The Bade of 1776: A TL based off "The Grasshopper Lies Heavy"

Introduction
"I have not become the King's First Minister in order to preside over the liquidation of the British Empire."

– Winston Churchill, 1942.


Hello all! This is my first TL and it will be on the world of "The Grasshopper Lies Heavy". First, a little background, the book has it's origins in the novel "The Man in the High Castle", a double blind look of how a person in an axis dominated world would view an allied victory. To summarize the novel explained in the book, the UK wins in Europe singlehandly? The USA defeats the Japanese but never bothers in Europe? Britain annexes all of Europe? Then Britain turns into a racist empire? Then the British win over the USA?

This all may sound ASB but my take on this concept will be different in this TL. I will follow the general tropes in the novel, except for a few and make everything more realistic rather than a speculation by a random writer in an Axis dominated world. I will also base this TL on the world that Bruce made a while back. The way Bruce did his world in very believable and realistic, even though some elements are inevitably implausible. I will make my first post very soon and give me suggestions and stuff.
 
Prelude to War: 1933-1939
Chapter 1 Part 1 - Big Trouble in Little Miami

On November 11 in Miami, president-elect Franklin Delano Roosevelt was touring. Crowds teemed on the streets and cheered on their soon to be president. Many nationwide viewed FDR as a possible hope for healing America reeling from the Great Depression. After years of poverty and inept leadership, radicalism emerged in America. Fascists and communists threatened the free way of American life and many viewed that FDR represented as a middle ground. As the president just concluded a speech to the people in his car as it slowly drove trough the streets, a deluded anarchist under the name of Giuseppe Zangara runs up to FDR and shouts "Too many people are starving!" and fires gunshots at FDR. Due to his sporadic shooting, none his FDR but wounds Anton Cermark and others around him. Zangara was quickly apprehended by the crowd and officials went to aid FDR.

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A rare photo of FDR greeting a crowd in Miami moments before the assassination attempt, circa 1933

After the whole chaotic ordeal, FDR was unscathed from the assassination attempt but Mayor of Chicago, Anton Cermark, was wounded. FDR met the victims of the assassination attempt at the hospital, his standing partner, Anton Cermark received a single bullet wound in the chest but miraculously, he lived despite his life threatening wound he received. Many would say the bullet didn't damage nay vital organs, he was spared. As for the assassin, Giuseppe Zangara he was found guilty due to his assassination attempt and sentenced to 80 years in prison. He was known when he said this line when he was escorted from the courthouse, "Four times 20 is 80. Oh, judge, don't be stingy. Give me a hundred years.".

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Anton Cermark after being wounded during the assassination attempt, circa 1933

With FDR in the White House, he immediately began to persue his "New Deal" campaign to fix America's economy and to bring the USA out of the depression. The main thing was to reform the economy to prevent another depression from happening and go about on investing in public works, to rebuild infrastructure and to give jobless folks a job. The recovery was slow and took much needed time. FDR also wanted America to get involved in the world stage and fight the rising tides of fascism more but many remember the days of WW1 and how that little "expedition" amounted to nothing for the American people. Many felt America should not get involved in the world stage, as the Founding Fathers once warned. But when foreign aggression washed on the shores of America, the American people had no other choice...

[The POD is Anton Cermark not dying as a result of the bullet wound, I needed SOME change ya know]
 
Prelude to War: 1933-1939
Chapter 1 Part 2 - The Final Countdown to War

Roosevelt was massively successful in his "New Deal" policies he enacted. The US economy was rapidly recovering from the depression and rescued the optimism for the nation as a whole. Massive infrastructure projects sprouted up across the nation, dams were constructed to tame the great wild rivers and use them for hydroelectric power for the masses, grand new railroads were built to transports America's manufacturing goods, everything was in a boom. Many viewed the "New Deal" as technocratic, with many technocrats praising Roosevelt as a champion of technocracy. The New Deal not only affected America, it also inspired their former WW1 allies across the Atlantic Sea.

