Out of Pod Experience

1984 is one of my favorite books but I haven't read it in ages. I was just browsing around when I stumbled upon a map from the book.

This one.

And I had an odd thought about it. It is possible that this alternate history could have come to fruition if the United States remained completely neutral and did not enter the War. Stop rolling your eyes and bare with me for a moment here.

This is the map of Axis advancements.

Now let's take some points into consideration. First what would be some results of the US not entering the War on the War itself.

1. No second front in Europe, definitely.
2. No front in Italy. Probable.
3. Less bombing of German Industry and Western Luftwaffe Destruction.
4. No aid to Russia and Briton.

Now the important thing is no second front. Russia won that war narrowly, the Germans were at the gates of Moscow which means the possibility of a Reich controlled Eurasia. Alternatively the Soviets were no weaklings but without a Western Front it would be a real party in France... A Communist Party. There would be no way Stalin who did grab half of Europe with the Western Allies there would not aim to grab the rest.

So what does this mean for Briton, her Colonies in the Pacific and China? Well Japan was trouncing the Pacific creating their Co-Prosperity Sphere and they did two things. 1. Pushed a British naval retreat from the Indian Ocean forcing Australia to rely on the US primarily especially with half its Army overseas. Port Moresby was the perfect staging ground for an invasion and the Japanese moved for it. The Task Force they sent was thrown back by a US counter Carrier Task Force which sunk one Japanese small Carrier and rendered the two big ones inoperable for a time losing one large Carrier in the process. Now this isn't about whether Japan could take Australia, it is still part of Oceania on the map.

1. Briton unable to defend her colonies makes peace with Japan in return Australia is backed off of.
2. Briton weakened Indian Independence happens throwing the British back in India. Briton is cut off further from allies.
3. China in a civil war and a war with Japan mostly falls to Japan and her pro Empire puppet government.
4. Japan takes the Philippians, America is apathetic and Pearl Harbor as a potential target is ignored by the Japanese.

Things are looking bad for Briton cut off on all fronts not receiving supplies but she of course has a big advantage. Her huge Navy makes invasion nearly impossible. It isn't sustainable but it would keep the Eurasian enemy at bay, it would take years for the Germans to set up a navy that could sustain and supply a landing, longer for the Soviet Union because they would need time to establish their conquests. The US is not in good shape either surrounded by huge rivals.

What would Britons options be. Sue for peace would be an obvious one, a ceasefire of some sort. Most likely backed by pressure and threats from a panicked US whom would absorb Briton and her colonies into an Alliance, a unity of separate nations or states so to speak. Now it is obvious whom they would turn too with no hope against an enemy that hugely outnumbers them in this uneasy peace. Now they are not alone but Briton, US, Canada, South Africa and Australia, that is what at the time, 300 million all told against the entire rest of the world?

Here is where things become totalitariany. With the rise of Totalitarianism everywhere it would seam to many to be a model of success and Fascist and Communist opinions flourished in the depression Era everywhere. This road would probably be helped by some wartime martial laws, a healthy dose of censorship and a military arms race. It would not be surprising to see them make the jump. But what next, they are so heavily outnumbered. Well invade South America of course. It would just fall to the other Empires anyway and with it not only do they control the continent but have the numbers too, under crisis it would be easy to justify to themselves.

Next the disputed zones. A cease fire in North Africa would leave the area disputed and with plenty of troops there it would be understandable for war to flair up. India with little Industry and hundreds of millions of workers would be a prize for any of the big three. The disputed Isles would be Eurasia and Oceania trying to reclaim their territories from Eastasia whom with China would have time to build defenses and turtle in, especially with so many new workers.

Atomic weapons were mentioned as seeing limited use and everybody was working on them at the time so it isn't a stretch that everyone develops them in the temporary cease fire / re armament. So when this war starts or is going on Atomic Bombs are used in limited amount but realizing that they are too destructive the three powers create a twisted version of MAD in which instead of agreeing not to go to war they agree nobody wins it. Technology is said to have mostly halted in war so they use inaccurate Rockets (and in the death worshiping Eastasia's case maybe just Kamikazes) to do minor damage to cities. With warplanes replaced by Rockets than Giant makes Yamato seam small Battleships would pound each other and probably rarely sink each other at that.

Flash forward a few decades and here you are. Oceania, Eastasia, Eurasia / Anglo America, Co Prosperity Sphere, German or Soviet Eurasia. Yeah I know a lot of strings, tape, theory and a mighty helping of Chrystal Ball is holding it all together but it is conceivable. Just a thought from someone who did not get enough sleep this night.

a more viable alternative history would be that the D day invasion of june 6 1944 failed and it took the allies too long tpo launch a second invasion attempt
remember 2 weeks after D day the soviet launched their operation bagration that operation would not only take them into poland by september it also destroyed most of the german armies in the east tho what was left was rebuild but would be a mere shadow ..... litteraly opening the doorsinto east Germany and berlin it self , it wouldn't be much of a problem for the soviet armiesto steamroll into western europe late 44 early 45

The OP seems to have a relativity simplistic view of the war. Americans got dragged into the war kicking and screaming, while FDR (and most of his liberal Progressive friends) saw Pearl Harbor as his Birthday Present. Germany's work on Atomic weapons and Ballistic missiles (V-1 rocket, while not really a ballistic missile, was it's predecessor) was far ahead of what anyone else was doing.

