Stupid Luck and Happenstance, Thread III
- Thread starter Peabody-Martini
- Start date
This would be a good place to start:
Stupid Luck and Happenstance.
This is GOOD! Otto Kretschmer in the Pacific with a really good submarine; someone's in for a world of hurt. I have a sneaking suspicion that Amelia Earhart's book will contain materials embarrassing to someone...and Kat will be reading behind the lines and comment on it.
www.alternatehistory.com
There wasn't a whole lot mentioned about what exactly happened beyond how ITTL the whole idea of North Korea was rather brutally ended with the summary execution of Kim Il-Sung by the provisional government of Korea. These are the relevant bits.
Part 153, Chapter 2791
Chapter Two Thousand Seven Hundred and Ninety-One
27th August 1979
Youth Correctional Facility Neustrelitz
After spending the last month in the Giant Mountains, Sepp had returned home to find his usual lack of welcome the night before. Everyone had other things to do, so there was note from his mother telling him that there were leftovers in the refrigerator and that he knew how to heat them up. With this being the last week of the holiday, going to see Hagen seemed like the best use of his time. Just like during past visits, Sepp’s younger brother wasn’t inclined to talk at first.
“So Ma is getting married again” Hagen said with a smile, “The way that Didi described it, I guess she is really trading up.”
At that moment, Sepp wanted nothing more than to strangle his brother. His feelings regarding their mother’s impending marriage were generally negative, mostly because he hated the idea that his father was being replaced. Thomas Ott had been his youngest brother’s mentor which is what had brought him into contact with their mother. As an Emergency Surgeon at the University of Berlin’s Hospital, Ott was everything that their father could never have been.
“Didi also said that you joined the Forest Service” Hagen said, “That isn’t the sort of thing I ever imagined you doing.”
Sepp didn’t ask what Hagen imagined he would be doing. What was tragic was that Sepp had never once thought that his brother would end up anywhere other than exactly where he was, in prison. As it stood, the State was obligated to release him when he turned twenty-five in eight years after he had already spent nearly five years in Neustrelitz.
“That is something that I sort of fell into when I applied for a job through the University” Sepp replied.
“Lucky you didn’t join the Army by accident then” Hagen said not knowing that was exactly what Sepp had done, though indirectly.
“I think you might like it” Sepp said, “So far they have sent me to the Riesengebirge, I heard talk that I might be going to Berchtesgaden next year.”
“Where’s that?” Hagen asked.
“The Alps” Sepp replied.
“Oh” Hagen said with a shrug. The Alps might as well be Narnia as far as he was concerned.
“Would you believe that I learned to ride a horse this summer?” Sepp asked.
Hagen gave Sepp a look.
“What would they have you do that for?” Hagen asked in reply.
“There are places you cannot drive to” Sepp said.
It was funny that was the highlight of the summer and much of the time, it had been spent on a horse that was trained to follow the horse in front of it. For some reason it seemed like the horse in front of his always had gas.
Fort Meade
The smell of late summer was different here than it was in Los Angeles. There it seemed like there was always brush fires burning somewhere in the mountains, which added to the infamous smog that choked the sky of the LA Basin. Instead as August had progressed the thunderstorms had grown more frequent, which had been welcome after how hot and humid July had been.
School started next week and Stevie was not looking forward to it. It was not as if he had ever looked forward to the end of Summer Vacation, but this year was worse than others. He was going to be starting at a new school where he wouldn’t know anyone. At least back in Los Angeles he would have the Soccer season to look forward to, but here it seemed like no one had heard of Soccer. The upcoming tryouts for Peewee Football had been suggested, which Stevie had absolutely zero interest in. He remembered playing pickup Football during recess in prior years and how that had been little more than an excuse for the bigger kids to beat up on the smaller kids.
There were pickup Baseball games that took place in one corner of the athletic field of what he had discovered was the local elementary school, the same one he would be attending next week. It was far cry from the organized league games that would take place next year, but Baseball tryouts were not until next spring which was forever from now. Mostly though, he had ridden his bicycle around the base. Even going so far as to explore the edges of the “No-go” zones he had been warned about.
