Der Adler auf dem Globus: The Rise of the Third Reich (Edge of Darkness AAR)

[AchtungPanzer]

Prologue

The German defeat in the First World War left Germany in a state of absolute chaos. After the collapse of their armies in 1918 Germany had to sign the Treaty of Versailles in which part of their national territories were snatched: Alsace and Lorraine, snatched to France in the genesis of the German Empire, and the Danzig corridor at the hands of the young and reborn Polish state. His main nemesis in the Great War, France, demanded considerable economic rewards due to the damages caused in its territory. The old imperial government was replaced by a weak and unstable republic: the Weimar Republic. However, not all Germans were willing to accept a transition to liberalism. Inspired by the Russian Revolution of 1917, the German Communists of the Spartacist League attempted an armed uprising on January 4, 1919 but were crushed by the opposition of nationalist paramilitary groups. Trying to take advantage of the weakness of the Weimar government, the right-wing nationalists Wolfgang Kapp and Walther von Lüttwitz tried to carry out a coup that failed miserably. And if that were not enough, France began to take a more aggressive stance on the payment of war reparations by occupying the Ruhr industrial region.

Hyperinflation, crime, political violence between the left and the right. The young republic tried everything possible to overcome these adversities. It seemed that German democracy could get a chance of survival by going through a golden age of economic recovery and political stability in the so-called Golden Years of the Republic between 1923 and 1929. However, the Great Depression passed. The German economy collapsed again and thousands of German workers ended up unemployed. An air of desolation and anguish crossed Germany. A feeling of resentment and betrayal nested in the hearts of German citizens. The nation that seemed destined for glory suffered hunger and humiliation. A man managed to capitalize on the discontent of the German people: Adolf Hitler.

According to his speech, Germany had not lost the war due to the exhaustion of its armies or lack of resources, but was treacherously stabbed in the back by internal enemies who sought the ruin of Germany. After a failed coup attempt in Munich in 1923, Hitler began to work on other ways to come to power. Capitalizing on the dissatisfaction of middle class citizens and through the alliance with powerful industrial groups, his party, the NSDAP, gradually began to seize the seats of the Reichstag. Hitler sought the creation of an authoritarian regime that opposes the weak liberal democracy and the heretic communism, with a racial doctrine that glorifies the Germanic race in contrast to other "undesirable" etnic groups. In January 1933, the opportunity to come to power was within reach: the weak conservative government of President Hindenburg seemed willing to let the Nazis be part of the government. This was Hitler's opportunity not only to make Germany obtain supremacy in Europe by repaying the impersonal humiliations in the Treaty of Versailles, but to expand its Lebesbraum beyond the limits of the Oder and even the Dnieper: to the remote Urals. A new era for Germany and the world begins...

Germany on January of 1933

Welcome to my first AAR on the Edge of Darkness mod. This AAR will have a narrative historical perspective for the most part. My English is not that good so I will try my best to make cohesive sentences. I will try to upload regularly. Criticism is very well received.

 

[Vlad_Dracul1989]

Wunderbar!

 

[noobeless]

Looking forward to read the AAR as time goes on, i like historical perspectives, good luck.

 

[trekfan]

Your English is very good - looking forward to more!

 

[AchtungPanzer]

The Serpent's Egg (January 1933)

"The Führer always had a lot of esteem for Hindenburg for his attempts to get Germany out of the abyss. We even applied some of his policies in the early months of the National Socialist State. It was too late to save his own political career but it was not too late to save Germany. That's when we went into action" - Statthalter Albert Speer in a letter to German economists, 1956


On January 2nd of 1933, German economy wasn't on his best shape. In the resources department, the country had to face a considerable deficit in both money and energy but the situation was considerable better in relation to iron reserves thanks to iron trade with Sweden. The reserves of oil were enough thanks to the convertion of energy. With respect to military production, Germany was building three heavy cruisers and one light cruiser with the Deustchsland already about to be completed. The treaty of Versailles had limited Germany's military expansion on land, sea and air, but the armored heavy cruisers of the Deutschland class were not under such limitations despite French opposition. The armies based in East Prussia were to be supplied by convoys to Konigsberg due to the loss of the territory connecting East Prussia with the rest of Germany

The German army was a shadow of what it once was. Limited to only 100,000 men by the Treaty of Versallles, it was reduced to only 11 divisions divided into 9 armies (7 of Infantry, 3 of Cavalry and 1 High Command). More than 115,000 in total. The position of Chief of the Army was occupied by Werner Von Fristch and the post of Chief of Staff was under the command of Ludwig Beck.

