Dark Earth Timeline Discussion

[Simon Darkshade]

July
July 1: British marriage rates reach their highest totals yet in the 20th century, at 15.4 per thousand people, with just over 2 million marriages occurring in the previous year. Divorces increases to 72,000, reflecting some of the expected issues involved with the large scale return of troops from wartime service in the Far East, whilst the total fertility rate seems to have ceased its natural decline from the post Second World War peak of 3.75 in 1967, holding steady at 3.2.
July 2: The race for the Democratic nomination for US President is effectively wrapped up for Hubert Humphrey after he wins a number of key primaries including Ohio, Michigan and Illinois thanks to his advantage in the labour union vote; his chief competitor, Senator Henry Jackson, now cannot win enough delegates to overcome Humphrey unless he were to somehow gain all of those pledged to Senator Robert F. Kennedy.
July 3: IBM begins sales of 5.25” ‘floppy disks’ in the United States for use in business, educational and personal home microcomputing engines, adopting the standard size pioneered by a number of British computing engine manufacturing companies; the latter are known to be engaging in experimental research on the potential utilisation of specialised variants of video laserdiscs for microcomputers.
July 4: A live telecast of the Orion 6 space mission, currently in deep space between the orbits of Jupiter and Saturn en route to Uranus and Neptune, is carried by all five major television networks in the United States. Mission Commander Colonel Edwin 'Buzz' Aldrin, USAF and Deputy Commander Captain James Lovell, USN conduct a tour of the command, engineering and habitation modules and the hangar deck of the Orion spacecraft; careful observers note the presence of four USSF space fighters in the latter area.
July 5: President Kennedy signs the Universal National Medicare System Act of 1972 at a ceremony in the White House, establishing a universal national health care system across the United States, and hailing it as a strategic victory in the war against sickness, want and ignorance across society and a great measure befitting a great nation.
July 6: The Victorian Football League announces its largest expansion since 1925, with the VFA clubs Werribee, Sandringham, Port Melbourne and Coburg to be elevated for the 1975 VFL season for a total of 16 teams. Further prospects for expansion into a national competition is to be studied, with the strength of the SANFL, WAFL, QAFL and NSWFL providing both opportunity and challenges.
July 7: A secret CIA report on Project MKUltra recommends that successful programmes be continued with appropriate oversight, whilst a review of previous test subjects is to be commenced in order to appraise the longer term effects.
July 8: The Soviet Union reaches an agreement with the Imperial Wheat Board to buy £250 million worth of British Commonwealth grain and meat to cover regional shortfalls in the last year’s harvest.
July 9: Military officials from the U.S. Department of Defense and British Ministry of Defence meeting in Bermuda sign an agreement for coordination of the cooperative development of new cruise missiles for use by USN and RN warships, based on the existing Lionheart and Regulus missile families. A separate agreement in principle for licensed production of a British version of the AGM-102 air launched strategic cruise missile for deployment on RAF heavy bombers; deployment of USAF ground launched cruise missiles in the United Kingdom and other parts of the British Empire; and for cooperative development and fielding of new specialised missile launcher ground vehicles and long range cruise missile for the British and U.S. Armies was already reached at the end of June.
July 10: Commissioning of the 12th and final vessel in the Enterprise class of nuclear aircraft carriers, USS Franklin, bringing the USN once again to an active strength of 28 fleet aircraft carriers, along with 10 anti submarine light aircraft carriers and 10 escort carriers. Four new CVANs of the successor Ticonderoga class (Shiloh, Bunker Hill, Valley Forge and Ticonderoga) are under construction with a further four ordered (Philippine Sea, Antietam, Khe Sanh and Leyte Gulf) ordered, with Ticonderoga due to commission in November. The Ticonderogas are larger than their older sisters, carry a range of new missile and gun systems as well as increased ammunition stocks and field the world’s largest carrier air groups.
July 11: The World Chess Championship between Boris Spassky and Bobby Fischer begins in Reykjavik, Iceland, with the clash between the Soviet and America, the two youngest grandmasters in history, being a highly anticipated measure of Cold War superiority, with there having not been a non-Soviet world champion in quarter of a century.
July 12: 5 inches of rain fall in Death Valley, California, in less than 24 hours, in an accidental deployment of new experimental weather control enchantments, causing considerable flooding and the formation of ephemeral lakes. The event does give rise to a novel idea, which is referred to the Presidential Scientific Advisory Committee Sub-Group on Arcane-Scientific Innovation, chaired by Dr. Henry Strangelove and also consisting of Dr. Emmett Brown, Professor John Frink, Dr. Crawford Tillinghast Jr. and Dr. Julius Kelp.
July 13: The Democratic National Convention is held in Metropolis, Delaware, with Senator Hubert Humphrey winning the Democratic nomination for President with Senator Henry Jackson of Washington as his running mate. There is something of a subdued atmosphere for the first part of the convention prior to the arrival of President Kennedy, who gives a characteristically well-received speech rallying the party faithful and urging them to get behind Humphrey for the national poll in November; even so, there is a certain sense that with the passing of universal health care, the party's well of political capital may at last be running dry.
July 14: France unveils a range of new military hardware at the Bastille Day Parade in Paris, lead by the new AMX-32 main battle tank and followed by the 27 ton AMX-10 mechanised infantry fighting vehicle, new self propelled 155mm, 194mm, 220mm, 240mm and 320mm artillery systems, the Pluton SRBM, the swift Peugeot jeep replacement, the rugged Renault ERC 8x8 armoured car and the formidable Panhard VRBC 12x12 armoured reconnaissance tank destroyer/assault gun.
July 15: A team of academics, archaeologists, historians and wizards lead by Professor J.R.R. Tolkien, former Minister of Magic, excavating the Skalunda Barrow in Lidköping, Västragötaland, Sweden uncover the long lost burial mound of Beowulf, King of the Geats and greatest hero of the Northern World in the age of the Great Winter and the War Against Darkness. There in the centuries untouched mound is the fabled treasure of the dragonslayer - gold, silver, gems and wonders almost without measure ; Nægling, the sword that was broken (marked mysteriously with seven stars and a crescent moon); a fabulous green gem set in a silver broach; a ring of two intertwined silver serpents with eyes of emerald; a coat of shining mithrium mail; what appears to be a codex from Mesoamerica alongside a golden sun medallion; and a luminous stone that catches the eye like a globe with a thousand facets.
