Dark Earth: 1947

Steve, you are correct on the typo.

Britain knocking back Marshall Plan aid has set some alarm bells ringing in Washington, with the suppositions being that the British have found large oil, gold or diamond deposits and are trying to keep it secret; this doesn't seem to make sense, though.

South Vietnam is under the rule of Bao Di.

Both North Borneo and Sarawak are protectorates under White Rajahs, which raises some problematic issues later down the line.

No, they were found by him in the 1890s.

1947 Part 5b

1947 was marked by a number of different political, social and economic occurrences in Britain. The tough times of 1946 slowly faded away as the pace of reconstruction and demobilization grew and the country returned to peacetime customs. Over twelve and half million Britons had been serving under the King’s colours at the time of Japan’s surrender; by mid-1947, this had fallen to a little over three millions. The great fleets of escorts and merchant ships built at such great pace over the Second World War were laid up or sold for scrap. The vast squadrons of bombers and armies of tanks that had been the keys to victory in Europe, Africa and Asia now sat in hangars in Scotland and the fields of Ireland, if they had not already gone to the foundry to be forged anew.

The pace of demobilization had been managed by the Ministry of Labour and the War Ministry to avoid a labour glut, with priority being given to those with the longest service and combat veterans. Gradually, the millions of men were processed, being issued with their demob suit and their demob cash bonus of £100 and schooled on their rewards and benefits under the National Service Veteran’s Act of 1944, which offered housing and mortgage assistance, educational assistance to attend higher education and a guaranteed veteran’s pension. Demobilization was handled better than the rushed arrangements after the Great War, but due to the sheer scale of the task, there was a certain amount of dislocation and bureaucratic muddling up until mid-1946. For a brief few months, it seemed as if the every man on a British street wore a new uniform of the demob suit, overcoat and natty hat.

The men and women came back to a country changed in many ways by six long years of war, bearing the scars of bombing and rockets alongside the great new airfields, factories, fortifications and royal highways of the war effort. It had changed by far more than in a merely physical fashion. For the first time in twenty years, there was a new government, one that rode the pent-up desires of many for a new spirit of change. The Conservative-National government of the pre-war era was tainted by many with the mistakes of the past and voter turnout was higher than any previous national poll in the 20th century.

The 1945 General Election of September 28th had been extremely tight, with the Conservative Party winning 287 seats, the Liberals 185, Labour 152, the Nationals 35, Socialists 32, Radicals 25, Imperialists 18 and the various independents winning 16 seats. The great personal popularity of Churchill had not been enough to counterbalance strong swings to Labour in the industrial heartlands of Scotland and the North, whilst the Liberals made great gains beyond their traditional strongholds in Wales, the South-West of England and Lyonesse. The National Party vote in Ireland and Scotland dropped to levels unseen since the 1870s and the Socialist and Radical parties captured many new seats in the Midlands.

Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill advised King George VI that he would be unable to form a majority government or a stable coalition and that he should send for Richard Harcourt, the leader of the Liberal Party. After lengthy discussions with Labour leader Mr. Clement Attlee, Harcourt accepted His Majesty’s offer to form a new minority Liberal-Labour coalition government on October 2nd 1945. He had significant experience in operating in a coalition, having been Minister of War from 1941 to the end of the war under Churchill and distinguishing himself as the most highly regarded minister in that position for over half a century.

The dashing 48 year old Harcourt had won great renown on the fields of the Somme and Amiens in the Great War with the Household Cavalry and had risen to public fame in the aftermath of the Great Depression as a passionate and erudite advocate for liberalism and social reform. A staunch Liberal Imperialist and proponent of Imperial Preference, he supported the continued progress of Indian self government and the economic and political integration of the Dominions. With Churchill, he advocated an increased pace of rearmament by the British Empire in the face of expansionism by the fascist and communist powers in the 1930s and stood as a firm opponent of appeasement.

Prime Minister Harcourt took on the role of Minister of Reconstruction and appointed his fellow Liberals Sir Edmund Chamberlain as Chancellor of the Exchequer, Edward Blackstone as Minister of War, Viscount Samuel as Lord Chancellor, Gwilym Lloyd George as Minister of War and Sir Archibald Sinclair as Foreign Secretary. From the Labour Party, Attlee was named as Deputy Prime Minister, Ernest Bevin as Home Secretary and Minister of Labour, Aneurin Bevan as Minister of Health, Sir Stafford Cripps as President of the Board of Trade, Herbert Morrison as Minister of Pensions and Social Security, Eric Blair as Minister of Information and Hugh Dalton as Minister of Education.

