Atompunk

This map is a modernisation of an ancient one I did back in 2009. My how times have changed. It is done in the style of one of my favourite map artists, QuantumBranching. I'd recommend checking out his deviantart profile if you like my stuff, he is a big inspiration for me.

This is the world of Atompunk, in the year 1975. The United States of America is embroiled in the middle of the ‘Cold War’ between it and the threatening Universal Soviet Union, with vast nuclear arsenals aimed at each other. It is closely allied with the British Empire and the European Commonwealth. The United States has changed little since the end of the Second World War in 1945, after the defeat of Nazi Germany and the meeting with the Red Army along the Vistula. The greater advance of the German Army against the Russians, reaching as far as the Volga frontier, gave the Western Allies more time to occupy territory and made the Russians seem far weaker than OTL. Within the US both economy and technology roared ahead in the immediate aftermath of the war. Technological advancement brought innovations such as the miniature nuclear reactor, advancements in robotics and (most recently) cordless telephone receivers. Blacks aren’t yet at equal rights, but they are far closer to it than any point before. The Civil Rights movement is gaining greater and greater momentum, it is believed by many that Black Suffrage to be achievable within the decade. There are also movements which turn to the more violent times of the 1960s, with frequent clashes between extremist Black supremacists and local militia, disrupting the usual happy family image America maintains abroad. It is hoped that this situation will soon be sorted out as it would the US greatly, since peace at home allows it to focus on its more troubled allies.

To put it bluntly, the British Empire is in terminal decline. After the war the British attempted to federalize their empire into a signal, global entity. However, this experiment has ended in dismal failure. The majority of its African empire has broken away from London, as have most of its Asian holdings. South Africa left the Empire to form a new Axis with Argentina whilst both Canada and Australia are turning more to the US for protection, with Britain seemingly unable to hold onto East Africa. The India Crisis, more than any other, characterised the failure of the British to maintain order within their imperial borders. Only a few spots remain under British control, and it is not known for how long. The enclaves of Lesotho and Swaziland remain loyal more due to fear of South Africa rather than any personal loyalty to the Crown, for example. The slow loss of the empire has had a severe affect on the Home Islands. Britain is currently experiencing nothing less than a crisis of confidence. Debates are raging on whether Britain should stay the course or side more closely with the US or Europe, with the later containing small but vocal elements calling for joining the European Commonwealth.

The European Commonwealth is a construct created not long after the recreation of Germany in 1950. France, realising that they couldn’t subdue Germany through force, began a policy of extensive cooperation with it and their former Italian enemies (if you can’t beat ‘em, smother them in you embrace so they can’t do anything you don’t want ‘em to). The formation of the EC in 1955 at Strasbourg was partially to foster economic and political cooperation between the states of Europe, then composing only of France, Italy, Germany, the Benelux, Austria and the Czech Republic, and to prevent future war between the former Allies and rehabilitated Axis. This they have achieved with remarkable success. A second feature was of trying to maintain their colonial empires. As demonstrated to them by the British Experience, maintaining their empires became steadily far more difficult. Instead new policies of infrastructure development and extensive colonisation were introduced. This has lead to, among other things, a Trans-Sahara Railway and large scale irrigation projects of the desert. Resistance to the European colonisers is, however, extremely high, with nationalists, communists and everything in-between attempting to drive the Europeans out (as well as their unpatriotic opponents, of course). Increasingly harsher measures are being introduced by the Europeans to maintain order, but things are quickly turning far bloodier than Strasbourg ever wanted it to be. The third reason for the formation of the EC was due to the rather disturbing events occurring on the other side of the Iron Curtain.

No one knows for sure when the transition from the Soviet Union to the Universal Soviet Union took place, since very little information leaks out of the place, but most western experts date its birth with the ascension of one Gregori Morchenko into the seat of General Secretary after Stalin’s death in 1956 and the intervention and assimilation of China during the Chinese Civil War in 1958. Ever since Morchenko’s rise things have become rather...odd. The assimilation of Russia’s Eastern European clients was only the beginning of a string of international incidents to which the West was too distracted to intervene against. This was followed quickly by a revolution in Persia and an invasion of Afghanistan. The Indian Incident of 1967 was the most recent of these incidents, where the Soviets watched as Indian nationalists fight the British for independence, only to march into an exhausted nation unopposed when the British finally withdrew. Only the arrival of American soldiers prevented the total collapse of the subcontinent. Ever since then the Universal Soviet Union has been eerily quiet, with little more than your average propaganda emanating from it calling for unity of all peoples at any cost. Yet inside its borders, many westerners would shiver at the extent of its “Revolution of the Proletariat” has gone. The renaming of cities based on numbers, with its new capital of City 1 located where Almaty once stood standing as the prime example, the pacification of the masses through propaganda and cheap distractions and the effective separation of people and party paint a frighting picture of both Orwell’s and Huxley’s worst nightmare. Yet it stands as the single most powerful state in history, with a colossal population and an army like never seen before. Many westerners fear what is being planned within halls of the United Commissariat in City 1, whether it is the final conquest of the Middle East, the invasion of Japan or the assimilation of Western Europe.

To combat the seemingly invincible enemy, the United States is forging closer alliances with both the British and the Europeans, with plans for a joint-strategic command being put into effect. And the US is not without choice in the search for new allies. The United Arab Republic is greatly angered by the Soviet intervention in the Persian Revolution “accidentally” spilling over into Iraq, nationalist agents in India work once again to free India from foreign oppression and (even though they won’t admit it) there is always the Argentine-South African New Axis. The New Axis nations were the primary ‘retirement homes’ for Nazi fleeing prosecution in Europe. Neo-Nazi’s have become rather influential in the political sphere of Argentina and South Africa, to the point where learning German can become a reliable boost to ones career. No one would ever admit with working with the New Axis, but subtleties of Nazi influence means that they are hard to ignore behind the scenes. A company might be working for a Neo-Nazi front without ever knowing about it. In the New Axis, knowing the right person is key, but knowing a veteran of the Second World War provides the greatest boost. As the Allies search for anyone to help them against the Soviets, the benefits of working with Neo-Nazi companies are becoming disturbingly tempting. And whilst the New Axis are very committed to the total annihilation of the Communist menace which kicked their superiors out of their homes, they have their own sinister agendas. A promise for silence or even amnesty could earn you a lot, from a wealth of diamonds and jewels from South Africa's slave mines to a custom pent house built in the greatly expanded Buenos Ares, not to mention the full military backing of some of the most powerful and sinister technologies to escape Berlin.

The challenges for western democracy are many, both in the form of Communist brutality to subtle influences of the Neo-Nazis. A titanic struggle seems imminent, and said struggle will be the most decisive one yet. 6 countries boast nuclear arsenals, far larger than anything in OTL. One can only hope that this Cold War will go out with a fizzle, and not with a bang.