The aerial branch of the armed forces only had 1 division of fighters, 1 of obsolete interceptors under the jurisdiction of the National Socialist Hermann Goering.

Finally, the Navy under the command of Erich Reader only had 3 battleships, 6 light cruisers, 8 transport divisions and 23 destroyers divided into 6 divisions with 23 vessels in total.

Regarding the international situation, the Far East was far from being quiet. China went through the political period of the Nanjing Decade under the command of General Chiang Kai Shek and began an attempt at modernization through the promotion of education and industry. Chiang Kai Shek believed that modernization would allow China to prepare for the inevitable confrontation with other hostile foreign powers, the main one being the Empire of Japan. Japan was also not immune to geopolitical changes. Surrounded by hostile powers, Japanese democracy seemed to weaken progressively in the face of Japanese nationalist militarism that called for military expansion in Asia. In addition, its puppet government of Manchuria also carried out a process of internal pacification

When dealing with German history, there is usually no talk of the measures that the old President Hindenburg tried to apply with the aim of revitalizing the German economy in early 1933. The traditional German post-III Reich historiography always presented Hitler as responsible for the German economic recovery. However, Hindenburg and industry minister Alfred Hugenberg, supporter of the NSDAP, had already tried to change the economic situation through certain measures.

Hindenburg's cabinet on January of 1933


In the first place, Hindenburg tried to fill the empty coffers of Germany with a considerable loan destined to boost the industry and the technology. This measure caused great controversy within the government of Hindenburg and in the circles of German economists because Germany already owed a large amount of money in war reparations and American loans. The money came mostly from several British and American industrialists and bankers, including Henry Ford (it would not be the last time the Germans collaborated with him). With this measure, Hindenburg sought to repeat the success of Gustav Stresemann and the Dawes Plan to put an end to the German economic recession.

One of the biggest problems for a possible economic recovery was the enormous internal dissension within Germany. Sabotage of factories, strikes, unemployment and the political demonstrations of the extreme left and right were proof of this discontent in the population. In order to remedy this situation, Hindenburg changed the economic orientation of production. The production of the naval units was stopped indefinitely and the production of supplies for the army was regulated to star investing on the production of consumer goods. Added to several fixations of prices of first necessity, this measure was oriented to be able to calm the enormous wave of discontent that crossed the Republic of Weimar. In addition, it also sought to remedy the budget deficit to pay the recent loan. These new economic policies were within an international context that augured state intervention in the economy, following the ideas of the economist John Keynes, as a method of economic recovery. The US government of Franklin Delano Roosevelt would be one of the first to put these ideas into practice.

Results of HIndenburg's reorientation of the economy on January of 1933

The money obtained from the loan also sought to finance new technological projects. Instead of concentrating on long-term projects whose completion was not assured, several short-term projects were investigated to give Germany the technological advantage over its opponents. Even in the darkest times of the Weimar Republic, Germany still had scientists and researchers of the highest quality. The new technological focus had four main focuses: to develop novelties aimed at improving the aeronautical branch, the creation of new antibiotics to lower mortality levels, the improvement of armored vehicles and the improvement of the decryption system for future espionage operations.

Several modifications were also made in the military field, with several officials sipping purges from the Armed Forces accused of communist sympathies or simple incompetence. This measure was aimed at increasing morale and discipline within the Army

The ghost of fascism and communism was still going through the Far East. Chiang Kai Shek initiated a Fourth Campaign against the Chinese communist state of Mao Zedong. His rival within the Kuomintang, Wang Jingwei began to flirt with fascism as a method to stop communism. Japan saw in the instability of China an opportunity for territorial expansion not only against the European colonies in Asia. As a result, at the Conference of the Five Ministers on January 5 1933, the decision that would affect the Japanese Empire in a considerable way was made: the Nashinron or expansion to the south