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A new highway overpass being built in rural California, circa 1936

In London, the British economy was struggling to get over it's WW1 trauma. For years, the British Empire grew in land size but the economy didn't and the times of prosperity of pre-1914 never seemed to return. British advisors visited the USA and were surprised how quickly the USA rebounded from the depression with the "New Deal" in action. Many advisors though the British needed a "New Deal" of their own so when they returned, they showed the government under Neville Chamberlain how to salvage the British economy with a British style "New Deal". Churchill, not yet in government, threw his support behind the act, saying "This act will not only fix the British economy once again, it will restore our glory!". In 1936, the Parliament passed the "Economic and Infrastructure Redevelopment Act" aka. the Churchill Plan because of Churchill involvement in the making of the act. Many technocrats across Britain were enlisted to join the government and old industrial areas in decay were rejuvenated again. The economic situation recovered at a fast pace, by 1939 before the outbreak of war, the British economy was doing as well as it was back in 1914 before WW1.

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A new modern residential district being built in Central London, circa 1938

Bad news also emerged from Europe, in which Nazi Germany continued to expand it's evil reign. The British primarily focused on rebuilding industrial might and economic recovery rather than European affairs. In 1936, the Germans re-militarized the Rhineland. In 1938, the Germans marched into Austria and annexed it. Finally in 1938, the Czechoslovak Crisis broke out in which the Germans demanded the Sudetenland. Under the policy of appeasement, the British and the French allowed the Germans to take the Sudetenland and to end their expansion. The Munich Conference brought the false notion of peace to Europe, as Hitler planned to expand further and exploit the weakness of the French and British. In 1939, Germans troops marched into the remains of Czechoslovakia and carved it up into pro-German client states of Bohemia and Moravia and Slovakia. Churchill called on the Parliament to expand the Churchill Plan to prepare for the inevitable war in 1938 but Chamberlain rejected, claiming that mobilization is a obvious suicide towards another war.

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Germans troops march in Prague after the invasion, circa 1939

Meanwhile in the British Raj, Indian independence champion, Mahatma Gandhi, continued to perform peaceful protests against the British colonial government. The so called "Half naked Indian fakir" as Churchill named him was becoming an increasing problem for the British in India, as many Indians sympathized with Gandhi's anti-British cause. In 1938, as Gandhi was walking in Calcutta in the darkness of the night, he contacted a unknown man in the darkness of an alleyway. He quickly pulled out a machine gun and shot down Gandhi, killing him immediately. The death of Gandhi angered the population of India as many nationalists blamed that the murder was set up by MI6 agents but the British government claimed that it was a radical Hindu nationalists who was responsible for the murder of Gandhi. The Gandhi Dilemma is still unresolved to this day, with the British government refusing to leak any evidence.

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Mourners of Gandhi at his funeral, circa 1938
 
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The World at War: 1939-1945
Chapter 2 Part 1 - Here we go!

The so called "20 Year Armistice" at Versailles was quickly unraveling. Hitler exploited the fledgling League of Nation and continued to expand. Britain was too busy fixing their economic situation and France was too meek to sacrifice another war on the scale of WW1 again. The Western powers allowed the Nazis to take over Austria and the Sudetenland due to many feeling that Germany was treated to harshly at Versailles. In the months to war, Hitler then was able to force Lithuania to cede the Memeland to Germany. Then Hitler demanded that Danzig be returned to the German Reich and sent an ultimatum to Poland. The Polish refused, knowing it was another futile Nazi attempt top steal land from the Polish nation. Nazi Germany declared war on Poland on September 1, 1939 and Germans troops crossed the border. The British and the French could no longer tolerate Nazi expansionism and they too stood behind Poland and declared war on the German Reich. The Second World War began in Europe.

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German troops tear down Polish-German border gate, circa 1939

The Soviets then jointly invaded Poland after signing a non-aggression pact with them. Soviet divisions crossed into Eastern Poland. With the Germans tactic of "Blitzkrieg", the Polish army was defeated swiftly and the nation was partitioned between the Soviets and the Nazis. The Soviets then forced the Baltic States to sign "cooperation" agreement with the Soviets and allow the Red Army to station in their countries. The Soviets then declared war on Finland as an attempt to build up land defense to protect Leningrad from a possible German attack while in truth, was to drag Finland back into the Russian jackboot like in the Tsar's days. Meanwhile, in the West, there was no action between the Germans and the Western Allies. This time period from 1939-1940 was nicknamed the "Phony War".

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British expeditionary forces in leisure at a battlefield post, circa 1939

When 1940 came along, the Germans were no longer willing to sit and took action. In April of 1940, German troops Blitzed trough Denmark and Norway. The British sent a division and naval squadron to protect the Norwegian from falling to the Germans. Despite helping the Norwegians very much, most of Norway fell under the Nazi jackboot. Neville Chamberlain became very unpopular within the House of Commons due to his humiliation with Germany in 1938 and his reluctance to fight German aggression against Norway and Denmark. In May 10, he resigned as prime minister and Winston Churchill took over power. Churchill took power just as the Germans invaded the Lowland countries and penetrated into France itself. The Maginot Line defense crafted by France failed and the Germans stormed into Paris while the British expeditionary forces fled from Dunkirk.

