doesn't become a popular ASB trope for a while at one point on this TL's version of AH.com I'll eat my hat.
Britain does have the Commonwealth and a close partnership with Free France, Free Belgium and Free Portugal (which means, the colonies once held by these brutal colonial powers).
The Romanians did send some help but the Legionaires are not in the best terms with Germania because of their anti-Catholic policy.
I thought that legionaires are orthodox Christians or did something change ?
Yes, but the Orthodox Church would not be less outraged if the Germans began to arrest catholic priests and burn down churches. Christian churches have their own disputes but most wouldn't just stay and watch the kind of atrocity the Germans enacted and just say "meh, they have a slightly different interpretation of the same book, let them burn". Especially with the Germans actively changing the Gospel through Positive Christianity.
TheSpectacledCloth
Gone Fishin'
I wonder what Goebbels' "Angrif" will mean for early Nazi party members, like Julius Streicher and Hermann Esser.
XLIII - ENTR'ACTE
THE IRON EAGLE
ENTR'ACTE
The rocket flew higher and higher, leaving nothing behind but a powerful explosion, a trail of smoke which looked like a cloud. They watched from a safe distance, of course, right there at Cologne, one of the many beating hearts of the Reich, came up the great machine. The Führer watched with a glow in his eyes, and his cold eyes so many times could change into a burning heat just as that rocket had once been a cold piece of metal. This was their triumph, one of many, the first man into Space, a news confirmed later that evening with the images returning of a rocket flying hundreds of kilometers into the stratosphere. It was the end of 1959, and in the middle of the Solstice, the German Volk could look proudly to the stars and know that a German was there, that nothing was impossible for the Aryan spirit. He was 62 years old, and the greatness he had so many times dreamed about, which he wrote in his great novels and romances, was there for the taking. So many died so that he could be here, not thanks to them but because he overcame them all, him, the weakest man of the party, the one so many times mocked for his deficiencies by those with a smaller mind. ENTR'ACTE
Otto Strasser, Walter Stennes, Alfred Rosenberg, Hermann Göring, Martin Bormann, Heinrich Himmler, Paul Wegener, Reinhard Heydrich, Rudolf Hess, men of such great power and capability, which history would never remember as anything but a footnote. The great and unstoppable march of History would swallow all but those who rose beyond mediocrity, those like Adolf Hitler, the man he idolized, his Messiah, the Savior of Germany, no, of Europe. Yes, he did lose patience at times, he was frustated when the Führer did not take his side, but he was always loyal, more loyal to him than any other. Because he was truly the perfect disciple, he was the Saint Peter to his Jesus, he was the man who was always meant to carry the torch and see to it that the German volk reached it's heights, and while the Providence saw fit to mock him and take their Führer so soon, he still resisted that test and now he was stronger than he ever was. He was the Führer.
But by his side there were men he knew would only wait for the slightest of mistakes for him to fall. To his right was the Party Chancellor Karl Kaufmann, a man who was once his partner at the very beginning, the Gauleiter of the almighty Urban Hamburg, an urban man like him, but one whose ambition could never be unchecked. Kaufmann knew that he did not have the people, he did not have the voice, but neither did Wegener, Bormann and Heydrich and yet they could still command through a weak Führer. Perhaps Kaufmann believed him to be weak, but he was not, that was another viper to be crushed. To his left was the Minister of the Economy and Armaments, the architect and darling of all the burgeouise elements infecting National Socialism, Albert Speer. If he knew that this man would become the bane of his existence, he would have never introduced him to Hitler, never contracted him in the Propaganda Arm to make a spectacle. And yet here he was, the man who backed him to end the worthless war that Wegener made, all in hopes that he would be in command. He was the corruption and the idolatry of money and greed that corrupted the Reich over the last decade, the one which began taking hold after the Führer's demise and was now rotting all of the Reich from within, which is why that war in the east could never be won. There was a whole host of those who would await for him to tumble and seize upon themselves the reins of State, to once more drift Germany into it's decline.
