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Post by simon darkshade on Jul 23, 2024 16:37:53 GMT
If every little detail is given away in the timeline, there is less scope for future story hooks; additionally, leaving some things deliberately vague or ‘blurry’ is a bit of contingency in case other people ever join in the DEverse.
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on Jul 23, 2024 16:39:35 GMT
If every little detail is given away in the timeline, there is less scope for future story hooks; additionally, leaving some things deliberately vague or ‘blurry’ is a bit of contingency in case other people ever join in the DEverse. Was joking, do not want to get into trouble with, who would it be that would visit me.
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Post by simon darkshade on Jul 23, 2024 22:44:38 GMT
As said, there is no trouble or in universe effect, with the decision being for primarily authorial purposes.
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Post by simon darkshade on Jul 24, 2024 5:12:08 GMT
Before any notes on 1973, to let things sink in a bit and give more than 13 hours for comment, some overall analysis for 1974 and beyond:
- The stock market crash has not lead to a U shaped recession but a more conventional (for postwar DE) V shaped one akin to that of 1960 and 1958 in @ - In a significant part, this is due to the lack of an accompanying oil shock on top of a continued Bretton Woods system and the shorter Vietnam War - Inflation is seen as *a* problem, relatively speaking, even as it is at 3% vs ~15% in Britain and 4% vs 9% in the USA. In both cases, it is likely to drop to the 1.8-2% mark by the end of 1974 - A flow on effect of this will be a lack of a Steel Crisis, with heavy industries remaining robust in both countries, just as they are in Germany, Japan, France and elsewhere - Recovery will drive demand and there won't be the same reverberation that was a significant factor in the advent of the 'Rust Belt' and similar entities across the Western world - Right at a time when energy became a major geopolitical and domestic albatross in @, there is almost the inverse situation with the growth of nuclear (fusion) power and a lack of oil prices being used as an OPEC political instrument; the very different make up of DE OPEC militates against that - This different situation of the international economy and that of the national economies of the Western world will have downstream effects upon politics, culture, law and order, defence capacity and more broadly, the general mood of the decade as it approaches its halfway mark - The Middle East is tense in a different way, with less specific tension in some areas being offset by there not having been any 'release valves' in the 1950s and 60s. When states and leaders forget what war is like, it somehow becomes more palatable in a certain sense - Leading the world in terms of difference is Indochina. Rather than the domino theory seeming to come to fruition, there is a sense that the Communist advance in South East Asia has been decisively halted, at least for now. There is a lack of any major outflow of refugees from Vietnam and elsewhere, which will have 'downstream' consequences on a whole range of issues across many countries - In turn, the outcome of the Vietnam War means that there won't be a 'Vietnam Syndrome'. The impact upon US defence policy in particular will be interesting, with an end to conscription being unthinkable and a great many projects likely to be viewed in different lights - Africa is profoundly different, but like the Middle East, the absence of some @ issues, problematic leaders and problems doesn't necessarily make for a utopic outcome. The Congo is the next flashpoint - The Soviet Union isn't in a period of Brezhevian stagnation, but is shifting gears from the initial 25 years of post WW2 recovery related growth. It does have the advantage of having seemingly solved its major agricultural issues of @ and is dabbling around with some paths not taken. There is some sense that Sergeyev is prepared to 'bend the meaning of socialism' similar to Khruschev, yet not identical; there is a strong iron hand maintained in the red velvet glove - China, having not been out in the cold/behind the Bamboo Curtain in the same manner as @, isn't positioned to rise in the same manner as on Earth, either in terms of a US embrace against the USSR and an eventual economic opening and growth - International terrorism just took a little hit - Arms control, that ever present feature of the second half of the Cold War, is yet to manifest in any meaningful manner; the scope for the Soviet Union catching up with the USA in strategic weapons is minimal - Technology is pushing ahead of @ by ~10 years in some areas - As the 1970s progress, the advances in medicine of the last decade will start to be felt in more profound and interesting ways...
