Alternate History Thread III

[das]

Don't see a "near-global war" anywhere yet, but I understand your point.

Incidentally, how might this affect other events elsewhere? i.e. with the precedent set, might Grozny be nuked as well (or even Riga if the butterfly effect changes the very late Soviet political chaos, allowing a hardline crackdown)? And might an Indo-Pakistani War go nuclear?

 

[Insane_Panda]

I was just working under the assumption that Symphony would take it that route

 

[Symphony D.]

Incidentally, how might this affect other events elsewhere? i.e. with the precedent set, might Grozny be nuked as well (or even Riga if the butterfly effect changes the very late Soviet political chaos, allowing a hardline crackdown)?

Nuking someone for deploying NBC weapons is very different from nuking someone for rebelling. They aren't equivilent or even comparable reasons at all.

 

[das]

Yes, but technically a hard-line crackdown is a hard-line crackdown. Riga might indeed be overboard, but one could claim that Russia overreacted in Chechnya anyway. What's to stop Yeltsin - to say nothing about Yanayev - from nuking Grozny if nothing stopped him from bombing it like he did in OTL? He could always claim - or his more trigger-happy advisors could always tell him - that the Chechnyans were planning to deploy NBCs themselves. Hell, they actually might be - the precedent is set, and in the wake of Iraq's inevitably messy collapse it might be possible to acquire some NBCs there, or to get them from an Iran eager to take over the role of "leader of the Islamic resistance".

 

[Symphony D.]

Again, as you pointed out, threatening to do something is by no means the same thing as doing it. The United States is justified, in this scenario, in nuking Iraq because Iraq deployed first. If the Russian government decides to nuke first, then in that instance they are the aggressor, and the Chechnyans have the moral high ground in responding in turn, should they be able to. It is not a situation where one can strike the first blow and expect any sort of sympathy or empathy from fellow nations; if anything they can only expect retribution and scorn. The precedent does not work that way. The option is only exploitable with justification by initially being the victim (this is similar to the concept of reprisal). Now, if the Russian government was to fake a chemical attack on their own people and blame it on Chechnya, sure. I can even envision that potentially happening, though it likely won't under by pen.

You're also dramatically underestimating the messiness of the end situation in Iraq. It won't be a precedent anyone will want to follow by the time it's over.

 

[das]

Again, as you pointed out, threatening to do something is by no means the same thing as doing it.

Rather irrelevant - I don't recall the Russian government actually threatening any nuclear strikes, or even any carpet bombings. But the carpet bombings did occur, despite the bad press.

It won't be a precedent anyone will want to follow by the time it's over.

When is it over, though? Also, people rarely learn all that well from recent (or any) history, or rather they often tend to think that they could do better than their predecessors.

 

[Symphony D.]

[...] that the Chechnyans were planning to deploy NBCs themselves.

That "threat". Nuking someone over something they might do is certainly preemptive. It's also a few magnitudes of order beyond carpet-bombing them, even if the later does actually tend to do more short-term damage than the former. The precedent of three nuclear weapons being used in anger instead of two does little to diminish that fact. Now, if the Israelis toss their hat in, the psychological effect of nuclear warfare is perhaps a little dampened compared to its normal mystique, but still not by much--the mystique of horror will just be replaced by the fact of horror.

It also just prompts rogue groups and minor nations to go about getting their own weapons with that much more vigor to avoid a similar fate. If Russia nukes Chechnya later on in this timeline, it seems rather likely Moscow will go up in a fireball too. Proliferation will be a major concern post-war.

When is it over, though? Also, people rarely learn all that well from recent (or any) history, or rather they often tend to think that they could do better than their predecessors.

When most everyone is dead. Which won't take as long as one might think. Regional thermonuclear war, much like its bigger brother global thermonuclear war, is not a game many people would care to try their hand at.

 

[das]

And what of Indo-Pakistan?

When most everyone is dead.

Huh? I doubt that even all the Iraqis could be killed here... Or will the Americans use nukes against all major population centers?

 

[Symphony D.]

Huh? I doubt that even all the Iraqis could be killed here... Or will the Americans use nukes against all major population centers?

I think the Israelis would be the primary concern in terms of nuclear weapons. They aren't generally looked upon highly by most of the industrial world (European governments and media in particular have it in for them, at least in my opinion), and in 1991 they didn't really have this slowly built-up, vague humanitarianism they have now, so I don't think they'd see the need for restraint, especially if the US did it first and they were receiving most of the SCUDs. I can see the war expanding to include Syria, Lebanon, Iran, and possibly Jordan and Turkey (who were more worried about the Kurds than anything).

