Possibly the most violent dictator of all time, Joe Dowling instigated the World War in North America, and along with King Charles XI and Benito Mussolini, caused the deaths of more than a hundred million people. He also commited the greatest act of genocide in history, and was ultimately responsible for the near destruction of the CSA.
Early Life[]
Born on the 10th of July, 1889, Joe Dowling was the son of a mining family in Virginia, and what the many upper class Confederates saw as the 'white trash', little better than blacks. Both his parents died before his 18th birthday, and he joined the Confederate Army in 1910. By the time of the Great War, he was already a seargent in the 1st Richmond Infantry.
The Great War[]
Joe Dowling was stationed on the Maryland front throughout most of the War, fighting with distinction during the fall of Washington, Baltimore, and the battle of the Delaware. From this high water mark, however, the CSA's gains were slowly hammered down, while in Tennesse, General Custer's 1st Army crept through Kentucky and towards Nashville. There is evidence that Dowling formed a relationship with a young black woman during this time, but her name is unknown. When the blacks rebelled, however, Dowling was sent into Georgia to fight them. Although the rebellion was crushed, he returned to Virginia, to find that his fiance had been murdered by his regimental commander, a Native American. This, coupled with the slow and agonizing defeat of the CSA by the US and its allies, explain Dowling's later actions. By the start of 1919, the war was turning very badly against the CSA. Russia had left the war in Europe, the Irish Rebellion was in tatters, Italy was wavering, and France had been forced out of Cologne. Both Quebec and the CSA were collapsing. The CSA's surrender on July 10th, followed two weeks later by the fall of Montreal and the surrender of France and Quebec, brought the Great War to an end.
Founding the Sons of the South[]
In the aftermath of the war, Dowling began to get involved in the extremist politics which dogged the CSA after 1919, eventually joinin the Sons of the South. By 1920, he was the head of propaganda in the group and managed to oust Cordell Hull, the founder of the party in the same year. The Sons of the South, ran for the presidency in the elections of 1921, but were soundly defeated by the Radical Liberals and the more entrenched Whig Party, but not by a large margin. The focus of the party then switched to the 1923 and 1925 mid-terms, where the party hoped to gain more votes and then move against the Whigs.
A setback[]
However, in the summer of 1923, the party suffered a major setback, when a deranged Sons of the South member shot the President of the CSA. Almost immediately, the party crumpled in the polls, losing heavily at the 1923 and 1925 midterms. Most of the 1920s were a dark time for the Sons of the South, as it seemed like the CSA would be able to recover from the war. However, in 1928, the stock markets crashed, catapulting Mussolini to power in Italy and Charles Maurras to power in France. By 1930, it was clear that Dowling was the coming man.
Seizing power[]
Dowling, unlike Mussolini or Maurras, did not try and seize by force, although he used it very regularly against his opponents. By 1931, the Sons of the South dominated the Congress, and in 1933, Dowling was easily elected the first non-Whig president of the Confederate States of America. Almost immediately, he began crushing anyone with the capacity to oppose him, namely the opposing parties and the Supreme Court, the later of which he forced into an extremely skillful power struggle which alienated it from the people. He also began aggressive moves against Louisiana, Aztlan Texas, and Florida, which he claimed were part of the CSA. The CSA reinforced its alliance with France, Italy, and Japan, as well as Mexico, where the growing Confederate army aided the Emperor in the defeat of pro-communist rebels. However, Russia under Tsar Aleksei refused to have anything to do with the CSA.
The Road to War[]
By 1938, Anglo-French relations were sinking fast, and it was obvious that another war was just around the corner. Dowling responded by bullying Seqouyah into giving the CSA large amounts of oil for free, while building up the Confederate submarine force. With the United States uninterested in starting another war, while Austria and Turkey were lethargic and downright hostile to Germany and Britain at best, France demanded Belgium and Alasce-Lorraine in early July 1939. When this was refused, France invaded Germany again in August 1939, with Italy and the CSA declaring war a few days later.