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Post by simon darkshade on Jul 25, 2024 5:46:34 GMT
December 1973 Notes
- The Adelaide tank factory is built on the site of the Wingfield Rubbish Dump/Landfill and is quite well positioned for either sea or train transport of tanks with only a modicum of changes to some rail lines. It is built in Adelaide to take advantage of the available power generated by SA's nuclear plants, following on from a continued period of industrial growth under Sir Thomas Playford, as well as to distribute facilities away from Sydney and Melbourne. On a broader level, it shows a great degree of difference in Australia's defence industrial capacity, and in turn Commonwealth integration thereof; and some different diversification of the Australian economy - Buckaroo Banzai is joined by Ramírez ("I'm not Spanish, I'm Egyptian!"), Tomasz Wiseau (who bears a purely coincidental resemblance in name and appearance to the director of The Room) and Dr. Insano, a character from the defunct YouTube comedy series The Spoony Experiment - New Zealand, that great opponent of all things nuclear in other universes, has its electricity capacity significantly increased by a single plant. The consequences on what it is capable of will be interesting - The BAOR is larger than @, consisting of 6 forward deployed divisions of I and II Corps, plus corps level troops in brigades and field forces and Army level assets; III and IV Corps in Britain; and the Canadian I Corps. There is some consideration being given to forward deploying a division from the British based corps to the Continent, or alternately to increasing the forward deployed 'POMCUS' divisional equipment sets in the Low Countries and Western Germany. Many of the infantry battalions and armoured regiments of the BAOR have been or are in the process of converting to 'tank heavy' or 'infantry heavy' Battle Groups, whilst others (usually in divisions used in reserve) maintain a different structure that suits their purpose; in each case, they are fielding attachments of the new weapons systems so that each Regiment or Battalion has substantially increased firepower and staying power - Japan's curious KFC at Christmas tradition starts a year earlier, whilst the descendants of Asterix and Obelix continue to love wild boar - An effective cure for paraplegia will have a few consequences down the line, as well as improving the lives of many ordinary people - Dr. Emmett Brown got a little excited when the first experimental fusion reactor hit 1.21 gigawatts - Bernard Giles gets caught and fried in short order - JFK gets a Nobel Peace Prize for a variety of reasons, all of which are cumulatively a bit controversial - The little snippet about the American cost of living is an indicator that things are on a different trajectory - British firms start working on a secret speeder/hoverbike for some reason - Canada has a very decent sovereign wealth fund, yielding quite the useful annual return for funding some budget areas. The other interesting tidbit is the Canadian currency... - The Trafalgars are exceptionally powerful and expensive SSNs with a multi-faceted role in various warplans; alongside the R and S class boats, they represent quite the British edge against the Soviets - Sea World gets some extra killer whales early on, being delivered by a very, very big flying boat: the successor to the Saro Queen, being about 1.5 times the size and capable of carrying 2500 passengers or a lot of cargo - The reenactment of the Boston Tea Party is a historical event, just without the terrible waste of perfectly good tea - Older trees are being found in some areas, with others having ice sheets at that time... - The real substance of Barton's address can be found in the implications of 'help at home' - A number of new US Army projects begin, ranging from the conventional (a new version of the M109) to the imposing (a 1980s MBT carrying on the M-70 that will bear some resemblance to the Abrams) and the very different indeed (double barreled SP howitzer). This 'hides' the significant news of 4 newly activated/reactivated divisions and the broader shape of the US Army, with some units being easily understood, some new (mechanised cavalry being equipped with some different weapons systems for potential deployment in the ME as well as Europe) and others being very different indeed (a Ranger division of multiple regiments, a Commando division separate from the Rangers and Green Berets and actual artilllery divisions as postulated by military journals in the 1960s and 70s) - The Prime Minister of Spain is another emerging 'interesting' type; the idea of national leaders with their own weapons was inspired by an old picture of Lincoln shooting first, taking out Booth with an over the shoulder revolver snap shot - Operation Fateful Lightning, whose name speaks volumes, was commanded by a General Joshua Chamberlain - Pharoah Tutankhensetamun is from a children's animated show from ~ 2003 named Tutenstein - The Soviets fiddling about with giant spiders, ants, radscorpions, mutated wasps and other nasties is one way they seek to redress the strategic balance, as well as showcasing the sheer nuttiness of Lysenko and Co - The Father Christmas Letters are less of a