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Post by simon darkshade on Apr 10, 2024 5:52:44 GMT
Steve, 1.) It is the regular April Fool's Day event, with a tie into the earlier disappearance of Constitution. You are absolutely on the money with the ship in a bottle trick being how the historic frigate was stolen; the Statue of Liberty disappearing through visual illusion tricks is a bit of an Easter Egg reference to David Copperfield making it disappear in 1983. 2.) The @ tiger population was 100,000 in 1900, falling to ~1827 in 1970, largely through unrestricted hunting and uncontrolled killing. Here, there has been a drop, but not the same 98% fall. 3.) Jefferson is the @ one in Northern California and Southern Oregon: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_(proposed_Pacific_state). This is an isolated situation of Shasta looking like it might erupt and everyone not wanting it to occur; the name of the Lieutenant Governor is the same as in Henrik Ibsen's 'An Enemy of the People', so what I'm working for here is a modern day transposition of that main idea. 6.) Absolutely. There is no way of knowing, but when there are enough bullets flying around in the Southern Cone, someone ends up getting hit. 9.) It will be regarded as a bit of a curiosity for quite a long time to come; as you would know from lived experience, in the 1970s and 1980s in Britain and Australia, fast food restaurants were considered a special treat/outing than a regular mass market food trough. The general pattern/level of prevalence for usual dining is home cooked meals in the overwhelming first place, followed by chain restaurants and British Restaurants (both supplying 'sit down' dining), then various foreign restaurants, then fish and chip shops and takeaway food right down at the bottom. Pizza/pitza will remain a niche food in the final category, lagging behind fish and chips, pies and various sandwich permutations. Insofar as the pineapple/Hawaiian pizza thing is concerned, I'm firmly in your camp. Pineapple works well with salty meats and cheese; a grilled pineapple ring also makes an appearance on the 'Aussie Burger' or the Australian version of the hamburger with the works, which has a beef patty, cheese, fried onion, bacon, a fried egg, pickled beetroot, said grilled pineapple ring, lettuce, tomato, onion and tomato sauce. The acid in the fruit and pickled veg does offset riches and too much meatiness/umami flavour. My inclusion of the pineapple on pizzas here is a bit of dig at those people who are so uptight about what someone else likes on their food that they get into conniption fits. 10.) Absolutely. Ethiopia has a much better future without famine and with freedom. 12.) Star Wars was historically filmed in Britain at Elstree Studios in Hertfordshire. It was originally owned by Associated British Picture Corporation in the 1930s, who were then bought out by Warner Bros and EMI. In Dark Earth, the Big Five of British film production studios are ABPC (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Associated_British_Picture_Corporation ), Imperial Studios (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_and_Dominions_Imperial_Studios ), the Rank Organisation's General Film Distributors (pending a different name), British Lion Films (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Lion_Films, backed up by the clout of EMI) and finally Hammer Film Productions. Hammer's role in Britain is analogous to 20th Century Fox in Hollywood, being the 'youngest', but one of the biggest in terms of success. They have branched out further from their meat and bread in horror films into science fiction, fantasy, thrillers, mysteries, historical epics and most recently, war films. I'm going to have to do an extended piece on DE cinema and trends 14.) Historically, the Austin Allegro was a disastrous dog of a car. Here, it is a different design in the same category/class, and being something of a combination of the best features of the Honda Civic (hence the reference to a 'civic car') and the later Austin Maestro. 16.) Surely nothing bad could come from disturbing a long sealed mysterious tomb! 17.) Emperor Max is ambitious, but he realises that if Mexico remains completely focused on the United States, it will only exist as a southern adjunct to someone else's story. 20.) An Iberian union is unlikely, as there isn't any huge outside pressure forcing them together, positioned as they are on the edge of the European/Mediterranean/Atlantic worlds, unlike Belgium and the Netherlands, who have the 'Polish problem'; that is a little joking phrase I picked up from a talk by Lech Walesa I once attended, where he stated that Poland's chief historical mistake was being located between Germany and Russia, who were such good friends that they always wanted to visit each other. 24.) It certainly is very ominous. Combine the 1979 Sverdlovsk anthrax leak with certain elements of Warhammer 40K... (This is not to say that it is W40K, just that there is a certain localised dimensional weakness that was probed and almost ruptured, with some nasty influences/forces seeping through the cracks in the brief moments that there was a connection) 26.) Very much so. Taking a long term view means copping losses sometimes, whilst retain the capacity to bounce back and recoup them, as compared to the modern tendency for governments of all ideological characters to throw the kitchen sink at whatever problem crops up; eventually, you run out of kitchen sinks. The final sentence shows that this is not a universally endorsed position, with there being a not insubstantial level of support for greater public spending in the here and now, whatever the costs; however, for now, there is a feeling that all types of spending levels are quite comfortable. 27.) Different laws of physics, the influence of magic and some things that simply can't quite yet be explained. If you wish to experience the heights of frustration mixed with exasperation and fear, become a certain type of scientist in Dark Earth. You can come up with a perfectly logical theory, then along comes some spiffing bloke in a cape or a flying lizard or a man in a funny hat who breaks your theories with words and gestures. 28.) They are very wealthy men with a lot of resources, who have similarly sweeping ambitions. The whole ~4300 mile distance seems huge, but it is 520 miles from NYC to Pittsburgh, 190 miles from there to Cleveland, 520 to Chicago, 420 miles from there to St. Louis, 740 miles to Oklahoma City, 840 to Albuquerque and 530 to Phoenix, AZ and thence 575 to LA. Tack on some extra distance for the nature of indirect railroad routing and then we get to pondering the various comparisons of a 12-15 hour rail journey in luxury with your car onboard vs a 2 hour Boeing 2707 or Concord flight. As a whole, it ends up being difficult to justify, but it creates a whole lot of useful little 'parts' in the form of the high speed links between urban centres in the Midwest, South and South West. 30.) There is something that scientists are puzzled and even alarmed by and some very long term thinkers are intrigued by. Titan, for example, is the size of Earth and is regarded as a future prize for settlement, along with the Jovian moons visited earlier. Curious. |
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Post by simon darkshade on Apr 10, 2024 13:44:44 GMT
1973 Statistics
1973/74 Largest GDPs
1.) USA: $12,759,578,439,922.13 (+ 4.28%)
2.) USSR: $6,105,609,224,823.79 (+ 7.64%)
3.) Germany: $4,936,604,492,206.17 (+ 4.32%)
4.) Japan: $4,726,684,284,657.89 (+ 10.03%)
5.) Britain: $4,685,044,589,435.96 (+ 4.84%)
6.) France: $2,643,926,632,069.69(+ 3.95%)
8.) Canada: $2,344,421,195,962.22 (+ 3.78%)
7.) India: $2,380,686,207,741.98 (+ 6.77%)
9.) China: $2,311,783,104,315.28 (+ 7.85%)
10.) Italy: $1,789,642,340,962.36 (+ 3.43%)
11.) Austria-Hungary: $1,511,954,147,188.87 (+ 4.35%)
1973/74 Populations
1.) China: 1,115,333,864
2.) India: 745,249,839
3.) Soviet Union: 413,456,253
4.) USA: 374,587,219
5.) Indonesia: 279,126,235
6.) Japan: 278,346,110
7.) Germany: 205,496,887
8.) Brazil: 195,034,198
9.) Mexico: 157,248,237
10.) France: 150,962,250
11.) Britain: 142,876,539
12.) Austria-Hungary: 132,989,336
1973/74 Share of World Industrial Output
1.) USA: 21.7%
2.) Japan: 13.9%
3.) Soviet Union: 12.1%
4.) Germany: 11.7%
5.) Britain: 7.6%
6.) China: 6.6%
7.) India 5.4%
8.) France: 4.8%
9.) Canada: 3.8%
10.) Italy: 3.1%
11.) Austria-Hungary: 3.0%
Steel Production 1973/74 (millions of tons)
1.) Japan 254
2.) USA 240
3.) USSR 210
4.) Germany 132
5.) Britain: 100
6.) China: 98
7.) India 84
8.) AH: 75
9.) Poland 72
10.) France 60
11.) Canada 59
Coal Production 1972 (millions of tons)
1.) USA: 748
2.) USSR: 724
3.) China: 618
4.) Germany: 602
5.) Poland: 567
6.) Britain: 554
7.) India: 489
8.) Austria-Hungary: 460
9.) France: 300
10.) Australia: 266
11.) South Africa: 255
Oil Production 1973 (Thousands of bbl/day)
1.) USA: 17,396
2.) USSR: 13,852
3.) Arabia: 12,679
4.) Persia: 7013
5.) Iraq: 6129
6.) Canada: 4532
7.) Trucial States: 4497
8.) Venezuela: 3428
9.) Britain: 3384
10.) Kuwait: 3276
11.) Mexico: 3066
1973 Wheat Production (millions of tons)
1.) USA: 178
2.) USSR: 125
3.) China: 101
4.) India: 95
5.) Canada: 90
6.) Australia: 72
7.) France: 64
8.) Argentina: 62
9.) Austria-Hungary: 60
10.) Germany: 56
11.) Britain: 54
12.) Italy: 42
13.) Turkey: 37
14.) Spain: 33
15.) Poland: 26
1973 Barley Production (millions of tons)
1.) USSR: 67.5
2.) Australia: 32.4
3.) Canada: 26.8
4.) Germany: 25.2
5.) France: 21.3
6.) Britain: 18.4
7.) Spain: 16.3
8.) Argentina: 14.7
9.) Turkey: 11.1
10.) USA: 10.4
11.) Poland: 9.9
12.) Austria-Hungary: 8.4
1973 Potato Production (millions of tons)
1.) USSR: 143
2.) India: 72
3.) China: 69
4.) Germany: 42
5.) France: 39
6.) Canada: 38
7.) Britain: 33
8.) Poland: 32
9.) Peru: 26
9.) Turkey: 25
11.) Netherlands: 22
12.) Persia: 19
1973 Corn Production (millions of tons)
1.) USA: 257
2.) USSR: 105
3.) China: 87
4.) Brazil: 82
5.) Argentina: 69
6.) India: 50
7.) Canada: 48
7.) Mexico: 45
9.) Indonesia: 32
10.) Romania: 29
11.) France: 27
12.) Australia: 24
Automobile Production 1973
1.) Japan: 13,542,919
2.) USA: 12,976,538
3.) Germany: 7,980,375
4.) Britain: 5,256,923
5.) France: 4,578,017
6.) Italy: 3,892,888
7.) USSR: 3,752,964
8.) Canada: 3,566,895
9.) Austria-Hungary: 2,823,500
10.) Mexico: 2,572,235
11.) Spain: 2,106,398
Merchant Shipbuilding 1973
1.) Japan: 40,743,922 tons
2.) Britain: 27,561,356 tons
3.) USA: 20,456,547 tons
4.) Korea: 4,860,239 tons
5.) Germany: 3,791,523 tons
6.) France: 2,014,960 tons
7.) Italy: 1,627,075 tons
8.) Canada: 1,428,050 tons
9.) USSR: 1,299,624 tons
10.) China: 984,226 tons
11.) Sweden: 920,249 tons
Aircraft Production 1973
1.) USSR: 6520
2.) USA: 6084
3.) China: 3842
4.) Britain: 3793
5.) Germany: 1829
6.) France: 1434
7.) Japan: 1150
8.) India: 1028
9.) Canada: 980
10.) Italy: 654
11.) Austria-Hungary: 583
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Post by simon darkshade on Apr 24, 2024 14:04:13 GMT
May
May 1: The BBC’s Tonight program features a special sequence on ‘A Tale of Two May Days’, contrasting the grandiose and warlike military parade conducted in Moscow with the joyful innocent family activities of the May Day holiday in Britain and closing with a split screen image of a young laughing May Queen and a scowling Red Army conscript.
