Timeline (The Hammer of America)

Link to main page

1920's

1921

• August 29: FDR dies while vacationing at Campobello Island, New Brunswick. The funeral is held 2 weeks later. Crowds of people show up to honor the deceased Assistant Secretary of the Navy.

1928

• November 6: Albert Ottinger is elected Governor of New York on an anti-Tammany Hall platform. He is a fairly good governor, and will be reelected for a second term in a close race.(ATL)

1929

• October 24-29: The U.S. stock market crashes, ushering in the Great Depression.

1930's

1932

• March 7: The Ford River Rogue strike is broken when police fire on 3000 unemployed auto workers. 25 people are killed.
• November 6: The Presidential election: Al Smith crushs Herbert Hoover in the election. He is seen as optimistic, ready to help, and most importantly, he is not Herbert Hoover.

1933

• March 4: Al Smith is inaugurated as president of the United States. In his inauguration speech, he says that "The old ways of Laissez-faire are broken. Government must not stand by while her people suffer. Only the supreme power of the land can ensure that this tragedy does not happen again."
• Al Smith launches what he calls the Economic Restoration Initiative. This includes a number of reforms aimed at restoring the economy to 20's levels.

1934

• August 2: Hitler becomes Führer of Germany
• Despite some successes with Smith's Economic Restoration Initiative, the economy is still tanking. The Dow Jones is below 20 points and slowly dropping.
• Al Smith, seeing the quick recovery of Germany from the effects of their depression, begins to imitate some of their methods in an attempt to solve the near critical economic crisis in the United States. This provokes cries of dissent in Congress, but the Democrats, desperate for any way to solve the crisis, pass the proposed bills.

1935

• January 5: The economy is slowly improving, but it is evident to everyone that things are not going to get better soon, and these policies will continue for a while.
• January 12: The arrest of a prominent news editor, who was criticizing the government policies as that of a dictatorship, not a democracy, sparkes uprising across the United States against the government. The guerrillas, led by left wing socialists, declare revolution against the dictatorship of the United States government. The army begins mobilizing in response. The Second American Civil War has begun.
• January 17: The Soviet Union voices support for the guerrillas, and begins secretly shipping weapons and sending volunteers to them.
• January 18: Germany and Italy announce support for the United States government and begins negotiations over the deployment of German and Italian armed forces to the U.S. so they can gain combat experience.
• January 20: Canada, worried about the possibility of a fascist United States on it's border, begins sneaking weapons over the border to the guerrillas.
• February 15: Douglas MacArthur leads a militarist coup d'etat of the United States government and declares martial law.
• February 21: A countercoup, led by democratic forces still loyal to Al Smith, fails horrendously. Al Smith is forced to seek political asylum in Canada.
• March 3: Albert Einstein, who had been deemed a person of national interest and forcibly recruited by the government to help develop atomic weapons based off of his theories, is kidnapped by guerrilla forces and snuck over the border into Mexico. He will then take a boat over to Canada, where he will continue his work in hopes of overthrowing the fascist government of the U.S.
• March 20: German and Italian divisions are deployed in the U.S. to fight the guerrilla forces.
• July 23: The Battle of Norfork occurs, resulting in the destruction of the naval yard, the shattering of the U.S. First Army, and the seizure of some destroyers and a battleship by the guerrilla forces.
• July 25: George S. Patton is killed in by a roadside bomb on his way back to Washingon D.C. after the defeat at Norfork.
• November 3: The Unified Socialist Confederation of America declares it's independence from the United States of America. The capital is set up in Detroit, and Earl Browder is made the internum leader. A congressional committee meets in Chicago to write up a constitution for the new country.
• November 6: The majority of Alaska is occupied by the Soviet Union, who are trying to secure the oil fields there. The rest is occupied by Canada.
• November 8: Philippine forces overwhelm the reduced garrison on the islands, and declare their independence from the United States. They then begin treaty negotiations with England and Australia to secure their independence from the United States.
• November 23: MacArthur moves the capital of the United States to Denver, for security reasons. They refuse to diplomatically recognize the USCA, hoping to force them to collapse from an economic embargo. Unfortunately, their plan is sabotaged by the Canadians, who give preferred trader status to the USCA and treat them as the true government of the United States.
• December 12: The Chicago Constitution is signed by all the states in the USCA, setting up the USCA as a democratic republic, with elections held every 4 years. It is very much like the democratic U.S. constitution.

