Thread by @YNot_1989

#WhatIf the "Business Plot" succeeded in overthrowing FDR in 1933? There probably would have been an anti-capitalist Revolution in the US a few years later, and ironically Smedley Butler probably would have been one of its leaders. #alternatehistory (1)

Blah blah, second American civil war 1933-1938, the United Socialist States of America is established, its a dictatorship, because that's what communism always slides into, heard it all before. (2)

Fast forward to the cold war with two communist blocs (cue the comparisons to 1984). The US would still win, and probably would have at best a Chinese-style economic/political system in the 2020s, and would still be the world's strongest economy and most powerful nation. (3)

Why? Because while writers LOVE historical parallelism with the Soviet Union when writing about a communist USA, there's no getting around the fact that the geographic advantages of the US FAR exceed the Soviet Union. (4)

Russia is just a crappy place to try govern. Rivers flow to the arctic, and back up with ice dams every year, you have horrifying seasonal flooding that turns the ground to mud then back to ice, which means roads are a pipe dream in much of the country. It deeply sucks. (5)

Compare that to the US. Temperate climate for much of its territory, largest inland and intercoastal waterway system on the planet with the former overlaying the biggest breadbasket anywhere. Meaning HUGE food and manufacturing surpluses that are easy to move. (6)

So the Soviet Union, probably still gone in 1991 in this TL, and the USSA, a repressive dictatorship run by the military (where the Soviets were run by the Intelligence Services)... but its not going anywhere. (7)

Now, Tankies are probably drooling over this TL, but know that the US would still be an Empire, and would still meddle in the affairs of Latin America to keep the Soviets out.

Just ask the Chinese how well Marxism unites nations with disparate strategic interests. (8)

One possible change that would be interesting is that IF Allende takes power, even if he's overthrown, the USSA would might taken an interest in Project Cybersyn. Imagine the 1980s with an unholy union of Yuppies and Communists. (9) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_C…

The 1990s would see these party members supplant the octogenarian leaders from the Revolution, and paint their new system as liberalizing the government, but really this would be the trappings of neoliberalism wrapped up in a red flag. (10)

Point is: I want to read a book or see a series of a modern, communist America that doesn't just fall into, "What if America was the Soviet Union," have some fun with just how weird and farcical the USSA would be. (11)

@threadreaderapp unroll