The Kriegsmarine Gets Wings

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A little flash-forward

BBC.com
Accessed October 21, 2015

Royal Navy's first nuclear-powered carrier enters service

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Today is am important day in Royal Navy history as the "Senior Service" commissioned its first nuclear powered supercarrier, HMS Indomitable, pennant number R/N01. Hundreds gathered gathered at Portsmouth for Indomitable's commissioning ceremony. Captain Steven Moorhouse has been selected to be her first commanding officer.

1,100 feet long, 135 feet wide, and weighing in at 100,000 tonnes, Indomitable is the largest warship built for the Royal Navy to date. The heart of the ship consists of two Rolls-Royce pressurised-water reactors. Her aircraft capacity is rated at 95 fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters. Indomitable is expected to operate the Supermarine Seafire II strike fighter.

While the Fleet Air Arm has operated large carriers starting with the three-ship Warspite class* in the late 1960s, they have all been used conventional oil-powered propulsion. HMS Indomitable marks the FAA's entry into the nuclear age, joining the American Leyte Gulf-class and the French Richelieu-class carriers.

Indomitable is slated to replace the Eagle-class carrier HMS Anson, which was commissioned on April 10, 1976 and is scheduled for decommissioning in April 2016.

Launched in 2012, Indomitable shares her name with the famed Illustrious-class carrier that served in the Pacific Theatre of WW2. Decommissioned and put in reserve after the war, the elder Indomitable was saved from the scrap heap by Australia, who acquired her in 1950 and commissioned her into the Royal Australian Navy in 1958 after extensive modernization. HMAS Indomitable served with the RAN until 1988, seeing action in the Vietnam War and the Cyrpus War of 1975-1976. Upon decommissioning, HMAS Indomitable was preserved as a museum ship in Perth. Veterans from the elder Indomitable's time in both the British and Australian navies have attended her namesake's commissioning.

HMS Indomitable is the first in a planned three-ship class. The second ship-HMS Valiant, was launched in 2014 and is awaiting commissioning, and the third-HMS Nelson is currently under construction.

* Modified version of OTL CVA-01

[whiteshore]

Does Bangladesh contain West Bengal and is Assam an exclave of India within Bangladesh is it part of Bangladesh?

[silentrunner]

Jun 13, 2016 13:25:30 GMT whiteshore said:

Does Bangladesh contain West Bengal and is Assam an exclave of India within Bangladesh is it part of Bangladesh?

West Bengal and Assam are both part of India as IOTL.

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Chapter Thirty-Three

With the defeat of the Axis Powers, relations between the Soviet Union and the Western Allies began to grow tense. The Soviets had control over half of Europe, installing Communist governments in the nations they had "liberated" from the Nazis.

In Greece, the government faced a Communist insurgency beginning in March 1946. The United Kingdom and United States supported the government against the rebels. HMS Malta had her first taste of combat when she bombed rebel strongholds with Fairey Spearfish attack aircraft.


Designed during the closing days of WWII, the Spearfish would continue to serve into the 1950s before being replaced with the turboprop-powered Westland Wyvern.

With the help of America and Britain, the Greek government was eventually able to defeat the Communist rebels by 1949.

In China, the ruling Kuomintang and the Communist Party of China restarted their conflict after the end of the Japanese threat. From March 1946 to October 1949, the two sides fought viciously for control of China. The Soviet Union supported the Communists, while the Western Allies supported the KMT. The United States Navy supported the KMT by bombing Communist-held areas. Eventually, the war ended in a stalemate and armistice, with China divided along the Yangtze River between a Communist north and a KMT-controlled south. Despite signing an armistice, both sides continued to claim themselves the legitimate government of all of China.

In the Middle East, the state of Israel was created in May 1948 as a homeland for Jews after the Holocaust inflicted on them by Nazi Germany. Israel's Arab neighbors refused to recognize the new nation and immediately started a war to crush it. Despite long odds, Israel managed to triumph over the Arabs.

In America, the 1948 presidential election saw Harry Truman being defeated by former Minnesota governor and US Navy veteran Harold Stassen. At the age of 41, Stassen was the youngest man ever elected President. Stassen would preside over the foundation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO, on April 4, 1949, to counter the rising Soviet Union.

