Beautiful. Do we have an idea of what the immediate reaction to the news of the war's end/ratification of MV will be in the Union? I imagine spontaneous celebrations in the streets, victory parades, etc...
Sequel de Mayo (Cinco de Mayo, Vol. II)
- Thread starter KingSweden24
- Start date
If he’s still born in this TL, he might go by the name Leslie King. Perhaps there will be a Confederate President named William Blythe.
Its going to happen by present day - just not entirely sure when.
Some of that, and also... quiet relief.
Keeping him as Leslie King is definitely the more interesting move lol
There's a no OTL presidents rule, though, so even if Bill Blythe manages to become a notable Arkansas pol he won't make it to the presidency. While Leslie Lynch King being either Speaker or a little-known congressman who sponsors a bill to transition the US to the metric system seems more like TTL's roll.
The African Game: The European Contest for the Dark Continent
"...extension of the Malcolm-Jagow Convention in 1917 to Morocco, with Sultan Abdel Aziz signing a trade agreement with the German envoy that would make them the third country, after Britain and Spain, to enjoy "special privileges" in Morocco including a small German concession in the international port of Tangier.
In practical terms, the German-Moroccan Treaty of 1917 was a fairly minor one. It did nothing to disrupt Britain's interests in central and south Morocco, nor did it disturb Spanish ambitions in the arid "Spanish Sahara" or its territories around Ceuta and Melilla; indeed, it irritated Madrid, which had hoped to increase its sphere of influence deeper into Morocco, up to and including taking control of the port of Tetuan, an ambition driven for over a decade by Spain's devastating loss of the Philippines but checked by virulent French opposition. Morocco's dependence on British financing, firearms, and finished goods created marginal space for German economic influence in the Sultanate but did provide German culture with a greater exposure to Berber civilization and a brief boomlet in Moroccan-inspired fashions and decorations amongst the elite.
As with many British foreign policy decisions of the time, it was easy to misread and did little more than offend France. France had desired much of Morocco's interior and northern coast for decades, and had made clear in secret communiques throughout the 1910s that a formal Spanish sphere of influence or protectorate over northern Morocco would be a cassus bellum in Africa. Spain's reluctance to enter a colonial war as it recovered from its humiliation at Japan's hand had stayed a crisis in the region, as had Sultan Abdel Aziz's triumph over his brother in 1907 and the subsequent reorganization of Moroccan debts by the British that had lowered taxes and seen the country enjoy a period of sustained prosperity. Germany's arrival as a partner in the British-Spanish operation in Morocco thus persuaded France further that the Malcolm-Jagow Convention was a secret plot by London and Berlin to encircle them, now including the Spaniards, and that it was a "forward base" for an attack on Algeria in the future. While benign in intent and even more benign in result, the German-Moroccan Treaty's hand in strengthening the Francophobic Abdel Aziz pressed France to rotate even more of her naval assets into the Mediterranean, now convinced that a future conflict was probably inevitable and that it would include Spain as well as Italy and perhaps even Greece, and that French lines of communication from Marseille to Algiers to Suez would be of utmost importance..."
- The African Game: The European Contest for the Dark Continent
In practical terms, the German-Moroccan Treaty of 1917 was a fairly minor one. It did nothing to disrupt Britain's interests in central and south Morocco, nor did it disturb Spanish ambitions in the arid "Spanish Sahara" or its territories around Ceuta and Melilla; indeed, it irritated Madrid, which had hoped to increase its sphere of influence deeper into Morocco, up to and including taking control of the port of Tetuan, an ambition driven for over a decade by Spain's devastating loss of the Philippines but checked by virulent French opposition. Morocco's dependence on British financing, firearms, and finished goods created marginal space for German economic influence in the Sultanate but did provide German culture with a greater exposure to Berber civilization and a brief boomlet in Moroccan-inspired fashions and decorations amongst the elite.
As with many British foreign policy decisions of the time, it was easy to misread and did little more than offend France. France had desired much of Morocco's interior and northern coast for decades, and had made clear in secret communiques throughout the 1910s that a formal Spanish sphere of influence or protectorate over northern Morocco would be a cassus bellum in Africa. Spain's reluctance to enter a colonial war as it recovered from its humiliation at Japan's hand had stayed a crisis in the region, as had Sultan Abdel Aziz's triumph over his brother in 1907 and the subsequent reorganization of Moroccan debts by the British that had lowered taxes and seen the country enjoy a period of sustained prosperity. Germany's arrival as a partner in the British-Spanish operation in Morocco thus persuaded France further that the Malcolm-Jagow Convention was a secret plot by London and Berlin to encircle them, now including the Spaniards, and that it was a "forward base" for an attack on Algeria in the future. While benign in intent and even more benign in result, the German-Moroccan Treaty's hand in strengthening the Francophobic Abdel Aziz pressed France to rotate even more of her naval assets into the Mediterranean, now convinced that a future conflict was probably inevitable and that it would include Spain as well as Italy and perhaps even Greece, and that French lines of communication from Marseille to Algiers to Suez would be of utmost importance..."