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British troops wait for ships to pick them up from Dunkirk, circa 1940

In France, the Germans routed the French army and poured into French territory. By a few months time, the entirety of North France was overran. Within the French government, there was a drift between the pro-armistice Petain and the anti-armistice Charles De Gaulle. With proclaiming that France will never bow to the Germans, he gained popularity and became the next leader of France while Petain was expelled and mutinied to the Germans. The French government fell under the control of Charles De Gaulle and also effectively split between the pro-armistice faction and the anti-armistice faction. Charles De Gaulle fled to Algeria with the loyal French navy in July of 1940 and refused to surrender to the Germans. Petain collaborated with Hitler but faced a more punitive treaty, with Italy annexing all French land to Rhone River and Germany taking a large slice of land in the North. Hitler set up RK Burgundy out of Belgium and occupied French territory and carved out a puppet state of Brittany.

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Battalions of Free French troops land in Algeria after the fall of France, circa 1940

Meanwhile in Finland, the Winter War ended with the Soviets gaining some territory from the Finns but at a costly amount of causalities. The Soviets also forcefully annexed the Baltic States of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania into the Soviet Union and integrated them as new SSRs. The Germans then turned their attention to Africa and the Balkans. Mussolini's failed invasion of Greece dragged the Germans into their Balkan campaign, delaying Hitler's plan for an invasion of the Soviet Union. The war in Europe was only picking up though, things were about to get bigger when the honeymoon between Stalin and Hitler ended.

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World War Two in Europe as of 1940 after the Fall of France and the start of the German Balkan Campaign
 
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Please man, make the Franco-British union a real thing, is the only way for the Brits counter the US.

As much as that would be cool, the French under Charles De Gaulle are too patriotic to allow the union to be enacted. The old rivarlies between the French and the British are still ingrained unfortunately.
 
As much as that would be cool, the French under Charles De Gaulle are too patriotic to allow the union to be enacted. The old rivarlies between the French and the British are still ingrained unfortunately.
Kill De Gaulle, without France there's no way Britain could have stand up to a post-WW2 America. Maybe if they had stayed out of the two wars, but thats not the premise of the whole timeline. They are pretty much exausted has an empire by this point.
 
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Kill De Gaulle, without France there's no way Britain could have stand up to a post-WW2 America. Maybe if they had stayed out of the two wars, but thats not the premise of the whole timeline. They are pretty much exausted has an empire by this point.

Later in the TL the British and the French don’t unite in a Union but are very close economically and politically, think like the UK-US “Special Relationship”. The British also later manage to rebuild and create a European Union to stand up to America to protect their imperial possessions in part due to a less hard fought WW2.
 
Looking forward to see what you will do to the soviets to make them less powerful than the British post-war, if they survive the war at all.
 
The World at War: 1939-1945
Chapter 2 Part 2 - Under the Jackboot

Meanwhile in Britain, Churchill ordered to expand the Churchill Plan into the newly built British industry and the entire empire as a whole to mobilize all of British society for the war. He transformed the British economy into a fully fledged war economy to face the modern German one. Quotas were high in the factories but propaganda encouraged to produce for king and country. The British maximized production to all level high to produce military equipment to fight off the Nazi war machine. Another smart mind working for the British cause was brilliant pioneer computer scientist Alan Turing. He was quickly welcomed by technocrats and he was a major figure in a crew of code breakers to break the infamous Enigma Code the Germans used. Both scientists and workers untied against the Nazi menace and Churchill was confident that despite the odds the British face, victory is possible.

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The code breaker "Bombe" computer which broke the Enigma Code, circa 1941

By this point in time, the German war machine seemed unstoppable. Yugoslavia was steamrolled by the Axis powers and mutilated and partitioned among them. The Greeks on the other hand lost control of the mainland but retreated to Crete. Churchill saw this as his chance to prove the new worthy might of the British military and to finally blunder the Germans. A Royal Navy squadron headed to Crete in April 1941 with thousands of empire troops and a few Free French divisions. The Germans landed one of the first ever paratrooper invasions into Crete. Unfortunately for the Germans, stiff local resistance and the combined forces of the British and the French ultimately picked off the paratroopers and the entire operation ended in a disaster for the Nazis. Hitler was upset but decided to scrap future invasion plans for Crete and to focus his troops for the war against the Soviet Union. the victory greatly boosted morale in Britain, with the Crete operation being the first success of the British during WW2.