May 2: Japan pays off the last remaining instalment of its postwar food aid debt to the United States, with the $200,000,000 payment being channeled directly into the new aid programme for the reconstruction of South Vietnam.
May 3: President Ronald Reagan arrives at Heathrow Airport in London on the first foreign state visit of his presidency to Britain and is greeted by Ambassador Walter Annenberg, Prime Minister Stanley Barton and Foreign Secretary Sir James Callaghan, before being received by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and His Royal Highness Prince Phillip at Windsor Castle and reviewing a brigade of the Queen's Guard, followed by the traditional twenty-four course royal state banquet. The visit is to include an address to both Houses of Parliament at Westminster and a naval review of the Grand Fleet of the Royal Navy at Scapa Flow.
May 4: The 1670ft tall Sears Tower in Chicago is topped out, becoming the tallest skyscraper in the United States and the world, just shading the new World Trade Center towers in New York City, with both overtaking the Palace of the Soviets in Moscow to restore American leadership in the somewhat secondary measure of the world's tallest buildings.
May 5: The Sports Federation of the German Democratic Republic initiates the State Research Plan, a blanket programme for the distribution of performance enhancing drugs, steroids and experimental alchemical concoctions to athletes competing in international competitions, particularly the Olympic Games.
May 6: The Italian Ministry of Economy and Finance presents a 10 Year Project for the improvement and modernisation of the Italian economy, based on a reduction in inflation, increased domestic production of energy to transform costs, increasing exports by 60% and continued investment in the continued development of the South.
May 7: Opening of the Royal Military Exhibition, a special exposition of Britain's land, sea and air forces and their equipment, held at the Royal Exhibition Centre at Earl's Court. The prize exhibits are a new RAF Supermarine Spitfire, the Army's new Medium Combat Vehicle version of the FV525 Warrior and the Royal Navy's new Coastal Forces hydrofoil Super Fast Attack Missile Craft.
May 8: US forces kill several hundred rebels in a brigade sized ground sweep and clear action in Sudan, with heavy air support from USAF strike fighters and bombers and USMC attack helicopters. It is estimated that the objectives of the joint punitive mission will be achieved by the end of June.
May 9: Resignation of the Prime Minister of the Lebanon after his failure to resolve the cabinet impasse over military cooperation with Syria and other members of the Arab Union, which is driven by Lebanon's position as the only majority Christian state in Levant.
May 10: Debut of The Great Adventurers, an ITV series based on the book by Sir Winston Churchill, the Duke of London, on the greatest explorers, adventurers and discoverers in the history of the British Empire.
May 11: The Hawke Labor government in Australia successfully introduces a programme of free tertiary education for approved students as part of their raft of reforms aimed at modernising and diversifying the burgeoning Australian economy, following on from the introduction of the Prices and Incomes Accord with the Australian Council of Trade Unions and a programme for the further encouragement of nationally significant secondary industries, specifically the automotive, steel, electrical, textile, clothing and footwear and consumer goods industries.
May 12: Completion of the Soviet space station Mir, joining Krasnya Oktabyr and Vostok as the USSR's major facilities in Earth's orbit, in addition with the smaller Salyut stations operating in lower orbits for more temporary reconnaissance and experimental purposes.
May 13: German arcanologists working with the Kaiserliche Anstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung develop a new industrial enchantment for the separation of different components of commonly used plastics into easily reusable base compounds which, in line with last year's law on the prevention of waste in rubbish management and the promotion of re-use and 're-cycling', opens up the potential for upwards of 96% of commonly used plastics to be recovered rather than go to landfill.
May 14: The Kustartilleriet of the Royal Swedish Navy begins deployment of the new Bofors 125mm light coastal defence gun in fixed single and twin mounts and in the mobile role; it is intended to fill the role between the mobile 105mm and 152mm guns and the heavier 152mm, 254mm, 375mm and 610mm pieces. The new Swedish gun is thought to have been designed for maximal capacity with the British Royal Ordnance 125mm Light Gun and the US M125 as part of the latest manifestation of the longstanding Anglo-Swedish Defence Pact, along with the joint development of a new mobile assault gun system, provisionally designated the Infanterikanonvagn 105.
May 15: Rhodesian Army and security forces overrun a major guerilla base in the far south west of the country in Operation Scarecrow, eliminating or capturing hundreds of fighters. The success of the operation is hailed as a major victory by The Rhodesia Herald and as, whilst not the beginning of the end, then the harbinger of a new phase in the Bush War. Some professional foreign observers ascribe a large part of recent improved performance to increased US aid in the aftermath of American victory in the Vietnam War, as well as more advanced RAF aerial support and intelligence gathering capacities. Whatever the causes and contributing factors, the outcome of Scarecrow marks a notable shift in the tides of Cold War conflict in Central Africa.
May 16: A joint Anglo-American Peaceful Nuclear Explosion is conducted by the US Department of Energy and British Ministry of Atomic Energy at the Nevada Test Site to test a new experimental device designed for potential use in the construction of a Nicaragua Canal, exploitation of the Athabaskan oil sands and iron ore mining in the Pilbara region of Australia.
May 17: The Air Ministry issues Specification B.24/73 for the development of a very long range strategic heavy bomber to augment and possibly eventually replace the RAF’s fleet of Avro Vulcans. It calls for a multi-engine supersonic jet bomber capable of carrying a bombload of 60,000lb to a range of 6400nm at a cruising speed of 875 knots at 75,000ft, with considerably greater maximum speed, altitude and bombload and provision for a range of defensive armament. Avro, Vickers, Handley-Page, Armstrong-Whitworth and BAC are invited to submit designs for the ambitious specification. This move towards the future is accompanied by C.25/73, a curious shift to the recent past, which sets out a requirement for an updated and enlarged version of the Bristol Britannia powered by the new Rolls Royce Severn 16000shp turboprop engine; the ostensible fuel economy advantages of the engine present a compelling case in the considerably different strategic circumstances of 1973 compared to 1964.
May 18: Militant dissidents attempt to hijack an Aeroflot jet in Dushanbe with a view towards fleeing to Persia, but are subdued by an elite team of Omega Group commandos fortuitously on standby in Samarkand; the GRU special forces eliminate all five dissidents in the process, having been instructed not to take prisoners.
May 19: The Ministry of Agriculture and Food publishes a study on emerging technologies, enhanced alchemical fertilisers, agricultural enchantments and new seed varieties and their impact upon crop yields. It forecasts an increase in potato production to 32 tons per acre by 1980, whilst wheat and barley productivity, particularly in England’s great breadbasket of East Anglia and in Lyonesse and Leinster could rise from the current 112 and 94 bushels per acre to above 200 in the same time frame.
May 20: The heads of the Oriental Orthodox Churches and Patriarch Demetrios of Constantinople issue a joint declaration following a conclave in Constantinople that the Chalcedonian and Miaphysite Churches, whilst having differences of some Christological formulations, there is no fundamental difference of belief and that they will work together towards a unified Christianity.
May 21: The Committee of Imperial Defence authorises the fourth stage of the Long Range Missile Defence of the United Kingdom Plan, which will complete the deployment in the British Isles of 640 Violet Friend long range ABMs (with a top speed of Mach 10, a ceiling of 500 miles and a maximum range of 750 miles), 640 Black Beauty medium range weapons (Mach 6, 250 miles ceiling and 250 miles range) in both their mobile and silo based versions; and 1280 Blue Sky short range point defence missiles (Mach 12, 25 mile ceiling and 50 mile range) by the end of 1975. Additionally, in the medium term, four further Skyguard energy weapon facilities are to be established, providing direct coverage over the west and south; RAF Fighter Command's 48 Bristol Blue Envoy squadrons are to be equipped with advanced new long range Mark IV missiles and four airborne battle stations equipped with air launched Black Beautys; the Army's Air Defence Command will increase to forty squadrons of English Electric Broadswords in the home air defence role; and the Royal Navy is to increase the assignment of missile cruisers to the Home Fleet from three to five.
May 22: The US Bureau of Economic Analysis publishes statistical data on national economic activity computed by Alfie, their intelligent IBM Super Multivac 9000 supercomputer, indicating that the United States is emerging from recession based on small business sales, retail trends and stronger manufacturing output. Across the Atlantic, the British economic outlook remains more grey, with pressure growing from the Labour backbenches for direct investment and interventionist policies to further ameliorate the broader effects of the recession, whilst Prime Minister Barton and the Cabinet remain committed to the current course of action, with a suspension of all immigration save for special cases to stabilise the labour market being the only significant new measure taken in the second quarter of the year.
May 23: Formation of the Organisation d'Action Secrète by the French DCRG as a domestic counterpart to the SDE's Action Service, combining a number of previous separate groups utilised by the French government for the suppression of internal security issues and the provision of an 'active response' to the same.
May 24: British Oil’s exploration team submits a report on the discovery of five new major oil and gas fields in the Irish Sea. Investigations by drill ships and submersibles into a suspected larger deposit around Rockall continue.
May 25: Representatives of United States Air Force and Royal Air Force sign a memorandum of agreement for the cooperative development of a range of high precision laser guided bombs.
May 26: The Jordanian Prime Minister and Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban meet in Jericho for a fruitful discussion on general rapprochement and economic cooperation, with both countries keen on pursuing the benefits of the Red Sea-Dead Sea Canal and on the export of Israeli electricity to Jordan.
May 27: Brazil signs defence sales agreements with the United States and Britain in response to the Argentine armament of recent years, with the former being for a range of land based equipment (headlined by 1600 M60 tanks, 2000 M113s and hundreds of modern artillery pieces) and the latter package including both land and air surplus weapons, consisting of 960 Chieftains, 800 Bristol Bloodhounds, 1200 PT.428 Rapiers, 240 de Havilland Tornadoes, 300 Hawker-Siddeley Merlins, 120 Vickers Thunderbolts, 240 Fairey Delta IIs and 240 Supermarine Sunstars along with new radar systems and 100 Vickers Vimy supersonic heavy bombers. The British aircraft order for the Imperial Brazilian Air Force comes after a decade of careful cultivation of high ranking officers and Air Ministry officials and the accompanying fillip of resource purchase agreements and investment in Brazilian industrial development.
May 28: Buckingham Palace announces the engagement of Princess Anne and Prince Christian of the Netherlands, with the union seen as a masterly means to cement ties between Britain and the Netherlands, and by extension with the increasingly strongly integrated Benelux Union.
May 30: A coup attempt in Yemen is barely suppressed by Arabian troops, leading to the widespread unrest and disorder as long-running tensions emerge to the surface of Yemeni society. The perceived economic weakness of the regime, which is the only one without substantial oil discoveries to date, is seen as being an underlying reason for the instability.
