Specifically, the point of divergence was changed from the Spring 1942 campaign in southern Russia to the D-Day invasion. That’s right, the failure of the latter was enough to turn the tide–never mind that Zhukov was getting ready to smash into Poland.

Also, Joe Kennedy was sanitized from the somewhat Nazi-sympathetic right bastard that he was in the book (and in real life). In the book, the reader was left hanging at the end before the Hitler-Kennedy summit ever took place, with it remaining an entirely open question whether photographic evidence of the Holocaust would change Joe’s mind or simply provide fuel for some chuckles over cocktails with Hitler. In the movie Joe sees the pictures, starts weeping like Iron Eyes Cody at the sight of somebody littering, and orders his drive to turn the car around and leave Berlin.

Apparently the producer thought American audiences would be too fucking stupid to stand seeing a Kennedy–even a dirtbag like Joe–as friendly to Hitler. Shit! In real life, Joe Kennedy and Prescott Bush were probably fighting each other to steal the crematorium contract from I.G. Farben.

Richard G.