NationStates Jolt Archive

((Okay guys. Here is my rough shod attempt to forge a Timeline for France, although inevitably other HL powers had to be involved. Please see my comments at bottom when you are done. Have a good one all, adieu!))

History

May 1945

Hitler having committed suicide a few days earlier, Germany under its Nazi masters crumbles, utterly vanquished. Germany is partitioned. World War Two ends in Europe.

September 1945

Tulglary receives its constitutional monarch Grand Duke Papan (already 62) and the Royal Family from exile in Britain following the country’s liberation from the Nazis at the end of World War Two as ceremonial head of state. In the wake of American hegemony in Western Europe following the war the USQ insists that Tulglary maintain a bicameral legislature based on the Quinntonian model where all major powers of state will lie. The Marshall Plan reinvigorates Western Europe.

In France the hero of the French resistance to the Nazi hordes, Charles de Gaulle, is swept into office without any serious opposition, the center holds and for a while it looks as though Anglo-American democracy is totally triumphant. Growing signs of competition and the potential for conflict between the Western Democracies and Communist Powers cast a dark shroud over this assessment for a discord free post war Europe.

December 1945

Miserable economic conditions on the continent allow a radical wing of the socialist party in Tulglary to capture nearly both houses of representation. Tulglary prepares to withdraw from NATO and enter into alliance with the USSR. Anti-American riots occur in the streets, churches are burned. Seeing this as a danger to its national security, Quinntonia supports a coup d’etat in which a radical group of monarchists belonging to Grand Duke Papan’s bodyguard corps storm the Parliament, and massive arrests follow which are kept under wraps by a massive CIA presence. Papan assumes complete control of the state, and re-enters into a stronger alliance with NATO than ever, also personal alliances with the White House itself.

It was during that Christmas that the Grand Duke, now in complete control of Tulglary, begins to ponder as a restored absolute monarch how he might increase his position. The burgeoning idea of a Holy League is formed by Papan, who as a devout Catholic believes with all his heart God has destroyed the Nazi Empire utterly to make way for a Restoration of all that is good and pure in Europe’s history. Namely those virtues being absolute rule of a hereditary monarchy whose powers are balanced by an invigorated Holy Catholic Church and to a lesser extent the hereditary nobility. In his train of thought, and when all was said and done a sound thought, was that both the Fascists and Communists had arisen from the common people, was that they must never be allowed to have power again though election or any form. He begins to house and shelter various exiled and disempowered royal families throughout Europe in his country for the purposes of nourishing them and one day sending them forth to take back their thrones by coups and subterfuge. The CIA is easily thrown off track, as all the peoples Papan has gathered are vehemently anti-Communist, and willing to support monetarily the White House’s agenda. Most important of the royals in exile were the Houses of Bourbon, Spanish and French, the Italian House of Piedmont (which had taken to calling themselves the Piedmont-Caesars) and the House of Groznyy of the Russias. Tulglary becomes a haven for militant monarchists, as it provides money and land for their operations.

February 1946

Louis Charles Henri Alphonse de Bourbon et Parma, the pretender to the Bourbon, or Legitimist as opposed to Orleanist, throne of France was living, with his blue blooded but poverty stricken family in Sardinia, where they had hidden away during the war. When Papan called, the shrewd man, then working as a physician, packed his family up and took off to Mons, where Papan gave them a grand stipend and fine estate.

He was a widower of 53. He had one son, Louis Xavier Auguste Philippe Stanislaus de Bourbon et Parma, is a young boy of 11 whose favorite hobby was fishing off the warm Sardinian coast and bringing home the catch for dinner. It was this boy who would one day take the throne as His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX. Dr. Louis also had a daughter, but she died along with Maria, the doctors Sicilian wife and the future Louis XX’s mother of consumption at the age of only 7. Lawyers held up medical treatment because of statutes and bribery (the Bourbons after all were not Sardinian nationals)…the last remaining Bourbon family from this one tragic event develops a hate for inefficient democracy and the bureaucrats and lawyers who maintain it. A hot hate that is passed on father to son and on. It is a great irony that had the family not suffered two tragic deaths the French pretenders would have been happy to remain in their humble position in sunny Sardinia, and there is every possibility there would have been no French Restoration.

May 1954

Concurring with the Hungarian Revolution, Wingert von Groznyy-Farrah, who would one day pronounce himself Tsar Wingert I of Estenlands and later of all the Russias, sensed the time was right to begin an insurgency against the Communists in his homeland of the Ukraine. He is a brutish man of twenty, and the Grand Duke thought him the most promising of his groomed Restorationist pupils.

Wingert is able to draw on massive CIA assistance as well and donations from Tulglary’s state coffers. Before the year was out Ukraine was in the grips of a massive guerilla war. Beginning in the Crimea it spread like lightning all about the land. Wingert rallied tortured civilians and began brutal campaigns against the Soviet occupiers. By November 1955, it is fair to say the country is experiencing full scale civil war. USSR reprisals are atrocious, with Stalin ordering “the mass liquidation of all ethnic Ukrainians for their intransigence upon contact”. Neither sides give quarter, but to be fair Wingert was much craftier when it comes to brutality: captured communists were left with their bodies flayed of skin on the roadside for their comrades to find.

Dr. Louis, with the help of Papan, soon manages a plot by blackmail and extortion in which they take majority control of Daimler-Benz in French occupied Germany by bribing off French administrators. The Bourbons soon grow to become the richest of the exiled Houses, quickly paying Papan back and gaining a growing horde of their own. They are also large shareholders of United Elias Oil and secretly through their connections in Germany’s French occupied zone ruthlessly exploit the people with everything from smuggling, prostitution, and drug trafficking. The French administrators, bribed and content, soon become quite under the table solid supporters of Dr. Louis. They soon, with huge illicit profits, go legitimate by becoming stockholders of at least forty major corporations, from DeBeers in South Africa to Ford Motors in Quinntonia.