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German paratroopers land in a field in Crete, circa 1941

In Africa, the Italians continued to blunder. They did manage to take over French and British Somaliland but they were only futile expeditions. The British launched a full scale invasion of Italian East Africa in January of 1941 and quickly advanced. The Italians were very weak and lead by incompetent generals and had a general lack of resources due to Axis shipping being blocked by the British controlled Suez Canal. By late 1941, Italian East Africa was conquered by the British and the newly proclaimed “Jewel of the Italian Empire” was no more. Italian East Africa was divided into occupation zones administers by the British. Deposed Emperor, Haile Selassie was invited back to Ethiopia to be restored as emperor. In January of 1945, Haile Selassie was restored as emperor of Ethiopia again.

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A British armored vehicle takes down a Fascist Italy monument after the Fall of East Africa, circa 1941

In Italian Libya, things looked even bleaker for the Italian army. Even with German backup to defend, the Axis couldn’t hold their lines when facing the Anglo-French onslaught from Tunisia and Egypt. With the success of the British in Italian East Africa, Libya was conquered relatively smoothly by Anglo-French forces. The axis lost humiliatingly and lost thousands of troops in an encirclement at Tripoli in mid 1941. The loss of the Italian colonies to Anglo-French forces made Mussolini’s reputation back in mainland Italy decline. Many in Italy’s government felt that Mussolini was a inept leader and a Nazi dupe. Many were secretly discussing how Italy was in need of new leadership and was totally unprepared for the war.

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British tanks in the Libyan Desert as they mach on Tripoli, circa 1941

In mid-1941, the turning point in the war occurred. For months, Hitler was planning to invade the Soviet Union ever since he wrote Mein Kampf in the 1920s. He though all land to the Urals was rightfully German and occupied by “Asiatic Judaeo-Bolsheviks”. Hitler launched a surprise attack at the Soviet Union in June of 1941. Stalin was shocked that how Hitler stabbed him in the back so quick, he thought that after the 10 years expired as the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact stated, that war was inevitable. The Germans annihilated the unaltered Red Army, the Baltics and the Ukraine fell within months and to make things worse, Finland joined the Nazis to regain lost territory from the Winter War.

The Northern German army was heading towards Moscow but Hitler was unsure of a march to Moscow at first but the thought of capturing the heart of communist appealed to Hitler so he approved. German united marched towards Moscow and surrounded the city and barraged it with artillery. Stalin refused to leave and remained in the Kremlin, where he died from an artillery shell hit the Kremlin. Despite the heavy resistance the Germans faced in Moscow, the capital fell to the Germans in late 1941. To make things worse, Leningrad fell to the Germans around the same time.

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Barricades in the streets of Moscow during the Battle of Moscow, circa 1941

The Soviets after the death of Stalin turned their leadership in a emergency government led troika and moved their capital to Yekaterinburg. The Soviets joined the British cause to hold back the German advance. The Red Army was devastated and was in near collapse and the Soviet needed urgent support. Churchill accepted the Soviets into the allies, doing anything do fight back the Nazi advance. The British began to send supplies to the Soviets and even send divisions to fight in Moscow to defend it from the Germans The situation in Leningrad was much more grim, with all sides of the city surrounded by the Finns and the Nazis, cut off from Soviet and British support. While the war in Europe was expanding, a new front would open up in Asia...

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World War Two in Europe in mid-1941
 
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The World at War: 1939-1945
Chapter 2 Part 3 - The Rising Sun

While the war just began in Europe, in Asia it already started. In 1931, the Japanese invaded the Manchurian region of China and spun it off as a puppet state ran by deposed emperor of China, PuYi. The Japanese then launched a full scale invasion of all of China in 1937. The Japanese managed to conquer Northern China and the coastal regions but the struggled to conquer the nationalists inside inner China. The Japanese were denounced for their invasion and war crimes they committed in China. The Japanese signed an alliance with Germany and Italy in 1936, forming the Axis. When the 1940s came along, many in the military of Japan planned to expand greatly into Asia and create the empire they desired to acquire since WW1.