July 16: Production of the US Army’s new family of Mechanised Infantry Fighting Vehicles begins, with the Bradley Fighting Vehicle to be produced in Infantry Fighting Vehicle, Cavalry Fighting Vehicle, Battlefield Command Vehicle, Battlefield Air Defense, Engineer Fighting Vehicle, Combat Fire Support Vehicle, Anti Tank Missile Vehicle and Armoured Personnel Carrier variants. The main IFV is a 32 ton vehicle protected by advanced armour capable of carrying up to 12 infantrymen at a top speed of 55mph and is armed with 40mm automatic cannon, TOW missiles and a heavy machine gun; the CSFV assault gun version armed with a 105mm gun is intended to augment the Army’s tank and tank destroyer arms.
July 17: The USN destroyer USS Corry is damaged by a rogue mine whilst on patrol off South Vietnam in what is described by naval officials as a ‘one in a million’ accident. After the immediate danger of sinking is abated due to the swift and professional action of the damage control crew, Corry is taken under tow by the guided missile light cruiser Wilmington and shepherded towards the USN base at Cam Ranh Bay for repairs.
July 18: A 12 strong SAS training team attached to the Omani Army is attacked by communist rebel guerrillas of the Popular Front for the Liberation of the Occupied Arabian Gulf at a fort in Mirbat, suppressing the rebel assaults with machine guns, grenade launchers, rockets, automatic mortars, missiles and a 25pdr infantry gun before the arrival of a QRF commando company from RAF Thumrait and air support from the ready flight of Harrier supersonic jump jets.
July 19: A military crackdown at the University of El Salvador, involving hundreds of troops supported by tanks, triggers several days of widespread unrest across San Salvador and leading to the establishment of a unified umbrella group of several revolutionist and guerilla movements, the Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación Nacional.
July 20: The US Department of Defense begins talks with Britain and Egypt over American employment of certain inactive British Commonwealth air and land bases in Egypt for logistical use for its planned expansion of Middle Eastern Command. Existing American facilities in Southern Israel are faced with certain hard limitations on their scope for future expansion.
July 21: 15 year old American girl Lynne Cox swims the Channel in 9 hours and 36 minutes, breaking the record time for one of such tender years and of the fairer sex.
July 22: Chinese and Japanese diplomats begin a series of meetings in Geneva with the aim of completing the ongoing process of full normalisation of postwar ties and establishment of ordinary diplomatic relations.
July 23: Coronation of King Gustav VII Adolf of Sweden in Uppsala Cathedral by the Archbishop of Uppsala and high prelate of the Church of Sweden, who crowns the young king and invests him with the sceptre, orb and Sword of Vasa. In attendance are the former King, Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip, King Olav of Norway, King Eric of Denmark, King Louis of France, King Carl II of Finland, King Baldwin of Belgium and Queen Beatrice of the Netherlands, Kaiser Wilhelm IV of Germany, Kaiser Otto of Austria-Hungary, King Juan III of Spain, Tsar Sergei and the other crowned heads of Europe and South America.
July 24: The US Bureau of Labor Statistics forecasts that, on current trends, American workers will enjoy up to four weeks of annual leave by the end of the 1980s, in addition to the federal public holidays of New Year's Day, Good Friday, Memorial Day, Victory Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Columbus Day, Thanksgiving, Veteran's Day and Christmas Day, whilst earning increased salaries through the effects of productivity growth, technological improvements and decreased industrial strife.
July 25: The French Army completes the first phase of modernisation and renovation of certain ouvrages of the Maginot Line as part of the general increase in its conventional defences along the eastern borders of France. Whilst some military thinkers have described the fortifications as completely obsolete in the atomic age, they have been given a new lease of life with adapted roles as hardened underground headquarters, communications facilities, logistical centres and reinforcement bases for the Grande Armee in Western Germany.
July 26: Beginning of Exercise Red Flag I, an air combat training exercise for the fighter forces of Tactical Air Command held at Nellis AFB, close to the ‘convention city’ of Las Vegas. Previous international fighter exercises and the similar 'Top Gun' training establishment created by the USN's fighter forces at NAS Miramar in California have been driven by the 1970 and 1971 symposiums on the air combat lessons of the Vietnam War for US and Western fighter forces. Red Flag 1 is statistically notable for the participation of the USAF's 1st Fighter Wing, equipped with the new F-15A Eagles, and the new F-4S Phantoms of the 990th Fighter Wing, representing a mixture of the old and the new.
July 27: Virginia Piper, the wife of millionaire Minneapolis investor Harry Piper, is kidnapped whilst gardening at their house in Orono. Her horrified husband immediately sends to telegrams, one to Amy Amanda Allen, a Los Angeles journalist and the other to Reverend Elvis Presley in Tennessee.
July 28: The Israeli Army begins the gradual activation of a further two regular divisions gears utilising its latest delivery of Commonwealth armaments aid from Britain and Canada and new aid and purchases from the United States. Current expansion plans also call for formation of two armoured cavalry regiments, a brigade of ranger/mountain troops to augment other commando formations and formal establishment of the Border Guard as a distinct arm of service.
July 29: NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey complete the initial programme of launches of Earth Resources Technology Satellites with a twelfth satellite launched from Cape Canaveral to provide for full observation capacity across the Western Hemisphere.
July 30: Belgian and Dutch officials begin discussions on a proposed timetable for full fiscal union of the Benelux states, seen as the penultimate step before the putative political reunification of the Low Countries as the restored United Kingdom of the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg.
July 31: The Ministry of Munitions issues a new directive on monthly artillery shell production quotas to the Royal Arsenal Woolwich and the Imperial Arsenal Nottingham; the National Factories at Gretna, Stirling, Mullingar, Elenydd and Banbrow; Royal Ordnance; and the principle private manufacturing firms, outlining a expected shift in total capacity to two million units of field calibre and above in ordinary operations.