The initial priority of the Harcourt ministry was on national reconstruction and the full implementation of the Education Act of 1943 and the Beveridge Report into social insurance and health care. An ambitious target of 10 million new homes in five years was set, along with an extensive programme of slum clearance and the construction of New Towns and Royal Highways. The Victorian and Georgian tenements of London, the Midlands and the industrial North were to be replaced with new semi-detached cottages with gardens and indoor plumbing. New towns built under the exacting standards of the elven garden city movement were planned out beyond the green belts surrounding London and the major cities to limit urban sprawl and protect the countryside.

The Prime Minister had long been a proponent of public works and the modernization of British infrastructure and took to his particular responsibility with great zeal. The wartime programme of reconstruction expansion of loading gauge of several major railways was expanded. Great new power stations began to spring up across Britain, with the expansion of both electricity supply and general electric production seen as key factors in continuing the growth of heavy industry seen in the war. In the South West of England, the newest four massive steam turbines were finally installed in the power plants of the mighty Severn Barrage, completing the process begun after the last war. British iron, steel, oil, gas and coal production hit new record heights in 1946, with international demand for raw materials driving the planning of new deep water ports at Felixtowe and Southampton. Intense arcane exploration of the floor of the North Sea by hydromancers employed by British Petroleum, Shell and Anglo-Saxon Petroleum was beginning to indicate some very encouraging prospects.

The economic recession that had begun in 1944 as mobilization limits were reached was finally receding and the burgeoning deficit was once again under control. The small surplus recorded in 1947 was projected to rise in 1948. Debt reached its highest percentage of Gross Domestic Product since the Great War in 1947 (61.1%), but remained just within the realm of serviceability. The balance of payments continued to tilt in Britain’s favour, with a current account surplus of £750 million coming from an export trade running at 185% of 1938 levels, domestic oil production and an extremely lucrative annual Martian convoy. 35% of imports came from the United States as compared to 24% of exports, with the gap requiring payment in hard currency, but the deficit was largely addressed by invisible income from investments in North and South America and growing Imperial assets such as gold production from the Lasseter Mine in Central Australia and crude oil from the Gawar Oil Field in Arabia.

The proposed Labour programme of nationalization of industry was tempered by the differing position of their Liberal coalition partners and the government’s narrow Parliamentary majority. Extensive consideration was given to the nationalization of the five major railway companies as part of a new plan for British transport, but the commanding heights of steel, coal, shipbuilding, mining and electricity remained beyond the pale of realistic consideration for the Harcourt government. Both the Liberal and Labour parties shared a common dream of building a New Jerusalem in postwar Britain, but they differed vehemently on the question of public ownership and socialism.

National Insurance and National Health Service Acts were passed in 1946 to great acclaim from the general populace and the Church, fulfilling the Liberal and Labour manifesto promise to fully implement the Beveridge Report. Alongside these great Liberal reforms was the lesser known Town and Country Planning Act. It set out wide ranging powers on land development, urban planning, the preservation of woodlands, forests, dwarven holds and great houses and precise urban building requirements; it is thought that the latter provision was one of the major reasons for modernist and brutalist architectural trends not being reflected in British urban construction in the 1940s and 1950s in the manner of the Continent.

The Conservative and National opposition did not sit idly by in 1945 and 1946, but vigorously opposed the extent of social welfare legislation in Parliament, playing on the divisions between the two major coalition parties. Churchill adopted a general position of criticizing the Liberals from the right and characterizing the more left wing elements of Labour as in thrall to the small Socialist faction. The Radicals positioned themselves as an ideological distinct faction apart from Left and Right alike, advocating land taxation reform, Christian socialism and abolition of the House of Lords. The die hards of the Imperialist Party generally supported the Conservatives, apart from on the longstanding India question that had lead to their separation in 1918.

The ardour of political struggles, as with much else around Western Europe, was cooled over the winter of 1946/47. It was one of the harshest in living memory, with extremely cold temperatures resulting from an anti-cyclone over Scandinavia and by late January even parts of Lyonesse and the Isles of Scilly were underneath several inches of snow. France, the Low Countries and Germany were all struck by terrible blizzards, exacerbating the problems that already beset their shattered nations. As February loomed as an even colder month, the decision was reached by the Ministry of Magic and the Cabinet in London to use the Sunstone, one of the three great magical artifacts forged at such great price to save the world from the dire threat of Nazi Germany in the darkest days of the war. The winds and snow abated and the fields and streets knew warmth once again. Whilst ice floes drifted past the coast of East Anglia, the dweomercraft of the Sunstone protected the sceptred isle from the icy grasp of the wolf winter, albeit only just. The coastal convoys and coal trains kept the vital power stations and the nation’s steam engines running. The winter gave way to a cold and wet spring, with the Thames bursting into flood in March and causing millions of pounds of damage.

