HALF PAST NOON: Ronald Reagan and the rise of the American Conservative Party
- Thread starter TransUral Empire
- Start date
- Timeline Post-1900
Night_stalker
Slava Ukraini!
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Probably leaving as well, RA aren't in the best shape, so a deal of safe passage and not blowing up any non-movable heavy gear would be pretty good for them.
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Aremenia's included. The whole area's a bit of a cluster fuck. Even if the Soviet military junta recognizes them, it doesn't guarantee an end the strife as there's a great deal of religious and ethnic tension between various groups going on. I'm sure there's also a lot of political feuding between the new states as well. Like Yugoslavia it's a big mess but I don't really go into it because it wasn't something I planned on touching on in Part 1. In the newer version I've drafted there will be more of a mention and discussion about it but in this version that I've written it's sort of relegated to a side event unfortunately.
34 - Part 32: Principles of the People
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Part 32: Principles of the People
In 1994, China was a mess. The state machinery itself had ground to a halt as every element of the society focused in on red emperor Wang Hongwen. Things were changing in the red east. Wang had been diagnosed with cancer and did not look long for this world. Suddenly the man who made everything run was going to die.
This was a major shock to the system and it didn't bode well considering the Revolutions of New October and the Spirit of '94 going on in Europe and Russia. Wang totally controlled the entirety of the nation's power in a nexus around himself by playing the powerful state actors off one another. Until his diagnosis he was expected to rule China for many years to come and indeed rule into the next millennium. No one expected the young Red Emperor to pass so quickly and at such a young age. The power vacuum was going to be so large even before he died that the state was no longer working properly and was instead jockeying for influence and power for their own gain.
The whole of China was watching of course not because they cared for their former master's health, but because they believed whoever took over China would rule in the same manner as Wang had. At this point in its history the PRC had a well established tradition of having a single, very powerful ruler who would rule until death and then a new one would arise from the proverbial ashes. The same was expected to happen. The cyclical nature of Chinese history even before the PRC did nothing to lessen the expectation of a new Mao or Wang.
When Wang did die, he did so after appointing a follower to be his successor. Much to the chagrin of the military, his successor was decided to be Qi Benyu.
Qi was an odd choice and indeed an odd man. He was one of a hand full who had managed to make it from the age of the Cultural Revolution until the 90's. The party itself rarely had someone of his age and experience as Wang disliked having potential challengers but Qi survived based on sheer luck rather than any sense of good politics as his later actions would reveal. Qi was also from the firm revolutionary clique and did not bend on any matters of ideology. This led to him being favored by the radical party militia but disliked by the more stability minded military bosses who benefited from Wang's parasitic patronage of the military.
Qi took power and it appeared that things would go his way. There was little in the way of legitimate opposition within the party. They were too young, too cowed to stand up. Even the ambitious types who had been trying to secure power for themselves shut up after Qi was put in charge for fear of purges. The military was quiet. The militia was approving. So for several weeks that was the nature of things. Of course, politics is not inert and so change came to China.
Qi ordered the invasion of Mongolia. Mongolia had recently thrown out the Pro-Soviet government and began to form a western orientated government instead. With the Soviet Union's hands tied there was no one to intervene and it shut down any further movement of what Qi (and Wang while he was alive) saw as a dangerous revolutionary wave even though they liked to exploit the collapsing USSR in propaganda.
Qi saw this both as an opportunity to stop a problem from evolving but also to stoke nationalist fervor. Both the military and the militia wanted the glory of taking the country down but the new "red emperor" Qi was less concerned about their respective glory although he did want to appease the military. Just as Wang ran a military focused budget to appease the oft purged military, Qi decided to toss his political bone to the military. The militia, given their disunited and always fractious nature didn't take it well.
Some considered Qi Benyu to be loyal and worthwhile, but many thought the military's boon to be an example of favoritism instead. Qi was expected by the militia higherups to be wholly supportive of them and when this failed to be the case it rattled their cages. Qi firmly believed that they backed him however and he went about his business without hearing the mumbling in the government.
The invasion of Mongolia went off without a hitch, the military units walked in to Ulaanbaatar and took things over. Given the small size of the Mongolian army. China got some diplomatic fuss and ran into some more restrictions on trade over it but that was nothing new for the PRC. Mongolia was then China's but China wasn't Qi's.
On a trip to Shaanxi to celebrate the legacy of Mao Zedong, Qi was suddenly attacked by a radical group of militia on a suicide mission. They believed that Qi was betraying the revolution and the teachings of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism-Wangism and that he needed to be killed to avenge the ideological crimes he had committed. Qi's security detail was more than ample enough to deal with hopped up farm boys and so he survived the attack but he was a changed man following the assassination attempt. He now no longer had the base he once had in the militia but at the same time had few friends in the military. Qi knew that he had to get both of them under his thumb or get tossed out.
Qi set about a new wave of revolutionary reforms of society, promising another big step towards Communism. It had long since been established ideologically that in Chinese society that the material base had changed but the superstructure had not been wholly reformed. Qi promised, firmly and strongly, that he would bring about the final few steps towards total communization of Chinese society. Of course then, the first step was to do what he learned from Wang, to purge the military and militia.
The military, suffice to say, had no interest in being purged. Even with many marshals and other bigwhig types that had been accrued under Mao gone the military still had enough balls after everything to stand tall in the struggle. The militia was in a similar position however even more open in their disapproval with a militia commander in Chengdu talking about starting a "Bomb the HQ" movement – a movement against not just the party as before, but Qi as well. There was no longer a peaceful way out of the struggle.
The militia was highly prone to internal warring and ideological struggle so the response wasn't unified, but in Beijing Qi wasn't respected anymore. A group of radical militia moved against Qi's government and besieged government buildings. Including buildings run by the military.
The militia were able to secure some of the buildings in Beijing but the military buildings were too heavily guarded. In the immediate hours of the coup though, it was effectively a success. The CCP in Beijing and Qi himself were arrested and a new government who were more loyal to the militia then Qi had been were assembled. The militia leaders who may or may not have backed the coup initially began to sing its praises and the military forces in Beijing were forced to stand down. The heads of the military were taken into custody along with the former Qi government and everyone knew that it would be but a blink before they went after the lower ranks and regional theater commanders.
The military was anxious and as the dust began to settle, the 38th army moved into Beijing and put the new government and the militia bosses under arrest. The militia outside of Beijing reacted violently and so they crossed the Rubicon and struck directly at military bases in response. Whoever won now would survive and whoever lost would be purged. It was do or die.
The PLA in Beijing after ousting the Pro-Militia government
The military, was not anything close to united in the same goal but they generally had similar backgrounds at the very least. The military was largely apolitical and was made up of those who were uninterested in joining the militia, but even more importantly very few of even the higher ranks of the officer corp were over the age of 50. These were people who were not only detached from the Chinese Communist Revolution, but had also suffered immensely under the Mao and later Wang government. Despite their status as elements of the state the military was not used in state repression and was only ever used during wars or against the militia. This and the fight against the militia was the glue that held the military together in the fateful days after Qi's overthrow.
At the same time however, the military was not made for governance and knew that the Chinese people had no interest in a military regime. They had to find someone in the party who would support them. The military and the party were both vast patronage systems and the personalities rarely agreed 100%. It made any real alliance between the two impossible. To the military the party was too dirtied by their complicity in Wang and Qi, to the party the military was too dirtied by their complicity in the coup and repressing the militia who were technically armed organs of the party itself.
In that same vein of thought, the military and the vast majority of Chinese society had grown to hate the party. The party was sucking the nation dry of its generations with bloody purges and wasted its resources on worthless projects. Indeed the government of the PRC had stunted economic and technological development of China and made fools of them on the international stage. When you add in global economic issues, a revolutionary wave across Marxist-Leninist states, and the hatred for the party it became clear that the military could not rely on the party. Indeed any unity with the CCP was impossible as long as the militia and military engaged in low scale civil war with one another. It didn't take long for the military to totally reject the party.
So the military leaders turned to the only place they could: the people. Just as Gorbachev had in Russia, the Chinese military would stake their future on the support of the people.
Instead of trying to make friends in the party, the military decided to embrace the spirit of the people. Whether it was a genuine belief of the Chinese military, or perhaps just a cynical measure to drum up support isn't known nor would any one sentiment represent the whole of the military apparatus, but the military began to defend the protests that began to occur. It started slowly, a small demonstration in Tiananmen Square demanding freeing political prisoners grew into something larger. Freedom of Speech was tolerated, political prisoners of the gulag system were released by force of arms, militia radicals who dared to strike against the protesters in areas the military controlled found their cadre liquidated and their bodies left out in the open as a message.
The militia had lost, not in an official capacity, but they had lost once the will of the people found itself firmly behind the military.
Despite the best efforts of Wang and later Qi, the Chinese people had caught onto the Revolutions of New October. Indeed in the past Wang and Qi both trumpeted about the failures of Soviet revisionism in state news and made it a part of party propaganda. The people weren't stupid, and when they saw the old statues and walls come crumbling down they flirted with the idea doing the same. But they knew how things would go for them. Tyrants have come and gone in Chinese history and Wang and the bespectacled Qi were by no means anything new for the Chinese nation.
The people of China in urban areas primarily took inspiration in the other political movements around the globe. They believed in the spirit of '94 and bemoaned the twin losses of Gorbachev and Yeltsin. In this way, the people took the side of the military. With the militia losing ground by the day and fighting elevating from sporadic and regional into a larger, more formal struggle, it was clear that the nation was on the verge of a civil war.
Had the military and party militia both been cowed, had Qi Benyu been a more ample oppressor, then perhaps their dreams and idle flirtations would remain just so. Instead the militia went wild, the military set up barricades and tore down portraits of Qi, and the new "red emperor" disappeared until his bones were discovered over a decade later. Now however the situation was vastly different. The party was neutered and the military was slowly asserting control over more and more territory at the expense of the militia. It was a week since the coup against Qi and the skirmishes were becoming an honest to god civil war.
In Beijing the beginnings of a new government began to take shape. The party was removed from power and instead nonpartisans were appointed to governmental positions. These politicians while although technically nonpartisan were made up almost entirely of former political prisoners or those in exile rather than agreeable CCP members. The militia did not accept this change and the new appointments were not honored by the militia but the people across China, at least in military run regions of China, marched on party buildings and tossed out old portraits and the old party bosses. There was a fundamental change occurring in China and this new government led by democracy activist Wei Jingsheng was at the helm. Soon China would be on a wholly new path.
The militia had at this point fallen into two camps. The first camp were those who were less radical and less ideologically driven. They were those who were driven into serving the militia because of familial relations or because they lusted after power to rob and steal with impunity. They wanted the conflict to end but they were also too afraid to just toss down their arms, lest they find themselves imprisoned. The second camp was those who were radical. They were ideologically committed to the battle and refused to surrender under any circumstances. This second camp was the group that caused the most problems as the Beijing government moved to create a new constitution.
The radical camp were proactive in their violence and began to kill reform advocates or perceived allies of the military regime more and more often. This still wasn't enough however and the radical cadres around Beijing (numbering about 20,000) got together and moved against the nonpartisan government there. It was a "march of support for the CCP" in their words but the flagrant way they bused in large stocks of ammo to the marching cadres made it obvious as to what they intended to do.
A battle ensued and the 38th Group Army led by Xu Qinxian who had initiated the pro-military coup dug in and prepared to fight to the death. Xu was one of the many who joined the military out of love for their homeland and he suffered greatly under Wang. Major General Xu was moved to tears by the calls for reform and democracy from early protests inspired by the Revolutions of New October that occurred in Beijing in '93 that were brutally repressed by the ailing Chairman Wang. From that moment he dedicated himself to forging democracy in China and he endued his troops with the same spirit in the days following Qi's ousting. Both Xu and his troops were willing and ready to fight to the death despite running low on supplies and not expecting reinforcements because of the breakdown of the military's chain of command.
The 38th Army took a beating and after Major General Xu took a mortal wound things started looking truly bad. They were outnumbered and under supplied, they were being overrun more and more by the militia with each passing moment.
Major General Xu Qinxian
The radicals had penetrated about halfway through the city and fighting began in the square before Wang's palace. If the tide was not reversed then the Beijing government would have to leave the city, likely endangering the brand new government and engendering even more chaos. It was only then, when the deputy director of the Beijing military region's air force commanded immediate air support and brought other land units into the fray. The radicals were repulsed and the military hit them from the air as they turned tail and ran. Beijing was free albeit the city was left pockmarked and smoldering from the marks of wars.
From that moment on, the military refused to allow the militia anymore headway. The militia were outright enemies of the state and the civil war began in earnest. Although by that point there was not much of a civil war to be had. Much of the militia's numbers had resigned or deserted previous to the battle in Beijing. Those that remained were few and quite easy to track down given the public nature of the militia during Wang. The militia who remained were wiped out with spectacular ease by the military and the great 'civil war' had begun and lasted really only a few days. Of course some radicals escaped capture or execution and would cause issues in agrarian or remote areas of China for another few years before finally the last of the militia were finally done away with.
The CCP also collapsed as a result of the Beijing government standing firm. The CCP had largely come to terms with the changes except for a few individuals but they disagreed on where to go. The younger reform orientated types left the party of their own accord and began to bring together a coalition that would go on to form the Social Democratic Party of China. Others who were not as enthusiastic in becoming moderates or were radical Wangists remained with the now neutered party before eventually forming the Chinese Reformed Communist Party (Maoist) who rejected Wang and all leaders thereafter, the Chinese Communist Party who backed Wang's legacy to the hilt, and there was more moderate Chinese People's Party who were firmly anti-capitalist and populist but not dictatorial.
The military too, had reactions to the victory in Beijing and the short little civil war. It was obvious that the military chain of command which had been broken down had to be repaired and put under the Beijing government's control. This was to prevent any near losses like what happened in Beijing but also to prevent anything close to the Chinese warlord period from reappearing. The Chinese who had been stepped on for over a century were no longer interested in being a land of strife and disorder.
Furthermore, it was also clear that China would need official restructuring. While the desire for reform merely called for market reforms and more freedoms, it became more and more apparent that the old model based on the Soviet Union was no longer representative of the Chinese people's whims and wishes nor could it administer China correctly anymore. The Beijing government called a constitutional convention and its numbers were built off of the Beijing government but it was increased later on to allow for more respected former members of the CCP who joined the Social Democracy Party or other notable people who managed to find time to return to China to take part.
The constitutional convention decided on a few things and in the end the document looked quite similar to that of the US Constitution and Bill of Rights and also Dr. Sun Yat-sen's concept of Minquan.
Firstly, the Chinese people were granted a series of inalienable rights of which would form the basis of a liberal democracy. This much was obvious to each and every member of the convention however what rights were inalienable was the question that had to be asked. In the end the more European liberals won out in the end and so the rights are many in quantity but lack the extreme totality of American style freedoms. Naturally the American concept of the second amendment is totally nonexistent in the document.
The government was decided to be a federal one as the Chinese liberals had grown wary of the old "ruling from the center" the Chinese Bolsheviks loved to do so much. In addition to this, the President was the head of the executive Yuan and would be elected in a 2 round Presidential election every 5 years. The judicial Yuan was made from a combination of the traditional judicial Yuan but also from the control and examination Yuans, making it the branch which handles almost all paperwork. The legislative system was technically tricameral (the executive and judicial Yuans were both considered houses under Minquan) but in practice the legislature is unicameral with general elections coinciding with the Presidential elections or when the President calls an election with seats allotted based proportionally on votes.
With the basics of the government settled and the military holding things together, China was ready to march into a new era. Albeit deciding to keep the title "People's Republic of China" and not drop the "People's" for the sake of not making everyone confuse the mainland and Taiwan's Republic of China. For the time being the Beijing interim government led by Wei Jingsheng was at the helm, at least until the first free elections in the People's Republic of China in 1996.
Even in death Wang remains influential: Nepalese insurgents continue the struggle of Maoism-Wangism
The Chinese military left Mongolia and the Indochinese puppets the Wang regime set up. And now finally East Asia could find some peace. Maybe.
------
Back from Toronto. Interesting city. Probably the cleanest city I've ever been in.
Very happy to finally get this post up. We're reaching the closing of the Hammond Presidency and finally we're nearing the 1996 Presidential elections. Next post is... "A motherland without you."
In 1994, China was a mess. The state machinery itself had ground to a halt as every element of the society focused in on red emperor Wang Hongwen. Things were changing in the red east. Wang had been diagnosed with cancer and did not look long for this world. Suddenly the man who made everything run was going to die.
This was a major shock to the system and it didn't bode well considering the Revolutions of New October and the Spirit of '94 going on in Europe and Russia. Wang totally controlled the entirety of the nation's power in a nexus around himself by playing the powerful state actors off one another. Until his diagnosis he was expected to rule China for many years to come and indeed rule into the next millennium. No one expected the young Red Emperor to pass so quickly and at such a young age. The power vacuum was going to be so large even before he died that the state was no longer working properly and was instead jockeying for influence and power for their own gain.
The whole of China was watching of course not because they cared for their former master's health, but because they believed whoever took over China would rule in the same manner as Wang had. At this point in its history the PRC had a well established tradition of having a single, very powerful ruler who would rule until death and then a new one would arise from the proverbial ashes. The same was expected to happen. The cyclical nature of Chinese history even before the PRC did nothing to lessen the expectation of a new Mao or Wang.
When Wang did die, he did so after appointing a follower to be his successor. Much to the chagrin of the military, his successor was decided to be Qi Benyu.
Qi was an odd choice and indeed an odd man. He was one of a hand full who had managed to make it from the age of the Cultural Revolution until the 90's. The party itself rarely had someone of his age and experience as Wang disliked having potential challengers but Qi survived based on sheer luck rather than any sense of good politics as his later actions would reveal. Qi was also from the firm revolutionary clique and did not bend on any matters of ideology. This led to him being favored by the radical party militia but disliked by the more stability minded military bosses who benefited from Wang's parasitic patronage of the military.
Qi took power and it appeared that things would go his way. There was little in the way of legitimate opposition within the party. They were too young, too cowed to stand up. Even the ambitious types who had been trying to secure power for themselves shut up after Qi was put in charge for fear of purges. The military was quiet. The militia was approving. So for several weeks that was the nature of things. Of course, politics is not inert and so change came to China.
Qi ordered the invasion of Mongolia. Mongolia had recently thrown out the Pro-Soviet government and began to form a western orientated government instead. With the Soviet Union's hands tied there was no one to intervene and it shut down any further movement of what Qi (and Wang while he was alive) saw as a dangerous revolutionary wave even though they liked to exploit the collapsing USSR in propaganda.
Qi saw this both as an opportunity to stop a problem from evolving but also to stoke nationalist fervor. Both the military and the militia wanted the glory of taking the country down but the new "red emperor" Qi was less concerned about their respective glory although he did want to appease the military. Just as Wang ran a military focused budget to appease the oft purged military, Qi decided to toss his political bone to the military. The militia, given their disunited and always fractious nature didn't take it well.
Some considered Qi Benyu to be loyal and worthwhile, but many thought the military's boon to be an example of favoritism instead. Qi was expected by the militia higherups to be wholly supportive of them and when this failed to be the case it rattled their cages. Qi firmly believed that they backed him however and he went about his business without hearing the mumbling in the government.
The invasion of Mongolia went off without a hitch, the military units walked in to Ulaanbaatar and took things over. Given the small size of the Mongolian army. China got some diplomatic fuss and ran into some more restrictions on trade over it but that was nothing new for the PRC. Mongolia was then China's but China wasn't Qi's.
On a trip to Shaanxi to celebrate the legacy of Mao Zedong, Qi was suddenly attacked by a radical group of militia on a suicide mission. They believed that Qi was betraying the revolution and the teachings of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism-Wangism and that he needed to be killed to avenge the ideological crimes he had committed. Qi's security detail was more than ample enough to deal with hopped up farm boys and so he survived the attack but he was a changed man following the assassination attempt. He now no longer had the base he once had in the militia but at the same time had few friends in the military. Qi knew that he had to get both of them under his thumb or get tossed out.
Qi set about a new wave of revolutionary reforms of society, promising another big step towards Communism. It had long since been established ideologically that in Chinese society that the material base had changed but the superstructure had not been wholly reformed. Qi promised, firmly and strongly, that he would bring about the final few steps towards total communization of Chinese society. Of course then, the first step was to do what he learned from Wang, to purge the military and militia.
The military, suffice to say, had no interest in being purged. Even with many marshals and other bigwhig types that had been accrued under Mao gone the military still had enough balls after everything to stand tall in the struggle. The militia was in a similar position however even more open in their disapproval with a militia commander in Chengdu talking about starting a "Bomb the HQ" movement – a movement against not just the party as before, but Qi as well. There was no longer a peaceful way out of the struggle.
The militia was highly prone to internal warring and ideological struggle so the response wasn't unified, but in Beijing Qi wasn't respected anymore. A group of radical militia moved against Qi's government and besieged government buildings. Including buildings run by the military.
The militia were able to secure some of the buildings in Beijing but the military buildings were too heavily guarded. In the immediate hours of the coup though, it was effectively a success. The CCP in Beijing and Qi himself were arrested and a new government who were more loyal to the militia then Qi had been were assembled. The militia leaders who may or may not have backed the coup initially began to sing its praises and the military forces in Beijing were forced to stand down. The heads of the military were taken into custody along with the former Qi government and everyone knew that it would be but a blink before they went after the lower ranks and regional theater commanders.
The military was anxious and as the dust began to settle, the 38th army moved into Beijing and put the new government and the militia bosses under arrest. The militia outside of Beijing reacted violently and so they crossed the Rubicon and struck directly at military bases in response. Whoever won now would survive and whoever lost would be purged. It was do or die.
The PLA in Beijing after ousting the Pro-Militia government
The military, was not anything close to united in the same goal but they generally had similar backgrounds at the very least. The military was largely apolitical and was made up of those who were uninterested in joining the militia, but even more importantly very few of even the higher ranks of the officer corp were over the age of 50. These were people who were not only detached from the Chinese Communist Revolution, but had also suffered immensely under the Mao and later Wang government. Despite their status as elements of the state the military was not used in state repression and was only ever used during wars or against the militia. This and the fight against the militia was the glue that held the military together in the fateful days after Qi's overthrow.
At the same time however, the military was not made for governance and knew that the Chinese people had no interest in a military regime. They had to find someone in the party who would support them. The military and the party were both vast patronage systems and the personalities rarely agreed 100%. It made any real alliance between the two impossible. To the military the party was too dirtied by their complicity in Wang and Qi, to the party the military was too dirtied by their complicity in the coup and repressing the militia who were technically armed organs of the party itself.
In that same vein of thought, the military and the vast majority of Chinese society had grown to hate the party. The party was sucking the nation dry of its generations with bloody purges and wasted its resources on worthless projects. Indeed the government of the PRC had stunted economic and technological development of China and made fools of them on the international stage. When you add in global economic issues, a revolutionary wave across Marxist-Leninist states, and the hatred for the party it became clear that the military could not rely on the party. Indeed any unity with the CCP was impossible as long as the militia and military engaged in low scale civil war with one another. It didn't take long for the military to totally reject the party.
So the military leaders turned to the only place they could: the people. Just as Gorbachev had in Russia, the Chinese military would stake their future on the support of the people.
Instead of trying to make friends in the party, the military decided to embrace the spirit of the people. Whether it was a genuine belief of the Chinese military, or perhaps just a cynical measure to drum up support isn't known nor would any one sentiment represent the whole of the military apparatus, but the military began to defend the protests that began to occur. It started slowly, a small demonstration in Tiananmen Square demanding freeing political prisoners grew into something larger. Freedom of Speech was tolerated, political prisoners of the gulag system were released by force of arms, militia radicals who dared to strike against the protesters in areas the military controlled found their cadre liquidated and their bodies left out in the open as a message.
The militia had lost, not in an official capacity, but they had lost once the will of the people found itself firmly behind the military.
Despite the best efforts of Wang and later Qi, the Chinese people had caught onto the Revolutions of New October. Indeed in the past Wang and Qi both trumpeted about the failures of Soviet revisionism in state news and made it a part of party propaganda. The people weren't stupid, and when they saw the old statues and walls come crumbling down they flirted with the idea doing the same. But they knew how things would go for them. Tyrants have come and gone in Chinese history and Wang and the bespectacled Qi were by no means anything new for the Chinese nation.
