The Fire Never Dies, Part II: The Red Colossus
- Thread starter Meshakhad
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All of this brings up a question I have about the arts in the new America.
Are the official propaganda posters and such based in alt-Socialist Realism or are they more avant-garde?
The reason I ask is that in the period between the OTL Russian Civil War and Stalin's solidification of power, the Soviet Union was actually home to a pretty experimental art scene. It'd be cool to see that fully blossom since I'm assuming there isn't going to be an alt-Stalin in Red America.
Are the official propaganda posters and such based in alt-Socialist Realism or are they more avant-garde?
The reason I ask is that in the period between the OTL Russian Civil War and Stalin's solidification of power, the Soviet Union was actually home to a pretty experimental art scene. It'd be cool to see that fully blossom since I'm assuming there isn't going to be an alt-Stalin in Red America.
Propaganda will generally be realistic, but American art will be very experimental.
The Reds considered it but abandoned the idea as pointless. The Whites did, but that was after the Simmons coup, so they made no difference.
Daniel DeLeon personally penned several short stories featuring conversations between a SLP supporting Uncle Sam and a naïve worker named Brother Johnathan. The former usually wins the latter over to the socialist stance on the topic-of-the-day. Assuming Commissar DeLeon continued his editorials during wartime, conversations between these two presumably gave way to the new figures now associated with the ASU?
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Hi! I've been following your timeline for a while and I really love it. I was just wondering, what's Baron Roman von Ungern-Sternberg up to in your timeline? Given how you've already said that Russia was going to go Falangist in the future and you teased the involvement of the Black Hundreds, I could very much see Ungern becoming TTL's version of Himmler. He had some very weird beliefs and was obsessed with Buddhism and the occult and was very anti-semitic, murdering dozens of Jewish people during his occupation of Ulaanbaatar. If he gets involved with Russian Falangist movements after the war and gets any sort of power, I think he could become one of the worst war criminals of TTL's second world war.
Probably. We might see Uncle Sam hanging around in some form as the representation of the old America's better instincts. Very probably he would be drawn to more closely resemble Abraham Lincoln.
Oh yeah. He'll show up. No idea where and how.
Speculation for the Falangist Bloc leaders:
UK: JFC Fuller
France: Charles Maurras+Orleanist restoration
Russia: Nikolai Markov or Mikhail Diterikhs(with Markov as a very influential force due to BH influence)
Speaking of Falangist UK, does Falangist spring up across the Commonwealth? I could see the Australian Guard taking over Australia and someone like Adrien Arcand or William Whittaker taking over Canada(which would mean red continental unification once Arcand/Whittaker gets overrun by the Red US). Perhaps a more radicalized Churchill might commit atrocities in India as well?
The question is: How far will the bloc expand? I could maybe see the Falangists intervening in Spain(with a even more radical regime taking over instead of Franco), perhaps if Japan goes down the same route as OTL(except maybe worse with Tokohai or Kodoha in charge) they join in on the alt-Fascist bloc?
UK: JFC Fuller
France: Charles Maurras+Orleanist restoration
Russia: Nikolai Markov or Mikhail Diterikhs(with Markov as a very influential force due to BH influence)
Speaking of Falangist UK, does Falangist spring up across the Commonwealth? I could see the Australian Guard taking over Australia and someone like Adrien Arcand or William Whittaker taking over Canada(which would mean red continental unification once Arcand/Whittaker gets overrun by the Red US). Perhaps a more radicalized Churchill might commit atrocities in India as well?
The question is: How far will the bloc expand? I could maybe see the Falangists intervening in Spain(with a even more radical regime taking over instead of Franco), perhaps if Japan goes down the same route as OTL(except maybe worse with Tokohai or Kodoha in charge) they join in on the alt-Fascist bloc?
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I worry for what a falangist UK means for the 'celtic periphery'. The irish especially, but also the Welsh and Scotts
IOTL Ungern recruited Assyrian and Mongolian soldiers to fight against the Ottoman Empire and the Red Army during WW1 and the Russian Civil War. While it’s doubtful that he ever recruited any Mongolian troops ITTL as the White Army was never pushed all the way back to Siberia, I could see the Bloody Baron creating something similar to the SS’s Foreign Brigades. He already has experience in convincing non-Russians to fight for the Russian Empire and if he leans heavily into antisemitism and antisocialism in his recruiting efforts, Ungern’s troops could very easily become some of the most fanatical and bloodthirsty supporters of Falangist Russia’s war against socialism/ethnic minorities/the German Empire. This could put Baron Ungern in a very good position to do some very bad things.
