The ISOT thread

  Agreed.  This is going to be complex.  Your have the core Bulgaria which is now communist - although by 1988 how much support would that ideology actually have?  To its south and east there are chunks of occupied Greece and Yugoslavia that will not like what's happened in Bulgaria but might be unwilling to fight against their country.  Hitler will be enraged at what he sees as a Bulgarian betrayal where or not he understands quickly what has happened and that the new regime is technically communist.

  Bulgaria is going to be a tough nut to crack in the short term given its technological edge but would probably have limited staying power.  A lot of specialised equipment and materials such as oil will be serious problems as even if they can make allies in the down-time world those allies would have problems sending raw materials to them.  However how high a priority would this be for the Germans with the launch date for Barbarossa so close.  Will Hitler give up his 'crusade' against Soviet Russia to 'squash' the new state?  I suspect that he will seek to divert some forces to attack it but underestimate the potential power of this Bulgaria as he will not be willing to weaken the attack on the USSR much if at all.

  Getting allies could be awkward.  Stalin's paranoia, plus if he learns what happened to his legacy could mean he's very unwilling to trust Bulgaria or work in any significant way with it.  Plus even if he accepts Bulgaria as a communist state he's going to want to be the dominant power in any operation between the two.  Britain might be more friendly although its currently relatively weak and will have problems interacting with Bulgaria.  Ditto to a degree with a still neutral US.  Possibly some connections with UT diplomats from those countries assuming their brought along. 

  Anyway initial thoughts on the issue.

  Good points.

  With a communist nation on their NW as well as their NE border Turkey may be more worried about them that the Nazis at the moment.  Although their ambassador in Sofia could change that and as you say Turkey could do a deal with Bulgaria and the British to supply oil to the former in return for some tech and other knowledge.

  It would depend on the ambassador but I suspect that a lot of information will be passed to London with regards to many matters, including getting BattleAxe properly prepared but also the importance of the Atlantic battle and the threat in the far east.  How Britain and probably also the ANZ powers react to news of that disaster.  Also I wonder what Churchill's reaction will be to hearing that there is an Indian ambassador in Sofia and how the empire has gone.  Not to mention how British India reacts to news of the partition with all its bloodshed and the continued conflict between India and Pakistan.

  There will be a lot of other issues that come up.  Given the cold war and assorted hostilities between the Soviets and the west, especially the US relations between the two blocs could be chillier earlier and even assuming a Nazi attack that occupies much of the Soviet Union possibly the west reducing aid, especially once the latter is safe from collapse.  Possibly similarly how the west reacts to the fall of China to communism.  Along with assorted other news from the 'future' on many aspects of technology, politics, social development etc.

  I must admit I totally missed that the existence of reactors in Bulgaria will give a massive boost to nuclear programmes around the world.  Germany and Japan might learn from sympathizer's in the country but Britain, the US and probably the Soviets will also hear from their ambassadors and others of a lot of the details in developing nuclear weapons.  Depending on how much knowledge they might have in their embassies - both human and written/electronic - it could cut a year or so off the US nuclear programme especially.  You would see the British and Soviet projects also speeded up.  Possibly in this scenario the US, confident it its knowledge could refuse to work with Britain and even seek to block a British programme.

  Steve

Jetfighters but otherwise WWII equipment (still not Kalashnikov) and still rebuilding from WWII losses and devastation; oh well 4. Panzer Group and 18. Army lacking to German's as the Soviets have northern East Prussia and a 1941 Bulge around Bialystok.

However the Soviets still had some 300,000-400,000 troops in Poland, Petsamo Municipality are occupied by Soviet troops as are Karelia which probably rob the Finns of a major part of their Army, Hungary is occupied and the former Czech lands occupied by Hungary by 1941 is now Soviet territory though as the Hungarians didn't jump off till 1 July? it might not be all the devastating as they didn't declare war untill 27 June, some 30,000 troops in Romania, 1, 2, 4, Guard Tank Armies 3 Shock Army 8 Guard Army 49 Army 70 Army 16 Air Army (I presume the 1 Polish Army have left) in Soviet Occupation Zone of Germany, 1946 Soviet occupation of Austria amounted to 150,000 troops less 1950, add Soviet sizable troops in China/Manchuria and 50 IAD with MiG-15, Korea and Kuril Is.

Losing that many troops and having demobilized the Soviets won't be in good shape though the Germans will be very badly off in the North though the Soviets also have local resistance in the Baltics - Forest Brothers and such which seem to have amounted to a civil war by 1950 so some easing out of odds.

Not forgetting the Soviet Nuclear Programme they are still testing but could just switch to bombing Berlin and such as they have the Il-28 Beagle flying - early end to Nazi aspirations in the East. No Lend-Lease necessary. British are shocked as are the US though both freed up from fighting in Europe as it is soon Soviet occupied. Perhaps not even a War in the Pac as Uncle Joe may just go ahead and obliterated the Japanese as the Nuclear weapons go on-line production.

Orwell's 1984 no longer fiction!