Alternate Generals II is, as the name
suggests, the second volume of the Harry Turtledove edited alternate
history series. While the
majority of the stories in the anthology are well written and well-throught
out, the book does suffer from one of the problems which plagued its
predecessor of not providing the casual reader with some of the background
information which would permit a greater enjoyment of some of the more
esoteric scenarios.
“American Mandate” is James Fiscus’s
description of an American colonial power in Turkey following the Great
War, with General Pershing attempting to deal with the high tempers that
are flaring against the corporate governor appointed by the Harding
administration. At the same
time, Mustafa Kemal is trying to spark a revolution against the sultan and
a modernization of Turkey. In
some ways, “American Mandate” is a utopian look at the early twentieth
century idea of political mandates, which leads to events falling a little
too perfectly in the interests of Pershing and his comrades.
Senator Adlai
Stevenson travels to a semi-occupied Alabama in Michael F. Flynn’s witty
“Southern Strategy.” After
the Americans did not participate in the Great War, but did join
Wilson’s League of Nations, the United States has been reduced to a
second-rate power. A series
of lynchings in the south, the clearings, has led to a League occupation
to bring about racial harmony. Stevenson
is brought into contact with a variety of factions, and while Flynn uses
analogs from history in a humorous manner, he also draws more serious
parallels in this racially divided country and the difficulties of getting
it back on track.
All too often,
alternate history authors take an historical figure, put them in a
different situation and proceed to alter their personality to the extent
that the author could be writing about anyone.
Harry Turtledove avoids this trap with his portrayal of Adolph
Hitler in “Uncle Alf.” Following
the German victory in the Great War, Hitler finds himself sent to Lille,
where a group of socialists are threatening the German occupation.
Turtledove’s portrayal of Hitler shows his hatred turned towards
anyone who he perceives as having wronged him or not living in the world
as he sees it. Although not
depicted as the monster he became historically, Turtledove’s character
is still loathsome in his self-congratulatory manner.
Noreen Doyle explores an alternative ancient Egypt in
“Horizon,” which provides her with one of the major problems in
writing alternate history: using
a period which many readers will be unfamiliar with.
However, even more important is that Doyle has elected to focus her
attention on the big picture, rather than flesh out characters that the
reader can relate to. Horizon
is a look at the Egyptian pharoah Akhenaten and his foray into Asia during
the war between the Hittites and the Mittani.
Judith Tarr has
written several novels about the crusades, and her story “Devil's
Bargain” continues in that milieu.
On the eve of laying siege to Jerusalem, Richard of England is made
an intriguing by the Old Man of the Mountain who ruled over the assassins.
While much of Tarr’s story is a straightforward account of
Richard’s battle for Jerusalem, the ending does look at Richard’s
reaction to his bargain in both a practical and psychological manner.
Roland J. Green
takes the famous incident of George Patton slapping a soldier as a
departure point in “George Patton Slept Here,” which follows the
Italian campaign through a series of letters, journal entries and
newspaper articles. Rather than giving in to his initial impulse, Patton gives
the soldier words of encouragement with the result that his reputation and
the campaign proceed in different directions.
In Harry Turtledove’s “The Great War” series,
George Armstrong Custer is allowed to live into the twentieth century,
where he becomes a tank division commander.
Chris Bunch repeats this casting, although he has created a Custer
who is identical to the historical figure, except born in 1885, nearly a
decade after the historical Custer was killed at Little Big Horn in
“Tarnished Glory.” In
this position, Custer takes over George Patton’s role in World War II,
since the Patton in this timeline was killed in World War I.
While many alternate histories debate the Great Man theory of
history, Bunch has created a scenario which shows how interchangeable
individuals can be: Custer
for Patton in Italy, Reno for Custer at Little Big Horn.
However, Bunch is not willing to champion this position, and
Custer’s actions in World War II, while similar to Patton’s, result in
a very different history in the second half of the twentieth century.
S.M. Stirling & Richard Foss use a series of
flashbacks en route to the presidential inauguration to tell the story of
two “Compadres” who have risen to the highest offices in the country.
The authors play the identity of Roosevelt’s Vice President, who is
not Charles Fairbanks, close to their chest, providing some clues as to his
identity throughout the story. Rather than being an alternate history about the effects of
change, in this case the placement of the Mexican-American border, this is
an alternate history of surprise, as the authors spring their Vice
Presidential selection on the reader.
Just as Judith Tarr visited the third Crusades with her tale of Richard
at Jerusalem, Susan Shwartz goes a century earlier to look at Bohemond at
Antioch in “And the Glory of Them.”
Besides the crusader motif, the stories have more in common as each
general finds himself having a strange encounter with a man who is, or may
be, his enemy. The stories work well when juxtaposed against each other, as
Tarr’s Richard accepts the advantage offered to him while Shwartz’s
Bohemond insists on earning glory for himself.
R.M. Meluch’s contribution to Alternate
Generals, “Twelve Legions of Angels,” begins as an extended joke
between the author and the reader. Told
as an investigation by Hermann Goerring into a piece of “speculative
fiction” written by Hugh Dowding following the successful invasion of
Britain by the Nazis, Meluch and the reader share in a laugh about how
Dowding describes what occurred historically and the disbelief in his
suggestions by those who have lived through this alternate reality.
Once the joke, which also serves to let the reader know what really
happened, is out of the way, Meluch uses the situation to have Dowding
examine his own feelings of responsibility for the downfall of his country
and the deaths of so many of its pilots.
Joel Richards creates an unlikely general in his story "In the Prison of His Days," set during the Irish uprising of 1913. The poet W.B. Yeats is
offered a generalship, and eventual cabinet post, for his assistance in an Irish uprising against the
English. The revolutionaries realize that in
addition to a flash point, they also need a method of spreading the word about their activities to the rest of the country.
Esther Friesner creates not just an alternate general in "Labor Relations," but an alternative way of making war. Friesner's general, the
empress of the Japanese, has come up with a plan to conquer Korea without ever engaging the Koreans in an actual battle. When one of her soldiers,
Matsumoto Yoshi eventually deserts because he realizes there will be no chance for him to gain glory in this war, the empress's plan is revealed.
Friesner's story relies heavily on magic and the supernatural to bring about its conclusion.
Turtledove has elected to end the anthology with a piece by William Sanders, who provided one of the high points of the first Alternate Generals with his story "Billy
M\itchell's Overt Act." In "Empire," Sanders builds an alternative North America which only slowly, but carefully, reveals its
shape. His portrayal of a Napoleon who never became Emperor of France, but instead finds himself dealing with Davy
Crockett, Sam Houston, and Andrew
Jackson is realistic. While "Empire" is not as strong a story as "Billy Mitchell's Overt
Act," it shows Sanders's ability with alternate history and providing details to the readers in a reasonable
manner.
