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| - The war council decides that Hess will be the new Chancellor of Germany. Heavy fighting is still ongoing but that is believed to die down very soon. The Wermacht definitely has the upper hand and cities all around Germany and occupied territories falls from SS hands. Germany Hess makes his first speech as Chancellor in Berlin. Being a good politician he talks for a long time without saying much. Berlin In a top secret meeting the emergency war council with Rommel, Hess, Göring and some new lesser known members is briefed by Albert Göring on the Jewish question. Albert is the brother of the famous Hermann. He has many Jewish friends and is becoming increasingly concerned about their fate. Concentration camps are still being run by SS guards for lack of other qualified personnel. They are loyal to the new government but tainted by the recent civil war. The council knew already that many unlawful and downright uncivilized things have happened in concentration camps. They now learn that it is much worse and that many crimes against humanity have been committed. This is a new term but the only suitable description. Albert is thanked and dismissed. The council then has the unenviable task of deciding what to do. After many hours there is little progress but one thing is certain. What is done cannot be undone. And it is time for damage control. The world must not learn of the outrageous conditions in the concentration camps. It would taint the reputation of the fatherland forever. As a first measure the very name "concentration camp" must disappear to be replaced by "transit camp". Then transit camps must be demolished one by one and turned to agricultural use. Surviving inmates must be divided into groups and sent to different directions across the borders of the Reich. Maybe Palestine would be ideal. The Jewish terrorist Habanah group would welcome them and has already agreed to suppress knowledge about concentration - pardon transit - camps. Provided they receive some defensive weapons together with the inmates. Hess looks at the Habanah shopping list with a jaundiced eye: Some 1,000 obsolete T-34 tanks, some 500 scrapped Messerschmitts and some 100,000 "hunting" rifles like the Stu-46, and maybe some money to tide them over too. Hess shakes his head. Apparently Jews will never change. Still, it may be the best solution for now - A Jewish state in return for silence. Berlin Chancellor Hess foresees a standoff between Germany and the USA in the medium term. He appoints a cabinet to organize the German economy and military to prepare for this. Rommel, Göring, Goebbels and Speer are among those asked to serve in the cabinet. The idea is to compete with the USA in new weapons and technology, forcing the USA to spend enormous sums and causing great unhappiness to taxpayers. Fantastic monuments will be built and extravagant projects will be undertaken, ensuring full employment as a byproduct. For starters Dr. Saenger and Von Braun are asked to prepare a demonstration of their rockets. Prof Heisenberg and Planck are asked to come up with original ideas for using atomic power, no matter how daring. The base of any civilization is energy - the cheaper the energy the higher civilization can climb. And nuclear energy promises to be almost too cheap to measure. Stockholm The USA finally gets the go-ahead to invade Japan. Negotiators refused to discuss other subjects until the Japan issue was sorted out. German negotiators simply stalled for time, to ensure that all loyal German subjects had left Japan. Feedback from the last to leave is that the situation in Japan is becoming desperate. The industry is all but destroyed, oil unavailable, minerals running out and food is running low. If the USA does not invade the country will collapse on its own. Operation Downfall The long expected invasion of Japan starts, codenamed operation Downfall. It was already on the point of being implemented regardless of negotiations with the Axis. General MacArthur is in command of all Allied forces. The invasion starts on Kyūshū southeast of Tokyo. 1st and 8th army are assigned to the first phase, 25 divisions in total. The total effort dwarfs the failed Normandy invasion. Twelve atom bombs are dropped on Japanese strongholds before the invasion, completely paralyzing command and control. From the beginning it is clear that Japanese morale is low. The cream of the Japanese army has been crushed on various islands and only second rate troops are left. 50 Carriers and 10 battleships have sailed into Tokyo bay to support the invasion. In a synchronized operation US forces invade Manchuria from what is left of the Soviet Union. Operation Downfall A mass kamikaze attack by 5000 remaining Japanese aircraft causes heavy losses on the Pacific Fleet. Six aircraft carriers are sunk and at least 50 support ship sunk or damaged. Most attacking aircraft are shot down before reaching their target after being detected by B-17s carrying early warning radar. This is the swan song of the Japanese Air Force, it is now spent. US carriers strike back during the day. Road and rail traffic becomes impossible for the Japanese. Ground forces advance quickly and encounter little resistance. Operation Downfall Tokyo is surrounded. US troops are pressing in. Enemy attempts to counterattack are crushed by low flying B-29 bombers. Tokyo is covered by smoke. The wooden houses give little protection to attacking forces and defenders are overwhelmed. Japanese soldiers start to surrender in large groups for the first time in the war. Some Japanese try to resist using bow and arrow and even slings against Pershing tanks. US special forces use mustard gas to flush Japanese out of caves. Imperial command has always been worried about that possiblity. There is no defense against that tactic. Hirohito Emperor Hirohito takes command of all Japanese armed forces supported by a minority of the generals. This is an unprecedented event. Most generals are secretly relieved but some are obstinate and retire for the ritual of sepuku. Hirohito sends away messengers with the order to ask for an armistice and invite the Allied supreme commander to his underground bunker. Hirohito The Allies announce an armistice and emperor Hirohito is ordered to the command post of general MacArthur. He obeyes without hesitation. There is no point in insisting on ceremony when all is lost. G.I. Jones will later become famous as he transports the emperor to the negotiating table in a Jeep. The emperor is received with the proper