Louis the younger is now 18 years old. A childhood friend of Wingert, he is not so much a warrior as a subtle statesman and conniver. He begins pondering how he one day will go back to France as its savior. He and his cousin Philip Raul Pedro de Bourbon et Castile, the future Philip VI, take to going on lavish foreign vacations, whoring and drinking with equal abandon. This is balanced by Louis the younger’s non-stop machinations of how exactly he will take France back for the Bourbons. So it was that one vacation took them to Port Royal, Roycelandia. There they met the heir to the Palm Throne Royce. With Royce’s help, the future Louis XX was able to buy land the size of a small country in Roycelandian East Africa. He plans to set up camps there to train and equip a professional mercenary army. The beginning of a hearty life long friendship between Louis and Royce.

New Years Day January 1960

Wingert’s CIA trained guerilla forces seize the Soviet Nuclear base of Rostov-on-Lavda after nightmarish fighting, gaining access to some four dozen ICBM’s with the ability to deploy them. At the same time partisans liberate the capital of Kiev.

After a four year war, Ukraine is devastated. But many more communists died in the process than Wingert’s guerillas, and the dead peasants Wingert regarded as an imminently better place for Red bullets than his own troops. With Stalin dead, and the USSR drained and sick of buckets of blood being shed in an un-winable conflict, Nikita Khrushchev opens a dialogue with the rebels. Though hardliners wish to crush Ukraine utterly, even they realize that at this point the entire Soviet Bloc now sees a chance to break free, the Hungarians nearly had, and very well might if even one more year of fighting occurs. The so called Sofia Accords are signed in March, with Wingert agreeing to maintain friendly relations with the USSR and maintain trade. Wingert, crowned Tsar of Estenlands in a quiet ceremony on Easter Day, did not surrender his nuclear arsenal. As a symbol of where he wanted to take the nation, he renamed the country Estenlands, and declares himself answerable to God alone.

Celebrations in Amsterdam, with Grand Duke Papan and all the exiled royal courts celebrating with the Tsar in Kiev. Papan’s dream of a Holy League has taken its first step.
Louis the younger at twenty-two years of age marries Marie-Therese de Savoy, a beautiful disenfranchised Marquise with important political contacts in the de Gaulle cabinet as well as the upper echelons of French corporate concerns. The Bourbons are now the wealthiest private family in Free Europe. Dr. Louis, at the age of 67, is diagnosed with leukemia, but goes into remission shortly thereafter. It is described as a miracle, and taken literally as one by the surgeons adoring son.

April 1960

The Algerian War rose to a climax, following the Battle of Algiers. The de Gaulle Government is torn. On one hand it could not abandon two million plus ethnic French colons, on the other it was impossible to Franconize or even satiate the demands of a fierce Muslim inspired independence movement. The war dragged on, and only became bloodier, with dark atrocities being committed on both sides. The most disaffected were the French troops fighting in Algeria, and among them the elite and mercenary Foreign Legion felt that feeling keenly.

Dr. Louis saw his chance to put his own machinations into motion. Charles de Gaulle was a monumental figure, hitherto with nearly the whole nation standing behind him---left, right and center. He was the symbol of Republican power, and closely allied and admired by the NATO powers and the west as a whole. If the de Gaulle Regime could be undermined by a disaster in the Algeria War, then a leftist government headed by the eloquent and affable Monsieur Mitterrand, already waiting in the wings, would be instituted. Once this happened, the Bourbons could take what Wingert forced as simply as plucking an apple from a tree.

So Louis Xavier packed up, and with his covert connections in the French Military enrolled as a Captain of Le Legion Etrangere under an assumed identity. At the same time his father dispatched large sums of money to aid the fellagha rebels. Serving with distinction, although in the rear lines, he soon became connected to the military serving in Algeria, which was faced with a subtly strengthened rebellion while the government remained torn, even tearing further.

January 1962

The Algerian War was a disaster. De Gaulle, with no where left to turn, purposed peace on Algerian terms and prepared to forcibly remove French colonists to the mother country. Disaffection ran so high that far-right members of the military formed Le Organisation de l’armee Secrete, a die hard group which vowed to fight to the bitter end, even setting in motion plans to return to France and seize the faltering government. In response Charles de Gaulle said he would machine gun any paratroopers over Paris.

The OAF, as Le Organisation de l’armee Secrete was known, was headquartered in the Foreign Legion, and the man who ran it in the Foreign Legion was none other than now one Colonel Guillame Lagier, in truth Louis Xavier de Bourbon.

Dr. Louis’ plan had succeeded. The De Gaulle Government, as its death act, withdrew all Frenchmen from Algeria and recalled the military. Little did he know he invited what amounted to anti-government military extremists, the OAF, having been indoctrinated to the point where they wished to see a strong government, a French government, a monarchist government. Following the humiliating defeat, the de Gaulle resigned and the Gaullists fell apart.

Francois Mitterrand became the President of a torn nation. And though he tried his best, in such an environment his far left and well meaning social agenda would set into motion more than he could ever imagine.

December 1970

At the ripe age of 77 Louis Charles Henri Alphonse de Bourbon et Parma died of natural causes in le Château Beau Mont. The Patriarch of the Bourbons died, and his funeral was attended by all in Papan’s now vast network of active royalists. He lived a full and good life, for the first part healing men, in the latter part attempting to heal his nation from afar.

Yet in the wake of hid birth, on Christmas Day, Marie-Therese gave birth to Louis Auguste Francois Henri de Bourbon et Parma, on a bright and snowy fresh morning. This squealing baby would one day grow up to be His Most Christian Majesty Louis-Auguste.

Louis Xavier now rose to be the claimant to the French throne, and he was ready. He now began to organize his contacts in France, he hired mercenaries from afar with his contacts in the Foreign Legion. He paid them and financed his projects by the now massive Omni Group International, the company his vast holdings had been placed under, the 14th largest corporation on the globe. These mercenary troops, at first made of ex-Foreign Legion members and later constituting the finest soldiers of fortune money could buy, were the first seeds of what would become the French Royal Army.

In France itself, the Mitterrand Government was in trouble. Inflation soared, this was compensated for by government controls. More importantly, massive waves of Muslim Immigrants from North Africa were encouraged to immigrate. The OAF men had gone from complaining to under directions from Tulglary actively preparing to overthrow the government. Yet unpopular though he was, he managed election after election. Soon, with rumors encouraged by the Bourbons, news leaked that he was rigging elections using Muslim immigrants, and was leaning further to the left every year. Rumors, false but believable, even circulated in the mid-decade that he was supportive of Pal Pot’s methods in Cambodia, saying the Khmer Rouge was a natural extension of Rousseau’s thought.

