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Description

An EEUSG cover for the State of Jefferson and Organic California , also featuring two of QuantumBranching 's embiggen maps (the Republic of China and Zambia ), and one of my Sixteen Louisianas . Also inspired by EBR’s “Stars and Stripes Forever ” timeline, which includes an alt-State of Jefferson. This required some massaging, as the two provided canon maps are technically mutually exclusive (Organic California doesn’t show up on the State of Jefferson map, for example), but the scenarios were similar enough that I thought to throw them together. Chalk it up to shoddy post-apocalypse information; those road warriors are terrible cartographers.

The PoD is in 1968, when the Warsaw Pact did not invade Czechoslovakia and allowed a neutral, socialist Czechoslovakia to persist. This blow was not as big as the one to NATO, with France fully withdrawing from the alliance over differences in how its nuclear arsenal is to be used.

This world gets hit with two nuclear wars. The first happens at the end of a Sino-Soviet war, when the Soviets intervene in China to get rid of the Gang of Four, who have all but invaded the Soviet Far East. Though the Soviets won the initial conflicts, China’s massive population and the immense logistical nightmare of supplying Soviet forces in East Asia ground the Soviet Army’s advance to a halt. With the blessing of the outgoing Nixon administration, which promised absolutely no intervention on behalf of the Chinese[1], and knowledge that the panicking CCP were considering a nuclear first strike, the Soviets resorted to the nuclear option. The Soviet strike successfully decapitated the People’s Republic of China, and organized Chinese resistance melted away. The Soviets busied themselves with establishing a puppet Chinese government, under Soviet-friendly members of the CCP. Meanwhile, Washington is aghast at the outcome of the conflict. The Americans believed that the two communist powers would annihilate each other; instead, one emerged supreme over the other, and proved to the world that a nuclear war could be won. Detente went out the window, and the Americans rushed to develop more and better nuclear weapons and delivery systems. The Soviet Union itself was sanctioned by almost the entire rest of the world, putting its economy in dire straits.

The second, and grander, nuclear war happened in 1983, after a series of crises. The ailing Soviet economy was now facing massive shortages, given the international sanctions it so relied on. Moscow’s hardline leadership saw Soviet power declining rapidly, and so pursued an incredibly aggressive foreign policy, particularly in the Middle East. The Iranian Revolution of 1978 ended with the Shah replaced with a pro-Soviet government, one which was invaded by the United States to prevent the movement of Soviet influence to the Persian Gulf. Inspired by the Czechs, other members of the Warsaw Pact[2] moved to throw off the shackles of Soviet oppression. This was a bridge too far for Moscow, which sent the tanks in. It was too late, and the Warsaw Pact descended into full-blown civil war. Nobody knows who made the decision to involve NATO, or the exact reason why, but fighting broke out between Soviet and NATO forces in Germany. Few on either side considered de-escalation, as both believed that the other would attempt a successful first strike. Shortly afterward, nuclear weapons were launched, and World War III ended almost as soon as it began.

Other nuclear wars happened around the world. A short war between India and Pakistan ended with an Indian bomb leveling Islamabad, causing the Pakistani government to collapse before a retaliatory strike could be launched. Israel destroyed the Iraqi and Egyptian invaders during the last Arab-Israeli War, leaving Syria, Iran and Saudi Arabia to pick up the pieces.

The US and Soviet governments survived in some form. In North America, the United States survived in the middle of the country, although it remains under an emergency government run by the Joint Chiefs of Staff: a government of military commanders who survived World War III, when many in the civilian government did not. The Soviet Army stationed in China [3] was spared from the nuclear fire, and so established a military regime of their own from the newly-annexed Mongolian SSR. Still, much of their former lands are either chaotic wasteland or irradiated ruins, with few organized societies being friendly to outsiders. Some “indigenous” peoples, already living in rural areas far from the nuclear devastation, became the nucleus for survivor societies in the post-war era.