The first act of NATO was the creation of a new German state. After the fall of the Nazis, Germany was divided into American, British, French, and Soviet zones of occupation. The Western Allies eventually decided to merge their occupation zones into an independent state to act as a buffer against Soviet-dominated Eastern Europe. This measure was opposed by many in the United States, who did not want to see Germany rise again after Operation Götterdämmerung. Despite these reservations, the Federal Republic of Germany was formally created on May 23, 1949. The new state was subject to some restrictions from NATO. The new German navy was forbidden from operating any warships over 5,000 tons, including aircraft carriers. Also, former Nazis were forbidden from serving in the government or military unless they explicitly renounced Nazi ideology.

To counter the new Federal Republic of Germany, the Soviets created the German Democratic Republic out of their occupation zone. Despite its name, the GDR was a Communist dictatorship modeled on the Soviet Union.

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Chapter Thirty-Five

After the end of Japanese rule, the Korean Peninsula was divided between Soviet forces in the north and American forces in the south along the 38th parallel. In 1948, the two halves became independent as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and the Republic of Korea respectively.


Kim Il-sung, Marxist dictator of North Korea

Neither government was satisfied with this arrangement. On June 25, 1950, the Korean People's Army, the army of North Korea, launched an invasion of South Korea.

The North Koreans were able to make rapid progress, thanks to the unprepared state of the South Korean military.

Faced with the imminent fall of South Korea, the United States and British Imperial Commonwealth decided to intervene. On July 1, the first Anglo-American troops landed in South Korea. The US Navy and Royal Navy deployed carriers to provide air support.

Right away, the American forces in South Korea faced problems. The Truman Administration had cut defense spending to the bone and shrunk the US armed forces drastically. While the Stassen Administration had stopped the cutbacks and allowed modest growth, the US military was still smaller and less prepared for war than it was in WWII. The British forces were in the same state, as the Labour government prioritized rebuilding the economy and infrastructure over maintaining the military. For the first month of the war, the Allies suffered setback after setback as the under-trained and ill-equipped Anglo-American forces were pushed south. By August 4, the North Koreans had driven the Allies behind the Pusan Perimeter, a 140-mile defensive line around an area on the southeastern tip of the Korean peninsula.

However, the North Koreans' rapid advance ended up overstretching their forces. USAF, USN, and RN bombers hammered away at their supply lines, eroding their initial material advantage.


A North American AJ Savage bomber aboard USS Coral Sea, being prepared for a bombing mission over Korea. While designed to carry nuclear bombs, the Savage was adapted by the USN for conventional strikes in Korea.

When the North Koreans assaulted the Pusan Perimeter, the Allied forces managed to hold strong. On September 15, supported by the guns of USS Montana, American general Douglas MacArthur staged a daring landing at the port of Inchon, opening up a second front. The KPA was forced to discontinue their assault on the Pusan Perimeter.
Having come back from the brink of defeat, the Allied forces went on the offensive. By mid-October, the Allies had nearing the Yalu River on the Sino-Korean border.

The Allied advance alarmed the People's Republic of China. The government of the PRC decided to intervene on the behalf of North Korea. On October 25, the People's Liberation Army began an offensive against the Allies. By January 1951, the PLA had driven the Allies back to the 38th parallel. Meanwhile, the People's Liberation Army Air Force deployed the Soviet-developed Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 jet fighter. The MiG-15's advanced swept-wing design allowed it to make mincemeat of the slower, less maneuverable straight-wing jet fighters and propeller-driven bombers of the Allied air forces and navies.

In response to the MiG-15, the Royal Navy deployed the Hawker Sea Hawk.


A Hawker Sea Hawk prototype lands on HMS Audacious. The Sea Hawk allowed the Fleet Air Arm to fight the MiG-15 on equal terms.

The US Navy responded to the MiG-15 with the Grumman F9F. Together, these aircraft would score the majority of Allied air victories against the MiG-15.


A Grumman F9F from USS Midway flies with the less advanced F8F, which was relegated to the ground-attack role by the arrival of the F9F.

While the Allies gained the advantage in the air, the war on the ground turned into a brutal stalemate that would go on for two years. Finally, on July 27, 1953, North Korea and China agreed to an armistice with the Allies. A demilitarized zone was established between North and South Korea.

The United States had succeeded in keeping South Korea from falling to communism. However, America's assistance had a price-President Stassen demanded that South Korean dictator Syngman Rhee step aside and allow democratic elections in 1952. When Rhee refused, Stassen threatened to withdraw Allied support. Having no choice, Rhee did not stand for re-elction. The resulting election saw independent candidate Cho Bong-arm elected second president of South Korea.

[orvillethird]

Well, both Rhee and Truman are gone! The world will get much more peaceful!

