by James Philip
Consider the example of Adolf Hitler.
If Corporal Adolf Hitler had died in a gas attack on the Ypres salient in Belgium on 14th October 1918 – as he might well have died that day – it is possible that there would have been no Holocaust, no Nazi Party, and no death camps.
Notwithstanding, with or without Hitler it is also possible, more likely probable, that there would have been a second general European War two or three decades later, albeit not the one we actually had. Hitler’s war aims in 1939 were strikingly similar to the Kaiser’s in 1914, unsurprisingly because most of what we regard as being his war aims were in fact drafted by members of exactly the same military caste which had been so keen on war in 1914, and had been so embittered by Germany’s crushing defeat in 1918. While I readily concede that no senior officer of the German General Staff went so far as to write a book extolling the necessity for lebensraum – or ‘living space in the East’ – Hitler was by no means the only man in Germany in the 1920s and 1930s who publicly and unashamedly yearned to expand the Pax Germanica, the German Peace, into the Baltic States, Poland, White Russian and the Ukraine. Moreover, it was not Adolf Hitler who invented the ‘myth of the betrayal of Versailles’. That invention was the convenient fig leaf behind which the High Command of the vanquished German General Staff hid behind – all the better to gloss over its numerous egregious military and political war time blunders - to undermine and discredit the democratic legitimacy of the post-war Weimar Republic which to a man, its members detested.
Adolf Hitler was an undeniably horrible, bad, psychopathic despot who was very good at public speaking and without him German history between the World Wars would have been different in character but not necessarily in outcome. Basically, there is no way in which we can actually know that Corporal Hitler’s demise in the 14th October 1918 gas attack would have prevented World War II; or with or without the little corporal’s survival, that another even more catastrophic and tragic war was, sooner or later, inevitable.
I do not pretend to know what would have happened if the USA and the USSR had gone to war over Cuba in October 1962. One imagines this scenario has been the object of countless staff college war games in America and elsewhere in the intervening fifty-three years; I suspect – with a high level of confidence - that few of those war games would have played out the way the participants expected, and that no two games would have resolved themselves in exactly the same way as any other. That is the beauty and the fascination of historical counterfactuals, or as those of us who make no pretence at being emeritus professors of history say, alternative history.
Nobody can claim ‘this is the way it would have been’ after the Cuban Missiles Crisis ‘went wrong’. This author only speculates that the Timeline 10/27/62 Series reflects one of the many ways ‘things might have gone’ in the aftermath of Armageddon.
The only thing one can be reasonably confident about is that if the Cuban Missiles Crisis had turned into a shooting war the World in which we live today would, probably, not be the one with which we are familiar.
A work of fiction is a journey of imagination. I hope it does not sound corny but I am genuinely a little humbled by the number of people who have already bought into what I am trying to do with Timeline 10/27/62.
Like any author, this author would prefer everybody to enjoy his books – if I disappoint, I am truly sorry – but either way, thank you for reading and helping to keep the printed word alive. I really do believe that civilization depends on people like you.
Other Books by James Philip
The Timeline 10/27/62 World
The Timeline 10/27/62 - Main Series
Book 1: Operation Anadyr
Book 2: Love is Strange
Book 3: The Pillars of Hercules
Book 4: Red Dawn
Book 5: The Burning Time
Book 6: Tales of Brave Ulysses
Book 7: A Line in the Sand
Book 8: The Mountains of the Moon
Book 9: All Along the Watchtower
(Available 1st June 2017)
Book 10: Crow on the Cradle
(Available 27th October 2017)
Timeline 10/27/62 - USA
Book 1: Aftermath
Book 2: California Dreaming
Book 3: The Great Society
Book 4: Ask Not of Your Country
Book 5: The American Dream
(Available 27th October 2017)
Timeline 10/27/62 – Australia
Book 1: Cricket on the Beach
(Available 20th December 2017)
Book 2: Operation Manna
(Available 20th December 2017)
Other Series and Novels
The Guy Winter Mysteries
Prologue: Winter’s Pearl
Book 1: Winter’s War
Book 2: Winter’s Revenge
Book 3: Winter’s Exile
Book 4: Winter’s Return
Book 5: Winter’s Spy
(Available 31st January 2017)
The Bomber War Series
Book 1: Until the Night
Book 2: The Painter
(Available 31st March 2017)
Book 3: The Cloud Walkers
(Available 31st March 2017)
Until the Night Series
Part 1: Main Force Country – September 1943
Part 2: The Road to Berlin – October 1943
Part 3: The Big City – November 1943
Part 4: When Winter Comes – December 1943
Part 5: After Midnight – January 1944
The Harry Waters Series
Book 1: Islands of No Return
Book 2: Heroes
Book 3: Brothers in Arms
The Frankie Ransom Series
Book 1: A Ransom for Two Roses
Book 2: The Plains of Waterloo
Book 3: The Nantucket Sleighride
The Strangers Bureau Series
Book 1: Interlopers
Book 2: Pictures of Lily
Audio Books of the following Titles
are available (or are in production) now
Aftermath
A Ransom for Two Roses
California Dreaming
Heroes
Islands of No Return
Love is Strange
Main Force Country
Operation Anadyr
The Pillars of Hercules
The Plains of Waterloo
Winter’s Pearl
Winter’s War
* * *
Details of all James Philip’s published books and forthcoming publications
can be found on his website www.jamesphilip.co.uk
* * *
Cover artwork concepts by James Philip
Graphic Design by Beastleigh Web Design