[jemhouston]

If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire the A-Team.

[Simon Darkshade]

Mr. Harry Piper certainly has a problem, but given his telegrams to The A-Team and Reverend Elvis Presley, someone should hopefully be able to help him.

[Simon Darkshade]

August
August 1: Signing of an agreement in Washington D.C. by representatives of the United States, Canada and Britain for cooperative development of the next generation of anti-ballistic missiles. The general principles call for a three layered system of short, medium and long ranged interceptor missiles and a network of ground, sea, air and space based solid state phased array radars, with there being some internal speculation that it might offer some means to resolve the long running dispute over ABM control between the United States Army and United States Air Force.
August 2: All Nippon Airways announces the selection of the Nakajima YS-24 intermediate jet airliner for its internal Japanese and regional routes, marking the first time a Japanese civil jet has been chosen over American and British competitors since the advent of the jet age in Japan in 1959.
August 3: A televised debate between Prime Minister Stanley Barton and Leader of the Opposition Sir Enoch Powell takes place for the first time, broadcast by the BBC and ITV. Both men give spirited displays, with Powell’s erudite call for a freer economy and a better Britain perhaps just edging Barton’s advocacy of a fair society, but the Prime Minister‘s powerful conclusion on Britain’s place as a global superpower, the great achievements to come and the duty that comes with it struck an undoubtable chord with many in the audience. ‘Powell won the head, but Barton got the gut’ was the pithy verdict of Richard Dimbleby.
August 4: Beginning of the Grand Kuraltaiy at the Mongol capital of Karakorum, with the aging Great Khan Amar announcing that he will select a worthy successor from the ranks of his two dozen sons, with his third eldest, Temür, 26, regarded as the favourite due to his many sterling qualities and leadership in the Mongol Expeditionary Force in North Vietnam from 1968. Whoever the pronounced heir may turn out to be, it is taken almost for granted that the complex alliance with the Soviet Union will be continued, on practical grounds alone, as long advised by the Great Khan's chief advisor, Ungern Khan.
August 5: The Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Harry Brubaker, issues a report citing the importance of maintaining USN traditions in an everchanging modern world, with one example being the continuation of the prohibition of women serving at sea or in combat roles.
August 6: A baseball game in Midland, Texas is disrupted and abandoned after a plague of locusts descends upon the ground, blotting out the light towers and attacking the players and crowd, forcing them to flee in fear of their very lives. The swarm is only stopped when destroyed by a fireball cast by the oddly dressed female companion of visiting NASA astronaut Colonel Tony Nelson, who was on a goodwill tour of Western Texas with Royal Space Force Major Thom Jones.
August 7: England defeat Brazil 2-1 in an international friendly exhibition game at Empire Stadium, marking the first time that the world champions have been defeated since their World Cup triumph.
August 8: Unveiling of the newest model fourth generation Chevrolet Corvair at a motor show in Detroit, with it being hailed as the safest and most innovative new compact car on the American domestic automotive market and a fitting counter to recent penetrations by smaller Japanese and European cars.
August 9: The Committee of Imperial Defence discusses a proposal for possible British intervention in Uganda, which is seeing growing civil unrest amid controversial proposed laws against the Indian populace and violence against white settlers and miners. The report of the Governor-General describes the situation as fluid and potentially volatile. An initial reinforcement of the Ugandan imperial garrison from Tanganyika and Kenya is ordered as an immediate measure.
August 10: A meteor approximately 100ft in diameter is intercepted in near Earth space by the inner layer of space based missile defences assigned to the American portion of Project Spaceguard, causing a visible fireball high above Skull Valley, Utah, in the middle of the Utah Test Range.
August 11: The U.S. Army’s 250th Infantry Brigade, a new light infantry formation, becomes the first regular American troops to be deployed to India since 1946, with their new base in Eastern Assam to be used for specialised jungle and hill training alongside Indian, British and Gurkha forces.
August 12: German quarterly exports of military equipment reach their highest postwar level (with the scope of said achievement somewhat limited in light of the long time restrictions on any such participation in the international arms trade by Berlin) on the back of increased sales to Arab states, Persia and the Balkans, on top of the massive Turkish arms deal that continues to enrich the Teutonic arms titans of Krass-Maffei, Krupp, Gruber-Mauser, Rheinmetall, Messerschmitt and Thyssen-Henschel.