The people of China in urban areas primarily took inspiration in the other political movements around the globe. They believed in the spirit of '94 and bemoaned the twin losses of Gorbachev and Yeltsin. In this way, the people took the side of the military. With the militia losing ground by the day and fighting elevating from sporadic and regional into a larger, more formal struggle, it was clear that the nation was on the verge of a civil war.
Had the military and party militia both been cowed, had Qi Benyu been a more ample oppressor, then perhaps their dreams and idle flirtations would remain just so. Instead the militia went wild, the military set up barricades and tore down portraits of Qi, and the new "red emperor" disappeared until his bones were discovered over a decade later. Now however the situation was vastly different. The party was neutered and the military was slowly asserting control over more and more territory at the expense of the militia. It was a week since the coup against Qi and the skirmishes were becoming an honest to god civil war.
In Beijing the beginnings of a new government began to take shape. The party was removed from power and instead nonpartisans were appointed to governmental positions. These politicians while although technically nonpartisan were made up almost entirely of former political prisoners or those in exile rather than agreeable CCP members. The militia did not accept this change and the new appointments were not honored by the militia but the people across China, at least in military run regions of China, marched on party buildings and tossed out old portraits and the old party bosses. There was a fundamental change occurring in China and this new government led by democracy activist Wei Jingsheng was at the helm. Soon China would be on a wholly new path.
The militia had at this point fallen into two camps. The first camp were those who were less radical and less ideologically driven. They were those who were driven into serving the militia because of familial relations or because they lusted after power to rob and steal with impunity. They wanted the conflict to end but they were also too afraid to just toss down their arms, lest they find themselves imprisoned. The second camp was those who were radical. They were ideologically committed to the battle and refused to surrender under any circumstances. This second camp was the group that caused the most problems as the Beijing government moved to create a new constitution.
The radical camp were proactive in their violence and began to kill reform advocates or perceived allies of the military regime more and more often. This still wasn't enough however and the radical cadres around Beijing (numbering about 20,000) got together and moved against the nonpartisan government there. It was a "march of support for the CCP" in their words but the flagrant way they bused in large stocks of ammo to the marching cadres made it obvious as to what they intended to do.
A battle ensued and the 38th Group Army led by Xu Qinxian who had initiated the pro-military coup dug in and prepared to fight to the death. Xu was one of the many who joined the military out of love for their homeland and he suffered greatly under Wang. Major General Xu was moved to tears by the calls for reform and democracy from early protests inspired by the Revolutions of New October that occurred in Beijing in '93 that were brutally repressed by the ailing Chairman Wang. From that moment he dedicated himself to forging democracy in China and he endued his troops with the same spirit in the days following Qi's ousting. Both Xu and his troops were willing and ready to fight to the death despite running low on supplies and not expecting reinforcements because of the breakdown of the military's chain of command.
The 38th Army took a beating and after Major General Xu took a mortal wound things started looking truly bad. They were outnumbered and under supplied, they were being overrun more and more by the militia with each passing moment.
Major General Xu Qinxian
The radicals had penetrated about halfway through the city and fighting began in the square before Wang's palace. If the tide was not reversed then the Beijing government would have to leave the city, likely endangering the brand new government and engendering even more chaos. It was only then, when the deputy director of the Beijing military region's air force commanded immediate air support and brought other land units into the fray. The radicals were repulsed and the military hit them from the air as they turned tail and ran. Beijing was free albeit the city was left pockmarked and smoldering from the marks of wars.
From that moment on, the military refused to allow the militia anymore headway. The militia were outright enemies of the state and the civil war began in earnest. Although by that point there was not much of a civil war to be had. Much of the militia's numbers had resigned or deserted previous to the battle in Beijing. Those that remained were few and quite easy to track down given the public nature of the militia during Wang. The militia who remained were wiped out with spectacular ease by the military and the great 'civil war' had begun and lasted really only a few days. Of course some radicals escaped capture or execution and would cause issues in agrarian or remote areas of China for another few years before finally the last of the militia were finally done away with.
The CCP also collapsed as a result of the Beijing government standing firm. The CCP had largely come to terms with the changes except for a few individuals but they disagreed on where to go. The younger reform orientated types left the party of their own accord and began to bring together a coalition that would go on to form the Social Democratic Party of China. Others who were not as enthusiastic in becoming moderates or were radical Wangists remained with the now neutered party before eventually forming the Chinese Reformed Communist Party (Maoist) who rejected Wang and all leaders thereafter, the Chinese Communist Party who backed Wang's legacy to the hilt, and there was more moderate Chinese People's Party who were firmly anti-capitalist and populist but not dictatorial.
The military too, had reactions to the victory in Beijing and the short little civil war. It was obvious that the military chain of command which had been broken down had to be repaired and put under the Beijing government's control. This was to prevent any near losses like what happened in Beijing but also to prevent anything close to the Chinese warlord period from reappearing. The Chinese who had been stepped on for over a century were no longer interested in being a land of strife and disorder.
Furthermore, it was also clear that China would need official restructuring. While the desire for reform merely called for market reforms and more freedoms, it became more and more apparent that the old model based on the Soviet Union was no longer representative of the Chinese people's whims and wishes nor could it administer China correctly anymore. The Beijing government called a constitutional convention and its numbers were built off of the Beijing government but it was increased later on to allow for more respected former members of the CCP who joined the Social Democracy Party or other notable people who managed to find time to return to China to take part.
The constitutional convention decided on a few things and in the end the document looked quite similar to that of the US Constitution and Bill of Rights and also Dr. Sun Yat-sen's concept of Minquan.
Firstly, the Chinese people were granted a series of inalienable rights of which would form the basis of a liberal democracy. This much was obvious to each and every member of the convention however what rights were inalienable was the question that had to be asked. In the end the more European liberals won out in the end and so the rights are many in quantity but lack the extreme totality of American style freedoms. Naturally the American concept of the second amendment is totally nonexistent in the document.
The government was decided to be a federal one as the Chinese liberals had grown wary of the old "ruling from the center" the Chinese Bolsheviks loved to do so much. In addition to this, the President was the head of the executive Yuan and would be elected in a 2 round Presidential election every 5 years. The judicial Yuan was made from a combination of the traditional judicial Yuan but also from the control and examination Yuans, making it the branch which handles almost all paperwork. The legislative system was technically tricameral (the executive and judicial Yuans were both considered houses under Minquan) but in practice the legislature is unicameral with general elections coinciding with the Presidential elections or when the President calls an election with seats allotted based proportionally on votes.
With the basics of the government settled and the military holding things together, China was ready to march into a new era. Albeit deciding to keep the title "People's Republic of China" and not drop the "People's" for the sake of not making everyone confuse the mainland and Taiwan's Republic of China. For the time being the Beijing interim government led by Wei Jingsheng was at the helm, at least until the first free elections in the People's Republic of China in 1996.
Even in death Wang remains influential: Nepalese insurgents continue the struggle of Maoism-Wangism
------
Back from Toronto. Interesting city. Probably the cleanest city I've ever been in.
Very happy to finally get this post up. We're reaching the closing of the Hammond Presidency and finally we're nearing the 1996 Presidential elections. Next post is... "A motherland without you."
- Location
- Rex, NC, USA
Eh, the UK may not have a full-fledged duolopy, but it's pretty close.
Interesting changes in China with a really revolutionary potential for change and the end of the old autocratic system. Not forgetting however its been about for millennium and Chinese society has a deeply embedded fear of disunity and unrest so things are not hope and dry yet. However good move to adjust from a China economically and politically retarded compared to OTL could make major improvements.
Would be interesting in how Taiwan responds to events here and also with 1997 coming up what might happen with Hong Kong? Could be a very easy transition to it being part of China if things goes well.
Which does raise the question of what happened in Tibet and Sinking regions as to whether there were any attempts to gain autonomy, although I suspect the Chinese military presence will prevent anything substantial.
Would be interesting in how Taiwan responds to events here and also with 1997 coming up what might happen with Hong Kong? Could be a very easy transition to it being part of China if things goes well.
Which does raise the question of what happened in Tibet and Sinking regions as to whether there were any attempts to gain autonomy, although I suspect the Chinese military presence will prevent anything substantial.
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Happy to hear you're enjoying it.
Taiwan has just began to democratize around the same period as per OTL and there's many who feel that the mainland is a dead weight or that Taiwan is a distinct entity. There's also many in the mainland that don't have any interest in being government by even in part by the Kuomintang. Unification is possible and likely but there's hurdles both have to cross before they can consider that.
In regards to Hong Kong, there was never any love for Wang from the Brits. So there's no handover of Hong Kong planned right now. This is changing rapidly consider recent events obviously.
As far as Tibet and Xinjiang go, it's a mixed bag I think. The federal system likely makes many Tibetan and Uyghur activists more accepting of the situation. There's also likely a general rapprochement with the Dali Lama going on, although at the same time Xinjiang's Uyghur nationalists are almost assuredly becoming more and more interested in Islamism as the region opens up to the world. So it's a mixed bag.
- Location
- Rex, NC, USA
Would it really be classified as the 5th party system ITTL? OTL historians are confronted with a Democratic vs. Republicans duopoly which has lasted all the way to the present day, so they feel the need to split it up into 3-5 systems based on who was voting for which party. ITTL, with the GOP withering away during the 1970s and 1980s, the "Third Party System" could be extended to cover the entire era of their existence.
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
I mean, sure I guess. The way people think about US political history and how they evaluate it is likely pretty different than OTL so that doesn't seem to far fetched really.
35 - Part 33: A motherland without you
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Part 33: A motherland without you
In North Korea however, the spirit of revolution and reform was much more muted. The long time leader Kim Il-sung had held a tight grasp on the state since its inception and had done an even better job of destroying whatever intellectual basis there was outside of the party. Indeed, in many ways China's Wang had learned his better leadership strategies from Kim. When Kim finally gave up the ghost in 1995, it was in the midst of the CCP's collapse and as a result it gave the Korean regime a great deal of anxiety over the issue
Some of the anxiety was written off because the nation's political class could at least count on an already decided successor for the state. Kim Jong-il was Kim Il-sung's son and had been quite openly designated as the dictator's successor since the late 80's. Although at the same time, Kim Jong-il's political position was not as stable as it might have seemed nor would his being successor be that much of a relief for the political authorities.
Kim Jong-il's personality did little to soothe tensions between him and others. His personality was rough and strongly authoritarian. If one even slightly broke from what he had decided or deviated from the various micro managing minutia he had put forward then he took it as a sign of disloyalty. It was the hallmarks of a tyrant for the North Korean government. As a result, he had managed to alienate several key potential allies and with the death of close ally O Jin-u it seemed like the previously easy assent to power was no longer as easy as it could have been.
O Jin-u: Too little, too late.
While Kim Jong-il was appointed to head the Korean People's Army and was a part of an official triumvirate, from 1995 he was unofficially the nation's leader albeit with internal foes to deal with. At the same time blood was in the water and sharks had begun to swim.
The new despot also had a reputation for economic mismanagement and he quickly proved the reputation not wholly undeserved following the collapse of the country's agriculture and the whole of its economy. With the country being unable to trade with China and the Soviet Union, North Korea had few countries to trade with and little to trade with those North Korea could trade with. With trade almost entirely gone and agricultural disaster occurring, the nation was in the midst of a famine. Kim Jong-il might have had a theoretical iron grip on the nation but with the nation collapsing and starving and with Kim Jong-il taking his father's death extremely poorly it was clear that there was going to be a change in North Korea.
Likely not a change akin to that of the Soviet Union or China was going through, but a change all the same. It became clear that a purge, either of the Kim Jong-il or his opponents was going to occur. The opposition to Kim Jong-il was not ideological and was more based on patronage networks and therefore whomever had their networks removed or felt threatened would be open to striking against Kim Jong-il.
The main challenger to Kim Jong-il was Jang Song-thaek, his brother-in-law. Jang was not from the Kim family but had married into it and had grown too big for his britches. His power and influence in the country grew exponentially since marrying into the Kim dynasty and he plotted to removed Kim Jong-il himself from power. The other challenger of course was Kim Jong-il's younger half-brother Kim Pyong-il who had fallen from grace in the 70's and had since been relegated to diplomatic duties abroad. Kim Pyong-il was then therefore not nearly as much of a serious challenger as Jang Song-thaek. He was more likely to take the role of figurehead than as the real leader in any future regime. It was inevitable then that Jang Son-thaek figured Kim Pyong-il for a good ally.
Kim Jong-il hadn't totally lost the support of the party or the military but it was lacking. Jang Song-thaek however had in the meantime been using his pawn Kim Pyong-il as a front and had been using his contacts to begin to assemble a group to go against Kim Jong-il. Later on, Kim Pyong-il was recalled from his diplomatic post in Finland back home. This was not an attempt by Jang to prepare for a coup but rather a play by Kim Jong-il himself. He had sniffed out their plot and was preparing to remove both of them at once.
Kim Jong-il on his rivals: "They think I don't know what game they're playing. All I need is a month and then I'll have them and their families sent away forever. They will never see Pyongyang ever again."
Jang Song-thaek wasn't stupid either and so he and his supporters readied themselves. Sometime soon they would likely be attempted to be imprisoned by Kim Jong-il's forces and when that time came they could either go quietly or fight back. If they fought back they'd likely die, but if they went quietly they would certainly die. In the state that North Korea was, where soldiers were digging up the recently deceased for nourishment, neither faction was fighting for power anymore. Just survival. If Kim Jong-il's faction won they'd inherit a broken nation but they'd survive and the same could be said of Jang's faction.
Several months later, Kim Jong-il's faction began the attempted purge of Jang's faction. Kim Jong-il's close friend O Kuk-ryol ordered close associates of Jang and Kim Pyong-il in the military arrested. This was to be step one in the final series of steps that would ultimately secure control of North Korea. Rather than cowing to the other faction's demands however, Jang's faction instead took the offensive.
Jang's faction moved against Kim Jong-il's faction and the two factions began to fight. The fighting was not expected to last long and one side was expected to relent before long. Instead though, the fighting continued throughout the day and the hours turned into days. Suddenly the fighting that was simply squabbling over inheritance was turning into an international event. South Korea and the United States couldn't help but notice. Especially with the North Korean army now actually fighting itself.
South Korea under recently the elected president Kim Dae-Jung had no interest in renewing fighting or intervening in any manner in the conflict. As the first civilian President in over 30 years and a promoter of a detente with North Korea, President Kim was firmly against any action but he knew that it was out of his hands if the US decided to take action. When considering America's actions not too long ago in Libya President Kim wasn't sure if it meant that the Americans were too busy in Libya or if America was on a roll.
American's President Hammond on the other hand saw the potential value of intervening. He was no longer bound to following Dan Crane's orders as President but at the same time North Korea was a tempting target considering their artillery was no longer really aimed at Seoul and they were busy fighting each other. The Soviets couldn't respond and the Chinese didn't want to respond. The country was starving and fighting among themselves. After things in Libya went so well, Hammond was interested in wagging the dog to help the party and bump out more Big 5 allies within the party bureaucracy so it. What could go wrong?
American and South Korean military forces crossed over the DMZ for the first time since the 50's and the war was on again. People didn't like it, the UN didn't like it, Americans didn't really like it, South Koreans didn't like it, and unsurprisingly the North Koreans didn't like it either. North Korean forces around the border put on a stalwart although ultimately futile defense. Of course, the shells fired from North Korean artillery or bombs dropped by North Korea bombers on Seoul were by no means futile. The dead civilians in Seoul numbering at about 10,000 who's corpses plastered the covers of magazines across the world were not futile or worthless either. But if there was a silver lining to the dead innocents, it was that at least because of how paralyzed and broken the North Korean state was and how quickly the US and South Korean forces won air supremacy over the peninsula that WMDs were never used and that North Korean artillery was silenced about as fast as expected.
With US and Korean marines landing just north of Pyongyang, the very brief civil war ended when Jang's forces were either dead or threw down their flags in defense of North Korea. The forces which could regroup on both sides began to prepare defenses and Jang and Kim Pyong-il were turned over to Kim Jong-il who liquidated them. Others who had fought on Jang's side were given reprieves from any punishments, certainly at least until the Americans and the South Koreans were kicked out of the peninsula.
But the new Kim regime was not to last long. The military that wasn't outright flattened upon contact with the US and the South Koreans didn't last much longer. To fight against their enemy was a losing proposition. The North Korean weapons and military doctrines remained almost unchanged since the 1960's and with air supremacy the North Korean columns could no longer travel in the open. It was a suicide mission to travel by roads. But many in the north didn't care either way. Decades of propaganda and lies produced by the North Korean government had made the vast majority of North Koreans to believe that the American soldiers would rape and torture them to death anyway. Young boys were goaded into throwing themselves at American soldiers with live grenades in hand. Entire families were encouraged to kill themselves and those that refused often found themselves killed by rabid soldiers who were high on stimulants and adrenaline. Indeed one could compare the disgusting actions of the North Korean regime in its final days with that of the Imperial Japanese military action's during the battle of Okinawa. Thankfully however, the chaos would not last as long and most deaths came from American air planes.
The North Korean regime was battered and with the capture of Kim Jong-il and much of the government's upper echelon central leadership of the nation collapsed within the first 72 hours. These moments in 1995 were the regime's darkest and it makes sense then that the regime dissolved with only so much pressure applied from outside. The North Korean regime which had held a tight grip over the country since the 50's had finally collapsed. The Korean war was finally over.
Though at the same time, the chaos and the violence of the conflict was not even close to ending. North Korea was in the midst of a massive famine by the time the war began and those that survived the conflict were in poor medical care and were starving. Of course the gulag system itself needed to be addressed and many individuals needed to be captured and held for trials of the North Korean state. America, for whatever positive image the intervention might have given them, were quick to lose interest in Korea. Beyond showing American military forces kicking ass and handing out supplies Hammond didn't care about the conflict. The war was one of propaganda just like Libya. With the failing economy eating at his approvals and the generic ballot looking really good for Democrats, the man from Alaska was looking to wag the dog. It didn't work all too well.
American troops were quickly reverted to pre-intervention levels and the aid given by America to South Korea both as direct government aid and aid explicitly to deal with the food crisis faded away as days past and criticisms towards the reckless decision grew louder. The North Korean gulag system muddled criticism so Hammond escaped mostly unscathed and with a slight bump in the market to show for his mettle. Was it worth just that for Hammond? Maybe if it went as smooth as Libya, but almost 40,000 killed in less than a week and trillions in damages makes one reconsider these sorts of things.
North Korea was done though. Thanks to the quick actions of US and ROK marines Kim Jong-il and his government were captured early on. Of course there was always the rogue agents of North Korea and the various partisans who refused surrender who would continue to cause a great deal of pain. The gigantic economic and social gap between the North and South, even larger than that of East and West Germany, was also a massive drain on the extremely fiscally weak South's resources. But Korea was united. Once the Changwon tribunals began Hammond even got a mini-bump in his approvals.
Kim Jong-il serving his life sentence in prison, 2006
Yet still, it was not enough for him to totally oust the Big 5 and their allies from the party bureaucracy. There was still more work for Hammond to do but as 1996 came nearer and nearer it became clear that Hammond was never going to have control over the party like the Big 5 did during their hay day.
------
Will trade humanitarian disasters for votes. Or political power, whichever's easier for you.
Thankfully a much simpler proposition when you take into account the lack of China being involved and the regime fighting itself. After you get air supremacy it would basically just be the Gulf War if you make sure to avoid any WMD use. Maybe I'm going a little easy on Korea with this one but Alternate History needs more optimism. And Korea needs to be wanked more. Everyone wanks Japan but Korea always seems to be the red headed step child of East Asia in AH. I have plans for Korea though. Part II will be interesting for them.
Next post after this is finally a return to US politics. Rejoice!
In North Korea however, the spirit of revolution and reform was much more muted. The long time leader Kim Il-sung had held a tight grasp on the state since its inception and had done an even better job of destroying whatever intellectual basis there was outside of the party. Indeed, in many ways China's Wang had learned his better leadership strategies from Kim. When Kim finally gave up the ghost in 1995, it was in the midst of the CCP's collapse and as a result it gave the Korean regime a great deal of anxiety over the issue
Some of the anxiety was written off because the nation's political class could at least count on an already decided successor for the state. Kim Jong-il was Kim Il-sung's son and had been quite openly designated as the dictator's successor since the late 80's. Although at the same time, Kim Jong-il's political position was not as stable as it might have seemed nor would his being successor be that much of a relief for the political authorities.
Kim Jong-il's personality did little to soothe tensions between him and others. His personality was rough and strongly authoritarian. If one even slightly broke from what he had decided or deviated from the various micro managing minutia he had put forward then he took it as a sign of disloyalty. It was the hallmarks of a tyrant for the North Korean government. As a result, he had managed to alienate several key potential allies and with the death of close ally O Jin-u it seemed like the previously easy assent to power was no longer as easy as it could have been.
O Jin-u: Too little, too late.
While Kim Jong-il was appointed to head the Korean People's Army and was a part of an official triumvirate, from 1995 he was unofficially the nation's leader albeit with internal foes to deal with. At the same time blood was in the water and sharks had begun to swim.
The new despot also had a reputation for economic mismanagement and he quickly proved the reputation not wholly undeserved following the collapse of the country's agriculture and the whole of its economy. With the country being unable to trade with China and the Soviet Union, North Korea had few countries to trade with and little to trade with those North Korea could trade with. With trade almost entirely gone and agricultural disaster occurring, the nation was in the midst of a famine. Kim Jong-il might have had a theoretical iron grip on the nation but with the nation collapsing and starving and with Kim Jong-il taking his father's death extremely poorly it was clear that there was going to be a change in North Korea.
Likely not a change akin to that of the Soviet Union or China was going through, but a change all the same. It became clear that a purge, either of the Kim Jong-il or his opponents was going to occur. The opposition to Kim Jong-il was not ideological and was more based on patronage networks and therefore whomever had their networks removed or felt threatened would be open to striking against Kim Jong-il.
The main challenger to Kim Jong-il was Jang Song-thaek, his brother-in-law. Jang was not from the Kim family but had married into it and had grown too big for his britches. His power and influence in the country grew exponentially since marrying into the Kim dynasty and he plotted to removed Kim Jong-il himself from power. The other challenger of course was Kim Jong-il's younger half-brother Kim Pyong-il who had fallen from grace in the 70's and had since been relegated to diplomatic duties abroad. Kim Pyong-il was then therefore not nearly as much of a serious challenger as Jang Song-thaek. He was more likely to take the role of figurehead than as the real leader in any future regime. It was inevitable then that Jang Son-thaek figured Kim Pyong-il for a good ally.
Kim Jong-il hadn't totally lost the support of the party or the military but it was lacking. Jang Song-thaek however had in the meantime been using his pawn Kim Pyong-il as a front and had been using his contacts to begin to assemble a group to go against Kim Jong-il. Later on, Kim Pyong-il was recalled from his diplomatic post in Finland back home. This was not an attempt by Jang to prepare for a coup but rather a play by Kim Jong-il himself. He had sniffed out their plot and was preparing to remove both of them at once.
Kim Jong-il on his rivals: "They think I don't know what game they're playing. All I need is a month and then I'll have them and their families sent away forever. They will never see Pyongyang ever again."
Jang Song-thaek wasn't stupid either and so he and his supporters readied themselves. Sometime soon they would likely be attempted to be imprisoned by Kim Jong-il's forces and when that time came they could either go quietly or fight back. If they fought back they'd likely die, but if they went quietly they would certainly die. In the state that North Korea was, where soldiers were digging up the recently deceased for nourishment, neither faction was fighting for power anymore. Just survival. If Kim Jong-il's faction won they'd inherit a broken nation but they'd survive and the same could be said of Jang's faction.
Several months later, Kim Jong-il's faction began the attempted purge of Jang's faction. Kim Jong-il's close friend O Kuk-ryol ordered close associates of Jang and Kim Pyong-il in the military arrested. This was to be step one in the final series of steps that would ultimately secure control of North Korea. Rather than cowing to the other faction's demands however, Jang's faction instead took the offensive.
Jang's faction moved against Kim Jong-il's faction and the two factions began to fight. The fighting was not expected to last long and one side was expected to relent before long. Instead though, the fighting continued throughout the day and the hours turned into days. Suddenly the fighting that was simply squabbling over inheritance was turning into an international event. South Korea and the United States couldn't help but notice. Especially with the North Korean army now actually fighting itself.