Japan theoretically could have been contained in Mongolia and Korea had the US not imposed oil and rubber embargo's which forced them to go south and had Germany not gone to war with Russia, allowing Russia to go to war with Japan.

The land invasion of Britain and the Battle of Britian was long over before the US officially got into the war. Germany never gained air superiority over the channel and gave up hopes of a land invasion and targeted Russia, and got bogged down supporting Italy in Africa.

The all would have been mostly contained without us getting directly involved, only serving up supply and a few unoffical air units. The long term problem was Germany's atomic weapons programs. Had not the US got involved, We'd all be speaking German...or have third limbs growing out of our heads..

As far as Cntral and South America goes, despite the beliefs of anti-Amerericanists, the US never had any attention of colonising the South. Most of those countries were nuetral or were sypmpethecic to Germany (inculding Mexico, which had some small German units stationed there). They all quickly changed their stance after Germany declared war on US days after Pearl Harbor. For all their provodo, not one of them was about to go against the US on a full-on war front.

another alternative history on similar lines is Philip K ****'s The Man in the High Castle

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_in_the_High_Castle

hardly, if you had tried to do that at time, the whole thing would have ground into a halt with statci lines just like WWI.

In regards to the thread then Airstrip One would be part of Eastasia.

In regards to reality then everyone in the US would have to learn how to speak British... Again.

I saw an interesting documentary about war plan red. It is a planned scenario for an Anglo American War from the 30's when US / Empire tensions were at their height. If anyone's got 45 minutes it's a good one.

Youre forgetting the most important part.

You could get a decent cup of tea from starbucks.

As far as atomic weapons went they were a long way off. All the knowledge they needed was labeled Jewish Knowledge and ignored for the most part. Rockets yes, far ahead of its time, but not nukes.


Not really, they were planning the East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere long before the war started. The ABCD Line is motivator to be sure but they would have done it anyway.


The first attempt. If Germany took Russia or vise versa they would have the resources to plan a mark 2 version that Briton could not defend against alone. Operation Sealion was a joke that wasn't possible even if they did shoot down every British plane. It would take almost half a decade to attack fortress Briton for either power after European consolidation. Briton would most likely push for peace and try to align politically with the US. The US would support them and I would bet the Russians or Germans would agree rather than face both.


That would have changed fast with Briton, Australia, Canada, South Africa and the US being the only real powers left to oppose the shaky Axis. They would side with the Allies peacefully or be taken by force.

Of course in keeping with the thread at that point Totalitarianism would have to overthrow Democracy to create a 1984 World. I still doubt that part would happen but if it did as I said, the world map would look like the one from 1984.

Right, finished it now.

Pretty much what I anticipated, the US would focus on a Land campaign, Canada would buy time and Britain itself would bank on Naval Supremacy and domination of the coasts. Trade cities in North America.... Looking at the Plan Red anticipations it seems a bit ridiculous to mount an amphibious invasion of Nova Scotia, Bermuda and Jamaica within 6 days of beginning of the war.

Thank god that war didn't happen, it would have been a senseless bloodbath like WW1 and knocked both of us out of the running to fight WW2. That said, I can't help but wonder what the post war arrangements would have been, would the UK have sold Canada for some obscene amount of Gold? How would the British Empire managed its North American territories swelling in size, population and likely some sort of resistance movement?

You guys wouldn't have been abandoned, but people wouldn't have been sent to their deaths is what I took from it. We couldn't and would never intend to win a ground campaign, the US would have had its coasts raided, Port Cities seized and with Carriers starting tom come into play the interior would have been opened up. All in all it would have been like the Blitz, only New York and Boston being bombed.

It said that the British position would have been to continue this until the US sued for peace, paid reparations and withdrew from Canada.

Toronto at the time was a centre of Canadian industrial power, it still is today but not as crucial to a counter-attack than it is now. A century prior to the scenario the US had tried to invade and failed, so lessons would have been learned, in this case it seems like the plan was to take out cities and damn the civilian casualties. Odds are the Canadian troops would have ripped up most of New Englands countryside infrastructure and possibly burned down Detroit and a good stab at Chicago in the Canadian plans of battle to delay the US advance.

Can't see the BE holding the US territory after the war without merging it with Canada, and by that point it would have just lead to the Imperial Federation being formed with the US states as colonies.

I love alternate histories, but I end up thinking we were lucky to live in this one.