The unfolding of the situation in China was not alien to the German government. German interests in China go back to the Empire and its maritime colony in Qingdao. The establishment of ties with the Kuomitang government had already been attempted in the 1920s with the sending of military adviser Max Bauer to China. On January 19, 1933 an agreement was reached with the Chinese government for the exchange of rare materials for support for the development of the industry and military equipment and training. The Hindenburg government sought not only to stop the expansion of communism in Asia and to boost the economy through the production of weapons, but also to try new military tactics of Hans Von Seekt military strategist based on mobility and qualitative rather than quantitative superiority . These tactics would become the backbone of the future Wehrmacht. The policy of trade relations between Germany and China was being driven by the subsequent Hitler government, lasting at least another four years. While Hitler continued to promote the Sino-German ties in a substantial way, it has been mistakenly associated as the origin of them.

On the other side of the Pacific, the United States of America observed with great concern the situation in the Far East. Intelligence reports that showed the Japanese government's intention to expand across the Pacific confirmed US suspicions. Based on this, the US government declared the independence of the Filipinas on January 21, 1933. The creation of an independent government in the Philippines would allow the islands to have their own army to defend against a possible Japanese attack and consolidate the position of the US government as the "Arsenal of Democracies" in the Pacific

The political measures of Hindenburg to revitalize the German economy did not go unnoticed by the French government. Therefore, they decided to give a greater boost to the process of French economic recovery after the Great Depression. However, with the arrival of the Nazi regime, France would never be able to achieve the same level of industrialization that the German Reich possessed. This was considered one of the main factors that contributed to its inability to stop the German armies in 1940, but the considerable number of French divisions deployed for the defense of France that matched the Wehrmacht in number questioned this hypothesis.

The technological projects of Hindenburg seemed to have paid off ... but not in the way that was expected. The military technicians had advanced in the investigation of the transport of military messages through the training of carrier pigeons. The discovery was filtered through the German press and a journalist from a German period mentioned in an article that Hindenburg "spent the money of the German people on flying rats". NSDAP thugs made sure the story did not remember his name but they could not avoid Hindenburg's association with the pigeons. The most famous of them was a political cartoon of a French magazine that showed Hindenburg looking after pigeons while a group of poor people asked for food that was accompanied with the inscription "President Hindenburg is working on his super-secret weapon to take down France ... other issues can wait"

The years of Hitler's political campaign and the NSDAP seemed to have paid off. Despite his defeat in the presidential elections of April 1932 against Hindenburg, Hitler managed to obtain a considerable 35 percent of the votes. The government would fail to get the parliamentary majority in the elections of July and November. Conservative sectors led by Franz Von Papen with the support of the Minister of Economy and National Socialist parliamentarian Alfred Hughenberg conspired to achieve the fall of Chancellor Schleicher and the installation of Hitler as chancellor. Von Papen's personal ties with President Hindenburg ended up prevailing and after several weeks of negotiations with the NSDAP, on January 30, 1933 Adolf Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany. Papen believed he was capable of controlling Hitler. Subsequent events would show how wrong he was

The legacy of the Hindenburg government would prove to be very bittersweet. Their moderate position against the National Socialists and their inability to stabilize both the economy and the political situation in Germany are accompanied by their economic and military reforms of their last years of their management that would allow to advance to a process of economic recovery. The question of why these reforms were put into practice in 1933 and not immediately after the Great Depression is one of the great questions in the history of the interwar period. Hindenburg bet on these reforms because of the need to gain political credibility against the National Socialists? Can one really speak of a history of state interventionism at the same time that the Roosevelt government was doing it with its New Deal? These would be the questions that the historiography of the 90s would be made in the context of the installation of the Second American Republic and the end of the German "Oberherrschaft". The rise of Germany from ruined nation to superpower would be a matter of interest for the following generations of historians ...

 

[stnylan]

Will follow with interest

 

[Vlad_Dracul1989]

just one tiny suggestion, make sure Fuhrer finishes every speech without leaving sooner - if you know what i mean

 

[AchtungPanzer]

just one tiny suggestion, make sure Fuhrer finishes every speech without leaving sooner - if you know what i mean

We don't want the Fuhrer to leave so soon. It would be such a shame. Besides, we don't want the drug adict to replace him

 

[Grahe]

Hmm this gave me idea is it posible to play without hittler ? Or you miss out on lot of events.

 

[AchtungPanzer]

Hmm this gave me idea is it posible to play without hittler ? Or you miss out on lot of events.