South Korea under recently the elected president Kim Dae-Jung had no interest in renewing fighting or intervening in any manner in the conflict. As the first civilian President in over 30 years and a promoter of a detente with North Korea, President Kim was firmly against any action but he knew that it was out of his hands if the US decided to take action. When considering America's actions not too long ago in Libya President Kim wasn't sure if it meant that the Americans were too busy in Libya or if America was on a roll.
American's President Hammond on the other hand saw the potential value of intervening. He was no longer bound to following Dan Crane's orders as President but at the same time North Korea was a tempting target considering their artillery was no longer really aimed at Seoul and they were busy fighting each other. The Soviets couldn't respond and the Chinese didn't want to respond. The country was starving and fighting among themselves. After things in Libya went so well, Hammond was interested in wagging the dog to help the party and bump out more Big 5 allies within the party bureaucracy so it. What could go wrong?
American and South Korean military forces crossed over the DMZ for the first time since the 50's and the war was on again. People didn't like it, the UN didn't like it, Americans didn't really like it, South Koreans didn't like it, and unsurprisingly the North Koreans didn't like it either. North Korean forces around the border put on a stalwart although ultimately futile defense. Of course, the shells fired from North Korean artillery or bombs dropped by North Korea bombers on Seoul were by no means futile. The dead civilians in Seoul numbering at about 10,000 who's corpses plastered the covers of magazines across the world were not futile or worthless either. But if there was a silver lining to the dead innocents, it was that at least because of how paralyzed and broken the North Korean state was and how quickly the US and South Korean forces won air supremacy over the peninsula that WMDs were never used and that North Korean artillery was silenced about as fast as expected.
With US and Korean marines landing just north of Pyongyang, the very brief civil war ended when Jang's forces were either dead or threw down their flags in defense of North Korea. The forces which could regroup on both sides began to prepare defenses and Jang and Kim Pyong-il were turned over to Kim Jong-il who liquidated them. Others who had fought on Jang's side were given reprieves from any punishments, certainly at least until the Americans and the South Koreans were kicked out of the peninsula.
But the new Kim regime was not to last long. The military that wasn't outright flattened upon contact with the US and the South Koreans didn't last much longer. To fight against their enemy was a losing proposition. The North Korean weapons and military doctrines remained almost unchanged since the 1960's and with air supremacy the North Korean columns could no longer travel in the open. It was a suicide mission to travel by roads. But many in the north didn't care either way. Decades of propaganda and lies produced by the North Korean government had made the vast majority of North Koreans to believe that the American soldiers would rape and torture them to death anyway. Young boys were goaded into throwing themselves at American soldiers with live grenades in hand. Entire families were encouraged to kill themselves and those that refused often found themselves killed by rabid soldiers who were high on stimulants and adrenaline. Indeed one could compare the disgusting actions of the North Korean regime in its final days with that of the Imperial Japanese military action's during the battle of Okinawa. Thankfully however, the chaos would not last as long and most deaths came from American air planes.
The North Korean regime was battered and with the capture of Kim Jong-il and much of the government's upper echelon central leadership of the nation collapsed within the first 72 hours. These moments in 1995 were the regime's darkest and it makes sense then that the regime dissolved with only so much pressure applied from outside. The North Korean regime which had held a tight grip over the country since the 50's had finally collapsed. The Korean war was finally over.
Though at the same time, the chaos and the violence of the conflict was not even close to ending. North Korea was in the midst of a massive famine by the time the war began and those that survived the conflict were in poor medical care and were starving. Of course the gulag system itself needed to be addressed and many individuals needed to be captured and held for trials of the North Korean state. America, for whatever positive image the intervention might have given them, were quick to lose interest in Korea. Beyond showing American military forces kicking ass and handing out supplies Hammond didn't care about the conflict. The war was one of propaganda just like Libya. With the failing economy eating at his approvals and the generic ballot looking really good for Democrats, the man from Alaska was looking to wag the dog. It didn't work all too well.
American troops were quickly reverted to pre-intervention levels and the aid given by America to South Korea both as direct government aid and aid explicitly to deal with the food crisis faded away as days past and criticisms towards the reckless decision grew louder. The North Korean gulag system muddled criticism so Hammond escaped mostly unscathed and with a slight bump in the market to show for his mettle. Was it worth just that for Hammond? Maybe if it went as smooth as Libya, but almost 40,000 killed in less than a week and trillions in damages makes one reconsider these sorts of things.
North Korea was done though. Thanks to the quick actions of US and ROK marines Kim Jong-il and his government were captured early on. Of course there was always the rogue agents of North Korea and the various partisans who refused surrender who would continue to cause a great deal of pain. The gigantic economic and social gap between the North and South, even larger than that of East and West Germany, was also a massive drain on the extremely fiscally weak South's resources. But Korea was united. Once the Changwon tribunals began Hammond even got a mini-bump in his approvals.
Kim Jong-il serving his life sentence in prison, 2006
Yet still, it was not enough for him to totally oust the Big 5 and their allies from the party bureaucracy. There was still more work for Hammond to do but as 1996 came nearer and nearer it became clear that Hammond was never going to have control over the party like the Big 5 did during their hay day.
------
Will trade humanitarian disasters for votes. Or political power, whichever's easier for you.
Thankfully a much simpler proposition when you take into account the lack of China being involved and the regime fighting itself. After you get air supremacy it would basically just be the Gulf War if you make sure to avoid any WMD use. Maybe I'm going a little easy on Korea with this one but Alternate History needs more optimism. And Korea needs to be wanked more. Everyone wanks Japan but Korea always seems to be the red headed step child of East Asia in AH. I have plans for Korea though. Part II will be interesting for them.
Next post after this is finally a return to US politics. Rejoice!
36 - Part 34: Something new, Something blue
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Part 34: Something new, Something blue
It was 1996 and the Democrats were feeling hot. People were tired of the Conservative policies after 4 terms and the economy was failing. With a deal this good, not even Jerry Brown could fuck this up. Well, they hoped. Brown was naturally running again and was ready to be as ambitious as he always was. Mercifully though, it was clear from early polling that whatever momentum Brown had before in '92 had largely vanished and many blamed him as a vote spoiler. He was at best a 3 spot or 4 spot candidate in the beginning because of his name recognition, set to tower over the unknowns of the race. As the race grew on it was inevitable that someone would eclipse him.
As the primaries drew nearer and nearer the economy showed no signs of recovering. As a result, the reformists were not as enthusiastic as they were in the past. People wanted serious economic action and the budget obsessed reformists weren't the ones to lead the charge. Proxmire's wing was finally falling out of favor with the party. The previous candidate Myerson had fallen by the wayside because of her electoral loss and a corruption probe and the only big name from those who took after Proxmire was Jerry Brown. Although at the same time it must be mentioned that Brown never fully took after Proxmire. Just like Myerson had her own accents to the program (Social Liberalism and Pro-Israeli foreign policy in Myerson's case) Brown had his own additions. Brown's political platform more strongly aped the Conservatives, going as far as promoting a flat tax while at the same time strongly backing protectionist sentiments, opposing the death penalty, and supporting hippy-dippy environmentalism. Brown was always an odd and idiosyncratic. But once again it must be mentioned that economically strenuous times like in the Long Recession, people wanted solid economic proposals. Brown and the other reformists offered little beyond piecemeal programs and support for supposedly pragmatic solutions. Brown and several other reformists were convinced that the Long Recession was just about over. The Long Recession was just known as the "Asian Panic" at the time.
The main dichotomy of the '96 Democratic primaries was based on how strong the candidates support for extensive government programs were. Most Hardliners took the side favoring government based solutions and Kenysianism whereas most of the basic liberals of the Democrats were less strongly supportive of government based solutions. Not to say they were opposed to government spending of course, after all they were still Democrats.
By the time Iowa and New Hampshire rolled along, there was really only a few major candidates left. Despite hard fought campaigns by big names like Dellums and Bob Kerry, the Democrats coalesced around a small number of candidates early on.
Poll of candidate favorability, just after 1996 Iowa caucuses:
Tom Harkin 21%
Dick Gephardt 14%
James Florio 13%
Jerry Brown 13%
Joe Biden 11%
Mickey Leland 9%
Doug Wilder 7%
Mark Shriver 6%
Others 6%
1996 front runner Tom Harkin celebrates after winning his home state
New Hampshire a few days later gave another victory for Harkin, giving him two solid wins. The race continued to slim down quickly despite the high number of initial contenders. Dellums and several other hardliners ultimately shuttered their campaigns, endorsing Mickey Leland. The Texas Congressman was by no means a Hardliner but he was close in some respects especially when it came to fighting against poverty and racism. Leland also had a strong level of experience as well as strong cross over appeal to more moderate and conservative black groups, potentially giving him a leg up when it came time for primaries in the south. The black population of America (black women especially) had been an important if ignored portion of the Democratic base for many years and Mickey Leland was by far their most popular candidate in the running of 1996. The southern primaries would take time however, and in the beginning the heavily white states of Iowa and New Hampshire had to be gotten through before the rest of the country could have their primaries.
Poll of candidate favorability, just after 1996 New Hampshire primaries:
Tom Harkin 23%
James Florio 21%
Dick Gephardt 18%
Mickey Leland 17%
Joe Biden 10%
Mark Shriver 4%
Others 7%
Out of nowhere, former New Jersey Governor James Florio was in striking distance in first and Leland was even closer to eclipsing Gephardt. Florio was a typical mid-Atlantic moderate governor and Leland was of course a black southern Congressman. How the two managed to bridge the gap in Iowa and New Hampshire is not totally known. The real question, the most important one, was how Super Tuesday went. If Leland or Florio could manage an over performance they could potentially be very close to locking down the nomination. It was a real possibility forthem to manage to win the primaries if he got the momentum from a Super Tuesday victory. For Leland to be that close, and to be so strongly making inroads into white demographics as a black candidate it was newsworthy. Even if that was as far as he got, it would be worthy of a place in the history book. Harkin and Gephardt's campaigns running into fatigue so early perhaps also earned them a place in the history books.
For that reason, and for the fact that 4 top candidates were all close it made so that there was a great deal of political maneuvering before 1996's Super Tuesday.
Biden's campaign of course had managed to stay afloat largely via his reputation opposing Proxmire and Brown but his debate appearances also helped bolster his at the polls. Whereas other were largely lackluster or otherwise unnoticeable, Biden injected some passion into his speeches. In some ways, he started to sound like a Hardliner. He was hitting hard on the economic issues of the day and the others had done so as well, but with the pugnacious charm of Diamond Joe. In some ways, this was a hindrance to him however as he looked slightly unhinged to some. Both favorable and unfavorable comparisons to John Glenn were sure to follow. On Super Tuesday he just focused on campaigning his butt off with the very last of his abilities in the hopes of a surprise victory. Gephardt basically just tried to do the same and borrowed some of the brash and bold style of Biden in the hopes of getting enthusiasm back into his campaign.
Harkin of course simply tried to look magnanimous and presidential. Harkin figured that since he was in the lead so he didn't need to ruffle any feathers. Harkin was of course the most successful and most traditionally economically left wing among the remaining notable candidates. He was only a few steps away from being a Hardliner and his more polite image and lack of association with Dellums or Daschle was largely what kept him from becoming one in the eyes of the public. Harkin continued course. It looked good so far so why change it?
Of course, famously, the Shriver campaign shut down and endorsed Leland rather than Harkin. He was expected to endorse Harkin by most of the media since his campaign began to flag but he chose differently. Jerry Brown went along a similar path and instead of endorsing James Florio or staying in he ended up opting to not take part in any more primaries and so his campaign was stuck in something of a political limbo. Not dead but most certainly not alive.
The results of 96's Super Tuesday were of course a famous moment in American history.
Poll of candidate favorability, just after 1996 Super Tuesday:
James Florio 31%
Mickey Leland 30%
Tom Harkin 25%
Joe Biden 6%
Dick Gephardt 5%
Others 3%
Mickey Leland pulled off a surprising string of victories and surged forward in popularity despite all odds. Harkin however saw his campaign collapse under the pressure of more enthusiastic supporters from Leland and Florio's campaign and he saw moderate success in very white states but otherwise saw few victories for the rest of 1996. James Florio, the suburbanite moderate from the dying Proxmire wing of the more socially liberal Myerson variety, took first place even if barely. It soon became clear that only Florio could stop Leland but with so many contests in Leland's backyard still to come it was looking almost possible for the Democrats to nominate a black man for President.
In the end, Florio was unable to surpass Leland's lead although he came in a very respectable (and very close) second. Harkin, Brown, Biden, and others of course staying down towards the bottom of the polls almost every time. For Brown it marked the end of his public career and for Biden and Harkin it was their final attempt at the Presidency.
Mickey Leland on military spending under Reagan and Hammond: "Every dollar spent on guns and bombs is a dollar not spent elsewhere. Not spent on healthcare, not spending on welfare, not spent on education, or infrastructure. We're starting to see the startling results of what rampant military spending does to a society. We don't want to look like the Soviet Union."
At the tasteful vista of Buffalo, the first black man in American history was nominated to as President by a major party. Amid the cheering of course there was an underlying current of anger and racial anxiety. Threats and fears of bombings and assassins made the convention the most secured convention in American history. Of course, there was also rumors of people thinking of jumping ship just like last time with Myerson and Jackson. If the economy wasn't so broken and if Brown had done better maybe they anti-Leland forces could have done something but there was just too much against them this time around. People wanted change and Mickey Leland was willing to bring it.
The question then was who was to be Leland's second? Florio and his campaign seemed to be under the impression that as a respectable second they deserved the spot. At the same time, Congressman Thomas Andrews was being seriously considered. Andrews was noted for his dedication and work towards world peace and a stronger dedication to a peaceful foreign policy was one of the elements that Leland wanted to put forward on his platform. The Florio campaign made a good argument though and Leland didn't want to risk another repeat of Jerry Brown. So it was decided that Thomas Andrews would be Secretary of States if Leland was elected and Florio would be his running mate and perhaps VP.
From that point it came time to set up the platform and general tone of the general campaign. Leland's primary campaign was largely economically moderate considering the circumstances. It largely relied on increasing much needed regulations and enabling a negative interest rate in order to promote consumer spending as well as creating a much larger social safety net. The social platform was obviously more progressive, at least racially. Leland promoted what could be best described as racial harmony – uniting whites and blacks. His foreign policy was his least discussed area and largely seemed to rely on focusing on peace and avoiding things like the ugly debacle in Libya or Korea. None of it was outwardly objectionable to most Democrats and so that was carried into the general without much in the way of change.
The Conservatives had the exact opposite situation. They were not really expecting to win the upcoming election and didn't have many running. It did have the effect of jostling around the factions that Hammond's independence had woken up however so it was politically momentous at the very least.
The Mainstream faction was of course still there and not going away. They were wounded and eagerly looking for a win against Hammond's Jack Kemp. Their main candidate was former Democrat turned Conservative Zell Miller. He was something of a firebrand however so he at least had that going for him even if it wasn't much. The Big 5 was falling apart at a record pace and it was clear that Zell was not going to be the one to save their power anyway. It was clear that even though Hammond didn't give it a death blow, the Big 5 was mortally wounded and instead a new, more normal sort of political establishment would take charge in the Conservative Party in the future.
Hammond's group (formed out of the Chicagoites and the Classical Liberals) were firmly behind Hammond's VP Jack Kemp. Kemp fully and completely backed Hammond's vision of a more idealistic version of the Conservative Party and their ideology. How well he could do that depended on fighting the party hierarchy itself in many cases and so it proved a challenging task.
The far-right of course had their candidates. Pat Robertson and Ellen McCormack were representing the more religiously minded among them and they fared poorly, an obvious sign that the evangelicals were simply not as powerful as they once were. The other was Pat Buchanan who presented a bit of a quandary. He was firmly within the Paleoconservative's ideological range and he benefited strongly from anti-Leland sentiment but he also saw a fair amount of support from the libertarian section of the party. The libertarians had seen a nosedive of unity and support since their informal leader Ron Paul's death in an aircraft crash over Tennessee the year prior. The libertarians largely merged into the Paleoconservative faction and supported Buchanan, folded into Hammond's crowd, or if you were a supporter of Gygax you left and joined the Freedom Party. The Freedom Party of course was and still is politically irrelevant.
The leader from day 1 of the primaries was naturally then someone from neither of the original factions. Someone more associated with their respective local politics. Someone regional. Someone interesting. This person, who's faction could be referred to as the Populists carved out his own niche of support early in the primaries. He loudly rejected Hammond and his crew but he didn't fall in line with the Mainstream. His Conservative Party was to be nativistic, protectionistic on the basis of saving jobs, oppositional to Buchanan's isolationism, firmly supportive of American exceptionalism, and in favor of unilateral action to secure American interests abroad. This sort of conservatism was paternalistic and populistic. The candidate to carve out this base for himself was none other than Arkansas governor Bill Clinton.
Bill Clinton stumping in South Carolina, 1996
Clinton was very charismatic and smooth. Comparing Buchanan to Clinton was comparing a rotten apple to a fresh one. There was just seemed to be no way to defeat him on the debate stage. His success on the stage and his success in the early primaries seemingly handed him a secure victory early on. All the southern states were going to back him and with the solid momentum he had from his twin victories in Iowa and New Hampshire made it look like there was no way for him to lose. McCormack endorsed after promises of a national right to life amendment, Pat Robertson suspended his campaign, Kemp endorsed Clinton rather than let Zell Miller get a victory. Bill Clinton was taking off and with each victory Mickey Leland had, Clinton's base of support only got larger. For Conservatives, he was the only one who could beat the Democrats and the only one who could provide a solution to the Long Recession. He was to be the new Reagan.
What no one knew, not even Clinton himself, was that his health was in a bad place. While debating with Zell Miller at a televised event Clinton suddenly collapsed. He was dead of a massive heart attack before his body hit the floor. The presumptive nominee was dead and so was his campaign. A brief "Draft Hillary" campaign took off in an attempt to get Clinton's widow to run but she turned it down, likely well aware that she could never win in '96 with the cards that she and the Conservatives had been dealt.
From that moment forward Zell Miller and Pat Buchanan were the only ones left with a chance to win outright. The others who jumped back in or joined in late would have to rely on a contested convention. As a result there was little interest among serious or notable candidates to join in. It was just Miller and Buchanan going one on one.
Buchanan wasn't very charismatic and his campaign left much to be desired when it came to fund raising. Buchanan (who was previously a distant third) simply slid further and further behind Miller. His attempts to woo party officials to bring victory at the convention also went sideways. With Buchanan's campaign and the weak attempts by Forbes and Keyes to bring up the rear going awry Zell Miller easily swept the rest of the contests and secured the party's support at the convention. His running-mate was decided to be Michigan governor John Engler to provide for more geographic balance. Having two governors on the ticket was scrutinized in whispers but there was little vocalized concern. Whatever optimism there was during the days of Bill Clinton disappeared right quick once he died that day.
1996: Mickey Leland/James Florio vs. Zell Miller/John Engler
------
1996 is an important year. Had Harkin not fumbled and if Billy managed to kick his hamburger habit it would probably be less important of a year. But that's not how I wrote it so Billy died and Harkin fumbled.
It was 1996 and the Democrats were feeling hot. People were tired of the Conservative policies after 4 terms and the economy was failing. With a deal this good, not even Jerry Brown could fuck this up. Well, they hoped. Brown was naturally running again and was ready to be as ambitious as he always was. Mercifully though, it was clear from early polling that whatever momentum Brown had before in '92 had largely vanished and many blamed him as a vote spoiler. He was at best a 3 spot or 4 spot candidate in the beginning because of his name recognition, set to tower over the unknowns of the race. As the race grew on it was inevitable that someone would eclipse him.
As the primaries drew nearer and nearer the economy showed no signs of recovering. As a result, the reformists were not as enthusiastic as they were in the past. People wanted serious economic action and the budget obsessed reformists weren't the ones to lead the charge. Proxmire's wing was finally falling out of favor with the party. The previous candidate Myerson had fallen by the wayside because of her electoral loss and a corruption probe and the only big name from those who took after Proxmire was Jerry Brown. Although at the same time it must be mentioned that Brown never fully took after Proxmire. Just like Myerson had her own accents to the program (Social Liberalism and Pro-Israeli foreign policy in Myerson's case) Brown had his own additions. Brown's political platform more strongly aped the Conservatives, going as far as promoting a flat tax while at the same time strongly backing protectionist sentiments, opposing the death penalty, and supporting hippy-dippy environmentalism. Brown was always an odd and idiosyncratic. But once again it must be mentioned that economically strenuous times like in the Long Recession, people wanted solid economic proposals. Brown and the other reformists offered little beyond piecemeal programs and support for supposedly pragmatic solutions. Brown and several other reformists were convinced that the Long Recession was just about over. The Long Recession was just known as the "Asian Panic" at the time.
The main dichotomy of the '96 Democratic primaries was based on how strong the candidates support for extensive government programs were. Most Hardliners took the side favoring government based solutions and Kenysianism whereas most of the basic liberals of the Democrats were less strongly supportive of government based solutions. Not to say they were opposed to government spending of course, after all they were still Democrats.
By the time Iowa and New Hampshire rolled along, there was really only a few major candidates left. Despite hard fought campaigns by big names like Dellums and Bob Kerry, the Democrats coalesced around a small number of candidates early on.
Poll of candidate favorability, just after 1996 Iowa caucuses:
Tom Harkin 21%
Dick Gephardt 14%
James Florio 13%
Jerry Brown 13%
Joe Biden 11%
Mickey Leland 9%
Doug Wilder 7%
Mark Shriver 6%
Others 6%
1996 front runner Tom Harkin celebrates after winning his home state
New Hampshire a few days later gave another victory for Harkin, giving him two solid wins. The race continued to slim down quickly despite the high number of initial contenders. Dellums and several other hardliners ultimately shuttered their campaigns, endorsing Mickey Leland. The Texas Congressman was by no means a Hardliner but he was close in some respects especially when it came to fighting against poverty and racism. Leland also had a strong level of experience as well as strong cross over appeal to more moderate and conservative black groups, potentially giving him a leg up when it came time for primaries in the south. The black population of America (black women especially) had been an important if ignored portion of the Democratic base for many years and Mickey Leland was by far their most popular candidate in the running of 1996. The southern primaries would take time however, and in the beginning the heavily white states of Iowa and New Hampshire had to be gotten through before the rest of the country could have their primaries.
Poll of candidate favorability, just after 1996 New Hampshire primaries:
Tom Harkin 23%
James Florio 21%
Dick Gephardt 18%
Mickey Leland 17%
Joe Biden 10%
Mark Shriver 4%
Others 7%
Out of nowhere, former New Jersey Governor James Florio was in striking distance in first and Leland was even closer to eclipsing Gephardt. Florio was a typical mid-Atlantic moderate governor and Leland was of course a black southern Congressman. How the two managed to bridge the gap in Iowa and New Hampshire is not totally known. The real question, the most important one, was how Super Tuesday went. If Leland or Florio could manage an over performance they could potentially be very close to locking down the nomination. It was a real possibility forthem to manage to win the primaries if he got the momentum from a Super Tuesday victory. For Leland to be that close, and to be so strongly making inroads into white demographics as a black candidate it was newsworthy. Even if that was as far as he got, it would be worthy of a place in the history book. Harkin and Gephardt's campaigns running into fatigue so early perhaps also earned them a place in the history books.
For that reason, and for the fact that 4 top candidates were all close it made so that there was a great deal of political maneuvering before 1996's Super Tuesday.
Biden's campaign of course had managed to stay afloat largely via his reputation opposing Proxmire and Brown but his debate appearances also helped bolster his at the polls. Whereas other were largely lackluster or otherwise unnoticeable, Biden injected some passion into his speeches. In some ways, he started to sound like a Hardliner. He was hitting hard on the economic issues of the day and the others had done so as well, but with the pugnacious charm of Diamond Joe. In some ways, this was a hindrance to him however as he looked slightly unhinged to some. Both favorable and unfavorable comparisons to John Glenn were sure to follow. On Super Tuesday he just focused on campaigning his butt off with the very last of his abilities in the hopes of a surprise victory. Gephardt basically just tried to do the same and borrowed some of the brash and bold style of Biden in the hopes of getting enthusiasm back into his campaign.
