TL-191: President Taft 1940

[Baldrick]

Let's say that instead of Al Smith, the Democrat Robert Taft gets in in 1940. His administration is faced with violence in Houston and a re-arming CSA. However, being a Democrat, he has the opposite solution to Smith: get tough on Featherston. There is no summit in Richmond, and thus no plebiscite in Kentucky, Houston, or Sequoyah. All of these regions remain part of the USA, and the garrisons of both Kentucky and Houston are beefed up (Sequoyah was fairly happy in the Union if I remember correctly). So, the question is: what happens now? With the Second Great War still breaking out, does Featherston remain neutral, or does he launch Operation Blackbeard from reduced start lines? Being a Democrat, will Taft have seen Blackbeard coming and bulked up the defences? Please leave your thoughts...

 

[bguy]

Let's say that instead of Al Smith, the Democrat Robert Taft gets in in 1940. His administration is faced with violence in Houston and a re-arming CSA. However, being a Democrat, he has the opposite solution to Smith: get tough on Featherston. There is no summit in Richmond, and thus no plebiscite in Kentucky, Houston, or Sequoyah. All of these regions remain part of the USA, and the garrisons of both Kentucky and Houston are beefed up (Sequoyah was fairly happy in the Union if I remember correctly).

It's mentioned in The Victorious Opposition that Sequoyah is actually more restive than Kentucky (the US only won the plebiscite in Sequoyah because it imported a lot of American settlers into the territory after the FGW. The Confederates citizens there still really, really hated the US occupation.)

So, the question is: what happens now? With the Second Great War still breaking out, does Featherston remain neutral, or does he launch Operation Blackbeard from reduced start lines? Being a Democrat, will Taft have seen Blackbeard coming and bulked up the defences? Please leave your thoughts...

Featherston being Featherston, he will certainly attack. Nor am I sure that Taft can do that much to beef up US defenses in the short time he will be in office before the war begins. (There is only so much you can do in six months to make up for two decades of underfunding.) Thus I expect the initial Confederate attack to be relatively successful. (The US will be at a disadvantage in the early battles as its military has been primarily trained and equipped to fight counter-insurgency warfare for the last 20 years while Featherston has been able to build an army designed specifically to fight a conventional war.) Still, the Confederates can only advance so far before outrunning their supply lines, so their offensive probably peters out at the Ohio River. Once the Confederate's initial advance has been halted, the US's greater population and industrial strength should begin to tell, so I would imagine 1942 sees the US retake Kentucky and occupy Tennessee. Richmond, Atlanta, and Dallas probably all fall early in 1943 after which Featherston is probably overthrown and the CSA sues for peace.