At 05:30 PM 5/9/2002 -0600, you wrote: >This is probably old news by now, but it's pretty surreal. Apparently, >Kaiser Wilhelm II wanted to "put America in its place," and even had a US >invasion plan drawn up in 1897. > >http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,712147,00.html > > >From the article: "It was planned down to the last detail. Sixty German >ships laden with tens of thousands of troops were to arrive at various >points on the US Atlantic seaboard. Several thousand soldiers would land at >Cape Cod and march into Boston, while heavy cruisers entered New York's >Lower Bay to bombard Manhattan. > >In Washington, President Theodore Roosevelt would be forced to negotiate..." > >Now there's a scheme that was doomed to failure. > >Kevin Street
I read a fiction book about five years ago that covered this very same subject. It was written by a HS History teacher. It's set in 1900; Kaiser Bill demands that the US turn over its recently acquired overseas territories (acquired during the Spanish-American War) to the Second Reich. When President McKinley refuses, Germany lands troops on Long Island and occupies Brooklyn and Manhattan. With the bulk of the Regular Army fighting Aguinaldo in the Philippines, it falls to the militia to resist the invasion. McKinley dies (either from a stroke or a heart attack) due to stress and TR becomes President. The militia doesn't fare too well against the Germans, and it appears that the US will have to give in to Germany's demands. However, with some covert assistance from Great Britain, and due to a quickly negotiated settlement with the Philippine rebels (which grants them independence) the US is able to transfer its combat ready troops from the Philippines to the US for a climatic battle. The US is victorious and the German army is beaten. I don't remember if the author mentions the invasion plan referred to in the article above, but he does mention that the Kaiser was unhappy about the fact that the US was able to gain a great overseas empire through its defeat of Spain. I also don't remember the author's name. I seem to remember the title of the book was 1900, but I can't be sure. It was a book I read while I was hospitalized and probably got it from the hospital's library. john