May 31: Opening of a great bridge spanning the Bosphorus in Constantinople, providing a direct link between Europe and Asia for the first time since the far off time of Emperor Darius the Great of Persia. The ongoing tensions and simmering hostility between Byzantine Greece and Ottoman Turkey makes the full potential of the continental link a question for hopeful future resolution at this time.
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Post by simon darkshade on Apr 25, 2024 12:41:19 GMT
May Notes - The 'Tale of Two May Days' is just one example of how Britain is at least trying to compete at the top level, even culturally. Their point is quite well made, with a peaceful, free society without needing to lock its people in being rather more attractive than the Soviet alternative. Actually saying so is an example of a Britain that is far more confident in itself than the @ of the 1970s nadir - Japan's payment to the Americans isn't as needed for balance of payments purposes here, but comes as both a welcome gesture and a sign of Japan's burgeoning strength and confidence - Reagan visits Britain earlier than in his @ first term, showing the relative importance of the Anglo-American relationship; there is more emphasis upon this in Britain, but the power balance is slightly different - The heights of the Sears Tower and WTC here are part of the never-ending Cold War competition between the USA and USSR - GDR doping will be a bit more 'effective' here, at least until exposed - Italy is bobbing along reasonably well, but increased exports of luxury cars, clothing, shoes, furniture and other valued added consumer goods/desirables is in their favour - The Royal Military Exhibition is a bit of an attempt to push up economic activity through events, as well as trying to advertise British defence equipment to the rest of the world. The Medium Combat Vehicle version of the Warrior is a 90mm/25pdr vehicle that tries to straddle the line between AFV and 'medium tank', mainly as a sales attempt, as it is unlikely to see service in the British Army due to the Ikv 105 dalliances outlined later on - Bob Hawke's Labour (note different spelling to the @ Americanised version of the ALP's name, adopted thanks to King O'Malley) is on a different wicket to its @ advent in 1983, with there being much, much less scope for economic rationalist policies or moving away from industrial protectionism; the removal of university fees also reflects the priorities of the time - Mir is larger, as are the other Soviet stations, with crews of 250+ and looking like hybrids of the Von Braun style rotating wheel space station and the first picture on this page: www.lakesidepress.com/fictitious-reviews/spacestationguide.htm The next stage, taken by the Americans and British, has been to add more rings above and below, eventually forming a sphere that then is secured with external plating as in the 8th image on this page imgur.com/gallery/4faJG then progressing towards the class Frank Tinsley sphere here: www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/images/spacestations/station.jpg- German researchers have effectively developed a method that will resolve one of the big issues with regard to recycling - that of plastics and plastic coated cardboard. The future consequences are interesting - The Swedish 125mm gun is a Bofors product made with a fair bit of British input and is quite the performer. The flipside of accepting 'cooperation' here was to get a quid pro quo for orders of the Ikv 105, which will have a limited role in mechanised infantry battalions - The Rhodesian victory is a tactical one, but does signal a shift to the next phase of the Bush War. More change to come - PNEs will see a fair bit further use as the decade proceeds, in the East and the West - The potential Vulcan replacement is a very ambitious and complex aircraft and will encounter some issues; the return of the Britannia, or a version thereof, represents one manifestation of the same issue, whereby replacing aircraft with the speed accustomed to starts to shift - Omega Group (the GRU counterpart to the KGB's Alpha Group) is a different development who will see some foreign use. The Soviets are seemingly not immune to domestic terrorism - Crop yields are growing markedly above the @ averages for this point towards some record figures; the postulated equivalents of 13.45 tons/hectare (200+ bushels/acre) is pushing up towards the @ world records set in the last 10 years by a Lincolnshire farmer who got 17.96t/h for wheat and 16.2t/h for barley. By the end of the 1980s, those type of figures will not be outliers, but fairly common yield equivalents not just on English and Irish farms, nor just in France, Hungary and Germany, but in the world breadbaskets of the US Midwest, Argentina, Canada, the Punjab and Australia. The consequences of this are fairly wide reaching - A move towards reconciliation between the Oriental Orthodox/Miaphysite and Orthodox Churches creeps closer, with the Nestorians observing its progress with interest - The LRMD of the UK Plan is progressing well, with the deployed ABM force providing a substantial defence against the Soviet IRBM/MRBM threat and SLBMs to boot; the Violet Friends and laser defences are two of the four measures to counter missiles that are even longer range/faster, meaning those in the ICBM/LRBM class - America starts to roll out of recession (as a point of interest, the BEA's computer, Alfie, is named after the computer in Barbarella ) whilst Britain remains in a bit more of a rougher patch, for the moment. The effective suspension of immigration to relieve labour market pressure is a step that is different from @ policies and might continue for a little, leading to some observations on other such moves - Here, the OAS being an arm of the French state and secret service is one of the little ironic crossovers of DE and @ - There is a lot more Irish Sea oil, on a par with a significant fraction of the @ North Sea and there is thought that there might be a very big field out near Rockall - The Red Sea-Dead Sea Canal, hydroelectricity and development project is something that will bind Jordan and Israel closely together - Brazil goes American for the Imperial Army and British for the Imperial Air Force and air defence units of the Army, with the Chieftains being the anomaly coming from clashes of opinion between two powerful aristocratic generals. The size and nature of the order is definitely something that has cost a lot of investment and creative promotion - Princess Anne has a different match here |
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Post by simon darkshade on May 3, 2024 2:36:17 GMT
June
June 1: Young director Steven Spielberg, after having been linked with initial discussions for a film version of Frank Herbert’s Dune, is signed to direct the well anticipated big screen adaption of Flipper. The ongoing saga of trying to bring Dune to the cinema, along with that of the other popular science fiction property, Morning Star 40,000, the bright and noble future of the 41st century, where high adventure reigns across the galaxy.
June 2: A Soviet Tupolev Tu-184 supersonic narrowly avoids crashing whilst flying above the Paris Air Show, with sorcerous protection dweomers stabiliising it out of a dangerously steep dive over the crowd of hundreds of thousands of spectators. The incident comes amid the much anticipated 'Duel of the Supersonics', with the new generation of American, British, French, Soviet and German supersonic airliner designs showing off their capabilities and sleek lines.
June 3: A crowd of an estimated two millions, and tens of millions more watching on BBC, witnesses the spectacle and ceremony of the annual Trooping of the Colour, marking the official birthday of Queen Elizabeth II. Her Majesty, riding on Burmese and accompanied by the Sovereign’s Escort of the Household Cavalry and twelve Royal Knights, proceeds down The Mall, which is lined by a full brigade of Foot Guards, to Horse Guards to inspect the twelve arrayed Guards (all of full company strength), the Mounted Regiments of the Household Cavalry and the King’s Troop, Royal Horse Artillery. The massed bands and corps of drums of the Household Division, numbering over a thousand musicians, provide the musical accompaniment to the spectacle, whilst Her Majesty and the Royal Family later appear on the balcony at Buckingham Palace to witness a feu de joie and a fly past by over two hundred jets of the Royal Air Force, lead by the Red Arrows.
June 4: At a reception in Washington D.C., collective donations by Britons and Canadians for assistance in support and relief for the victims of the Mississippi floods totalling almost $100 million are ceremonially handed over by Canadian Governor-General and revered Imperial elder statesman Sir William Richardson, who states “America has done so much to help the world, and it is the very least gesture thar we can supply in return. As was said back at the Taku Forts, ‘blood is thicker than water.’ “
June 5: The Territorial Army’s 25th Infantry Division leaves Aldershot by skyships bound for Israel on the first such reserve roulement to Middle East Land Forces; much of their heavy equipment will be drawn from pre-positioned stocks in Sinai, the Negev and the Galilee in a test of wartime mobilisation capacity beyond the scope of the Continent. The 49th (Wessex) Infantry Division is to deploy by sea to Norway for support of Britain's Scandinavian NATO allies on the 10th, similarly utilising prepositioned equipment at Trondheim and Bodo.
June 6: US astronauts from Orion 6 land on Titania, with Mission Commander Buzz Aldrin and his deputy James Lovell the first to walk upon the Uranian moon; their landing had been delayed to allow for comprehensive probe missions of the dense atmosphere, surface conditions and Titanian environment, along with harvesting of certain gasses for fuel supplies of their atmospheric flying support craft. The entire 12 man landing team remarks on the strangeness of the primordial landscape and jagged alien peaks, reminscent in some ways of Luna, albeit with bizarre rainbow coloured luminscent mosses and lichens and deep lakes of methane and ethane.
June 7: A joint FBI-Seattle PD investigation uncover an underground illegal boxing club that acts a front for an anarchist terror gang. Despite exacting security measures, including two separate binding geases to not talk about the nature of the 'Fighting Club', the team lead by Lieutenant Martin Crane and FBI Special Agents Dale Cooper and Fox Mulder rolls up the group, which turns out to be lead by a renegade Soviet agent.
June 8: Opening of Singapore International Airport at Changi, replacing the earlier airfields at Kallang and Paya Lebar and adjacent to RAF Changi.
June 9: King Juan of Spain issues a proclamation that he will exercise royal authority to provide necessary advice and counsel to the Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition regarding the exercise of its powers in circumstances beyond its specific remit. This act of effective limitation seems to be quite unexpected by the Spanish Inquisition.
June 10: The Boys Scouts Association issues a report on the continued progress of the Scouting movement in the British Empire and Commonwealth, noting that in Britain alone, there were 2.8 million Boy Scouts and Cubs and 2.4 million Guides and Brownies; the latter have seen an increased uptake in recruitment due to the success of the ‘Brownings for the Brownies’ fundraising drive.
June 11: Peter Smithers MP, long standing chairman of the House of Commons Select Committee on Un-British Activities, where he followed in the footsteps of his redoubtable father, announces a fresh series of investigations into Red influence on academia and the arts.
June 12: A meeting of various Central American leftist revolutionary groups and KGB advisors takes place in Guatemala City to determine the next phase of the concerted liberation struggle.
June 13: Echo class atomic cruise missile submarine K-56 collides with a Soviet research vessel off Cape Povorotny and, despite the desperate attempts of her crew to save her, is sunk, killing 23.
June 14: The Ministry of Food publishes a paper on the British diet, noting that meat consumption has continued to rise, even through the recession, due to increased production, utilisation of the Commonwealth stockpile and successful television and wireless advertisements for British beef and veal, pork, lamb and mutton and chicken. Whilst traditional roast joints, steaks, chops and stews remain the most popular forms of meat consumption, there has been an a noticeable rise in the popular consumption of minced, diced and sliced meats for simpler occasions.
June 15: The 'Hicklin test' for obscenity is upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in United States v Caulfield, maintaining the established standard that all material that contributes in some way to the corruption and depravation of minds open to immoral influence is obscene, regardless of any perceived artistic or literary merits.
June 16: USAF B-47 Stratojets bomb suspected communist rebel camps in Eastern Angola in support of Portuguese forces operating against the Frente Popular de Libertação de Angola.
June 17: RCMP Special Cases investigators destroy a nest of vampires hidden deep in the slums of Old Mexico City, having followed the trail of a suspected black lotus smuggling ring all the way from Vancouver.
June 18: Opening of the Washington Summit of the ‘Big Three’ superpowers, with General Secretary Sergeyev and Prime Minister Barton being formally welcomed by President Reagan. It is hoped that the summit could lead to some sort of breakthrough on the nuclear arms race.
