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The Union of European Soviets Poster

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This image is part of the alternative history series: Alternative History Series: USSR 1958
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A big thanks goes to TiltschMaster for designing the coat of arms: CoA Union of European Soviets :)                
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When the Second World War was over in 1948 after nine years of bitter fighting, tens of million of people had lost their lives and cities lay in ruins all the way from Madrid to Moscow. After a fight-to-the-death battle between two civilizations and social systems, it was natural that the defeated, conquered side converted over to the winning side, and this happened all over Europe, excluding the British Isles, relatively peacefully. Some nations adopted Soviet-style communism, others democratic socialism, and to some, the new system was perceived as attractive and victorious or at least worth the try because of the failure of the old system. Others’ hands were forced by the Red Army and the NKVD.

The Union of European Soviets is a federation of Russian-style Soviet republics in West-Central Europe. The UES was formed in 1953, two years after the Second World Congress of the Socialist World Republic decreed that unionism was the next logical step in the development European sovietism. The Eastern European republics were incorporated into the Soviet Union already in 1951.

Unlike the Soviet Union in Eastern Europe, the western union favored large republican units. Instead of giving small nations their own SSR as was preferred in the East, the UES consists of five large national units; the French, the German, the Italian, the Dutch and the Iberian (or Spanish-Catalan-Portuguese as it is officially termed). Let us briefly account for the UES republics.

The French Commune is currently the leading republic of the UES. It is an interesting twist of fate that the declining great power, being a double loser in the Second World War - first against the Germans, then the Soviets -, ended up as the leading nation in Western Europe. The cause for this development was that France had the strongest communist movement in Western Europe before the war and at the war's end – some of them had even been involved in administration before 1939. Many of those who took over in 1948 were communists who had been fighting the Germans from underground during the war years, while their counterparts in Germany, Italy and Spain had mostly been behind bars or operating from Moscow. Additionally, many Frenchmen saw the Red Army as a liberating force from the Germans (as was the case in many Eastern European republics too).

The Soviet Federation of Iberia is the militancy hotspot in the UES, because this was the last bastion of reaction and fascism during the final phase of the war and survived the war with little material damage, in comparison with Germany and France. However, it was in the post-war period that Iberia became intensively heated by class conflict, conflicts of ethnic groups as well as violence committed by, and against, the Soviet occupation forces. Unhealed wounds from the Spanish Civil War lead to a great red terror in 1949-1950, after which the Soviet Republic stood secure and united, but severely wounded.

Germany was the grand loser of the Second World War. The nation suffered total destruction and massive casualties. In 1948-1949, zealous remnants of the SS and National Socialist guerrilla parties roamed remote regions of Germany and Austria, terrorising civilians and the Soviet occupation forces. Despite mass killings and great terror, National Socialist insurgents continued to operate underground well into the 1950s. The German Soviet Republic was also burdened by war reparations, and relinquishment of industries to Russia. Despite all this Germany has made good progress in normalisation since the mid 1950s and is rising in economic strength at a rapid speed.

There were two Western European states that were abolished in 1948. Belgium was absorbed into the French Commune and the Dutch Soviet Republic, and Switzerland was carved up between the German, Italian and French soviet republics. In order to appease the populations of these countries, the former Swiss and Belgian cities of Brussels and Geneva became some sort of super-national administrative centers of the socialist world. Brussels now serves as the capital of the UES, a historically neutral city situated between France and Germany, in which Belgian bureaucrats and administrators have found a fitting role. The former capital of the League of Nations, Geneva, is now the seat of its successor organisation, the Socialist World Republic, having also taken over Comintern activities, formerly conducted in Moscow.

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monterrang's avatar
Why does strasbourg has a "H"?