Harkin of course simply tried to look magnanimous and presidential. Harkin figured that since he was in the lead so he didn't need to ruffle any feathers. Harkin was of course the most successful and most traditionally economically left wing among the remaining notable candidates. He was only a few steps away from being a Hardliner and his more polite image and lack of association with Dellums or Daschle was largely what kept him from becoming one in the eyes of the public. Harkin continued course. It looked good so far so why change it?
Of course, famously, the Shriver campaign shut down and endorsed Leland rather than Harkin. He was expected to endorse Harkin by most of the media since his campaign began to flag but he chose differently. Jerry Brown went along a similar path and instead of endorsing James Florio or staying in he ended up opting to not take part in any more primaries and so his campaign was stuck in something of a political limbo. Not dead but most certainly not alive.
The results of 96's Super Tuesday were of course a famous moment in American history.
Poll of candidate favorability, just after 1996 Super Tuesday:
James Florio 31%
Mickey Leland 30%
Tom Harkin 25%
Joe Biden 6%
Dick Gephardt 5%
Others 3%
Mickey Leland pulled off a surprising string of victories and surged forward in popularity despite all odds. Harkin however saw his campaign collapse under the pressure of more enthusiastic supporters from Leland and Florio's campaign and he saw moderate success in very white states but otherwise saw few victories for the rest of 1996. James Florio, the suburbanite moderate from the dying Proxmire wing of the more socially liberal Myerson variety, took first place even if barely. It soon became clear that only Florio could stop Leland but with so many contests in Leland's backyard still to come it was looking almost possible for the Democrats to nominate a black man for President.
In the end, Florio was unable to surpass Leland's lead although he came in a very respectable (and very close) second. Harkin, Brown, Biden, and others of course staying down towards the bottom of the polls almost every time. For Brown it marked the end of his public career and for Biden and Harkin it was their final attempt at the Presidency.
Mickey Leland on military spending under Reagan and Hammond: "Every dollar spent on guns and bombs is a dollar not spent elsewhere. Not spent on healthcare, not spending on welfare, not spent on education, or infrastructure. We're starting to see the startling results of what rampant military spending does to a society. We don't want to look like the Soviet Union."
At the tasteful vista of Buffalo, the first black man in American history was nominated to as President by a major party. Amid the cheering of course there was an underlying current of anger and racial anxiety. Threats and fears of bombings and assassins made the convention the most secured convention in American history. Of course, there was also rumors of people thinking of jumping ship just like last time with Myerson and Jackson. If the economy wasn't so broken and if Brown had done better maybe they anti-Leland forces could have done something but there was just too much against them this time around. People wanted change and Mickey Leland was willing to bring it.
The question then was who was to be Leland's second? Florio and his campaign seemed to be under the impression that as a respectable second they deserved the spot. At the same time, Congressman Thomas Andrews was being seriously considered. Andrews was noted for his dedication and work towards world peace and a stronger dedication to a peaceful foreign policy was one of the elements that Leland wanted to put forward on his platform. The Florio campaign made a good argument though and Leland didn't want to risk another repeat of Jerry Brown. So it was decided that Thomas Andrews would be Secretary of States if Leland was elected and Florio would be his running mate and perhaps VP.
From that point it came time to set up the platform and general tone of the general campaign. Leland's primary campaign was largely economically moderate considering the circumstances. It largely relied on increasing much needed regulations and enabling a negative interest rate in order to promote consumer spending as well as creating a much larger social safety net. The social platform was obviously more progressive, at least racially. Leland promoted what could be best described as racial harmony – uniting whites and blacks. His foreign policy was his least discussed area and largely seemed to rely on focusing on peace and avoiding things like the ugly debacle in Libya or Korea. None of it was outwardly objectionable to most Democrats and so that was carried into the general without much in the way of change.
The Conservatives had the exact opposite situation. They were not really expecting to win the upcoming election and didn't have many running. It did have the effect of jostling around the factions that Hammond's independence had woken up however so it was politically momentous at the very least.
The Mainstream faction was of course still there and not going away. They were wounded and eagerly looking for a win against Hammond's Jack Kemp. Their main candidate was former Democrat turned Conservative Zell Miller. He was something of a firebrand however so he at least had that going for him even if it wasn't much. The Big 5 was falling apart at a record pace and it was clear that Zell was not going to be the one to save their power anyway. It was clear that even though Hammond didn't give it a death blow, the Big 5 was mortally wounded and instead a new, more normal sort of political establishment would take charge in the Conservative Party in the future.
Hammond's group (formed out of the Chicagoites and the Classical Liberals) were firmly behind Hammond's VP Jack Kemp. Kemp fully and completely backed Hammond's vision of a more idealistic version of the Conservative Party and their ideology. How well he could do that depended on fighting the party hierarchy itself in many cases and so it proved a challenging task.
The far-right of course had their candidates. Pat Robertson and Ellen McCormack were representing the more religiously minded among them and they fared poorly, an obvious sign that the evangelicals were simply not as powerful as they once were. The other was Pat Buchanan who presented a bit of a quandary. He was firmly within the Paleoconservative's ideological range and he benefited strongly from anti-Leland sentiment but he also saw a fair amount of support from the libertarian section of the party. The libertarians had seen a nosedive of unity and support since their informal leader Ron Paul's death in an aircraft crash over Tennessee the year prior. The libertarians largely merged into the Paleoconservative faction and supported Buchanan, folded into Hammond's crowd, or if you were a supporter of Gygax you left and joined the Freedom Party. The Freedom Party of course was and still is politically irrelevant.
The leader from day 1 of the primaries was naturally then someone from neither of the original factions. Someone more associated with their respective local politics. Someone regional. Someone interesting. This person, who's faction could be referred to as the Populists carved out his own niche of support early in the primaries. He loudly rejected Hammond and his crew but he didn't fall in line with the Mainstream. His Conservative Party was to be nativistic, protectionistic on the basis of saving jobs, oppositional to Buchanan's isolationism, firmly supportive of American exceptionalism, and in favor of unilateral action to secure American interests abroad. This sort of conservatism was paternalistic and populistic. The candidate to carve out this base for himself was none other than Arkansas governor Bill Clinton.
Bill Clinton stumping in South Carolina, 1996
Clinton was very charismatic and smooth. Comparing Buchanan to Clinton was comparing a rotten apple to a fresh one. There was just seemed to be no way to defeat him on the debate stage. His success on the stage and his success in the early primaries seemingly handed him a secure victory early on. All the southern states were going to back him and with the solid momentum he had from his twin victories in Iowa and New Hampshire made it look like there was no way for him to lose. McCormack endorsed after promises of a national right to life amendment, Pat Robertson suspended his campaign, Kemp endorsed Clinton rather than let Zell Miller get a victory. Bill Clinton was taking off and with each victory Mickey Leland had, Clinton's base of support only got larger. For Conservatives, he was the only one who could beat the Democrats and the only one who could provide a solution to the Long Recession. He was to be the new Reagan.
What no one knew, not even Clinton himself, was that his health was in a bad place. While debating with Zell Miller at a televised event Clinton suddenly collapsed. He was dead of a massive heart attack before his body hit the floor. The presumptive nominee was dead and so was his campaign. A brief "Draft Hillary" campaign took off in an attempt to get Clinton's widow to run but she turned it down, likely well aware that she could never win in '96 with the cards that she and the Conservatives had been dealt.
From that moment forward Zell Miller and Pat Buchanan were the only ones left with a chance to win outright. The others who jumped back in or joined in late would have to rely on a contested convention. As a result there was little interest among serious or notable candidates to join in. It was just Miller and Buchanan going one on one.
Buchanan wasn't very charismatic and his campaign left much to be desired when it came to fund raising. Buchanan (who was previously a distant third) simply slid further and further behind Miller. His attempts to woo party officials to bring victory at the convention also went sideways. With Buchanan's campaign and the weak attempts by Forbes and Keyes to bring up the rear going awry Zell Miller easily swept the rest of the contests and secured the party's support at the convention. His running-mate was decided to be Michigan governor John Engler to provide for more geographic balance. Having two governors on the ticket was scrutinized in whispers but there was little vocalized concern. Whatever optimism there was during the days of Bill Clinton disappeared right quick once he died that day.
1996: Mickey Leland/James Florio vs. Zell Miller/John Engler
------
1996 is an important year. Had Harkin not fumbled and if Billy managed to kick his hamburger habit it would probably be less important of a year. But that's not how I wrote it so Billy died and Harkin fumbled.
37 - Part 35: An unripe fruit?
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Part 35: An unripe fruit?
It needn't be restated that going into 1996 that the Conservative Party wasn't feeling too hot.
President to be?: Zell Miller in Dayton, Ohio
Though it bears mentioning that internal polling and polling done by the various independent polling houses revealed that the situation on the ground wasn't as cut and dry as it otherwise seemed. Polling showed that most minorities in general swung strongly towards the Democrats in even traditionally Conservative groups (Cubans, Vietnamese, etc) but it also revealed that whites seemed to be anxious regarding Leland and not nearly as enthusiastic as other groups. White male moderates were especially low in their regard for Leland. It didn't mean that they swung towards Miller in response, but it did mean that they were not eager to vote.
From that point onward the Miller campaign was focused on two strategies. One was simply focused on winning the election in the traditional manner and maintained an above board approach. The other was a little dirty and was at best in legal gray areas. This other approach focused on suppressing turnouts for groups that were deemed to be vulnerable to dirty tricks.
The plan was to create conspiracies and false news stories which could then be spread by non-party organizations. Just like the older dirty tricks tried by the party it relied on outside but trusted agitators who could spread news. The plan would also make use of mass mailing techniques that anti-tax and other conservative activists created and utilized to great effect in local elections. The goal, more than anything else, was to decrease the opposing party's turnout.
This second strategy could have been wildly successful as it was later shown to be in 2020 but it ran into two major obstacles. The largest and most obvious issue was funding. For the conspiracy theories to be made and distributed it cost a lot of money. Money the CNC didn't have to spare. Their war chests were running dangerously low going into the general and it wasn't getting any better no matter how much fund raising events they had. The other was President Hammond. Hammond had since written off 1996 and while he wasn't keen to hand the Presidency off to Democrats he wanted to prevent a culture of criminality from taking hold in the party. Even if his "crusade" against the Big 5 did not grant him a victory, he was totally against allowing a Nixonian culture from taking root in the new party.
Hammond found out about the plans from one of his "eyes and ears" inside the CNC and used all of his power to shut the secondary strategy down. Miller and his campaign weren't interested in peddling conspiracies, nor was the party machinery itself. In the end Hammond got them to shy away from the more lurid and racist false news but only with heavy pressure and threats of leaks. His relationship with the CNC and the party was mostly ruined from that point on. Some within the party have speculated that it was this moment and the subsequent squabbles over Buchanan which led to Hammond's death via a car crash in 2003 but that remains merely a conspiracy theory whispered about in smokey rooms.
President Hammond to the CNC: "Nixon and his party are dead. Let's keep it that way."
Of course, the Leland campaign and the team just kept moving forward. They focused on driving up turnout, especially in inner cities. These were areas that even if strategy 2 had been employed would have been unaffected. The campaign worked alongside activist groups to focus on getting people registered to vote and getting them out on the day of. Even if that meant busing these people to the polls if need be. The Democratic strategy was a far cry from the bungled failure of Bayh's 1976 attempt to change the road map to the White House on his own.
Leland and Miller squared off in debates and so did their running-mates. Leland focused on his platform and calls for unity, given the state of the economy and race relations it was a strong argument. Miller of course tried to provide his own answers to the problems and issues America faced but it seemed worthless. He could only do so much without totally neutering his own political message and so he tried to refocus the debates on foreign policy when he could. Claims that Leland's less active diplomacy would harm the country internationally largely fell flat however. With the Soviet Union falling in on itself and the majority of other communist powers having been overthrown, there was little reason to think America really needed to assert herself in world affairs.
Florio and Engler of course had their match ups and those were really of little note. Neither were particularly good or bad at public speaking and as a result little needs to be said about the debates.
The day finally came and counting went into the night.
Mickey Leland/James Florio (Democratic Party): 51.1% (+11%)
Zell Miller/John Engler (Conservative Party): 45.6% (-4.2)
Other and Write-Ins: 3.3% (+2.5%)
Congressional Makeup of the newly elected Congress:
Changes in seats measured since the most recent Congressional Makeup section...
Senate – Democratic Majority
Democratic: 51 (+6)
Conservative: 49 (-6)
Vacant: 0
House of Representatives – Democratic Majority
Democratic: 223 (+28)
Conservative: 211 (-22)
Independent Democrat: 1 (-6) (Caucuses with Conservatives)
Vacant: 0
So the polls were (largely) right in the end. Minorities swung strongly towards Leland and the Democrats whereas moderate whites largely stayed home rather than vote for either. American had its first black President. Although it was a bittersweet victory. It was clear that the race and the down ballot races were hampered by Leland's skin color. Had a white Democrat won in his place the Democrats could have easily put double digits over the trash that was the Miller campaign, not to mention also win a few more hotly contests races in the down ballot.
The success (little less than 2 percent of the popular vote, but still shocking to the media) of the David Duke engineered Populist Party was also an ugly sight. During the fanfare and great pride that the inauguration brought the new President elect had to beef up security and watch closely to make sure the numerous threats against him weren't acted upon. Sadly for America this was not the end of this strife, but the beginning. America had a lot more to bleed and learn before this story was over.
------
We're on the tail end of the story now. Only a handful of posts left.
Part II is going along swimmingly and I'm working on it when I get free time on my weekends. We're about 4 posts deep at this point.
I also just realized I forgot entirely about the Yugoslav wars. Just one more thing I'll add to the redux. Same thing with the whole abortion thing.
It needn't be restated that going into 1996 that the Conservative Party wasn't feeling too hot.
President to be?: Zell Miller in Dayton, Ohio
Though it bears mentioning that internal polling and polling done by the various independent polling houses revealed that the situation on the ground wasn't as cut and dry as it otherwise seemed. Polling showed that most minorities in general swung strongly towards the Democrats in even traditionally Conservative groups (Cubans, Vietnamese, etc) but it also revealed that whites seemed to be anxious regarding Leland and not nearly as enthusiastic as other groups. White male moderates were especially low in their regard for Leland. It didn't mean that they swung towards Miller in response, but it did mean that they were not eager to vote.
From that point onward the Miller campaign was focused on two strategies. One was simply focused on winning the election in the traditional manner and maintained an above board approach. The other was a little dirty and was at best in legal gray areas. This other approach focused on suppressing turnouts for groups that were deemed to be vulnerable to dirty tricks.
The plan was to create conspiracies and false news stories which could then be spread by non-party organizations. Just like the older dirty tricks tried by the party it relied on outside but trusted agitators who could spread news. The plan would also make use of mass mailing techniques that anti-tax and other conservative activists created and utilized to great effect in local elections. The goal, more than anything else, was to decrease the opposing party's turnout.
This second strategy could have been wildly successful as it was later shown to be in 2020 but it ran into two major obstacles. The largest and most obvious issue was funding. For the conspiracy theories to be made and distributed it cost a lot of money. Money the CNC didn't have to spare. Their war chests were running dangerously low going into the general and it wasn't getting any better no matter how much fund raising events they had. The other was President Hammond. Hammond had since written off 1996 and while he wasn't keen to hand the Presidency off to Democrats he wanted to prevent a culture of criminality from taking hold in the party. Even if his "crusade" against the Big 5 did not grant him a victory, he was totally against allowing a Nixonian culture from taking root in the new party.
Hammond found out about the plans from one of his "eyes and ears" inside the CNC and used all of his power to shut the secondary strategy down. Miller and his campaign weren't interested in peddling conspiracies, nor was the party machinery itself. In the end Hammond got them to shy away from the more lurid and racist false news but only with heavy pressure and threats of leaks. His relationship with the CNC and the party was mostly ruined from that point on. Some within the party have speculated that it was this moment and the subsequent squabbles over Buchanan which led to Hammond's death via a car crash in 2003 but that remains merely a conspiracy theory whispered about in smokey rooms.
President Hammond to the CNC: "Nixon and his party are dead. Let's keep it that way."
Of course, the Leland campaign and the team just kept moving forward. They focused on driving up turnout, especially in inner cities. These were areas that even if strategy 2 had been employed would have been unaffected. The campaign worked alongside activist groups to focus on getting people registered to vote and getting them out on the day of. Even if that meant busing these people to the polls if need be. The Democratic strategy was a far cry from the bungled failure of Bayh's 1976 attempt to change the road map to the White House on his own.
Leland and Miller squared off in debates and so did their running-mates. Leland focused on his platform and calls for unity, given the state of the economy and race relations it was a strong argument. Miller of course tried to provide his own answers to the problems and issues America faced but it seemed worthless. He could only do so much without totally neutering his own political message and so he tried to refocus the debates on foreign policy when he could. Claims that Leland's less active diplomacy would harm the country internationally largely fell flat however. With the Soviet Union falling in on itself and the majority of other communist powers having been overthrown, there was little reason to think America really needed to assert herself in world affairs.
Florio and Engler of course had their match ups and those were really of little note. Neither were particularly good or bad at public speaking and as a result little needs to be said about the debates.
The day finally came and counting went into the night.
Mickey Leland/James Florio (Democratic Party): 51.1% (+11%)
Zell Miller/John Engler (Conservative Party): 45.6% (-4.2)
Other and Write-Ins: 3.3% (+2.5%)
Congressional Makeup of the newly elected Congress:
Changes in seats measured since the most recent Congressional Makeup section...
Senate – Democratic Majority
Democratic: 51 (+6)
Conservative: 49 (-6)
Vacant: 0
House of Representatives – Democratic Majority
Democratic: 223 (+28)
Conservative: 211 (-22)
Independent Democrat: 1 (-6) (Caucuses with Conservatives)
Vacant: 0
So the polls were (largely) right in the end. Minorities swung strongly towards Leland and the Democrats whereas moderate whites largely stayed home rather than vote for either. American had its first black President. Although it was a bittersweet victory. It was clear that the race and the down ballot races were hampered by Leland's skin color. Had a white Democrat won in his place the Democrats could have easily put double digits over the trash that was the Miller campaign, not to mention also win a few more hotly contests races in the down ballot.
The success (little less than 2 percent of the popular vote, but still shocking to the media) of the David Duke engineered Populist Party was also an ugly sight. During the fanfare and great pride that the inauguration brought the new President elect had to beef up security and watch closely to make sure the numerous threats against him weren't acted upon. Sadly for America this was not the end of this strife, but the beginning. America had a lot more to bleed and learn before this story was over.
------
We're on the tail end of the story now. Only a handful of posts left.
Part II is going along swimmingly and I'm working on it when I get free time on my weekends. We're about 4 posts deep at this point.
I also just realized I forgot entirely about the Yugoslav wars. Just one more thing I'll add to the redux. Same thing with the whole abortion thing.
- Location
- Rex, NC, USA
I assume from the capital D that the Democratic Party has a monopoly on political power after the fall of the Conservatives.
38 - Part 36: Fighting for FREEDOM, Bald Eagles, and the last vestiges of my manhood
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Part 36: Fighting for FREEDOM, Bald Eagles, and the last vestiges of my manhood
Of course there was going to be a reaction to the first black president.
This reaction of course was created by the scaremongering and racial anxiety following the election of America's first black President and the final gasps of the American evangelical movement. This reaction of course had many different elements and could in many ways be thought of as a "far-right soup" with numerous groups of various ideologies making up the reaction. This "soup" was manifest in primarily three types of political expression.
The first of course were the so-called "Patriot Movements" which formed the most violent and radical elements of the reaction. The Patriot Movements came about after the raid on the Branch Davidian compound and the later Weaver standoff by the ATF. The numerous deaths in both incidents led to a perceived level of heavy handedness that was tyrannical. That supposed tyranny combined with the increase of racial anxiety and outrage directed at President Leland led to numerous conspiracy theories and the formation of many armed groups to "defend freedom" among other things.
The Branch Davidian compound burns after an armed confrontation with FBI agents looking for the absconded cult leader, 1997
These Patriot Movements of course were multifaceted and represented a range of ideologies in American society. The first and largest of these ideological strains were the Constitutionalists who represented an extreme, almost religious devotion to maintaining the US Constitution. The Constitionalists were in favor of minimal government, and were against income taxes if not taxes all together. The other much smaller group were the Identitarians who were formed exclusively as White Nationalist groupings. That isn't to say that the Constitutionalists were not bigoted however, as all of the Patriot Movement groups firmly believed in a wide variety of conspiracy theories ranging from belief of a Jewish cabal ruling the government to President Leland being a secret Israeli-Ethiopian secret agent. Racism and radicalism were not just facets of the Patriot Movements but were instead their very elements of their creation, without racism and radicalism they would not have existed. The Patriot Movement quickly grew to cause the vast majority of politically motivated crimes in the US by 1997.
Michigan Militia leader Norman Olson: "We're ready to defend our rights in this country. We'll fight Leland and the other Israeli gun grabbers if we gotta."
The second was the Populist Party led by Duke. This party formed the far-right's electoral vehicle for a time following Leland's ascension to the Presidency. The party was in the beginning overtly racist and clearly aped much of their policy from the deceased Bill Clinton's positions by order of party leader David Duke. The party worked with the Conservative Party for a time after the election and there were several cross endorsements of candidates. This began to change however with the rise of the Patriot Movements which led to internal bickering between supporters of the more Dukian Populism versus those who backed the Patriot Movement. Duke had only truly planned to use the party as a ladder towards the Conservative Party's nomination in either 2000 or 2004 and so his wing planned their departure in response to the controversy. Duke and his close political confidants announced their defections to the Conservative Party in 1998 which coincided with Duke's rejection of racism (in the same manner as Wallace in 1972). From that point the followers of the Patriot Movement took control and the Populist Party swiftly splintered and died following Duke's leaving. Duke however continued to take part in certain activist circles of the Conservative Party and later made an official conversion to Sunni Islam in 1999.
Duke runs for Governor, 1999
The third and final was the Lobby of '76, the name of course smartly referencing both 1976 and 1776. The lobby of '76 was a lobbying and grassroots political movement formed to counter Leland's agenda and make him a "one termer" like Bayh. It was formed by a self styled "dream team" made up by Paul Weyrich, Edwin Feulner, Richard Viguerie, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Judie Brown, Willis Carto, and Ellen McCormack. It was more of a rogue's gallery but that isn't to say that it was a worthless effort. They utilized the latest technology and planning, most of which was initially to be used by the Miller campaign until Hammond put the kibosh on it. The Lobby of '76 was mostly funded from donations from more affluent sources but a not insignificant portion of their income was derived from mailed in checks from blue collar types. The Lobby of '76 got off to a hot start and aimed to direct who would become nominated and who would win in 2000 and beyond.
How influential they would be of course depended on how fund raising kept up more than anything else.
------
A shorter post. Hope you don't mind. Only so much you can write about crazy fuckers in the woods or on TV.
The next two posts address Leland's foreign and domestic policy. Not totally sure if I'm going to make domestic or foreign go first. We'll see what happens. After those two there's not much left. Only a few more posts.
Of course there was going to be a reaction to the first black president.
This reaction of course was created by the scaremongering and racial anxiety following the election of America's first black President and the final gasps of the American evangelical movement. This reaction of course had many different elements and could in many ways be thought of as a "far-right soup" with numerous groups of various ideologies making up the reaction. This "soup" was manifest in primarily three types of political expression.
The first of course were the so-called "Patriot Movements" which formed the most violent and radical elements of the reaction. The Patriot Movements came about after the raid on the Branch Davidian compound and the later Weaver standoff by the ATF. The numerous deaths in both incidents led to a perceived level of heavy handedness that was tyrannical. That supposed tyranny combined with the increase of racial anxiety and outrage directed at President Leland led to numerous conspiracy theories and the formation of many armed groups to "defend freedom" among other things.
The Branch Davidian compound burns after an armed confrontation with FBI agents looking for the absconded cult leader, 1997
These Patriot Movements of course were multifaceted and represented a range of ideologies in American society. The first and largest of these ideological strains were the Constitutionalists who represented an extreme, almost religious devotion to maintaining the US Constitution. The Constitionalists were in favor of minimal government, and were against income taxes if not taxes all together. The other much smaller group were the Identitarians who were formed exclusively as White Nationalist groupings. That isn't to say that the Constitutionalists were not bigoted however, as all of the Patriot Movement groups firmly believed in a wide variety of conspiracy theories ranging from belief of a Jewish cabal ruling the government to President Leland being a secret Israeli-Ethiopian secret agent. Racism and radicalism were not just facets of the Patriot Movements but were instead their very elements of their creation, without racism and radicalism they would not have existed. The Patriot Movement quickly grew to cause the vast majority of politically motivated crimes in the US by 1997.