In Italy Caesar Maximus, and Jacamo Giuseppe de Piedmont had come to be known, managed to upturn a weak coalition government by promises of reform. The second state in Europe to fall to absolute monarchy, it was by nature the weakest of the powers. Some credited the decentralized nature of Italian politics, others credited the Latinate nature of the Italians, now Romans, themselves. He does manage to acquire nuclear weapons, however, and heads a respectable if hodgepodge military.

Then the Shah of Iran fell.

Fall 1979, the Winter Troubles

An absolute monarchy the Shah of Iran was overthrown by Muslim extremists. Ayatollah Khomeini returned from his asylum in London to assume command of a radical Marxist/Islamist regime.

Because of Bourbon machinations the Shah went into exile in France. It was not long before Louis, now a clever man of 41, got to the Shah and made him offers and man of sense could not refuse. In Paris the Shah railed against what had happened. He cited a grand plot by ‘Islamo-Marxism’ was in play, a plot which had undermined his government, and now had France as his priority. Muslim groups continued to get more and more rights under the uber-liberal Mitterrand Government, which was by itself Marxist in philosophy by admission.

Starting in October, in what was called the Autumn Addresses, the Shah proclaimed how only a monarch can oppose the might forces of Islamo-Marxism, he was baptized as a Roman Catholic in Notre Dame. The climax came when he pointed out his monarchy had failed because of Mitterrand himself, who was funded by the Ayatollah and Soviet Premier and by these same forces achieved election. Papers were shown, videos watched.

Louis Xavier now believed the time was right, and the Restoration of France began.

On October 24th the Shah was speaking at a Parisian Hotel, when a Muslim suicide bomber, who though was real had been allowed to hit his target by Louis and his OAF contacts, blew up himself, the Shah, and the audience.

A combination of Muslim terrorists and agents provocateurs of the Restorationists systematically began to terrorize France, not doing much actual damage, but frightening the population out of their minds into sheer panic. Mitterand urged calm though it was impossible that would have evaded him. He sounded like a child yelling for the cannons to cease, petulant and unprincipled, though his heart felt strongly for benign social programs and the decency of everyman. That could not assist him whatsoever in that time’s circumstances. Perhaps never was a decent man in such a bad place at the worst time. History must not judge him harshly, for who could have withheld against such webs and traps and insidious brilliances lay against them?

Catholics were terrorized, but Mitterrand did not raise his voice as a Catholic to defend them. Jews were terrorized by the Muslims (a sign of the Bourbon genius, their agents did only phobic damage, where as the Muslim militants were simply let loose to their awful natural inclinations). Christians hand blood thrown on their houses. Perversion skyrocketed, rapes became common, children being victimized in the most horrible manner on a everyday basis occurred, arson and theft seemed mild.

For months the Winter Troubles racked France, a seeming period of hell on earth. Word spread, and it soon became obvious, so called Communists (agents provocateurs of Louis) proclaimed allegiance with the Muslims, and planned to overthrow the national government and ally themselves with radical Islam and Soviet Russia. People lamented in the streets the devil had come to the world and tormented France.

January 1980

The Restoration began auspiciously, with the birth of Louis Xavier and Marie Therese’s second son, le Comte d’Artois.

Then, in a feat of showmanship that would come to characterize the Restored Bourbon Monarchy, Louis Xavier Philippe Stanislaus de Bourbon, who from this time on referred to himself as Louis XX, King of France, appeared on New Years Day.

Attended to by a chapter of the Brotherhood of the Good Brothers of St. Francis, he was discovered in a monks robes singing psalms at the Cathedral of Lourdes. At his side was the Sword of Charlemagne, powerful against the cloth of brown.

He greeted the dazed pilgrims to perhaps the holiest site in France, of which there were an exceeding number due to the chaotic republic and evil days. With his strong demeanor, he declared that angels had proclaimed to him and these monks who he had been praying with, that, quote:

“The Lord Thy God shall not abandon France, He has heard the prayers of our people, and with the wisdom of the Saints and the Glory of Our Savior Jesus Christ sends you a king of old to fight off the evils of the new!”

What followed was an event of singular interest in history. So right was the time and so right the place that, save for the spread of the Gospel, word and excitement, delirious, zoomed about the land saying a king, beyond all hope from the line of Capet and Bourbon had come to rescue France.

That marked the beginning of the fairy tale which was to so characterize the Restored French Monarchy.

Louis XX was far too intelligent, however, to believe that a miraculous appearance would be enough to take the state. As he appeared over the Tulglarian border the mercenary and ultra loyal Royal Army streamed into France. In the early hours of the morning, members of the Republican Army High Command who were not OAF, around five generals, were assassinated. The army, stripped of funding and morale as it was, did nothing to stop the Restoration, in many cases joining with the King’s troops.

The Quinntonians did not prop Mitterrand up because Louis had been quite sure to demonstrate to Jesse Obed that without his coup d’etat France would loose both its Christianity and become a Communist power in the heart of NATO. Once again the CIA aided a monarchist coup to forestall the threat of Communism which it was engaged in mortal combat with.

By the 2nd of January Paris was in the hands of Louis, Mitterrand was placed under house arrest along with the majority of government bureaucrats and representatives. Crime was crushed with clubs and bayonets, order was restored in a blaze of glory, ground under the returning Kings iron wheels.

France celebrated.

May 1980

In what proved to be a remarkably quick seizure of power, France was again a Kingdom.

The son of a pretender physician was crowned His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX, King of France and Navarre, Defender of the Faith at Reims Cathedral in a ceremony as lavish as that of Louis XIV, his direct ancestor. Trumpets sang and church bells rang, white doves were released and choirs and orchestras boomed the Te Deum.

The world stood in awe.

He immediately set about issuing law. All law previous to the Restoration was declared void. The underlying legal principle was that instead of a paper constitution the monarch served as direct and omnipotent living law. Therefore the King ruled by fiat, with ministers tending to government matters. Two major declarations ensued, which were in fact the only codified law issued under the Bourbon Restoration.

