Why are Axis victory timelines popular in AH.com?

I was born in 1983. I remember Reagan, Thatcher and Gorbachev, but only vaguely, as images on TV. It wasn't until 2nd or 3rd grade in elementary school that I even began to be politically aware (the U.S. 1992 presidential election is the first one that I followed with interest; I was initially in favour of Bush "becuz he's da Prezdent!" before I switched over to Clinton). Therefore for me the Cold War is as abstract a concept as the 3rd Reich and World War II. By abstract I mean I don't have any personal memories or feelings of either event. Because of this I make my judgement purely based on what I've read and what I've watched from TV. I would lie if I said my Jewish background didn't also play a role in this.

The Soviet Union was an authoritarian regime, and under Stalin it was a totalitarian one. It was crumbling for decades and it deserved to fall. Still, I regard the 3rd Reich as much worse. Because of this, I really don't think that a world where the Cold War is butterflyed away is worth it if it meant the additional death and suffering of millions of people. For me, the shorter the war, the better. That's basically what Roosevelt and Churchill had to decide at the time when dealing with Stalin, and I for one think they made the right call.

Agreed, just trying to provide a different sort of answer to your question, one that maybe gets at the psychology of some of the people on the board born before 1983 that doesn't "totally" white wash the fascination in the process.

If you're fishing for anti-semetism, I very much hope you don't find it, and I think most people who have desires to examine better-performing 3rd Reichs do so in spite of the acceptable, modern ideals they hold. I was impressed with a post Blairwitch wrote in his recent Manstein/Rommel TLs that basically took time out to remind everyone what monsters he was playing with there.

I will say, reading Rommel's Barbarossa, it's quite interesting how many of the commentors are pushing for the Jews not to die, for the Nazis to decide to ship them off to Madagascar instead. And this with no encouragement from Blairwitch at all, they just keep hinting really hard that it would be nice if they could have their cake and not have the Jews die at the same time.
 

Thande

Donor
I will say, reading Rommel's Barbarossa, it's quite interesting how many of the commentors are pushing for the Jews not to die, for the Nazis to decide to ship them off to Madagascar instead. And this with no encouragement from Blairwitch at all, they just keep hinting really hard that it would be nice if they could have their cake and not have the Jews die at the same time.

Which is a bit daft if you ask me. No-one (except Susano) ever complains about all the millions of Germans who die if you have a Gustav Adolf-wank timeline. Or even about African genocides in 20th century TLs. It does raise Unfortunate Implications if the only people you care about are Holocaust victims because you happen to have seen photographs of them in school.
 
Which is a bit daft if you ask me. No-one (except Susano) ever complains about all the millions of Germans who die if you have a Gustav Adolf-wank timeline. Or even about African genocides in 20th century TLs. It does raise Unfortunate Implications if the only people you care about are Holocaust victims because you happen to have seen photographs of them in school.
The Jews really are the most notable of the Nazi's victims. Ask a man off the street "Who did the Nazi's kill?" and if he's got some (really any) historical knowledge, he'll say "The Jews." It takes a certain amount of study of the period, or a more developed awareness to know that Slavs, homosexuals, gypsies, communists, etc got to axe too. Well, politically-motivated groups will probably know if Hitler sent the Boys in Field-Grey after their fellows (ie, I'm betting lots of politically-active GBLT people know of the Nazi persecution of that group, compared to the average person), which is natural.

And, too, it might just be people going (since we're bringing TvTropes into this) Draco in Leather Pants on the Nazis. They want to have a cracking good timeline, but the Nazis are so far over the Moral Event Horizon that its simply not possible to root for them. A simple authoritarian Germany, out to contest the "Who Won the Great War" issue is easier to approve of, and still be able to look in the mirror.
 