June 19: Travellers in Ronceveaux Pass report hearing the echoing blasts of a horn, which they surmise to be some sort of haunting recurrence of the sounding of Roland’s Olifant, 1195 years ago.
June 20: Unveiling of the prototype Tanque Argentino Mediano in Buenos Aires. The 36t tank is much lighter than the MBTs in used in the first world, having been designed as a cheaper alternative to them for rougher terrains and militaries with more modest budgetary restrictions, and is praised as such in the Argentine technical military press until the field tests of July 13th against the M60 and Chieftain.
June 21: Sir Kimball O’Hara retires from Indian government service after over 75 years of assorted confidential roles and classified missions, stating that he will divide his time between his estate in Shimla and visiting the residence of his longtime friend and confidante Mowgli in the Mahadeo Hills above Seoni.
June 22: Opening of the British Army Equipment Exhibition at Pegasus Village in Aldershot, organised by the Sales and Aid Department of the War Office and showcasing the military vehicles, missiles, weapons and equipment produced by the forty two Royal Ordnance Factories and 320 large and small firms directly engaged in defence production. Britain's position as one of the top exporters of arms in the world over the postwar decades remains a significant source of foreign earnings and the emerging markets in Asia, Africa and the Middle East offer great future potential alongside traditional clients in South America and Europe. Orders for British tanks alone contribute hundreds of millions of pound to the country’s economic health every year.
June 23: LAPD detectives arrest long time fugitive Nazi war criminal Kurt Dussander, living under an assumed name in the suburbs, after a tipoff from 12 year old Todd Bowden, who recognised the old man from a school project; the youngster’s hand is shook and hair is formally ruffled in congratulation by Captain Joe Friday.
June 24: A resolution for the expansion of the Council of the League of Nations to 15, consisting of the five permanent members and a number of rotating seats (two from Latin America, two from Western Europe, one from Eastern Europe, one from the Commonwealth, one from the Middle East, one from Africa and two from Asia) is unanimously passed. A proposal for the expansion of the permanent members was unsuccessful due to Soviet and Chinese concerns.
June 25: King Zod of Albania signs an agreement with Emperor Alexander in Constantinople for a timetabled program of defence coordination and security cooperation.
June 26: England set a new Test cricket record in the Third Test against New Zealand at Lords, winning by an innings and 624 runs, having scored 854/6 declared and dismissing New Zealand for 98 and 132, with Geoffrey Boycott topscoring with 254, Keith Fletcher making 178, Colin Cowdrey 156 and Alan Knott 150*.
June 27: A suspected Arab terrorist is killed by a remotely detonated bomb planted in his parked automobile in Paris, with the assassination ascribed to the work of Israel’s Mossad.
June 28: British unemployment peaks at 1.54%, or a total 1,846,800 men and women, amid the first clear signs of economic recovery. Treasury figures will later show a decline in GDP of 1% in the first quarter and 0.6% in the second before the bullish recovery in the second half of the year.
June 29: Japanese industrial defence scientists demonstrate a new model of a Toyota utility vehicle that is capable of transforming into an off-road armoured vehicle. Whilst the concept has been dismissed as a mere novelty by some, Prime Minister Yukio Mishima is heard to remark approvingly that “they are more than meets the eye” to inventor Dr. Tenma and his accompanying child android.
June 30: A British husband and wife are rescued by a Korean fishing boat after having drifted at sea for 120 days in the Pacific Doldrums, following the sinking of their pleasure yacht by a whale. Their incredible ordeal will later serve as the basis for Staying Alive, a 1975 motion picture adaption.
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Post by simon darkshade on May 5, 2024 4:01:09 GMT
June Notes- Spielberg's Flipper is a different film and not quite the same blockbuster; the market is rather different as well, in addition to ongoing discomfort about megalodon and GWS attacks and what was done in response to them. Dune is going to be made earlier than 1984 (in any event, with the @ soundtrack) and Morning Star 40,000 is fairly much the antithesis of Warhammer 40k, reflecting the differing circumstances of its origin, being a novel product of the early 1970s rather than a miniature game in 1980s Britain - Here, there isn't a fiery and bloody Tupolev crash at the Paris Air Show, but rather, a sign that they are still seen as the way of the future. Air travel in general is still in its 'golden age' period of class, luxury/benefits (such as proper meals, decent legroom and larger seats) even for economy class and non-deregulated prices. The 1980s emergence of cheap 'flying Greyhound buses' is a long, long way off, if it emerges at all. By the by, there are some interesting sorcerous efforts underway to provide barriers between the smoking and non-smoking sections on flights - Trooping the Colour is larger, with 12 Guards (compared to the @ practice of 8 at this point) of greater strength, with the other noticeably different features being the larger number of Guardsmen lining the Mall in numbers similar to 1953 (without the modern unfortunate spectacle of police facing the crowd), the inclusion of a feu de joie and the much larger RAF flypast - The flood donations refer to the circumstance evoked in the Canadian wireless commentary piece by Gordon Sinclair, whereby the Mississippi floods did not elicit a skerrick of help, whereas the US rallied to help those affected by the flooding of the Nile, the Ganges and the Niger. Here, there is the capacity to assist and a generally greater sense of cousinly/neighbourly connection - TA roulements are a way of maintaining effective total strength whilst appearing to save money on the accounts books, as well as providing men and units with substantive experience - Titania doesn't appear to be teeming with life in the same way as the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, but still has some weird stuff going on. More scientists will be screwing up their hypothesis and starting over with new data - Despite the first and second rules of Fighting Club being 'Do not talk about Fighting Club', they are as nothing before the tenacity of Marty Crane and Agents Cooper and Mulder of the Y Files - The Spanish Inquisition did not expect the King to start to push back against their more extravagant flourishes - No change of name in 1967 for the Boys Scouts Association, chiefly because there was no need for the @ Chief Scout's Advance Party review from 1964-1966. The uniform remains the traditional one with shorts and campaign hat rather than long trousers and berets. 'Brownings for the Brownies' comes on the back of the Guides being 'handed down' the stocks of Sterling SMGs - The House of Commons Select Committee on Un-British Activities has more to it than meets the eye. It is a function of looking like assuaging some American concerns regarding suspected dalliances with communism, which are actually previously turned double agents and even unknowing double agents; providing cover for investigations into actual Red penetration/influence attempts that, for various tactical and operational reasons, have been decided need to be exposed; obscures the real committees working against the Reds; and provides some nice compensatory role for a certain type of MP who would otherwise ruffle feathers, yet can’t quite be trusted (on ground of competence or otherwise) to be bought into the inner circles. Thus, rather than being a rather clumsy and American hammer (in search of a nail), it is a picture of one that obscures the secret entrance to a room with more secrets and more secret exits - The Soviets see Central America as ripe for being a potential front for insurgency; actually projecting force there is seen as ridiculously unlikely - K-56 is lost here, rather than grounded on a sandbar - We begin to see slight shifts in the type of meat consumption with new generations having more time and more money, as well as the seeming embrace of new technologies; this manifests itself in faster cooking cuts and recipes for weeknight meals - The Hicklin test remains in the absence of a 1957 reassessment in Roth v United States, which effectively means that the broader definition of obscene content rules out certain novels, films and publications that otherwise rose to prominence in the 1960s and early 70s and the absence of the @ Miller test. The flow on effects of this mean that more risque content in films is doubly staked (after the first one from the Motion Picture Code), pornography is subject to much greater legal persecution (with no @ window of child pornography not being illegal in most jurisdictions), no rise of comedians using rude words for shock effect and there is a lack of bad language on television programmes, with the furthest extent being the 1960s uses of 'damn', 'hell' and 'dammit' - USAF bombers joining in to support the Portuguese in Africa indicates some very different strategic concepts - The Mounties always get their man, or, in this case, their covert vampire drug smugglers - Slow efforts towards some sort of cap on nuclear arsenals inch forward - The TAM tank is a good little vehicle and well suited for its designed role. The only issue is that it can't penetrate either the M60 or the Chieftain with its current armament, and they can blow its turret clean off from 3000 yards away; in light of the Brazilians just ordering hundreds of each, the TAM goes back to the drawing board for modifications - Kim and Mowgli are long time friends; they regard Sir Rudyard Kipling's adaptions of their adventures rather fondly, reflecting the want of old men to regard their youth through rose coloured glasses - The Army Equipment Exhibition is an @ development, albeit from 1976: www.kvbk.nl/sites/default/files/bestanden/uitgaven/1976/1976-0506-01-0129.PDF- Kurt Dussander is one of the two villains from Stephen King's novella 'Apt Pupil, or the Summer of Corruption' in the collection D ifferent Seasons (which coincidentally included The Body, which became Stand By Me, and Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption, which became The Shawshank Redemption) which was later ruined as a film adaption in 1998 by Bryan Singer. Here, Todd is taught about the Holocaust that little bit earlier, and has just that little bit more moral reinforcement that, despite his morbid curiosity (that would turn into full blown evil as he grew up), he does the right thing and turns in the old Nazi concentration camp commandant rather than seek to hear the details of his stories and in doing so, saves his soul - Expansion of the Council of the League follows on similar expansion of the UN Security Council in the @ 1960s, albeit with different categories of nations still maintained. Expansion of the permanent members to 6 is a bridge too far at this point, as the likely candidates are all seen as being in the orbit of the US and Britain - British unemployment starts to go down fairly rapidly from this point as the economy bounces back and this is the last time it will be in seven figures for many a long year. Unlike the @ 1973-1975 recession in Britain, this is very much a V shaped recession rather than a protracted U shape, without the added kicker of an oil shock hanging in the shadows of the second half of the year. Just as in America, there is an absence of protracted stagflation and the British economy has fairly strong fundamentals - the balance of trade and balance of payments remain positive, secondary industry contributes 42% of GDP (tertiary 48% and primary 10%) and the domestic market has an ever increasing appetite borne of affluence - PM Mishima considers that the Toyota 'transformer' is 'more than meets the eye'; the opinion of Dr. Tenma and Astro-Boy is not available at this time - The husband and wife adrift in the Pacific is an interesting story drawn directly from @
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Post by simon darkshade on May 18, 2024 11:23:17 GMT
July
July 1: The world premiere of Richard Attenborough’s epic war film A Bridge to Victory takes place in London before Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and His Royal Highness Prince Phillip. The 219 minute film, which tells the tale of Operation Market Garden, the Allied invasion and liberation of the Netherlands by the Allied Airborne Army, the First Canadian Army and British Second Army, was filmed from September 1970 to November 1971 on location in Europe and, with a budget of almost $70 million, is comfortably the most expensive film made to date. The initial impression of the audience and critics at the premiere are that it is a masterpiece, with massive set piece battle scenes and aerial filming capturing the grand scale of the campaign most successfully.
July 2: President Ronald Reagan tops the list of the most admired Americans, followed by Reverend Billy Graham, former President John F. Kennedy, Chief Justice Richard Nixon, Dr. Martin Luther King, Neil Armstrong, General Dwight Eisenhower, Linus Pauling, Edward R. Murrow and General Creighton Abrams, the victor of Vietnam.