Parkinson is gonna take affect the Führer sooner or later. But for now, he is planning his revenge against the West

 

[joespaniel]

I will be following this AAR (via carrier pigeon).

 

[JodelDiplom]

That event with the pigeons gave me a good laugh

 

[REDrake]

That event with the pigeons gave me a good laugh

You should see what tech is required for the 1938 version. Nuclear physics.

 

[AchtungPanzer]

The Fire Rises (February 1933)

"From this position, I will make sure that no other Dutch communist will burn again any other German building. The Dutch will be indoctrinated on the virtues of National Socialism - Reichskomissar of the Netherlands Arthur Seyss-Inquart, 1953

"That fat idiot knows only two things well: eat and inject morphin on himself. He will make Germany burn as he did with the Reichstag" - Heinrich Himmler, Joachim Pieper's Memories 1970

Hitler's cabinet after being elected Chancellor

One of Hitler's first steps as Chancellor was to continue the policy of economic restoration initiated by Hindenburg. The old economic recipes of liberal bourgeois capitalism were put aside in a definitive way to give way to the interventionism of the State in the market. Half of the loan money obtained in the government of Hindenburg was destined to this end. The result of this investment was the creation of numerous jobs and the reactivation of several fundamental industries for Germany, especially the production of arms and ammunition. This allowed to temporarily alleviate the discontent of the German people. But there was still much to be done to lift Germany from ruin ...

From the beginning, Hitler made clear his intention to create an autocratic regime opposed to communism and to the democratization that allows the military rearmament of Germany to repay the humiliations of Versailles but to colonize and Germanize the vital spaces of the East. This was commented on a dinner with military officers in the house of the Commander in Chief of the High Command of Berlin. General Kurt Von Hammerstein Equord on February 3, 1933. Due to his opposition to National Socialism, Hammerstein-Equord advanced within the Wehrmacht by remaining stuck in merely defensive roles. After the Reichstag fire, he was replaced by Marshal Werner Von Blomberg. Later, he would be assigned command of the defense of the Siegfried line. After the fall of France, he was assigned command of the German Army in the Netherlands, a position he held until his death in 1943.

Meanwhile, General Sadao Araki gained influence in Japanese politics upon reaching the post of Ministry of War. Being within the right-wing nationalist circles of Japan, also part of the Japanese faction of the Imperial Way. However, instead of a march to the South against China, it supported a Hokushinron or March to the North against the Soviet Union. Therefore, he was involved in several plots to gain control of the Kwantung Army in Manchuria. Later, it would be one of the main supporters of declaring war on the Soviet Union after the success of Operation Barbarossa

On February 10, 1933, Hitler gave one of his most famous speeches at Sportpalast. Unfolding all his charisma and oratory skills, Hitler denounces communism and international financial powers as the culprits of the problems of Germany in the last 10 years and calls on the German Volk to support him in his project of economic reconstruction.

Despite the fact that a large number of German citizens seemed attracted by Hitler's speech, there were those who still defended democracy at all costs. The Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold was formed by members of all political ideologies with the aim of defending the Weimar Republic from left and right extremism. Despite facing the attempts of the communist and nationalist parties to overthrow the republic, they were banned by the Hitler government in March 1933. The remains of their members went into exile in the United States until the German invasion, although some of them attempted to ally themselves with Slavic militias during the Great Eastern Uprising (Großer Ostaufstand) in a last attempt to overthrow Nazism.

Meanwhile, the Luftwaffe makes changes in the layout of its aircraft. The division of Dornier Do 17 light bombers belonging to the air transport service "Blitzstrecken", were separated from the jurisdiction of the Luft Hansa to form the 1 Flieger Division, under the command of Generaloberst Alfred Keller based in Breslau. This change would be the beginning of the formation of aerial bombers used in all the operations of the Second Weltkrieg

The surplus of the German finances due to the stabilization of the economy, allowed the reinvestment in investigation of new scientific projects: one of the main obsessions of Hitler always was the one to demonstrate the scientific and technical superiority of Germany over other nations.

