Shipbucket

As I move in to more advance phase on my AU after material gathering and creating the overall history elements I want to move in to consulting phase. Shortly speaking I will present you ideas that I want to incorporate in to AU and ask for opinions and I'm open to criticism.

For now I will only show basic information, no too much spoilers just to create a background for discussion. The basic information are that we move to time span from 1916 to 1940, only in real technology level and constructions. If it exist we take it in to consideration, fantasy creation... nope. Real world of that time (with some geopolitical exception) no extra land mass, no extra islands and no "Atlantis" syndrome. Every political element like Spain Civil War, Japan fights in China ect. are the same. Those are the basic information of time... now we take place.

This is no mystery for some people here that I work on AU placed in Alaska for pretty long time. I admit it take now a couple of years to gather some materials about that place and it is not easy to do as I think at start. At least where I live. The gathering process is not ended as appetite increase as you eat, Alaska became some of my favorite thing to learn about.

I would not say anything about geopolitical elements by now but the place is important factor, every idea you need to look by prism of Alaska natural environment. Because it is a major factor, even the most important in almost every aspect. In Alaska men bow before nature not in the other way... and if you don't bow, you die. It is a rich and beautiful land but also unforgiving and harsh, the Aleutian Chain is possible one of the most hostile to men place on the planet. Shit hit the fan is day like everyday there.

But the main task of this brainstorm are different point of view, I'm of course biased towards my work so I don't see the possible problems sometimes. The key word is Realism, of course for the sake of AU I need to bend some rules, expand population, increase economy and industry level ect. but nothing too big, no "empire from nothing".

I will try to present two "problems/ideas", one from civilian and one from military department. Today I like to ask about opinion for my idea that join to those thing in one. Transportation and to be more precise, truck.

By now I choose:

Marmon-Herrington 1932 TH320-6 6×6

Please take in to consideration the natural environment of Alaska as I ask before. Those are 1930's we talk about, if you have any other proposition or ideas about the interesting trucks of that time I would be glad to hear them. Also ask anything!

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Nobody expects the Imperial Inquisition!

It's certainly an interesting challenge when you try to think of an AU nation from a realistic standpoint. When I originally came up with the idea for Sieran there were a few key questions I had to answer, namely;

- How did the nation originate? Where is the diverging point from reality?

- What reasons are there to sustain the nation long term? A nation that has no strengths or reason for being would likely cease to be swiftly

- What limitations will the nation have? What sort of relations does it have with its neighbours and the global powers?

There are plenty others but those were the basics. I based Sieran on a real province and gave it a divergent point after the 1905 Bolshevik uprising in Tsarist Russia. That set up the sort of people who will make up the nation, their ethnic/cultural origins, some of their likely diplomatic relations, etc. the location being pre-existing made things somewhat easier too. Knowing it to be like Alaska and inhospitable. A much larger population than reality wouldn't make sense so that limits what your options are.

I guess what I'm saying in a long winded manner is that even in the manner of trucks, you need to think exactly what roles it is filling, who is ordering and driving them and who might be politically inclined internationally to provide them for you, if you lack the ability to produce them within your own nation.

That said I say bring on more minor power nations! I like the challenge of having many constraints.

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"The first rule is not to lose; The second rule is not to forget the first rule"

Alaska?!?

http://www.alaska-map.org/detailed-map.htm

Good grief! The Russians *(those guys who conquered Siberia previously.) tried to make a go of Alaska and they muffed it completely.

It's not that too far off the truth to say that the environment will kill you fast if you don't know what you are doing. That means once you move inland from the coasts (something like northern Norway, Sweden, and Finland for our European friends) it's almost a tundra desert like the similar terrain in Canada.

http://www.wildalaskatravel.com/alaska- ... ur-photos/

A 6x6 MH truck will not make it off road. That thing was designed for the Continental US. (Indiana 1930 mud roads specifically.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marmon-Herrington

You want FORD or Packard.

Thank you lads for comments. To respond to your questions/suggestions and not reveal too much of secrets:
Alaska as the nation or rather country as nation need to be "build" in contrast to just declare the independence (as our US friend's know well that declaration of independence is just a first step in creating of nation) was created in 20's after Alaskan defense war or as you like war of independence against Bolsheviks regime. We are in the multiverse where the Alaska was not sold to US in 1867 and was instead transferred towards Russian-American Company that was taken over by fictional House of Nevsky that became single ruler of now declared Grand Duchy of Alaska. In times of Civil War the Alaska was last bastion of White Movement and after imminent loss of Whites it declare independence. It take place after defeat of Bolshevik invasion.
After the end of civil War Alaska was the only "save heaven" for remnants of Russian aristocracy and intelligent's, also it was the place where the treasury of Tsars was evacuated along side most of good's of noble houses. Also I did "increase" amount of early oil fields discovery on south part of Alaska that alongside natural resources was main "fuel" for budget of Grand Duchy for most of early XX's. The creation of new nation move from simple survival of bolsheviks onslaught to self sufficient new homeland. Slow understanding that Imperial Russia or just Russia was lost and what was left is admittedly corrupted beyond any saving.
Main limitation of Alaska is based of it's unforgiving nature. Limitation of populace it can maintain by own power, lack of highly developed agriculture and limited birthrate that seriously hampered the population increase. Lack of heavy industry, limited level of any type of industry in fact. Poorly developed transport system etc. After all we speak about Alaska... it's not a milk & honey there.