There were those who still believed in Bormann and Wegener's ideas, the leeches of the corrupt Party bureaucracy who desired, no, craved the stagnation and mediocrity. Taking the people from National Socialism, seeking to corrupt the Youth and turn National Socialism into an elitist force which was contrary to all they have believed, all they had achieved. If one take the Volk out of Volksgemeinschaft, what are you left with? A souless machine full of greed and hunger for more and more power which will lose touch with those they are meant to lead, such a machine, like the Weimar Bureaucracy, could never be allowed to triumph. That was only one of the enemies, there were also the Burgeoise spirit that lived within the great German capital, one he had tolerated before due to the war, but now it grew more and more into an abomination no less different from the banks of the Rothschild. They were corrupted by the same vile ideals of the Jew, who believed the state must serve the capital, not the opposite, the capital is necessary but it can never be allowed to fester and grow. This is what Speer believed in, he would let his corrupt overlords take hold over the Reich and continue the growing spiral of misery and stagnation that the Volk now was realizing and agitating against. Either that would destroy the Reich in the short term, through dangerous Judeo-Bolshevism infecting the minds of the hungry people, or it would be in the long term, as the State would lose all power and Germania would become a city of bankers and beggars. And of course there was the SS, which was meant to guard the Neuordnung and instead turned into it's corrupt aristocracy, the new Prussians and nobles who leeched the common people, as greedy as the bankers and as stagnant as the bureaucrats. For once he had to thank the Jew, for killing Heydrich weakened these damned creatures, who would be twice damned once the Hammer of Justice comes crashing upon them.
They would have their turn, they all would, he swore silently while he became the Führer. He was the Great Apostle of National Socialism, the rock from which this Church would be built to last a thousand years and a thousand years forevermore. He alone was left who understood the great wisdom of the Führer, he alone understood the game he played and could understand now, all needed to come in due time. If he ordered all the men with him seized, he would be shot the next day and the Great Revolution would be dead before it started. No, he had to set the stage, like a great director sets a movie, the right actors, the right script, the right visuals, the right angle, all would be perfect, for Germany would have a revolution, there was no way out, and National Socialism had to once more lead the Attack, it had to lead this Revolution and awaken like a great wolf killing the small parasites approaching it. He would be this wolf, he would be the true Party, he would be the true Architect, he would be the true Guardian, and as the rocket reached into the stars, his belief in the Aryan spirit was the same. Despite all odds, despite all obstacles, through ingenuity, through a controlled explosion, through a rise over the cloud and smoke, the German Volk, the true National Socialism, would prevail, and Germany would rise into the Stars.
So many letters always reaching his table, so much gratitude, so many threats, most never even reached his secretary and yet a few were always picked up by him on his way to sleep. The President of the United States was particularly reflective this Christmas, to the point he hardly even bothered with the news of that Kraut going into space, what was his name? Müller? Jünger? It did not matter, if you closed your nostrils you could say whatever gibberish you wanted and it would sound German. They can boast about their rocket, he would deal with that later, now he was more bothered with the pain in his back, which was enough to make him sit for most of today's family meeting in the White House. His brother George came, despite his doctor's advice, and his younger brother Earl listened to the doctors, or rather he was in so much pain that even the family stubborness could not pull him from his bed. The three of them were old men now, past their prime, and they have ruled this nation like Helmsmen. George was content in staying in Congress, standing up for him like the loyal brother he was, and Earl took care of his son Russell and their home in Louisiana. Sure, many wanted to join the meeting and he did throw a party to the White House employees and their wives, husbands, brothers, cousins, nephews, children and even the odd crazy uncle, they earned their fill, but this late in the night this was only a Long family celebration now.
He was having a cup of wine, something colder to relax his muscles after the feast. With a sigh, he looked at his family, there was his wife Rose, lovely in her own way and having the vigor of a woman half her age, there was his daughter Rose, a cherry woman with her children, his son Russell, who was now a grown man with his own children, and his son Palmer, who also had how own grown kids. Huey was a grandfather, this was the image even the country had of him, the kind grandpa who gave his children their allowance to buy candies and toys while giving sage advice. He was not even 70 yet and he felt like it, how old was Hull when he had his stroke? 74? 75? That was a lot for a man to be a President, but that is just how the Democrats rolled at the time, and he was not fit to be a Wartime POTUS so he did not run, he would hate to have presided over the invasion of Japan. Yeah, he was 9 years younger and felt just the same as old Hull. And yet elections were coming, and he knew he would win if he ran, he would not even need a campaign, the Germans already did that when they pulled back from the Volga and he soaked up all the adulation of even men like Knowland who had wanted to give the Krauts a bloody nose for a while.