Not that there had been much to see.
The expansive parking lot and the big black building that belonged to what was referred to as “No Such Agency” by the people who lived on Fort Meade was surrounded by a double chain-link fence topped with razor wire and there were armed guards patrolling the perimeter. Stevie was many things but had seldom been called stupid. He had taken one look at that place and had decided that whatever was going on in there, he wanted no part in it. The Military Installations, like where his father worked, had similar level of security. It was also incredibly obvious that no one thought that he could get past the fences, so he had free run of the rest of the base.
It was then that Stevie saw Doud coming the other way. His introduction to Doud had been as their mothers had chatted at the PX and he had not known what to make of the other boy his age, whose family’s involvement in the Army went back to the beginning of time. He had asked what sort of name Doud was and Doud had just said that it was his grandfather’s. As if to drive in how weird Doud was, the bike he rode was black No-Name 10-speed with drop bars. “Like they ride in the Tour-de-France” Doud had said when Stevie had asked. As Doud had smiled and waved as he passed, Stevie knew that he was cursed to have him as a friend from the instant he got to class next week.
27th August 1979
Youth Correctional Facility Neustrelitz
After spending the last month in the Giant Mountains, Sepp had returned home to find his usual lack of welcome the night before. Everyone had other things to do, so there was note from his mother telling him that there were leftovers in the refrigerator and that he knew how to heat them up. With this being the last week of the holiday, going to see Hagen seemed like the best use of his time. Just like during past visits, Sepp’s younger brother wasn’t inclined to talk at first.
“So Ma is getting married again” Hagen said with a smile, “The way that Didi described it, I guess she is really trading up.”
At that moment, Sepp wanted nothing more than to strangle his brother. His feelings regarding their mother’s impending marriage were generally negative, mostly because he hated the idea that his father was being replaced. Thomas Ott had been his youngest brother’s mentor which is what had brought him into contact with their mother. As an Emergency Surgeon at the University of Berlin’s Hospital, Ott was everything that their father could never have been.
“Didi also said that you joined the Forest Service” Hagen said, “That isn’t the sort of thing I ever imagined you doing.”
Sepp didn’t ask what Hagen imagined he would be doing. What was tragic was that Sepp had never once thought that his brother would end up anywhere other than exactly where he was, in prison. As it stood, the State was obligated to release him when he turned twenty-five in eight years after he had already spent nearly five years in Neustrelitz.
“That is something that I sort of fell into when I applied for a job through the University” Sepp replied.
“Lucky you didn’t join the Army by accident then” Hagen said not knowing that was exactly what Sepp had done, though indirectly.
“I think you might like it” Sepp said, “So far they have sent me to the Riesengebirge, I heard talk that I might be going to Berchtesgaden next year.”
“Where’s that?” Hagen asked.
“The Alps” Sepp replied.
“Oh” Hagen said with a shrug. The Alps might as well be Narnia as far as he was concerned.
“Would you believe that I learned to ride a horse this summer?” Sepp asked.
Hagen gave Sepp a look.
“What would they have you do that for?” Hagen asked in reply.
“There are places you cannot drive to” Sepp said.
It was funny that was the highlight of the summer and much of the time, it had been spent on a horse that was trained to follow the horse in front of it. For some reason it seemed like the horse in front of his always had gas.
Fort Meade
The smell of late summer was different here than it was in Los Angeles. There it seemed like there was always brush fires burning somewhere in the mountains, which added to the infamous smog that choked the sky of the LA Basin. Instead as August had progressed the thunderstorms had grown more frequent, which had been welcome after how hot and humid July had been.
School started next week and Stevie was not looking forward to it. It was not as if he had ever looked forward to the end of Summer Vacation, but this year was worse than others. He was going to be starting at a new school where he wouldn’t know anyone. At least back in Los Angeles he would have the Soccer season to look forward to, but here it seemed like no one had heard of Soccer. The upcoming tryouts for Peewee Football had been suggested, which Stevie had absolutely zero interest in. He remembered playing pickup Football during recess in prior years and how that had been little more than an excuse for the bigger kids to beat up on the smaller kids.