The chilly conditions and heavy rain did have one unexpected effect, with the legendary Loch Ness Monster appearing just fourteen years after its last sighting, well ahead of the usual forty year cycle. As chance would have it, Nessie quizzically raised his mighty head out of the waters just as David Lean’s production of Shakespeare’s Richard I was beginning filming for the day on the shoreline beneath the backdrop of nearby Urquhart Castle. Laurence Olivier’s opening monologue was interrupted by the characteristic cheerful yips and yawps of a delighted Nessie, who has often associated humans with the prospect of fresh meat and plenty of attention. Seventeen sheep and several rolls of film later, the monster splashed farewell with his flapping flipper and dived back down. The benign nature of most of Britain’s lake monsters stood in stark comparison with the troubles experienced with a rogue megalodon off Amity Island later in the summer.

Away from the political arena and the vagaries of the weather, life was gradually returning to normalcy. Rationing of most basic foodstuffs and everyday goods had largely ended by late 1946, but there were widespread shortages of tropical fruits, exotic foodstuffs and luxury goods throughout most levels of society over the next few years. Beef, mutton, fish, vegetables and domestic fruits were comparatively plentiful and the welcome end of the sugar ration lead to a surge of cake making and baking. The hundreds of British Restaurants established by the Ministry of Food in 1940 continued to attract the patronage of large sections of society, offering large servings of simple, traditional food throughout the day. The BBC began television broadcasting anew, this time in colour. The flickering pictures were not seen in many homes in 1947, but the number of households with television sets increased to 200,000 by year’s end.

As cold spring turned into glorious summer, Test cricket made a welcome return to Britain, with the South Africans being roundly beaten 4-0 in a series remembered for years to come for Denis Compton’s marvelous batting and the sparkling debut of John Cathrington at Lord’s. Both would play key roles in the legendary Ashes series of 1948 against Bradman’s ‘Invincibles’. During the same heady weeks, the England football team conducted a successful tour of Western Europe, with the highlight being a 10-0 win over Portugal, whilst Liverpool were victorious in the First Division of the Football League. The distinguished athlete and missionary Eric Liddell undertook a series of talks across Britain after his return from China in late August. Finally, on September 16th on the Bonneville Salt Flats of Utah, the motorist John Cobb broke his own prewar land speed record in his Railton Special, reaching a speed of 401mph.

During the end of the winter, the Royal Family departed Portsmouth onboard the super battleship HMS Vanguard for a tour of South Africa and Rhodesia as the first stage of a circuit of all the Dominions in honour of their great wartime achievements. In a tour lasting 75 days, the Royal party covered over 15,000 miles and visited the vast gold mines and wheatfields, the famous Victoria Falls and the great Zulu indaba at Eshowe, where over a million roaring Zulus pledged their allegiance to the King. In the second half of the year, the nation was captivated by the fairy tale engagement of Princess Elizabeth to Captain Philip Mountbatten, announced in the height of the idyllic summer warmth of July. Mountbatten, a celebrated Royal Navy officer and captain of the famed cruiser Hero, was created Duke of Edinburgh prior to the wedding on the November 20th in Westminster Abbey, which was witnessed by over two million cheering people packed along the route from Buckingham Palace to the Abbey and almost half a million watching on television.

Britain’s industry took time to turn from the needs of a world war to those of peace, but some moved quicker than others. On September 26th 1947, the one millionth Land Rover rolled off the production line at Solihull as the sturdy quality and rugged utility of the wartime standby of the Imperial armies attracted ever greater consumer attention. Civil aviation in the British Empire and the United States was built around the great warbuilt glut of Vickers Victorias and Handley-Page Hastings in the former case and C-47s and C-54s in the latter, but the march of aircraft technology by no means stood still. An Imperial Airways Bristol Brabazon landed at New York’s Idlewild Field on October 12th after a non-stop flight of 14 hours with 284 passengers and crew onboard, opening up new frontiers in the expansion of air travel.

In the scientific laboratories of the Empire, British boffins continued to build on their record of outstanding wartime achievement with new developments such as the transistor and the integrated circuit. The mighty Colossus electrical difference engine captured the imagination of press and public alike across the Empire with its whizzing dials, astounding calculation abilities and unnerving chess skills. The scientists Edward Appleton and Robert Robinson received the Nobel Prizes for Physics and Chemistry respectively, but their achievements were overshadowed by the new race for space, which remained an area of considerable British strength and advantage. Professors Quatermass and Challenger of the Imperial Rocketry Programme were knighted and jointly awarded the 1947 Royal Prize for Science after the successful launch of the Newton I artificial satellite from Woomera in April and Captain Dan Dare of the Royal Space Force flew a Hawker-Siddeley Skybolt rocketplane to an altitude of 66,254ft at well over the speed of sound in December.