1936

• February 26: An group of dissatisfied army officers manages to stage a coup of the Japanese government. They are determined to establish a great empire for Japan, whether by diplomacy, or by force.
• March 5: An attempted coup of the Spanish Second Republic by militarist factions fails. The Spanish Civil war begins, with Germany, Italy, and the U.S.A siding with the militarists, while the Soviet Union and the U.S.C.A support the democratic government.
• March 7: Germany reoccupies the Rhineland. The French and British start to take notice of Hitler's aggressive attitude, and begin preparing their respective countries for war.
• July 15: James P. Cannon is elected President of the U.S.C.A.
• November 26: the Anti-Cominterm Pact is signed between Germany, Japan, and the U.S.A.

1937

• February 12: A workers strike in the USA is brutally crushed by federal troops under Norman Cota.
• May 28: Neville Chamberlaine becomes Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.He promises to safeguard England against all threats.
• June 25: The Qingdao Bay Incident occurs. This was a confrontation between a Japanese and Chinese fleet, which escalated into a full scale battle that the Japanese handsomely won. The Japanses government uses this as an excuse to declare war on China, marking the beginning of the Sino-Japanese War.
• August 12: Italy joins the Anti-Cominterm Pact.
• Septmeber 23: Brazilian president Getulio Vargas pronounces himself dictator of Brazil.
• November 12: The U.K. and France, alarmed by the spread of fascim throughout the world, meet to determine a common stance on how to deal with the Fascist states.
• November 15: Albert Lebrun gives his "Building Storm" speech, saying that the rise of Fascism will bring upon the world a storm that the world has never before seen, dwarfing that of even the First World War. He also says that France will not be caught offguard, and begins a program of militarization.
• November 20: the Alliance of Democratic Nations is formed, with the initial members being the United Kingdom, Canada, France, and Poland.

1938

• March 12: Germany annexes Austria, much to th dismay of the new Democratic Alliance.
• June 19: The USCA and the Soviet Union sign the Archangel Pact. This is a mutual alliance between the two of them, but establishes the independence of the American Socialists from the Cominterm.
• September 15-30: The Munich conference begins between Germany, England, and France. In the end, despite the disagreement of France, the Munich agreement is concluded between Germany and Czechoslovakia, giving the Sudetenland to Germany.
• November 29: Czechoslovakia, hoping to protect the remnants of this once proud nation, signs a defensive alliance with the Soviet Union, since the Czechs feel betrayed by the Alliance.

1939

• April 7: Italy occupies Albania, in an attempt to equal the successes of Hitler.
• May 13: The Spanish Second Republic is finally crushed by the militarist faction, led by one Francisco Franco. This ends the Spanish Civil war. The French start to panic, as they are ringed in by fascist states.
• July 8: Hitler pressures Franco to join the Anti-Comintern Pact, but Franco refuses.
• July 21-30: Hitler uses the excuse of persecution of German citizens to launch an invasion of Denmark. The Danish army resists, but is defeated quickly by the Germans.
• August 2: France declares an economic embargo against Germany, and urges the other members of the Alliance to do otherwise.
• August 20: Hitler gives the go ahead to begin preparation for Operation Switchblade, which would involve taking out Poland, and then crashing through the Maginot line at numerous points.
• August 25: Hitler is convinced by Kleist to alter Operation Switchblade. This alteration is like the OTL Manstein Plan, in which Germany goes through BeNeLux, and then strikes for the coast. The D-Day is September 12.
• September 1: 11 days before the beginning of Operation Switchblade, Hitler announces a non-aggression pact ha been signed between Germany and the U.S.S.R. Secretly, the treaty also covers the division of Poland and the Baltic States.
• September 12: Using the excuse of a Polish attack on a German railway station, Germany declares war on Poland. The U.K., and France declare war on Germany. The Second World War has begun.

World War 2 Era

• September 13 - 30: The Polish Army is crushed in a series of battles against the better equipped German Army, but the country is saved by a timely offensive by France through the Maginot Line, which is successful in breaking through to the Rhineland.