Chapter 67, London, 12 November 1936
Butler immediately felt vindicated by his dogged insistence to his superiors that letting Pollard anywhere near the headquarters was mad, practically begging for trouble. The Chief (Butler was intrigued that the Head of Service was involved in this – that suggested some attention from ‘on high’ in this approach to the SIS) had seemed disinterested (presumably the ongoing political chaos was sapping his capacity as much as it was everyone else’s) while Winterbotham, Head of Air Section, and the senior officer leading the Spanish monitoring, had seemed glibly, blithely dismissive of a risk. But Butler, kicking his heels while he waited for a response to his report on Spain (having had no response to his internal espionage), remained horrified by much in his home country. The sense of panic was everywhere, the sense held by the public of a failure by the Political class to improve the country was palpable. Mosley had been released and was holding rallies in the East End, the Communists (a convenient term used broadly by the print press for anyone of the left) were demonstrating wherever they could, and a weak Government was saying and doing very little.
They were in one of the safe houses, a tawdry, run-down affair midway between Regents Park and Hampstead Heath, a jumble of drab net curtains, streaked and fading tobacco stained wallpaper and God-awful furnishing, and all rounded off with the scratching of mice behind the floorboards.
Pollard, actually the retired Major Hugh Pollard, arrived in the dingy little house with Falstaffian flair, throwing open the door with such energy that it slammed into the young lad keeping watch.
“View Halloo! Horrid gaff you’ve got here, are you the grand fromage?” They were stood in the narrow hallway.
It took the nonplussed Butler a moment to realise that Pollard was addressing him. “Actually, you want Turley, he’s through there.” Butler, as he pointed towards the front room, spoke with a surly tone, his distrust of Pollard’s faux bonhomie palpable. ‘Turley’ was the working alias for Winterbotham for this briefing, although Butler suspected that they knew one another. As Pollard bounded towards the front room, Butler silently followed him in.
Winterbotham and Butler had arranged the room carefully and according to the agent’s handbook; three chairs, carefully triangulated, with Pollard furthest from the door and in a battered armchair that seemed to part swallow Pollard as he sank into it. Butler and Winterbotham, by contrast, sat on higher, rigid, dining room chairs.
“Hugh,” Winterbotham said with a weary sigh, his sharp city suit utterly out of place in the squalid safe house.
“Freddie,” Pollard said warmly.
“Your latest report,” Winterbotham said in a chilly tone, “I know that you didn’t receive sufficient thanks for it,” he said this without the merest hint of gratitude, “it did get to Sinclair.”
Pollard snorted. “That little shit in Lisbon wanted the glory for…”
“…we are aware,” Winterbotham snapped, earning a look of surprise from Butler, “of the issues with Lisbon station.” Winterbotham looked, very briefly, perhaps unintentionally, to Butler, perhaps aware that Butler was still suspicious of the role of the SIS team in Lisbon in rescuing him during the abortive mutiny. “That is not your concern.”
“But Sinclair read the report?” Pollard, to Butler’s fascination, was less bombastic now, Butler sensed that he was focussed on getting something from the SIS men.
“He did,” Winterbotham confirmed, “and he has used your views to gain a French perspective.”
“Frogs? Why?”
“Because,” Winterbotham said, equably, “the establishment of a Soviet regime in the Iberian Peninsula is hardly, I think you’d agree, a happening which anyone could view with equanimity for military, political or economic reasons.” Those weren’t Winterbotham’s words, Butler immediately recognised them as Sinclair’s, but Winterbotham made a decent enough stab or repeating the Chief’s opinions without it sounding too artificial.
“You’ll look into it, then?” Pollard was alert, but trying not to seem so.
Winterbotham, with a sideways glance, deflected to Butler, who spoke for the first time in this meeting.
“Yes, Sir,” Butler said the 'Sir' despite himself, “if the Communist International is funding overt and secret activities in Spain we’ll get to the bottom of it.”
“With,” Winterbotham interjected sternly, “our colleagues in the Deuxième Bureau.”
Pollard nodded, again, trying to seem nonchalant. He really was a barely contained bundle of energy. “Was that it, then?”
Winterbotham shook his head slightly. “Franco.” It was said, not as a question, but merely as a statement.
“Franco,” Pollard said, relaxing as the matter close to his heart was raised. “What do you make of my little shopping list?”
