France Continues Fighting From North Africa? Pro-West Korea But PRC Taiwan?

Still checking on the public forums of the Internet's premiere alternate history site despite having been self-banned from posting for several years at this point. Here are some of the most interesting recent offerings.

Essai En Guerre: An FFO-Inspired TL-"France Fights On" is one of the more well-known scenarios in the online AH subculture, albeit more so in France than in the Anglosphere. It diverges from our history when the suspiciously pro-Axis mistress of French Prime Minister Paul Reynaud dies in a traffic accident. This tiny change leads to a Reynaud more willing to exert himself to continue fighting Germany from the colonies even if it means disengaging from the losing battle on the mainland. As a result, the French evacuating much of its military to North Africa and continuing the war from there rather than having Marshal Petain get a cease-fire and set up the puppet Vichy regime. Here's a YouTube video breaking the first part of the main timeline down and here is an in-progress English translation. This version, though it has a lot in common with the main FFO scenario, has some unique spins. It's definitely a worse world for the Axis on top of the additional losses the Germans took having to fight for the entirety of European France--the Italians get their stuffing wrecked in Africa well before they did in real life and the French, reequipped with gear they'd ordered from the US that didn't arrive in time to help them fight the Germans, contribute enough for (most of) mainland Greece to hold against the Germans and their various cronies in the Balkans.

(Not as crazy as it sounds--Hitler's strategic priority at this point was attacking the Soviet Union for "living space," so leaving the Allies with a toehold in mainland Europe that they now have to feed is plausible. He was pretty overconfident about defeating the "subhuman" Russians, so him thinking he can deal with Britain, the French die-hards, and that little bit of Greece after the Soviets are destroyed isn't that much different than his real-life view he could deal with Britain once the Soviets were destroyed.)

Pro-Western United Korea, PRC-Controlled Taiwan-This timeline has two different scenarios, not just one. In the first, the Red Chinese finish off the Nationalists in Hainan Island more quickly than in real history, allowing them to attack the Nationalist remnant in Taiwan before the U.S. can organize the Seventh Fleet to defend them. This keeps them too busy to intervene in Korea to keep North Korea from getting obliterated. In the second version, the Chinese don't intervene in the Korean War, leading the U.S. to withdraw the Seventh Fleet--and after a sufficiently-decent interval the Chinese pounce on Taiwan. Either way, this world is spared the horrors of the Kim Dynasty, but the Chinese Communists have a direct outlet on the Pacific. That in turn will have its affects on U.S. possessions and allies in the region, like Okinawa and the Philippines.

Patton In Korea? Two Versions of a Communist Confederacy? 1196 Byzantine Revival?

Still self-banned from the alternate history forum, but I still check on the public sections for good stuff to read. Here are some of my latest choices:

Patton in Korea-In which the...controversial...General George Patton doesn't die as a result of a car accident at the end of World War II and after a very brief retirement, is recalled to the colors to command US troops in the Korean War. Only a few chapters in and so far so good...Patton is restoring discipline that in actual history had been seriously allowed to lapse and remembering lessons of WWII that the peacetime army had forgotten to make the North Koreans' opening advance a lot more difficult. But it's not all sunshine and roses--Patton is having territory issues with MacArthur, who's diverting resources for something Patton dismisses as just "an amphibious landing." We'll see how this goes.

Union Blue and Dixie Red: A History of the Communist South-The author of this timeline makes the argument that an independent Confederate States of America would have a lot of the same social conditions that Czarist Russia had, and like Russia might be vulnerable to a Communist takeover if it lasted into the 20th Century. I like the alternate-timeline ephemera--quotes from historians, politicians, books, etc.--that offer hints as to how this happened. The divergence from real history is that it's the North, not the South, that violates Kentucky's neutrality first, and that causes a lot of trouble.

To Live and Die In Dixie: A Communist Confederacy TL-Fellow author Sean C.W. Korsgaard has been tinkering with the idea of a successful Confederate secession that later falls into Communist revolution for years now. The novel that takes place in this timeline involves a reluctant African-American soldier named Malcolm Little (real-life Malcolm X) on a mission to infiltrate the Red Confederacy for the U.S., but getting there is the fun part. The divergence from the timeline seems to be during our history's Seven Days Battle, which in this timeline is referred to as the Six Days Battle. The opening post hints that a lot of "victorious Confederacy" clichés will be avoided--Lee apparently will die a hated pariah rather than a national hero.

The Eagle of the East, Rhomania: An Eastern Roman Timeline-My first professional publication was a military-history article on the 1071 Battle of Manzikert, which kicked off the large-scale Turkish settlement in Asia Minor and the beginning of the end of the Byzantine (Eastern Roman) Empire. In this scenario, the incompetent and pleasure-loving Byzantine Emperor Alexios III Angelos is deposed by two Anatolian Byzantine aristocrats disgusted by the Empire's failure to defend the Emperor's frontiers against the marauding Seljuk Turks. They reform the military and push back against the Seljuks, but the Venetian doge Enrico Dandalo still hates the Byzantines and he's got an army of Crusaders to plot his revenge.

Some Off-the-Wall (But Plausible) Alternate History Scenarios

Here are a couple of alternate-history scenarios posted on AH.com that are incredibly plausible and well-thought-out responses to fairly bizarre challenges.

The first one is a challenge to get Alexander the Great in Japan.  Although some people thought it was ridiculous, the user-name whose handle is Admiral Matt came up with a really awesome scenario.

Alexander the Great in Japan

To make a long story short, there's a mutiny against Alexander while he's in Afghanistan and he and his loyalists end up wandering across Asia, intermarry with some horse-tribes, and conquer Korea.  As an old man, he invades Japan to fight pirates there.  AM made a comment about how he wouldn't get anything more than a novelette out of this scenario.  I think I'll post this entry in the original thread to jog his memory.  That scenario was just awesome.

Here's a second one, based on a topic I posted this afternoon in response to a discussion about neo-paganism in a society with minimal Abrahamic religious influence.  I came up with the notion of a Wiccan Tibet.

The user whose handle is jakewilson posted the following scenario:

(Partially) Wiccan Tibet

Basically, Tibet ends up a protectorate of an India that becomes a British Dominion (think Canada) and Gerald Gardner, the founder of Wicca, visits the country.  He notices the use of pentagrams in Tibetan Buddhist ritual and ties it in with his "Witch Cult" theory.

Those of you who are interested in alternate history and creativity in general might like these scenarios.