Michigan Militia leader Norman Olson: "We're ready to defend our rights in this country. We'll fight Leland and the other Israeli gun grabbers if we gotta."
The second was the Populist Party led by Duke. This party formed the far-right's electoral vehicle for a time following Leland's ascension to the Presidency. The party was in the beginning overtly racist and clearly aped much of their policy from the deceased Bill Clinton's positions by order of party leader David Duke. The party worked with the Conservative Party for a time after the election and there were several cross endorsements of candidates. This began to change however with the rise of the Patriot Movements which led to internal bickering between supporters of the more Dukian Populism versus those who backed the Patriot Movement. Duke had only truly planned to use the party as a ladder towards the Conservative Party's nomination in either 2000 or 2004 and so his wing planned their departure in response to the controversy. Duke and his close political confidants announced their defections to the Conservative Party in 1998 which coincided with Duke's rejection of racism (in the same manner as Wallace in 1972). From that point the followers of the Patriot Movement took control and the Populist Party swiftly splintered and died following Duke's leaving. Duke however continued to take part in certain activist circles of the Conservative Party and later made an official conversion to Sunni Islam in 1999.
Duke runs for Governor, 1999
The third and final was the Lobby of '76, the name of course smartly referencing both 1976 and 1776. The lobby of '76 was a lobbying and grassroots political movement formed to counter Leland's agenda and make him a "one termer" like Bayh. It was formed by a self styled "dream team" made up by Paul Weyrich, Edwin Feulner, Richard Viguerie, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Judie Brown, Willis Carto, and Ellen McCormack. It was more of a rogue's gallery but that isn't to say that it was a worthless effort. They utilized the latest technology and planning, most of which was initially to be used by the Miller campaign until Hammond put the kibosh on it. The Lobby of '76 was mostly funded from donations from more affluent sources but a not insignificant portion of their income was derived from mailed in checks from blue collar types. The Lobby of '76 got off to a hot start and aimed to direct who would become nominated and who would win in 2000 and beyond.
How influential they would be of course depended on how fund raising kept up more than anything else.
------
A shorter post. Hope you don't mind. Only so much you can write about crazy fuckers in the woods or on TV.
The next two posts address Leland's foreign and domestic policy. Not totally sure if I'm going to make domestic or foreign go first. We'll see what happens. After those two there's not much left. Only a few more posts.
39 - Part 37: Expecting more
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Part 37: Expecting more
Leland became President in a time of much trouble, taking power after a deeply unpopular president who only managed to survive by the skin of his teeth. The economy was on life support, at its worst point since the 70's. Crime and drug abuse was running out of control and racism was rearing its ugly head in a way which hadn't been seen since the 60's. While things on the international front looked great for America, things at home were terrible. To say that Mickey Leland inherited a mess would be giving a compliment to Hammond and Reagan. No, this was just not a mess, this was a disaster.
"The state of the union is strong!"
And the first thing to do after a disaster, once all the rescuing and first aid is given out, is to start to begin repairing and recovering. That is exactly what President Leland set out to do.
Leland was always considered a talented politician and activist, and during his time in Congress he was often able to wrangle support for his programs through unlikely alliances. This time he wasn't able to do such a thing with much of the Conservative Party having long since writing him off as a "one term President in the making" among other things. There was however, a small number of Conservative Party representatives who managed to become elected in more suburban or otherwise more blue constituencies. The few that remained in 1996 of this small group would become swing votes on a great deal of legislation, giving Democrats just a little extra breathing room at least.
With a newly Democratic majority in both houses of Congress and an anti-poverty activist in the White House, things were looking up for the average poor person. While they might be out of work and hungry now, the ruling mandate of the Leland White House and his new programs could change his situation. All that was needed was a vote.
The first thing undertaken was a rollback of much of New Federalism, Reagan's baby. The power of the federal government was strengthened and "block grants" which had been shown with Hammond's response to the Long Recession to be little more than money pits were gotten rid of. Some compared this initiative to FDR's less popular policies like court packing but many understood why block grants had to be gotten rid of. The Federal government also began to assert itself more frequently, much to the anger of the Patriot Movement. It became something of a political victory for the Conservative Party but Leland judged that rolling back Reagan's policies would be key to fixing the economy and the nation in the long term.
In tandem, laws to regulate the financial industry and several other key centers of the economic crisis were pushed. Conservatives complained about the laws but for the most part they fell on deaf ears. There was little in the way of sympathy for the industry that had sent the nation and the world into a recession, never mind enough trust to ever allow them to regulate themselves. While the roll back of New Federalism was hard to bare for many on the right, the inclusion of regulations for the financial sector in the roll back's bills made it more acceptable for many. Most of America was worried about their own pocketbooks than the legacy on Reagan, moneyed interests be damned. Some on the right stuck to their guns, David Duke made his stand here and the brief popularity he had and the flirtation of being Clinton's heir went away. Duke said "Here I stand!" and America started to ignore him again, not really feeling too hot about Conservatives, the financial sector, or "former" White Nationalists at the time.
After this assault, Leland moved forward with the real meat of his agenda. With the holes in regulations filled, block grants tossed aside, and a large portion of former defense spending set aside for more helpful uses, now President Leland had the political capital and the funding to move forward. These policies enacted under President Leland would become to be known as the "American Dream Deal" which was a poor name for the policies really, it didn't take much effort for the Conservative Party to spin it as the "Dream Deal" because you "needed to be asleep" to believe it. Snappy political comebacks neither here nor there, the American Dream Deal is what helped bring about economic recovery in America .
The exact number of bills that made up this American Dream Deal were vast and complex. Leland and Senate whip Tom Daschle had both found that smaller, more numerous bills were easier to get passed. This was because it allowed for smaller concessions and very few big "show down" voting sessions. It was also done in this manner because it made it harder to repeal. The bits and peaces of pork in the various bills that were passed made repealing the many laws that made up the American Dream Deal a cumbersome and perhaps a politically dangerous thing to do. This was done so by design, as Leland and the other architects of the deal (ranging from all over the Democratic Party's leadership and caucus) wanted to transform the deal into a "third rail" that would be politically untouchable. The pork was the bullet proof vest, a very expensive bullet proof vest.
The American Dream Deal began first to restore the parts of LBJ's old Great Society Programs that had been destroyed and were defunded by Reagan and Hammond. These programs often times were no longer up to snuff when considered by the Hardliners and so when the were brought into the American Dream Deal they were often beefed up in benefits and powers the programs had. Of course, this wasn't the only thing that undertaken. President Leland strengthened the social safety net and for the first time since LBJ, made war on poverty in earnest. This had a great effect on many poor communities, but in black areas the gains from the programs were not nearly as large as those in white communities. This was largely because attitudes and laws regarding the drug wars and policing as a whole had remained unchanged.
It was one of Leland's major failures domestically in that he was unable to effect the harsh and draconian law enforcement and drug laws in the nation. Leland could only ever ask for more community based and more responsible approaches to policing (never mind trying to change federal drug laws) but he was not the President who could push for such reforms. Just as McGovern could have never went to China and Nixon did, Leland couldn't reform the system of law in the US. A President who was more white collar, who was more middle class, who was more white and unassuming would need to take the plunge on those issues in the future. Admitting it to himself gave Leland a bad taste in his mouth but it was true that a black President, as radical as that might have been, wasn't Superman. He was held to the same confines that other Presidents were and are still held to, the only difference of course was that he had the added weight of his race factored into the mix.
The crowning achievement of the American Dream Deal of course was not its welfare or social safety programs. While a good few supported those, Leland's promise to fix the economy and get people back to work was what really drove votes. People wanted change and not just in society, they wanted it in their wallets too. This was of course a tough issue to tackle once Leland got around to it. While he was not the leader in Congress, his hubris in pushing for greater social programs at each chance he got left him with little wiggle room. While it was inevitable that the budget ran a defect, Leland didn't want it to become a bugbear for him and tried his best to work close to the revenue that the US gained. By the time the Works programs came around it was clear that the old idea of an expansive and revolutionary program to eliminate unemployment was no longer politically possible, at least until before midterms.
Stunted but not stopped: With the economy beginning to recover computers in the home and in the work place are becoming more and more common in the US. Some even have access to the internet.
The 1998 midterms were a surprise to the Democrats. Usually the party of the President can take large losses in midterms but what made things interesting was that instead of the massive losses that were expected in part due to the ambitious policies enacted, what instead happened was that the losses were much more minor. The Democrats even held onto their majorities in both houses of Congress. It was an encouraging sign for Democrats if anything.
The Conservatives on the other hand were shocked. Newt Gingrich as Minority Leader (former Whip) had begun to institute a program requiring stricter allegiance to the party line in the House and the program spread to the senate. It was the hope of Gingrich and others that the party could return to the days of Reagan that way, back when they marched in lock step with one another. The CNC under Pete Sessions underwent a remodeling and modernization as well, finally placing all state parties directly under the control of the CNC and also getting a web presence in the hopes of the internet taking off more once the Long Recession was over.
"I mean, it could have been worse." - Senate Majority Leader Patrick Leahy
The Conservatives' party morale took a hearty drubbing when Leland and the Democrats stood firm. The failure to gain a majority in the senate was a painful shortcoming in particular.
Congressional Makeup of the newly elected Congress:
Changes in seats measured since the most recent Congressional Makeup section...
Senate – Democratic Majority, VP Florio breaks ties
Democratic: 50 (-1)
Conservative: 50 (+1)
Vacant: 0
House of Representatives – Democratic Majority
Democratic: 218 (-5)
Conservative: 217 (+6)
Vacant: 0
While the gains from the Long Recession were gone, at the very least the Democratic Party had majorities in both houses and could move forward with a jobs program of some sort. That being said, with the majorities being razor thin, any policy after 1998 would have to be seriously neutered. Every vote counted now.
Due to following Keysenian policy and promoting government spending to solve the economic issues, there was a slight pickup in economic activity but it was not enough to satisfy the masses. There was still a demand for further economic recovery and ultimately a fulfilled promise of a jobs program or at least something as an equivalent.
On this promise the Leland administration dropped the ball. By the time that the midterms came and went things shifted against him in Washington. While Congress was Democratic, only so many were willing to risk their butts when it came to reelection. This was because it was obvious that if the jobs program and its vague parameters that were described during the primaries and general election it would either necessitate a large tax increase or an increase in the national debt. Neither was something many Congressional Democrats were willing to risk, nor was Leland.
In the end an intriguing proposal came from a most unexpected person. A Democratic Senator from Colorado of Native American descent named Ben Nighthorse Campbell proposed a solution. Certain industries would be given a tax credit for each number of hires which they undertook and kept for a defined period of time. Hires who were "defective" and were not fit to work wouldn't be counted negatively towards the tax credits as they were considered "just firings." Individuals who left the work of their own accord were counted similarly. In effect, what happened was that Campbell proposed what amounted to bribes from the government to employ people. Leland and the others were reticent to accept the proposal but any proposal was better than none. It would also likely increase the deficit (Campbell and others disagreed strongly) as tax reductions would never increase government revenue at this stage. It was chance to bring some independents over in the months leading up to the beginning of the general election however.
Campbell drafted and Congress passed the bill. This program, now known as "Campbell Credits" became a popular bill and became supported by both the Democratic and Conservative parties. Some minorities in both parties continued to oppose the bill, giving those in favor a slim majority with both party leaderships trying to whip votes one way or another.
House Minority Leader Gingrich on Campbell Credits: "You know, we don't always see eye to eye but at least Mr. Campbell believes in America. You can't say that for most Democrats these days."
When it came to his desk Leland didn't sign it, he vetoed it instead. A jobs program was never created.
------
I opted for domestic policy first.
Leland became President in a time of much trouble, taking power after a deeply unpopular president who only managed to survive by the skin of his teeth. The economy was on life support, at its worst point since the 70's. Crime and drug abuse was running out of control and racism was rearing its ugly head in a way which hadn't been seen since the 60's. While things on the international front looked great for America, things at home were terrible. To say that Mickey Leland inherited a mess would be giving a compliment to Hammond and Reagan. No, this was just not a mess, this was a disaster.
"The state of the union is strong!"
And the first thing to do after a disaster, once all the rescuing and first aid is given out, is to start to begin repairing and recovering. That is exactly what President Leland set out to do.
Leland was always considered a talented politician and activist, and during his time in Congress he was often able to wrangle support for his programs through unlikely alliances. This time he wasn't able to do such a thing with much of the Conservative Party having long since writing him off as a "one term President in the making" among other things. There was however, a small number of Conservative Party representatives who managed to become elected in more suburban or otherwise more blue constituencies. The few that remained in 1996 of this small group would become swing votes on a great deal of legislation, giving Democrats just a little extra breathing room at least.
With a newly Democratic majority in both houses of Congress and an anti-poverty activist in the White House, things were looking up for the average poor person. While they might be out of work and hungry now, the ruling mandate of the Leland White House and his new programs could change his situation. All that was needed was a vote.
The first thing undertaken was a rollback of much of New Federalism, Reagan's baby. The power of the federal government was strengthened and "block grants" which had been shown with Hammond's response to the Long Recession to be little more than money pits were gotten rid of. Some compared this initiative to FDR's less popular policies like court packing but many understood why block grants had to be gotten rid of. The Federal government also began to assert itself more frequently, much to the anger of the Patriot Movement. It became something of a political victory for the Conservative Party but Leland judged that rolling back Reagan's policies would be key to fixing the economy and the nation in the long term.
In tandem, laws to regulate the financial industry and several other key centers of the economic crisis were pushed. Conservatives complained about the laws but for the most part they fell on deaf ears. There was little in the way of sympathy for the industry that had sent the nation and the world into a recession, never mind enough trust to ever allow them to regulate themselves. While the roll back of New Federalism was hard to bare for many on the right, the inclusion of regulations for the financial sector in the roll back's bills made it more acceptable for many. Most of America was worried about their own pocketbooks than the legacy on Reagan, moneyed interests be damned. Some on the right stuck to their guns, David Duke made his stand here and the brief popularity he had and the flirtation of being Clinton's heir went away. Duke said "Here I stand!" and America started to ignore him again, not really feeling too hot about Conservatives, the financial sector, or "former" White Nationalists at the time.
After this assault, Leland moved forward with the real meat of his agenda. With the holes in regulations filled, block grants tossed aside, and a large portion of former defense spending set aside for more helpful uses, now President Leland had the political capital and the funding to move forward. These policies enacted under President Leland would become to be known as the "American Dream Deal" which was a poor name for the policies really, it didn't take much effort for the Conservative Party to spin it as the "Dream Deal" because you "needed to be asleep" to believe it. Snappy political comebacks neither here nor there, the American Dream Deal is what helped bring about economic recovery in America .
The exact number of bills that made up this American Dream Deal were vast and complex. Leland and Senate whip Tom Daschle had both found that smaller, more numerous bills were easier to get passed. This was because it allowed for smaller concessions and very few big "show down" voting sessions. It was also done in this manner because it made it harder to repeal. The bits and peaces of pork in the various bills that were passed made repealing the many laws that made up the American Dream Deal a cumbersome and perhaps a politically dangerous thing to do. This was done so by design, as Leland and the other architects of the deal (ranging from all over the Democratic Party's leadership and caucus) wanted to transform the deal into a "third rail" that would be politically untouchable. The pork was the bullet proof vest, a very expensive bullet proof vest.
The American Dream Deal began first to restore the parts of LBJ's old Great Society Programs that had been destroyed and were defunded by Reagan and Hammond. These programs often times were no longer up to snuff when considered by the Hardliners and so when the were brought into the American Dream Deal they were often beefed up in benefits and powers the programs had. Of course, this wasn't the only thing that undertaken. President Leland strengthened the social safety net and for the first time since LBJ, made war on poverty in earnest. This had a great effect on many poor communities, but in black areas the gains from the programs were not nearly as large as those in white communities. This was largely because attitudes and laws regarding the drug wars and policing as a whole had remained unchanged.
It was one of Leland's major failures domestically in that he was unable to effect the harsh and draconian law enforcement and drug laws in the nation. Leland could only ever ask for more community based and more responsible approaches to policing (never mind trying to change federal drug laws) but he was not the President who could push for such reforms. Just as McGovern could have never went to China and Nixon did, Leland couldn't reform the system of law in the US. A President who was more white collar, who was more middle class, who was more white and unassuming would need to take the plunge on those issues in the future. Admitting it to himself gave Leland a bad taste in his mouth but it was true that a black President, as radical as that might have been, wasn't Superman. He was held to the same confines that other Presidents were and are still held to, the only difference of course was that he had the added weight of his race factored into the mix.
The crowning achievement of the American Dream Deal of course was not its welfare or social safety programs. While a good few supported those, Leland's promise to fix the economy and get people back to work was what really drove votes. People wanted change and not just in society, they wanted it in their wallets too. This was of course a tough issue to tackle once Leland got around to it. While he was not the leader in Congress, his hubris in pushing for greater social programs at each chance he got left him with little wiggle room. While it was inevitable that the budget ran a defect, Leland didn't want it to become a bugbear for him and tried his best to work close to the revenue that the US gained. By the time the Works programs came around it was clear that the old idea of an expansive and revolutionary program to eliminate unemployment was no longer politically possible, at least until before midterms.
Stunted but not stopped: With the economy beginning to recover computers in the home and in the work place are becoming more and more common in the US. Some even have access to the internet.
The 1998 midterms were a surprise to the Democrats. Usually the party of the President can take large losses in midterms but what made things interesting was that instead of the massive losses that were expected in part due to the ambitious policies enacted, what instead happened was that the losses were much more minor. The Democrats even held onto their majorities in both houses of Congress. It was an encouraging sign for Democrats if anything.
The Conservatives on the other hand were shocked. Newt Gingrich as Minority Leader (former Whip) had begun to institute a program requiring stricter allegiance to the party line in the House and the program spread to the senate. It was the hope of Gingrich and others that the party could return to the days of Reagan that way, back when they marched in lock step with one another. The CNC under Pete Sessions underwent a remodeling and modernization as well, finally placing all state parties directly under the control of the CNC and also getting a web presence in the hopes of the internet taking off more once the Long Recession was over.
"I mean, it could have been worse." - Senate Majority Leader Patrick Leahy
The Conservatives' party morale took a hearty drubbing when Leland and the Democrats stood firm. The failure to gain a majority in the senate was a painful shortcoming in particular.
Congressional Makeup of the newly elected Congress:
Changes in seats measured since the most recent Congressional Makeup section...
Senate – Democratic Majority, VP Florio breaks ties
Democratic: 50 (-1)
Conservative: 50 (+1)
Vacant: 0
House of Representatives – Democratic Majority
Democratic: 218 (-5)
Conservative: 217 (+6)
Vacant: 0
While the gains from the Long Recession were gone, at the very least the Democratic Party had majorities in both houses and could move forward with a jobs program of some sort. That being said, with the majorities being razor thin, any policy after 1998 would have to be seriously neutered. Every vote counted now.
Due to following Keysenian policy and promoting government spending to solve the economic issues, there was a slight pickup in economic activity but it was not enough to satisfy the masses. There was still a demand for further economic recovery and ultimately a fulfilled promise of a jobs program or at least something as an equivalent.
On this promise the Leland administration dropped the ball. By the time that the midterms came and went things shifted against him in Washington. While Congress was Democratic, only so many were willing to risk their butts when it came to reelection. This was because it was obvious that if the jobs program and its vague parameters that were described during the primaries and general election it would either necessitate a large tax increase or an increase in the national debt. Neither was something many Congressional Democrats were willing to risk, nor was Leland.
In the end an intriguing proposal came from a most unexpected person. A Democratic Senator from Colorado of Native American descent named Ben Nighthorse Campbell proposed a solution. Certain industries would be given a tax credit for each number of hires which they undertook and kept for a defined period of time. Hires who were "defective" and were not fit to work wouldn't be counted negatively towards the tax credits as they were considered "just firings." Individuals who left the work of their own accord were counted similarly. In effect, what happened was that Campbell proposed what amounted to bribes from the government to employ people. Leland and the others were reticent to accept the proposal but any proposal was better than none. It would also likely increase the deficit (Campbell and others disagreed strongly) as tax reductions would never increase government revenue at this stage. It was chance to bring some independents over in the months leading up to the beginning of the general election however.
Campbell drafted and Congress passed the bill. This program, now known as "Campbell Credits" became a popular bill and became supported by both the Democratic and Conservative parties. Some minorities in both parties continued to oppose the bill, giving those in favor a slim majority with both party leaderships trying to whip votes one way or another.
House Minority Leader Gingrich on Campbell Credits: "You know, we don't always see eye to eye but at least Mr. Campbell believes in America. You can't say that for most Democrats these days."
When it came to his desk Leland didn't sign it, he vetoed it instead. A jobs program was never created.
------
I opted for domestic policy first.
40 - Part 38: Folding the wings of an Eagle
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Part 38: Folding the wings of an Eagle
One of Mickey Leland's most important contributions to American history, much more beyond his economic policies was his foreign policy. Coming into his presidential term, Leland was presented with a new opportunity. For the first time in American history America almost totally lacked rivals and had no real exterior threats. The Soviets and her allies were imploding, the Chinese were having elections and there was chatter of unification with Taiwan, the Koreas were just Korea now. Who was left that could even hope to stand before America? America was a world power and the closet runners up were on board as America's allies. Had such an incredible victory been won before? Certainly not on the world stage. The year was 1997 and America was the sole superpower.
Leland took this as an opportunity to change things. For decades now, American foreign policy had been dictated by outside events. He understood the internal logic of intervening in foreign nations, even if he disagreed with it. But with the Soviets on their death bed it was clear that now, now America could pull back from world affairs. Not totally, no Leland was not interested in isolationism – but it meant he could free up money in the budget. For the first time in a long time Leland could take the American military-industrial complex to task, the intelligence agencies too. He had the political capital. All that money, all that those resources, they all could be devoted elsewhere. To better things, to economic recovery. Leland had a mandate to rule, that much was true and he was determined to make the best of it.
The first thing Leland did was bring forward an audit of the DoD, CIA, FBI and several other choice agencies. Major cuts to programs that weren't essential were ordered. Bases in non-essential locations shut down. The bases in Okinawa and South Korea (new northern bases were established) were the first to close down. Several less than savory groups and programs in the CIA and FBI went up in (very much literal, in the case of most files) smoke and proof of their existence became unrecoverable. Leland wanted to go after them but they didn't get anywhere beyond grumbles. There were some things America needn't know, at least that's what the spooks in the CIA said. This was of course controversial although Paleoconservatives like Pat Buchanan gave support for America's change of policy on the world change.
A great bundle of cash was freed up which could go towards important recovery policies. In this sense, the audit was a victory on the domestic front more than on the foreign front. Leland could not realistically raise taxes, lest he want to risk the ire of taxpayers. For the first time in a long time, American foreign policy was fully focused on multilaterialism and human rights. Leland got his win at home but abroad, perhaps not. This victory in budgetary matters freed up important monies that he later used in key parts of the American Dream Deal.
The conflict in the Balkans and the repression in East Germany and Romania mixed with Leland's lack of action on both accounts did little to engender good feelings towards his lack to intervention in Europe. This of course led to people realizing that America had to involve herself in world affairs. The world had long since become America's neighbor and America could not ignore her. How America should approach world affairs became a growing debate on the left and right, however the defined schools of thought only took root after 2000.
The Balkans were, as per usual, not a place of much stability. With the death of the autocrat Tito in 1980, Yugoslavia was on a path towards collapse. The state survived on an uneasy ethnic balancing act and with Tito gone nothing could prevent Yugoslavia's unequal ethnic power sharing from leading towards Civil War. Slovenia, and Croatia left Yugoslavia with Bosnia following not soon after. The whole of the former Yugoslavia was engulfed in an ugly ethnic violence that led to many innocents being killed. Leland had little interest in intervening in a unilateral fashion (or at all, as he was afraid of the response from the Conservatives) and instead passed the buck to the UN. The UN tried their best but without firm American support the UN intervention was largely toothless. This of course garnered a great deal of criticism and calls for a humanitarian intervention in the conflict increased to save the Bosnian Muslims at the very least and the intervention under Leland did go forward but with only an air based campaign to damage the ability for Serbia to make war rather than win the conflict for any one side outright. In the end the UN and the other European powers would step up.
