Alternative history

If Hitler had not invaded Russia we would now have a Europe under the domination of a German totalitarian government. Britain would have been forced to capitulate in 1940/41 and would now probably be a satellite of that regime, America would still have had a war with Japan and would very likely have won that war so we would now have three superpowers. America, the German European empire, and the Russian/Soviet empire, all of which would have nuclear weapons. The Germans were working on developing atomic weapons in the 1940's and if the war had ended in 1940/41 there would have been nothing to stop that. The American atomic weapons program would probably have gone on much like present history, so that the Pacific war would be brought to an end with the use of atomic bombs on the Japanese mainland. The Soviets might still have collapsed in the early 1990's, but that would not change the general situation much. Having said all that though, it's not a scenario that is likely to have come about because as far as we can tell, it was always the intention of Hitler to attack the Soviets as he saw territories of European Russia as the "Living Space" that he believed the German people needed. I think that would only have not happened if Hitler himself had not come to power, but that as they say, is a horse of a different colour.

We speculated that Hitler talked Japan out of agression toward the U.S. and limited their expansion into China and the Far East, tho they did take over the Phillipines, it was more of a pushing the U.S. out rather than by force. Switzerland, Spain and Ireland remained neutral, and independent. Yes, England fell, but still resisted, there were continuing resistance, in fact, in most of the occupied countries, just much more underground. Because the war ended in 1942, with Germany in control over most of Europe, they didn't develope the Bomb in any of the 3 or 4 mega powers (counting Japan) and, actually the U.S. was probably the weakest of the 3, mostly still free because it was too hard to bother invading. Russia still watched Germany and Japan from its two sides, and was mostly still independent because someone had Hitler's ear that said, "Look what invading Russia did for Napoleon - don't fall into that trap." Oh, another alternant history is the S. M. Stirling's Island on the Sea of Time books - wonderful!

Yes, I've read all three of "The Island" books and I would love to see him write another. There were several loose ends that could be the basis of another novel, maybe set several years further on.

I don't think that it has much use, though I suppose that it could be said that analysing the events of the past might help us to understand what is happening now better and to avoid mistakes that have been made in the past. It might have been better for Hitler (but worse for the rest of us) if he had studied previous invasions of Russia and how those worked out. Not just Napoleons famous invasion, but the lesser known Swedish invasion of the previous century which ended in a crushing Swedish defeat at Poltava.