Quote:
Originally Posted by Curmudgeon
Following Reynolds is President Charles Lindbergh and his Vice-President and good friend, Henry Ford. The twenty-second amendment is never proposed and Lindbergh serves from 1940-1964, being succeeded by his son, Jon Lindbergh. Henry Ford dies in office on V-E Day, 7 April, 1947.
WWII officially continues in the Pacific until V-J Day, 27 Jun, 1954. China continues to fight to expel the Japanese until 1956. Hong Kong and Macau were liberated as part of the V-J surrender terms.
The isolationist U.S. has very few friends in the world. It tries starting a 'Good Neighbour' policy with Latin America but is too closely identified with the United Fruit Growers Company to achieve much success. Mexico and Argentina as nations with pro-Nazi regimes do draw closer to the U.S.
The U.S. is very nervous at the war's end. The world's longest undefended border has been fortified since 1943 and Canada has a formidable military machine which has yet to disband. (IRL Canada ended the war with the world's third large navy and fourth largest air force, in this timeline they each move up a spot). While the Free French performed creditably, the war's most formidable victors are the Soviet Union, the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand (Canada and ANZ can't get together without disputing their relative ranking at some point. Generally, Canada gets listed first for the European theatre and ANZ gets listed first for the Pacific.)
Canada and the UK bought up most of the Belgian Congo's uranium supply and Canada refused to sell the US any of its Great Bear Lake uranium, so the US never got the bomb.
With 90% of the world's nickel supply, Canada also refused to sell that to the Americans. Consequently, stainless steel is rare in the US. Lack of nickel also inhibited the development of the alloys required for jet engines.
Operation Paperclip didn't happen for the U.S. German rocket scientists captured by the allies, such as Werner Braun, work at the British space centre at Montego Bay, Jamaica.
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A number of good ideas in your post; Lindbergh really wasn't the level of evil I was going for, but he makes a good transitional (I fully expect him to step down in '48, he backed a loser and will catch the blame for the new depression). I think I've found our guy though: David Curtiss Stephenson. Never goes to prison here, wins election in '48, takes credit for the US nuclear program (there's enough uranium in Arizona and New Mexico that it can't really be prevented), and stays in office until his death in '66, at which point the sons he didn't have IRL take over.
Would there be a Paperclip with a longer war without American leadership? I fully expect von Braun and his colleagues to be in an unmarked grave in Germany.