Anyway, combined effects of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons in the general region (Mesopotamia), ecocidal practices (destruction of Kuwaiti and Hama oilfields; prolonged war and greater number means perhaps two or three years to stop them all instead of slightly less than one), other assorted features of war (landmines, cluster bombs, depleted uranium), and a breakdown in social order (between the "regime change" in Iraq, extremist Islamic elements, religious warfare, internecine and factional fighting, so on) perpetuated by governmental and infrastructural failure (and civil strife) produces a regional situation similar to Afghanistan or Somalia, except on a larger scale, in my mind.

Large numbers of dead (initially, yes, but a larger number after the fact from secondary health concerns: disease, famine, pollution) combined with the vastly increased environmental hostility and general lawlessness leads to the greater Middle East becoming a "wasteland" with little rule of law--there would be a few highly militant or capitalist exceptions, mostly on the periphery (Israel, UAE, maybe Kuwait itself). Most survivors seek safety elsewhere, which combined with the extremism which expanded the war in the first place going with them, causes a large number of problems... what's left in the Middle East becomes a sort of "Wild West" (more so than in real life) where people and companies try and strike it rich by exploiting remaining deposits of "black gold"--and a haven for terrorists.

Aside from the various sociological consequences, this also has interesting effects on global energy concerns, namely making oil prices spike. Alternate sources, such as in Russia, Venezuela, Indonesia, and the North Sea, become of prime concern (interesting situation pops up here with an energy-hungry China eyeing fairly poorly defended Siberia). Alternative fuel-sources receive much heavier investment than in OTL. And, interestingly, 62% of the entire world's shale oil deposits sit within the United States, and those suddenly look much more profitable than otherwise with most of the crude gone and developing exploitation technologies...

India and Pakistan... it seems entirely possible some sort of radical Islamic government overtakes Pakistan as a result of the upswelling of extremism, fires off a few warheads over Kashmir... of course, India has more of them, better delivery systems, a larger population, and a bigger country, so...

While all of this is going on it doesn't seem implausible that North Korea might make some sort of move, perhaps even the PRC against Taiwan (though less likely)--everybody else will be distracted.

Essentially by kick-starting one major regional crisis and fanning its flames, you'll get a firestorm-effect that will trigger off most of the other ones. It might not be a "world war" in terms of connections, but in terms of scope it'll probably be about equivilent--a bunch of really bad smaller conflicts all going on at the same time that really mess up the bigger picture. Essentially a more heavily armed, intolerant, and energy hungry global situation. "New World Order" indeed.

 

[das]

So basically, this will provoke the intensification of a series of conflicts all over the Islamic world (at least). The Indo-Pakistani situation looks interesting in and of itself - a quick, extra-violent, nuclear solution should have pretty interesting results as on one hand the whole Indo-Pakistani tensions will probably be "resolved", but lots of new problems will appear for the battered India, including a rise of Muslim (and possibly Sikh) radicalism, and dealing with the usual effects of a nuclear war.

 

[silver 2039]

and possibly Sikh) radicalism

Sikh radicalisim was crushed in the 1980's. And crushed quite throughly might I add. Khalistan is dead.

 

[das]

Weren't there some Sikh radicals in the Kashmir region recently?

Btw:

interesting situation pops up here with an energy-hungry China eyeing fairly poorly defended Siberia

How about this scenario: the detiriorating situation in the world at large scares the die-hard communists - the KGB or the party itself - into acting more quickly, decisively and drastically. Probably no nuking, but no rolling over as in OTL. Instead a coup is carried out, and the situation detiriorates into a civil war. Without much support left even within the party ranks itself, the coupers will probably face a quick collapse in most areas (complete defeat would be prevented by the leaderless - or, rather, uncoordinated - state of the opposition, especially if Yeltsin goes down as an early martyr), and at this point it would be reasonable for them to turn to PRC, promising reconciliation and "special rights" in "historical Chinese territories" in exchange for military assistance. Basically, a Second Russian Civil War with a Chinese intervention while the Americans are busy in the Middle East. A bit reliant on the butterfly effect, but I think its plausible. And then, ofcourse, a scared Japan might begin to rearm...