[silentrunner]

Chapter Thirty-Five

In November 1952, President Stassen was re-elected, defeating Democratic challenger Estes Kefauver. Stassen's victory was rather narrow and was attributed to the American people not wanting to "change horses mid-stream" with the ongoing war in Korea.

On May 17, 1954, the United States Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that the segregation of public schools in the American South violated the Fourteenth Amendment of the US Constitution.

President Stassen fully supported the Supreme Court's decision. On May 22, he issued an public statement calling on district courts to implement desegregation "with all deliberate speed."

Stassen would end up paying dearly for his support for desegregation. On June 19, as Stassen was participating in a Juneteenth parade in Washington D.C., he was shot and killed by Byron De La Beckwith, a WWII veteran and salesman from Mississippi. Beckwith was captured two days later. He would eventually be sentenced to death and executed on August 18, 1957.

With the death of Harold Stassen, his Vice President, George Aiken, was sworn in as President. Aiken vowed to continue the fight for African-American civil rights.

On August 18, the Voting Equality Act, which banned poll taxes and literacy tests, was passed by the House of Representatives over the strident opposition of Southern Democrats. When the Act reached the Senate on October 1, Georgia Senator Richard B. Russell launched the longest filibuster ever conducted by a single senator, speaking for a record 24 hours and 21 minutes. Despite Russell's efforts, the VEA passed the Senate on October 3 by a margin of 54-46. The act was signed into law by President Aiken a week later.

The governments of the Southern states did all they could to preserve segregation. On January 30, 1955, a group of 10 African-American children were blocked from entering an all-white elementary school in Columbia, South Carolina by the Columbia police. In response, Aiken ordered the 101st Airborne deployed to Columbia to ensure's the students' safe entrance.


Three white protestors in Columbia are driven away by 101st Airborne troops.

The Columbia incident was just one of many throughout the South as state governments did their best to defy Brown v. Board of Education. Many public schools were privatized to take advantage of the loophole that exempted private schools. In addition, the Ku Klux Klan mounted a campaign of terror against Southern blacks.

Heading into the 1956 election, the Democratic Party found itself divided. The Northern progressive wing generally supported Aiken's civil rights measures while the Southern wing viciously opposed it. The issue ultimately fractured the party-the Northern faction nominated California Senator Pat Brown while the Southern faction nominated Senator Russell. The divided opposition allowed Aiken to comfortably win re-election. In a famous speech on the campaign trail in Knoxville, Aiken responded to claims that segregation was a matter of states' rights by declaring "States' rights end where human rights begin."

On June 28, 1957, President Aiken signed the Civil Rights Act into law, formally dismantling the "Jim Crow" laws that had held African-Americans back since the end of Reconstruction. The act was fiercely resisted in the South, where whites took the streets in a wave of riots that resulted in at least 140 deaths and millions of dollars in property damage in what was later known as the Summer of Hate. Nonetheless, Aiken had paved the way for the end of institutional racism in America.

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Chapter Thirty-Six

In January 1953, the Royal Navy announced it could no longer afford to keep HMS Indomitable in reserve. Plans were made to send her to the breakers.

In response, a group of former crew members and officers banded together to form the HMS Indomitable Association, in hopes of raising enough money to buy her from the Royal Navy and preserve her as a museum ship.

But it was the government of Australia that proved to be Indomitable's salvation. They had already purchased the light carrier HMS Colossus in 1948 and renamed her to HMAS Sydney. The Royal Australian Navy wanted a large carrier in addition to Sydney, but were not ready to purchase an Essex-class carrier from the United States.

On March 1, 1953, the Parliament of Australia voted to acquire Indomitable for 2 million Australian pounds. She entered Perth on July 2 to begin an extensive modernization. Her hull was lengthened and widened, her boilers were replaced, her hangar height was increased to accommodate jet aircraft, and her axial flight deck was replaced with an angled deck with steam catapults. In addition, she was fitted with the modern Type 984 radar system. The process took nearly five years and millions of pounds. Finally, on March 26, 1958-the 18th anniversary of her launch, HMAS Indomitable was commissioned into the Royal Australian Navy with Captain Galfrey G.O.Gatacre in command.


HMAS Indomitable after her modernization

[orvillethird]

I do think that racism will still be around- and not just in the south. One can hope that the Civil Rights Act will be enforced naitonwide. (One can also hope that a Voting Rights Act will do the same.)

[silentrunner]

Chapter Thirty-Seven

In March 1953, Soviet General Secretary Joseph Stalin suffered a stroke. Although Stalin survived, the stroke led him to gradually retreat from an active role in governing the Soviet Union.