- The African Game: The European Contest for the Dark Continent
Have his college nickname be "Fish" so that we can have both "Fish" King and Kingfish as leaders in North American in the 20th century.
I hope alt-Gerald Ford/Leslie King goes pro and has a hall of fame rugby career in TTL. Heck, the guy was even a model in Cosmo. After his rugby career, you could turn to acting instead of politics. A rugby movie epic in the late 1950s with the two opposing rival coaches played by Tom Dewey and Leslie King would be a TTL blockbuster.
The Firm Hand of Freedom: Soft Imperialism by the United States in Latin America 1917-69
"...the 1917 Nicaraguan elections were possibly some of the dullest in the history of the country, and as the sixth re-election of Zelaya and seventh election he had stood in, the result was obvious. What separated them from previous contests was that in 1917 there was not even the facsimile of an organized or democratic opposition; Nicaragua's Conservatives had all either been put to the sword brutally in the brief 1909 civil war, or scattered to the wind in the years thereafter, especially during the high conflict of 1913-14 with what was once Centro. Out of duty, Zelaya asked two Liberal Congressmen, Artemio Ruiz and Pelagio Rodriguez, to stand as independents so that he would not run unopposed, but he nonetheless won the election with over ninety percent of the vote.
Was this a reflection of how Nicaraguans actually felt about Jose Santos Zelaya? Perhaps, perhaps not. Zelayismo was a curious thing, a hardened nationalism for a country that had never had any particular unity, all built around an immense pride in the Canal, which Nicaragua did not even itself own. Zelayismo had crushed the kind of landed Catholic oligarchy that had formed in Mexico and Brazil, and he had defended Nicaraguan Liberalism through three hard years of war. The country was by 1917 finally enjoying the fruits of the Canal's opening four years prior, with the war in the rear view and shipping rapidly increasing; by the end of the 1910s, small factories were spreading across the belt of land between Managua and Leon, taking advantage of their position astride the world's most important new shipping corridor.
Of course, it bears mention that Zelaya had only won because he was propped up by the Marines and American infantrymen of Camp Foraker and Camp Hearst, named after the two American Presidents most associated with the Canal's approval and construction, as well as the Naval squadron now permanently at the Gulf of Fonseca. Zelaya would never admit as much, but in many ways he served almost entirely at the pleasure of Philadelphia, and after his death in 1919, it could be argued that the United States selected every Nicaraguan President for the next several decades before elections were even held. Newer and bigger forts were built at Foraker and Hearst, new drydocks for Naval vessels, in time large airstrips that were just as much for military planes as for commercial ones - Nicaragua was increasingly not just the site of the trans-isthmian canal linking the Pacific to the Atlantic, but one of the most important military installations on earth, and the backbone of American strategic planning..." [1]
- The Firm Hand of Freedom: Soft Imperialism by the United States in Latin America 1917-69 [2]
[1] And with that, we say goodbye to Jose Santos Zelaya, who had a very different relationship with the United States ITTL than the real version
[2] Hopefully this title is wholly unsubtle in what's to come
Was this a reflection of how Nicaraguans actually felt about Jose Santos Zelaya? Perhaps, perhaps not. Zelayismo was a curious thing, a hardened nationalism for a country that had never had any particular unity, all built around an immense pride in the Canal, which Nicaragua did not even itself own. Zelayismo had crushed the kind of landed Catholic oligarchy that had formed in Mexico and Brazil, and he had defended Nicaraguan Liberalism through three hard years of war. The country was by 1917 finally enjoying the fruits of the Canal's opening four years prior, with the war in the rear view and shipping rapidly increasing; by the end of the 1910s, small factories were spreading across the belt of land between Managua and Leon, taking advantage of their position astride the world's most important new shipping corridor.
Of course, it bears mention that Zelaya had only won because he was propped up by the Marines and American infantrymen of Camp Foraker and Camp Hearst, named after the two American Presidents most associated with the Canal's approval and construction, as well as the Naval squadron now permanently at the Gulf of Fonseca. Zelaya would never admit as much, but in many ways he served almost entirely at the pleasure of Philadelphia, and after his death in 1919, it could be argued that the United States selected every Nicaraguan President for the next several decades before elections were even held. Newer and bigger forts were built at Foraker and Hearst, new drydocks for Naval vessels, in time large airstrips that were just as much for military planes as for commercial ones - Nicaragua was increasingly not just the site of the trans-isthmian canal linking the Pacific to the Atlantic, but one of the most important military installations on earth, and the backbone of American strategic planning..." [1]
- The Firm Hand of Freedom: Soft Imperialism by the United States in Latin America 1917-69 [2]
[1] And with that, we say goodbye to Jose Santos Zelaya, who had a very different relationship with the United States ITTL than the real version
[2] Hopefully this title is wholly unsubtle in what's to come
Now the question is whether his son graduated from West Point in 1910 as iOTL. (and yes, as different as the relationship was, the idea of his son at West Point may be even *more* likely iTTL)
Now I'm imagining Ford as a conservative Bill Bradley.
