by Scott Palter
Dewey, Thomas (1902-1971): Very able attorney and administrator. No charisma. He was derisively named ‘the little man on the wedding cake’ during his losing Presidential run in 1948. Was the front man for Eisenhower’s successful theft of the 1952 Republican nomination from Taft. Dewey continued to be a behind-the-scenes organizer of the old money and Wall Street eastern progressive wing of the Republican party under Nelson Rockefeller. Dewey’s initial fame came as a crusading district attorney in Manhattan fighting organized crime. He was a complete weasel and his most successful case, the conviction of Lucky Luciano, was based on perjured testimony and doctored evidence. His other big cases were cleaner but none was clean. He was an end-justifies-the-means type, and felt that the decent people owed neither due process nor any real justice to those he regarded as the enemies of society.
Dietl, Eduard (1890–1944): WW1 veteran. Freikorps veteran. Early Nazi. Hero of Narvik in 1940 campaign. In OTL, led 20th Mountain Army in the Arctic against the Soviets. Died in an air crash, 1944. Capable divisional commander. His army command was unsuccessful - whether that was due to his faults, or being given small resources to accomplish huge things across amazingly poor terrain, can be debated.
Dietrich, Sepp (1892–1966): WW1 veteran. Joins Nazis, 1928. Protégé of Hitler. Head of his SS bodyguards, LAH. Key role in Blood Purge. Inept commander of LAH (which grows from a regiment to brigade to division), France, Greece, Russia. Learned on the job. Good commander at corps/army level, Normandy and Ardennes. Often blamed for failures of his army in Ardennes, although the main problem was poor higher plan and abysmal road net.
Dill, John (1881-1944): Not the brightest light in the heavens, but ended up as Chief of Imperial General Staff after a fairly undistinguished career. He was charitably viewed as obstructionist and unimaginative in that office. Given a further promotion and sent to DC when the Combined Chiefs of Staff were created in 1942. Proved to be the only British senior general able to avoid condescending to the Americans, with the result that he got on well with Marshall and his team. Died of aplastic anemia.
Dilley, Bruno (1913-1968): Excellent pilot and officer.
Doenitz, Karl (1891–1980): WW1 veteran. Created Nazi U-boat service after Versailles limits were put aside by Hitler. Created the Wolfpack tactics. Head of Navy after Raeder. A Hitler groupie more than a Nazi. Fanatic anti-Communist and anti-Semite (with the usual caveat of protecting a few part-Jews who were senior naval officers). Hitler makes him head of state after his suicide. Acquiesces in the final surrender. Convicted at Nürnberg, in part for using the same U-boat tactics USN did in the Pacific. As rigid a martinet as Raeder.
Dolmazzo, Lorenzo (1886-1959): Italian Corps Commander in North Africa, and Corps /Army Commander in the Balkans. Negotiated collaboration agreements with Croat and Albanian nationalists. Competent.
Donator, Lev Mikhaylovich (1903-1941): Soviet cavalry general at divisional and corps level during 1941 campaign. One of the few successful Soviet commanders in that kidney-stone-of-a-year’s campaign.
Eden, Anthony (1897-1977): One of the early architects of Appeasement before turning against it. A perpetual candidate for Prime Minister, he finally got the job and then lost it over Suez, one of the worst inept bungles in British history. He’s one of those bright young men who doesn’t age well and never quite makes the grade. Also somewhat contemptuous of Italians.
Eichmann, Otto Adolf (1906–1962): Oil salesman who joins Austrian Nazis and SS in 1932. Joins German SD in 1934. Made head of ‘Jewish Department’ (probably because he spoke Yiddish). Works at various emigration schemes, including helping terrorize Austrian Jews into fleeing in 1938 after reunion with Germany. Helps create ghettos in Poland. When Final Solution is implemented in 1942, he becomes a transportation bureaucrat, especially for the liquidation of Hungary’s Jews in 1944. Goes back to Austria at war’s end. Emigrates to Argentina 1950. Kidnapped from there by Israelis in 1960. Tried in Jerusalem and executed 1962. Originally post-trial opinion pegged him as a mere clerk, a faceless minion. Recent findings of his papers from Argentina show him as far more hardcore.