The key to the success of National Socialism was in the economic and political support it could have. For this reason, Hitler met with several German industrialists on February 20, 1933. The objective was to gain financial support to finance the electoral campaigns and pass laws in the Reichstag. In this meeting, Hitler presented himself as the protector of private property against the Marxist threat. T

Following the development of the Luftwaffe, a new type of seaplanes was developed at the end of February 1933 with which to equip the ships of the Kriegsmarine. His research was promoted during the first months of Hitler's Chancellorship because it was fast and little costly

On February 27, 1933, the building of the Reichstag burned down. The accused of the fire was the Dutch communist Marinus van der Lubbe, who was tried and executed ten months later. Hermann Goering awarded the incident to a "communist plot". As a result of the incident, the anticommunist tendencies of the German government became enraged by the persecution and arrest of thousands of communist militants.

However, this is only the official version that the National Germanic State continues to maintain until today. Some modern theories of the current of the new left of Chicago and even of the more moderate Kennedyism, assure that the incident was used to be able to justify the repression and the authoritarianism. This theory emphasizes that Van Der Lubbe was a simple mental deranged and that it was an isolated incident. Other more radical theories coming from the North American syndicalism or the English neo-Bolshevism go even further to assure that it was a false flag resulting from a conspiracy planned by Hermann Goering with the aim of winning the favor of Hitler by discovering a supposed "communist conspiracy", accusing to the Chicago current of being functional to the official version One of the evidences used in favor of this theory, is a dialogue during Hitler's birthday in 1943 in which Goering apparently confessed his role in the Reichstag fire, but the only one proof in this regard are the memoirs of Joachim Peiper where he mentions how Himmler intended to use this alleged confession against Goering during the power struggles after the death of Hitler. The Americanist national current of the Silver Legion accused those who elaborated these theories of "anti-American" and "Judaizers", assuring that it was an operation with the endorsement of Stalin and the Soviet Union. The huge amount of different positions on this incident would be one of the many conflicts arising from the historical review after the formation of the Second American Republic, but this is not by far the most controversial

 

[MateuszS]

Well written and all-embracing episode (with some spoilers).

 

[stnylan]

I like these hints of the future world we get.

 

[AchtungPanzer]

The Fall of The Republic (March 1933)

"We told ourselves: "It is now or never". It was never, and I think it was better that way" - Ernst Torgler, last chairman of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD), 1955

"The arrest of many of our comrades after the Reichstag's Fire was a heavy blow to us. Nobody had the moral to try a last resistance against the Nazi tyranny, seizing power by force. Rosa would have been so ashamed of us" - Wilheim Pieck, 1952. The Last Stand of The Demoracy: The Downfall of the German Republic Eric Hobsbawn, 1975


As a result of the Reichstag fire, security measures were put in place. The industrial center of Frankfurt am Main was secured by the Gruppenkomando 2, confirmed by the 3rd Division of Cavalry under SS-Obergruppenführer Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski, arriving on March 3. The divisions of cavalry would be the main base to form motorized divisions according to the new doctrines of rapid movements

On March 4, 1933, Franklin Delano Roosevelt has his inauguration as the 32nd president of the United States of America. At that time, the United States dared its worst economic crisis with a quarter of its workforce unemployed and two million people homeless. To fix the fragile economic situation, alleviate the discontent of the population and get the United States back to its former splendor, would require a radical change in the economy.

On March 5, 1933, Germany's parliamentary elections were held. Although the NSDAP achieved a significant increase in voters, which reached 43.9 percent of the vote. However, there was not enough votes to be able to form a government, so he was forced to form a coalition with the conservatives. Even so, it was possible to increase the number of parliamentarians from 196 to 288 with which it was possible to carry out all kinds of bills, including the Enabling Act.

The unstable mountainous structure of Japonjugaría against him on numerous occasions. On March 6, 1933, an earthquake occurred on the coast of Sanriku in the Tōhoku region of Honshū, Japan with a magnitude of 8.4

In order to reactivate the German economy and to compensate the injustices of Versailles, it was necessary to promote the armament industry. This would allow the reactivation of German industries and the employment of a large quantity of unemployed labor. For this, Hitler and together with the Minister of Industry Alfred Hugenberg, instead of precipitating massive state funding aimed at a larger interventionist economic model decided to promote the production of arms and ammunition