Britain and Germany were hit so hard that neither government survived. Some areas of Europe miraculously survived. The rebelling Warsaw Pact states, whose revolutionaries were close to winning against the beleaguered Soviet Army, were spared from NATO nuclear strikes. On the other side, France - at the time having fully withdrawn from NATO membership - was spared by the Soviets. Although not hit directly with nuclear weapons, starvation, radiation and incredibly heavy-handed tactics by the emergency regime led to desperate mobs launching a second French Revolution. The French Sixth Republic is a constitutionally socialist one, one which ironically pursued neo-colonial policies in Africa to ensure resource security. Yugoslavia and Spain, not members of either alliance, were spared, and their dictatorial governments took advantage of fear of general chaos to bolster support for their regimes. Albania, on the other hand, was targeted and hit by both NATO and the Warsaw Pact. Sweden became a great power overnight, leading the other Nordic states in rebuilding efforts.

The Republic of Acadiana is the most successful of the post-war societies in Louisiana. Rallying around the Acadian entity, the republic is ruled by a council of warlords who put aside their differences to fight against the starving hordes moving in from the east, and the road bandits of the west. Seizing control of some offshore oil rigs and some of the last functional petroleum processing plants in the Western Hemisphere, the Acadians have successfully secured for themselves an empire which resembles the feudal kingdoms of old Europe, only this time it is the technical and not the horse which reigns supreme.

The Republic of China capitalized on the fall of the PRC, and later the fall of the USSR. Taiwan was never hit by any nuclear weapons, the only country in East Asia which could make that claim. As a result, it became a prime candidate for the next regional power. Portions of southern China were very accepting of the RoC government, given the familiarity of the older generations with the RoC, cultural similarities, dislike of the PRC due to the Cultural Revolution and the subsequent craziness, and fear of the Soviet Union and general chaos. With this manpower boost, the RoC was able to propel itself to further heights.

The parts of the world not hit directly by WWIII also went through some troubles. The apartheid government in South Africa fell to communist revolutionaries during the devastating South African Wars, although a feared race war never materialized. Ironically, many high-ranking officials in the South African People’s Collective are educated whites, leading opponents of the SAPC to criticize the regime as apartheid with a red coat of paint.[4] Zambia formed a capitalist counterweight to the SAPC in the form of the Zambezi Federation, and is locked in a cold war with the SAPC. Both African powers have nuclear weapons, but both are naturally very hesitant to use them. In West Africa, Nigeria and Ghana have emerged as major regional powerhouses, mostly by filling the manufacturing gap left by China after the 1976 war.

Although taking an economic hit, the nations of Latin America survived WWIII relatively unscathed. The Latin American nations formed economic agreements to feed one another during the immediate aftermath, and afterwards geared their economies to feeding the rest of the world.[5] There is greater cooperation among the Latin Americans, who have bound together to replace the power vacuum left by the United States. There is already a growing American Union, though so far it only contains South American members.

The Non-Aligned Movement has become far more powerful after WWIII, as its nations were the least hard hit by the war. Although there has been far more fear of nuclear weapons, there are many growing cold wars throughout the world. These regional conflicts may become nuclear themselves, as there are reports that nations such as Nigeria are working very hard on getting bombs of their own.

[1] Nixon’s progress with Maoist China went out the window when the Gang of Four came in and ushered in a wave of anti-Western sentiment.
[2] Notable exceptions include East Germany and Bulgaria.
[3] A sizable force outnumbering even Soviet forces in Europe.
[4] The criticism doesn’t really hold: the majority of the SAPC’s government is black, as have all its leaders. Still, whites are disproportionately represented in the Politburo. Whether that’s indicative of systemic racism is a matter of intense debate.
[5] Though there was a famine after WWIII, due to collapsed American production and supply lines, the famine was not as bad as some expected. Nuclear winter was not as bad, and the grim reality of the post-war world is that the nukes removed many hungry stomachs from the equation.