But should he? Was it not more precious to be here? With his own family all around, his grandkids singing a carol and him watching and nodding along? Has this life not taken enough from him? He had bullet wounds to prove to anyone that he already paid his fair share of sacrifice, as well as his white hair, back pain, and a numb leg that he barely ever felt anymore. No one would blame him for standing down after literally going an extra term to make sure his legacy would stand on it's own two feet, perhaps it was time for America to move on from the Kingfish. And yet, if he did not run then he could see it all coming down, no name but the name Long could rally so many to the voting booths, no name like Long could bring Congress to vote for something like reducing their own salaries, no name like Long could get everyone together like Thanksgiving or Christmas. If he ran, he would win, and with four more years he could set so many things straight, he could make sure all the needed changes he made would stay, that those spiteful fat cats would never return. But perhaps that was because he could never stop being thirsty for more, he could not settle down while there was something for him to correct, something for him to take, something greater to aspire to be. Would he be reduced to a glorified retirement home like Wheeler? His fate was not to remain sulking in a country house while the world changed while he could do nothing but write memoirs and feed cows.
But perhaps he should think this through, there was still time after all, New Year was around the corner and soon they would get into a new age one way or the other. The negroes continued to agitate and the Dems in return blamed it all on the blacks for lynch mobs to move on them. There were even those in his own party who were changing focus and obsessed with this issue on either side, ignoring the greater goals to be consumed into some waste of time like who sits where on a bus, what matters is just that you are in the damned bus and get to your job, home and family, he said that himself and less and less people listened to it. Maybe he did need to retire, was that just him being out of touch? Nonsense, his popularity was greater than ever, might as well get shot again and skip the election entirely. He was so distracted he had to be nudged by Rose for him to stand up and do his speech, while everyone was staring at him full of attention. This was no electoral speech, but he did take his cane and helped himself up, with his back screaming a protest louder than any Negro parade.
The presentation finished, he applauded, greeted some people on the way out and heard their complaints, a destroyed house, the costs for a funeral, the body of a loved one, all somber news that only became worse as you went west. He remembered when he visited Orenburg, what he saw was devastation unlike any other city, if you could even call it a city, the railroad still worked and government offices remained, but all that was not useful for the Germans, they burned, during the conquest, during the siege, during the retreat. Could they call it a victory if they had all but admitted that all west of the Volga and Oral had been lost? They could, because like his brother, even if still afflicted with a disease, Russia still survived, but he also knew that if they were to ever return, they would be far more relentless than they were now.
He worried about news from the East, the Communist leader in Peking was to make an announcement, he also took Mongolia within days, overrunning the local garrison while he was powerless against it. Now many officers wanted retribution, but those were the old guard, men who have been in service for 50 years and refused to die, these men had such a pathological hatred of Communism that could only compare to Kislitsin, if he had not stood his ground then, Chuikov and half his officer corps would have been dead and he had no doubt they would have lost in that case. On the way back to the Palace, there was one man awaiting with an old Soviet uniform down the steps, but the guards and him both recognized the man, it was Zhukov, the Generalissimo of the old Red Army who aged far more than his 61 years showed. The Marshal took off his cap and bowed his head, but his knees never bended, the man was made out of pure steel if one looked outside. If not for his advice, his actions during the war, even if the two men were polar opposites, he knew that they would have been both dead. He smiled, like a strong and yet sympathetic Russian man, the two had a greeting and began to walk during that cold winter, the cold was once shivering for Andrey, but recently he had grown to like it far more than the heat.
"They will return, Andrey." Zhukov said, speaking with the Tsar by addressing him by his first name, that sounded natural for a man who grew up in the Red Army, and Zhukov already liked Andrei far more than he ever liked Stalin, at least with him you could have a conversation without fearing for your life. "Any news from Washington?" The Tsar shook his head, and Zhukov took his military cap off again with a sigh that turned into a cold breeze in the winter, he straightened up his cap and put it back on his head. The Tsar of the Empire and the former commander of the Revolutionary Red Army, such a contrast that could only grow into friendship in Russia. "They have had twenty years to learn, you can't rely on them to save Russia." The two talked about America, Huey Long once again rejected the Tsar's request for an official alliance, an international agreement between several nations against the Threat of Nazism. He replied with his usual "we will study this proposal" while filling the rest of the runtime of the call with compliments and adulation. He was that friend you could call for a Vodka, but who would be the first one to stand and watch when a fight breaks out, despite Donovan's pleas, the Tsar's trust in the American government was never secure either. "You ever wonder if it could be different?" The Tsar asked after a long moment of silence, with the Generalissimo giving a nod. "Maybe we could have been in Berlin now, in another life."