August 13: The Journal of the American Medical Association publishes a landmark extended study on the negative health effects of American football, specifically its links with severe concussions and other head injuries and subsequent traumatic dementia. Data from as far back as the 1920s was examined in order to provide a baseline as to effectiveness of the introduction of helmets and other protection, with a conclusion drawn that although helmets had reduced the incidence of more visible injuries, there had not been a reduction in the risk or incidence of traumatic concussions. Evidence from brain autopsies of deceased footballers who had suffered repeated concussions showed clear evidence of 'punch-drunk' lesions. The combined weight of the data from several sources indicated that protective measures including helmets had not had a significant effect in reducing the risk and incidence of traumatic head injuries and that the lifelong and lifechanging effects of such injuries were sufficient to support a conclusion that changes be considered to youth participation and that, at present, the sport could be characterised as 'unsafe at any age'. The article sparks immediate controversy and is covered extensively in the lay media, with some links drawn between the tragic death of champion boxer Cassius Clay from head injuries and the new findings on football.
August 14: Australian and British Phosphate Commission representatives reach an agreement with the native populace of Nauru for the investment of super phosphate profits into a sovereign wealth fund and the arcane restoration of the Pacific island colony’s interior to a pristine state.
August 15: USAF, USN and USMC aircraft begin disaster relief operations in Northern Luzon as part of Operation Saklolo, the effort to provide thousands of tons of aid to beleaguered flood victims.
August 16: Rebel elements in the Royal Moroccan Air Force attempt to shoot down the personal jet of King Hassan as he returns from a conference in France. After the assassination’s failure, the backlash lead by troops loyal to the King sees dozens arrested and the ringleaders swiftly guillotined.
August 17: The US Fourth Army stages Exercise Walker around Fort Polk, Louisiana, a simulated response to an ostensible outbreak of a mass infection zombie plague, which captures the attention of local journalists and newspapers, providing an effective concealment for the real purposes of the exercise.
August 18: British automotive exports continue to rise, with a tenth successive quarter of increased foreign sales, driven by increased demand in the Middle East, Africa and South America. The Land Rover remains the strongest performing non commercial vehicle, followed by the Austin Mini, the Morris Marathon, the Triumph 2500, the Vauxhall Viking and the Rover P25.
August 19: The Bay Area Rapid Transit, or BART, begins initial operation in San Francisco. The broad gauge high speed urban railway augments the existing streetcar network and it is projected that it will link together San Francisco with Oakland, San Jose, Fremont, Berkeley, Richmond, Vallejo and Petaluma.
August 20: An article in The Manchester Guardian describes the recent increase in popularity of Italian and Anglo-Italian food and restaurants across Britain, with the events of 1940 effectively snuffing out a thriving prewar niche and the bad feelings from the war preventing real cultural inroads over the subsequent decades, prior to the Anglo-Italian Trade and Cooperation Agreement of 1961 reopening scope for migration and culinary-cultural intercourse. The renewed significant presence of American military forces in Britain from 1961 is also described as playing a role in driving demand for dishes familiar from home, such as 'spaghetti bolonese', 'parmesiano' and 'pitza' (the last being described by the article's author as an ingenious open sandwich of cheese, tomato sauce, pineapple and sliced meat), in addition to the familiar ice cream stalls of prewar memory.
August 21: Distribution of war prizes from the Vietnam conflict begins in the United States, Australia, Britain and Canada, with museums, veteran's associations, municipalities and benevolent societies all submitting requests for a prized share in the captured enemy arms and equipment, including 175 tanks of a range of Soviet and Chinese types and several hundred artillery pieces and mortars of various calibres. The national collections of the Smithsonian, the Imperial War Museum, the Royal Canadian War Museum and the Australian War Memorial have already been allocated the principal prizes, including captured jet fighters.
August 22: Establishment of TSR Hobbies by Gary Gygax, Don Kaye and Dave Arneson in order to publish the new tabletop fantasy roleplaying game, Dungeons & Dragons. Using the capital and magic ring gifted to Gygax by a mysterious sorcerer, and despite the attempted trickery of a wicked wizard from the coast, the sumptuously produced and beautifully illustrated game will become an immediate best seller, riding the wave of the fantasy and sword and sorcery boom to sell 25,000 copies in its first year alone.