decorum and general MacArthur has ensured that dozens of war correpondents are present. The issue has already been decided and Hirohito signs the instrument of surrender as commander in chief of all Japanese forces. His tears of grief are captured by countless flashing cameras and in some small measure contribute to the feeling that finally Pearl Harbor has been avenged. Japan The US is generous in victory and is sending supplies to shattered Japan. In some places it is too late to avert deaths from famine. In a process that is mystifying to Westerners Japan is already becoming the staunchest ally of the US. Trauen Dr. Saenger and Von Braun show off their rocket engine in a fixed test rig. After a countdown that will become a trademark for rocket flights the Saenger motor comes to life spitting a blue-yellow flame horizontally for 50 meters. Prodiguous quantities of smoke envelop the rig while Hess and his cabinet clap their hands to their ears. The flames peter out reluctantly and water douses the overheated rig, causing angry hissing and steam clouds. A jubilant Saenger explains to the observers how successful the test was: "800 tons of force for 3 minutes. This rocket, gentlemen, will take us to the stars." The observers are impressed by the noise and raw violence, if slightly disappointed because nothing actually moved. Nevertheless Saenger is authorized to organize space flights. Long range plans are started for the first moon landing. The date is set at sometime in 1952, in five years time. Kaiser Wilhelm This time Hess and his cabinet are invited to the Kaiser Wilhelm institute for atomic research. Heisenberg shows off his ideas, most of them only in the planning stages. There is a relatively small nuclear reactor running on plutonium that will power a submarine for two years. There is a Thorium reactor that will power a large city for twenty years, although it needs more development. There are also plans for a fusion reactor that will use heavy water as fuel, but it is unclear if fusion is practically possible. Conrad Zuse shows off his latest computer, the Z7. Using state of the art transistors it is very reliable and has enormous capability, running at 5 MegaHertz and having 16 kilobytes memory. The cabinet members can only shake their heads in awe, not knowing what the terms actually mean. Zuse confidentially mentions that his department is researching artificial intelligence, which means humans will become obsolete. He quips "the computer only has to learn to make mistakes to become human!" The members laugh uneasily wondering if this is a joke or not. Then Planck shows the members something they can understand, if only remotely: a model of a million ton spaceship. The monster has already a name: Orion. It will be powered by atomic explosions, incredible as this seems. The explosions will be absorbed by a pusher plate and gradually kick the spaceship to enormous speed. A speed of 3,000 km/second is theoretically possible: to Mars and back in two days ... it's too much. The cabinet members' heads are spinning. They have to retire for lunch after that announcement. William Shockley Professor William Shockley defects to Germany to head the specially constructed Shockley Labs. He had been studying the transistor effect at Bell Labs. Being obstinate and ambitious he was not easy to work with. German agents used the promise of his own laboratory with unlimited resources to entice him. Shockley is eager to investigate field effect transistors and has ideas about combining several transistors on one substrate, creating a miniature component, a circuit that is fully integrated. This starts the era of "poaching" where agents from all sides try to entice scientists to defect. The long term effect of all these activities is an enormous increase in science output in general. Konrad Zuse is now director of the Zuse Institute, an impressive new building based on architectural drawings by Hitler. He will use the products of Shockley Labs to produce ever more complicated computers. Israel David Ben-Gurion, acting head of the world Zionist movement meets secretly with the German Hess cabinet in Berlin accompanied by Golda Meir. The cabinet is somewhat defensive because of the regrettable treatment of Jews in the previous government. As a result Ben-Gurion enforces his claim to a Jewish state in Palestine easily. There are many details to sort out. The astute Ben-Gurion accurately gauges the atmosphere of the cabinet and delicately updates his shopping list with machine guns, cannon, mortars, flame throwers and more money, all for defense of course. He also suggests that the name Palestine is an unfortunate modernism and that the area is in fact called Israel. The cabinet bickers about the money but a compromise is reached: Swiss banks will be pressured er ... asked to release money deposited by Jews over the years in dormant accounts, many billions of Marks. EU On this day the European Union is formed in Strassburg. It is not a political organization but a congregation of idealists from different European countries. The president is Francois Schubert, a French German from the disputed Alsace area. The organization has no political power but will be a think thank that will show that Europeans can bury their differences and work together. They will lobby for a united Europe of course. Scientists and politicians are encouraged to join the Union. UN In response to the budding European Union the USA forms, or rather re-forms the United Nations. The USA, Canada, Mexico, Australia, Brazil, Siberia and Japan join immediately. This jolts Axis countries into considering the European Union seriously. China Mao Tse-Tung is captured by Kwomintang forces in China. USA advisors supported the Chinese efforts. Against USA advice Mao is executed without delay. His body is cut into little pieces that are sent to all corners of the country and burned. Let his spirit try to recover from that. The long civil war comes to an end. Sabre An F-86 Sabre makes its first flight with George Welch at the controls, flying from Muroc Dry Lake. The aircraft is based on captured German jets. The USAAF is very encouraged by the aircraft's potential. Now the Luftwaffe may expect some serious opposition. Max Planc Institute The venerable scientist Max Planck dies at the respectable age of 89. Messages of condolence arrive from many great scientist including Albert Einstein. He has been productive to his last day. The Kaiser Wilhelm Institute is immediately named after him.
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