Britain stood at peace, but remained on guard in a new world that was becoming increasingly complex. The Royal Navy’s Exercise Manticore in the Atlantic was followed by Exercise Guisarme, a large Royal Air Force air defence exercise over the British Isles, North Sea and Low Countries involving over 1500 fighters coordinated by five of the newest airborne RDF equipped skyships. Two atomic tests were carried out in September at Maralinga in South Australia, demonstrating the power of the British Empire’s new series of A-bombs. The heavy but inevitable cuts to wartime defence budgets in the second half of the year lead to a certain contraction in strength, but only in comparison with the force of two years ago. The British Empire stood clearly alongside the other two superpowers as having capabilities several orders of magnitude greater than the rest of the world.

1947 in Britain was a year of new hopes and cooling glories; a year of warm summer and future strife; a year of new frontiers and old dangers; and above all else, a year of change.

1947 Part 5d

Anglo-American Relations in the Second World War

The Second World War of 1939-1945 saw the eclipse of the British Empire as the unrivalled world superpower and hegemon by the United States of America. Whilst Britain and the Empire were by no means bankrupt and prostrate by 1945, a clear changing of the guard had occurred. The American share of world manufacturing had risen from 30% to 42%, with Britain falling from 20% to 16% and the US Gross Domestic Product of over $4.25 trillion was equivalent to that of the combined total of Britain, the Soviet Union, China, Canada, India, France, Australia, Sweden, Belgium and the Netherlands. The total population of Britain and the Dominions was just over 234 million, behind the 240 million people of the United States and the 263 million of the Soviet Union, but their collective GDP of $2.5 billion was several orders of magnitude below that of the USA.

Britain produced well over half of the industrial output of Europe and over two thirds of global trade was conducted in sterling. London remained the centre of the world’s financial system, the sterling zone and the Imperial Preference trading bloc. Britain had more overseas investments than the rest of Europe combined and the British Empire remained the largest the solar system had ever seen. Compared to any other power save the United States, Britain could stand out in front.

Militarily, the United States had a clear advantage over Britain. The United States Army had fielded 13,564,837 personnel in 236 divisions, the United States Air Force 4,879,559 men and 101,297 aircraft and the United States Navy fielding 10 US Marine Divisions, 10,426 ships, over 40,000 aircraft and 6,234,751 men. The British Army fielded 5,632,749 men and women in 96 divisions, the Royal Air Force 3,287,214 men and 32,586 aircraft and the Royal Navy fielded 5 Royal Marine Divisions, 7959 ships, 16,285 aircraft and 3,769,552 men. However, the forces of the Dominions, India and the Empire provided millions of troops, thousands of additional aircraft and hundreds of warships under the overall command and direction of the Union Flag.

This balance of economic, industrial and military forces in 1945 did not necessarily reflect the balance of the relationship between the British Empire and the United States of America over the previous 6 years. From mid 1941 to late 1943, Britain and her indomitable Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill were the main drivers of the Atlantic Alliance, with 1944 being a year of shared power and 1945 seeing the clear ascendancy of the United States and Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman.

The personal relationship between Prime Minister Churchill and President Roosevelt lay at the heart of the Anglo-American alliance in the Second World War. The two men had been friends and correspondents since the Great War and, after the catalytic events of the Battle of France, began to forge a close partnership aiming to bring the United States into the war. Over the course of Churchill's state visits to the United States and the various Allied conferences that mapped the course of the war, this partnership would be the bedrock of victory. In 1944 and 1945, Roosevelt did lean closer to Stalin in an effort to forge a closer relationship built upon a mutual antipathy for imperialism, but did not encounter particular success.

After the Fall of France, the Vinson-Walsh Act had authorized $10 billion for naval expansion, defence spending increased exponentially and a peacetime draft had been put in place. An agreement had been reached for the establishment of US air and naval bases in key British possessions in the Western Hemisphere in exchange for annual payment and aircraft, the so-called 'Planes for Bases' Agreement. Whilst relations were warming, driven by the cordial bond between Roosevelt and Churchill, the American perception of Britain driving a hard bargain remained paramount in many influential minds.

American aid to the British Empire increased over the latter half of 1940, with arms purchases under Cash and Carry being augmented by transfers of surplus equipment and indirect loans through a complex web of British corporations in the United States. Roosevelt, after victory in the 1940 Presidential election, had began to advocate increased support of Britain, portraying their struggle as being vital for the defence of civilization.