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Chinese civilians flee Imperial Japanese troops, circa 1938

In late 1940 after the fall of France, the Japanese and their Thai allies invaded Indochina with a surprise attack. The French didn't have time to respond to Japan for this so they let them off for now. The Indochinese people though of the Japanese as liberators after experienced decades of French colonialism but the Japanese merely replaced the French. Indochina was rebranded "Japanese Indochina" and exploited the people as bad as the French did. The Vietnamese rebelled and two rival groups emerged, the VNDQQ, a pro-KMT Vietnamese rebellion army and the Viet Mihn, a communist partisan group. Also with the conquest of Indochina, the Japanese were able to launch a new front in the Second-Sino Japanese War. Japan's conquest of Indochina frustrated many Asian nationalists, with many viewing the Japanese near or even worse to the Western colonizers.

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A Viet Mihn guerrilla army, circa 1940

In the USA, president Franklin D. Roosevelt after running two terms officially decided not to run for election in 1940 to respect the two term limit and placed Rexford Tugwell as democratic nominee for the election. Due to the democrats being viewed positively throughout the USA due to FDR's "New Deal" and it's success, the democrats led by Rexford Tugwell won the election of 1940 against republican Wendell Willkie.

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A portrait of American president Rexford Tugwell, circa 1940

The Japanese officially decided to achieve their imperial ambitions and take on their rival, the United States. In 1941, the Japanese declared war on the USA and the UK and invaded the Philippines and British Malaya. Rexford Tugwell recently withdrew the Pacific Fleet from Pearl Harbor to Panama which were spared the Japanese raid on the Hawaii oil tanks. The "Battle of Hawaii" resulted in the US losing a majority of their oil supplies in the Pacific and nearly 2,000 died to the raging inferno that tore trough the Pearl Harbor base from the oil tank explosion. The American people were outraged as this blatant act of Japanese imperialism and in late 1941, the United States declared war on Japan. Hitler didn't declare war on the US yet, fearing that the US would funnel supplies to the UK and the USSR and scramble his war campaign in Europe. Mobilization and recuperation was delayed due to their loss of oil in Hawaii and the US still inexperienced from going to war.

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An oil tank explodes in Pearl Harbor after the Japanese raid, circa 1941

The Japanese went on the offensive in Southeast Asia, the Philippines continued to resist the Japanese invasion led by American troops, with Japanese troops eventually overwhelming them in May 1942. The Japanese also landed troops in Borneo and attack the Dutch East Indies. In mid-1942, the Dutch East Indies fell to the Japanese. From Thailand, the Japanese invaded Burma but after too much overstretching their forces in Indochina and the East Indies, the offensive in Burma wasn't a total success and a British counteroffensive halted the Japanese at the Irrawaddy river, saving the British Raj from Japanese invasion. In Malaya, the Japanese overran the entire British colony and laid siege to Singapore.

Unfortunately for the Japanese, the Singapore army was led by by "Mad" General John Shmittins. John used to be an advisor for the Japanese back in the 1920s and knew that the Japanese ere the toughest fighters and how surrender was the worst thing a solider could do. When the Japanese surrounded Singapore, he aroused his troops and despite the little resources they had. He and the Japanese engaged in house to house combat in Singapore throughout 1942, the Japanese were shocked at the Generals constant refusal to surrender. In late 1942, General John and his remained army withdrew from Singapore and continued to resist in the jungles of Malaya, gaining support of the local Malayans.

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Japanese troops lay siege to Singapore from a hill, circa 1942

By 1942, the Japanese reached their territorial height in Asia. Stretching from the East Indies to Manchuria, the Japanese amassed a huge empire in such little time. Things after 1942 would only go bad for the Japanese in Asia. The Americans established new oil tanks in San Diego and used their untouched navy against the Imperial Japanese Navy. The industrial production the American had overwhelmed the Japanese industry and after Japanese defeats in face of the American in 1942, the Imperial Japanese Navy would decline while the American navy grew in power. The Battle of Hawaii ended in a decisive American victory and they would continue their island hopping campaign in Micronesia and eventually to the Japanese home islands...

