Here's the rest of 1961:
1961 onwards—As part of a new program to further bind the member states of the Independence Movement together, the governments of the Ottoman Empire and the Empire of Brazil announce the establishment of a brand new program aimed at completely developing their allies.
Called the “Alliance for Peace and Friendship,” (although it will known by most as the "AfP" in the coming decades), the program’s stated goals are to fund new infrastructure, educational facilities, and agricultural projects among all of the member nations of the IM. Volunteers drawn from all over the two empires will be stationed for up to three years at a time, from Bharat to Bolivia, on these AfP-funded programs. It’s regarded as a showcase by many international observers as a showcase of the great economic prosperity that has emerged in both nations since the end of the Second Great War, a boom made possible as the continuing phenomenon of industrialization and reduction of trade barriers with their IM allies.
Although initially an Ottoman and Brazilian program, the AfP will expand in the coming decades to include volunteers and administrators from all of the IM’s nations.
Meanwhile, in the United States, growing numbers of young Southerners begin to enlist voluntarily in the military. Besides being one of the few well-paying employment opportunities available, many of these new enlistees consider it an act of rebelliousness against their parents’ generation to serve the U.S. in any way.
There’s a great degree of distrust on the part of most military leaders about this new influx of Southern recruits. Up until this point, Southerners had been exempt from the selective service, although officially volunteers were always accepted (a rare phenomenon before the beginning of the current decade). In spite of their fears, there is no major outbreak of anti-U.S. violence on the part of these new soldiers, and such reluctance will have vanished on the part of the government with the advent of the Fourth Pacific War, later in the decade.
July 1961—Riots continue to erupt in townships all over South Africa in the aftermath of the AN Massacre. Both the United States, as well as the Independence Movement increasingly aid the anti-Apartheid groups operating in the country. South African society becomes increasingly militarized in the coming years as a result of this pressure.
A German scientist, Dr. Michael Fleischer, publishes an article detailing the discovery of a new and horrific disease that he discovered while in the Congo. Little noticed at the time of its publishing, the article goes on to describe the side-effects of the virus, which seems to waste away the victim’s immune system. The disease will be known as Fleischer's Syndrome in the coming years throughout the world.
August 1961 onwards—The Russian government begins to make contingency plans to deal with the emergence of the Veteran’s Patriot Movement in the upcoming elections to the (mostly powerless) Duma. A far-right coalition, mostly of Second Great War veterans, the group is mostly known for their boisterous anti-Socialist, anti-German, and anti-American demonstrations. Unlike the case of the Freedom Party in the old CSA, the Movement is not led by a single charismatic figure, and is known for its frequent inter-party schisms.
The Russian government is in fact more fearful of a resurgence of the old Socialist and Communist parties, which have been long-forced underground by the Tsarist regimes. Recently, they have been publicly blamed for the latest round of strikes, which has sent shockwaves through Moscow.
August 4, 1961—Great Britain grants independence to both Northern and Southern Rhodesia, which subsequently vote to unite as one nation. The Free State of Rhodesia is under white-minority rule, which will cause it a great amount of pressure, both inwardly and from the outside world, especially from the United States and the Independence Movement.
August 15, 1961—The last U.S. soldiers leave Haiti.
August 20, 1961—The German and Austro-Hungarian Empires begin Project Zeus, a covert program to harness fusion power.
September 1, 1961—The Bahamas (including Bermuda), the Sandwich Islands (excluding the militarily-governed Big Island), and Jamaica are admitted into the Union as states.
September 29, 1961—In a ceremony at the White House, President Humphrey signs the Environmental and Wilderness Protection Act into law. The new bill dramatically increases the volume of land under Federal control, and establishes dozens of new national parks and national monuments, including several in the former Confederacy and Canada.
October, 1961—A new organization based on the Big Island, calling itself “Mormons of the Union” begins to lobby the U.S. government for permission to send out missionaries. In spite of this group's professed and earnest patriotism, these first requests fall on deaf ears. This situation will not change for another couple of decades, until the general relaxing of American society during the late 1970s and ‘80s.
December 31, 1961—With no small assistance from the O.S.S.’s Office of Special Investigations, agents from Cassius Madison’s Remembrance Center manage to capture their intended targets and extradite them to the United States. These two men have been wanted since the end of the Second Great War, and their subsequent trial will be the single biggest event of 1962…
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