And, too, it might just be people going (since we're bringing TvTropes into this) Draco in Leather Pants on the Nazis. They want to have a cracking good timeline, but the Nazis are so far over the Moral Event Horizon that its simply not possible to root for them. A simple authoritarian Germany, out to contest the "Who Won the Great War" issue is easier to approve of, and still be able to look in the mirror.
I know in my own writings, a lot of it has to do with this. The Nazis are wonderful villains, and as an AH writer, keeping them around for a while before giving them their justly deserved destruction makes a lot of sense. They provide that perfect moral contrast. Though whoever might be the protagonist may not be purest good, or even necessarily good at all, but no one doubts that the Nazis are blackest evil.
 
I know in my own writings, a lot of it has to do with this. The Nazis are wonderful villains, and as an AH writer, keeping them around for a while before giving them their justly deserved destruction makes a lot of sense. They provide that perfect moral contrast. Though whoever might be the protagonist may not be purest good, or even necessarily good at all, but no one doubts that the Nazis are blackest evil.

Yep. In Statichaos' Laughter & Tears, Roy Cohn is the bad guy until George Lincoln Rockwell comes onto the scene, and suddenly you're rooting for Cohn.
 

Cook

Banned
I know in my own writings, a lot of it has to do with this. The Nazis are wonderful villains, and as an AH writer, keeping them around for a while before giving them their justly deserved destruction makes a lot of sense. They provide that perfect moral contrast. Though whoever might be the protagonist may not be purest good, or even necessarily good at all, but no one doubts that the Nazis are blackest evil.

Why is it nobody wants to talk about all the good things Hitler did?

http://www.noshame.org/scripts/yancey050429.htm
:D
 

Thande

Donor
They want to have a cracking good timeline, but the Nazis are so far over the Moral Event Horizon that its simply not possible to root for them.
I would argue it is possible, you just need a sufficiently odious enemy. I generally found myself rooting for the Nazis when I read Worldwar for example (it helps that the German viewpoint character is sympathetic and not a committed Nazi of course) even though they still get up to wacky hijincks with the Jews when they can get away with it.
 
I would argue it is possible, you just need a sufficiently odious enemy. I generally found myself rooting for the Nazis when I read Worldwar for example (it helps that the German viewpoint character is sympathetic and not a committed Nazi of course) even though they still get up to wacky hijincks with the Jews when they can get away with it.
And I felt sorry for the poor bastards when they went up against the Draka. They never had a chance.

But those two examples, alien invasion and absurd slave empire-wank are fundamnetally unrealistic. If you want a non-ASB timeline, or one with a POD fairly close to the war itself, you can't really put the Nazis up against anyone dramatically worse. Sure, you can turn Stalin up to 11, but he was already an evil bastard to start with, so little gained there.

Its easier to simply make the Nazis less evil. Really, aside from the brutal genocide, they aren't really outstanding among the various conquering-empires of history in terms of monstrosity. People don't have really strong moral qualms about rooting for the British Empire or American expansion in timelines, and making the Nazis closer to them makes them more sympathetic.

Also, there's the fact that taking out the genocide and so forth makes them better candidates for victory, given the resources they wasted on persecuting and killing arbitrary ethnic and social groups. (This, of course, being seperate from the resources spent on battling communists and other regime enemies, which arguably was not wasted.) They lost potential soldiers and factory workers, as well as scientists, engineers, etc, and made themselves a pile of enemy resistors in occupied territories that could have been bought off with better treatment.

I think another factor in the Nazi-interest factor was that they were up against the only nation arguably as bad as they were at the time: the Soviet Union. Bringing down the Soviet Union makes for all kinds of fun TL changes, and the Nazis are, historically, in the right place, with the right weapons, men, and political determination to do the job.
 
My interest in a Nazi victory TL simply comes from the fact it generates an alternate Cold War. Rather then the USSR now the US is going to face the Third Reich. Part of is that it was quite possible that the Germans could have won the war or more likely forced their competitors out with separate peaces. I have no real wish for the Nazis to win, but I'm very interested in how everything plays out from there since I love to study the Cold War and its military and political aspects.

I do think that any TL should make clear the implications of such a victory. Make it clear that the Germans under Nazi leadership do kill millions and why. It makes the AH more important since it shows why the Nazis needed to be defeated in the first place (and give reason for them to be defeated in the ATL).
 
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