On March 11, 1933, The Joint State Political Directorate was dissolved to make way for the fearsome internal intelligence and secret police agency of the Soviet Union: the NKVD (People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs) The reorganization of the internal bureaucracy of the Union The Soviet that gave rise to the NKVD is usually associated with Hitler's arrival of power and the need to be able to get rid of possible "fascist reactionaries". But what undoubtedly had more weight in this decision was the reports of intelligence arrived from Japan by the spy Richard Sorge: it was quite apparent that the Japanese were training new amphibious landing forces due to the vulnerability of Japanese intelligence. Stalin wanted to avoid at all costs this kind of problems in the Soviet State so one of the prorities of the year 1933 was to reorganize the areas related to internal affairs. It would last until 1946, until Lavrenti Beria would replace it with the MVD

The remains of the Weimar Republic were beginning to disappear. The German-red-gold German republican flag was replaced by the flag of the NSDAP with the Esvastica on March 12, 1933. This flag lasted for almost 50 years until the restoration of the old German Imperial flag.

The final blow to democracy in Weimar, which would converge to Germany in a dictatorship proper, would be the Enabling Act. The victory of the NSDAP in the parliamentary elections of the previous week and negotiations with the catholic and center parties, would allow to sanction the law March 13, 1933. The only ones who voted against the Law were the Social Democrats. It gave Hitler and his cabinet the ability to make laws without the participation of the Reichstag, including laws that deviate from the Constitution of the Weimar Republic. From that moment, the Enabling Act would be renewed every four years until 1985

That same day, Germany abandons the League of Nations. Hitler considered that the presence of Germany in the League only slowed the development and rearmament of Germany. As a result, relations with the member countries of the League cooled down

Some people still hoped to save the republic. The leader of the German Social Democratic Party (SPD), Otto Wels, gave a speech the next day in the Reichstag in defense of the Weimar Republic opposing the Enabling Act and denouncing the Hitler government. After the Sudeten Crisis in 1938, Wels was forced into exile in Prague, and then in Paris where he died the following year

On March 16, 1933, the United States Congress passed the Emergency Banking Act with the objective of stabilizing the banking system still fragile by the Great Depression. By means of this law, all banks of manifest insolvency were definitively closed, allowing operations only to banks that proved to be sufficiently solvent to sustain themselves

On March 17, 1933, the economist Hjalmar Schacht was reappointed as President of the Reichsbank. Originally from the German Democratic Party, Schacht moved to the NSDAP and convinced the German industrialists to support Hitler's appointment as chancellor in 1932. He would play a fundamental role in the reconstruction of the German economy and military rearmament.

That same day, the Fourth Encirclement Campaign ends in China with relatively minor Nationalist advances in Jiujang and Ji'an. The anarchy that reigned in China would be nothing compared to the catastrophe that would affect the nation four years later.

The fate of the old battleship Hessen was decided when it was discarded and sold on March 18, 1933. Hitler was not interested in maintaining an obsolete battleship of the turn of the century to confront the Navy Roya: it would be easily defeated by the new and modern English battleships . By continuing to believe in the possibility of a decisive battle against Great Britain at sea, he decided that the best course of action would be to build new battleships that can be measured with the Royal Navy. However, this plan would receive many modifications in the future

Mussolini did not stay behind in the naval career by creating the Decima Flottiglia Mas which consisted of a special command of frogmen destined to destroy enemy ships. During the Second Weltkrieg, they stood out for making several raids to the Allied ports, even attacking the port of New York.

The first attempts of the government of Hitler to promote scientific research yield their first fruits ... through improvements in the breeding of carrier pigeons. The old President Hindenburg was furious at what he considered a "waste of public funds", but above all he was furious at the possibility that German public opinion would associate him with pigeons again. No journalistic article or news referring to this fact is registered, which is evidence of the strict control that the National Socialist government had of the press. Even so, this image of the once powerful general who tried to conquer the country would be popularized in France and Britain where he was nicknamed "General Pidgeonburg" with several references to his supposed fetish for pigeons due to his senility. A French political cartoon shows Hindenburg with the body of a pigeon and Hitler with the body of a raptor bird. While Hitler devours the remains of the Weimar Republic (represented by a rabbit), Hindenburg devours the crumbs of bread found on the road with an inscription that says "Not exactly the dove of peace"..
.