Eicke, Theodor (1892–1943): WW1 veteran. Failed policeman who became a security guard at I.G. Farben. Joined Nazis and SA, 1928. Joined SS, 1930. Forced to flee to Italy, 1932, over a bomb plot. Insane asylum, 1933, over internal Nazi politics (he fell afoul of a Gauleiter). Himmler pulled him out of mental hospital to be replacement commandant of Dachau. Converts the camp from sloppy SA model to the SS strict regime we all know. In Blood Purge, personally liquidates Röhm. Head of Camp Administration, thereafter. Forms corps of camp guards. Recruits a division out of them when the war starts. Heads the division. Inept commander, frequent massacres of prisoners and civilians. KIA, 1943. Fanatic anti-Semite and anti-Bolshevik. Not a stable personality, but not the lunatic portrayed postwar.
Eisenhower, Dwight ‘Ike’ David (1890-1969): Career Army officer. Scary bright but a natural diplomat so he hid it well. Pro-level athlete in his youth. Workaholic. Rocketed from mid-level staff officer to Supreme Command (TORCH, Sicily, Salerno, D-Day, ETO), in good part from the diplomatic skills. He was the only senior US general who could disguise his loathing for the British (who loathed pretty much all the Americans and made no effort to hide it, especially Monty). Never managed to deal with de Gaulle, but that prickly personality fought with almost everyone. Not an especially good operational commander, but that could be due to overstretch - the inter-Allied and US Army politics were in themselves a full time job. In OTL spent most of 1942-1945 looking over his shoulder for fear he’d be sacked. His paranoia was quite justified. This series will show Ike progressing via a more standard promotion route, which will emphasize some aspects of his personality that OTL did not bring out. For a start, Patton will loyally support him so there will be no great fear of being sacked. Plus he actually gets to learn the operational craft instead of getting parachuted into a supreme commander slot.
Fallaci, Oriana (1929–2006): From a family of political resisters. Served in the partisans, WW2. Famous journalist, first of the left but turned anti-Islamist late in life. The Oriana character in the book is loosely based on her. VERY loosely.
Farley, James (1888-1976): Farley was a wheeler-dealer politician from New York City who became FDR’s political fixer for his first two terms. FDR was noted for his casual cruelty to his subordinates. As part of FDR’s coy cat and mouse game about a third term, Roosevelt had dangled the possibility of Farley being his anointed successor in 1940. FDR then snatched away the prize and refused to do the personal handholding needed to pacify this very important minion.
Fegelein, Hermann (1906-1945): Former cavalryman and Bavarian state policeman. Run out of police for stealing exam questions/answers. Early Nazi and SS man. Father ran a riding school and Hermann was a skilled rider. The skills had limits; he failed to qualify for the Berlin Olympics. Toady of Himmler’s. Given command of an SS cavalry regiment for the Polish Campaign. Involved with massacres, mostly of Polish elites. Court-martialed for theft and fraud. Himmler quashed proceedings. Broke the race laws, but again protected by Himmler from Heydrich. Barbarossa saw the regiment upped to brigade strength and again used as an anti-partisan/ethnic cleansing force. Committed to combat, Fegelein proved to be inept. He got results, burned his unit out and got himself wounded. He would do the same with new units 1942 and 1943. Married Eva Braun’s sister and sucked up to Bormann as well as Himmler. Fegelein was shot near the end in Berlin for desertion. He was an alcoholic and a thief with no officer training, but he was socially adept and good at ingratiating himself with superiors. In this ATL he lacks Himmler to protect him and dies sooner.
Fleming, Ian (1908–1964): Eton. Left Sandhurst after one year, due to VD. Failed foreign service exam. Worked in journalism and finance. Made a naval intelligence officer, 1939, purely due to family connections. Was involved with spies, commandos, Enigma. Postwar journalist who wrote a series of spy novels about a man named James Bond.
Fleming, Peter (19
07–1971): Older brother of Ian. Successful British adventurer, journalist, and travel writer. In WW2 was reserve officer, Grenadier Guards. Served in Norway, Greece, China, Far East/South Asia. Involved with commandos, guerrillas (included preparations for guerrillas in UK in the event of German invasion), spies and various classified intelligence operations. Literary executor for his brother.
Ford, Gerald (1913–2006): 40th President of the US. In OTL, was in Yale Law School in 1940 where he helped found what became the America First Committee. The trip to Europe and work on the Hoover Relief Agency is quite fictional, but fit his views and those of his associates.
Frank, Hans (1900-1946): Old Party comrade and Hitler’s personal attorney. Made Governor General of the General Government (the part of occupied Poland not formally annexed to the Reich). Frank was somewhat inept, preoccupied with factional infighting, and fairly corrupt. Convicted and hanged at Nuremberg. He is executed in 1940 in this ATL for corruption and because Heydrich doesn’t like him.