Proclamation of Manifest Virtue

Issued on the 9th of May
Anno Domini 1980
Issued by His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX

In order to guarantee the safety and prosperity of the Kingdom of France, let it be known the following:

Preface-Previous items of the criminal penal code, misdemeanors or lesser, shall remain in code but subject to the discretion of a presiding magistrate of the King. Major criminal offenses are subject to the jurisdiction of His Most Christian King’s magistrates in toto.

1. All political parties, groups, or affiliations are illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment, or hanging by the neck until dead.

2. The following beliefs are declared to be wicked in the sight of Almighty God, and are therefore illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment, or hanging by the neck until dead:

-Marxism, a.k.a. Communism, a.k.a. Socialism, a.k.a. Fascism, a.k.a. Democracy, a.k.a. Republicanism, a.k.a. Totalitarianism.

-Practice of or abetting of Islam and or Muslim persons.

-Practice of or abetting of Anarchy and or Anarchist persons.

-Criticism of His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX or the Invincible Royal Family, their retainers, court or vassals is illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment, amended to include drawing and quartering.

-Practice of or abetting of Secular Humanism a.k.a. Paganism, a.k.a. New Age Beliefs, a.k.a. Demon worship and/or Satanism.

3. Any slandering or critical comments pertaining to or suggesting the Holy Catholic Church, or attacks on the inviolable truth of its doctrines, known as heresy, are illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment, or hanging by the neck until dead.

4. All subjects have the right to immediately send for redress of any grievance to His Most Christian Majesty directly and be guaranteed a response before execution of legal sentence.

5. In order to secure the public good, all persons shall be tied to their place and means of work in perpetuity, which shall be the sphere of a peer or noble administrator. Exemptions granted in the case of military service or entering the Holy Catholic Church as a regular of preaching clergy member.

6. The Holy Catholic Church shall be placed in charge of all education, which shall be compulsory and free.

7. The Holy Catholic Church shall be placed in charge of all health care, which shall be compulsory and free.

8. An Estates General shall be established consisting of the Clergy, Nobility, and Commoners to dissimulate the various wills of people to His Most Christian Majesty.

9. France will return to demarcations of her original provinces.

10. The legal wishes of The Most Christian King shall be dissimulated by Parlrements du Loi, one body for each respective province, one for Paris.

11. Degradation of the public good is illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment, or hanging by the neck until dead.

12. Use of abortion and or contraceptive agents is illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment or hanging by the neck until dead.

13. Sumptuary laws are to be obeyed with full compliance, failure to do so is illegal on pain of fine or imprisonment.

14. Any section of the Proclamation of the above is subservient to the King’s Law and is at his pleasure.

15. Every subject shall acknowledge the righteous and invincible nature of The Most Christian King as a divinely inspired ruler.

16. Usury is illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment or hanging by the neck until dead.

Edict of Nantes

Issued on the 9th of May
Anno Domini 1980
Issued by His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX

In order to guarantee the spiritual health and righteousness of the Kingdom of France be it known the following:

1. The Holy Catholic Church shall be the official religion of the Kingdom of France.

2. The Jewish faith and people shall be protected by His Most Christian Majesty, and granted the right to free worship in accordance with their beliefs.

3. *Quinntonian Christian Brotherhood Amendment* Protestant Christians shall have the right to worship in accordance with their beliefs.

4. All members of the Muslim faith shall convert to Catholicism in mind and soul or shall be subject to intense government labor programs on pain of fine, imprisonment or hanging by the neck until dead. Emigration is not permitted.

November 1980

Using a very similar method to the French coup d’etat, the Spanish Bourbon His Catholic Majesty took both his title and throne in Madrid. Philip VI was, as well as Louis XX’s cousin, much of his same mind, and the Catholic King tended to follow the trends set by his Gallic neighbor. 1980 was declared by Time Magazine “The year Time went back.”

Monarchs, absolute in Spain, France, Ukraine and grand-fatherly Tulglary in the space of a few years transformed both the Cold War and world politics radically. Truth be told, at this point most of the world was simply too dumbfounded to react, with revolutions in Asia causing equal changes. As of yet the Restored states maintained their allegiance with NATO, all save Estenlands by necessity of course, thus throwing the USSR into a spending frenzy, which, as time would show, devastated the corruption and inefficiency laden communists. Also as of yet, though, Grand Duke Papan had yet to unite these power flushed resources, and already in his late 80’s had problems of his own to tend to, things went far to quickly for him, he was startled.

The Restoration had been a smashing success. The first two symbols the Restoration chose to build were the Bastille and Versailles, actually Versailles was more rehabitated rather than rebuilt.

The Bastille however was raised on its original site, save it was twelve times the originals proportion. Huge and made of reinforced steel and concrete, it was a veritable fortress in the city of Paris. Though it was not the highest structure its squat medieval visage dominated the Paris skyline, the Bourbon Coat of Arms flying high from the parapets. Each hour it sounded its cannon. When the King visited Paris it gave a twenty four gun salute, for any other member of the Royal Family sixteen.

It here that the thousands upon thousands of former Republicans were sent, along with Marists of all kinds and other “suspectedly dangerous persons.” Only a few very dangerous persons were hung, most were simply locked away in dark, cold, impregnable oubliettes, cones of iron, man eating, where you put people to forget about them for good. Mitterrand got an oubliette larger than most, it even caught a bit of sunlight for about five minutes a day.

Versailles again was the capital of France, glittering and sublime. Once again balls and military parades, playing of fountains, fetes, and illuminations heralded the glory of the Sun King.

The Eiffel Tower now bore four massive golden fleur-de-lys on its quadrilateral side, a symbol that the monarchy intended not to destroy but to create. Statues to the King were going up all over France, from Lille to Grenoble to Bordeaux.

Now the most adored monarch of them all, Louis XX called together a conference of the absolute monarchs. A symbol of his new found position as the most dashing and debonair member of the clique, he brought them in splendor to Versailles. There, in the shade of magically symmetrical forests and gardens, with the sounds of fountains and string quartets, His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX, sitting with the Royal Hand clapped on Grand Duke Papan’s shoulder, proposed they solemnly create the alliance and power network the Tulglarian benefactor had organized for generations:

The Holy League.