Sarajevo, 1997
Bulgaria had a similar but much more muted ethnic conflict. With the forced return of Todor Zhivkov to power, the situation between the Bulgarian majority and the Turkish minority came to a boiling point. Zhivkov had previously engaged in what effectively amounted to an ethnic cleansing campaign set on wiping out muslim cultures by way of forced assimilation in Bulgaria and upon his showed no signs of letting up upon his return to power. With the backing of Soviet troops, Bulgaria was somewhat stable and Zhivkov continued to administrate the country with the intent of reasserting control first and foremost. The Turks presented a strong challenge to authority and it all went from there. The Turkish minority expanded their already ongoing campaign of armed resistance against the government, moving from just bombings to shootings and suicide bombings. The Soviet and Bulgarian forces were low on supplies and even lower on morale, they were never going to be able to crack down on the Turks. When the Demichev Junta fell Soviet forces left Bulgaria and returned to the Soviet Union, in response to the news the Bulgarian dictator Zhivkov died of a heart attack almost immediately. The Bulgarian communist government fell later that week and a new democratic government took control. This new Republic of Bulgaria was eager to smooth over relations with the Turks and the other muslim minorities. They make quick work to rescind earlier measures by Zhivkov and as a result most ethnic violence ended but a small number of radicals carried on a campaign against the new government to create 2 Turkish autonomous districts, almost independent of Bulgarian control. The new government had little interest in bowing their heads to them, especially considering they were just a couple radicals on a goat farm after Zhivkov and his Soviet handlers left the scene.
East Germany and Romania were also quick to attempt to regain full control of their respective nations. The Ceausescu family in Romania and the Honecker family in East Germany were both ready to violently crack down on dissidents but both nations had vastly different end results because of a number of different factors.
In East Germany the situation had already reached a boiling point and only through the intervention of the Soviets had East Germany been able to retake control of its armed forces and stifle the end of the wall. Even with a loyal military and support from the Soviet forces, they could not keep the wall safe forever nor could they keep the country safe from subversion. The country was falling apart around their ears. This was especially true in 1995 when after a long battle with liver cancer, Erich Honecker passed away. His wife, Margot Honecker took control of the state apparatuses following her husband's death and began a wave of repression on all levels of East German society via Statsi terror with the help of her new close political ally Erich Mielke. The terror swept thousands into prison camps and sent many running over the border. While it was becoming clear that for the time East Germany was unfortunately rather stable, it was also increasingly clear that the state was quite literally running out of people as the trained and educated of East Germany fled into exile in the West to escape capture. The DDR was stable but it was on a surefire path to become economically insolvent.
Romania was in a similar state. Racked with internal dissension, Romania had barely survived a series of uprisings against the government in the past. The state itself managed to stay alive largely through the strength of the state's security forces, but such forces were only useful against civilians, this strength could be easily negated if the army turned against the government. In 1996, with the regime on its death bed the Ceausescu family finally saw how hated they were and packed their bags and headed for the Soviet Union. Whatever was left of the old regime attempted to keep things in order but as soon as the people found out that the old dog and his terrible family turned tail there was little the stay behinds could do other than chose to surrender or fight back. Following their old master's initiative they ordered the military and the secret police to fight back – and found out neither were willing to suppress the fermenting uprising. The regime was over before the end of the the day following Ceausescu's flight.
This of course was not the end of the story for either Romania or East Germany, or indeed any of the former Warsaw Pact nations including the Soviet Union itself. The 90's had much excitement and anxiety to offer to the world and Europe was playing center stage.
The 90's in general were a time of change for American foreign policy and both the Democrats and the Conservatives saw shifts in their ideology.
The Democrats by and large came to prefer multilateralism and moderation in global affairs, following the example of Leland. The Democrats were also notably more cohesive than the Conservatives in foreign policy during the 90's although the Reformists did manage to buck the trend. The Reformists were somewhat inspired by Clinton's endorsement of American exceptionalism and supremacy. They followed a middle path, accepting multilateralism – but only when it suited them. Indeed the Reformists offered some of the strongest criticisms of Leland's foreign policy. In general the Democrats kept an ambivalent policy regarding Israel in reaction to the changing allegiances in the Middle East and were rewarded with the firm support of America's Jews as a result. Compared to the Conservatives, Democrats were practically Pro-Israeli although in the end the Conservatives were just out for blood.
The Conservatives were far more confused on foreign policy. Compared to the Democrats the Conservatives were just confused in general. On more than just foreign policy, the Conservative Party was in flux. The various factions (Mainstreamers, Hammondites, Populists, Paleoconservatives) were fighting for control over the party and indeed their own adhoc groups following the political decline of the Big 5. Only Newt Gingrich and a few others fought to keep the party together. For better or for worse they fought to keep differences from tearing the party apart.
This, combined with the economic issues America was facing made the party itself and ideological mess both in domestic and foreign policy. The two groups in ascendant, the Populists and the Paleoconservatives, were in outright conflict with each other. The Populists preferring to use America's power for self interest abroad whereas the Paleoconservatives demanding an end to America's affairs abroad and launching criticisms of the Populists' "messianic globalism." The Hammondites and those in the more Mainstream (although not really the party's mainstream at this point, merely Gingrichian Reaganism) both largely staked out a policy of involvement in foreign affairs but without the zeal of the Populists. What did unite the factions however on the foreign front was their dislike of Israel.
Pat Buchanan stumping, 1999: "Just leave forget about them and stop sticking our fingers in everyone's pies. Our national decline is detrimental for Western Civilization. Focus on the home front."
This dislike of Israel largely descended from the diplomatic issues that the US and Israel had but it was also resulting from the scandals of the late 90's that drove the point home. Investigations led by both the CIA and FBI into the infamous Triangle finally began to bare fruit and it soon became apparent that Israel's intelligence apparatus had far reaching influence in the American northeast. The spy ring, now known as the Haifa ring, dated back to the 1970's and its primary purpose was to acquire illicit funds through smuggling and other crimes for use in Israeli intelligence's black operations. These black operations for the most part were related to silencing critics of Israel but as the regime grew more authoritarian and more controlled by the military in the face of international challenges the operations began to encompass silencing not just Pro-Palestinian critics but critics of the regime itself.
It only got worse when an American freighter was struck by an Israeli fighter and killed a number of the freighter's sailors. The Israeli government claimed that the freighter was mistook for a military craft and did not respond to calls to identify herself. The American government wanted an apology and some sort of compensation for the freighter's owner and the families of the casualties. Others even still, wanted to go further against Israel. Leland refused to take aggressive action, claiming that it would only push Israel further away but this was poorly received and viewed as an excuse to let Israel get away with it. Senator Jim Inhofe led the charge against Leland on this and led a press campaign to "take Israel to task" alongside the Lobby of '76.
Senator Jim Inhofe: The man for the new millennia?
It was no surprise then that American popular opinion had wildly swung against Israel during the late 80's and then the 90's. This did not necessarily mean a hatred for Israelis or Jews, but it is an unfortunate side effect of politics that anti-semitism began to become en vogue on the right and among certain sections of the left as well. The natural response for this new found dislike of Israel and in many cases Jews, was to support the Palestinians and by virtue of that, Islam itself. Islam's new status as America's favorite minority religion of course was represented best by the new influence that American Islamic leaders found as well as their fully filled coffers for their non-profits and advocacy groups. Another of course was the increasing conversions of Americans to Islam. This of course split the evangelicals in the Conservatives, the Moral Majority faction split damn near down the middle over the issue. Some quite rightly pointed out that Islam wasn't Christianity and was therefore terrible and wrong and a work of the devil, whereas others pointed to Islam's perceived admirable qualities such as a focus on tradition and public morality.
The Moral Majority was already faltering by that point so by no means did the Islam issue cause the end of the faction nor is it ever likely to become even a plurality in America and supplant Christianity but it was one of the various issues the faction faced that caused its demise. The group had effectively been absorbed by the Paleoconservatives by then but the issue of Islam and the decline of popularity of Buchanan is what really began to eat away at it.
In this sense, the foreign policy victory after the collapse of the Communists in Europe and Asia influenced American domestic policy as much as it influenced America's foreign policy.
------
Hopefully elucidating a little bit more regarding Israeli-American relations.
One of Mickey Leland's most important contributions to American history, much more beyond his economic policies was his foreign policy. Coming into his presidential term, Leland was presented with a new opportunity. For the first time in American history America almost totally lacked rivals and had no real exterior threats. The Soviets and her allies were imploding, the Chinese were having elections and there was chatter of unification with Taiwan, the Koreas were just Korea now. Who was left that could even hope to stand before America? America was a world power and the closet runners up were on board as America's allies. Had such an incredible victory been won before? Certainly not on the world stage. The year was 1997 and America was the sole superpower.
Leland took this as an opportunity to change things. For decades now, American foreign policy had been dictated by outside events. He understood the internal logic of intervening in foreign nations, even if he disagreed with it. But with the Soviets on their death bed it was clear that now, now America could pull back from world affairs. Not totally, no Leland was not interested in isolationism – but it meant he could free up money in the budget. For the first time in a long time Leland could take the American military-industrial complex to task, the intelligence agencies too. He had the political capital. All that money, all that those resources, they all could be devoted elsewhere. To better things, to economic recovery. Leland had a mandate to rule, that much was true and he was determined to make the best of it.
The first thing Leland did was bring forward an audit of the DoD, CIA, FBI and several other choice agencies. Major cuts to programs that weren't essential were ordered. Bases in non-essential locations shut down. The bases in Okinawa and South Korea (new northern bases were established) were the first to close down. Several less than savory groups and programs in the CIA and FBI went up in (very much literal, in the case of most files) smoke and proof of their existence became unrecoverable. Leland wanted to go after them but they didn't get anywhere beyond grumbles. There were some things America needn't know, at least that's what the spooks in the CIA said. This was of course controversial although Paleoconservatives like Pat Buchanan gave support for America's change of policy on the world change.
A great bundle of cash was freed up which could go towards important recovery policies. In this sense, the audit was a victory on the domestic front more than on the foreign front. Leland could not realistically raise taxes, lest he want to risk the ire of taxpayers. For the first time in a long time, American foreign policy was fully focused on multilaterialism and human rights. Leland got his win at home but abroad, perhaps not. This victory in budgetary matters freed up important monies that he later used in key parts of the American Dream Deal.
The conflict in the Balkans and the repression in East Germany and Romania mixed with Leland's lack of action on both accounts did little to engender good feelings towards his lack to intervention in Europe. This of course led to people realizing that America had to involve herself in world affairs. The world had long since become America's neighbor and America could not ignore her. How America should approach world affairs became a growing debate on the left and right, however the defined schools of thought only took root after 2000.
The Balkans were, as per usual, not a place of much stability. With the death of the autocrat Tito in 1980, Yugoslavia was on a path towards collapse. The state survived on an uneasy ethnic balancing act and with Tito gone nothing could prevent Yugoslavia's unequal ethnic power sharing from leading towards Civil War. Slovenia, and Croatia left Yugoslavia with Bosnia following not soon after. The whole of the former Yugoslavia was engulfed in an ugly ethnic violence that led to many innocents being killed. Leland had little interest in intervening in a unilateral fashion (or at all, as he was afraid of the response from the Conservatives) and instead passed the buck to the UN. The UN tried their best but without firm American support the UN intervention was largely toothless. This of course garnered a great deal of criticism and calls for a humanitarian intervention in the conflict increased to save the Bosnian Muslims at the very least and the intervention under Leland did go forward but with only an air based campaign to damage the ability for Serbia to make war rather than win the conflict for any one side outright. In the end the UN and the other European powers would step up.
Sarajevo, 1997
Bulgaria had a similar but much more muted ethnic conflict. With the forced return of Todor Zhivkov to power, the situation between the Bulgarian majority and the Turkish minority came to a boiling point. Zhivkov had previously engaged in what effectively amounted to an ethnic cleansing campaign set on wiping out muslim cultures by way of forced assimilation in Bulgaria and upon his showed no signs of letting up upon his return to power. With the backing of Soviet troops, Bulgaria was somewhat stable and Zhivkov continued to administrate the country with the intent of reasserting control first and foremost. The Turks presented a strong challenge to authority and it all went from there. The Turkish minority expanded their already ongoing campaign of armed resistance against the government, moving from just bombings to shootings and suicide bombings. The Soviet and Bulgarian forces were low on supplies and even lower on morale, they were never going to be able to crack down on the Turks. When the Demichev Junta fell Soviet forces left Bulgaria and returned to the Soviet Union, in response to the news the Bulgarian dictator Zhivkov died of a heart attack almost immediately. The Bulgarian communist government fell later that week and a new democratic government took control. This new Republic of Bulgaria was eager to smooth over relations with the Turks and the other muslim minorities. They make quick work to rescind earlier measures by Zhivkov and as a result most ethnic violence ended but a small number of radicals carried on a campaign against the new government to create 2 Turkish autonomous districts, almost independent of Bulgarian control. The new government had little interest in bowing their heads to them, especially considering they were just a couple radicals on a goat farm after Zhivkov and his Soviet handlers left the scene.
East Germany and Romania were also quick to attempt to regain full control of their respective nations. The Ceausescu family in Romania and the Honecker family in East Germany were both ready to violently crack down on dissidents but both nations had vastly different end results because of a number of different factors.
In East Germany the situation had already reached a boiling point and only through the intervention of the Soviets had East Germany been able to retake control of its armed forces and stifle the end of the wall. Even with a loyal military and support from the Soviet forces, they could not keep the wall safe forever nor could they keep the country safe from subversion. The country was falling apart around their ears. This was especially true in 1995 when after a long battle with liver cancer, Erich Honecker passed away. His wife, Margot Honecker took control of the state apparatuses following her husband's death and began a wave of repression on all levels of East German society via Statsi terror with the help of her new close political ally Erich Mielke. The terror swept thousands into prison camps and sent many running over the border. While it was becoming clear that for the time East Germany was unfortunately rather stable, it was also increasingly clear that the state was quite literally running out of people as the trained and educated of East Germany fled into exile in the West to escape capture. The DDR was stable but it was on a surefire path to become economically insolvent.
Romania was in a similar state. Racked with internal dissension, Romania had barely survived a series of uprisings against the government in the past. The state itself managed to stay alive largely through the strength of the state's security forces, but such forces were only useful against civilians, this strength could be easily negated if the army turned against the government. In 1996, with the regime on its death bed the Ceausescu family finally saw how hated they were and packed their bags and headed for the Soviet Union. Whatever was left of the old regime attempted to keep things in order but as soon as the people found out that the old dog and his terrible family turned tail there was little the stay behinds could do other than chose to surrender or fight back. Following their old master's initiative they ordered the military and the secret police to fight back – and found out neither were willing to suppress the fermenting uprising. The regime was over before the end of the the day following Ceausescu's flight.
This of course was not the end of the story for either Romania or East Germany, or indeed any of the former Warsaw Pact nations including the Soviet Union itself. The 90's had much excitement and anxiety to offer to the world and Europe was playing center stage.
The 90's in general were a time of change for American foreign policy and both the Democrats and the Conservatives saw shifts in their ideology.
The Democrats by and large came to prefer multilateralism and moderation in global affairs, following the example of Leland. The Democrats were also notably more cohesive than the Conservatives in foreign policy during the 90's although the Reformists did manage to buck the trend. The Reformists were somewhat inspired by Clinton's endorsement of American exceptionalism and supremacy. They followed a middle path, accepting multilateralism – but only when it suited them. Indeed the Reformists offered some of the strongest criticisms of Leland's foreign policy. In general the Democrats kept an ambivalent policy regarding Israel in reaction to the changing allegiances in the Middle East and were rewarded with the firm support of America's Jews as a result. Compared to the Conservatives, Democrats were practically Pro-Israeli although in the end the Conservatives were just out for blood.
The Conservatives were far more confused on foreign policy. Compared to the Democrats the Conservatives were just confused in general. On more than just foreign policy, the Conservative Party was in flux. The various factions (Mainstreamers, Hammondites, Populists, Paleoconservatives) were fighting for control over the party and indeed their own adhoc groups following the political decline of the Big 5. Only Newt Gingrich and a few others fought to keep the party together. For better or for worse they fought to keep differences from tearing the party apart.
This, combined with the economic issues America was facing made the party itself and ideological mess both in domestic and foreign policy. The two groups in ascendant, the Populists and the Paleoconservatives, were in outright conflict with each other. The Populists preferring to use America's power for self interest abroad whereas the Paleoconservatives demanding an end to America's affairs abroad and launching criticisms of the Populists' "messianic globalism." The Hammondites and those in the more Mainstream (although not really the party's mainstream at this point, merely Gingrichian Reaganism) both largely staked out a policy of involvement in foreign affairs but without the zeal of the Populists. What did unite the factions however on the foreign front was their dislike of Israel.
Pat Buchanan stumping, 1999: "Just leave forget about them and stop sticking our fingers in everyone's pies. Our national decline is detrimental for Western Civilization. Focus on the home front."
This dislike of Israel largely descended from the diplomatic issues that the US and Israel had but it was also resulting from the scandals of the late 90's that drove the point home. Investigations led by both the CIA and FBI into the infamous Triangle finally began to bare fruit and it soon became apparent that Israel's intelligence apparatus had far reaching influence in the American northeast. The spy ring, now known as the Haifa ring, dated back to the 1970's and its primary purpose was to acquire illicit funds through smuggling and other crimes for use in Israeli intelligence's black operations. These black operations for the most part were related to silencing critics of Israel but as the regime grew more authoritarian and more controlled by the military in the face of international challenges the operations began to encompass silencing not just Pro-Palestinian critics but critics of the regime itself.
It only got worse when an American freighter was struck by an Israeli fighter and killed a number of the freighter's sailors. The Israeli government claimed that the freighter was mistook for a military craft and did not respond to calls to identify herself. The American government wanted an apology and some sort of compensation for the freighter's owner and the families of the casualties. Others even still, wanted to go further against Israel. Leland refused to take aggressive action, claiming that it would only push Israel further away but this was poorly received and viewed as an excuse to let Israel get away with it. Senator Jim Inhofe led the charge against Leland on this and led a press campaign to "take Israel to task" alongside the Lobby of '76.
Senator Jim Inhofe: The man for the new millennia?
It was no surprise then that American popular opinion had wildly swung against Israel during the late 80's and then the 90's. This did not necessarily mean a hatred for Israelis or Jews, but it is an unfortunate side effect of politics that anti-semitism began to become en vogue on the right and among certain sections of the left as well. The natural response for this new found dislike of Israel and in many cases Jews, was to support the Palestinians and by virtue of that, Islam itself. Islam's new status as America's favorite minority religion of course was represented best by the new influence that American Islamic leaders found as well as their fully filled coffers for their non-profits and advocacy groups. Another of course was the increasing conversions of Americans to Islam. This of course split the evangelicals in the Conservatives, the Moral Majority faction split damn near down the middle over the issue. Some quite rightly pointed out that Islam wasn't Christianity and was therefore terrible and wrong and a work of the devil, whereas others pointed to Islam's perceived admirable qualities such as a focus on tradition and public morality.
The Moral Majority was already faltering by that point so by no means did the Islam issue cause the end of the faction nor is it ever likely to become even a plurality in America and supplant Christianity but it was one of the various issues the faction faced that caused its demise. The group had effectively been absorbed by the Paleoconservatives by then but the issue of Islam and the decline of popularity of Buchanan is what really began to eat away at it.
In this sense, the foreign policy victory after the collapse of the Communists in Europe and Asia influenced American domestic policy as much as it influenced America's foreign policy.
------
Hopefully elucidating a little bit more regarding Israeli-American relations.
- Location
- Rex, NC, USA
Good to see this get updated.
41 - Part 39: Czar
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Part 39: Czar
In the 1990's Soviet politics had become a revolving door of juntas and general secretaries. The failures of the economy and the state itself manifest in the destruction of the Soviet Empire, with little more than Russia and her Central Asian SSRs being kept in line. It aroused questions of nationalism in the Soviet Union, more so than ever before. But it was no longer a question of independence, rather it was a question of how much shame could the Russian people endure and if the Soviet Union would continue to pretend to be anything other than a Russian entity.
By 1998 the Leningrad Junta had given up even more territory, that of Belarus. Russian Nationalists were sickened and could no longer stomach the regime but there was little they could do. Most Nationalists and Ultra-Nationalists were busy involving themselves in the fratricidal bloodletting occurring in the Balkan and Caucasian statelets, with some also going to former Soviet SSR of Ukraine or the increasingly unstable Tajikistan SSR.
Belorussian nationalist leader Zianon Pazniak speaking, 1996
The Soviet economy itself was ran almost entirely off of the energy sector of which the Leningrad Junta dedicated an disturbingly large amount of the military forces to defending the oil pumps and refineries. It didn't take long for the black market to make the connections with the commanders in charge and before long most shipments for export were only half full, assuming of course the Banditi didn't snag the shipment instead. There was simply no income anymore. The GDP per capita of the Soviet Union had fallen to a third world level of merely 2,000 USD.
Further economic and political degradation had created problems for the Leningrad Junta and it was clear that another change was coming, it was just that no one expected where from. Change ocurred from within at first. It started when after General Vladimir Lobov died of organ failure after hospitalization and Mikhail Moiseev's death from an assassin's bullet. Instead of adding new members to the junta's top rungs or spreading out influence equally, both Pavel Grachev and Dmitry Yazov teamed up together and began to coalesce power around themselves. It created a great strain on the junta and the others of the junta looked to find a new solution.
The only non-Russian of the junta, Ruslan Aushev, found his salvation in an outside source. The junta he believed was on its way to its death and so was the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union needed someone of great prestige to rally around to save the nation and prevent the bloodshed from spreading to what remained of the Soviet Union. Aushev put his faith in General Alexander Lebed. He was loved by Russian Nationalists and had come under fire from the junta for criticizing their failings, giving him respect from the anti-government types. Helping guarantee safety for the Russian minority in Moldavia was another great accomplishment of his. Lebed was approached and agreed to take part in a coup.
Aushev intended to use him as a puppet of sorts but Lebed naturally had no interest of taking part in anyone's plans. While it was widely known that Lebed was an independent sort, no one had expected to be the political operator he turned out to be. This was something only found out later, and so Aushev and new collaborator Kulikov planned their attack.
The junta was based in Leningrad, as per the name and was heavily defended in a cordoned off part of the city. A frontal assault was dangerous and deadly but the only method of assault. After the assassination of Moiseev the whole city went under a tight curfew and enhanced security measures, many times more restrictive (and effective) than the martial law outside Leningrad. The coup would have to be quick at both capturing the loyal elements of the Leningrad junta and seizing control of the media so as to prevent the media going rogue.
In the summer of 1998 Leningrad woke up to the sound of gunshots. Forces loyal to the coup plotters moved quickly and surrounded the district that the junta had set up for itself. Heavy weapons were relied on excessively to suppress the loyalist troops. The loyalist forces weren't push overs and while the media centers in both Leningrad and Moscow were seized by coup plotters (specifically those sympathetic or otherwise loyal to Lebed) the intense fighting continued.
It was only when Lebed's name was mentioned that loyalist forces began to surrender to the coup plotters. He was the only general without any black marks against him and was something of a celebrity across most of the Soviet Union. To the people on the ground, even those not involved in politics – Lebed as the one who rode in on a white stallion to save the day just made sense. It was why Aushev and Kulikov picked him after all.
After an hour or so it was clear that the junta would not win. Only the most fanatical loyalists of coup's generals remained. Even the security apparatus of the state, the weakened but fanatic group it was, stepped aside and provided no support for the Leningrad government. It was clear that there was something different about this coup. Something had to give. The Soviet Union was on it's last legs. There was nothing left after this.
General Yazov was a particularly worthless commander and man. His troops had little love for him. It made sense then that his troops deserted him. Yazov's troops shot him and several of his still loyal men and flew the white flag. They had no interest in fighting for a man that they hated.