August 23: First deliveries to the USN of the McDonnell-Douglas A-4R 'Skyhawk II', a lightweight supersonic multirole light attack jet based on the now legendary Douglas A-4 Skyhawk (although looking similar, it bears relatively few common parts and the relationship is more reminiscent of that between the Vought Crusaders and Crusader IIs) suitable for operation on new light and escort carriers, as well as airborne platforms; the USMC has expressed strong interest in acquisition of the type for a continued light attack capacity, in addition to the planned VAX strike aircraft. The replacement of the North American A-5 Vigilante and Boeing F-111B carrier-based bombers with the VBX a new plane based on the Boeing FB-111 and North American B-73 Retaliator continues at expected pace, with the Marine version to replace their bombers being seen as the less complicated aircraft. The United States Marine Corps Future Air Systems Plan makes specific provision for a light attack role alongside the VAX, VBX and VFAX, in addition to the Harrier VSTOL ground attack fighter, the Tomcat, Phantom fighter-bomber and Starburst interceptor.
August 24: New Avalon border guards arrest six Mexican citizens for attempting to cross over the border fence from Sonora, finding explosives and automatic weapons in their possession, along with poorly written pamphlets calling for the liberation of California from 'the Americans and the English'.
August 25: Publication of the Appleby White Paper on the Royal Artillery, a study of its current equipment, projected procurement for the 1970s and future programmes. It endorses the formerly contentious attachment of 125mm armed field regiments and LARS batteries at brigade level in concert with divisional artillery brigades of 6” and 8” medium and heavy artillery; for its support of the retention somewhat maligned U.S. 175mm long range gun at corps and field army level; expanded procurement of wheeled self propelled guns for both coastal defence and expeditionary warfare; formation of specialist heliborne artillery regiments for operation of projected soft recoil aerial guns; and the procurement of very long range variants of the Hawker-Siddeley Javelin for high precision tactical missile strikes. It is notable for its length of clauses and sentences, extensive footnotes and a seeming relish of complex verbosity and sesquipedalian expression.
August 26: Opening of the Summer Olympic Games at the Great Stadium in Constantinople by Emperor Alexander in front of a crowd of over 400,000 spectators. The Olympics showcase the decade long programme of grand public works authorised by the young Emperor and the modernisation experienced by the Byzantine Greek capital since the 1950s war with the Turks.
August 27: A freak dust storm in Kern County, California, leads to multiple automobile collisions and pileups on several major interstate highways, killing 18 and injuring over 200.
August 28: England defeat Australia in the 6th Test at The Oval by 26 runs to retain the Ashes 3-2 in a thrilling conclusion to one of the best series in years. Celebrated Australian opening pair Bob Simpson and Bill Lawry made a century partnership in their final Test before Greg Chappell and Rod Marsh took Australia tantalisingly close to their target of 410 runs.
August 29: Commissioning of the Royal Canadian Navy’s first atomic guided missile super battleship, HMCS Canada, replacing the older battlewagon of the same name which saw service in the Second World War, Malaya, Korea, the Middle East War and Vietnam before decommissioning in 1969.
August 30: The British general election is held, with the Labour Party under Stanley Barton winning the most seats with 333, but failing to form the necessary majority of 421 in the enlarged House of Commons, where 60 new seats had been added since the last general election in April 1968 due to population growth reflected in the 1971 Census and the integration of Singapore. The Conservative opposition lead by Sir Enoch Powell rallied from their 20th century nadir of 1968 with 256 seats (a net gain of 83 including newly established seats), whilst the Liberals under the popular Sir Arthur Chamberlain saw a recovery to 148 seats (a gain of 24) and the Nationals under Erskine Childers also gained a dozen seats for a total of 44; 13 Imperialists, 13 Socialists, 17 Radicals and 19 Independents round out the house. With no party able to form a government in their own right, Mr. Barton continues as Prime Minister whilst expedited discussions take place with the Liberals for support on confidence and supply similar to the 1964-1968 agreement.
August 31: Rhodesian gold output reaches its highest yet monthly level of 2.4 million ounces, indicating that the prosperity and fortune of the gold rush has some time yet to run.