There were pickup Baseball games that took place in one corner of the athletic field of what he had discovered was the local elementary school, the same one he would be attending next week. It was far cry from the organized league games that would take place next year, but Baseball tryouts were not until next spring which was forever from now. Mostly though, he had ridden his bicycle around the base. Even going so far as to explore the edges of the “No-go” zones he had been warned about.
Not that there had been much to see.
The expansive parking lot and the big black building that belonged to what was referred to as “No Such Agency” by the people who lived on Fort Meade was surrounded by a double chain-link fence topped with razor wire and there were armed guards patrolling the perimeter. Stevie was many things but had seldom been called stupid. He had taken one look at that place and had decided that whatever was going on in there, he wanted no part in it. The Military Installations, like where his father worked, had similar level of security. It was also incredibly obvious that no one thought that he could get past the fences, so he had free run of the rest of the base.
It was then that Stevie saw Doud coming the other way. His introduction to Doud had been as their mothers had chatted at the PX and he had not known what to make of the other boy his age, whose family’s involvement in the Army went back to the beginning of time. He had asked what sort of name Doud was and Doud had just said that it was his grandfather’s. As if to drive in how weird Doud was, the bike he rode was black No-Name 10-speed with drop bars. “Like they ride in the Tour-de-France” Doud had said when Stevie had asked. As Doud had smiled and waved as he passed, Stevie knew that he was cursed to have him as a friend from the instant he got to class next week.
The great-grandson of Dwight D. Eisenhower, yes. Where it gets interesting is that Doud Dwight Eisenhower died of scarlet fever at the age of three in OTTL. ITTL something else must have happened since his grandson is around.
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So Sepp has Dr Ott as his new step-dad. I wonder if Kiki is coming to the wedding as Dr Ott was a (sort of) role model for her as an emergency surgeon - and not always in a good way as her interactions with the group of medical students in a 'recent' update showed her 'paying forward' the "shut up and stay out of my way" attitude Ott gave her in the dim and distant past.
Part 153, Chapter 2792
Chapter Two Thousand Seven Hundred and Ninety-Two
7th September 1979
Dublin, Ireland
The treaties that had come into effect on the 1st of January 1977 had called for signatory nations to adopt standards and recognize the draft legislation establishing International bodies to enforce those treaties. One of those was European Court of Human Rights and it was supposed to come into existence at the stroke of midnight on the 1st of January 1980 with Ireland as one of the signatories. Happy New Year, Marie thought to herself as she looked over the long list of relevant laws that Jack was having her research. While everyone was focused on the implications for Poland and Slovakia, no one had seemed to have paid much attention to Ireland. This was because the Poles didn’t have clean hands despite their complaining about how they had been treated over the past several decades which had resulted in an instant uproar. Galicia-Ruthenia had a greater claim when they brought up the Main Market Square massacre that had happened on the 7th of August 1966 or the Lwów pogrom that had occurred on New Years Eve in 1967. Both of those events had been perpetrated by the Polish Army acting at the direction of the Polish Government. While Marie had heard nothing remotely similar in regard to Slovakia, there was talk that it was only because they had lacked the opportunity. The main beef that the Slovakians had was with Bohemia and it was felt that picking a fight with them would be akin to national suicide.
The affect that the new laws would have in Ireland had been either ignored or hadn’t been noticed by anyone beside Jack Kennedy. There was also the very real possibility that those who they seemed to be aimed at were too arrogant to realize what was about to happen. Jack wanted to make sure that he knew the answer to every question before it was asked. There were also dozens of interviews that Marie still needed to conduct, usually on weekends. Her professors were not in on what he was up to but they saw how Jack was keeping Marie busy when she wasn’t in the lecture hall, so they didn’t have a problem with any of this.
