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dannyboy2016

Lt. General
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Nov 22, 2002
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"At what point shall we expect the approach of danger? By what means shall we fortify against it? Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant, to step the Ocean, and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest; with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a thousand years. At what point, then, is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide."

The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume I, "Address Before the Young Men's Lyceum,of Springfield, Illinois January 27, 1838, p. 109.


asiastart.jpg
 
USHeartland.jpg

The United States in 1938

Unfortunately, Tukachevsky's victory over Poland was just the beginning The Red Army, emboldened by its success, drove into Germany and Hungary. The garrison forces that Versailles allowed the former Central powers were not enough to stop the Bolshevik army. Only intervention by the allied powers could possibly save Europe from Bolshevism.

That help was not to come. The leadership of Britain and France was impotent in the face of Soviet power. They had little desire to save their former German enemies and even less desire to fight the Russians again after their disastrous intervention in the Russia civil war. Having lost their chance to fight Leninism in Germany, they could only hope that it was not their fate to fight it in France and England.

While the remaining capitalist Europeans prayed for peace, the Soviets issued the call for a “holy war against imperialism.” Sultan Galiyev, the highest ranking Muslim in the Soviet Government, urged the Soviet Government to turn its attention to the vast colonies of Europe in Africa, the middle east, and Asia. According to Galiyev, the Soviets would find millions of willing volunteers in the oppressed colonies. The Soviet leadership, eager to exploit the opportunity, stepped up propaganda and espionage campaigns in the western colonies and began preparations for the invasion of Turkey and Iran.

The Soviet Union backed by European industrial power and the numbers of the colonial world would overrun the entirety of the old world within a decade. With the conquest of the old world complete, the Soviets focused their attention on conquering the New World. The Americas, weakened by the depression and the loss of access to European and Asian markets, seemed like easy pickings for the Soviets.

northamericastart.jpg

The Americas in 1938

The United States were in disunity. The depression opened deep wounds. Radicals of the far right and far left seized power in much of the country and declared independence. The authority of Congress and the Presidency was, for a time, limited to the area immediately around the Federal capitol. The United States leadership would have to act if a single nation of free men was to remain on this earth.

-A Short History of the Second World War James L. Stokesbury
 
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Edzako, the manpower represents American refugees from the rest of the USA. Since my enemy gets 12 manpower a day (USSR has cores on all of the “Old World”) I figure that 1000 mp isn't too big a deal. Additionally, I am using the resource events from compendium mod so any new nations I create will have some more resources than they would normally have. This will mostly benefit the USSR, however. Furthermore, the USA is worth around 600 IC altogether This way I'll have a nasty fight on my hands to restore America but will have a little more IC to help deal with the USSR.
 

"Yes, we were dreamers when we advocated legislation for unemployment insurance, for social security, for minimum wages. They laughed at our crazy ideas. Although we have not reached perfection, many of our 'wild dreams' have now become realities of everyday life."

-David Dubinsky


One of the strangest alliances to come out of this period was the relationship between the so called Mid Atlantic Republic and the Soviet Union. The leadership of the Mid Atlantic Republic were reactionaries in the eyes of the Kremlin and the Trade Unionists who ran the Mid Atlantic Republic viewed the Kremlin as betrayers of the workers. Kremlin archives even reveal that Soviet agents attempted to assassinate Trade Unionist leaders in the republic on numerous occasions.

The Soviets had hoped to place their allies in the CPUSA in charge of the Republic. But a premature coup attempt ended with the arrest and eventual execution of much of the CPUSA's leadership. Left without any options, Stalin found himself obliged to come to arrangements with the unionists if he wanted any sort of foothold in the Americas.

MidAtlanticRepublic.jpg

The Government of the Mid Atlantic Republic in 1938


President David Dubinsky was initially less than eager to work with the Soviets. The horror stories he heard of the treatment of Trade Unionists in Russia made him unsympathetic to the Kremlin. Yet Dubinsky had few options left if he wanted to keep his country independent in the from the likes of Ford or Roosevelt. Stalin and Dubinsky would bury the hatchet after a secret meeting between Molotov and Jay Lovestone in London. The Soviets would support Dubinsky's right to rule the Mid Atlantic Republic in exchange for Dubinsky's adherence to the Comintern's line in all foreign policy issues.

