Board Thread:Fun and Games/@comment-39133133-20191108204817/@comment-35614398-20191109203342

My idea of a quick timeline:

1989, the Soviet Union is dying, thanks to the actions of one Michael Gorbachev. Control over Europe has collapsed, and the fate of the USSR seems set in stone.

August 19th, Gorbachev is overthrown by the Soviet “gang of eight”, a group of high-ranking communist hardliners. Lead by Vladimir Kryuchkov, this new state committee renounces Gorbachev’s policies, and tries to save the Union.

Here is the point of divergence.

Somehow, the gang of eight stays in power, instead of just being deposed. I dunno, maybe Boris Yeltsin died as a baby or something. For whatever reason, Vladimir Kryuchkov becomes new Soviet premier, and takes up a hardline policy against Eastern Europe. Throughout the 1990s he restores the dying empire, and by Y2K the Soviet Union is back in its feet, somehow.

Next point of divergence:

The September 11th attacks. This time, the attacks are even more devastating than they already were, with a successful hit on the White House killing the President (I know this probably couldn’t have happened, but roll with it). In the aftermath of this tragedy, the United States is headless, and begins a process of downward spiral which culminates eventually in a short civil war, and then its dissolution.

In Europe, meanwhile, a surge in “New Century Communism” sweeps Western Europe, and quickly the Iron Curtain expands, until all of mainland Europe falls under a red tide. A host of governments in exile and refugees populate London’s embassies, and the Soviet Union has never been more powerful.

Does this seem reasonable?