Into this was Jackie Kennedy, after spending the whole Summer Holiday with her family in Italy she was happy to be back with Marie. It seemed that her parents Jack and Bridget, had decided to live up, or down depending on your perspective, to every stereotype about Irish tourists while on a mortifying trip into the Vatican. Jack had told her that Jaqueline, which was her actual name, was just being a bit dramatic. Marie had a feeling that it was extremely likely that both those things could be true at once.
Washington D.C.
The night before, ninth season premiere of long running sitcom, The Finleys, which was titled Death is just Life’s little way of saying “Hey, you’re dead” had aired to instant controversy. Which was perfectly in keeping with the show’s eight prior seasons. Sam Finley, who was played by George Carlin, learned that his best friend from Highschool who he had a falling out with years earlier and hadn’t talked to in years had died months earlier with him not finding out about it until a chance meeting with a mutual friend who had asked him why he had not been at the funeral.
While Sam was trying to come to terms with that, the usual chaos that the Finleys thrived on was happening around him. His wife Brinda had signed up for classes at the local Community College and had gotten more than she had bargained for. Sam Junior ends up in the hospital when trick shot at the pool hall goes horribly wrong, but he won the bet. Their youngest son Danny comes out as gay to his family only to learn that it was something that all of them had known since he was a child. Hard to care too much about something that they had come to terms with two decades earlier. It was only then that their daughter Stacy, who had wanted to talk to them about something serious throughout the episode but had been ignored because everyone else was so caught up in their own drama, blurted out that she was pregnant and that she hated all of them before storming upstairs to her bedroom with Brenda following. It ended with Sam out in the garage still trying to come to terms with the death of his friend. It was a rather simple message, that even in the face of death, life still comes at you.
With that being the lead story, James Hendrix had been asked his opinion and he had said that he was glad that he wasn’t related to anyone like the Finleys. Besides that, wasn’t the actress who played Stacy Finley pregnant in real life? Either the studio would need to find a way to hide that little fact or work it into the plot somehow. They had obviously decided on the latter. The Reporter who had asked the question had not been to thrilled that James had pointed out something so obvious to him.
Hendrix wished that all questions could be answered so easily. Lately it was looking more and more like if Dick Nixon was aiming for an unprecedented third run at the White House. Just because no one had done it before didn’t mean that the U.S. Constitution had anything to say on the subject. This was almost as controversial as the latest episode of The Finleys had been with wild talk about amending the Constitution happening just below the surface. That was a nonstarter so long as Bill Stoughton had anything to say on the subject. The Speaker of the House of Representatives was fond of telling anyone foolish enough to ask that the Constitution already had term limits, they were called elections, but that required getting off your ass and going the least that asked of you as a citizen. Stoughton was of the opinion that the sort of laziness he saw at the heart of that argument would ultimately be the death of American Democracy. “You don’t need to take part, let us do it for you because we already have all the answers” Stoughton had said with his voice dripping with sarcasm when Hendrix had discussed the matter with him.
7th September 1979
Dublin, Ireland
The treaties that had come into effect on the 1st of January 1977 had called for signatory nations to adopt standards and recognize the draft legislation establishing International bodies to enforce those treaties. One of those was European Court of Human Rights and it was supposed to come into existence at the stroke of midnight on the 1st of January 1980 with Ireland as one of the signatories. Happy New Year, Marie thought to herself as she looked over the long list of relevant laws that Jack was having her research. While everyone was focused on the implications for Poland and Slovakia, no one had seemed to have paid much attention to Ireland. This was because the Poles didn’t have clean hands despite their complaining about how they had been treated over the past several decades which had resulted in an instant uproar. Galicia-Ruthenia had a greater claim when they brought up the Main Market Square massacre that had happened on the 7th of August 1966 or the Lwów pogrom that had occurred on New Years Eve in 1967. Both of those events had been perpetrated by the Polish Army acting at the direction of the Polish Government. While Marie had heard nothing remotely similar in regard to Slovakia, there was talk that it was only because they had lacked the opportunity. The main beef that the Slovakians had was with Bohemia and it was felt that picking a fight with them would be akin to national suicide.