July 3: A joint Rhodesian and South African force of four reinforced brigades begins a sweeping offensive into the District of Manica and Sofala of Portuguese East Africa in conjunction with Portuguese Colonial Army troops and supported by RRAF and RSAF fighter-bombers. A decisive shift in the course of the Portuguese counter-insurgency is viewed as strategically vital by Cape Town and Salisbury and it is considered that the greatest opportunity for victory lies in the east.
July 4: The latest report on US economic data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis is released, showing that the markets and the country has well and truly transitioned into the recovery phase, with GDP growing by 1.2% in June alone. A positive side effect of the recovery is the restoration of a positive balance of payments, whilst the end of reduction of the once mountainous debt accrued during the Second World War is now in sight, and could be reached by 1975 or 1976.
July 5: A fire breaks out at a railyard in Kingman, Arizona whilst propane is being transferred from a railcar into a storage tank, threatening to cause a massive boiling liquid expanding vapour explosion. The surrounding firemen report hearing a sonic boom and seeing a red and blue flash before the railcar is hurled several thousand feet into the air mere seconds before it explodes into a fireball over two hundred feet across; the strange intervention is considered as saving the lives of dozens of firefighters and onlookers within the blast zone on the ground.
July 6: Filming begins for the first picture of a planned film trilogy adaption of Robert E. Howard's Conan the Barbarian in Spain, directed by young John Milius and starring Arnold Schwarzenegger in the title role alongside Bruce Lee as his companion Subotai, Reb Brown, Sandahl Bergmann, Brian Blessed, Tomasz Wiseau, Max von Sydow, Chuck Norris, Geoffrey Bayldon, and Sean Connery as the wicked Thulsa Doom. Howard will later visit the film set and comment on the high quality and thematic veracity of the adaption.
July 7: The Ethiopian General Election sees voters across the empire select from over five thousand candidates for the 400 seats of the Chamber of Deputies. Longtime Prime Minister Mekonnen Endelkachew remains in office in a sign of continuing stability.
July 8: The Metropolitan Police Force begins the issuing of new L2A4 assault rifles for issue in patrol cars, replacing the earlier mix of carbines to complement the Sterling automatic shotgun and the general service sidearm .455 Webley automatic pistol. Scotland Yard has plans to issue new expandable truncheons and electrical stunguns to street patrols in the East End as part of the next phase of police armament modernisation in response to the London Outrage and Tower Bridge Incident of 1968; the last five years have also seen an increase in the strength of the Met from 64,378 to 75,924 to provide for more effective coverage of all shifts and locations.
July 9: Treasure hunters claim to have uncovered the sunken wreck of the 17th century Spanish treasure galleon Nuestra Señora de Atocha off the Marquesas Keys, with the fabulous treasure aboard worth $1 billion.
July 10: Wealthy American oil scion John Paul Getty III is kidnapped by a dastardly gang of Italian criminals in Rome, who demand a ransom of $25 million from his billionaire grandfather. Rather than cave into the ransom demand, J. Paul Getty immediately cables Memphis, Tennessee, summoning the aid of Reverend Elvis Presley.
July 11: After reports of an attempted heathen revival in Borgarfjörður, 30 Church of Iceland paladins and warrior priests descend upon the area to investigate, supported by a British team from the Office of the Witchfinder and determined to scour out the blasphemous wickedness with fire and sword.
July 12: The US National Personnel Records Center of the General Services Administration completes the task of fully computerising and indexing the service records of US Army personnel between 1912 and 1956, amounting to over 36 million individual files. The process allows not only for research of individual service records for family or historical purposes, but also shows up a number of anomalous cases, which are promptly handed over the FBI's 'Y-Files' office for further investigation.
July 13: Swedish driver Ronnie Peterson wins the British Grand Prix, over New Zealander Denny Hulme, Austro-Hungarian Niki Lauder, American Steve McQueen, Jackie Stewart and Graham Hill making up the rest of the top five finishers.
July 14: Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Mishima unveils a new ambitious ten year plan for the modernisation and expansion of the Imperial Japanese Armed Forces, with the Imperial Japanese Army to increase its regular and reserve strengths by a quarter and form a volunteer reserve component based upon the US Army National Guard and the British Territorial Army; the Imperial Japanese Air Force to increase its tactical fighter and interceptor force by 40% and field new strike fighters, long range interdiction aircraft and ground attack bombers; and the Imperial Japanese Navy to further develop capabilities for long range defence against submarine threats and kaiju attacks.
July 15: A massive mudslide threatens to devastate the Soviet Kazakh city of Alma-Ata before being halted by the new Medeo Dam and the intervention of a number of redclad flying heroes.
July 16: Alan Turing is created a Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II for his services to the British Empire in the Second World War and subsequent pioneering work on the development of the modern computing engine.
July 17: KGB agents begin clandestine release of specially bred variants of Mongolian death worms, produced in Professor Lysenko's underground Biopreparat laboratories deep beneath the Urals, in the Sahara Desert as the first stage of experimental deployment of the results of the Iskusstvennoye Sushchestvo programme.
July 18: The Times features a story on the postwar rise of English wine, with the improved weather conditions allowing for the expansion of vineyards beyond the traditional viticulture heartlands of Kent, Sussex and the West Country (where some monastic vineyards have a heritage stretching back before the Norman Conquest) further up into the Home Counties and East Anglia, whilst newer strains of blue wine promise to return the popular type of yore to the forefront of the vinter's consideration along with the Continental reds and whites, the green win of Ireland and the golden wine of the Lyonnesse mountains.
July 19: King Mohammed Zahir Shah of Afghanistan celebrates the 40th anniversary of his accession to the throne in a joyous ceremony in Kabul. The ongoing modernisation of Afghanistan over the last twelve years of his reign has been widely labelled as the 'Afghan Renaissance', with a new constitution, free elections and universal suffrage, the liberalisation of women's rights and a number of great national infrastructure projects pushing the Anglo-Indian protectorate well and truly into the 20th century. The occasion is made doubly auspicious by the completion of the new railway between Kabul and Peshawar through the Khyber Pass
July 20: Negotiations between the central Congolese government and the provincial administrations of Katanga and Kisu break down over intractable differences regarding power sharing and security. The latter provinces have a greater prevalence of mercenary units of the Armee Nationale Congolese under their command, with their issues and demands being a quite significant driver of the general restiveness, after the concerns of foreign mining companies. The United States, France and the British Empire have expressed concern at the development, given that it could potentially drive the Leopoldville government further towards the orbit of other external powers.
July 21: France conducts a further semi-atmospheric thermonuclear test at Mururoa Atoll in French Polynesia, on top of a successful firing of the prototype Matra ASLP missile carrying a dummy TN72 warhead at a target ship.
July 22: Orion 7 astronauts conduct simultaneous landings on Oberon and Umbriel, further showcasing the impressive capabilities of NASA and the USSF. Both landing teams remark on the even more alien landscapes and the strange manifestations of apparent mineral structures reminiscent in some ways of vegetation.
July 23: The Home Office reports that murders across the British Isles in 1972/73 fell to 96, with the drop being severally ascribed to ever more efficient police investigation and swift punishment acting as a deterrent, increased community links and relative affluence, religious revival and the completion of the economic readjustment process following the demobilisation of additional forces required for deployment to the Far East during the Vietnam War.
July 24: Former President John F. Kennedy opens an exhibition of the photographs taken for the 'Documerica' project of the US Environmental Protection Agency in New York City. Over 5000 photographs showcase a range of human and natural landscapes and environments from across the United States.
July 25: BBC’s Panorama programme feature an investigation of the Isle of Man Railway and the running of its curious enchanted locomotives, particularly in light of the new undersea tunnel connections with mainland England. Isle of Man Railway Controller Sir Topham Hatt, who cut a svelte figure, proudly displayed the new locomotives purchased for the new 'Kipper Express' service to the mainland.
July 26: At the direction of the King, strong elements of the Royal Guard of Chile preemptively surround and assault a number of Chilean Army bases in the immediate surrounds of Santiago, with the move bought on by indications of an imminent coup against the Chilean government. The Chilean High Command is summoned to the Palace for a series of frank conversations on the King’s view of extra-constitutional action by any party or group.
July 27: The BBC begins broadcast of a fifth national radio station, the Sports Programme, joining the BBC Home Service, the Light Programme, the Third Programme and the Children's Programme, and intended to provide 24 hours of sports coverage from around the world, particularly for evening and night shift workers; the sixth station slot remains occupied by regional BBC services across the British Isles. The Light Programme also introduces a daily folk music programme in response to its increasing popularity.
July 28: Emperor Maximilian II of Mexico, whilst visiting the neighbouring state of Yucatan to examine a newly discovered underground Maya ruined city, gives a speech on the importance of Mexico's relations with not just the Yucatan, but the rest of 'independent Central America', stating that the strategic value of the region, particularly the potential of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, is among the true treasures of the 20th century.
July 29: Reverend Elvis Presley and his loyal posse storm a cave complex in Calabria, rescuing the kidnapped John Paul Getty III; the Italian gangsters have no response to the surprise attack of the laser sword wielding Presley, the overwhelming power of Lucky the wise-cracking allosaur and the mesmerising enchanted guitar playing of James Hendrix.
July 30: Famed illustrator and author Frank Tinsley is presented with a special Lifetime Achievement Award by Mechanix Illustrated for his innovative work over the past five decades in 'visualising the future that has now come', particularly through his 'Let's Build...' advocacy articles during the Second World War and the Korean War.
July 31: Commonwealth troops in Uganda officially hand over their occupation and reconstruction mission to a brigade sized field force of the King's African Rifles, who are to remain in support of the reconstituting Ugandan authorities under the oversight of Imperial authorities and Governor-General Sir Thomas Acton. The presence of the Imperial garrison in adjacent Kenya is considered sufficient force to respond to any further civil strife, with certain special forces elements to remain operational within Uganda for now.