[jemhouston]

Hopefully the evidence of the head trauma will lead to improved safety for all sports.

[Simon Darkshade]

It is going to lead to some fairly marked changes directly, including one drastic option I'm mulling over, but as you say, the awareness of the risk will have a lot of flow-on effects in various sports where concussions are possible.

There are those, such as rugby and Australian Rules football, where concussions are not rare, but also not common to the same degree as certain other sports; they will see alterations in the management and treatment of concussion, rather than the 1970s and 1980s approach of 'toughing it out'.

[Eaglenine2]

Mongol Expeditionary Force?

[jemhouston]

It is going to lead to some fairly marked changes directly, including one drastic option I'm mulling over, but as you say, the awareness of the risk will have a lot of flow-on effects in various sports where concussions are possible.

There are those, such as rugby and Australian Rules football, where concussions are not rare, but also not common to the same degree as certain other sports; they will see alterations in the management and treatment of concussion, rather than the 1970s and 1980s approach of 'toughing it out'.
[/quote

US Basketball is a contact sport, US and Australian Rules football along with rugby are collusion sports.

I'll admit, back in the 60s I did where a helmet when I rode a bike. now when I see someone without a helmet, I think WTF.

[Simon Darkshade]

Mongol Expeditionary Force?

A force sent to provide fraternal aid and assistance to North Vietnam. Not quite the same as the 'Mongols' in the Korean War, which were a means of passing off Central Asian Soviet troops...

[Simon Darkshade]

It is going to lead to some fairly marked changes directly, including one drastic option I'm mulling over, but as you say, the awareness of the risk will have a lot of flow-on effects in various sports where concussions are possible.

There are those, such as rugby and Australian Rules football, where concussions are not rare, but also not common to the same degree as certain other sports; they will see alterations in the management and treatment of concussion, rather than the 1970s and 1980s approach of 'toughing it out'.

US Basketball is a contact sport, US and Australian Rules football along with rugby are collusion sports.

I'll admit, back in the 60s I did where a helmet when I rode a bike. now when I see someone without a helmet, I think WTF.

Basketball is already a fair bit back from where it was in @ 1972, where the Gallup polling data had it at 9%, far behind American football with 32% and baseball with 24%; the Dark Earth figures would be ~5%. As such, it won't really register with the same significance.

I'd say that rugby and gridiron are certainly collision based sports, using that terminology, but Aussie Rules is something short of that, with the collisions more incidental than inherent.