Winterbotham shot an exasperated look at Butler before looking gravely at Pollard. He sighed, seeming to weigh up whether or not to obfuscate or be direct. “You really ask too much,” he said after an awkward pause, Butler relived that the direct approach was favoured.
“Now hang on Freddie,” Pollard began, forcefully, trying, messily, to rise out of the armchair, “this is the Ascot, the Cowes, of espionage. I’m giving you access to a coming man…”
“…at the cost of hunting horses and lavish expenses?” Winterbotham had adopted a forensic tone.
“A man has to maintain a cover, and mine would be as a hunting gentleman,” Pollard said with wounded pride.
“You are rather famous, one might say
infamous, for your exploits with Franco,” Winterbotham said calmly, continuing his demolition of Pollard’s demands, “we.”
“We?” Pollard sought temporary refuge in a question.
“We,” Winterbotham said, a touch of force creeping into his voice, “do not agree that a cover story is required.”
“But, er, er,” Pollard again heaved himself forward, trying to get out the chair.
Winterbotham looked at Butler again. “Mr Butler here,” he pointed at Butler, “also has concerns about the diplomatic passport that you have requested.”
Pollard, his mouth still flabbily flapping open and shut like a newly landed trout, looked from Winterbotham to Butler. “You do?”
“I…”
“…he does,” Winterbotham interjected, seemingly determined to maintain control. “A gentleman abroad, even one for hunting, wouldn’t go on a diplomatic passport.”
“It would signal to everyone, the Abwehr, the Deuxième Bureau, that you’re on the payroll,” Butler spoke with a quiet authority, earning a nod of approval from Winterbotham.
“Typical,” Pollard said with a flourish, rallying, “I hand him the keys to Franco, and he treats me like a common jailer.” Without any invitation he made a third, successful, effort to rise from his chair, straightened his rumpled blazer, and stalked from the room; it was, Butler admitted, quite magnificent, the gloriously haughty attitude only magnified when Winterbotham’s secretary, returning from notifying the Chief that contact had been made, stopped him from getting out of the room.
“And good day to you madam!” Pollard boomed.
“Well, that went well,” Butler said softly.
“I trust that you had envisaged this?” Winterbotham, to Butler more of a civil servant than he realised, was now evidently shifting the responsibility for this debacle onto Butler. “And, therefore, that you have a plan?”
Butler looked at his superior. “If you want to get to Franco, you need someone who knows Spain. Not,” he pointed at the door where Pollard had just left, “that idiot, but someone who has an excuse to travel to Spain. And who doesn’t need a diplomatic passport.”
“I believe you have contacts?” Winterbotham ignored Butler’s sarcasm.
“Yes, one in particular. He’s high up in Vickers-Armstrong.” Winterbotham looked alarmed. “Not too high up, but the Francoists will not be offended by him.”
“One of us?” That, Butler realised sadly, was the important question; he had anticipated that or ‘is he clubbable’ being raised in the meeting.
“Well,” Butler began warily, “not really. He has risen up, I’m told he’s very
capable at his day job.” This was Whitehall code that Butler’s contact wasn’t very Establishment, certainly not from the gentry or the shires, and probably not from the banking, Army or academic families who made up for their lack of money by sheer brain power.
“Political?” Winterbotham seemed to be going along with the plan.
“Scores highly here,” Butler said warmly. “Seems to occasionally mix himself up with Mosley and his boys.”
“That would work in his favour,” Winterbotham said to no one in particular. “I’ll prepare orders for him to go out. He can take two assistants, one of them will be you, the other should be someone disposable, preferably one of his subordinates, or a family member. Prepare the mission, Butler”.
“I already am,” Butler said quietly. Then, realising that Winterbotham was too tired to give an answer to a question that had been niggling for some time, warily asked it anyway. “Can I ask why we want to get to Franco? What are we going to say?”
Winterbotham, not nearly as commanding as Pollard, tried to look down at his subordinate. “The less you know, the better. Just arrange the route, will you,” the ‘will you’ was the most patronising that Butler had been addressed since joining the Secret Service from university. “And there is something else,” his eyes looked at the floor, evidently uneasy with what he was about to say.
“I sense I’m about to roll my eyes,” Butler said, trying to build bridges.
Winterbotham offered a wearied smile. “We have a problem. Did you notice a well-dressed man leaving as you arrived? Tall, well-dressed? As out of place as me in the safe house?” Butler nodded. He had noticed the smart cut of the man’s suit, the obvious worth of his watch, briefcase and spectacles, and the obvious air of arrogant irritation at lowering himself by visiting a tawdry SIS safe house. “He was from the Treasury. From Churchill himself.”