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The Falangrists will be in for a fight against Scotland, remember, isn't nine men and a bagpiper called a Rebellion in Scotland?
Same for the Irish it should be noted.
Both of those groups were nuts it should be noted.
The only way that the English got the Scots to stop rebelling is to let them win. (James IV/I)
I'm still figuring out exactly who will lead the Second Entente (the name for the Falangist Bloc). JFC Fuller will be very prominent in the UK, but he will not be its leader. Currently, I plan on him being something like the Falangist British equivalent of Hermann Goering, only he'll command the army instead of the air force.
Unsure at the moment. The only definitive answer is that Churchill will not be a falangist. He will in fact be one of our main sources on the history of Falangist Britain, so his survival is a given. He may be imprisoned during the war, or he may escape Britain entirely. Hmm... India...
Spain is the birthplace of falangism. Japan is still a bit unclear, but the Anglo-Japanese treaty is even stronger ITTL with the ASU as a potential adversary. Portugal is pretty much a given. Other possible falangist states include Belgium, Greece, and Serbia.
Probably nothing good. At best, there will be efforts to co-opt them into the new British national identity the falangists create.
Absolutely. On the flip side, he might inadvertently become Germany's top recruiter. If Ungern and the other Russians are committing atrocities against Jews in Eastern Europe, how hard will it be to convince the Jews of Eastern Europe to enlist?
Could Australia make this list? Australian falangists had little electoral support IOTL, but there a few incidents that suggest their strength.
In 1932, before Premier Jack Lang was dismissed from office in New South Wales, the Old Guard came within twenty-four hours of ordering its thirty-thousand members to violently overthrow him. Earlier, on 6 March 1931, a coup attempt was aborted in western Victoria. The plotters had ready access to the armouries of the army reserve, and there were up to 100,000 members in these ‘fascist’ groups. John Monash was supposedly a supporter. Thomas Blamey, another supporter, led a fascist paramilitary group at this time.
The ability of these groups to overthrow a state government, or the federal government, is probably nil. Their membership numbers might be exaggerated, or inflated by members who just wanted to join the increasingly violent street brawls against communists and Catholics. But might a mainline Australian conservative party turn to someone like the respected Thomas Blamey to led them in these uncertain times? He was not a falangist or anti-Semite, but he did have authoritarian tendencies and regarded the Japanese as vermin. Of course, the Anglo-Japanese Alliance holds ITTL, so he would have to direct his racism elsewhere.
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Very possible. I don't have any real plans for Australia. That said, I don't see John Monash supporting an explicitly falangist regime, what with being Jewish and all.
Agreed on John Monash.
Canada might receive falangism poorly too? IOTL the CCF had some electoral success while it was led the pacifist J. S. Woodsworth, who opposed Canadian entry into the Second World War. Might his views be more popular with Falangist Britain in charge of the war ITTL? In 1943, election polls actually gave the CCF a one-point lead, though Woodsworth had passed away by then. French Canadians may also be unwilling to go to war for Falangist Britain if OTLs Conscription Crisis of 1944 is any indication.
South Africa may be another candidate for falangism or neutrality. IOTL, in 1939, South African Prime Minister J.B.M. Hertzog, and his ally D. F. Malan, lost a vote that would have kept South Africa out of the war by a margin of 80 to 67. Both men had racist views, so they may make better Falangists ITTL than neutrals.
Speaking of racist views, how will Falangist Britain handle its colony in Palestine? IOTL, in 1921, the future Liberal Party leader Herbert Samuel appointed Amin al-Husseini as the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. The Mufi broke with Britain over the Peel Commission, and simultaneously became so despotic and anti-Semitic that the Arab opposition began cooperation with the Jews. Maybe the Mufi keeps supporting Falangist Britain ITTL?
Would Herbert Samuel make a good puppet Prime Minster for the Falangists? Or maybe David Lloyd George could fill that role? He did call Hitler the greatest living German and the George Washington of Germany before eventually repudiating the Führer.
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On that note, any chance we might see countries similar to Finland IOTL who aren’t exactly Falangist but are aligned with them due to geopolitical reasons or circumstance?
On that note, would it be correct to assume that the best OTL equivalent to Churchill would be those German conservatives who initially enabled Hitler but eventually realized the kind of monster they had supported similar to Goerdeler and co?