fiction here - Holding a Christmas feast in the Crystal Palace is a nice way of showing that it is not just still around, but frequently used (the size of the interior lends it towards some events), whilst the cost of decent Christmas hampers would be quite considerable, but not for the world's wealthiest monarchy - Ultra is officially declassified earlier, along with an expedited completion of the Official History of the Second World War - Comet Kohoutek ends up as less of a fizzle - Japan tries to make its own ABM, whilst hedging its bets with the (earlier) Patriot, which in turn is based on its hotter earlier version - Some sense of arms control is seen as in the interests of the superpowers and Great Powers, but the devil is in the detail - Carlos gets captured, and not by a country that only has life imprisonment - Dreadnought heads on out to Neptune, behind Orion 6 and with a little hat tip to Star Wars in the wording
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Post by simon darkshade on Aug 28, 2024 13:20:27 GMT
Looking ahead to 1974:
- The world bounces back from the 1973 recession - Britain, Canada and the USA start to deal with the beginnings of an energy glut - Some things begin to shift in Africa on at least four fronts - A variety of new ships, aircraft, weapons, television programmes, films and books make an appearence - Japan continues to streak forward, surpassing other nations as its economy grows. A partial constraint upon this will be its defence budget and armed forces, eventually - In South East Asia, we see what I like to characterise as the opposite of an earthquake, or video footage of a rock being chucked into a pond rolled in reverse, with the removal of the ripples of Vietnam. This is firstly felt in Cambodia, then Thailand, Burma and Malaya and most notably in Indonesia, which is inching towards 'coming in from the cold' to a certain extent - Patty Hearst has a different period of captivity, before someone, ahem, ensures that she is 'returned to sender' - Some familiar notes from our own 1970s crop up, in the form of some cricketing names, Dungeons & Dragons, certain films, novels and even some versions of popular music - On the British political front, some clear air starts to emerge between the Labour Government and Conservatives on immigration, although the positions of each party are quite distinct from those adopted by their Earthly equivalents. This isn't meant to provide any commentary on contemporary matters on Earth, but rather to reflect where an opposition party might go to distinguish itself from a 4th term government when the major grounds of economics, defence, foreign policy, industry, the welfare state and social policy have a great deal of consensus - The canals of Venice get drained and cleaned (having not happened in 1956 due to the rather large events happening that year) - Persia starts to hit its straps, not entirely due to oil revenues. Like its neighbour in Afghanistan, there is something of a liberal mood in the air, for now - We delve into some statistics, which is one of my little areas, looking at crime rates, sickness/mortality, job data and a bit more on both sides of the Atlantic - The different path and trajectory being enjoyed by the Soviet Union continues to come to the fore, with a clearer distinction from the Brezhnevian Stagnation of the @ 1970s coming through each year. This isn't to say that it is not a repressive dictatorship, but rather that the inner picture aligns more with concerned estimations from the West as to their staying power and capabilities - South American continues to both develop positively and simmer threateningly, providing one of several areas of tension to keep readers guessing as to what might be the Spark for something - The 1974 Soccer World Cup has some different competitors and a fair bit of excitement - Some positive moves on environmental protection and other measures start to compound; just as compound interest is a powerful force in other respects, so it is here - A few interesting talking vehicles do their bit - An @ PM has some success in yachting, in a bit of crossover with another pollie known for having a long swim - An extremely articulate politician from Singapore starts to make a name for himself in the Imperial House of Commons - Reagan doesn't end the policy of what amounted to a 'semi-detente' (primarily in Europe) that existed under JFK, but things start to cool down, driven by some Soviet mistakes and policies - Israel and the Arabs continue to bristle a bit. As I put it in a story that I'm not sure will end up being completed (due to a lack of a distinctive hook and theme at this time), one of the problems is that neither the Israelis or the Arabs have had experience of a real war in their neighbourhood since 1956 (and even that was a bit of a 'curbstomp' rather than a risky conflict) and a lot of lessons get forgotten in almost a generation; expeditionary war in Malaya and Vietnam isn't the same as the Middle East. Weighed up against this is the wishes of certain Western superpowers for any disagreements to be kept low level and non-military, particularly in light of disturbing recovery from the sharp recession of the previous year
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