November 11th 1980, The First Congress of the Holy League

In the Hall of Mirrors His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX, His Imperial Majesty Tsar Wingert I of the Estenlands, His Eminence Grand Duke Papan of Tulglary, His Catholic Majesty Philip VI and His Excellency Caesar Maximus of Italy, now Rome, signed into being the Holy League. Papal nuncios and Orthodox ministers blessed the alliance.

There has rarely even been such an event, an event which took the world by storm jus as the storms had brought crowns to the respective nations of the Holy League. It had four points, that was all:

1. All League members shall defend one another from external aggressions if attacked.

2. All League members shall defend one another from internal uprisings and shall preserve at all cost the legitimate monarch of each League member.

3. All League members shall recognize the state of divine right absolute monarchy as the supremest form of government on the face of the earth, and moreover shall do their best to house monarchs seeking their throne or assist ennobled persons creating their own.

4. All League members shall recognize Orthodox Christianity, both Roman Catholic and Eastern Rites, as the official form of religion and the greatest aid in maintaining a divine order upon the earth.

And so an ideology had erupted like a volcano out of the small garden Grand Duke Papan had planted. The Holy League crowns withdrew from NATO while maintaining amicable relations. Simultaneously the USSR began to suffer a series of strokes it would not recover from, seeing as a huge nation with a huge border with the failing Communist state was now armed to the teeth and allied with fellow absolute divine right monarchs bearing the same arms.

The stage was set for the modern era, an era where occurrences in Europe had bewildered the world, and as events will show, continued to.

Current Events

The Golden Summer 1985

The current era of France began when Louis XX had borne the last of his six children. One after another, year after year, they came, birthed by Her Serene Majesty Marie-Therese. In order there came le Comte de Provence, le Duc de Normandie, and le Duc de Aquitaine. The last to be born was le Comtesse de Noailles, Marie Antoinette, his charming daughter.

It was called the Golden Summer because Louis XX and Tsar Wingert, the major figures of the Holy League, reclined in the salons of Versailles between hunting parties, discussing how to ‘make the Holy League a credible power.’ It was then Wingert, egged on by Louis, formulated a plan to ravage and seize an annoying neighbor of his, Lavrageria, a small and fiercely independent nation headed by a democratic demagogue Larionko Aidarov. So from that moment on the Holy League focused on the tiny, landlocked, poverty stricken yet stubbornly democratic nation.

With the USSR faltering more everyday, the Most Christian King and Imperial Majesty began a plan of re-armament, deciding that the best way to secure their, in the final analysis, precarious thrones was to gain a relatively easily military victory which would still have international repercussions. With their lead the Holy League en masse began to arm itself like the feudal knight it portrayed, but Estenlands and to a lesser degree France led the way.

It was also decided that, to show the blood brotherhood between the French and Estenlandic monarchs, the Dauphin of France Louis Auguste would marry Wingert’s daughter, also five at the time, Arch Duchess Jillesepone. Shortly thereafter, the King of France married off his baby daughter Marie Antoinette to the Spanish Bourbons Principe de Asturias, also around one year old. Le Comte d’Artois was married to Papans great-great-niece, la Duchesse de Ypres. Thus the Holy League became tied together in blood as well as deed.

So it was called the Golden Summer, and so the Holy League slowly and surely secured itself internally and prepared itself to smashing weak socialist democracies and giving them proper divinely ordained governments, first in Europe, later beyond.

The Lavragerian War February-August 1992

After seven years of preparation, France and Estenlands were ready to demonstrate to the world both their power and intentions.

The plum fell from the tree when the USSR, for the better part of a generation now tossing and turning on its sickbed, racked by strokes and corruption at all levels…so much that it was said the most efficient part of the regime and responsible was the Red Mafia...now began to disintegrate.

In a last ditch effort, the Central Committee opted for a free election, a sure sign of the critical nature of the crisis, the elections were not even rigged.

So it came to pass that the USSR ceased to exist, fell apart, and in its place was a young and charismatic Vladimir Putin. Putin was a Quinntonian trained capitalist, whose primary agenda was a ‘war’ on crime. War was what he got. With chaos boundless Louis XX and Wingert made their move.

Critically important for future events was that the then Dauphin, at the age of twenty-two, was a heroic soldier during the war and leading the charge in person smashed the enemy stronghold of Hia’Itakchi. His companions at the front were none other than le Duc de Broglie, who would become Louis-Auguste’s Minister of War, and Monsieur le Noir, his intelligence chief who would one day preside over the greatest terror police since the Gestapo, la Marechaussee.

A fuller account of the Lavragerian War can be found, a fine history, penned by Lunatic Record Robots.

For our purposes the Holy League smashed Lavrageria, sent what members of its government remained alive (unfortunately this included Aidarov) into hiding, and partitioned the country. This war was critically important for several reasons:

1. It showed that Western Democracies would not interfere if their own welfare was not threatened, and would smile on if such wars did damage to their ‘progressive’ and more importantly ‘anti-capitalist’ enemies.

2. Demonstrated the Holy League was now the premier military force in the world, vicious and brave, able to conduct a blitzkrieg with fanatically loyal troops.

3. Set the group for global acceptance of civilian deaths not as collateral but as a process of the new age of warfare.

In the aftermath of the Treaty of Washington D.C. Tsar Wingert and King Louis were now poised to exert themselves to the status of a world power, which in short order they began to do.

1994

This is the year that Louis XX groomed puppet, Omar Abdullah---who would soon assume the throne in Algiers as Louis I King in Algeria---returned to his country and with large assistance from ex-OAF forces, as well as Louis XX crack mercenary troops, launched a coup which made Algeria a vassal state to France. He marries as his queen Louis XX’s niece, Yolande de Polignac. The northern half of the country, from the Laghouat line northwards, became the Kingdom of Algeria. The vast empty spaces below were given as a present to Roycelandia, and to this day are know as Roycelandian Southern Algeria.

Resistance was present, but was crushed. Radical Islamists were arrested for life sentences or worse. While the population was allowed to maintain its faith, the rulers were to a man and woman devout Catholics along with their Court. This fuels the French Restoration handily, and resources flow in. In France serfs have rights, in the Kingdom of Algeria the peasants are given only rites.