Pavel Grachev, the most corrupt and power hungry of all the junta bosses tried to escape. Through a series of tunnels general Grachev and his most loyal confidants ran away with filled suitcases of valuables and his family in tow. At the end of the tunnel where Grachev was expecting a few cars to take everyone to Finland. Instead he was ambushed by his own troops and even after offering all of his money in his suitcases, all his ill gotten goods, they weren't going to let him escape. Grachev and those around him were killed.
The final one of the junta left was Sergey Akhromeyev. Akhromeyev was a loyal supporter of the Soviet Union and was earnest in his attempt to save the Sovie Union. He was the Leningrad Junta's most ideologically loyal member and was the most firm in his support of the Soviet Union. His involvement in the junta was one of true support and it made men look up to him, at least among his own forces. From the junta only he and Aushev had interest outside of corruption and power on their mind so it made sense then that he lasted the longest. Akhromeyev's forces were surround in a small hospital that had been converted for government use as a supply warehouse. The warehouse had become encircled by the coup forces but the forces present there couldn't force the junta's forces to surrender nor could they overpower the well supplied and well barricaded defenders. Until more support came Akhromeyev's men would stand firm.
The warehouse had been surrounded for several hours by the time the rest of the coup plotter forces managed to join in the encirclement. It was then that tanks joined in on the firefight and some fires started in the warehouse. The fire spread to the ammo stores and Leningrad was filled with the sound of cracking and popping for the following day. The rest is history.
Leningrad, 1998
With every supporter of the old Leningrad Junta dead or cowed into submission, the coup was successful. The people of the Soviet Union however was less assured. News spread quickly of a coup and the people prepared to roll with the punches of what the political chaos would inevitably bring. Up until that point the news just played classical music to calm the nerves of the viewers to encourage them to stay at home and not go out. Some rumors of Lebed leading the coup were spread around but no one believed it. Lebed himself didn't have enough men to take on all of Junta himself so it was considered either to be a suicidal attack on Lebed's part or just that rumors were merely rumors.
The opinion of the public changed when Lebed himself appeared on the television all over the Soviet Union. Such an appearance wasn't planned by the other coup plotters but it occurred nonetheless, Lebed wasn't one to take orders. Not anymore anyway.
Lebed gave a speech where he outlined his views of the Soviet Union and stated what his plans were for the future. He wasn't beating around the bush and was frank in his views. The most shocking statement was the famous sentence, a sentence every Eastern European remembers.
General Lebed: "The Soviet Union is over."
What Lebed presented was definitive. It was the end of the Soviet Union and the end of Marxism-Leninism. The remaining states still officially following Marxism-Leninism was small, consisting only of Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, the GDR, Mongolia, and Somalia. By 2000 the only remaining Marxist-Leninist states remaining were Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and the GDR. Even then, only the GDR followed anything even remotely close to Orthodox Marxism-Leninism.
This wasn't the only thing Lebed spoke on. During his speech touched on many things, all of which were important to the new Russian state.
Lebed promised an end to the Soviet Union once new negotiations could be held, perhaps sapping some of the luster of his previous statement. All the leaders of the still remaining SSRs would meet in and design a new constitution for a new Union. This new Union would be, ostensibly, more equal and federative than the previous Soviet Union. The new union would be based off of the martyred Gorbachev's plans at least in part.
Furthermore, Lebed promised to help bring the various military struggles (The Caucasian Wars, Yugoslavian Wars, and the Bulgarian Turkish insurgency, etc) to an end via diplomacy and work to help the Russian minorities across Europe. This coincided with a new approach to foreign policy which looked to be more cooperative with the rest of the world while not being weak. The key phrase to this new foreign policy was "Respectability" and this phrase extended into economics as well.
One of the only benefits of the Soviet Union surviving so long past the collapse of her satellite states was that the Soviet Union was able to see what radical privatization wrought upon the nations which practiced it. Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungry, and the Baltic states all saw the economies fall into crisis as their respective economies began to stall and fail. Times were rough and privatization was unfair and cruel.
What Lebed promised was "Respectable Marketization" which made room for the market, much more so than Gorbachev, but at the same time keeping firm state controls where needed and slowly reforming the economy to a more market controlled economy. Part of this was the legalization and recognition of the black market. The idea was that if they were brought out of the dark and into the light that Viktor Bout and the other "Underground Kings" could be held legally responsible for any crimes and it would destroy the black market while also growing the legal economy itself.
Another initiative was the move from collectivized agriculture to beginning privatization. Kolkhozes and Sovkhozes were all privatized, doling out equal portions of land to all members. Half of the product would be bought by the government at the state price and the other half could be sold at whatever price desired. This would, theoretically, solve the very serious issue of agricultural shortfalls and allow for the birth of a private supply chain from private farms to new private grocery stores. In regards to other elements of the economy, privatization was to be limited to only insolvent or nonviable state enterprises. This of course would also necessitate a general committal to wiping out corruption in the economy which Lebed backed to the hilt. Additional research into creating state run companies in the French Dirigiste fashion rather than simply state run factories and businesses was also promoted but no major decisions were made as of the time of the speech or immediately afterward.
McDonald's in Russia, owned partially by the government itself
Obviously these proclamations were shocking for Kulikov and Aushev but they didn't have the strength or the interest in fighting against the now very popular Lebed. Kulikov was interested in money and power and Lebed could give that. Aushev wanted to keep violence in the Caucuses to a minimum, this too, was something Lebed could give.
In the weeks following Aushev and Kulikov lost influence in the new government as Lebed gained popular favor for his refusal to commit troops to shut down public gatherings and his work to rehabilitate/destroy the Banditi. The new Soviet Union, or rather the successor state came into being not much later on. The other SSRs had disliked the old Soviet system but the promise of a new more fair union was little issue for them, especially considering the numerous economic benefits of staying together there were. In this new nation known as the simply as the Union State or as the Eurasian Union each of the constituent nations would be free to act locally however there would be national elections as well as overseeing from Moscow in the typical Russian style. Things like free elections were of course much debated and like many other issues, there was much to be done and much to be decided in Europe's newest state.
------
Lebed is a serious looking man with a baritone voice. In case you're wondering what he sounds like. Seriously one of the deepest speaking voices I've ever heard.
In the 1990's Soviet politics had become a revolving door of juntas and general secretaries. The failures of the economy and the state itself manifest in the destruction of the Soviet Empire, with little more than Russia and her Central Asian SSRs being kept in line. It aroused questions of nationalism in the Soviet Union, more so than ever before. But it was no longer a question of independence, rather it was a question of how much shame could the Russian people endure and if the Soviet Union would continue to pretend to be anything other than a Russian entity.
By 1998 the Leningrad Junta had given up even more territory, that of Belarus. Russian Nationalists were sickened and could no longer stomach the regime but there was little they could do. Most Nationalists and Ultra-Nationalists were busy involving themselves in the fratricidal bloodletting occurring in the Balkan and Caucasian statelets, with some also going to former Soviet SSR of Ukraine or the increasingly unstable Tajikistan SSR.
Belorussian nationalist leader Zianon Pazniak speaking, 1996
The Soviet economy itself was ran almost entirely off of the energy sector of which the Leningrad Junta dedicated an disturbingly large amount of the military forces to defending the oil pumps and refineries. It didn't take long for the black market to make the connections with the commanders in charge and before long most shipments for export were only half full, assuming of course the Banditi didn't snag the shipment instead. There was simply no income anymore. The GDP per capita of the Soviet Union had fallen to a third world level of merely 2,000 USD.
Further economic and political degradation had created problems for the Leningrad Junta and it was clear that another change was coming, it was just that no one expected where from. Change ocurred from within at first. It started when after General Vladimir Lobov died of organ failure after hospitalization and Mikhail Moiseev's death from an assassin's bullet. Instead of adding new members to the junta's top rungs or spreading out influence equally, both Pavel Grachev and Dmitry Yazov teamed up together and began to coalesce power around themselves. It created a great strain on the junta and the others of the junta looked to find a new solution.
The only non-Russian of the junta, Ruslan Aushev, found his salvation in an outside source. The junta he believed was on its way to its death and so was the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union needed someone of great prestige to rally around to save the nation and prevent the bloodshed from spreading to what remained of the Soviet Union. Aushev put his faith in General Alexander Lebed. He was loved by Russian Nationalists and had come under fire from the junta for criticizing their failings, giving him respect from the anti-government types. Helping guarantee safety for the Russian minority in Moldavia was another great accomplishment of his. Lebed was approached and agreed to take part in a coup.
Aushev intended to use him as a puppet of sorts but Lebed naturally had no interest of taking part in anyone's plans. While it was widely known that Lebed was an independent sort, no one had expected to be the political operator he turned out to be. This was something only found out later, and so Aushev and new collaborator Kulikov planned their attack.
The junta was based in Leningrad, as per the name and was heavily defended in a cordoned off part of the city. A frontal assault was dangerous and deadly but the only method of assault. After the assassination of Moiseev the whole city went under a tight curfew and enhanced security measures, many times more restrictive (and effective) than the martial law outside Leningrad. The coup would have to be quick at both capturing the loyal elements of the Leningrad junta and seizing control of the media so as to prevent the media going rogue.
In the summer of 1998 Leningrad woke up to the sound of gunshots. Forces loyal to the coup plotters moved quickly and surrounded the district that the junta had set up for itself. Heavy weapons were relied on excessively to suppress the loyalist troops. The loyalist forces weren't push overs and while the media centers in both Leningrad and Moscow were seized by coup plotters (specifically those sympathetic or otherwise loyal to Lebed) the intense fighting continued.
It was only when Lebed's name was mentioned that loyalist forces began to surrender to the coup plotters. He was the only general without any black marks against him and was something of a celebrity across most of the Soviet Union. To the people on the ground, even those not involved in politics – Lebed as the one who rode in on a white stallion to save the day just made sense. It was why Aushev and Kulikov picked him after all.
After an hour or so it was clear that the junta would not win. Only the most fanatical loyalists of coup's generals remained. Even the security apparatus of the state, the weakened but fanatic group it was, stepped aside and provided no support for the Leningrad government. It was clear that there was something different about this coup. Something had to give. The Soviet Union was on it's last legs. There was nothing left after this.
General Yazov was a particularly worthless commander and man. His troops had little love for him. It made sense then that his troops deserted him. Yazov's troops shot him and several of his still loyal men and flew the white flag. They had no interest in fighting for a man that they hated.
Pavel Grachev, the most corrupt and power hungry of all the junta bosses tried to escape. Through a series of tunnels general Grachev and his most loyal confidants ran away with filled suitcases of valuables and his family in tow. At the end of the tunnel where Grachev was expecting a few cars to take everyone to Finland. Instead he was ambushed by his own troops and even after offering all of his money in his suitcases, all his ill gotten goods, they weren't going to let him escape. Grachev and those around him were killed.
The final one of the junta left was Sergey Akhromeyev. Akhromeyev was a loyal supporter of the Soviet Union and was earnest in his attempt to save the Sovie Union. He was the Leningrad Junta's most ideologically loyal member and was the most firm in his support of the Soviet Union. His involvement in the junta was one of true support and it made men look up to him, at least among his own forces. From the junta only he and Aushev had interest outside of corruption and power on their mind so it made sense then that he lasted the longest. Akhromeyev's forces were surround in a small hospital that had been converted for government use as a supply warehouse. The warehouse had become encircled by the coup forces but the forces present there couldn't force the junta's forces to surrender nor could they overpower the well supplied and well barricaded defenders. Until more support came Akhromeyev's men would stand firm.
The warehouse had been surrounded for several hours by the time the rest of the coup plotter forces managed to join in the encirclement. It was then that tanks joined in on the firefight and some fires started in the warehouse. The fire spread to the ammo stores and Leningrad was filled with the sound of cracking and popping for the following day. The rest is history.
Leningrad, 1998
With every supporter of the old Leningrad Junta dead or cowed into submission, the coup was successful. The people of the Soviet Union however was less assured. News spread quickly of a coup and the people prepared to roll with the punches of what the political chaos would inevitably bring. Up until that point the news just played classical music to calm the nerves of the viewers to encourage them to stay at home and not go out. Some rumors of Lebed leading the coup were spread around but no one believed it. Lebed himself didn't have enough men to take on all of Junta himself so it was considered either to be a suicidal attack on Lebed's part or just that rumors were merely rumors.
The opinion of the public changed when Lebed himself appeared on the television all over the Soviet Union. Such an appearance wasn't planned by the other coup plotters but it occurred nonetheless, Lebed wasn't one to take orders. Not anymore anyway.
Lebed gave a speech where he outlined his views of the Soviet Union and stated what his plans were for the future. He wasn't beating around the bush and was frank in his views. The most shocking statement was the famous sentence, a sentence every Eastern European remembers.
General Lebed: "The Soviet Union is over."
This wasn't the only thing Lebed spoke on. During his speech touched on many things, all of which were important to the new Russian state.
Lebed promised an end to the Soviet Union once new negotiations could be held, perhaps sapping some of the luster of his previous statement. All the leaders of the still remaining SSRs would meet in and design a new constitution for a new Union. This new Union would be, ostensibly, more equal and federative than the previous Soviet Union. The new union would be based off of the martyred Gorbachev's plans at least in part.
Furthermore, Lebed promised to help bring the various military struggles (The Caucasian Wars, Yugoslavian Wars, and the Bulgarian Turkish insurgency, etc) to an end via diplomacy and work to help the Russian minorities across Europe. This coincided with a new approach to foreign policy which looked to be more cooperative with the rest of the world while not being weak. The key phrase to this new foreign policy was "Respectability" and this phrase extended into economics as well.
One of the only benefits of the Soviet Union surviving so long past the collapse of her satellite states was that the Soviet Union was able to see what radical privatization wrought upon the nations which practiced it. Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungry, and the Baltic states all saw the economies fall into crisis as their respective economies began to stall and fail. Times were rough and privatization was unfair and cruel.
What Lebed promised was "Respectable Marketization" which made room for the market, much more so than Gorbachev, but at the same time keeping firm state controls where needed and slowly reforming the economy to a more market controlled economy. Part of this was the legalization and recognition of the black market. The idea was that if they were brought out of the dark and into the light that Viktor Bout and the other "Underground Kings" could be held legally responsible for any crimes and it would destroy the black market while also growing the legal economy itself.
Another initiative was the move from collectivized agriculture to beginning privatization. Kolkhozes and Sovkhozes were all privatized, doling out equal portions of land to all members. Half of the product would be bought by the government at the state price and the other half could be sold at whatever price desired. This would, theoretically, solve the very serious issue of agricultural shortfalls and allow for the birth of a private supply chain from private farms to new private grocery stores. In regards to other elements of the economy, privatization was to be limited to only insolvent or nonviable state enterprises. This of course would also necessitate a general committal to wiping out corruption in the economy which Lebed backed to the hilt. Additional research into creating state run companies in the French Dirigiste fashion rather than simply state run factories and businesses was also promoted but no major decisions were made as of the time of the speech or immediately afterward.
McDonald's in Russia, owned partially by the government itself
Obviously these proclamations were shocking for Kulikov and Aushev but they didn't have the strength or the interest in fighting against the now very popular Lebed. Kulikov was interested in money and power and Lebed could give that. Aushev wanted to keep violence in the Caucuses to a minimum, this too, was something Lebed could give.
In the weeks following Aushev and Kulikov lost influence in the new government as Lebed gained popular favor for his refusal to commit troops to shut down public gatherings and his work to rehabilitate/destroy the Banditi. The new Soviet Union, or rather the successor state came into being not much later on. The other SSRs had disliked the old Soviet system but the promise of a new more fair union was little issue for them, especially considering the numerous economic benefits of staying together there were. In this new nation known as the simply as the Union State or as the Eurasian Union each of the constituent nations would be free to act locally however there would be national elections as well as overseeing from Moscow in the typical Russian style. Things like free elections were of course much debated and like many other issues, there was much to be done and much to be decided in Europe's newest state.
------
Lebed is a serious looking man with a baritone voice. In case you're wondering what he sounds like. Seriously one of the deepest speaking voices I've ever heard.
- Location
- Rex, NC, USA
Nice to see Russia undergoing a smoother transition to capitalism than IOTL.
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Well, I mean they have a GDP per capita less than Moldova at the same period which makes Russia the poorest state in Europe by far, but it's certainly a smoother transition at the very least.
Minus the Caucuses as well. But yeah the Union State is a shell of the former Soviet Union's self.
Last edited:
42 - Part 40: Anxieties and Missteps
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Part 40: Anxieties and Missteps
On the precipice of the next millennium the Conservatives were lacking leadership and control. While Gingrich and others tried to keep things close to Reagan as they want him remembered, the party's voters took things in a different direction. The lack of centralized controls within the party bureaucracy, the torpedoing of the party consensus by Hammond, and the general reaction to President Leland did little to assist the party rank and file in keeping doctrinaire Reaganism as the party's guiding ideology. By 2000 it was beginning to take its toll on the party infrastructure.
Hammond's wing had largely fallen off as a result of Hammond's quickly waning political popularity. Even in the party's inner circles itself Hammond was considered lackluster. The victories of Korea and tax cuts was perhaps not enough when compared to Reagan's record. When you added on the Long Recession to his "achievements" under his administration things looked even worse for Hammond and his political allies. Hammond's party wing seemed out of step with the others. Hammondites had always been more optimistic and forward thinking than the other groups, it was their defining feature. In and age where anger was the most powerful emotion in the Conservative Party it was seeming more and more out of touch with the party itself. The Hammondites supported old Hammond VP Jack Kemp or they threw their support behind Barry Goldwater Jr. who was something of a Gingrichian Reaganite. Any victory in intra-party disputes won by Hammondites were reversed by 2000 as Gingrich and the others began to regain control over the party's control mechanisms.
Slowly by surely Gingrich and his allies have begun to take control of the party mechanisms. They hope to create a party orthodoxy and bring the party in line with their own idealized version of Reagan's policies.
Goldwater Jr. was at the center of a growing split within the party of those with more libertarian economic views but not backing the more radical elements of the Paleoconservative's trade and social views. Like his father, Goldwater Jr. inherited a more nuanced and slightly moderate series of opinions on social policy and that put him at odds with the Paleoconservatives. His more Neoliberal free trade views also caused issue of the Buchananite portions of the Paleoconservatives. When combined with the faltering of the Hammondites it led to a unique situation where Goldwater Jr. was able to at least potentially resurrect the Libertarian section of the party, drawing in support from the Hammondites and the Paleoconservatives. At the very least he could graft a more libertarian flavor onto Gingrich's style of idealized Reaganism. Such a thing would require a victory in the primaries or a respectable finish as second at the very least.
Paleoconservatives of course had their own folks running. Pat Buchanan was representing the his section of the Paleoconservatives who formed the majority of the faction. Buchanan had been one of the big names talked up about running in 2000 by practically every big media figure because of his strong criticisms of President Leland from day one. Buchanan was initially thought to be someone who could take control of the reaction to Leland and make them into a viable force but as the reaction ran out of steam and criticism of Leland became more focused on Leland's less active foreign policy it did little to make Buchanan look good as he was an isolationist himself. Pat Robertson was another hopeful who was talked up quite a bit with many estimating his evangelical base would make him a powerful opponent but when 2000 came it appeared that the average America's religiosity had decrease and that the evangelicals that boosted Robertson before had lost interest. The old Moral Majority was no longer as powerful as it once was nor was it ever to be again, with Robertson's candidacy representing the proverbial death rattle of evangelical's massive influence in American politics.
Of course there was also James Buckley, the old idol of the party. Buckley himself flirted with a run and "kept it in consideration" despite his position as a sitting judge. Buckley's star had faded much over the years and he was no longer the old senator he once was so he campaign went no where early on. Another from out in the proverbial wilderness of the party was Clayton Williams, former Texas governor. Williams fought a hard campaign but Goldwater Jr. had already sucked up most of the support for more moderate or typical conservatives in the race. Williams of course had his cowboy appeal but it didn't resonate out of the Southwest – exactly where Goldwater Jr.'s support was its highest.
The Populists too had their fair share of people running. When it came down to it, the Populists had two major candidates in 2000. The first to announce was Oklahoma's Jim Inhofe who firmly backed Bill Clinton's run in 1996. Inhofe was not as much of a strong supporter of the American unilateralism that Clinton was but was more interested in Clinton's domestic agenda which played around with economic and social populism along with dog whistles and general social conservatism. The other of course was Bob Dornan.
Representative Bob Dornan
Bob Dornan was in many ways an almost facsimile copy of Bill Clinton's views from 1996 mixed in with an increased anger directed at Israel and a more frank or crude style of speaking. Dornan's "off the cuff" style of speech and his venomous rhetoric towards Democrats and President Leland was a great draw for his campaign. His former days as an actor certainly helped him give his speeches a certain dramatic quality other candidates lacked. He was one of the front runners from the start.
When Iowa and New Hampshire came around Dornan won Iowa but suffered a narrow loss at the hands of Inhofe. The other candidates took notice. Calyton Williams, Buckley, Kemp, and Robertson's campaigns all ended before Super Tuesday. They realized that they weren't the future of the Conservative Party. At least in 2000.
The Hammondites were done, they were broken in this election. The final candidate even remotely related to them, Goldwater Jr., had the endorsement of Kemp and kept strong in a respectable third place. Buchanan followed in fourth and the two populists led the pack. Other less important candidates remained but there was little to say of them and their campaigns.
Before Super Tuesday all the candidates realized how important that date would be. If either one of the Populists won a majority of the races it would likely clinch the race in their favor. If Buchanan or Goldwater Jr. manged a few victories it could flip the race on its head.
Bill Clinton's widow Hillary naturally came to become an important endorsement. She had a growing political career in her own right by 2000 and there were even calls for her to run that year. Madame Clinton, as she had come to be called, declined citing her desire to run for Governor of Arkansas after retiring from her seat in the House of Representatives. Both Inhofe and Dornan sought her endorsement and she weighed both. Inhofe was young and not totally on board with her deceased husband's platform. Dornan was older and ideologically closer to Bill. In the end Madame Clinton decided to endorse Bob Dornan ahead of Super Tuesday.
"Out of any candidate, Bob Dornan best aligns with me and my late husband Bill's vision of what America could, should, and will be. So for that reason, I officially endorse Mr. Bob Dornan for the Presidency of the United States."
So Super Tuesday came and went, Clinton's endorsement made Dornan seem like the "official" Populist whereas Inhofe was an imitator. Dornan won big and Inhofe lost big. Inhofe's campaign stalled and collapsed afterwards, leaving Doran to rocket forward. Of course with Goldwater Jr.'s small victories coinciding with Inhofe's collapse made him a decent runner up to Dornan and lead to Goldwater Jr. being labeled as the "Anti-Dornan" candidate by some. He was not even remotely close enough to defeat Dornan but it did help give him some prestige.
When the convention came around and the economy began to pick up in earnest Dornan had already clinched the nomination. The race from that point became one of foreign policy and the Conservatives could no longer strongly critique the economics of Leland as his economic proposals were being seen as more and more successful by the general. The running mate spot was given to Wisconsin Congressman Scott L. Klug to balance out the ticket and provide a more traditional conservative on the ticket. Things were starting to look down but regardless of who won and who lost, the future was coming to the Conservatives and a fight between the party rank and file's mainstream headed by Gingrich and the diadochi of Bill Clinton seemed increasingly inevitable in the coming years. There much much unfinished business in the Conservative Party indeed.
------
Just one more post after this. I'm working on Part II and the redux faithfully on the weekends.
On the precipice of the next millennium the Conservatives were lacking leadership and control. While Gingrich and others tried to keep things close to Reagan as they want him remembered, the party's voters took things in a different direction. The lack of centralized controls within the party bureaucracy, the torpedoing of the party consensus by Hammond, and the general reaction to President Leland did little to assist the party rank and file in keeping doctrinaire Reaganism as the party's guiding ideology. By 2000 it was beginning to take its toll on the party infrastructure.
Hammond's wing had largely fallen off as a result of Hammond's quickly waning political popularity. Even in the party's inner circles itself Hammond was considered lackluster. The victories of Korea and tax cuts was perhaps not enough when compared to Reagan's record. When you added on the Long Recession to his "achievements" under his administration things looked even worse for Hammond and his political allies. Hammond's party wing seemed out of step with the others. Hammondites had always been more optimistic and forward thinking than the other groups, it was their defining feature. In and age where anger was the most powerful emotion in the Conservative Party it was seeming more and more out of touch with the party itself. The Hammondites supported old Hammond VP Jack Kemp or they threw their support behind Barry Goldwater Jr. who was something of a Gingrichian Reaganite. Any victory in intra-party disputes won by Hammondites were reversed by 2000 as Gingrich and the others began to regain control over the party's control mechanisms.