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Post by simon darkshade on May 19, 2024 15:25:45 GMT
July Notes
- A Bridge to Victory is a different film to A Bridge Too Far, not simply on account of the differing circumstances and outcome of the battle, but of the much greater available stores of WW2 equipment and its combination with visual illusions, which can produce a product on a par with the best CGI from @ 2024. There are even more iconic 'big picture shots', showing the scale of the air and land forces deployed in a manner reminiscent, in a certain way of the 2011 South Korean picture My Way, which portrayed D-Day as more than just a bloody tactical fight far better than multiple more acclaimed Western films. Thus, rather than Brigadier J.O.E. Vandeleur being pictured with several dozen tanks and halftracks, hundreds of Centurions, tracked APCs and other assorted vehicles are shown, including some aerial wide shots to give scale; as well as the excellent take-off, flight and paradrop scenes of the aerial armada, there is also a wide angle 'illusorily modified' image of the hundreds of Dakotas and Victorias (and Skymasters and Hastings) flying over the Channel, and several comparable scenes of the supporting bombers and fighter-bombers; rather than a single 25pdr battery providing a brief preliminary barrage to the Guards Armoured Division advance, there is an 'illusorily modified' depiction of 8 field, 4 medium, 2 heavy, 2 superheavy and 4 rocket regiments providing the kick-off. It also features the first major heliborne assault, with a battalion of US Army Rangers directly hitting the Son Bridge
- This isn't a veiled criticism of the @ ABTF, which did what it did very well, but simply an illustration of *how* applied magi-tech, among other capacities, can make a radical difference in every facet of everyday life, including the motion picture trade
- The 'Most Admired American' list was and is a real list, with the array of names here based on the type of men historically cited. It allows for a bit of a display of who is still around (Eisenhower, JFK and MLK) and an image of a respected Nixon who has never quite got the opportunity to show his less admirable traits
- Rhodesian and South African intervention in Mozambique, as well as Angola, shows that there is a joint determination and realisation that the flanks of Southern Africa are more important than the 'frontline' up on the Congo border
- The US economy begins bouncing back from the recession, with very solid fundamentals. The reference to WW2 debt refers to the $394 billion of the total DE WW2 cost that the USG funded through debt/bonds; US DE GDP in 1945 was £108,974,358,974.36 or $435,897,435,897.46 in 1945 DE USD, putting the total at below 100% of GDP and less than @, but still eye-wateringly high by DE/in-universe standards. It was reduced by some of the federal primary surpluses of 1946-1949, before Korea and the Cold War changed priorities, and then further reduced by the surpluses of the second half of the 1950s. Most of all, it has shrunk dramatically as a percentage of GDP given the very large growth of the United States in 1945-1973. Symbolically paying off the wartime debt and bonds is seen as an attractive path by some; note that there distinctly isn't mention of the debt accrued by Korea, the Cold War and Vietnam, which is a whole different basket of cash
- No Kingman BLEVE tragedy, due to *someone* intervening and chucking the railcar far up into the air
- Conan the Barbarian is a longer, higher quality picture compared to the @ one, but still maintaining the parts that were good, great and awesome in @; no James Earl Jones casually turning into a snake during a weird orgy, for example
- Ethiopia is much more stable and not about to experience the Derg
- The Metropolitan Police are not only larger, and have never moved away from their armed period, but are now reacting to previously signposted developments, debates and policy shifts that have occurred over 6-10 years. The increasing wave of terrorist incidents begats a reaction, which in this case is an armament level not reached until US police forces in the 1990s
- John Paul Getty III's kidnapping is handed over to Reverend Elvis Presley, who has an excellent track record in such matters...
- The @ heathen revival in Iceland lead by Sveinbjörn Beinteinsson and which became Asatru comes up against different circumstances here
- No fire destroys the US National Personnel Records Center, which in turn shows up some strange things that should not be there...(start whistling the X-Files theme tune)
- Japanese rearmament kicks up a pace, with the excuse of Godzilla being quite useful in a certain fashion
- Behind the Iron Curtain, there dwell Red superheroes
- Alan Turing gets further recognition
- The KGB are up to something in the Sahara, but the release of modified lifeforms or 'artifical creatures' into the wild can surely, surely not go wrong in any way, can't it?
- English wine returning is another manifestation of a different climate, not due to global warming here, but rather localised climate control through the Sunstone since 1947
- Afghan railways are a sign of a country heading on a different trajectory, as well as a continuation of the King's modernising policies
- The Congo starts to hit something like the @ mercenary revolts of 1967, that little bit later (adjusting for the later independence of the Congo from Belgium) and without a Mobutu in charge
- French nuclear tests are hitting the grey area of 'semi-atmospheric', but aren't quite yet going out and breaking the moratorium
- Orion 7 discovers strange marvels on the Uranian moons
- The murder rate drops in Britain; there are a number of reasons cited there by in-universe experts, but the most important of them is the relative affluence and its flow-on effects on communities
- The Isle of Man Railway is very much based upon Reverend Wilbert Awdry's Railway Series, which was adapted as Thomas and Friends
- Rather than Chile being a case of the Chilean Army & Ors vs the Allende government & Ors, this shows that there is a third faction at play that doesn't want either side to cross the event horizon of a coup or other extra-constitutional action. The outcome here won't be the @ one, but will be based in a certain way on another @ series of events, in a different country
- BBC radio stations did not change their names in 1967 in an attempt at modernisation, nor has there been a distinct move to follow the golden calf of youth oriented pop music and pop culture, either on the wireless or on television. In the absence of rock and roll, 'pop' music is very different in some ways, but there are some elements that are similar - songs such as 'You'll Never Walk Alone' and 'Downtown' are around, reflecting their different origins and style, but guitar bands don't really register outside of country music. An exception to this, in a certain way, is the rise of folk music as a popular youth niche, which will manifest itself in something like the historically influenced folk rock bands of @, such as Steeleye Span, Pentangle and Spriguns of Tolgus
- Frank Tinsley, rather than dying mostly unremembered, gets some recognition here for his quite zany and funny ideas; this is a universe that regards them more seriously
- A pullback of sorts from Uganda, but not one that leaves a vacuum for 'Generic Strongman Dictator' to try and take over. The British approach has been to set very clear red lines to the circumstances of independence of her former African colonies and, whilst such an approach can be afforded both financially and diplomatically, there is not a great deal of appetite for abandoning it and creating a vacuum for other powers to enter; the result is 'a very British Franc-afrique'
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stevep
Fleet admiral
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Post by stevep on May 19, 2024 15:35:26 GMT
JulyJuly 1: The world premiere of Richard Attenborough’s epic war film A Bridge to Victory takes place in London before Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and His Royal Highness Prince Phillip. The 219 minute film, which tells the tale of Operation Market Garden, the Allied invasion and liberation of the Netherlands by the Allied Airborne Army, the First Canadian Army and British Second Army, was filmed from September 1970 to November 1971 on location in Europe and, with a budget of almost $70 million, is comfortably the most expensive film made to date. The initial impression of the audience and critics at the premiere are that it is a masterpiece, with massive set piece battle scenes and aerial filming capturing the grand scale of the campaign most successfully. July 2: President Ronald Reagan tops the list of the most admired Americans, followed by Reverend Billy Graham, former President John F. Kennedy, Chief Justice Richard Nixon, Dr. Martin Luther King, Neil Armstrong, General Dwight Eisenhower, Linus Pauling, Edward R. Murrow and General Creighton Abrams, the victor of Vietnam. July 3: A joint Rhodesian and South African force of four reinforced brigades begins a sweeping offensive into the District of Manica and Sofala of Portuguese East Africa in conjunction with Portuguese Colonial Army troops and supported by RRAF and RSAF fighter-bombers. A decisive shift in the course of the Portuguese counter-insurgency is viewed as strategically vital by Cape Town and Salisbury and it is considered that the greatest opportunity for victory lies in the east. July 4: The latest report on US economic data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis is released, showing that the markets and the country has well and truly transitioned into the recovery phase, with GDP growing by 1.2% in June alone. A positive side effect of the recovery is the restoration of a positive balance of payments, whilst the end of reduction of the once mountainous debt accrued during the Second World War is now in sight, and could be reached by 1975 or 1976. July 5: A fire breaks out at a railyard in Kingman, Arizona whilst propane is being transferred from a railcar into a storage tank, threatening to cause a massive boiling liquid expanding vapour explosion. The surrounding firemen report hearing a sonic boom and seeing a red and blue flash before the railcar is hurled several thousand feet into the air mere seconds before it explodes into a fireball over two hundred feet across; the strange intervention is considered as saving the lives of dozens of firefighters and onlookers within the blast zone on the ground. July 6: Filming begins for the first picture of a planned film trilogy adaption of Robert E. Howard's Conan the Barbarian in Spain, directed by young John Milius and starring Arnold Schwarzenegger in the title role alongside Bruce Lee as his companion Subotai, Reb Brown, Sandahl Bergmann, Brian Blessed, Tomasz Wiseau, Max von Sydow, Chuck Norris, Geoffrey Bayldon, and Sean Connery as the wicked Thulsa Doom. Howard will later visit the film set and comment on the high quality and thematic veracity of the adaption. July 7: The Ethiopian General Election sees voters across the empire select from over five thousand candidates for the 400 seats of the Chamber of Deputies. Longtime Prime Minister Mekonnen Endelkachew remains in office in a sign of continuing stability. July 8: The Metropolitan Police Force begins the issuing of new L2A4 assault rifles for issue in patrol cars, replacing the earlier mix of carbines to complement the Sterling automatic shotgun and the general service sidearm .455 Webley automatic pistol. Scotland Yard has plans to issue new expandable truncheons and electrical stunguns to street patrols in the East End as part of the next phase of police armament modernisation in response to the London Outrage and Tower Bridge Incident of 1968; the last five years have also seen an increase in the strength of the Met from 64,378 to 75,924 to provide for more effective coverage of all shifts and locations. July 9: Treasure hunters claim to have uncovered the sunken wreck of the 17th century Spanish treasure galleon Nuestra Señora de Atocha off the Marquesas Keys, with the fabulous treasure aboard worth $1 billion. July 10: Wealthy American oil scion John Paul Getty III is kidnapped by a dastardly gang of Italian criminals in Rome, who demand a ransom of $25 million from his billionaire grandfather. Rather than cave into the ransom demand, J. Paul Getty immediately cables Memphis, Tennessee, summoning the aid of Reverend Elvis Presley. July 11: After reports of an attempted heathen revival in Borgarfjörður, 30 Church of Iceland paladins and warrior priests descend upon the area to investigate, supported by a British team from the Office of the Witchfinder and determined to scour out the blasphemous wickedness with fire and sword. July 12: The US National Personnel Records Center of the General Services Administration completes the task of fully computerising and indexing the service records of US Army personnel between 1912 and 1956, amounting to over 36 million individual files. The process allows not only for research of individual service records for family or historical purposes, but also shows up a number of anomalous cases, which are promptly handed over the FBI's 'Y-Files' office for further investigation. July 13: Swedish driver Ronnie Peterson wins the British Grand Prix, over New Zealander Denny Hulme, Austro-Hungarian Niki Lauder, American Steve McQueen, Jackie Stewart and Graham Hill making up the rest of the top five finishers. July 14: Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Mishima unveils a new ambitious ten year plan for the modernisation and expansion of the Imperial Japanese Armed Forces, with the Imperial Japanese Army to increase its regular and reserve strengths by a quarter and form a volunteer reserve component based upon the US Army National Guard and the British Territorial Army; the Imperial Japanese Air Force to increase its tactical fighter and interceptor force by 40% and field new strike fighters, long range interdiction aircraft and ground attack bombers; and the Imperial Japanese Navy to further develop capabilities for long range defence against submarine threats and kaiju attacks. July 15: A massive mudslide threatens to devastate the Soviet Kazakh city of Alma-Ata before being halted by the new Medeo Dam and the intervention of a number of redclad flying heroes. July 16: Alan Turing is created a Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II for his services to the British Empire in the Second World War and subsequent pioneering work on the development of the modern computing engine. July 17: KGB agents begin clandestine release of specially bred variants of Mongolian death worms, produced in Professor Lysenko's underground Biopreparat laboratories deep beneath the