Friday, February 26, 2010

The Drowned Baby Timeline

As an aid to those who may be unfamiliar with the Drowned Baby Timeline, I present a brief synopsis and a list of blog posts.

The Point-of-Departure, which is what alternate history buffs call the event that changes the alternate timeline from our own history, occurs on 20 April 1889, when a newly-born Adolf Hitler is accidentally drowned. With no Hitler to unite Germany's radical right during the Great Depression, it remains fragmented. Instead of being converted into a legal dictatorship, the Weimar Republic falls to a right-wing coup led by Ernst Röhm in October 1932. With his popularity dropping, Röhm launches an invasion of Poland in May 1936. The Poles are able to halt Röhm's poorly-equipped Brown Army, and by November 1936 the two armies are stalemated.



GERMANY AND POLAND - NOVEMBER 1936
(Showing the furthest extent of the German advance.)

The stalemate ends on Christmas Day 1936 with a Polish offensive. The Brown Army is driven back, and in June 1937 Germany is defeated by the Poles and their British and French allies.



OCCUPIED GERMANY - 1937
(Postwar Germany, showing the British, French, and Polish zones of occupation)

Poland annexes eastern Germany, and by 1940 Poland has been transformed into a federal republic, with half a dozen Devolved Areas, or devos, established among the country's various ethnic minorities.



POLISH COMMONWEALTH - 1940
(The Polish Commonwealth, following the establishment of the first six devos at the end of 1940)

A Soviet-backed coup attempt in Lithuania in October 1944 leads to war between the USSR and Poland. Poland is joined by several other Eastern European states, and eventually by Japan, and for six months the Red Army retreats across the Byelorussian and Ukrainian SSRs. Both sides agree to an armistice in March 1945, with the USSR ultimately ceding the Byelorussian and Ukrainian SSRs to the Poles, and the Karelian ASSR and the Kola Peninsula to the Finns. The Japanese, having lost Manchuria to the Soviets, do not take part in the armistice, and war between the USSR and the Japanese Empire continues.



POLISH COMMONWEALTH FROM 1945
(Lithuania independent 1945 - 1947)

As the newly-established Ukrainian Devo is integrated into the Polish Commonwealth, and the damage of war is repaired, the multi-ethnic country begins to experience a cultural renaissance, exemplified by the rise of a fast-paced mix of Jewish klezmer music and American jazz known as klezmerol. Meanwhile, an attempt by Benito Mussolini to use his newly-acquired atomic bomb to gain control over Yugoslavia is thwarted by the equally-new atomic arsenals of Great Britain, France, and Poland, leading to the creation of the League of Nations Atomic Control Commission . . .

Blog posts:

1. Drowned Baby Timeline, part 1 (20 April 1889 - 30 June 1937)
2. Passing the Torch (22 September 1937)
3. 1939: Where Are They Now? (1 September 1939)
4. The Armored Dream (1 September 1939)
5. St. Elsewhere (17 March 1921 - 1 September 1941)
6. Eagle and Chrysanthemum (25 May 1940)
7. Going Home (19 January 1940)
8. Where Do We Go From Here? (5 February 1940)
8A. The Fire Next Time (6 February 1940)
9. Are We Not Poles? We Are Devo (31 May 1940)
10. In Between (20 June 1940)
8B. Laugh While You Can (27 July 1940)
8C. Marriage of Inconvenience (21 October 1941)
8D. The Guide (13 May 1942)
11. Love and Rockets (8 - 10 June 1943)
12A. Białystok - Reel One (22 April 1944)
12B. Białystok - Reel Two (23 April 1944)
12C. Białystok - Reel Three (23 April 1944)
13. Octopus's Garden (17 July 1944)
14. The Wild Wild East (12 August 1944)
15. The Speer Squad (6 October 1944)
16. Of Course You Know This Means War (7 - 8 October 1944)
16A. The Helsinki Syndrome by Jussi Jalonen (9 October 1944)
16B. Tora! Tora! Tora! by Jussi Jalonen (10 October 1944)
17. Counterattack (22 October 1944)
18. I'll Say They Are! (3 March 1945)
19. The Darkness and the Light (16 March 1945)
19A. Testvér a Testvérért by Jussi Jalonen (16 March 1945)
20. 1945: Where Are They Now? (7 May 1945)
21. A Post About Nothing (7 - 25 June 1945)
22. Meet the Vontzim (17 July 1945)
23. Show and Tell (16 August 1945)
24. Equal and Opposite (4 - 5 September 1945)
25. Enemies of the People (28 May 1945)
26. Four-Step Program (17 November 1945)
22A. Ticket to Ride (22 January 1946)
27. Sejm As It Ever Was (8 February 1946)
28. Everyone Avoids Me Like a Cyclone Ranger (18 March 1946)
29. Deutchland Unter Alles (20 April 1946)
30. Ruling Coalition (5 May 1946)
31. And the Banned Played On (30 May 1946)
32. The Ideal Man (4 June 1946)
33. And We're Living Here in Speerburg (11 June 1946)
33 1/3. You Spin Me Right Round (23 June 1946)
34. Anniversary (30 June 1946)
35. Money Changes Everything (10 July 1946)
36. Meet the New Boss (18 July 1946)
37. Bad to the Bône (24 August 1946)
37A. Indochina (1937 - 1947)
38. The Artist (9 September 1946)
39. As Sweet As Any Harmony (18 September 1946)
40. Every Breath You Take (4 November 1946)
41. The Decider (19 March 1947)
42. Priest and a Rabbi Walk into a Bar . . . (6 May 1947)
43. Book Review - The Voyage of Eärendil (2 June 1947)
44A. The Long Auf Wiederseh'n - Book One (4 - 5 September 1947)
44B. The Long Auf Wiederseh'n - Book Two (6 September 1947)
44C. The Long Auf Wiederseh'n - Book Three (7 September 1947)
45. Brain Drain (5 March 1948)
46A. Three Days in October - Prologue (4 October 1949)
46B. Three Days in October - Ultimatum (14 October 1949)
46C. Three Days in October - Vigil (15 October 1949)
46D. Three Days in October - Proposition (16 October 1949)
46E. Three Days in October - Epilogue (24 October 1949)
DBTL Extra: Kelly, Jack, and Eddie visit Białystok by Dan McDonald (8 March 1950)
47: Like Shattered Jewels (16 September 1950)
α: Greeks Bearing Gifts by Demetrios Rammos (5 March 1933 - 1 June 1936)
A Drowned Baby Christmas (25 December 1936)
48: With Enemies Like These (27 May 1936)
49: Operation Sea Lion (12 April 1937)
50A: Where Beer Does Flow and Men Chunder (13 May 1936)
50B: Who Can It Be Now? (26 April 1937)
51A: City of Shadows - Interview (8 June 1937)
51B: City of Shadows - Intervention (10 June 1937)
51C: City of Shadows - Interest (18 June 1937)
51D: City of Shadows - Interlude (24 June 1937)
51E. City of Shadows - Interruption (28 - 30 June 1937)
52. Wedge (27 June 1941)
53. Salt & Pepper (30 June 1941)
54. A Man, a Plan, a Canal (9 May 1944)
55. Palestine (8 October 1932 - 1 May 1945)
56. I Feel Safest Of All (16 April 1945)
57. Some Men You Just Can't Reach (17 January 1951)
58. The Carrot and the Stick (28 January 1951)
59. The Chips Stay Up (17 February 1951)
60. The Double Helix (18 January 1952)
61. Homeward Bound (2 March 1953)
62. Road Trip (3 March 1953)
63. My Hometown (4 March 1953)
64. Everybody Wang Ch'ung Tonight (9 March 1954)
65. State of Emergency (22 June 1954)
66. The Party's Over (1 July 1954)
67. And I Think It's Gonna Be a Long Long Time (8 August 1955)
68. We Shall Overcome (17 May 1956)
69. The Ground Floor (10 January 1942)
70. Bojowy! (5 December 1961)
71. Conflict of Interest (22 November 1963)
72A. The Six Million Złoty Man, Act I (16 September 1966)
72B. The Six Million Złoty Man, Act II (16 September 1966)
72C. The Six Million Złoty Man, Act III (16 September 1966)
72D. The Six Million Złoty Man, Act IV (17 September 1966)
73. Today's Tom Sawyer (24 - 25 June 1968)
74. Enter the Dragon (10 July 1972)
75. Respect (14 September 1974)
76. Must Give Us Pause (17 February 1975)
77. The Little Finish (21 January 2001)
Afterword: Jeepers Creepers, Where'd You Get That Commonwealth?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

This is one of my favorite AH timelines and I am glad that you are collecting it in one place.