By early 1941, British arms production could not equip or supply all of the projected 100 division British Army, the 50 divisions of the Indian Army, the Commonwealth and Imperial forces, the Free French forces in Britain and North Africa or the other various European forces in exile; British armament plans in 1939 had been based upon 1942 as the target year for a fully equipped field army. The ongoing requirements of the campaigns in the Mediterranean, the Middle East, Norway and the bitter fighting in North Africa were consuming equipment at rates beyond earlier predictions and the uneasy phoney war against the Soviet Union in Central Asia threw many calculations into disarray.

Roosevelt successfully pushed the Lend-Lease Act through Congress and the Senate amid strong Republican opposition, allowing for the transfer, sale, exchange, lease or loan of military equipment and supplies to the Allies. Churchill managed to resist concerted American attempts to tie the agreement to the liquidation of British commercial assets in North and South America and trade concessions, with the support and legitimacy of the Free French in Algiers proving pivotal.

Technical cooperation between the British Empire and the United States extended across a vast array of areas, including radar, sonar, anti-aircraft weapons, warships, armoured vehicles and tanks, small arms, artillery, aircraft, chemical and biological warfare, code-breaking, gyroscopic gunsights, self sealing fuel tanks, air to air refueling and half a hundred other technologies. The top secret British cavity magnetron and proximity fuse were licenced for unlimited US production in exchange for royalties as part of an exchange in 1940. British development work on jet engines, rockets, lasers, robotics, computers, electronic transistors, superbombers and atomic power was kept secret to various degrees, over Churchill's objections in some cases. Likewise, American development of a variety of technologies occured outside of the framework of absolute Allied cooperation.

The Frisch-Peierls memorandum served as the initial basis for cooperation between the atomic programmes of the United States and the British Empire, with Tube Alloys rapidly overtaken by the Manhattan Project from late 1942. The two programmes ran in parallel with mutual cooperation and assistance, with Tube Alloys only producing its first bomb in 1946, prior to a postwar cooling of atomic collaboration.

The global battlefield was divided up between the United States and the British Empire, with different theatres of operations being the responsibility of each Allied state. The Mediterranean, , the Atlantic, Africa, the Middle East, India and South East Asia were under the command of the British, with the Pacific, South America, North America and the Far East being under American command. The European Theatre of Operations would be under the unified command of the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force as a joint Allied responsibility, with the Combined Bomber Offensive also operating as a joint command.

There were a number of political, economic and operational sources of tension between Britain and the United States over the course of the war. A general American antipathy for the European colonial empires had a bearing on a variety of theatres and issues, with strong support for immediate Indian independence from various figures in the United States being one of the more notable events. Life Magazine asserted that the United States was not fighting for the preservation of the British Empire in the Far East; the Times responded that the British Empire did not need the United States to do so.

Whilst public political disputes over the nature of the prewar and postwar worlds were among the more obvious areas of difference between the Allies, it was questions of an economic nature that would prove more consequential, albeit less noticeable to the general populace. The British Empire held steadfastly to its system of Imperial Preference, with negotiations aimed at creating a postwar global economic order based upon free trade breaking down in 1943-44. From an American perspective, the British sought to both overplay and underplay their strengths, depending on what would gain them best advantage at specific times. The British felt that the Americans were attempting to use their advantages in economic, industrial and military strength to compel cooperation out of proportion to the relative power of the Allied partners. Both were right and wrong in their own ways.

Imperial gold production and gold reserves were kept as closely held secrets throughout much of the war. The British Empire fought stubbornly to maintain their prewar possessions and concessions on Mars and Venus, with American commercial pressure eventually eking out the bones of an advantageous agreement that would be more honoured in the breach than in the observance. American free and unfettered use of British moonbases was far less controversial.

Differences in strategy comprised the final broad area of difference between the major Allies, with the most commonly referenced situation being the American enthusiasm for an early invasion of Occupied Europe opposed by a British preference for a peripheral strategy in the Mediterranean, the so-called Trident plan. The reality of the situation was more nuanced, with the American preference for a cross-Channel campaign motivated by inter-service rivalries, a doctrinal belief in engaging the enemy centre of gravity and enthusiasm for offensive action and the British Mediterranean approach being driven by shipping concerns, differing perceptions of the co-belligerent Soviet Union, prewar strategic planning, the necessity to support France as an ally and the ability to play to British strengths. The Battle of the Atlantic also saw division as to the best course of action to combat the U-Boat menace, with the Royal Navy eventually winning an early argument over the efficacy of convoying.