Russian Restoration and Baltic Wars 1996-7

After the total failure of the Putin Government, which in hindsight must be said to have had the greatest chance of truly reforming Russia, it was now relatively easy for the Estenlandian Tsar to move in and declare himself Wingert I Lavragerianus, Tsar of all the Russians, Master of all the Realms.

A brutally efficient consolidation of power followed, with communists being forced to basically lick his boots and hold his massive cape at state functions. Putin was killed by the Tsar in hand to hand combat, so like a tribal chief Wingert captured his prize. The hard word of the previous regime coupled with Wingert’s drive to power and Tsarist Russia soon became a power on par with the Americans once again. The Tsar had no problem properly punishing the Red Mafia, in a few weeks their dead bodies were removed from the meat hooks and thrown unceremoniously in the icy waters of Archangel.

To further demonstrate his power, he quickly crushed and occupied Baltic Nation of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia in the so called Baltic War, which was in reality a victory easier than the Lavragerian struggle.

((Okay guys, that is as far as I have made it so far. I have yet to do, in order, the following: New Caledonian Skirmish, assassination of Louis XX and Coronation of Louis-Auguste, and of course THE WORLD WAR. I am going to need your help on this though guys, although I can handle the assassination myself (AC’s help would be grand though), I should like to have BG if possible help me with New Caledonia, and LRR and Gurg with the worlds war in Africa and the Atlantic especially.))

((Can you all see where I am going with this now? I want all of us to create a grand timeline, the recent war will be the coup de gras after which we can continue more heartened than ever, with everyone on the same page, and with a history to power our nations. Ill check back tomorrow with my New Caledonia War, leaving it open for BG to amend. Also the Tsar could elaborate on the Baltic War. But in any case, the most important thing I think, is that we all get a common history set up, Id love to put a grand timeline up on NSwiki, that anyone can refer to if they have a ?. I do think the war will be the most difficult part, the longest and most detailed (Id like to try and add casualties and losses on the war history if I could. Anyway, please let me know what you all thing, and lets all get this excellent project done so we can resume AMW more realistically than ever with far more invigorated spirits.))

Looks really good. There are a few issues with the timeline, and some of the circumstances, though. I think that most of them can be glossed over though, as we re-boot this thing. I think that I will write a brief history of the Estenlands to compliment this, and perhaps that can figure in somehow.

Like: The Tsarist unprising was indiependent in most ways from France and Tulgary. But we can work that out. I think compramise is the best course of action in this case. Also, though the battle between Putin and Wingert did occur, it wasn't exactly on ESPN. So, is this a hostory that is to bring people up to date on what occured, or an official version as to what everyone is aware of?

Also, with the Putin/Estenlands thing, you have a couple of things out of order, but I can fix that.

Hmmm, perhaps I culd write my version, taking into account your "facts" and then in the end you could put forwarda definative version? My only issue is that I am attemting to translate some difficult passages in Flavius Jospehus from the Greek and my paper is due this week. Then, I have a conference this weekend, so the earliest I could get to working on it would be next week. Would that work?

Tsar Wingert the Great.

OOC: I'm going to post my own timeline here, related to the one above but not so much so, since I'm half a planet away. If this doesn't belong here, I'll remove it. I also sort of talk a lot about what my armed forces looked like, since I can't actually do anything before the 1982 Falklands War. Please bear with me.

pre-1945

1901-The United Colonies of Australasia is created by an act of the British Parliament.

1931- The Westminster Act is passed.

1942- The Free Colony of Australasia is created by the adoption of the Westminster Act in the former United Colonies, making the FCA wholly independent of the British crown.

1939-45- The UCA/FCA and the Wendselybury Islands form the Australasia Wendselybury Islands Army Corps, which fight in the South Pacific against the Japanese.

The Postwar Era

1945

The immediate postwar period is marked by an upsurge in production and economic growth as Australasia becomes a major player in the realm of sea trade. Capitalizing on its unique position in both Southeast Asia and the South Atlantic, the Free Colony facilitates trade and supply for the various Quinntonian and British interests in the area. While its merchant marine was dwarfed by that of Quinntonia and, to a lesser extent, Britain, its geographical position partially made up for this disparity.

After the war, much of the armed forces were demobilized and the Free Colony's only and famous battleship, UCS/FCS Wendselybury, was sold to a breaker's yard in Port Darwin. Thus began a three-decade trend to downsize the military in favour of armed protection from the United States of Quinntonia and Britain.

1948

The rise of the Federal Republic of Bonstock, observed closely by politicians in Raleigh, was cause for some amount of relief. An end to the fighting in the former Dutch colonies had been sought for some time, and the FRB was the recipient of no small monetary aid from the Free Colony.

1950

With the rise of Strainism and the declaration of the People's Republic of Spyr, Quinntonian planners took interest in the Free Colony as a strategic and friendly naval base. There was a brief attempt to establish a Quinntonian naval base in Port Darwin, but other overriding concerns regarding the European theatre caused a shifting of naval assets.

There was also a brief 'Red Scare' in which the government authorized the construction of six cruisers and the purchase of a large number of Quinntonian-made aircraft, but only three of these vessels were completed due to cost overruns. These cruisers served the FCN for two decades before being scrapped.

Response to the PRS was mixed. Its centrist economic policies were highly regarded in the Free Colony, which had similar ideals at the time. However, the idea of armed revolution to achieve these aims was alarmingly similar to that espoused by Marx and perpetrated by the Bolsheviks. Negotiations with the PRS were begun, specifically involving trade.

1951

Negotiations with the PRS were mostly successful, and trade was begun with the Lyong Peninsula. The rise of a Strainist Party in the Free Colony was cause for small concern, but it never achieved widespread appeal and has been mostly ignored for the past fifty-five years. In addition, concern was alleviated by the propaganda film The Invincible Revolutionary Army, which showed Strainist forces fighting with spears, hot-air balloons and cavalry troops.

The Glorious '50s

There was little activity in Southeast Asia during the 1950s, and the government of the Free Colony continued its policy of trade expansion and non-involvement. The army was disbanded in 1953, and was reorganized into the modern structure. In 1954, the First Expeditionary Force was raised, and was headquartered in the somewhat more turbulent province of Australasian South America. The first Australasian nuclear weapon was detonated on December 25th, 1956 on Christmas Island. It has been speculated that then-Prime Minister George Phipps, known for his macabre sense of humour, had a hand in the date and location of this test.