The Tsar returned to the front of the Palace after the night walk, Zhukov refused to go inside, claiming he needed to go back to catch a plane to Perm, there would be a military exercise in the region before the New Year. Andrei thanked him for accompanying him, and for his service to Russia. "You will still need me, Andrei, know that I will always come if it means killing some Fascists." The Tsar insisted in gifting him a bottle of fine Vodka, as well as one soft drink from America that Zhukov grew particularly found of, coming straight from Vladivostok, a glass bottle of Coca Cola, the General gave a chuckle and the two parted ways. Andrei knew that one day war may return in the west, he did not know when or how, but he had to make sure that next time, the Germans would not have an easier time even if they threw all they had. The former Bolsheviks could be very useful, even if they were once in opposite sides, this war did more to unite the Russian people, as well as all the millions of others slavs and non-slavs who fled from the west, than any government efford ever could. Kurchatov said he was getting closer every day, and perhaps one day, Russia too would have that power, and that day the Germans would think twice when they realize that their victims too can shoot back.
There was an old fable about the Hare and the Tortoise, in a race the Hare would run first before everyone, but in his arrogance he would rest after tiring himself, while the tortoise, always constant, would reach the finish line before him. That was a western fable which Mao came to know, about the virtues of patience, and it was very much like Chinese concepts found in Confucianism. Mao publicly despised old traditions, he spoke about making China anew, on revolutionary favor around the principles of Marxism, but sometimes he could find wisdom in private on old sages. Patience was necessary, but so was firmness, and the more he reflected on the numbers in his desk for thet Year's reports on the economy, the more he saw the need to do something drastic.
The United States, the heart of capitalism and one of the greatest threats in the Revolution, was still leagues ahead of China when it came to Industry, agriculture, technology and military statistics. With Russia triumphing in the North, the Reactionaries continued to surround him, even if he still preferred them than the vile Nazi-Fascist Linz Pakt that grew more hungry every year. The world was seeing an age of change, a whirlwind was coming and he could feel that even in the air during that winter in Beijing. The Chairman had a lot of responsibility, he was the face of Communism, of the legacy that Marx and Lenin built in the west and never expected to rise and settle in the East. And for that, something had to change, China needed to become more active in the international revolutionary efforts. But what could be done?
"Africa." He said, looking at it, his sudden inspiration was correct, he recalled when Haile Selaisse went to New Delhi, how he spoke of the struggle of the Ethiopian people under the Italian rule. He remembered the requests for arms and aid from so many small groups from Africa, from the Southern tip of it to Algeria, Marxists and non-marxists alike, millions upon millions of impoverished and exploited people under the rule of Imperialists and Fascists from Cape Town to Tobruk, and did his revolution not begin to chase away Chiang and the western imperialists? Did he not deliver a blow against the Portuguese in Macau? Nehru may or may not be trusted, but he was no enemy, the true enemies were in Washington and Germania, enemies of China, of the Revolution, and he alone could send them away. He attempted in Korea once, that failed, but that does not mean it was impossible.
But China, as the home of the free peoples, must rise up to this task, the countryside would be mobilized like never before, the fevor of the revolutionary cause would sweep away all the weakness and decadence. Industries will produce weapons, steel, concrete and asphalt unlike they ever did before, the willpower of hundreds of millions of hearts could defeat any challenge which was thrown at them, let the Imperialists slaughter eachother while they grow, soon China, with all it's potential from resources and people, as well as the grand unity of the free peoples of Africa and Asia, would finish the Imperialists, Capitalists and Fascists of the west, the old and decadent ideologies which were to be inevitably washed away by the wheels of History. All he needed was to prepare his country, for China to lead this struggle it would become stronger, and thanks to the contacts with old Soviet Spies and Scientists, they would soon reach parity with the west, for in a few months he was set to inaugurate the first Nuclear Reactor of the Nation, and soon he would see the power of the Atom used for an even greater good, to provide the Revolution with the strongest possible deterrent against the threats from without. Of course, he would also need to care for the threats within China, after all you cannot ever hope to defeat a disease when sickly yourself, and he could already hear whispers, he could already see the signs, not all of the party was loyal or united as he hoped, and he would have to ensure that he alone would be the Great Helmsman of the Revolution.