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The Pacific Theatre in 1942 after the Fall of Singapore
 
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The World at War: 1939-1945
Chapter 2 Part 4 - The Turning the Tide

In Europe, Nazi Germany continued to reign uncontested in mainland Europe but at this point, problems started to challenge their dominance. The British navy defeated the Italians in Africa and their navy, securing British dominance in the Mediterranean Sea and slashing the dreams for Mussolini's colonial empire. Mussolini 's popularity plummeted among Italians after the humiliations in Africa and the naval battles with the British army and the German domination over Italy and their influence over Mussolini. Beginning in 1942, many high ranking Italians and the Italian monarch himself, Victor Emmanuel III, were plotting to rid of Mussolini and end Italy's participation in the Axis, but another huge mistake will strike the Axis.

American had not yet intervened in the war in Europe yet. Hitler also didn't declare war on America yet because he didn't want to scramble his chances to defeat the British. The Americans on the other hand have been supplying the British with supplies and food and this was irritating the Germans due to the resources helping the British to carry on the war effort. Beginning in 1940, the Germans engaged in unrestricted submarine warfare, with u-boats patrolling the North Sea and the North Atlantic for merchant ships of all kind. In 1941, American vessels were targeted by German u-boats and thousand of Americans lost their lives when Germans cruelly torpedoed both passenger and merchant fleets. The Germans then sank an American naval ship in early 1942 and Rexford Tugwell could not tolerate this German aggression. The USA declared war on the Germans. Hitler scoffed, he thought the Americans were "mixed race" people and know nothing about battle like the German people did, but for Britain, Churchill knew from then on, the Germans were condemned to be defeated.

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Rexford Tugwell announces the declaration of war against Germany and their allies, circa 1942

The Americans landed troops in Free France, already staffed by British troops. The British and the Americans planned to knock Italy out of the war and to secure a foothold onto mainland Europe. The Americans agreed but also recommended a mainland invasion of France from Normandy but Churchill though of that war plan as ridiculous, thinking that the Germans would mow down the troops with their superior Luftwaffe due to France's proximity to Germany. In mid 1942, the allies launched a campaign in Sardinia, Corsica, and Sicily against Italy and Vichy France. The Italians, weak in morale, failed to prevent allies landing in Sicily and Sardinia. Corsica also fell swiftly to the allies. The anti-Axis sector in the Italian government was growing stronger, and began to collude with the allies to overthrow Mussolini. As a result of the Vichy failure to defend Corsica from the allies, the Germans destlaibhsed the Vichy regime and placed the entiryt of France under German occupation. This caused many forme German collaberators of France to join the Free French, increading their army and making them more powerful.

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A pro-allied Italian propaganda poster depicting the allied victory in Sicily, circa 1942

While the allies were on the offensive, the Soviets were on the defensive. The Germans, with Moscow in their hands, could no longer go on the offensive in Northern Russia, with supply lines being stretched thing and partisan resistance being very intense. Hitler proposed a full on offensive into the Southern Caucasus to seize the Baku oil and to finally being the death knell to the Soviet Union. In this operation nicknamed "Case Blue", the weak Soviet presence in the Caucasus proved easy for the Germans to face and Southern Russia quickly fell under German occupation in 1942. The British were fearful of the German getting hold of the oil at Baku so sent troops into the Caucasus to halt the German offensive. In Stalingrad, Red Army remnant troops fanatically defended onto Stalingrad as the Germans laid siege to it. With British reinforcements arriving at the scene, the Germans were prevented from taking all of the Caucasus. The Battle of Stalingrad began.

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A famous photo of Berlameï Fountain in the ruin of Stalingrad, circa 1942

The British not only supplied Stalingrad with troops, they also pledged divisions to fight in Northern Russia to free Moscow from the Germans. The British and the Turks made an agreement, the Turks would allow British troops to enter Turkey and would commit minor troops to help in the war in exchange for British protection of Turkish cities form German bombardment. With Turkey in the allies camp, the British secured a foothold in the Middle East which allowed them to funnel supplies to the Soviets in their struggle against the Germans with the Bosporhous Straits secure unlike what happened back in WW1. The Germans did to minor raids on Istanbul but never really bothered with Turkey, sparing them.

The British assigned their very own generals to lead the Red Army and to train the remnant Red Army and new division from Siberia. The British armed them with modern weaponry and the newest military tactics. The British also armed partisans groups fighting in Russia, heroic British pilots would drop off food and ammunition to the partisan groups to help sabotage the German lines. British spies were sent to the partisans to leak them information on the German's supplies. The Red Army combined with the efforts of the British managed to end the German advance in the Soviet Union and eventually, advance on the Germans. The Battle of Stalingrad eventually tuned into a stalemate, but eventually, the allies would emerge victorious over the German invaders.