The affect that the new laws would have in Ireland had been either ignored or hadn’t been noticed by anyone beside Jack Kennedy. There was also the very real possibility that those who they seemed to be aimed at were too arrogant to realize what was about to happen. Jack wanted to make sure that he knew the answer to every question before it was asked. There were also dozens of interviews that Marie still needed to conduct, usually on weekends. Her professors were not in on what he was up to but they saw how Jack was keeping Marie busy when she wasn’t in the lecture hall, so they didn’t have a problem with any of this.
Into this was Jackie Kennedy, after spending the whole Summer Holiday with her family in Italy she was happy to be back with Marie. It seemed that her parents Jack and Bridget, had decided to live up, or down depending on your perspective, to every stereotype about Irish tourists while on a mortifying trip into the Vatican. Jack had told her that Jaqueline, which was her actual name, was just being a bit dramatic. Marie had a feeling that it was extremely likely that both those things could be true at once.
Washington D.C.
The night before, ninth season premiere of long running sitcom, The Finleys, which was titled Death is just Life’s little way of saying “Hey, you’re dead” had aired to instant controversy. Which was perfectly in keeping with the show’s eight prior seasons. Sam Finley, who was played by George Carlin, learned that his best friend from Highschool who he had a falling out with years earlier and hadn’t talked to in years had died months earlier with him not finding out about it until a chance meeting with a mutual friend who had asked him why he had not been at the funeral.
While Sam was trying to come to terms with that, the usual chaos that the Finleys thrived on was happening around him. His wife Brinda had signed up for classes at the local Community College and had gotten more than she had bargained for. Sam Junior ends up in the hospital when trick shot at the pool hall goes horribly wrong, but he won the bet. Their youngest son Danny comes out as gay to his family only to learn that it was something that all of them had known since he was a child. Hard to care too much about something that they had come to terms with two decades earlier. It was only then that their daughter Stacy, who had wanted to talk to them about something serious throughout the episode but had been ignored because everyone else was so caught up in their own drama, blurted out that she was pregnant and that she hated all of them before storming upstairs to her bedroom with Brenda following. It ended with Sam out in the garage still trying to come to terms with the death of his friend. It was a rather simple message, that even in the face of death, life still comes at you.
With that being the lead story, James Hendrix had been asked his opinion and he had said that he was glad that he wasn’t related to anyone like the Finleys. Besides that, wasn’t the actress who played Stacy Finley pregnant in real life? Either the studio would need to find a way to hide that little fact or work it into the plot somehow. They had obviously decided on the latter. The Reporter who had asked the question had not been to thrilled that James had pointed out something so obvious to him.
Hendrix wished that all questions could be answered so easily. Lately it was looking more and more like if Dick Nixon was aiming for an unprecedented third run at the White House. Just because no one had done it before didn’t mean that the U.S. Constitution had anything to say on the subject. This was almost as controversial as the latest episode of The Finleys had been with wild talk about amending the Constitution happening just below the surface. That was a nonstarter so long as Bill Stoughton had anything to say on the subject. The Speaker of the House of Representatives was fond of telling anyone foolish enough to ask that the Constitution already had term limits, they were called elections, but that required getting off your ass and going the least that asked of you as a citizen. Stoughton was of the opinion that the sort of laziness he saw at the heart of that argument would ultimately be the death of American Democracy. “You don’t need to take part, let us do it for you because we already have all the answers” Stoughton had said with his voice dripping with sarcasm when Hendrix had discussed the matter with him.
The dispute is territorial and it is not really with Bohemia, they just happen to be a lot closer. The real reason for Slovakia's current state is that when Galicia-Ruthenia split from Poland, portions of the Prešov Region in Eastern Slovakia, which happened to be majority Ruthenian, opted to join Galicia-Ruthenia. Bratislava was understandably outraged by this development.
Nixon has to appear that he is not actively running for a third term, while behind the scenes he is using different ways to cut off other Democrats from gaining any traction for the nomination.
First as the incumbent President, he has control of the Democratic National Committee and the party machinery and that has hampered the actual candidates in gaining support.