Economic growth continued at a slightly reduced pace as Australasians watched the rise of the Ringist Shogunate in Japan. However, the pressing need for infrastructure in the evidently prosperous but still-unstable PRS provided much-needed business for Australasian shipping companies. Australasians, pleased with the rapid economic growth of their nation since 1945, entered into a period similar to the 1920s in the USQ.

The Japan War and the FRB Menace

In 1966, the illusion of calm was shattered when the Federal Republic of Bonstock invaded the Sakishima Islands. Support for the FRB, already at a low ebb after the brutal suppression of a communist revolt plummeted. The Australasian embassy was recalled immediately and the First Expeditionary Force was put to full alert. The FCA's small navy was tasked with patrolling the waters north of Oceania, and the USQ was contacted by Raleigh with an urgent request for aid in the construction of larger naval vessels. Simultaneously, the government began design of what would become the AS-6, Australasia's longest-lived military aircraft.

1967-72

While the government loudly denounced the FRB's actions, it was clear to all involved that nothing could be done. With the allegations of genocide on Timor, Raleigh began supplying the Revolutionary Front of Independent Timor (FRETIN) with monetary aid. However, in 1969 the FRB uncovered evidence of Australasian support and threatened military action. Faced with the prospect of invasion, the Free Colony backed down.

As a result, Prime Minister David Coltrera ordered the creation of the International Medical Brigade (IMB). The IMB appeared to be a semi-governmental aid agency dedicated to fighting poverty, malnutrition and disease across the globe. In fact, it was a front for a secret intelligence/guerrilla warfare group tasked with aiding local revolutions and rebellions whose goals coincided with those of the Free Colony.

An End to Isolationism

1972-74

With the commissioning of the FRB's Draken and the PRS' Lyong-Ti, the Free Colony of Australasia began to consider the possibility of its own battleship in 1972. The government of Quinntonia, then the only nation with experience constructing and operating large, nuclear-powered warships was contacted, as was the government of Britain, whose shipbuilders had outproduced the entire continent of Europe for over two centuries. A new drydock was constructed in Melbourne capable of supporting a vessel proportionally larger than the Wisconsin Class battleships of the USQ.

Quinntonian shipbuilders were contracted to work closely with the design bureau, eventually producing what can be recognized as the precursor to a Victory Class battleship. Original plans called for it to carry three more 19 inch guns and another thirty VLS cells, but cost projections caused the government to downsize the design significantly.

1976

The FCS Victory was commissioned on April 23rd, 1976. Its motto was Australasia expects every man to do his duty, and it formed the core of a new Free Colonial Navy that would soon grow to include several Quinntonian built frigates and destroyers, as well as an aircraft carrier (FCS Longbow), the first of her class. Thus armed, the Free Colony began providing monetary aid in earnest to anti-FRB groups.

Australasian politicians actively encouraged other western nations to take an interest in the FRB's dealings, although only the Hudecians showed interest.

More later. Perhaps the end result of this thread could be a unified timeline of some kind that involves every major nation active today?

1943

The Pacific War, between the Allies and the Empire of Japan, had begun to turn against the Japanese, and Japan was on the defensive against Allied forces with superior numbers and productive capacity. As desperation grew, Japan turned back to its earlier rhetoric of a free and independent Asia (abandoned for several years after its initial victories), attempting to raise local forces for defence against the return of the European empires. The nationalists of Southeast Asia emerged to offer assistance, co-opted into Japanese efforts under the unofficial slogan of “Independence for Alliance.” The IJA and IJN began the transfer of power to local nationalist leaders, and helped train and equip local units under a unified command structure. Singapore, with IJN help, began producing vital merchant vessels to transport raw materials back to Japan, as well as conducting repairs on Japanese shipping. As the war's end neared, CNS forces replaced their wooden training weapons with proper arms from Japanese and colonial stockpiles in preparation for Allied invasions.

1945
Allied assaults in Southeast Asia begin to come up against local CNS troops, in addition to the IJA, particularly as they press operations into the island of Borneo.

On August 15th, 1945, Japan surrendered to the Allies, with its forces still in control across much of Southeast Asia.

Japan’s defeat was not a severe blow to the nationalists… it had been seen as inevitable by even the most short-sighted members of the movement. What the alliance had done was simply to give the nationalists the tools they required for future success in their quest for independence. The Tulgarian and British, attempting to recapture their colonies, now faced an armed and organized government which had no intention of returning to colonial status. On August 17th, 1945, a Declaration of Independence was read in Singapore, declaring the formation of the Federal Republic of Bonstock, which included Malaya, Timor, New Guinea, and the Indonesian archipelago, with a capital at Singapore and a unicameral parliament.
Immediately, FRB-loyal forces attempt to secure Japanese surrenders and arms, with mixed results: though some Japanese forces were sympathetic, they had been instructed to await the arrival of British and Tulgarian representatives and most refused to recognize FRB authority. The most notable success is achieved in Singapore itself, where FRB militias assaulted Japanese positions and seized IJN vessels moored in the harbour, including cruisers Myoko and Takao and the destroyer Kamikaze. In Jakarta, several light tanks and artillery guns were secured from IJA commanders still sympathetic to the independence movement. However, word soon arrived from Tulgarian authorities: Japanese troops in the Tulgary East Indies were to suppress republican activity while the Allies brought forces to bear. Fighting between Japanese forces and Republicans soon swept across the Indonesian archipelago.
Tulgary was initially dismissive of Republican capabilities, until the loss of a naval escort and two troop transports to a surprise attack by the cruiser Myoko and its destroyer escort, who continued on to bombard restored Tulgarian land positions near Jakarta. Though the Myoko was later located and sunk by British aircraft as it fled back towards Singapore, the attack was a propaganda victory for the Republicans.
In Malaya, the returning British faced similar opposition. Though some troops and administrators arrived in Malaya by air, and elements of the British 14th Army were in position to redeploy southward, the Republican position seemed firm. As with British forces representing Tulgary in the East Indies, Allied units in Malaya began to find themselves in firefights with Republican and communist guerrillas as they sought to reassert control. The greatest surprise for the returning British was Singapore, where the Republicans had readied the large naval guns and anti-aircraft cannon (supplemented by the guns of the immobilised cruiser Takao). Flak was fired at the first Allied aircraft to approach the city, though the inexperienced gunners opened up too soon, allowing the British to withdraw back to Rangoon.
For several months, stalemate ensued, with Allied forces securing several cities but unable to achieve a decisive victory over Republican guerrillas. The prospect of facing yet another lengthy and costly war was far from popular amongst war-weary populations in Europe, but British and Tulgarian forces might have prevailed nevertheless, if it were not for the United States of Quinntonia. The USQ, continuing to hold to the rhetoric of freedom used during the war, realized that if supposed Allied ideals were not upheld in the post-war it would lead to further trouble down the road. Additionally, the Republicans seemed to be of nationalist persuasion, with democratic intentions, more acceptable than the Communist insurgents which seemed to be appearing in most former colonies, and their representatives in Washington had made assurances about the protection of Christian minorities and missionaries should it assume control. Without support from their greatest industrial ally, it simply became impractical for Anglo-Tulgary forces to re-colonize the area.