“Why…”
“We have a problem. A young man, Esmond Romilly, has vanished from France.”
Butler now rolled his eyes. “Why do we care that another young idiot from the Treasu…”
“…silence!” Winterbotham’s loss of patience was dramatic. “This is unpleasant enough without you interrupting me. This is not strictly Treasury business as he’s not from the Treasury. He is Clementine Churchill’s nephew.”
“Oh God.” Butler couldn’t resist interrupting, despite Winterbotham’s evident anger. “We’re really being tasked…”
“Yes,” Winterbotham said with a groan, “yes we are. He has been travelling through France, cycling south on, as the Chief calls it, 'a diet of coffee and absinthe'. He was last seen in the docks of Marseilles, presumably looking for either a tart or a way to get to Spain.”
“Any leads in Spain?” That was important, as Butler hoped that the lad was already there; Butler’s priority up until now had been the Nationalists in Spain and a diversion to Marseilles was unfeasible.
Winterbotham looked ready to snap again but realised that Butler was acting professionally and nodded, sadly. “We’ve heard rumours. Some of your old contacts in the Republicans have reported someone matching his description turning up in Catalonia. There is a small band of British types there, one of them is on the Paris Embassy’s payroll.”
Butler thought back to his own network in Spain from his days in the Embassy. It had been a small but promising group of contacts and Butler had been quietly hopeful that, in time, they would report on foreign influences in Spain, identify the promising leaders rising through both factions, and in time provide a conduit for whatever influence Britain wished to exert. They were good people, and Butler had, in this British exile, thought of them often. He feared that the network had collapsed or rotted away through inactivity. “We don’t usually do this sort of thing.”
“The Government,” Winterbotham said tiredly, “is terrified of anything that will make it look weaker than it already is. They have utterly washed their hands of Spain, and it is not convenient to have someone connected with our illustrious Chancellor jumping into the conflict.” He assumed a more commanding tone. “That is your second, but most important task in this operation. Try and get a message to Franco, but in all circumstances bring young Mr Romilly home.”
====
Reg McKay yawned and rolled over on the camp bed; hating, again, the light, airy, suburban setting and hating himself for rolling over. He wanted to vomit, badly, but he had been sick at least five times through the night and all he would do was heave and wretch uselessly. He realised with a mix of feelings, from accomplishing another of life’s milestones to a very real sense of shame, that he was suffering his first hangover.
The house belonged to a Mr Garrowby, a rather earnest little accountant who had agreed to look after Reg for Uncle Vernon, who had rescued him from a battering at the ‘Battle of Hyde Park’. Reg was thankful for the rescue and that miraculously Uncle Vern had been in London anyway. But it had turned rather queer; he had been curiously keen to keep Reg away from ‘the digs’ in London and had fobbed him off on the accountant, apparently temporarily. Except that temporarily had been a week, and counting. Uncle Vern had occasionally stopped by to check on him, that courtesy extending to taking Reg to a swanky party somewhere in Central London full of ‘la di dah’ types. They had mocked his accent, loved his account of the March and his subsequent adventures, and plied him with more and more wine (not, he noticed, the beer that the miners of Whitburn drank). He had even learned a really weird dance with some posh girl (she had stunning legs, though). That he liked female company and it seemed to like him (only to talk to, so far) was another milestone.
And now this, another day in this peculiar box of a house. It looked like an ice cream parlour, all white and coloured stripes, or perhaps a petrol station. But Abbotshall Avenue was a new development, the accountant, who had been among the first to buy into the street, called it ‘the future’; the residents were all middle-class professional types, and included the architect, a Mr Woodward, and most of his family. They were pleased (and to Reg’s mind obsessively) that their little street had featured in a magazine called
‘Design for To Day’ last August and viewed their light shiny homes as a beacon of the future among the dowdy semi-detached homes of North London. He sat up, slowly this time, and was rewarded an ache in the left side of his head. He vaguely remembered ending the evening drinking something called a ‘hanky panky’; the thought of its sharp contents made his stomach lurch. He staggered to the bathroom.
It was in the bathroom, kneeling as his stomach, long devoid of content, heaved helplessly, that Uncle Vernon and the accountant found him.
“Ah, that takes me back,” Uncle Vernon said in a cheery tone, “prostrate before the porcelain god.”