In September 1953, the British and Iranian government came to a settlement over Iran's nationalization of the Anglo-Persian Oil Company. Under the agreement, oil profits would be split 50/50 between Iran and Great Britain. The agreement greatly bolstered the position of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh. In Britain, the agreement was harshly criticized by the Conservative opposition.

In the 1955 general election, the Labour Party managed to hold on to their majority in Parliament. Clement Attlee, after a decade as Prime Minister, stepped aside in favor of Chancellor of the Exchequer Hugh Gaitskell.

In July 1956, Egyptian dictator Gamal Abdel Nasser seized control of the Suez Canal. The move drew protests from Britain and France, who depended on the Canal for commerce. Prime Minister Gaitskell attempted to solve the crisis diplomatically, suggesting that the canal be turned over to United Nations control. Gaitskell's overtures were rebuffed by Nasser, and pressure for military action grew in Britain.

Finally, after securing an agreement of neutrality from US president Aiken-who in any case was preoccupied with domestic events-Gaitskell agreed to military action. On November 1, Britain, France, and Israel launched Operation Musketeer. HMS Audacious, HMS Malta and HMS Africa, all fresh out of extensive modernization, were deployed to the eastern Mediterranean and launched airstrikes against Egyptian military and industrial targets with Westland Wyvern attack aircraft. The Wyverns were backed up by the Supermarine Scimitar fighter.


A Westland Wyvern prepares for takeoff from HMS Audacious.


A Supermarine Scimitar lands on HMS Africa after returning from a combat mission.


While the war raged in the air, British, French, and Israeli forces moved into the Canal area. By Christmas, the Anglo-French forces had re-established control over the canal. A desperate Nasser appealed to the Soviet Union for help, but Stalin-or more accurately, the bureaucrats governing in his name, demurred, wary of Nasser due to his past refusal to truly commit to the Warsaw Pact.

Finally, on New Year's Day 1957, the Egyptian government agreed to the terms originally laid out by Gaitskell. The Suez Canal was surrendered to control of the United Nations.

The victory in the Suez War was a great political victory for Gaitskell and the Labour Party, showing that they were committed to maintaining Britain's military strength.

[silentrunner]

Chapter Thirty-Eight

On July 20, 1957, Joseph Stalin died of congestive heart failure. The Politburo selected Mikhail Suslov to replace him as General Secretary. Suslov was well-known for his hardline adherence to communist ideology. He demonstrated this the following August, when Romania attempted to move out of the Soviet Union's orbit. The Soviet army ruthlessly crushed Romania's bid for freedom, drawing widespread condemnation from the West.

On September 8, Ghana became an independent dominion in the British Imperial Commonwealth. Sierra Leone would follow on October 19, followed by Nigeria on January 1, 1958.

On November 6, the Fairey Rotodyne made its first flight. Combining the vertical takeoff and landing and hovering capabilities with the cruising performance of a turboprop aircraft, the Rotodyne was intended for the civilian market, but the noise generated by the rotor tip-jets deterred civilian buyers. Nonetheless, the Fleet Air Arm expressed interest in the Rotodyne as an ASW and transport aircraft. The first Royal Navy Rotodynes entered service in February 1959 as carrier onboard delivery aircraft. The ASW version would follow six months later.


While unsuccessful in the civilian market, the Fairey Rotodyne would have a long and fruitful career in the Royal Navy.

[silentrunner]

Chapter Thirty-Nine

On October 8, 1959, the citizens of the United Kingdom went to the polls to elect a new government. After 14 years in power, the Labour Party had begun to wear out its welcome and the Conservatives managed to secure a majority, with Rab Butler becoming Prime Minister. Despite the hopes of many on the right, Butler chose not to mess with the welfare state set up by Labour.

In 1960, America prepared to elect a new president. Incumbent president Aiken was barred from seeking a third term by the 22nd Amendment. To succeed him, the Republicans chose Michigan Congressman Gerald R. Ford. The Democrats chose former California governor James Roosevelt, son of FDR. In response to the nomination of another liberal, the Southern conservative wing of the Democrats broke off to form their own party, the American Values Party. The new party nominated Senator Strom Thurmond as its candidate.

While Roosevelt campaigned on his family name and his accomplishments as governor of California, Ford campaigned on his war service as a sailor in the US Navy and Thurmond campaigned on rolling back civil rights legislation. Come Election Day, Roosevelt was able to triumph over Ford and Thurmond to become the 36th President of the United States.