Sheesh. If you thought the, uh, "special" relationship between the US and Panama was... "close" IOTL...
Say what you will about Hay-Bunau-Varilla (and there is a LOT of ways to criticize that unequal treaty), at least it had the effect of relatively limiting US influence outside the Canal Zone, Article 136 of the 1904 Panamanian Constitution notwithstanding. Here the Nicaraguan president is effectively an agent of the US government first and foremost.
The book title, however, does make me wonder what will happen in '69 to delineate an era of US imperialism in LATAM...
Had no idea his son went to West Point; that’d probably increase the chances of some kind of Zelaya dynasty in Nicaragua, honestly
“Good thing there’s no Canal Zone ITTL!”
*monkeys paw curls*
You’re 100% correct haha.
1969 and the years immediately after will be a very important period for American relations with her vassa- err, I mean neighbors south of her. I’ll leave it at that.
First thought on 1969 was that Simon Bolivar rose from the dead. (Maybe there is a *reason* that his heart is buried in a different country from the rest of his body)
Every American engineer has officially declared TTL as the Best Timeline. This was done after a scope discussion, expansive site survey, comprehensive design, cost estimate, bid award, contractor pre-construction meeting, work implementation, regular inspections, substantial project completion, and final inspection with return of as-built plans.
Especially in the shattered war-torn remnants of Centro. The fruit companies are somehow going to have more influence over the region than OTL. And while there are three post-Centro successor states that doesn’t take into account the potential existence of regional warlords. The region is going to be interesting in the apocryphal Chinese sense for years to come.
Don’t forget multiple design review board meetings and community input meetings after two or three lawsuits with associated appeals
Bingo.
You’re right, I forgot those! As well as expensive change orders to fix a break in a water main that should’ve been replaced 70 years prior!
From the Mendenhall Order, we could say there was an impulse for metrication at the turn of the century.
Then, with the level of government control, regulation and planning that went into the wartime economy of the US in the GAW, I'd say the use of the metric system as a government issued regulation and government issued specifications for contracts with suppliers for instance (I suppose), and permeating through the same channels to the public sphere, would have been boosted to considerable measures.
And to end up, we have Elihu Root, who could fit the definition of (proto) technocratic president due to his long experience in government and the good government mantra of the Liberals. From there to imagine the Root administration could have pushed for a formalization of this de facto situation with a federal law, I don't think there is much.
In the postwar context and the 1920 democratic landslide, I could see it one of the many reasons people are pissed off by the Liberals, since the metric system is a visible symbol of the Liberals' technocratic tendencies, even though ignoring this is just aknowledging a de facto trend of metrication.
If you wanted an idea for how metrication happens, here's one.
Bonus point if the Confederates say they will stay forever on the imperial system just to distinguish themselves from the Americans. Extra bonus if the Confederates opt for left-hand traffic for the same reason. That's so silly a reasoning that in the post war CSA, it might just appeal to Confederate people.
Then, with the level of government control, regulation and planning that went into the wartime economy of the US in the GAW, I'd say the use of the metric system as a government issued regulation and government issued specifications for contracts with suppliers for instance (I suppose), and permeating through the same channels to the public sphere, would have been boosted to considerable measures.
And to end up, we have Elihu Root, who could fit the definition of (proto) technocratic president due to his long experience in government and the good government mantra of the Liberals. From there to imagine the Root administration could have pushed for a formalization of this de facto situation with a federal law, I don't think there is much.
In the postwar context and the 1920 democratic landslide, I could see it one of the many reasons people are pissed off by the Liberals, since the metric system is a visible symbol of the Liberals' technocratic tendencies, even though ignoring this is just aknowledging a de facto trend of metrication.
If you wanted an idea for how metrication happens, here's one.
Bonus point if the Confederates say they will stay forever on the imperial system just to distinguish themselves from the Americans. Extra bonus if the Confederates opt for left-hand traffic for the same reason. That's so silly a reasoning that in the post war CSA, it might just appeal to Confederate people.
That seems a reasonable way to get to metric - Root/Stimson seem like the kind of guys who’d expand a Mendenhall Order in the scope of the war. I don’t think metric would be something Democrats would bother running against, but there may be some time where the federal government is purely metric by law but individual states take a while to get there.
I did lol at the idea of the CSA being left-hand drive out of spite, though. Haha