Dubinsky's deal with the devil was forged to protect the Mid Atlantic Republic. Instead it would plunge the young republic into a massive war.

-David Dubinsky a Life with Labor A. H. RASKIN
 
danielshannon said:
"At what point shall we expect the approach of danger? By what means shall we fortify against it? Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant, to step the Ocean, and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest; with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a thousand years. At what point, then, is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide."

Jeez, he was an optimist! :D

This AAR looks very promising. Beating USSR in normal game is tough, but beating it when it controls... what, the whole Eurasia? And you start with three provinces... Good luck! :)
 
Winner said:
Jeez, he was an optimist! :D

This AAR looks very promising. Beating USSR in normal game is tough, but beating it when it controls... what, the whole Eurasia? And you start with three provinces... Good luck! :)

More like punishing :D but I agree, it indeed looks great, I hope he will keep up like this.
 
I adore alt-history AARs, and, as you may be able to tell from my sig, I'm a massive fan of tiny, weak countries versus what seems to be nigh on the entire world.

I'll definitely be watching this.
 
this looks like it will be quite an ambitious game, I'll be watching it! :D
 
“This Black Belt region is the heartland of the American Negro. Here he has lived from generation to generation. It was upon its Atlantic Seaboard that his forefathers landed in Jamestown, Virginia, over 300 years ago. As a chattel slave, the black man followed the trek of King Cotton and the plantation across the face of the South. He planted and raised the South's chief cash crops, tobacco and cotton. His unrequited labor as a slave formed an essential part of the primary accumulation of wealth upon which the towering edifice of American industrial civilization was founded. Yet, sixty-five years after "emancipation" he is still denied his share. He remains a disinherited pauper, a social leper in his own homeland, groaning under the burden of absentee rulers and their regional henchmen, forced to obey laws which he has had no part in making. “
-Negro Liberation Harry Haywood

In all of the Americas Stalin could find no closer friend than Harry Haywood. Haywood's political work in the USSR, where he correctly campaigned against the left and right opposition to comrade Stalin's proper leadership, saved his life. Haywood was in Turkmenistan when much of the CPUSA leadership was round up and executed by the Government of the Mid Atlantic Republic.

The leadership of the CPUSA had long disagreed with Haywood's thesis that Blacks in America were a distinct nation who deserved their own territory. Haywood argued that Blacks fulfilled all of the criteria set down by Comrade Stalin in his Marxism and the National Question: a historically constituted, stable community of people, formed on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life, and common culture.

Black_belt_nation.gif

The Black Belt of the US South

With financial assistance from the USSR, Haywood returned to the United States and threw himself into propaganda work. Haywood and his allies in the Black Brotherhood planned to promote nationalist sentiment amongst the poor sharecropper mass of Black Belt Negroes. News of the Red Army's victories in Africa and Asia helped almost as much as the USSR's generous financial assistance.

Ironically, it was the actions of Southern Whites that made Haywood's Black nationalist dream come true. The reconstituted Ku Klux Klan's reign of terror in the months prior to the reconstitution of the Confederacy sent millions of Blacks fleeing southward into the Black belt. Haywood's comrades were able to organize and arm the refugees. Soon he had an army and with that army he waged a bloody civil war against Southern whites.

NewAfrika.jpg

The Government of New Afrika in 1938

Eventually, the CSA and the newly proclaimed Republic of New Afrika signed an uneasy armistice. This armistice did not improve New Afrika's position much. True, New Afrika had gained some territory, but the New Republic was surrounded by enemies. Texas, Florida, and the Confederacy were all openly hostile to New Afrika. Haywood didn't expect the peace to last long.