Slowly by surely Gingrich and his allies have begun to take control of the party mechanisms. They hope to create a party orthodoxy and bring the party in line with their own idealized version of Reagan's policies.
Paleoconservatives of course had their own folks running. Pat Buchanan was representing the his section of the Paleoconservatives who formed the majority of the faction. Buchanan had been one of the big names talked up about running in 2000 by practically every big media figure because of his strong criticisms of President Leland from day one. Buchanan was initially thought to be someone who could take control of the reaction to Leland and make them into a viable force but as the reaction ran out of steam and criticism of Leland became more focused on Leland's less active foreign policy it did little to make Buchanan look good as he was an isolationist himself. Pat Robertson was another hopeful who was talked up quite a bit with many estimating his evangelical base would make him a powerful opponent but when 2000 came it appeared that the average America's religiosity had decrease and that the evangelicals that boosted Robertson before had lost interest. The old Moral Majority was no longer as powerful as it once was nor was it ever to be again, with Robertson's candidacy representing the proverbial death rattle of evangelical's massive influence in American politics.
Of course there was also James Buckley, the old idol of the party. Buckley himself flirted with a run and "kept it in consideration" despite his position as a sitting judge. Buckley's star had faded much over the years and he was no longer the old senator he once was so he campaign went no where early on. Another from out in the proverbial wilderness of the party was Clayton Williams, former Texas governor. Williams fought a hard campaign but Goldwater Jr. had already sucked up most of the support for more moderate or typical conservatives in the race. Williams of course had his cowboy appeal but it didn't resonate out of the Southwest – exactly where Goldwater Jr.'s support was its highest.
The Populists too had their fair share of people running. When it came down to it, the Populists had two major candidates in 2000. The first to announce was Oklahoma's Jim Inhofe who firmly backed Bill Clinton's run in 1996. Inhofe was not as much of a strong supporter of the American unilateralism that Clinton was but was more interested in Clinton's domestic agenda which played around with economic and social populism along with dog whistles and general social conservatism. The other of course was Bob Dornan.
Representative Bob Dornan
When Iowa and New Hampshire came around Dornan won Iowa but suffered a narrow loss at the hands of Inhofe. The other candidates took notice. Calyton Williams, Buckley, Kemp, and Robertson's campaigns all ended before Super Tuesday. They realized that they weren't the future of the Conservative Party. At least in 2000.
The Hammondites were done, they were broken in this election. The final candidate even remotely related to them, Goldwater Jr., had the endorsement of Kemp and kept strong in a respectable third place. Buchanan followed in fourth and the two populists led the pack. Other less important candidates remained but there was little to say of them and their campaigns.
Before Super Tuesday all the candidates realized how important that date would be. If either one of the Populists won a majority of the races it would likely clinch the race in their favor. If Buchanan or Goldwater Jr. manged a few victories it could flip the race on its head.
Bill Clinton's widow Hillary naturally came to become an important endorsement. She had a growing political career in her own right by 2000 and there were even calls for her to run that year. Madame Clinton, as she had come to be called, declined citing her desire to run for Governor of Arkansas after retiring from her seat in the House of Representatives. Both Inhofe and Dornan sought her endorsement and she weighed both. Inhofe was young and not totally on board with her deceased husband's platform. Dornan was older and ideologically closer to Bill. In the end Madame Clinton decided to endorse Bob Dornan ahead of Super Tuesday.
"Out of any candidate, Bob Dornan best aligns with me and my late husband Bill's vision of what America could, should, and will be. So for that reason, I officially endorse Mr. Bob Dornan for the Presidency of the United States."
So Super Tuesday came and went, Clinton's endorsement made Dornan seem like the "official" Populist whereas Inhofe was an imitator. Dornan won big and Inhofe lost big. Inhofe's campaign stalled and collapsed afterwards, leaving Doran to rocket forward. Of course with Goldwater Jr.'s small victories coinciding with Inhofe's collapse made him a decent runner up to Dornan and lead to Goldwater Jr. being labeled as the "Anti-Dornan" candidate by some. He was not even remotely close enough to defeat Dornan but it did help give him some prestige.
When the convention came around and the economy began to pick up in earnest Dornan had already clinched the nomination. The race from that point became one of foreign policy and the Conservatives could no longer strongly critique the economics of Leland as his economic proposals were being seen as more and more successful by the general. The running mate spot was given to Wisconsin Congressman Scott L. Klug to balance out the ticket and provide a more traditional conservative on the ticket. Things were starting to look down but regardless of who won and who lost, the future was coming to the Conservatives and a fight between the party rank and file's mainstream headed by Gingrich and the diadochi of Bill Clinton seemed increasingly inevitable in the coming years. There much much unfinished business in the Conservative Party indeed.
------
Just one more post after this. I'm working on Part II and the redux faithfully on the weekends.
43 - Part 41: The theories of a Georgian (Finale)
TransUral Empire
Mess with the bull, you get the horse
- Location
- The Isle of Pen
Part 41: The theories of a Georgian (Finale)
The study of nations and civilizations is an odd field. Many men have come up with many theories and hypotheses about the path of nations. Marx, Hegel, Spengler, Ibn Khaldun, the list rolls and rolls on of men who try to understand the direction of history itself. By no means is it a purely academic pursuit either – simply ask anyone on the street how they feel about things and you'll find that many people consider these things.
Even an odd Georgian man in his Dacha did a little theorizing one night. His theory was one of light and dark, stability and instability. He believed there was an inevitable march to history in a particular direction. He predicted the future of the world with an ugly little glint in his eyes,"But it will be dark soon. And the dawn waits." is what he said all those years ago. His belief in this dawn was that there was a final dawn awaiting humanity that made all the evils he did justified. It was appropriately Hegelian, or perhaps Marxian if your prefer.
But has it really went in that direction? Perhaps not how he meant. Europe had swung hard against Stalin and the empire that he built. From the Spirit of '94 and the Revolutions of New October Europe had, for the most part, liberated themselves. There were no foreign armies marching, no secret paymaster schemes. The revolutions and uprisings in Europe were entirely domestic and grassroots affairs.
The vast majority of Europe was free. The only state which had not fallen to civil war or transitioned into Democracy was the GDR. Even the Soviet Union herself had collapsed and gone away, leaving little more than Russia, Belarus, and Central Asia as hanger-ons for the new state led by Lebed. Ukraine, the Baltic states, the Caucuses, they were all gone from Russia's grasp. Even Stalin's ancestral home of Georgia was living free albeit having to deal with the numerous issues of warring, banditry, terrorism, and economic stagnation that the region inherited from the Soviets even after leaving.
The former Soviet states of the Caucuses, circa 1998
The GDR herself was falling apart just like the rest of the remaining Marxism-Leninist states were. Outside of GDR the only self-proclaimed Marxist-Leninist states left alive as of 2000 were the Indochinese states and Cuba. None of these groups looked like they had long to live, considering their economies were stalling and collapsing under the weight of economic mismanagement and opposition from the people themselves.
Even the supposedly dangerous Socialist giant under Wang collapsed into disrepair and faded away. Much to the surprise of everyone, the military even kept their promise of elections. After several hundred million dead or so because of Mao and Wang it was perhaps only understandable that the military would go ahead and allow China to try the democracy thing that they heard so much about.
Chinese Presidential elections of 1996, Round 1:
Wei Jingsheng (Independent), 36.3%
Lucie Cheng (Social Democratic Party of China), 23.7%
Xu Wenli (National Democratic Party), 21.1%
Bai Zhijian (Chinese Reformed Communist Party), 8.4%
Ren Wanding (Chinese Liberal Party), 6.1%
Others, 4.4%
Chinese Presidential Elections of 1996, Round 2:
Wei Jingsheng (Independent), 69.1%
Lucie Cheng (Social Democratic Party of China), 30.1%
Others/Blank Ballots, 0.8%
Wei and the reformers had won against the solid leftists, although their narrow victory pointed to the worrying fact that China was not fully behind this new economic system. Regardless the reformers planned to push forward and forge a capitalist democracy in a time when the global economy wasn't looking too hot. It would take a great deal of effort to create a culture of democracy and transition the economy but it wasn't something that the government could afford to put off. After all, the government might be free of military influence for now but if things go bad, who says the Warlord period is anything that China can't repeat?
Wei Jingsheng, China's first freely elected leader
Russia and the rest of the post-Communist states had many of those similar issues. They had to transition to a market economy and help foster a democratic environment. For Russia Lebed might not really have to abide by democracy, he had other things to contend with. This issue was instability which only begat more and more violence and then more and more instability. The former Marxist-Leninist states of Africa had this too. They had shifted away from Marxism-Leninism not from the people's demands but because it was no longer worthwhile to stay involved with Russia's sinking empire. Now they could transition to the market however they liked, just without Soviet subsidies and without Soviet backing. More than a few African nations, formerly Communist or not, fell into chaos following the end of the Cold War. In some parts of Africa, things looked bright of course. South Africa had her elections and they went well, Nelson Mandela won his election as mentioned previously and his government continued without much in the way of problems. Things were peaceful at least in South Africa.
So in the end, it appeared that Capitalism had won. It won the struggle against Marxism-Leninism. Does this mean that Marxism's criticisms were wrong? Does this mean that there is no future for the left? While one might be inclined to crow on and on about the various liberal capitalist lines of thought, the existence of people like Alexander Lebed and his insistence in engaging in the market economy on his own terms seems to promote the idea that perhaps things are not as solid as they think. Indeed South America herself is seeing the beginnings of something of a strongly leftist character now that the US isn't in the business of overthrowing democracies down south. Perhaps that's why the mutterings of a "Post-Cold War Consensus" are never much more than mutterings.
Anyone who followed politics knew that it wasn't the "end of history" no doubt much to the chagrin to Hegel or Fukuyama. There is no end of history in the physical sense, but 2000 saw no end to history in the philosophical sense either. There is more to be told. Much more blood and sweat must be shed on the earth's fertile clay before the story of the world – or even America would be over.
And at the same time, what of Spengler? What of the Western World's supposed Untergang, her downfall? Only the future could tell us if Spengler would be proven right. Spengler believed that the West would slowly lose its vigor and after 2000 the most popular form of government would be a sort of ad hoc Caesarism with governments ruling by executive fiat. Does that seem like the future from this point? Maybe not, but much can change in a few years. After all no one expected President Leland in 1988.
The future still has much in store, does it not?
It was these very important questions that the man thought about as he waited in the dacha. In a spartan room the man and a young confidant sat in chairs at a table, both their eyes transfixed upon a television blaring out news from America. The Americans recently finished up their elections and today the man they elected was being sworn in. It was, as the man had come to understand, an important election in American history.
"Any man who loves Communism has no brains; Any man who loves Capitalism has no heart." - Alexander Lebed, 2005
The man took a drag on a cigarette, "I thought they would have gotten rid of him. The Americans are different from what I had expected."
The young confidant nodded in silent agreement. The two kept silently listening to the TV go on about the election and the signing in of the President. Such a thing had never happened in Russian history.
The man wasn't sure about democracy even if he liked to pretend to be heading in that direction in public.
"If we continue at the pace we're going it will be less than a decade before we have reincorporated the Ukraine and the Caucuses. From there we can begin to disrupt the Americans and what they have and we can move to incorporating other states into our Commonwealth. From there..." The man continued on about his plans for the future. To destroy the America, if you ask him, was as easy as taking what worked for them and then adapting it to your own position. A 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em' type of plan. Once America was gone then Russia could do as she wished. To do such a thing however was a great challenge that would assuredly take decades. The third Rome would not be built in a day! For now his machinations must lay undetected.
Then the TV flashed a different set of colors, different from the previous images showing DC's palette of greens, navy blues, and whites. A news alert. A local anchor, interrupting the dubbed over broadcast from the US. Both the men perked up in their chairs and stopped smoking.
What the text on the screen said was incredible news. This was most unexpected.
At that moment, a soldier bust through the wooden double doors into the room. "General Lebed!" the soldier's face was red and he was obviously exhausted. "The American President's been-"
"We saw." said the smoking man in his baritone voice as he stood up. "The television told us. They just say 'shot' what is his status?"
"Dead perhaps...?" the young confidant lurched forward with wide eyes.
The soldier took a few hasty breaths and leaned his hand on the door frame. "Our sources say that he's heading towards the hospital now. They believe that the wounds aren't fatal." The disappointment of the young confidant was obvious on his face. The older man, Lebed, kept his typical stony expression.
"So not dead. I see. I am starting to understand these Americans more." Lebed blew out some smoke, "Is the meeting with Doosan still on then?"
The soldier regained his composure and was back in form once more, "They're already waiting in the conference room, sir."
Lebed took one final drag and put the butt out on the wood table. As he exhaled he looked over to his confidant and shook his head. "You worry too much. We want him alive Maxim, not dead." Lebed walked out of the room without looking back. He had more important things to do than wonder about the future any longer.
The soldier followed Lebed out of the room and towards the conference room where the South Korean businessmen were waiting. The young confidant was left alone, still taking drags and staring aimlessly out the open doors.
He turned back around and looked at the picture of the American President before the assassination being displayed on the TV. He looked happy just that morning. He went from feeling like the greatest man in America to being carted off to the emergency room in a matter of an hour.
The TV buzzed, "...We have just received news that the American President has arrived at George Washington University Hospital and is receiving emergency care as we speak..."
The young confidant shook his head, "History, she is a harsh mistress!"
------
I decided to finish this up early.
So, that's that for Part I. This is my first TL that I technically finished and I think it shows. There's some ideas that I wasn't able to fully articulate and show while there's also important stuff that I really dropped the ball on.
In the redux for Part I and Part II I'll be redoubling my efforts and I'll be adding onto and changing things to make it better. One particular aspect I'll be focusing in on will be abortion which I feel like I pretty much forgot about. I stepped into writing this without a 100% firm understanding of the period so that's something I got wrong. So I'm happy to say that I've planned the redux to weave abortion and the Supreme Court into the story as a major issue for America. That's just the beginning of the things I've planned to fix and readjust. Domestic issues in general are something I'll be focusing more on because I feel like I focuses too much on foreign stuff during the TL.
I think the theme I was going for also got jumbled up somewhere down the line so I'll be working on that as well.
As far as when I'll finish the redux and Part II, I'm not totally sure. There's a lot of stuff to write and I've restricted my side projects to only be worked on during the weekend so that I can finish more important stuff during the week.
Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed this attempt. It certainly wasn't easy for me to write all of this (nearly 90,000 words) and sometimes I dropped the ball with the TL but I certainly enjoyed writing and posting it up on AH and on SV.
The study of nations and civilizations is an odd field. Many men have come up with many theories and hypotheses about the path of nations. Marx, Hegel, Spengler, Ibn Khaldun, the list rolls and rolls on of men who try to understand the direction of history itself. By no means is it a purely academic pursuit either – simply ask anyone on the street how they feel about things and you'll find that many people consider these things.
Even an odd Georgian man in his Dacha did a little theorizing one night. His theory was one of light and dark, stability and instability. He believed there was an inevitable march to history in a particular direction. He predicted the future of the world with an ugly little glint in his eyes,"But it will be dark soon. And the dawn waits." is what he said all those years ago. His belief in this dawn was that there was a final dawn awaiting humanity that made all the evils he did justified. It was appropriately Hegelian, or perhaps Marxian if your prefer.
But has it really went in that direction? Perhaps not how he meant. Europe had swung hard against Stalin and the empire that he built. From the Spirit of '94 and the Revolutions of New October Europe had, for the most part, liberated themselves. There were no foreign armies marching, no secret paymaster schemes. The revolutions and uprisings in Europe were entirely domestic and grassroots affairs.
The vast majority of Europe was free. The only state which had not fallen to civil war or transitioned into Democracy was the GDR. Even the Soviet Union herself had collapsed and gone away, leaving little more than Russia, Belarus, and Central Asia as hanger-ons for the new state led by Lebed. Ukraine, the Baltic states, the Caucuses, they were all gone from Russia's grasp. Even Stalin's ancestral home of Georgia was living free albeit having to deal with the numerous issues of warring, banditry, terrorism, and economic stagnation that the region inherited from the Soviets even after leaving.
The former Soviet states of the Caucuses, circa 1998
The GDR herself was falling apart just like the rest of the remaining Marxism-Leninist states were. Outside of GDR the only self-proclaimed Marxist-Leninist states left alive as of 2000 were the Indochinese states and Cuba. None of these groups looked like they had long to live, considering their economies were stalling and collapsing under the weight of economic mismanagement and opposition from the people themselves.
Even the supposedly dangerous Socialist giant under Wang collapsed into disrepair and faded away. Much to the surprise of everyone, the military even kept their promise of elections. After several hundred million dead or so because of Mao and Wang it was perhaps only understandable that the military would go ahead and allow China to try the democracy thing that they heard so much about.
Chinese Presidential elections of 1996, Round 1:
Wei Jingsheng (Independent), 36.3%
Lucie Cheng (Social Democratic Party of China), 23.7%
Xu Wenli (National Democratic Party), 21.1%
Bai Zhijian (Chinese Reformed Communist Party), 8.4%
Ren Wanding (Chinese Liberal Party), 6.1%
Others, 4.4%
Chinese Presidential Elections of 1996, Round 2:
Wei Jingsheng (Independent), 69.1%
Lucie Cheng (Social Democratic Party of China), 30.1%
Others/Blank Ballots, 0.8%
Wei and the reformers had won against the solid leftists, although their narrow victory pointed to the worrying fact that China was not fully behind this new economic system. Regardless the reformers planned to push forward and forge a capitalist democracy in a time when the global economy wasn't looking too hot. It would take a great deal of effort to create a culture of democracy and transition the economy but it wasn't something that the government could afford to put off. After all, the government might be free of military influence for now but if things go bad, who says the Warlord period is anything that China can't repeat?
Wei Jingsheng, China's first freely elected leader
Russia and the rest of the post-Communist states had many of those similar issues. They had to transition to a market economy and help foster a democratic environment. For Russia Lebed might not really have to abide by democracy, he had other things to contend with. This issue was instability which only begat more and more violence and then more and more instability. The former Marxist-Leninist states of Africa had this too. They had shifted away from Marxism-Leninism not from the people's demands but because it was no longer worthwhile to stay involved with Russia's sinking empire. Now they could transition to the market however they liked, just without Soviet subsidies and without Soviet backing. More than a few African nations, formerly Communist or not, fell into chaos following the end of the Cold War. In some parts of Africa, things looked bright of course. South Africa had her elections and they went well, Nelson Mandela won his election as mentioned previously and his government continued without much in the way of problems. Things were peaceful at least in South Africa.
So in the end, it appeared that Capitalism had won. It won the struggle against Marxism-Leninism. Does this mean that Marxism's criticisms were wrong? Does this mean that there is no future for the left? While one might be inclined to crow on and on about the various liberal capitalist lines of thought, the existence of people like Alexander Lebed and his insistence in engaging in the market economy on his own terms seems to promote the idea that perhaps things are not as solid as they think. Indeed South America herself is seeing the beginnings of something of a strongly leftist character now that the US isn't in the business of overthrowing democracies down south. Perhaps that's why the mutterings of a "Post-Cold War Consensus" are never much more than mutterings.
Anyone who followed politics knew that it wasn't the "end of history" no doubt much to the chagrin to Hegel or Fukuyama. There is no end of history in the physical sense, but 2000 saw no end to history in the philosophical sense either. There is more to be told. Much more blood and sweat must be shed on the earth's fertile clay before the story of the world – or even America would be over.
And at the same time, what of Spengler? What of the Western World's supposed Untergang, her downfall? Only the future could tell us if Spengler would be proven right. Spengler believed that the West would slowly lose its vigor and after 2000 the most popular form of government would be a sort of ad hoc Caesarism with governments ruling by executive fiat. Does that seem like the future from this point? Maybe not, but much can change in a few years. After all no one expected President Leland in 1988.
The future still has much in store, does it not?
It was these very important questions that the man thought about as he waited in the dacha. In a spartan room the man and a young confidant sat in chairs at a table, both their eyes transfixed upon a television blaring out news from America. The Americans recently finished up their elections and today the man they elected was being sworn in. It was, as the man had come to understand, an important election in American history.
"Any man who loves Communism has no brains; Any man who loves Capitalism has no heart." - Alexander Lebed, 2005
The man took a drag on a cigarette, "I thought they would have gotten rid of him. The Americans are different from what I had expected."
The young confidant nodded in silent agreement. The two kept silently listening to the TV go on about the election and the signing in of the President. Such a thing had never happened in Russian history.
The man wasn't sure about democracy even if he liked to pretend to be heading in that direction in public.
"If we continue at the pace we're going it will be less than a decade before we have reincorporated the Ukraine and the Caucuses. From there we can begin to disrupt the Americans and what they have and we can move to incorporating other states into our Commonwealth. From there..." The man continued on about his plans for the future. To destroy the America, if you ask him, was as easy as taking what worked for them and then adapting it to your own position. A 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em' type of plan. Once America was gone then Russia could do as she wished. To do such a thing however was a great challenge that would assuredly take decades. The third Rome would not be built in a day! For now his machinations must lay undetected.
Then the TV flashed a different set of colors, different from the previous images showing DC's palette of greens, navy blues, and whites. A news alert. A local anchor, interrupting the dubbed over broadcast from the US. Both the men perked up in their chairs and stopped smoking.
What the text on the screen said was incredible news. This was most unexpected.
At that moment, a soldier bust through the wooden double doors into the room. "General Lebed!" the soldier's face was red and he was obviously exhausted. "The American President's been-"
"We saw." said the smoking man in his baritone voice as he stood up. "The television told us. They just say 'shot' what is his status?"
"Dead perhaps...?" the young confidant lurched forward with wide eyes.
The soldier took a few hasty breaths and leaned his hand on the door frame. "Our sources say that he's heading towards the hospital now. They believe that the wounds aren't fatal." The disappointment of the young confidant was obvious on his face. The older man, Lebed, kept his typical stony expression.
"So not dead. I see. I am starting to understand these Americans more." Lebed blew out some smoke, "Is the meeting with Doosan still on then?"
The soldier regained his composure and was back in form once more, "They're already waiting in the conference room, sir."
Lebed took one final drag and put the butt out on the wood table. As he exhaled he looked over to his confidant and shook his head. "You worry too much. We want him alive Maxim, not dead." Lebed walked out of the room without looking back. He had more important things to do than wonder about the future any longer.
The soldier followed Lebed out of the room and towards the conference room where the South Korean businessmen were waiting. The young confidant was left alone, still taking drags and staring aimlessly out the open doors.
He turned back around and looked at the picture of the American President before the assassination being displayed on the TV. He looked happy just that morning. He went from feeling like the greatest man in America to being carted off to the emergency room in a matter of an hour.
The TV buzzed, "...We have just received news that the American President has arrived at George Washington University Hospital and is receiving emergency care as we speak..."
The young confidant shook his head, "History, she is a harsh mistress!"
------
I decided to finish this up early.
So, that's that for Part I. This is my first TL that I technically finished and I think it shows. There's some ideas that I wasn't able to fully articulate and show while there's also important stuff that I really dropped the ball on.
In the redux for Part I and Part II I'll be redoubling my efforts and I'll be adding onto and changing things to make it better. One particular aspect I'll be focusing in on will be abortion which I feel like I pretty much forgot about. I stepped into writing this without a 100% firm understanding of the period so that's something I got wrong. So I'm happy to say that I've planned the redux to weave abortion and the Supreme Court into the story as a major issue for America. That's just the beginning of the things I've planned to fix and readjust. Domestic issues in general are something I'll be focusing more on because I feel like I focuses too much on foreign stuff during the TL.
I think the theme I was going for also got jumbled up somewhere down the line so I'll be working on that as well.
As far as when I'll finish the redux and Part II, I'm not totally sure. There's a lot of stuff to write and I've restricted my side projects to only be worked on during the weekend so that I can finish more important stuff during the week.
Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed this attempt. It certainly wasn't easy for me to write all of this (nearly 90,000 words) and sometimes I dropped the ball with the TL but I certainly enjoyed writing and posting it up on AH and on SV.
- Location
- Rex, NC, USA
East Germany is Best Germany.