Description

An EEUSG cover for the State of Jefferson and Organic California , also featuring two of QuantumBranching 's embiggen maps (the Republic of China and Zambia ), and one of my Sixteen Louisianas . Also inspired by EBR’s “Stars and Stripes Forever ” timeline, which includes an alt-State of Jefferson. This required some massaging, as the two provided canon maps are technically mutually exclusive (Organic California doesn’t show up on the State of Jefferson map, for example), but the scenarios were similar enough that I thought to throw them together. Chalk it up to shoddy post-apocalypse information; those road warriors are terrible cartographers.

The PoD is in 1968, when the Warsaw Pact did not invade Czechoslovakia and allowed a neutral, socialist Czechoslovakia to persist. This blow was not as big as the one to NATO, with France fully withdrawing from the alliance over differences in how its nuclear arsenal is to be used.

This world gets hit with two nuclear wars. The first happens at the end of a Sino-Soviet war, when the Soviets intervene in China to get rid of the Gang of Four, who have all but invaded the Soviet Far East. Though the Soviets won the initial conflicts, China’s massive population and the immense logistical nightmare of supplying Soviet forces in East Asia ground the Soviet Army’s advance to a halt. With the blessing of the outgoing Nixon administration, which promised absolutely no intervention on behalf of the Chinese[1], and knowledge that the panicking CCP were considering a nuclear first strike, the Soviets resorted to the nuclear option. The Soviet strike successfully decapitated the People’s Republic of China, and organized Chinese resistance melted away. The Soviets busied themselves with establishing a puppet Chinese government, under Soviet-friendly members of the CCP. Meanwhile, Washington is aghast at the outcome of the conflict. The Americans believed that the two communist powers would annihilate each other; instead, one emerged supreme over the other, and proved to the world that a nuclear war could be won. Detente went out the window, and the Americans rushed to develop more and better nuclear weapons and delivery systems. The Soviet Union itself was sanctioned by almost the entire rest of the world, putting its economy in dire straits.

The second, and grander, nuclear war happened in 1983, after a series of crises. The ailing Soviet economy was now facing massive shortages, given the international sanctions it so relied on. Moscow’s hardline leadership saw Soviet power declining rapidly, and so pursued an incredibly aggressive foreign policy, particularly in the Middle East. The Iranian Revolution of 1978 ended with the Shah replaced with a pro-Soviet government, one which was invaded by the United States to prevent the movement of Soviet influence to the Persian Gulf. Inspired by the Czechs, other members of the Warsaw Pact[2] moved to throw off the shackles of Soviet oppression. This was a bridge too far for Moscow, which sent the tanks in. It was too late, and the Warsaw Pact descended into full-blown civil war. Nobody knows who made the decision to involve NATO, or the exact reason why, but fighting broke out between Soviet and NATO forces in Germany. Few on either side considered de-escalation, as both believed that the other would attempt a successful first strike. Shortly afterward, nuclear weapons were launched, and World War III ended almost as soon as it began.

Other nuclear wars happened around the world. A short war between India and Pakistan ended with an Indian bomb leveling Islamabad, causing the Pakistani government to collapse before a retaliatory strike could be launched. Israel destroyed the Iraqi and Egyptian invaders during the last Arab-Israeli War, leaving Syria, Iran and Saudi Arabia to pick up the pieces.

The US and Soviet governments survived in some form. In North America, the United States survived in the middle of the country, although it remains under an emergency government run by the Joint Chiefs of Staff: a government of military commanders who survived World War III, when many in the civilian government did not. The Soviet Army stationed in China [3] was spared from the nuclear fire, and so established a military regime of their own from the newly-annexed Mongolian SSR. Still, much of their former lands are either chaotic wasteland or irradiated ruins, with few organized societies being friendly to outsiders. Some “indigenous” peoples, already living in rural areas far from the nuclear devastation, became the nucleus for survivor societies in the post-war era.