“Er, hello,” Reg managed between heaves.
“Get up,” Uncle Vernon said, a harsh tone creeping into his voice. “You drink with the grown-ups? Fine, but you take the pain the next day”. In a characteristically loud suit, well-oiled hair and fresh face Uncle Vernon, who had more than outdrank Reg, looked no different from usual, much to Reg’s irritation.
“Er, alright, why the hurry?” Reg sounded hurt.
Butler walked in just as Reg stood up too quickly, triggered another bout of retching, and took a moment to compose himself. “I’d normally say I hope you’re all well, but on this occasion that feels fairly ill judged,” he said wryly. “Who,” he said, pointing to the sickly Reg, “is this?”
“Oh, that’s Reg, my sister’s son,” Uncle Vernon said with a touch of pride.
“Age?” Butler was very much in charge.
“He is seventeen,” Uncle Vernon, to Reg’s fascination, said without his customary swagger.
“Education?”
“He completed school,” Uncle Vernon said, continuing as if Reg wasn’t there.
"I see. Employment?”
“He acquitted himself well in a regional newspaper, kept trying to leave to try and join the Army, at which he was frustrated by my Brother-in-Law, so joined the Jarrow Marchers as a correspondent cum mascot, then narrowly avoided a kicking by Tom’s boys, and for the past week or so has been my fixer here in London.”
Butler raised an eyebrow. “Dependable?”
“I’ll vouch for him, yes,” Uncle Vernon said simply.
Butler didn’t reply but looked at the accountant. “He would make a credible resource,” he said, with more flair than Reg had seen in his week at Abbotshall Avenue. “He’s not very good on the juice, though, Cyril.”
Reg’s surprised face made the accountant chuckle. “Don’t ask, boy, but I am not the ‘stuffed shirt’ that you think I am”.
Reg now looked at Uncle Vernon, who laughed even more heartily than the accountant. “I’ve got some talking to do, Reg, I can see that. Is he with us?”
Butler looked shrewdly at Reg. “He travels in your charge, Vernon, but yes I think that his resourcefulness and lack of ties makes him useable. Is he packed?” This was to the not accountant-seeming accountant.
“He travels light so can be in all of five minutes.”
Butler nodded. “Thank you, let’s be at it then. Travel by road to where?”
Uncle Vernon pulled out a notebook. “To be honest it’s slim pickings. Our best bet is a Bibby Line liner from Liverpool to Gibraltar, the
Oxfordshire sails in two days’ time”.
Butler nodded. “Yes, I’ll get the travel girls to book us all passage. Second Class, I think.” Uncle Vernon frowned. “Sorry, but just in case we get a senior colonial or military type. Better than the P and O?”
Uncle Vernon nodded. “I would have said flying…”
Butler shook his head. “Too ostentatious. You’re a representative of Armstrong-Whitworth, not a film star”.
Uncle Vernon looked wounded. “They flew me to Hamburg”, he said in a hurt tone.
Butler pushed on. “But better than the P and O?”
“Yes,” Uncle Vernon said slowly. “Less Government types”.
“Right. You and the boy go and do what you need to, I’ll meet you in Liverpool tomorrow evening.”
====
GAME NOTES
Apologies, dear readers, for the delay. We are rapidly (well, steadily) approaching a major PoD for this TL, namely one of three of four possible political outcomes after the near certainty of a General Election and these are, broadly, Chamberlain wins and can prevail despite his naughtiness, Chamberlain stumbles/does a Teresa May leading to another Tory taking over (with another PoD for either Chamberlain loyalists or one of the outliers), some form of National Government emerging, or further Royal-inspired chaos. I have, as
@El Pip will testify, agonised over this PoD as it is so fundamental to what comes next. But having looked again at the landscape of 1936 I have alighted upon a course of action that I think is plausible (actually, the most plausible). But that has taken some time, as well as the necessary recalibration. Ultimately, with the expansion pack, I opted to replay the game (making the same decisions through 1936 that I already had) and am up to late 1938. I can now steer a path for us to what will be a form of WW2.
Back to this chapter and I’ve tried, as I occasionally do, to tie together some loose ends, as well as introducing some OTL events. And, as ever, truth is stranger than anything I could concoct. The idea of Clemmie Churchill’s nephew going to Spain may seem a stretch, but not as much as a mad Englishman offering himself as an interlocutor to Franco. Both, remarkably, happened.