Urals, in the Sahara Desert as the first stage of experimental deployment of the results of the Iskusstvennoye Sushchestvo programme. July 18: The Times features a story on the postwar rise of English wine, with the improved weather conditions allowing for the expansion of vineyards beyond the traditional viticulture heartlands of Kent, Sussex and the West Country (where some monastic vineyards have a heritage stretching back before the Norman Conquest) further up into the Home Counties and East Anglia, whilst newer strains of blue wine promise to return the popular type of yore to the forefront of the vinter's consideration along with the Continental reds and whites, the green win of Ireland and the golden wine of the Lyonnesse mountains. July 19: King Mohammed Zahir Shah of Afghanistan celebrates the 40th anniversary of his accession to the throne in a joyous ceremony in Kabul. The ongoing modernisation of Afghanistan over the last twelve years of his reign has been widely labelled as the 'Afghan Renaissance', with a new constitution, free elections and universal suffrage, the liberalisation of women's rights and a number of great national infrastructure projects pushing the Anglo-Indian protectorate well and truly into the 20th century. The occasion is made doubly auspicious by the completion of the new railway between Kabul and Peshawar through the Khyber Pass July 20: Negotiations between the central Congolese government and the provincial administrations of Katanga and Kisu break down over intractable differences regarding power sharing and security. The latter provinces have a greater prevalence of mercenary units of the Armee Nationale Congolese under their command, with their issues and demands being a quite significant driver of the general restiveness, after the concerns of foreign mining companies. The United States, France and the British Empire have expressed concern at the development, given that it could potentially drive the Leopoldville government further towards the orbit of other external powers. July 21: France conducts a further semi-atmospheric thermonuclear test at Mururoa Atoll in French Polynesia, on top of a successful firing of the prototype Matra ASLP missile carrying a dummy TN72 warhead at a target ship. July 22: Orion 7 astronauts conduct simultaneous landings on Oberon and Umbriel, further showcasing the impressive capabilities of NASA and the USSF. Both landing teams remark on the even more alien landscapes and the strange manifestations of apparent mineral structures reminiscent in some ways of vegetation. July 23: The Home Office reports that murders across the British Isles in 1972/73 fell to 96, with the drop being severally ascribed to ever more efficient police investigation and swift punishment acting as a deterrent, increased community links and relative affluence, religious revival and the completion of the economic readjustment process following the demobilisation of additional forces required for deployment to the Far East during the Vietnam War. July 24: Former President John F. Kennedy opens an exhibition of the photographs taken for the 'Documerica' project of the US Environmental Protection Agency in New York City. Over 5000 photographs showcase a range of human and natural landscapes and environments from across the United States. July 25: BBC’s Panorama programme feature an investigation of the Isle of Man Railway and the running of its curious enchanted locomotives, particularly in light of the new undersea tunnel connections with mainland England. Isle of Man Railway Controller Sir Topham Hatt, who cut a svelte figure, proudly displayed the new locomotives purchased for the new 'Kipper Express' service to the mainland. July 26: At the direction of the King, strong elements of the Royal Guard of Chile preemptively surround and assault a number of Chilean Army bases in the immediate surrounds of Santiago, with the move bought on by indications of an imminent coup against the Chilean government. The Chilean High Command is summoned to the Palace for a series of frank conversations on the King’s view of extra-constitutional action by any party or group. July 27: The BBC begins broadcast of a fifth national radio station, the Sports Programme, joining the BBC Home Service, the Light Programme, the Third Programme and the Children's Programme, and intended to provide 24 hours of sports coverage from around the world, particularly for evening and night shift workers; the sixth station slot remains occupied by regional BBC services across the British Isles. The Light Programme also introduces a daily folk music programme in response to its increasing popularity. July 28: Emperor Maximilian II of Mexico, whilst visiting the neighbouring state of Yucatan to examine a newly discovered underground Maya ruined city, gives a speech on the importance of Mexico's relations with not just the Yucatan, but the rest of 'independent Central America', stating that the strategic value of the region, particularly the potential of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, is among the true treasures of the 20th century. July 29: Reverend Elvis Presley and his loyal posse storm a cave complex in Calabria, rescuing the kidnapped John Paul Getty III; the Italian gangsters have no response to the surprise attack of the laser sword wielding Presley, the overwhelming power of Lucky the wise-cracking allosaur and the mesmerising enchanted guitar playing of James Hendrix. July 30: Famed illustrator and author Frank Tinsley is presented with a special Lifetime Achievement Award by Mechanix Illustrated for his innovative work over the past five decades in 'visualising the future that has now come', particularly through his 'Let's Build...' advocacy articles during the Second World War and the Korean War. July 31: Commonwealth troops in Uganda officially hand over their occupation and reconstruction mission to a brigade sized field force of the King's African Rifles, who are to remain in support of the reconstituting Ugandan authorities under the oversight of Imperial authorities and Governor-General Sir Thomas Acton. The presence of the Imperial garrison in adjacent Kenya is considered sufficient force to respond to any further civil strife, with certain special forces elements to remain operational within Uganda for now.
Well some interesting developments here although some nasty things as well. Sounds like the Soviets are seeking to add a touch of Dune to the Sahara, while the bloodbath in Iceland is a nasty reminder of the backward nature of religious intolerance and savagely in the DE TL. I'm also understandably worried by the level of militarization of the police despite the apparently stronger social order in Britain although the more horrendous nature of the DE universe with so many monsters about.
Good news about avoiding the OTL bloodbath in Chile and it appears that superheros are successful in both east and west.
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Post by simon darkshade on May 19, 2024 16:06:02 GMT
Steve,
- The Soviets don’t quite know what will result from what they are doing; their intent is to constrain exploitation of certain oil deposits
- Whilst the words ‘fire and sword’ are used regarding Iceland, it won’t be a bloodbath either in numbers (only a handful of kooky types) or how they are treated; it is more a matter of how it is outwardly shown
- The police armament, as written in the notes, comes from some very big terrorist incidents as well as the potential for nasty creatures. This isn’t a jump from an unarmed Dixon of Dock Green to Hot Fuzz, but rather from police armed with pistols and a shotgun in the boot of their patrol car to police with both of those and a rifle. Note that most Met ‘street bobby’ policemen at this time aren’t in cars, but are on foot patrol, so this doesn’t apply to them. In 2024, they have 5200 vehicles of all kinds, whilst in 1973 DE, it is rather fewer than that. For any major incidents, after the Special Patrol Group, the Home Office would deploy the Royal Constabulary, who as a gendarmerie like force do have rifles and machine guns, among other weapons, as well as call upon the Guards units on various public duties posts around Central London
- As said, Chile has a different future; superheroes aren’t limited to one ideology or superpower, but come from and work with many countries and groups
Simon
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Post by simon darkshade on May 19, 2024 16:49:10 GMT
Further to the policing issue, there is this extract from ANJ
Thankfully, there were no truly egregious challenges to internal security either at present or on the immediate horizon, with only a minor fringe of Communist sympathisers, fellow travelers and a smattering of silly radicals showing up as issues for the Security Service and Special Branch. There had been some occasional attempts by the equally fringe racialists to stir up trouble regarding the small coloured immigrant populace from the West Indies, India and the Far East that was concentrated in London and the major cities, but they had been quickly cracked down upon by the police. In any event, the numbers of immigrants were sufficient small and stable that there wasn't a basis for escalation. General standing plans for the unlikely event of civil disorder on a scale of the prewar Continent were due for their regular five-year update, with a proposal for a phased four level reaction involving local police forces, Special Patrol Groups, the Royal Constabulary and, at Phase 4, the Army, as well as an update of the Riot Act. That there hadn't been any incidences of such since the Cable Street affair of 1936 did not mean that it would never occur again, but Barton viewed some of the items as less than necessary - in the light of advances in crowd control spells as used in the field in Egypt in 1956 and the use of police lions, there wasn't a burning requirement for 'water-cannons' or the use of tear gas. This was Britain after all, not France or Italy! Still, the spectre of an armed outrage by the likes of the International Revolutionary Army or some of the other anarchist or communist terrorist group did nag at him, particularly in light of the events of 1960 that had been revealed to him as part of his initial Prime Ministerial secret briefing. Perhaps there would be some utility to form a special Scotland Yard unit for even the most remote of contingencies, such as this Special Wizardry and Tactics team.
General crime had been on a downward trend for six years, averaging 370,000 a year across the United Kingdom, and violent crime in particular had taken a sharp decline with the introductions of geases and the new wave of scientific policing; he did think that general affluence and the emphasis on internal security in the face of foreign threats since 1956 might have something to do with it as well. After all, when a young man has a good job, a wife or sweetheart and a family to think about and a decent home, he is less likely to get caught up in crime. Even if he did, there was less opportunity to get away with it when there were a lot of eyes watching. Murders had slightly risen in 1963 to 103, but that seemed more of a temporary aberration than a definite trend that would get Pierrepoint and his fellows dramatically busier…Barton felt that law and order had always been one of Labour’s strengths in his time as Leader and he was determined to be tough both on crime and the causes of crime.
- That was in late 1964. Since then, most of it has come to pass, including an updated Riot Act that reduces the period of time before dispersal and other means can be employed.
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Post by simon darkshade on May 22, 2024 13:29:09 GMT
Coming in August-December 1973:
- The Defence Policy of the Reagan Administration takes shape, with a different balance coming from a shift to a 'peacetime budget', but one of a noticeably increased share even compared to the pre-Vietnam JFK Administration, who were absolutely no shirkers in terms of defence. This will need a bit of a discussion and note in its own right, but there will be some signposted events
- Rapprochement attempts between Indonesia and the British Empire in the Far East
- The origin of Stockholm Syndrome
- Events come to a head in Chile
- Indochina continues to slowly rebuild from the war
- A fair bit of sporting news
- Instead of a Food Pyramid, we will see a somewhat different 'Food Circle', or 'Daily Plate'
- The Middle East simmering down; the presence of outside forces makes it a bit more difficult for various 'sides' or regional powers/states to tear at each other
- Some interesting cultural developments
- A boy in Lambton catches a queer looking worm
- A Royal wedding, Egyptian tombs, a special 99th birthday, assorted tax cuts and other legislation, and a significant arrest of an international threat
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lordroel
Administrator
Posts: 67,971
Likes: 49,378
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Post by lordroel on May 22, 2024 13:40:57 GMT
Coming in August-December 1973: - The Defence Policy of the Reagan Administration takes shape, with a different balance coming from a shift to a 'peacetime budget', but one of a noticeably increased share even compared to the pre-Vietnam JFK Administration, who were absolutely no shirkers in terms of defence. This will need a bit of a discussion and note in its own right, but there will be some signposted events - Rapprochement attempts between Indonesia and the British Empire in the Far East - The origin of Stockholm Syndrome - Events come to a head in Chile - Indochina continues to slowly rebuild from the war - A fair bit of sporting news - Instead of a Food Pyramid, we will see a somewhat different 'Food Circle', or 'Daily Plate' - The Middle East simmering down; the presence of outside forces makes it a bit more difficult for various 'sides' or regional powers/states to tear at each other - Some interesting cultural developments - A boy in Lambton catches a queer looking worm - A Royal wedding, Egyptian tombs, a special 99th birthday, assorted tax cuts and other legislation, and a significant arrest of an international threat Will we see something more than the 600-ship Navy, maybe the 1200-ship Navy |
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Post by simon darkshade on May 22, 2024 14:54:51 GMT
Considering that in the 1961 orbat, there are 680 major surface combatants alone, that is a very comfortable assumption; with amphibs and minesweepers, there were 1072, plus 150 major support ships and 179 submarines. Whilst some large classes of WW2 construction ships have retired over 1961-1973, the USN has not contracted a huge amount and indeed has seen considerable expansion for vessels suited to South East Asian operations.