While Germany followed the inevitable path of authoritarianism, the United States ended the Prohibition that prohibited the consumption and distribution of alcohol. On March 22, 1933, President Franklin Roosevelt signed an amendment to the Volstead Act, known as the Cullen–Harrison Act, allowing the manufacture and sale of 3.2% beer

On March 20, 1933, the Japanese defeated the last Chinese partisans in Jilin Province, incorporating the province into their puppet state of Manchukuo

After finishing the investigation of the decryption devices, the investigation of new class of amphibious transports was started. Germany was really behind in the development of naval units, so maritime technology would be one of its main priorities in the interwar period.

With the arrival of the new millennium, new questions were asked when reviewing the American past. Was there any way to avoid the fall of the United States? Even if Roosevelt managed to successfully recover the US economy in the 1930s, that was not enough to end the Third Reich. However, Germany had achieved a much more spectacular success by moving from a practically ruined nation to a superpower in less than 12 years. The atomic bombing of Operation Ragnarok and the subsequent invasion prove it. There are many variables on the question of whether the Allies could have won the war and avoided German world domination - was there a way to stop Hitler before he took power? One of the most famous alternatives within the Germanic and even neo-Bolshevik circles was the possibility of a communist revolution.

The German communist politician Ernst Thälmann had proposed the possibility of a collaboration between the SPD and the KPD to overthrow Hilter, a proposal that had even been considered after the Reichstag Fire. It was also popularized in German official historiography, a supposed plan to enter the Reichstag and assassinate Hitler using commandos trained in the Soviet Union. However, by that time, the KPD was very weakened by the arrest of many of its members and the relationship between the communists and the social democrats was never very good. In addition, there was no means or even the moral to attempt a coup d'état. The former President of the KPD, who would later collaborate with the Nazis and even work in the reeducation of former Soviet communists, Ernst Torgler seems to confirm this argument: "We could never have won, the NSDAP surpassed us in resources and in support. The workers simply abandoned us. The best we could do was adapt to the new system to save our lives, I wish Thalmann would have understood that "(Der Aufstieg: the rise of Germany, 2005, Joachim Fest, P. 345) Even so, Torgler is seen inside of the neo-Bolshevik circles as a traitor against his own people in the style of Quisling, Wang Jinwei or Mosley. "The testimony of Wilheim Pieck seems to confirm what Torgler said:" If I had known that the Soviets would lose the war, I would have taken with Thalmannthe the charge of the party and would have tried a coup d'état even if it meant our end. "(The Last Stand of The Democracy: The Downfall of the German Republic, Eric Hobsbawn, 1975, P 256). To consider what might have happened, it seems that you have to change the field completely ...

The genre of the so-called "alternative history" was popularized in the early 90's The pioneer of this genre was the British-Canadian writer Robert Harris with his book Motherland in 1994. The premise of this book is based on Van Der Lubbe instead of burning the Reichstag, it puts a bomb on Hitler's speech in the Sportalast by killing him and Goebbels as a result. Without its leader, the NSDAP collapses and the communists fill the void of power by winning the parliamentary elections of March 1933, transforming Germany into a socialist republic. After suppressing a rebellion of the National Socialists in Bavaria, the Communists allied themselves with the Soviets and quickly expanded the revolution throughout Europe as far as Romania, Bulgaria, Holland and Sweden. In the Second Weltkrieg, the Germans conquer France, Hungary and Italy very easily and the Soviets invade the Middle East and India. The Japanese go to war with the United States losing disastrously and being their territories in China preemptively invaded by the Soviets. Eventually, the United States enters the war and atomically bombs Moscow and Berlin but by that time they had conquered the United Kingdom. The war ends in an armistice that leaves communists in control of all of Europe and much of Asia.

However, the plot of the book itself is centered on a police story that involves a conflict between a more democratic Germany open to the West and a hardline Soviet Union. The Stasi detective, Xavier March, will try to reveal a Soviet plot to attack the Germans and impose a more loyal puppet regime. The novel, although revolutionary, has been criticized for being unrealistic in several aspects and attacked by critics of both political extremes. Even so, nobody takes away his influence in popular culture by daring to imagine a future different from the one lived in that moment.

 

[stnylan]

Rather nice alt history there

 

[Aniknk]

Wow. First Nazi, now Commi. Nice plot.

 

[Grahe]

Well this ought to be interesting does the edge of danknes has the comunism mod for germany ?