To the Churchill connection, first, and here I get unsympathetic with yet another stupid Englishman getting involved where he is not needed, something of a Thirties habit for the British. From a privileged background, the early 30s saw Esmond Romilly as a communist, and then a writer, and now latterly an anti-fascist heading (as he did OTL) to Spain to fight against Franco. That he stopped off in Marseille is true, it was a common staging post for Northern Europeans heading to the conflict, and it would appear that SIS’ contacts in the city were good at this time. Of course historically the British Secret Service was not tasked with retrieving him; here, with a connection to the Chancellor of the Exchequer in a far from stable government, I suggest that that SIS might be tasked to get him home. In OTL the silly idiot was invalided home in early 1937, only to vanish during WW2. Just to ram home the point that the Romilly brothers were overindulged fools, his older brother Giles was captured in Norway in 1940, a bit of a distraction for his uncle who by then was First Lord of the Admiralty.
And then we have another colourful character. Hugh Pollard was another English eccentric, something of an Elizabethan throwback, a catholic, a right-winger, and, as hinted, a huntsman and sportsman. He, of course, piloted Franco’s plane when he flew to Morocco in July 1936 and in a slight distortion of history I have hinted that it was Pollard who approached SIS in 1936, when it was actually someone (it appears suitably murky whether it was the Head of SIS, Admiral Sir Hugh Sinclair, or Winterbotham) from SIS who approached him. SIS, it appears, thought that this was an opportunity to understand Franco’s thinking but then blanched when Pollard named his demands; the scene with Winterbotham and the forensic dismantling of Pollard’s justification is fiction but I can imagine the raised eyebrows that the gloriously exorbitant bill would have prompted.
Winterbotham was real, of course, and is a character as colourful, in his own way, as Pollard. At varying times a lawyer (good man!), an Army (then RAF) Officer, a farmer, and a spymaster he was vital in Britain’s aviation intelligence in the build-up to WW2. Spain was an area of focus for him, hence he led the overtures to Pollard. During the war, of course, he was heavily involved in disseminating ultra decrypts. Getting a handle on his character proved so difficult that I almost ditched the chapter; in the end I made him focussed, professional.
Both events happened in relative proximity so I have bundled them up as a problem for our man (not quite) in Spain, Butler, to handle, dragging in Uncle Vernon and the ‘expendable’ Reg McKay. I envy them, because in this TL it will be a difficult winter for the British.
The Hanky-Panky is a cocktail made from gin, sweet vermouth, and Fernet-Branca. It was created by the head bartender at the Savoy Hotel and have gambled that it was still popular in the mid 30s. Another realism point, the shipping information is also accurate.
A final word on the architecture, seeing as I have given Victorian slums and Interwar suburbia a background role in this chapter. The shabby nature of much of inner city housing was a factor well before Attlee and his 1945 government made an issue of it (the problems were already well known by 1936, never mind 1945) but official measures were sporadic at best (there were benefits, of course, from the plethora of statutes cleaning up other things, such as air and water). ‘The market’, of course, was active, with the range of suburban North London estates such as the (real) Abbotshall Avenue which did indeed feature in lifestyle magazines. In the other AAR I talked about the ‘third Britain’ creeping up in the 30s, between the dingy industrial cities and the bucolic English countryside. Abbotshall Avenue is an example of that suburban Britain.
HOI4 is weird about the british empire. With France, they made the fairly correct decision of having pretty much all of it as 'France', which is certainly how the French viewed it all, even if it wasn't quite like that in practice.
With the British though...directly controlling Egypt is presumably something to do with Suez and Mediterranean balancing...but otherwise the decisions made are so crazy. The British Raj is a Dominion (and thus one step away from independence in 1936). British Malaya and Malaysia next door on the other hand, is annexed and directly administered. And whilst the dominions can be built up by the british, industry and otherwise, you can't dump a load of produce and force/flood them with your military cast offs to make sure they are properly equipped/you get your money's worth out of the Empire.
Having looked at the Raj, the next chapter will look at the 'white' Dominions, which is almost as messy.
I understand the importance of India to Britain - also its remoteness from London, which makes it somewhat hard for politicians and public to take Indian problems seriously. But I will say that I think an Indian uprising would be Very Very Bad, and especially so since war is coming.
I see definite parallels here. Lloyd George tries his tricks and stratagems, hoping to hang on to power despite what his head tells him is coming. And Britain hangs on to power in India, unable to either crack down and rule it or to peaceably let it go. There is a lot of denial going on, and I am not talking about a river in Egypt.