Freitag, Fritz (1894-1945): Police officer in Polish campaign who transferred to Waffen SS. Did staff work and line command at regimental, brigade, and divisional level. Did both combat and anti-partisan work. Committed suicide while in US custody.
Gandhi, Mohandas K. (1897-1945): Trained attorney, Indian nationalist agitator, and prize kook. His weird mix of non-violence, rejection of large scale production of any sort (he seemed to prefer going back to village artisans), vegetarianism, and weird asexual lifestyles fascinated progressive Westerners and the Indian rural classes. They also drove Nehru and the other professionals in the Congress Party near insane.
Geloso, Carlo (1879-1957): Staff officer WW1. Joins Fascists early in postwar. Division commander in Ethiopia. Commands an army against the Greeks. Falls out with Germans over their heavy-handed anti-partisan tactics. POW 1943-1945 first of Nazis and then Soviets. Not linked with Salo Republic. Smart planner, but not good at the factional politics of OTL’s Fascist regime.
Godwin-Austin, Alfred (1889-1963): British general officer commanding in Somaliland during the 1940 Italian invasion,. Godwin-Austin prioritized getting his outnumbered troops away cleanly from overwhelming Italian forces. Churchill felt that this was a coward’s way out; wanted a major battle and a casualty count to show determination. Commanded a division in East Africa and a corps in the Western Desert. Did well with both, but resigned after a command quarrel with his army commander. Churchill kept him from ever getting a field command again. In this ATL his OTL commander from East Africa, Cunningham, brings him to Egypt where he will be his usual prickly but competent self.
Goebbels, Joseph (1897-1945): No war service, due to physical disability (short leg /club foot). Short and fairly ugly. Compulsive womanizer. University graduate and failed author/journalist. Successful as professional Nazi Party official and propagandist. Good public speaker. Bureaucratic empire-builder and fanatic Hitler loyalist. Commits suicide with Hitler in the Bunker 1945.
Goerdeler, Carl (1884-1945): a monarchist and conservative beloved to the circles around General Beck that kept trying to kill Hitler. He was chancellor-designate had the Bomb Plot worked. When caught gave the Gestapo every name he could think of without even being subject to torture. He was in many ways all too typical of the ‘resistance circles’ who mostly lived in their own self-referential world where somehow the Kaiser would return and the madness would end. But for Stauffenberg and a small group of more active officers, they would never have gotten past muttering to each other about the gangster government.
Göring, Hermann (1893–1946): WW1 ace pilot with legendary Flying Circus. Early Nazi. Hero at Feldherrnhalle when Adolph ducked and covered. Wounded there. Became a morphine addict while a fugitive (had to keep constantly on the move instead of getting wounds properly treated). First wife was a Swedish aristocrat, the second a Berlin film star. In many ways was the “respectable” face of the Nazis during their rise to power. Founded Luftwaffe. Good bureaucratic empire-builder, but disliked doing the actual work. Libertine, art collector, cross-dresser, probably bisexual. Loved speeches, dressing up, and the accoutrements of wealth and power. Nickname: Fat Hermann.
Guderian, Heinz (1888–1954): WW1 veteran. Freikorps. Iron Division. Reichswehr. Helped found the Panzer troops. A favorite of Hitler until late 1941. Sacked for retreating against orders. Held staff positions of high title, but little power 1943–1945. Sacked before the end after a fight with Hitler. Helped organize the Bundeswehr post-WW2. Intelligent, but did not follow orders or play well with others, both characteristics he shared with Rommel.
Haber, Fritz (1868-1934): German Jewish Nobel Prize winner. His Haber-Bosch process was the key to German ability to continue manufacturing artificial fertilizer and high explosives during WW1 despite the British blockade on Chilean nitrates. Father of gas warfare. German patriot. Fled Nazis 1933 and died shortly thereafter.
Halder, Franz (1884–1972): Staff and then General Staff officer, WW1. Head of OKH 1938–1942. Half-hearted involvement in the early anti-Hitler plots, but bowed out before the 1944 Bomb Plot. Arrested anyway, but not executed. Worked postwar as historian for US Army. Capable. One of the few higher Army officers to take any interest in the Mediterranean Theater.
Halifax, Lord [given name is Edward Wood] (1881-1959): Very tall, very aristocratic, quite rich but a bit of a miser. One of the architects of Appeasement. Refused to be Prime Minister after Chamberlain, thus paving the way for Churchill. Headed the faction in the 1940 Cabinet and Tory Party which wanted to negotiate a peace with Hitler after Dunkirk. Served loyally through WW2 and after as a major Conservative Party figure.