These areas of difference were comparatively few compared to the many successes and sterling achievements of the Anglo-American partnership across the globe in the Second World War. Their close cooperation made the defeat of the Axis inevitable.

from Chapter 1 'A New World' in 'The Verdict of Victory: Britain after the Second World War' (C Barnett, Macmillan, 1972)

   Great updates, agree with Lordroel on that.

   So Moby Dick wasn't a threat to Kon Tiki.

   Like the Minister of Information in the coalition government. Obviously not so depressed by the results of WWII as OTL and somewhat less hard left.

   "The die hards of the Imperialist Party generally supported the Conservatives, apart from on the longstanding India question that had lead to their separation in 1918" - So the hard line opponents of increasing self-government for India split from the Tories in 1918 but they didn't include Churchill.

   The Sunstone sounds like a very powerful item but presumably has a high cost to it being used in some way. And its only one of three powerful magic items created during the war to protect the country. Is Britain somewhat more magically orientated than other countries/regions or are there a large number of other such items around the world?

   "The benign nature of most of Britain’s lake monsters stood in stark comparison with the troubles experienced with a rogue megalodon off Amity Island later in the summer" - So Jaws gets in a generation earlier TTL.

   Coloured TV by 1947 is a big step forward. Is it on a similar schedule in the US and other developed areas? - Ah see in part c that the US is moving at the same rate.

   Similarly the 1st British satellite in 1947 and two nuclear tests, as well as the transistor and two scientific noble prizes. Obviously a very good year for science.

   If the USAF is 21 years old by 1947 its obviously set up a good bit earlier than OTL. Would that mean Billy Mitchell had markedly more success than OTL?

   "The United States Army underwent the most significant reduction in strength, falling by almost 10 million men to a force of 2.6 million men organized in 30 divisions". This suggests to me a very long tail, presumably so that it can form the basis of a much larger front line force fairly quickly in a crisis?

   "The creature was eventually killed by the Police Chief Brody and New York newspaper journalist Clark Kent in an incident involving a Mark 25 torpedo, an automatic rifle and a series of punches." - This reporter seems to get about a bit. Good job Brody has such a good upper-cut.

   I love one of the Democrat VP candicates, "Senator Atticus Finch of Alabama"

   "The Second World War of 1939-1945 saw the eclipse of the British Empire as the unrivalled world superpower and hegemon by the United States of America. Whilst Britain and the Empire were by no means bankrupt and prostrate by 1945, a clear changing of the guard had occurred. The American share of world manufacturing had risen from 30% to 42%, with Britain falling from 20% to 16% and the US Gross Domestic Product of over $4.25 trillion was equivalent to that of the combined total of Britain, the Soviet Union, China, Canada, India, France, Australia, Sweden, Belgium and the Netherlands. The total population of Britain and the Dominions was just over 234 million, behind the 240 million people of the United States and the 263 million of the Soviet Union, but their collective GDP of $2.5 billion was several orders of magnitude below that of the USA." - While Britain is markedly stronger than OTL and the US doesn't reach 50% of world GDP that imbalance in GDP between the two does seem very large. Even if say the pound/dollar exchange rate is over 1:10 say.

   So this time Britain got a/c - hopefully not obsolete ones, in return for the bases supplied to the US.

1947 Part 6a

For many countries, 1947 was one of challenge, suffering and rebuilding. For the Dominion of Canada, it was one of continued prosperity and growing strength. It had emerged from the Second World War as a great power in its own right, dwarfing many of the damaged states of Europe in industrial, financial and military might. She fielded armies and fleets across the world and had won renown on battlefields from Egypt to Germany, from the South Pacific to the Arctic and from Iceland to Indochina. At the end of the war, the Canadian Army numbered 3,254,698 men in 36 divisions, the Royal Canadian Air Force 1,192,674 men and 8426 aircraft and the Royal Canadian Navy fielded 2 Royal Canadian Marine Divisions, 782 ships, 3972 aircraft and 1,249,734 men. Hundreds of merchant ships and escorts and thousands of aeroplanes and tanks had been built in the bustling shipyards and factories of Canada. It had been a mighty array of arms and industry for a nation of 54 million, whose fields fed a not inconsiderable number of the armies of the free world and whose mines and forest provided the sinews of victory.

The war had bought Canada out of the aftermath of the Great Depression and rocketed her firmly into the forefront of the new atomic age and the engine of this movement was industry. She had shifted from a debtor to a creditor nation and now produced more steel than Germany, more oil than Mexico and more coal than the Soviet Union. The Prairies and the North had been opened up for development and new cities and railroads sprang up in the greatest boom Canada had seen in the 20th century. British Columbia and New Caledonia were new powerhouses of hydroelectricity, timber, mining and farming. The traditional industrial heartlands of Ontario, Quebec and the Atlantic surpassed their prewar levels of production and served as the cradle of such great firms as Canadian Vickers, Avro Canada, the British Empire Steel Corporation, Canadian Electric, Imperial Motors, Canadian Steel and Dominion Engineering. Canadian gold, timber, grain and tools flowed back across the Atlantic, funding and feeding the rebuilding of Europe.