The relation with neighbors are complicated. From friendly Canada towards suspicious US and rather not pleasant France. State of War that was only move to case fire agreement with Soviet Union. The situation became more and more complicated with increasing contacts with Germany and Italia, close trade ties with Japan and joining the anti Comintern pact.
The "core region" of Alaska is based on square from Anchorage towards Fairbanks then route number 2 and end at Juneau. I will not move beyond that already established urban zone existing in Alaska as realistic border of "civilization" in more organized form.
Well the MH was one of the best AWD tucks of that time, it's should be in all aspects better then FWD or RWD trucks in therms of off road use. And it was my main reason to look at MH first place. I was also looking on Pragha RV and Mercedes-Benz L 10000.
Can you point me towards specific models?

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Nobody expects the Imperial Inquisition!

If you want trucks in general, then the pre-WW II Prada's in Europe. Czech military equipment of the era was phenomenally good.

Ford Canada produced an excellent CMP 4x4

That should have been the British truck on D-day instead of the British made trucks chosen which were notoriously unreliable. The Canadian CMP was built for Canada.

Packard produced a medium weapon carrier for the US Army that was based on their 6x touring car. It was fairly good,

Marmon Herrington earned a good British reputation, chiefly among the South Africans who took the motor carriages and made decent armored cars out of them. But that was compared to typical British gear. Compared to Czech, French or even Russian equipment standards the MH was not that good. By American standards, it lost out to GM in Army trials, and GM was not that good either.

American heavy duty truck makers of the era were FMC, and International.

German trucks of the era are vastly overrated.

CMP was not on production line before 39' so it's out of competition. Praga ND and RV as trucks are in 35/38 time span but they lack AWD and after annexation any type of parts supply is out of question. Packard did not build trucks in that time span or I just unable to find one. Same with International, FMC only light ones.

I have pretty large knowledge about quality of Russian equipment of that time. There is the Bad quality - Terrible quality - Soviet quality. Exactly in that order. The GAZ-AA and ZiS-5 of prewar production ware just abominations. They break just from looking at them.

Speaking about CMP it lead me towards Scammell that is for sure interesting manufacturer.

German trucks ware not that bad, they ware even very good. Blitz was wonderful and tough truck but it was no good on any type of cross country driving. Mercedes-Benz L3000 was better in that role. Lancia 3Ro and FIAT-634N are also on table.

The main requirement I have is AWD and there is not too much competition in that department in 30's.

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Nobody expects the Imperial Inquisition!

That leaves:
Ford
American Bantam
Brockway
Caterpillar (outstanding)
Diamond T (also outstanding)
Federal *That's modern FMC
Freightliner *that's modern North American Daimler
Hayes Truck Company
International *You might know it now as Navistar.
MACK
Oshkosh
Studebaker (*Those 6x6s were unbreakable.)
and finally Willys (Jeeps)

All of them produced fair to goiod to excellent ATVS in the 1/2 to 4 tonne class in 1930s America. They had to. There was no good highway system outside the Boswash corridor or California before WW II. What passed for national roads in those days was semi-paved or gravelled. Europe had a better road network, though America had more and better cars.

1950s was when the country built a true highway system.
That explains all the Studebaker two tonners still running around as prime movers for the Red Army doesn't it?
That's Leyland, isn't it? Remember those lousy trucks that failed the British at Normandy? Guess who made them?"


Lancia (Italy) worked better than it looked. Fiat was CRAP.
Look through the US list. Studebaker, International, Caterpillar, Diamond T and Willys in that order. If you must GMC Truck also.

That's a good list, worth to dig up and closer look. Thx.
For saying such things you would go to prison... and it's not a joke. Saying that any "capitalistic" tech was better then glorious communist one was illegal.
Part of Leyland only after 50's before that Scammell made a legendary Pioneer. Also Albion CX22S was not bad.

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Nobody expects the Imperial Inquisition!

Interesting setting for the nation then, would seem a natural opposite to my own if they were to be in the same situation given the roughly comparable situations climate and economy wise.

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"The first rule is not to lose; The second rule is not to forget the first rule"