Harris, Arthur (1892-1984): Head of RAF Bomber Command 1942-1946. Known to the London Press as Bomber Harris and to his subordinates as Butcher Harris. He was a strategic bombing fanatic who responded to the failures of his campaigns with a mixture of bluster and lies. All his raids managed to accomplish was strategic attrition on Germany via production and manpower diverted to AAA guns and night fighters. As his planes couldn’t hit a target much smaller than a metropolitan area, he invented a strategy of burning down cities which somehow was going to cut into German production by destroying the workers’ housing. Opposed having his planes tasked to Army support (Normandy), or to actual economic targets such as oil production or transportation. His Rhodesian connection comes from having emigrated there from Britain at age 17. His air crews sustained casualties worse than the assault waves in Haig’s less successful WW1 offensives.
Hausser, Paul (1880–1972): WW1 veteran, general staff on Eastern Front. Retired Reichswehr, 1932, with rank of Lieutenant General. Joined Stahlhelm, and from there SA, and then Waffen SS. Helped create Waffen SS. Rose from division command in France, 1940, to corps, then army and finally army group. Best operational commander the Waffen SS produced. Worked for US Army historical division under Halder postwar. Nickname: Uncle Paul.
Hess, Rudolph (1894–1987): Hitler’s Secretary and Deputy Führer. In OTL, flies to Scotland, 1941, as part of an insane peace plan. Bisexual or homosexual, accounts vary. May have been Hitler’s lover, but then the same is alleged about Speer. Supposedly Bormann was the biological father of Hess’s children. Nickname: Fräulein Anna.
Heydrich, Reinhard (1904–1942): Junior naval officer expelled for “dishonorable conduct” (broke an engagement with one girl to court and marry another). This left him in 1931 with a Nazi bride-to-be and no job. Her connections got him a job interview with Himmler. Rose rapidly in the SS from a combination of raw intelligence and extreme competence. Founded the intelligence arm of the Nazi Party, the SD, in 1931. Head of the Gestapo in 1934 and all of Party and state security agencies by 1936. Consolidates this in a meta-agency, RSHA, in 1939. Accused several times of having Jewish blood, a taint he never quite shook. In OTL, wounded in 1942 by Czech assassins in the pay of the British (they would say they were resistance fighters and Free Czechs, but assassin is descriptive; saying the Nazis were evil does not make using killers in civilian clothes int
o a wartime attack instead of an assassination). Died in hospital, quite possibly on orders of Himmler to his doctors, who were sent by Himmler to take charge of the case. Himmler was believed to be terrified of him. Virtually all the higher Nazis were afraid of him as well, as he had blackmail files on them all. Ruthless, amoral ... and the only competent bureaucrat among the higher Nazis. Hence my use of him in this series. Highest historic rank: Obergruppenführer and General of Police. In this ATL he is Reichsführer-SS and Deputy Chancellor, so far. Nicknames: The Blond Beast; The Man with the Iron Heart.
Himmler, Heinrich (1900–1945): Did officer training in WW1, but no active service. Involved with SA and Nazi Party. Failed chicken farmer who became a fulltime Party official. Lapsed Catholic who dived headfirst into occult, Nordic magic, and similar outre circles. Founded SS. Good bureaucratic empire-builder but poor administrator. Threw up after watching a mass execution. Betrayed Hitler in 1945 in absurd scheme to have the West make him head of a German government. Committed suicide when captured by the British.
Hindenburg (von), Paul (1847–1934): Half of the governing duo in WW1 with Ludendorff after major victories in the East. President of the German Republic, 1925–1934. A reactionary even by the standards of his social class and age, he was mostly a figurehead in the key years of the early 1930’s.
Ho Chi Minh / Nguyen Ai Quc (1890-1969): No one is really sure how much of his ‘past’ is true - or even if it is the same person for all the times. As with Kim Il Sung, the party names were often identities of convenience swapped out among operatives. However, someone answering to these names created the Viet Minh post-WW2 and led the party/regime that fought first the French and then the Americans to stalemate.
Hopkins, Harry (1890–1946): Social worker. Active in various relief projects during the New Deal. One of the voices to the left of FDR within the administration, but not as extreme as Henry Wallace or Eleanor Roosevelt. By 1940, de facto number 2 to FDR, replacing Farley. Headed Lend-Lease. Also, FDR’s frequent emissary to Stalin. Pro-Soviet, but it is uncertain whether he was a sympathizer or an active agent.