EDIT: Either way, this is shaping up to be an interesting althist! I wonder where will you take it, in the end. Say, is there any chance you could mod a NES in the resultant setting? It would be like a modern day NES, only more violent and thus interesting, and as you already said the effects of a nuclear war on global culture (via religion, but not solely) will be quite great as well, allowing many crazy things to happen that would otherwise have been way too unlikely (Sheep's attempt to impose a Papal dictatorship in Italy comes to mind).

 

[silver 2039]

Weren't there some Sikh radicals in the Kashmir region recently?

No. The Sikhs have nothing to do with Kashmir. The Muslims are the majority there. The Sikhs formerly wanted an independent state in Punjab known as Khalistan, they carried out terror acts blowing up planes, famously one from Candnda, and culminated in the Golden Tempel incident in which the army attacked the tempal to root out rebels. Later Sikhs were massacred following Indhira Ghandi assassination, and in short order the Khalistan movement was crushed with a sucsseful campagian by the Indian military and intelliegence. Sikhs leaders were hunted down, and most of the leadership is dead or in exile abroad or in Pakistan. Currently there is really nothing left.

How about this scenario: the detiriorating situation in the world at large scares the die-hard communists - the KGB or the party itself - into acting more quickly, decisively and drastically. Probably no nuking, but no rolling over as in OTL. Instead a coup is carried out, and the situation detiriorates into a civil war. Without much support left even within the party ranks itself, the coupers will probably face a quick collapse in most areas (complete defeat would be prevented by the leaderless - or, rather, uncoordinated - state of the opposition, especially if Yeltsin goes down as an early martyr), and at this point it would be reasonable for them to turn to PRC, promising reconciliation and "special rights" in "historical Chinese territories" in exchange for military assistance. Basically, a Second Russian Civil War with a Chinese intervention while the Americans are busy in the Middle East. A bit reliant on the butterfly effect, but I think its plausible.

And you could throw in Russian nationalists who want to create a Greater Russia or something like that. Basically a collapse of the Soviet Union and simaltenous coup by commounists and nationalists and maybe some republicans could get some nice civil war.

 

[das]

The Muslims are the majority there.

And the Sikhs are a minority. They wanted a state of their own there, from what I recall, after it became crystal-clear that noone was going to give them Punjab.

And you could throw in Russian nationalists who want to create a Greater Russia

Nonexistant in their pure form; same for republicans. Lets work with the real factions, shall we? That would mostly include the liberal students and intelligentsia, plus the various protoparties (not really a force in and of themselves, but a potential ally), the military (likely to devolve into warlordism under various ideological banners), the religious radicals (Muslim ones, mostly; the Christians are simply weak and complacent, the Orthodox Church probably backing the winner as usual - they backed the Bolsheviks in 1919, which says a lot), and ofcourse the separatists (including the Muslim radical ones; those mostly apply for Chechnya, Ingushetia and Tatarstan, however, Central Asia being a more secular nationalist area by then). National-populist leaders might also become prominent as the war continues; Zhirinovsky strikes me as a natural here. But ofcourse the widest variety of factions comes from the ranks of the KPSS. Firstly, we have the die-hards (Yanayev), in alliance with the KGB leadership (Kryuchkov). The moderate reformers (Gorbachev) had mostly lost control by now; we'll kill them off to start with, however, some of the regional moderates (Kravchuk, Aliyev) might just survive like in OTL, creating successor states in their Republics. Die-hard reformers (Yeltsin, Gaidar) are likely to lead the opposition, but also likely to get killed off early on. And we have the fringe, especially the various national-communists: Eduard Limonov, Gennady Zyuganov... The Eurasianists like Aleksandr Dugin may well forge alliances with the Tartars and the Central Asians, if they play their cards right. I also recall some communist radicals (as opposed to "conservative" die-hards) that proposed a return to War Communism. Civil wars make madmen thrive (see Ungern-Sternberg).

EDIT: While we're on the topic of radical politicians, Europe seems also quite interesting; the general idea being a scarier and more violent world, radicals will thrive, I suspect. So how about the European Nationalists (such as Thiriart)?

Meanwhile, in Israel, I'd imagine that Yitzhak Rabin will live longer; there probably won't be any of the OTL peace agreements with the Arabs, or at least no giving up so easily on so much land. Rabin might have problems with this, though, and I suspect he might not survive POLITICALLY. Extreme right - like Avigdor Eskin - may not come to power, but it will probably be more influential at least.