Canada now played an expanded role as the senior Dominion, the premier state in British North America and foremost power in the Empire after Britain herself. Two divisions of the Canadian Army remained as occupation forces in Germany and Japan, with a dozen smaller commitments across the world in Asia, Africa and the Pacific. Canadian ships served alongside those of the Royal Navy in the West Indies and Mediterranean and RCAF bombers regularly rotated through the airfields of Scotland and East Anglia. The integration of the military forces of the British Empire in the war had created something new and greater than before, a genuine alliance of equals. Canada was one of only three nations to possess the atomic bomb, albeit weapons of British manufacture.

The postwar Royal Canadian Navy would be built around a fleet unit on either coast based on two carriers, two battleships and supporting cruisers and destroyers and a strong escort fleet operating out of the great port of Halifax. Four new battlecarriers began construction in 1946 to replace the wartime light fleets and support the two Illustrious class vessels. The strength of the RCAF was set at 2350 aeroplanes, with the superb Canadair Mohawk MB.5 to replace the older Spitfires and Hurricanes in reserve and agreements put in place for the licenced production of British jet bombers. The Army would be based around four strong armoured divisions heavily equipped with mechanized infantry, tanks and artillery and a mobile reserve force of the Canadian Airborne Division, the Canadian Rangers, the Commando Brigade, the Iroquois Regiment and the Canadian Special Air Service. Production of the Centurion tank began in Toronto in 1946 to replace the wartime mix of Crusaders, Churchills and Grizzlies.

At the head of this nation on the move was their famed leader, Prime Minister Sir William George Richardson, VC. 58 years old in 1947, he had been in power since 1925, having succeeded the long-serving Sir Robert Borden upon his retirement. He was 6’5” giant of a man with a shock of blond hair and sparkling blue eyes and had been the greatest paladin in Canada for many a year, often pictured with his holy sword, Justice. Richardson had first come to the attention of the world in 1908, winning gold medals in fencing, shotput, the 800m and the pentathlon at the London Olympic Games. A lieutenant in the Canadian Grenadier Guards, he joined the Canadian Expeditionary Force at the outbreak of the Great War and won the Victoria Cross for singlehandedly slew the dread German dragon Totenkralle on the Somme in 1916. By 1918, he was the youngest general in the CEF, much beloved by his men and respected by his superiors alike. Richardson was knighted on the battlefield by King George V on November 28th for his valiant leadership in the grand offensive into the Low Countries and Germany that won the war. Returning home in 1920, he entered Parliament at the urging of his family and church to represent the interest of veterans. Like perhaps no other Canadian politician before or since, he attracted very strong support across the country, from Ontario to the Prairies and from the Maritimes to the West.

His booming laugh, warm humour and humble nature made him a public favourite and his soaring oratory in the House of Commons left many mesmerized. Sir William married his long time love Victoria in 1921, with the first of their ten children being born the next year. His popularity continued to grow, with his mighty appetite, simple piety and cheerful singing of hymns striking a chord with the average man on the street. He won the 1925 election by a landslide, with the Conservatives winning 169 of 250 seats to 57 by the Liberals and 24 by Labour. A dedicated and fervent believer in the British Empire, Richardson was a strong supporter of Imperial Preference and the Canadian National Policy throughout the 1920s and 1930s, encouraging the development of modern industry, a strong defence and a just society. The Great Depression presented his greatest challenge, with millions out of work and agricultural prices tumbling. Richardson initiated a great programme of public works such as railways, hydroelectric dams, cathedrals, ports, highways and the mighty St. Lawrence Seaway along with substantial unemployment relief. The volume of trade with Britain and the Empire was greatly increased and productivity slowly began to recover.

The Richardson Government established several national corporations in the early 1930s, such as the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the Royal Bank of Canada, Canadian Airways and Canadian Arsenals and ordered four new battleships from the dockyards of Saint John and Halifax to replace the Royal Canadian Navy’s pre-Great War battlefleet. The disturbing events occurring in Europe and the Far East began a gradual process of Canadian rearmament and preparation and Sir William took to wearing his scarlet dress uniform, shining breastplate, silver mail and golden sword on many state occasions. In 1936, the regular Canadian Army was increased to a peacetime strength of 189,000 along with almost a million men in the Militia. When war began upon the German invasion of Poland, Richardson immediately followed the British declaration of war with one from Canada, pledging all her resources to victory. He implemented a wide series of Defence of Canada Regulations under the War Measures Act, successfully passed a National Service Act and formed a National Government for the duration of the war, promoting Labour leader Tommy Douglas and many able Liberals such as C.D. Howe and Louis St. Laurent to the Cabinet. By the end of 1939, the first Canadian divisions were arriving in Britain and several squadrons of the Royal Canadian Navy lay at anchor with the Grand Fleet at Scapa Flow.