Britain and Germany were hit so hard that neither government survived. Some areas of Europe miraculously survived. The rebelling Warsaw Pact states, whose revolutionaries were close to winning against the beleaguered Soviet Army, were spared from NATO nuclear strikes. On the other side, France - at the time having fully withdrawn from NATO membership - was spared by the Soviets. Although not hit directly with nuclear weapons, starvation, radiation and incredibly heavy-handed tactics by the emergency regime led to desperate mobs launching a second French Revolution. The French Sixth Republic is a constitutionally socialist one, one which ironically pursued neo-colonial policies in Africa to ensure resource security. Yugoslavia and Spain, not members of either alliance, were spared, and their dictatorial governments took advantage of fear of general chaos to bolster support for their regimes. Albania, on the other hand, was targeted and hit by both NATO and the Warsaw Pact. Sweden became a great power overnight, leading the other Nordic states in rebuilding efforts.

The Republic of Acadiana is the most successful of the post-war societies in Louisiana. Rallying around the Acadian entity, the republic is ruled by a council of warlords who put aside their differences to fight against the starving hordes moving in from the east, and the road bandits of the west. Seizing control of some offshore oil rigs and some of the last functional petroleum processing plants in the Western Hemisphere, the Acadians have successfully secured for themselves an empire which resembles the feudal kingdoms of old Europe, only this time it is the technical and not the horse which reigns supreme.

The Republic of China capitalized on the fall of the PRC, and later the fall of the USSR. Taiwan was never hit by any nuclear weapons, the only country in East Asia which could make that claim. As a result, it became a prime candidate for the next regional power. Portions of southern China were very accepting of the RoC government, given the familiarity of the older generations with the RoC, cultural similarities, dislike of the PRC due to the Cultural Revolution and the subsequent craziness, and fear of the Soviet Union and general chaos. With this manpower boost, the RoC was able to propel itself to further heights.

The parts of the world not hit directly by WWIII also went through some troubles. The apartheid government in South Africa fell to communist revolutionaries during the devastating South African Wars, although a feared race war never materialized. Ironically, many high-ranking officials in the South African People’s Collective are educated whites, leading opponents of the SAPC to criticize the regime as apartheid with a red coat of paint.[4] Zambia formed a capitalist counterweight to the SAPC in the form of the Zambezi Federation, and is locked in a cold war with the SAPC. Both African powers have nuclear weapons, but both are naturally very hesitant to use them. In West Africa, Nigeria and Ghana have emerged as major regional powerhouses, mostly by filling the manufacturing gap left by China after the 1976 war.

Although taking an economic hit, the nations of Latin America survived WWIII relatively unscathed. The Latin American nations formed economic agreements to feed one another during the immediate aftermath, and afterwards geared their economies to feeding the rest of the world.[5] There is greater cooperation among the Latin Americans, who have bound together to replace the power vacuum left by the United States. There is already a growing American Union, though so far it only contains South American members.

The Non-Aligned Movement has become far more powerful after WWIII, as its nations were the least hard hit by the war. Although there has been far more fear of nuclear weapons, there are many growing cold wars throughout the world. These regional conflicts may become nuclear themselves, as there are reports that nations such as Nigeria are working very hard on getting bombs of their own.

[1] Nixon’s progress with Maoist China went out the window when the Gang of Four came in and ushered in a wave of anti-Western sentiment.
[2] Notable exceptions include East Germany and Bulgaria.
[3] A sizable force outnumbering even Soviet forces in Europe.
[4] The criticism doesn’t really hold: the majority of the SAPC’s government is black, as have all its leaders. Still, whites are disproportionately represented in the Politburo. Whether that’s indicative of systemic racism is a matter of intense debate.
[5] Though there was a famine after WWIII, due to collapsed American production and supply lines, the famine was not as bad as some expected. Nuclear winter was not as bad, and the grim reality of the post-war world is that the nukes removed many hungry stomachs from the equation.