Second his chief political aides are going around to the top party donors and telling them not to donate to the declared candidates but to funnel their money to the "independent" Citizens for Nixon committee that are running either write-in campaigns or supporting uncommitted delegates slates in the various primaries.
Third keep the rank and file party activists from supporting the other candidates and keeping them neutral for Nixon along side with other wings of the party like unions and minority groups.
The goal is to make sure that no candidates have a majority of delegates and for enough "uncommitted for Nixon" delegates to steam roll a "reluctant" Nixon to accept the nomination for a third term.
The new EU treaty should make it easier for Slovakia and Poland to declared independence from the German Empire as they will get subsidies from the EU instead of Germany and they will not be tied directly to Germany.
As for Ireland, the danger is that Ulster will want to become independent and with the EU Charter of Human Rights can cite the closeness of Roman Catholic Church to the government of Ireland, that is infringing on their religious rights.
First as the incumbent President, he has control of the Democratic National Committee and the party machinery and that has hampered the actual candidates in gaining support.
Second his chief political aides are going around to the top party donors and telling them not to donate to the declared candidates but to funnel their money to the "independent" Citizens for Nixon committee that are running either write-in campaigns or supporting uncommitted delegates slates in the various primaries.
Third keep the rank and file party activists from supporting the other candidates and keeping them neutral for Nixon along side with other wings of the party like unions and minority groups.
The goal is to make sure that no candidates have a majority of delegates and for enough "uncommitted for Nixon" delegates to steam roll a "reluctant" Nixon to accept the nomination for a third term.
The new EU treaty should make it easier for Slovakia and Poland to declared independence from the German Empire as they will get subsidies from the EU instead of Germany and they will not be tied directly to Germany.
As for Ireland, the danger is that Ulster will want to become independent and with the EU Charter of Human Rights can cite the closeness of Roman Catholic Church to the government of Ireland, that is infringing on their religious rights.
You know what, I dont care.
RICHARD NIXON
DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENT
THIRD TERM.
it's too awesome not to see...
RICHARD NIXON
DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENT
THIRD TERM.
it's too awesome not to see...
Governor Pat Brown of California and Mayor Mario Cuomo of New York City are also in the race.
Poor Sepp, he just cannot see how much better his life and the lives of his mother and younger brother are without his father.
I am sure after his mother kicked his father out of the house, there was more money to go around, and the bills paid on time,
His mother started to worry less and started to regain her looks without that drunken lay about around the house.
Plus, now Sepp doesn't have to worry about taking care of his mother and younger brother with Dr, Ott marrying his mother, and that should take a huge burden off his shoulder.
As for Hagen, what is the Over/Under on how soon he returns to prison?
For Stevie, Peewee football is separated by age/weight divisions so if a player is above a certain weight, they are put in another division and the teams are fairer for everyone to pay in.
I am sure after his mother kicked his father out of the house, there was more money to go around, and the bills paid on time,
His mother started to worry less and started to regain her looks without that drunken lay about around the house.
Plus, now Sepp doesn't have to worry about taking care of his mother and younger brother with Dr, Ott marrying his mother, and that should take a huge burden off his shoulder.
As for Hagen, what is the Over/Under on how soon he returns to prison?
For Stevie, Peewee football is separated by age/weight divisions so if a player is above a certain weight, they are put in another division and the teams are fairer for everyone to pay in.
LinkedTortoise
Monthly Donor
I would say being polished not stockpiled and since they are helping with the bill, they are oiling that fan themselves.
I don't recall any mentions that there were independence movements in those countries. Like no serious ones.
Could you point out where those "EU" treaties create something analog to OTLs European Union that could give out subsidies? Because I read it as a treaty that creates a legal frame work and some enforcement for those. But not something like the EU.
Hang on, I thought Slovakia, Galicia-Ruthenia and Bohemia are all member states of the German Empire aren't they? Maybe not Slovakia but Bohemia and Galicia I am certain they are. So this is either an internal territorial dispute within the German Empire, or a German-Slovakian dispute if Slovakia is independent.