So expecting Lloyd George to do anything constructive about India ia a pipe-dream. I confess I don't see how he plans to turn the Indian situation to his advantage in domestic politics, and frankly I'm glad I'm not in his position.
Send the King to Jarrow? Mayhap he will get himself shot. Still, getting the public to support the King is the only way Edward or Lloyd George survive.
India will be a mess for whomever takes over from DLG - I have alighted on what I think would happen, and it will shape the Empire and its response to WW2 dramatically.
Jarrow is a couple of chapters away.
All I can see of this is a gigantic poltical scandal that will hurt the whole establishment right when it needs stability the most (in the run up to confronting Hitler), and the Tories in particular. Electoral success has tied them to this specific king. And he's going out, no matter what at this point.
So yes, and the nature of that is what shapes the successor to DLG. A great deal of damage has been done, domestically, to the UK.
Would the next government keep him there, or barring his resignation could they replace him? Perhaps if he wasn't doing too well then Chamberlain would leave him to twist in the wind?
This is conjecture, because I'm leaning towards Churchill admitting defeat and resigning with what's left of his grace and honour before this is all over. What happens after that depends...he could well let his depression take him and commit suicide. He could be stuck in the wilderness forever. He could be booted to somewhere in the Empire where his gob could be of some use (Canada, the US?). Or sent to India with the slimmest hope of being rehabilitated if he does well, or at least doesn't mess things up further.
What is clear is that the hawks have been stuffed by this whole affair. No one left of relevance of that wing, and yet the doves are not going to be as well secured as they were OTL. Chamberlain, presuming he gets in, will not have the smooth run up to war (where he did start rearming, did start preparing, etc etc, whilst trying to stave off the war for as long as possible)...I suspect the UK is going to crash and burn in 1937, probably for most of the year. Nothing useful will be done until 1938, and that's too late.
I think that's fair as far as the political bit goes - the best possible outcome (the big beasts of the anti-appeasers live to fight again) just isn't the most likely one as Amery, Churchill, Bracken etc are going down in flames with the King.
I confess that I am not entirely understanding this - yes the combined trifecta of Church, Parliament, and Civil Service/Establishment are too great to be overcome, but if DLG somehow pulls a whole rabbit warren out of his hat and comes out of the general election with a mandate, then can he not then use a combination of parliament and the royal prerogative to break the establishment? I understand why a sane person would not do this - it would burn the whole British government and empire to the ground, but at this point Edward and DLG don’t seem to care so long as they get to rule over the ashes. At that point, the Church is isolated, and could be left to fume as Edward and Wallis tie the knot at the registrar’s office in Jarrow.
He can, if he has a majority in parliament, make pretty much anything legal. Enforcement would be the problem then. And of course, the dominions can do what they will in regards to this matter, which in game translates to fucking off entirely from this mess and going independant.
The Church openly refusing the marriage and coronation will be extremely bad for everyone, across the empire.
And, before the marriage can gin through, wallis needs that divorce. Which is going through the courts. Which are independant from everyone else and extremely good at fending off pressure from outside forces.
Let us be clear. DLG is not going to win a healthy majority, get around the Church of England and the Kirk of Scotland and the entire Civil Service, get the divorce through in a timely fashion and then have the marriage declared in a random office. Such a ridiculous farce would, at some or various points in the chain, cause his majority MPs to start rebelling and defecting back to Chamberlain or forming a new party (since they somehow have so many members and seats).
It is still possible for Wallis to get divorce and married to the king. But that's it. The Churches will not recognise it, and will hold (in Scotland's case) the king in violation of his oaths of office to defend and promote the Church of Scotland. The judiciary, after some contemplation, may well respond with 'this drive is legal in the U.K., but we are unsure as to whether we can force the Church to recognise it. Therefore, an act of parliament is necessary to define the law.'
Then DLG really needs to double down and pass another law saying that it is legal and then church must recognise it. They refuse. Etc etc. This does not end well. Before this point, his government will collapse and the king pushed out, if he even wins an election an all which...hmm.
I agree with a lot of this, which is why the DLG administration is royally screwed.
If they’d been true to recent form they would have consulted the odious Ribbentrop!
He’s doing a lot of that.
Oh dear, he really
must be angry! He should have knocked it back in a single gulp and
then tossed it into the fireplace!