 

[Luckymoose]

das I have been reading that British alt hist. And I must say. It is intriguing. I'll comment more once I finish reading it.

 

[silver 2039]

And the Sikhs are a minority. They wanted a state of their own there, from what I recall, after it became crystal-clear that noone was going to give them Punjab.

No...the Sikhs don't even factor into Kashmir. The minorities are Hindus and Buddhists. There might be like 3 Sikhs in Kashmir.

 

[Symphony D.]

at this point it would be reasonable for them to turn to PRC, promising reconciliation and "special rights" in "historical Chinese territories" in exchange for military assistance. Basically, a Second Russian Civil War with a Chinese intervention while the Americans are busy in the Middle East. A bit reliant on the butterfly effect, but I think its plausible. And then, ofcourse, a scared Japan might begin to rearm...

Although I can see that, given the PRC and USSR haven't liked each other very much since 1969, I can see the PRC deciding, even if offered such concessions, to decide to simply take (and get more) than receive (and get less), while the various factions within Russia are distracted. Ussuri and Sakhalin have rather copious amounts of oil, to say nothing of the rest of Siberia and the Russian Far East. They'd probably also try and reestablish some measure of authority over Mongolia (which, if I remember correctly, was always more within the Soviet sphere of influence).

I would expect the Japanese to take the opportunity of a Russian Civil War to move ("peacefully" maybe--maybe not) on the Kurils as well; Constitution or no, they want those islands. Now, if the Chinese stepped foot on Sakhalin, I can definitely see the Japanese getting rather paranoid... and if North Korea started up things concurrently, that would probably be far more than enough to overcome military stigma there.

While we're on the topic of radical politicians, Europe seems also quite interesting; the general idea being a scarier and more violent world, radicals will thrive, I suspect. So how about the European Nationalists (such as Thiriart)?

Depending on what happens in the Soviet Union, I can see Europe binding closer together and hurrying along with trying to get the EU running (out of collective fear and growing dislike for an increasingly powerful United States) or fracturing along nationalist lines (out of self-determination for energy and a removal of fear from the east). Perhaps even both at the same time in different spots. But they'd all probably have universal growing concerns with their Muslim populations, given "Eurabia" is a fear among some OTL anyway, and Europe would likely be the first stop on the list for Arab refugees.

Where else do people think they'd wind up in such an event? Former Soviet Republics with large Muslim populations? Southeast Asia?

Say, is there any chance you could mod a NES in the resultant setting? It would be like a modern day NES, only more violent and thus interesting, and as you already said the effects of a nuclear war on global culture (via religion, but not solely) will be quite great as well, allowing many crazy things to happen that would otherwise have been way too unlikely (Sheep's attempt to impose a Papal dictatorship in Italy comes to mind).

I seem vaguely obligated to something else but I have an ever-growing pool of ideas and haven't really hesitated to screw over people interested in the other ones before, so perhaps if demand is great enough... after I've written it.

 

[Symphony D.]

Odd PoD: what if the Pig War had gone hot (fried)?

 

[Disenfrancised]

Odd PoD: what if the Pig War had gone hot (fried)?

Well from the looks of things, the British had the superior military presence, and would have probably have won the intial engagement. After that I suspect there would have been a period of intense diplomacy as both sides attempt to resolve the conflict. Various options:

a)Civil war breaks out as normal, to avoid the british supporting the Confederacy the union turns over the San Juan Archipelago to Britain, future events continue unchanged.
b)Clandestine support for the Confederacy from Britain, longer/bloodier civil war.
c)(Unlikly) Open Support by Britain for the Confederacy, British seize Oregon County?

 

[das]

Although I can see that, given the PRC and USSR haven't liked each other very much since 1969, I can see the PRC deciding, even if offered such concessions, to decide to simply take (and get more) than receive (and get less), while the various factions within Russia are distracted.

It depends on how do we look on the issue. If China is going to intervenne anyway, is it not better to secure some sort of local support as well as a somewhat better casus belli? Plus if things go badly for the hardline government, it may well flee to the Chinese-occupied parts of Far East, where it will become a puppet government/bargaining card (like Kuusinen's government in the Winter War). Plus, why "get less"? Who's to stop them from getting as much as they physically could? Certainly not a government dependant on Chinese military support.