One of Canada’s major contributions to the war would come in the form of the Empire Air Training Plan, which saw the training of 100,000 airmen a year for as long as required. The total cost was over 500 million Canadian pounds and 235,000 Canadians were employed on airfields across the Dominion, with The Plan continuing through the Korean War. Canada also supplied the major facilities and power for the Tube Alloys project that developed the British Empire’s atomic bomb and was a key partner in the Manhattan Project. Relations with the United States grew warmer over the course of the war from the nadir of the Depression, with combined operations against the Japanese in Alaska and the North Pacific and cooperation in the defence of the Western Hemisphere as part of the ABC Pact, but no permanent agreements on defensive operations beyond wartime. The Battle of the Atlantic was Canada’s greatest victory at sea, playing a key role in the terrible convoy fighting of 1942 and 1943 that smashed the U-Boat menace once and for all. Canadian troops stormed ashore on D-Day and liberated the Netherlands on the road to Berlin. The battleships HMCS Canada and HMCS America were among the fleet that gathered in Tokyo Bay for the official end of the war in September 1945.

In the heady days of peace in late 1945 and 1946, negotiations on trade liberalization and defence agreements with the United States stalled in the face of domestic opposition from the left and right, with matters in Alaska continuing under the terms of the 1941 Treaty of Ottawa. The USAF, USN and US Army would continue to operate their wartime bases in Alaska alongside the British and Canadian contingents and a new system of radar stations would be constructed as part of the modernization of the air defences of the North American continent. Irregular Eskimo companies would patrol the shores and frozen wilderness to guard against Soviet infiltration. The security of Greenland would continue to be provided by the American and Canadian garrisons in conjunction with the small Danish forces available.

Both the Liberal Party and Labour improved their performance in the 1945 General Election, but were unable to break Richardson’s majority. It did influence much of his legislative agenda, with extensive social security and Hospital Insurance laws passed, building on his previous emphasis on pensions for the elderly and family allowances. Several major infrastructure projects were initiated, including a Trans-Canada Highway and a new deepwater port in Alaska. His wartime radio addresses were now joined by weekly television audiences from Dominion Keep, the Prime Ministerial castle outside of Ottawa. King George VI and Queen Elizabeth visited Canada as part of the North American tour in June 1946, officially opening the St. Lawrence Seaway.

On February 12th 1947, a major oil deposit was discovered at Leduc, Alberta by Imperial Oil, heralding a great race to explore the petroleum and gas deposits of the West and boosting the growing Canadian energy sector. It would drive a great deal of the increased prosperity of the Canadian West over the next decade and position the country as one of the oil superpowers of the economic world. Major sources of iron ore were detected in Northmark in November and December, which would prove to be a great boon in the years to come, rivaling the huge mines of Labrador. In the Yukon, Rupert’s Land and Mackenzie, huge gold, diamond and silver mines began to ramp up operations.

February also saw the record lowest temperature in North America in the small hamlet of Snag, Yukon, which saw the mercury reach a chilly -81.4° F. The bitter cold of the winter caused a downturn in the fur trade in the Canadian North, with agents of the Hudson Bay Company confined to their wayposts for days on end. Attacks by werebears and dire wolves on isolated villages in the Rockies bought a strong reaction, with the Prime Minister ordering the Knights of Canada and RCMP to ride forth and harry the wicked creatures back to their lairs. The unnatural temperatures also drove many tribes of Sasquatch out of their homes in the deep woods, but encounters between them and the general populace were on far more of a cordial basis.

The Avro Canada Jetliner became the second civil jet airliner to fly, taking to the skies for the first time on April 27th. The medium ranged aeroplane would prove to be extremely successful in years to come, with preliminary interest expressed by several American airlines, including Howard Hughes’ TWA and Bruce Wayne’s US Airways, as well as the Royal Air Force and Imperial Airways across the Atlantic. The first Bristol Brabazons acquired by Canadian Airways entered service in July operating on continental and trans-Atlantic passenger routes, with future plans to employ it on the Great Circle route in the Pacific. The main part of the Canadian airliner fleet remained US manufactured aircraft such as the DC-3 and DC-4.