[Simon Darkshade]

July Notes:

-British marriage rates are rather higher than @, reflecting the differing social climate, whilst divorces are markedly lower for much the same reason. TFRs are still very healthy indeed
- Humphrey wraps up the Democratic race; anyone who wins really doesn’t have a real chance for victory after 12 years of JFK. Not that they have been bad years, but due to that, there is willingness for change, explaining RFK pulling out
- Floppy disks emerge earlier, along with the hint that laserdiscs are going to have a bigger role
- Orion 6 is going nicely, with the telecast from deep space being very widely watched. The space fighters on board aren’t really for the Space Nazis, not that far out, but ‘just in case’ there is anything else out there
- The US gets universal health care, which is generally welcomed by some quarters, but seen as an overreach by others. The general tone of debate is a bit higher brow than @ down the line, with the lack of Watergate and the Pentagon Papers et al playing a role. The way it is described is a deliberate hint as to how it is portrayed
- VFL expansion will be ignored on every site this is posted on, but one day, someone from Australia might read Dark Earth and get the local references
- MKULTRA looking into last test subjects results in some not going ‘off reservation’
- An Imperial Wheat Board demonstrates the level of Commonwealth economic integration
- Anglo-American cooperation on SLCMs, GLCMs and ALCMs is designed to spread the costs
- 12 Enterprises seems a lot, but takes the historical intent for 6 CVAN-65s in @ and then extends it out further over the 1960s where there was a historical gap in US carrier construction. Here, Franklin was laid down in 1968. The Ticonderogas following them are the equivalent to the Nimitz class CVNs of @; no carriers apart from FDR have been named after politicians or admirals, messing up the nomenclature. The Nimitz class DDGs will be a Kidd/Tico class equivalent built in Spruance numbers
- Death Valley being accidentally flooded gives some ideas to the scientists who might be familiar…
- The French are fielding a lot of interesting gear
- Tolkien uncovering Beowulf’s tomb results in some interesting finds
- The Bradley is earlier, larger and comes in more variants, including what amounts to a medium tank version
- The Battle of Mirbat turns out differently on account of having supersonic fighter-bombers on stand-by a comparatively short flying distance away
- US Army Middle East Command is eying off former British bases in Egypt out of necessity
- The King of Sweden has a coronation, attended by a lot of interesting figures
- Not only are there more federal public holidays in the USA, but some other trends are emerging
- Red Flag is slightly different
- Israel begins gearing up
- The Low Countries being known as a “UK” is a nice twist
- The Ministry of Munitions is very busy

[Eaglenine2]

Where is New Avalon?

[Simon Darkshade]

The Lower California Peninsula.

[Bernard Woolley]

I’m going to try and say nothing about Powell. The more I read about him in @, the less I like him.

I see Harry Brubaker not only survived that raid on the Bridges at Toko-Ri, but rose from Lt in the USNR to the dizzy heights of CNO!

Does Colonel Tony Nelson dream of Jeannie?

[Simon Darkshade]

In saying that you will say nothing, you’ve said quite a bit. I will note that he hasn’t had any reason to comment on immigration here, given a very different immigration situation; and has had a different career, being Secretary of State for the Commonwealth, then Secretary of State for India, Shadow Minister of War, Shadow Chancellor and now Leader of the Opposition. He is a very intelligent man and an intellectual as in @, who has been partly moulded by his wartime experiences (where he did succeed in seeing action and was recalled, like many others, during Korea) and partway reaching his youthful dream of becoming Viceroy of India, in a certain fashion.

Here, Brubaker was promoted to LtCdr after the Toko-Ri action in 1952 and finished the war in 1955 as a CAG who had been earmarked for future promotion to Captain and beyond. After that promotion and getting a carrier in 1959, he is promoted to Rear Admiral in 1963, Vice Admiral in 1967 and Admiral in 1970.

Nelson does dream of her, given that she was the one who saved him from the insect plague, when not trying to awaken his occasionally vague British offsider (‘Ground control to Major Thom!’)

[Bernard Woolley]

Powell was a complex man. Neither as good as his supporters say he was, nor as bad as his detractors would have it. I’ll never be a fan & dislike his anti-Americanism.

[Simon Darkshade]

As said, the DE Powell is a markedly different man, not quite yet possessed of the same anti-American instincts developed in @ WW2; the overall imperial situation is quite different compared to @ 1972!

He leads a Conservative Party with quite a frontbench - Reginald Maudling, Ian MacLeod, John Profumo, William Whitelaw, Peter Thorneycroft, Margaret Thatcher, Keith Joseph, Oliver Stanley, Duncan Sandys, Lord Carrington, Lord Salisbury, Randolph Churchill, Lord Wooster and Sir Charles Ratcliffe.

