---
Korean War, winter 1951-52. The US army and South Korean forces, led by Douglas MacArthur, swiftly and ruthlessly crush the North Korean military. MacArthur pushes north through the Korean Peninsula, reaching all the way to the Yalu river at the border with China. MacArthur is on a mission: in the wake of World War 2 and the rise of the Iron Curtain, he believes humanity's conflicts will never end until "all authoritarian governments" of the world, including communist ones, are destroyed. Against the direct orders of US President Harry Truman, he crosses the Yalu river and begins to attack communist China, which is backed by the Soviets and armed with atomic weapons. Truman recalls MacArthur to Washington. MacArthur, with the support of SAC commander Curtis LeMay, successfully leads a coup against the war-weary president and continues his invasion of east Asia.
The USSR immediately comes to the support of its Pacific allies. The ousted leader of North Korea, Kim Il-Sung, is hailed as a "hero of the people" by the Soviets; he flees the Korean peninsula and escapes to Vladivostok, eventually being granted asylum in Moscow. Joseph Stalin immediately offers full military support to CCP chairman Mao Zedong, who happily accepts. Hong Kong is immediately annexed by China. East Germany is fully absorbed into the Soviet bloc.
The members of the still-fresh NATO immediately organize to support each other. MacArthur brokers a deal with the UK's Winston Churchill, in which the American military occupy India and Australia in exchange for Britain controlling all NATO forces in Western Europe. Churchill's initial goal is to keep Europe out of the war. Japan reorganizes into a country-sized military base under the direction of the US. Australia's desert is blanketed with ICBM silos.
War rages in east Asia throughout 1952 and into 1953. Bogged down by China's vast, rugged terrain, the war quickly decays into bloody battles of attrition. Mutually-assured destruction initially prevents the various factions from deploying nuclear weapons, though LeMay advocates for their use and secretly draws up contingency plans.
Upon Stalin's death in 1953, Georgy Malenkov takes control of the Soviet military. As devoted to communism as Goebbels was to Nazism, Malenkov believes that the US and its allies must be pushed out of Asia by any means necessary--including all-out nuclear war. Immediately after his ascension, he orders a surprise nuclear strike on US-occupied Sungkiang Province in northeast China. In the aftermath, LeMay reveals his contingency plans to MacArthur, who agrees to implement them. Churchill, facing intense pressure from MacArthur, agrees to relaunch Operation Unthinkable: a WW2-era plan to invade the Soviet Union. Nuclear war officially breaks out.
MacArthur and LeMay establish tight control of the US. Conscription is reinstated for all men of ages 18-45, regardless of health. Despite the apocalyptic war facing them, the American people hail MacArthur as the man who will "save the last free republic on Earth" from the tyranny and oppression of communism. The Red Scare runs rampant. Arrests are made daily.
The governments of the world, both to satisfy military needs and sustain their own populations in wartime, accelerate their state research and development programs. Supersonic and hypersonic aircraft, only a dream ten years earlier, fill the skies. Jet Age, Space Age and Atomic Age gadgets fill every household and are sold in every corner store. Vacuum tube-powered computers proliferate in business and government offices. The world becomes nuclear-powered; even cars, trains and household appliances are driven by small, portable nuclear reactors. Radiation medication becomes a necessary and ubiquitous part of daily life.
Once the war escalates to a nuclear conflict, the Soviets and the Americans scramble to accelerate their space programs. Both hope to send humans to different planets in the Solar System and protect the human race from Earth's destruction. Both Mars and Venus are inhabitable, and indeed very Earth-like. The US attempts to voyage to Venus while the USSR heads for Mars.
---
This story dates back to around 2012 and was designed with a live-action role-playing group in mind, but it probably could be adapted to a tabletop setting without much difficulty. My goal was to leave room for as many character types as possible: loyalists for both the US and the USSR, dissidents, neutral parties, soldiers, housewives, mercenaries, scientists, generals, propagandists, astronauts/cosmonauts, or even extraterrestrials.
I was the only person in the group to draw up a prospective character:
Glenn Barrie is an American astronaut sent on the US's first manned space expedition: a crew of four headed for Venus in a one-way suicide mission to determine if the planet can sustain life. His ship does not enter the atmosphere correctly and hits the ground hard, killing the other crew members and injuring Glenn. He discovers that Venus, beyond simply being habitable, is filled with "Venusians" with their own civilizations. Mars is similarly inhabited with "Martians". The Venusians help nurse Glenn back to health, after which he establishes contact with Earth and appeals to the Venusians to grant his countrymen asylum.
---