My library just grew again 2014...

[zenrat]

The Mongol Empire by John Man.
Not much in the way of Whiffspiration (although maybe a trebuchet mounted on a tracked chassis - modern Mongol artillery? What if there was no gunpowder?) but a fascinating read charting how modern China grew from Genghis and Kublai Khan's empire.
Lots of possible turning points for alternate histories.

[NARSES2]

Ah, OK. 

The current 'normal' edition has a Biggles painting on the cover and it's almost wall to wall WWI inside, no wonder I was confused. 

That is the issue I got Kit. You've been done mate

[NARSES2]

The Mongol Empire by John Man.
Not much in the way of Whiffspiration (although maybe a trebuchet mounted on a tracked chassis - modern Mongol artillery? What if there was no gunpowder?) but a fascinating read charting how modern China grew from Genghis and Kublai Khan's empire.
Lots of possible turning points for alternate histories.

Yes a fascinating period of history. I've a few historical books on the period and the Conn Iggulden novels based on Ghengiz and his successors are a good read as well. He went and lived with the Mongols for a period to try and understand the culture slightly better. Although he messes with history at the end of the book he tells you exactly where and for what narrative reasons he's done so.

[lancer]

Just added 'The Doomed Expedition' about the Norwegian campaign in 1940

[Leading Observer]

Downloaded the 4th Book in Colin Gees Red Gambit series on my Kindle - for those unfamiliar its premise is what if the Red Army launches an offensive into Western Europe in August 1945 and the Trinity Test fails due to Soviet sabotage

[PR19_Kit]

Downloaded the 4th Book in Colin Gees Red Gambit series on my Kindle - for those unfamiliar its premise is what if the Red Army launches an offensive into Western Europe in August 1945 and the Trinity Test fails due to Soviet sabotage

And................. ?

[rickshaw]

Downloaded the 4th Book in Colin Gees Red Gambit series on my Kindle - for those unfamiliar its premise is what if the Red Army launches an offensive into Western Europe in August 1945 and the Trinity Test fails due to Soviet sabotage

And................. ?

They lose....

[rickshaw]

Just finished this:



A slim volume which builds quite a lot from the small discoveries which have been made over the last 50 years.  Ties the Mongol attempted invasions of Japan in with the mid-20th century myth of the Kamikaze very well and explains how it's tale has grown with the emergence of Japan into the modern world after the end of the Tokagawa Shogunate.   As one of the few books (in English) which deals with the invasions in any degree of detail, it's worth reading.

[zenrat]

Looks interesting.  The world would have been a different place if Japan had been a Chinese province in 1941.

[jcf]

?
Even if the invasion had been a success it's doubtful that Japan would still have
been under Chinese control centuries later, hell China wasn't under its own
control in 1941.

[scooter]

?
Even if the invasion had been a success it's doubtful that Japan would still have
been under Chinese control centuries later, hell China wasn't under its own
control in 1941.

But as a province of the Republic of Tsingtao, along with the Korean Peninsula? Sure why not. 

[zenrat]

?
Even if the invasion had been a success it's doubtful that Japan would still have
been under Chinese control centuries later, hell China wasn't under its own
control in 1941.

True.  But if the invasion had been successful the changes to Japanese society (the Mongols had a tendency to slaughter populations who did not capitulate) and history from that point onwards could well have meant they did not attack Pearl Harbour.
Or maybe they did earlier?
Who knows?  That's what makes this fun.

[NARSES2]

The interesting thought in my mind would be if the Mongols were replaced on the mainland by the Ming as in the real world (I sometimes wonder about that phrase ?  ) and the Mongols stayed in power in Japan ? Although thinking about it, it's not a country at all suitable to their particular way of life, but heck they were quite good at adapting 

[jcf]

The Imperial Japan that attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941 had very little to do with historical Japan,
it was a very much a 'modern' government in the mould of 19th century European/Western imperial
powers, with identical imperial pretensions and intentions.
All the prating about Bushido etc., was a gloss of romaticized tradition over a very foreign political
structure.

The Japanese fought continual civil wars for centuries, do you really think they would have just
sat back and accepted a Mongol yoke? The original notion of course ignores the fact that the Mongols
didn't stay the same over time in China, nor did China stay the same, so why assume that a Mongol/Sino
dominated Japan would actually be all that different by the first half of the Twentieth Century?
Hell, for all we know a Mongol conquest of Japan could have resulted in a China controlled by Japan
by the time the 20th Century rolled around.

[Weaver]

Just picked up a cheap copy of By Any Means Neccessary by William E. Burrows, a history of the US aerial intelligence gathering campaign against the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Looks interesting.

The casualty list at the end is sobering: I make it one hundred and sixty-two........