[Simon Darkshade]

August 1972 Notes
- The tripartite cooperation between Britain, Canada and the USA is not a takeover of either of the Anglo-Canadian or American programmes, nor a merger. Canada and the United States have broadly similar and indeed analogous missile defence threats, so already have requirements that work towards what they want and need. Britain faces a different threat, being closer to the USSR, with the majority of the Soviet missile threat coming from medium ranged weapons with a flight time of ~12 to 15 minutes; new missiles under development will halve that. This isn't a joint programme, but cooperative development, whereby three existing programmes are combined as far as possible under an overarching whole; there is some small possibility that the US will take the next generation long range missile, the British the medium range and the Canadians the short range, but this arrangement isn't written in stone
- The Nakajima YS-24 is a twin jet roughly in the class of the Boeing 737
- Televised election debates occur much earlier in Britain, but don't turn out to be decisive here
- Temür takes after a distant ancestor. Additionally of interest in Mongolia is the aged White Russian chief advisor to the Great Khan
- Admiral Brubaker did fly missions against the bridges at Toko-Ri in the Korean War, but doesn't have a basis for breaching the long standing tradition against women serving at sea, anymore than he has the cachet to make the USN dry
- The locust attack is based on a historical event, although there wasn't a fireball slinging genie resembling Barbara Eden involved in @
- England have a pretty strong soccer team and won't be missing out on 1974
- The Corvair isn't effectively killed off by Nader
- Trouble is brewing in Uganda, but the response is going to be a bit stronger than the non response rendered to Amin. Uganda, like many former British (and French) colonies in Africa, is independent in name, but in practice, has a lot of red lines that it cannot cross without getting a reaction. This isn't without controversy, but without any real Soviet penetration in Africa, there is still a strong level of control
- The meteor getting intercepted is another indicator of advances
- The US Army is starting to field specific light infantry formations, but the more substantial part of the 250th’s tale is their location. India is fairly firmly in the Western camp, but one of the future theatres of trouble lies in Burma, still administered by India
- German arms concerns are nudging into the international market; Mauser-Gruber is owned by multi-millionaire industrialist, Hubert Gruber
- The AMA wades in on American football in a pretty conclusive manner. As to what occurs, that will play out over the next year; I'm currently weighing up all options
- Nauru being restored means that the island country will not have anywhere near the same sad fate
- Exercise Walker is designed to test operations in a protracted global war, after a limited nuclear exchange, and also to rehearse how to cope with extraterrestrial invasion
- Several of the British cars described are original designs
- Italian (or Anglo-Italian) food finally starts to spread, after its niche was closed for years after the war. The spelling of several dishes reflects a particular garbling of pronunciation, with the inclusion of pineapple as an essential topping for 'pitza' likely to send some in DE (and maybe some on Earth) into paroxysms of apoplexy
- Vietnam yielding war prizes is a sign of how the war will be perceived: as another successful battle for freedom and right
- TSR is established earlier than @ by an enriched Gygax and co and rides the wave of the fantasy boom to quite significant heights. The wicked wizard from the coast didn't get to stop D&D!
- New Skyhawks are an unexpected turn, but come from a changing requirement for a light attack plane; they look similar and have the same name, but there is a lot different 'under the hood', like the comparison of the Crusader and Crusader III. The VBX will be a big bugger of a plane indeed and the Marines get Tomcats. The final aircraft referred to is the Lockheed-Martin F-13 Starburst, a very hot fighter-interceptor
- Mexican designs on New Avalon are as far fetched as the Argentine nationalists who dream of the Falklands and Prydain
- The Appleby White Paper, by the well known civil servant, outlines a number of coming developments in artillery; in providing the rubber stamp of a approval, it reflects the differing power centre in British defence politics, with the old chestnut of the Treasury having final say simply not applying
- The Constantinople Olympics will see some famous moments
- Certain Australian cricketers stick around longer, whilst others debut earlier and in style
- Canada gets new battlewagons
- Barton and Labour come out as the largest party after the '72 General Election, showing how capturing a majority is going to be quite difficult, but not impossible. The result reflects a contest where there wasn't really a major difference in the policies of the Conservatives and Labour; not the @ Butskellism by any stretch of the imagination, but a general agreement on domestic, foreign and military policy
- Rhodesia's gold rush will turn out to be quite valuable, in several senses of the word

[Eaglenine2]

Wasn't the American brigade in India 250th?

[Simon Darkshade]

Yes it was. Typo, which I’ll blame on typing on a telephone with one finger.