Prime Minister Baron Takeichi Nishi took the office that day in December after at last the Pacifists lost their election. It was only natural, after the unfortunate death of High Commissioner Kuribayashi, the government was to blame over the lack of security, terrorist acts sharply increased and the police was overwhelmed, all while the Assembly blocked Katayama's attempt to appoint a new High Commissioner due to his supposed "Maoist Sympathies". Less than a week later, Japan, a nation which knew better than any other the effects of a Nuclear detonation, was shaken by the news of the Ultimatum, when the German Führer threatened to destroy Russia, perhaps even the world, with Nuclear fire. Even if no fires came down, that day was the death of Pacifism, because it showed that even if neutrality, Japan would never be safe if it did not defend itself.
Nishi came up rising seemingly out of nowhere in the head of the small "National Reconstruction Association" (Zenkoku Fukkou Kaiji or ZFK), a relatively small right-wing Party which grew sharply during the election and made a strong coalition with the National Liberal Party, where the larger NLP would hold the vast majority of the Ministries, however Nishi, thanks to his personal charisma and popularity, was granted the office of Prime Minister, as well as the ZFK being granted the right to appoint the new Police Commissioner. With the restrictions of the treaty lessened, the Police now included Naval and Air Forces, being renamed into the "Japanese Protection Force" (Inspired in part by the name of the Israeli IPF). All according to what they expected, the politicians could play their games, Akihito thought, but in the end it was the military who had the final word, that is how it was in the days of his Grandfather, the days of his Father, and now would be in his days.
But this time he would command the operation, let others see you as weak when you are strong and strong when you are weak as the Chinese said. They would be patient and tactical, await for the right opportunity to reclaim their nation. Perhaps the Empire was a fantasy, a distant dream, but the Sacred Home Islands have been outraged for far too long, and the enemy who occupied his country, the enemy which killed his father and his uncle, which caused so much suffering and misery to his people, that enemy would leave one way or the other. But for now, he would wait, wait and look for the opportunities of this new age.
Jews were the first victim, the main victim, the greatest enemy, and now they were gone. Nowhere within the Greater Germanic Reich or in Europe did Jews exist, for those who were too stubborn to flee were already taken, and those who still had legs and a working mind realized long ago how hopeless the situation was. Even if the emigration of Jews had been forbidden for almost 20 years, there were ways out of Europe before, but that was closed now. Portugal was the last country in Continental Europe with an existing Jewish community, and after the invasion, the last train to Auschwitz departed across Europe, and so within weeks the Jewish community in Portugal had either fled or died, either way Goebbels, and Nazism, won, Europe was now Judenfrei free of Jews.
The demolition team was led by the SS themselves, after all Eichmann, who was there in that fateful day in Wannsee, when the Death Camps were first approved, did not wish to leave more needless witness. The Minister of Propaganda wanted to give a form of plausible deniability as Germany was seeking a more "dynamic" approach to foreign relations compared to Hess' incessant Anglophilia or Hitler's unpredictability and untrustworthyness. Concentration camps would continue to exist of course, but they housed the "prisoners" in "humane" conditions as the Red Cross said, of course the camp they were set to visit was prepared beforehand with the more healthy-looking prisoners in other camps being transferred there, given abundant rations, good accomodations, a light workload and leisure. After the visit was over, they were all sent back to different camps. But Auschwitz? That was not a place one could disguise as humane.
The camp was torn down part by part, the wreckage still left would be taken away, the gas chamber blocks would be repurposed, the crematorium would be transferred somewhere else, perhaps to funeral services. Trees would be planted in the area, a way to mask that this land was ever used, that anything was ever built there, the railroad tracks were diverted away and now it was connected between urban centers, within years it would be as if nothing had ever happened if someone were to just look at it. The former guards of the SA and SS were retired, given plots of land in the east for their great services to the Reich, although some of them would sell the land and spend all the money in drugs and alcohol to drown the guilt of what they saw, while others felt no remorse and acted as perfect model citizens, fathering families with children who would never know what their parents did. The only thing they could never truly take from that place, the one thing that still remained of Auschwitz, was the smell.