The World War (1939 to 1942)[]
The CSA had been preparing for war for years, and had already built up a large army, with almost immediately invaded Texas, Louisianna and Florida. In Florida, the Confederate troops were welcomed as liberators, while in Texas and Louisianna, the CSA was so forceful that there was virtually no resistance in the early months of the occupation. Aztlan was next, after which Mexico and Deseret declared war on California and Oregon again. At sea, the CSA seized the Bahamas, Jamaica and Haiti, while a joint Confederate-French strike force captured Bermuda, effectively cutting the Allies in half. The collapse of Germany in 1940 seemed to make the CSA and France masters of North America and Europe, respectively, but Britain refused to surrender and launched campaigns against France's Spanish ally in Iberia and Africa.
On May 15th 1941, France invaded Russia, while Dowling demanded Kentucky and North Virginia, with threats of force if the request was not granted. The United States, under Alf Landon, flatly refused and mobilized, anticipating a Confederate attack. They did not have to wait long: on June 21st, 1941, Dowling ordered Operations Vlad and Blackbeard to begin. The first operation, Vlad, was aimed through Ohio and Kentucky, which by October, had split the USA in half. Blackbeard, was a strike through North Virginia towards Washington. The attack went well beyond Dowling's wildest dreams, cutting through the US lines easily, nearly reaching Philadelphia before it ran out of steam. However, the USA refused to surrender, and ran home this point with a counterattack through Arkansas. However, the attack bogged down, and in early 1942, Confederate troops captured San Diego on the Pacific. At the same time, Seqouyah refused to sell oil to the Confederates, and was invaded. This brough the Five Tribes into the war on the Allies side, with the Confederates reaching southern Kansas, before slowly being driven back.
Needing to knock the United States out of the war, the CSA launched a second major offensive, this time confined to the midwest in the summer of 1942. The main aim of the attack was to seize Chicago. At first, the attack went very well, with most of Indiana being overrun in a few weeks, but slowly, the stubborn US resistance began to mount. The Army of Kentucky reached Chicago early in September, uleashing a bombardment that reduced much of it to ruins. However, the CSA could not take Chicago, and was reduced to house-to-house fighting for unclear gains. This forced the CSA to thin its lines outside the city and fill them with Mexicans. The error cost the Confederates dearly, when a counter-attack by General Eisenhower slashed the Confederate lines south of the city and put the Army of Kentucky in a pocket. Despite several attempts to break in and out, the Confederates remained trapped in Chicago, and were forced to surrender in early 1943, at roughly the same time as the French at Volgograd.
The World War (1942 to 1946)[]
Following their defeat at Chicago, the Confederates were driven back into Ohio. A US salient formed around Toledo, which was the target of a Confederate counter-attack (the battle of the Toledo salient) in July, which failed. With this defeat, the USA was able to drive the Confederates from Ohio, Maryland, and Kentucky. By the end of the year, US troops were standing on the Cumberland and on Roanoake. The next year brought little in the way of relief, with the Confederates being forced out of California and back to the Red River in Sequoyah. Bermuda was recaptured in May 1944, while the USA tore through Tennesse, capturing Atlanta and Chattanooga, after two of the bloodiest battles of the war, rivaled only by the Second Battle of the Nations near Leipzig, in Europe. With the CSA collapsing on the ground, Dowling turned to the development of nuclear weapons to save the CSA, just as France was doing.
As 1945 wore on, the chance of a Confederate victory slimmed even further, with Anglo-Free German landings in Florida resulting in the loss of Florida and Georgia. The Five Tribes, backed by the Republic of Oregon, fought their way to the sea in Texas, splitting the CSA off from its forces in Aztlan and Mexico. Richmond fell in December 1945, along with most of the Carolinas. In the spring of 1946, the CSA detonated a nuclear bomb in Baltimore, causing extensive damage to the city, but failing to knock the USA out. In response, the USA destroyed Charleston and Jackson with nuclear bombs. Dowling attempted to escape to Mexico, but his plane was shot down by British troops over southern Alabama, and he was killed. With his death, James Huston ascended to the presidency, and surrendered to the United Staes and Britain, ending the World War.