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A Soviet guerilla groups equipped with British armed weapons, circa 1942

By this point, the Germans were on the retreat from now on. For the Soviets, the war would not be easily won with British troops. When they went to liberate Moscow, the Germans resisted and the Red Army only with the support of the British was that possible. Thousands of lives perished in the Second Battle of Moscow and simply driving the Germans was a bloody slog for the Red Army to do. After the Germans retreated, Moscow was looted and destroyed by the German army. The British supporting the entire Soviet war effort in WW2 heavily stained the public perception of the communist party, with many viewing them as weak and unreliable. The British entry into the Soviet Union also spread ideals of the West and how the quality of life is much better there, destroying Soviet exceptionalism propagated by the communist party. By this point, the Soviet Union's future seemed bleak after the war with the Germans finally concluded.

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Europe 1942 after the German Operation Case Blue and the Allied Sicily Offensive
 
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The World at War: 1939-1945
Chapter 2 Part 5 - The Wrath of the Eagle

The war in Asia went well for the Japanese from 1941-1942. The Japanese amassed a large empire within two years, but they would enjoy that for only so soon. In Early 1942, the Battle of Hawaii was raging between the Japanese and the Americans. The Japanese did bombing raids against cities and naval ports a to weaken Hawaii's defense forts for a Japanese invasion. The primary way to land Japanese troops in Hawaii was to defeat the American navy and assume naval dominance. However, due to the American Pacific Fleet being stationed in Panama, the odds were against the IJN. The Pacific Fleet arrived to the Battle of Hawaii and got in it's first fight with the IJN. The Pacific Fleet defeated the IJN in Hawaii and denied IJN naval dominance. In late 1942, the Battle of Hawaii decisively concluded in an American victory.

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The USS Arizona suffers damage from a torpedo attack in the Battle of Hawaii, circa 1942

This loss destroyed the Japanese ambitions at dominance in the Pacific. The IJN had to do a tactical retreat from Hawaii and Midway and hold down in the Marshall Islands. In other parts of the Pacific, the Japanese were slowly being rolled back. In Papua New Guinea, the Australians had been holding their line since 1942 and did a counterattack, taking back land lost to the Japanese. The Americans also were victorious at the Battle of Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands against the IJN in 1943. The Americans were also victorious in Tarawa in Micronesia and landed troops in New Britain 1943 too.

The US strategy in the Pacific was to do a "Island Hopping Strategy" in which American forces would capture islands in Micronesia all the way to the Philippines sand ultimately to the Japanese home islands. Taking the islands from the Japanese was no easy task, with many Japanese soldiers believing in the "Bushido" warrior spirit in which one would fight to the death. Many Japanese would do suicide attack against allied soldiers and in 1943, start doing Kamikaze suicide attack with their airplanes against allied ships. In Alaska, the Japanese were expelled from Attu and Kiska Island after their brief occupation. In Burma, the British launched a minor offensivce in Southern Burma.

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American troops in the jungles of Papua new Guinea during the Battle of Guadalcanal, circa 1943

The Japanese began to fear that the locals would rise up as a response to the allied offensive and their promise for liberation. In 1943, after the last of the American resistance was cleaned up, the Japanese negotiated with the exiled First Philippines Republic government who were in exile since 1900 ever since the American occupation. The Japanese promised that they would be free again under a Filipino led government but under the Japanese sphere of influence. The Filipinos agreed and set up the Second Philippine Republic in 1943. The president was to be Jose P. Laurel.

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Jose P. Laurel, the president of the Second Philippine Republic from 1943-1945

In America, industrial production by this point was in full swing. The Japanese simply could not catch up to American production and fell behind in nearly every sector. with the surplus of resources, the Americans had plenty of airplanes to spare and were able to bomb the Japanese home islands. In 1942, the American launched the Doolittle raid on Tokyo, with success. By 1943, American bombers could reach the Japanese home islands and decimate Japanese industry and cities. The war also spurred up America's economy to new heights. Even though the American economy was rebuilt by the new Deal by FDR, the world war helped bring back growth and helped wipe away the last vestiges of the Great Depression.

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A factory in Detroit mass producing tanks for the war effort, circa 1943

The Americans were also assigning American generals to help the Chinese fight the Japanese invasion. The war in the Far East was going in the likes of the allies and the Japanese were oblivious to this, still believing that victory is in their hands.

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