But don’t give the glass to Winston
Fair point… does this mean that Scotland can legally secede from Great Britain then according to the terms of the 1701 Act of Union?
No. The oath about defending the Scottish Church is older than the act of union. It was more a measure to ensure that the Scottish Church would not and could not be subsumed by the (much, much more Catholic based) Anglican Church of England.
I don't think anyone foresaw a king screwing over both at the same time, and all the other ones as well.
As for Scottish secession, there is no Scottish Parliament, political movement or real desire to leave the UK, so no one is going to suggest it outside of drinking hours. And of course, whilst Parliament does have the power to grant Scottish independence, they're the only people who can. The Union Act sure didn't leave any wiggle room for Scotland to get out, and why would it? Even the US has been very clear that no one leaves the US once you're in.
Agree - Scots nationalism isn't a factor here, it isn't anywhere near the issue that it became after 1997.
I remain surprised Churchill has stuck it out this long, I'd have thought relations between him and DLG would have reached unworkably toxic long ago, to say nothing of his doubtless colourful views on the tricks DLG is pulling.
I look forward immensely to Eddie in Jarrow, it is one thing to swan around as the Prince of Wales emoting about things, quite another when you are the King and there is a constitutional crisis going on. Plus of course there is the Wallis question, putting Eddie in front of the public could, theoretically at least, help (even if I suspect in his current mood it won't), but Wallis must be kept away from the public at all costs. So when Eddie demands she comes along on the trip there is bound to be fireworks.
I am a tad more optimistic about things. Nev can hardly cockup foreign policy worse than OTL, so nothing can get worse there. The long lead time items are capital ships for the Navy (and they are well in hand) and aircraft design. The crucial decisions in the air all pre-date the start of the AAR, so the Spitfire and Hurricane are coming, Shadow Factories have been planned and so on. At worst the bomber specs get delayed, but to be brutal given how Bomber Command performed until say 1942 that is not exactly a bad thing, you could even make the cynical case it's a net benefit not being able to launch a bomber offensive. On land, Army re-armament started in earnest so late that even a 1938 start would be an improvement over OTL, as long as the R&D happens (and it's cheap, so it will) no real loss there.
Of course compared to the ideal then this is all still bad news, but it's not existentially bad either. Indeed depending on what Naval tricks our author has up their sleeve things could be better, I have hopes for Churchill's last gift to the nation - a better naval building programme which ends up being too far advanced to get cancelled.
So I do agree mon brave, materially much will be as it was OTL (the RN gets some ships, the RAF gets some planes, the Army does its best until it can expand and rearm). I think that this TL will have two effects; the British lose credibility as a stable ally, leading some (France and maybe the Dominions) to look elsewhere, and second that the different prewar experience will impact upon doctrinal thinking (less so the RN but perhaps, in light of what I'm about to unveil, the Army and RAF). This and the butterflies from the first point mean that while there will be a war, the nature of that war and how is it fought will be different.
The end of his story is still looking a lot more like a death by bullet or bottle than any kind of triumph. That's the tragedy of the thing. So many potentials brought low and put by the petty desires of two horrible men (DLG and Edward).
It will get worse before it gets better...
Having spent the past week reading this AAR from the very beginning, I am fully caught up now. Another great AAR you have written, Le Jones.
I am thoroughly enjoying the turmoil King Edward VIII is putting England through in his hell-bent determination to marry Wallis Simpson, a woman whom almost nobody likes. The fall of the Baldwin government, the return of David Lloyd George as Prime Minister (he's like that bad movie sequel nobody asked for), the constant political plotting and maneuvering, England in the midst of a political war: King Edward and his motley band versus everybody else...all this over an American woman. I love that.
In the war between Edward and everybody else, I think the King is ultimately going to lose. As Le Jones has expertly laid out, there is too much opposition for Edward to overcome in his determination to both be the King of England and the third husband of Wallis Simpson. He can't be both and I think he will end up losing his throne one way or another. As other readers have said, the question is how much damage will Edward inflict on his country before he heads to the exit...again, all this over an American woman.
Then there's Oswald Mosley. I don't know much about him; before HOI2, I didn't know he even existed. But he has this look that makes me want to punch him in the face. I think someone who has never heard of Oswald Mosley, doesn't know a thing about him, would look at him and go "I don't know why, but I suddenly have a strong urge to punch this man in the face."
My dear chap! Welcome! I do need to canvass your opinion on a US element, actually...
Why kicking the face while having his balls to cut...
Oh Dear...