The destruction caused by the fighting put Haywood in an awkward situation. Though a staunch nationalist he knew he'd need allies if his country was to survive. Eventually the Party would build sufficient industries to provide for all of New Afrika's defensive needs, but until then New Afrika would be in desperate need of friends. The decision was made easily enough, New Afrika would align itself with the Soviet Union in exchange for assistance.

But whether the Soviet Union could protect New Afrika from a resurgent United States was a question that undoubtedly kept the New Afrikan premier awake at night.

-Hammer and Hoe: The Republic of New Afrika During the Depression and the War Robin D. G. Kelly
 
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this even tops Rich-love in the impossibility of it all! :eek:

good luck! this looks awesome.
 
Wow, quite a challenge you have here! I wish you the best of luck.
 
Very interesting stuff indeed. The set up is good reading.
 
"No more fatuous chimera has ever infested the brain than that you can control opinions by law or direct belief by statute, and no more pernicious sentiment ever tormented the heart than the barbarous desire to do so. The field of inquiry should remain open, and the right of debate must be regarded as a sacred right."

-William E. Borah

The Governors were in agreement and on the 20th of July they declared their independence from Washington. In the bitterly contested election in August William Edgar Borah, the Lion of Idaho, beat popular Colorado Governor by 200, 000 votes. Borah's experience in Washington was widely viewed as a major factor in his victory over the younger Governor.

Voters weren't the only ones who wanted Borah. During his time in the Senate, Borah had argued often for neutrality and friendship towards the Soviet State. While some modern historians contend that Borah was a “useful idiot” for Stalin, many viewed his stances as principled at the time. The Soviet Union was so impressed with Borah that American citizens could get permission to travel within the USSR with only a letter from Borah.

These early contacts between the old world and the new were not enough to bring the great Liberal to throw his lot in with Stalin. Instead this was brought about by a strange series of border skirmishes between the South Dakotan militia and the Intermountain Federation coupled with the mysterious assassination of foreign minister Nels H. Smith after an unsuccessful boundary commission meeting with his counterparts from Desert . Beset on both sides by countries with claims on his new Federation, Borah began looking for friends.

The Canadian Government, possibly the best option had things gone a little differently, was unable to help. The Government had to flee Ottawa for Regina after members of the Silver Legion, a fascist paramilitary organization with links to the Great Lakes Republic, seized parliament. With Quebec and Ontario gone and its position in the west shaky, Canada had no desire to come into on behalf of the Intermountain Federation. The United States, of course, didn't recognize Borah's government and couldn't offer any assistance even if it did. Borah turned his eyes towards gaining assistance from the Soviets.

intermountainfederation.jpg

The Government of the Intermountain Federation in 1938

Though the Soviet Union was too consumed by its African campaign to send troops, it did arrange for the transfer of captured French and British armaments to Borah. This was only enough to further radicalize internal opposition and embolden the foreign opponents of Borah's government. The Militia of South Dakota, composed of many adherents of the Silver Legion, launched a full scale offensive into Montana. Whether this was part of an attempt by Ford to reunify the United States under his rulership or the actions of a few patriots who saw Borah as a Bolshevik is not clear. But the threat was very real.

Borah pleaded with the Soviets to send more substantial military aid and advisors. While the Soviet Union didn't wish to get bogged down in the politics of North America it also didn't want to see Ford gain more territory at the expense of Borah. In a clandestine meeting in Winnipeg Borah was offered a deal. If he would allow communists loyal to Moscow into his cabinet and appoint a socialist Prime Minister, the Soviets would move heaven and earth to preserve a “free rockies.”

While Borah's choice is still controversial, especially to those who lost family members in the purges that Boyle would initiate or the victims of Trumbo's prison system, it was not irrational. Declassified archives of the state of Desert reveal that the Mormon state was in secret talks to divide the rockies with Cascadia and “other parties.” Borah chose to keep the Federation alive but at the cost of its soul. It was a Faustian bargain that Borah would live to regret.

-A Lion Among the Liberals: Senator William Edgar Borah and the rise of the Intermountain Federation Kevin C. Murphy