I'll have to crunch out an updated US orbat (as well as the other elements of the British one apart from the RN), but it won't have shrunk as noticeably in @.
Further to that particularly idea, what I'm trying to tease out is that this is a Reagan Administration coming in not on the heels of Carter and the post Vietnam period, but on top of very different foundations; consider that the USA still outguns the USSR in ICBMs and nuclear warheads by more than 2:1, having not halted their construction of either in the mid 1960s as in @ under McNamara. Large gestures such as an equivalent to an "X Ship Navy" aren't really needed in the same way.
What I am anticipating is:
- Increased Gato class SSN production per year
- Initiation of a new SSBN class
- New CGNs, DLGs/CLGs, DDGs and FFGs and development of an entirely new ship type
- Cruise Missiles. A lot of cruise missiles
- Initiation of a new strategic bomber project in addition to B-52 replacement, with latter retained ‘sideways’
- A lot more new F-111s and beefing up of the F-15, F-16 and F-20
- For the US Army, initiation of development of the successor the M-70 MBT and new SP artillery; and some new U.S. Army divisions
- Extra funding for new ICBMs
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Post by simon darkshade on May 27, 2024 14:21:09 GMT
August
August 1: The League of Nations Commission on Cambodian Reconstruction reports that the Indochinese nation continues to recover from the effects of the recent war ahead of anticipated schedule, with no deaths from either violence or unexploded ordnance and mines over the last two months.
August 2: Opening of the Imperial Conference in Colombo, with the main items scheduled for discussion being economic modernisation, diversification of technology, regular consideration of internal non-tariff barriers and internal migration between Commonwealth states.
August 3: CIA agents in La Paz conclude that the ELN and IRA are building up their strength for a concerted offensive action in Bolivia and recommend that US air and land forces be prepared to reinforce the current presence of one battalion of Green Berets from the 13th Special Forces Group.
August 4: A 13 year old Milwaukee boy is committed to indefinite detention at the Central State Hospital for the Criminally Insane in Waupun after investigations into juvenile delinquency and animal cruelty lead to reasonable grounds for the administration of the controversial Jekyll Test for latent criminal potential.
August 5: Indonesian diplomats in Switzerland pass a proposal through the French to the British Embassy for the winding down of active operations in Borneo and an eventual cessation of the Confrontation between Indonesia and the British Empire. proposes winding down Konfrontasi.
August 6: Dreadnought begins to slow down its initial acceleration phase on her journey from Mars to Saturn, remaining on schedule to arrive in January 1974 with the aim of using Saturn for a gravity assist for the subsequent two year voyage out to Neptune. NASA plans for the Grand Tour of the Solar System are scheduled to launch Orion 11 in 1976, following on the three Orion missions scheduled for the intervening three years.
August 7: A radio call for help from a boy trapped in an overturned truck with his deceased father in the vicinity of Albuquerque leads to one of the largest peacetime search and rescue missions in U.S. history. 'Lost Boy Larry' Ehrhardt is eventually located three days later by local 15 year old Boy Scout Walter White and makes a full recovery, with his grateful grandfather establishing a special trust fund for his intrepid rescuer.
August 8: Opening of the Royal Air Force Exposition 73 at RAF Farnborough, displaying the full range of combat aircraft operated by the RAF and a number of prototype warplanes, including the BAC P.96 fighter, the Hawker-Siddeley HS.1236, the de Havilland DH.187 and the Gloster Gladiator battlefield ground attack fighter. The exposition also makes pointed note of the increased production capacity of adjacent Royal Aircraft Factory after the completion of the expansion project of the last five years.
August 9: Nazi death camp guard Hermine Braunsteiner is formally extradited from the United States to Austria-Hungary after an investigation initiated by famed Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal.
August 10: A 12000t granite boulder known locally as the 'Nantua Pillar' is arcanely ‘caught’ and fixed in place overhanging the town after seeming to be on the brink of falling on the French Alpine town of Nantua following the intervention of a holidaying German wizard.
August 11: The defence policy of the Reagan Administration continues to take shape, with projections for shipbuilding in 1974/75 calling for a a total of six SSN nuclear attack submarines and increased orders for guided missile cruisers and destroyers. Design of a new class of large nuclear powered guided missile super cruisers, a guided missile ocean escort to complement the Knox class Joint Anti-Submarine Frigate and a new type of light surface combatant are underway at various stages of completion, with a requirement for a new SSBN to carry the Undersea Long-range Missile System also featuring high on the list of naval priorities. The USAF has indicated that it would regard the retention rather than the replacement of the B-52 Stratofortress favourably, as the Advanced Global Strategic Bomber programme continues to make steady if unspectacular progress, with the B-52's payload and range having proved its mettle time and again in the Far East and Africa
August 12: Deutsche Reichsbahn institutes a new series of reforms aimed at improving punctuality from its current low level 83% through the use of special computing engines for coordination of regional and national timetables and a 'real time' arcane model showing the position, speed and progress of every DR train currently in service. The two 5000mm lines of the former Breitspurbahn between Cottbus and Aachen and Hamburg and Munich, often regarded as the Rothaariges Stiefkind of the German rail network, are ironically markedly more punctual at at average of 92%
August 13: Completion of Kryal Castle, a replica medieval keep near Ballarat in country Victoria, replete with drawbridge, complex hedge maze, feasting hall, grim dungeons and a moat with Bazza, the resident (friendly) bunyip. It is to prove a popular event location and attraction for young and old alike.
August 14: British Mediterranean Command stages Exercise Gyrfalcon, a joint exercise in the Eastern Mediterranean, consisting of amphibious forces operating from Cyprus, covered by the Victorious carrier group, conducting landing operations on Crete, contested by a force based around HMS Formidable operating from Malta. The RAF contingents of both sides demonstrate the long range capabilities of the Avro Arrow and newly acquired F-111s.
August 15: An article in The New York Times notes that the 'country music bubble' looks to have burst, or at least started deflating, with fewer country groups climbing the record sales charts in June and July in comparison to adult contemporary pop music, easy listening and new swing artists. In response, Arkansas quintet Hogface Murphy and the Squidling Jeroboams release a satiric answer song (Just Because My Bubble's Bursting) It Doesn't Mean I Don't Love You.
August 16: Publication of The Gulag Archipelago, dissident Soviet author Alexsandr Solzhenitsyn's stinging account of life as a zek, or prisoner, in the Soviet labour camp system and the bloody purges of Stalin Senior, in Paris, having been secretly smuggled out to the West from behind the Iron Wall.
August 17: US Navy carrier deployment from the Seventh Fleet on ‘Yankee Station’ off the coast of North Vietnam is phased back to two carrier battle groups operating out of Subic Bay, with a separate battleship battle group at Cam Ranh Bay; this reduction comes as the 7th Marine Division begins redeployment from South Vietnam to the Philippines.
August 18: The All American Soap Box Derby in Akron results in scandal, as the winning boy is subsequently found to have an electromagnet secreted in the front of his purportedly unpowered car and disqualified, forfeiting his prestigious college scholarship.
August 19: The Indian national soccer team qualifies for 1974 World Cup, sensationally defeating Peru in Calcutta 3-2, with the winning goal by speedy forward Inder Singh coming with barely 10 seconds left to play. The Peruvian Football Federation and the government in Lima are, to put it mildly, displeased by this course of events.
August 20: Uruguay signs a trade agreement with Britain raising the annual British purchase of beef to 500,000 tons and facilitating expansion of the industrial packing facilities at Fray Bentos; the beef is to be allocated to Home Office civil defence reserve stocks and the Ministries of Health and Education.
August 21: An outbreak of cholera in Naples, suspected to be caused by shellfish imported from Tunisia, leads to the water supply being chlorinated, the streets sprayed down with formaldehyde and an emergency vaccination programme initiated within days, which vaccinates over 1.3 million people in a week. The USN Sixth Fleet steps on to vaccinate 50,000 people using fast action pistol syringes at its southern fleet base.
August 22: A private member's bill for the abolition of capital punishment is defeated in the House of Commons 624-158, with Government Chief Whip Reg Prentice noting that, "in the midst of a national recovery from recession and with a multitude of serious issues facing the country, it does speak volumes of the priorities of some of those opposite."
August 23: Jan-Erik Olsson attempts to rob the Kreditbanken on Normmalstorg Square in Stockholm in an effort to secure the release of his criminal mentor, seizing four hostages and exchanging fire with the police. They respond with firegas and, whilst subsequently storming the bank, accidentally combine the effects of two experimental arcane wands of command and paralysis, their own police protective cloaks and a small basket of seafood. The resulting impacts wears off the hostages after two days, but the captive Olsson remains unable to stop vomiting elvers for the better part of a fortnight; research wizards will later dub the accidental effect as ‘Stockholm Syndrome’.
August 24: The Chilean Chamber of Deputies narrowly passes a watered down vote of censure against Premier Salvador Allende, with the acquiescence of several independent members being bought through the dilution of the language and sentiment contained in the motion, so as to make it a mere gesture.
August 25: A middle-aged ne'erdowell is arrested for the attempted abduction of two girls, aged 11 and 5, at a SANFL football match at Adelaide Oval, with a quick-thinking off-duty police constable stopping the man as he attempted to carry off the distressed younger girl. He is charged with two counts of aggravated kidnapping and subsequently sentenced to death by hanging.
August 26: The Royal Navy's East Africa Station establishes a new patrol off the coast of Somalia in response to rising incidences of suspected pirate activity, suspected slaving ships and low level Somali provocations along the Kenyan border. The light aircraft carrier HMS Justinian, the frigate HMS Ambuscade, the sloop HMS Skylark and the corvettes Pansy, Dunvegan Castle and Osborne Bay are assigned, in conjunction with HMKS Kenya of the Royal East African Navy and HMIS Nilgiri and a RNAS Buccaneer squadron operating out of St George's Island.
August 27: An underwater expedition sponsored by the National Geographical Society locates the sunken wreck of the US Civil War era ironclad monitor USS Monitor off the coast of Cape Hatteras. Debate on the question of raising her begins, with key issues including her deteriorating condition, her position with regard to the territorial waters of North Carolina and her legal status as an article of federal property.
August 28: The Mexican states of Puebla and Veracruz are struck by an earthquake measuring 7.5 on the Richter scale, killing over 600 people, including 120 in the collapse of a larger apartment building in the city of Orizaba. The new guided missile battleship Montezuma, fitting out at Veracruz, suffers no damage.
August 29: Britain's strong economic recovery from the recession continues to gather pace, as unemployment falls further with the recovery of business and industry, the progress of Royal Highway construction, the expansion of oilfield development and offshore platform manufacture for the booming North Sea oil and gas sector and the flow-on effects of initial work on the expansive 'New Cities' program.
August 30: First flight of the Sikorsky Vertibird quad tiltrotor VTOL aircraft, an ambitious multirole assault transport/gunship equipped with an integrated 37mm autocannon and a number of other cutting edge classified capabilities. It is designed for a combat range of 750 miles with a maximum speed of 350mph and can carry a reinforced platoon of troops or 64,000lb of equipment and supplies.
August 31: The world heavyweight title fight between American George Foreman and Briton 'Little John' Smith at White City Stadium results in a majority draw after 15 rounds, with neither boxer able to land a a conclusive knockout blow.
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