1946[/b]

Negotiations between Walmington, Tulgary, and Bonstock began in late 1946, but fighting continued to rage across the region. The Republicans sought immediate recognition and withdrawal of colonial troops, while Anglo-Tulgary proposals started with the suggestion that the former colonies be divided up into several smaller states, Tulgary further proposing that their former East Indies retain the monarch of the Netherlands as head of state. This was refused outright by the Bonstockian negotiators, but Tulgarian forces began efforts to establish friendly states in their zones of control, united as the 'United States of Bonstock'.

[u]1947

With evaporating support for further conflict at home, a treaty emerged between the Federal Republic of Bonstock and Great Britain in January of 1947, the latter giving up claims to Malaya and Singapore and the former surrendering claims to Brunei (whose sultan had sided with the British against the Republican movement). Similar agreement saw the Portuguese drop claims to their colony in West Timor.

USQ-mediated talks aboard the U.S.S. Renville were initiated in the summer of 1947, in an attempt to resolve the continuing violence in the Tulgary East Indies. With credible reports of Tulgarian atrocities reaching newspapers across the globe, and Republican feelers emerging towards the Soviet Union in search of a way to achieve a firm victory, Tulgary was pressured into dissolving the Tulgary East Indies and withdrawing its troops. A final point of contention, Tulgarian holdings on New Guinea, remained unresolved with Tulgary still in firm control there and the Republic unable to mount a serious operation against them.

1948
With the departure of Tulgary, the Federal Republic began to secure itself as a nation-state. To unify diverse peoples, a culture of Bonstockian nationalism was cultivated, including the imposition of Bahasa (a branch of Malay) as national language and a system of military conscription. Symbols such as the lion were used to invoke pride and give the image of strength to the new state. Attempts were made to bring stability to the economy as well, with years of occupation and war having inflicted substantial damage. With the departure of the colonial tycoons, the reins of economic power fell mostly to the Chinese diaspora in the region, whose capital allowed the construction of factories and infrastructure.
The first FRB elections occurred in September of 1948 showed a nation deeply divided along ethnic, religious, and ideological lines, with no one holding a clear majority. The Communist Party of Bonstock (PKB) and the Islamic organisation Maysumi held large minority shares, while a candidate sponsored by emerging industrialists secured the Presidency. These three forces would serve alternately as heads of the ruling coalitions for the next decade.

1950
Northward in China, the Guomindang of the Chinese Republic had suffered defeat at the hands of the Chinese Communist Party, and had evacuated to the island of Taiwan. In 1950, now facing the threat of a PLA amphibious invasion, Chiang Kai Shek turned to Singapore in search of aid. The ROC agreed to grant the FRB control of the port of Hualian, in exchange for troops and naval support. However, the FRB had different ideas: the PKB refused to support legislation aimed at assisting the ROC, leading to the collapse of the ruling coalition. In the confusion, the Bonstockian military chose a new course of action: the cruiser Takao and accompanying troopships set about securing Hualien as a 'strategic outpost', renaming their new holding the Maropian Coast. Unable to spare the resources that would be needed to retake Hualien, the ROC fortified the border against further FRB encroachment and returned its attention to defending against the CCP.

The commander of the Takao during the Maropian incident was a Scandinavian ex-mercenary who had served with Republican forces in Malaya, under the name Gustav Adolphus.

At the end of 1950, a group of parliamentarians from the FRB state of Aceh resigned their post and returned home after failure to see Islamic law implemented in their homeland. These individuals gathered upon their return to declare their independence from the FRB, as the Islamic Republic of Aceh. Within forty-eight hours, FRB aircraft had begun a concentrated bombing campaign in the region, without authorization from the central government. Fighting broke out on the ground, but repression was brutal, and Aceh was brought back into the fold within a month.
This event marked an escalating trend of military independence and influence over electoral politics through force of arms, supported by their own political party and business interests... accusations of repression and dictatorship emerged with increasing frequency as regional commanders began to dictate policy.

1965
Political despotism in the Federal Republic of Bonstock caused great unrest as it grew in the years following its formation, especially in Java, where the Javanese populace were strong supporters of the PKB (Communist Party of Bonstock). The military, facing Russia and China now joined by Communist regimes emerging in Marimaia, Dra-pol, and Lyong (and communist-influenced independence fighters in Vietnam), was particularly brutal in its approach to striking down trade unions and collectivisation efforts. Though it still held several seats in parliament, the PKB knew that its position was growing precarious, and resolved to act before the military felt secure enough to assault them directly. On Sept. 30, 1965, a coup occurred in Java: the PKB, supported by Javanese peasant forces and possibly backed by the USSR or PRC, seized control of the local government. This was followed by other attempted coups across Bonstock as PKB cells launched attacks on Federal garrisons. Many conscript soldiers defected or deserted, bitter at the repressive system or eager for any excuse to return home to their native villages. Seven top generals were executed, and the President barely managed to evacuate Singapore before revolutionary forces stormed the Chancellery.
However, the revolution was short-lived. The Bonstockian navy, a highly potent entity, and elite volunteer marine corps escaped capture. From the carrier Yuko, airplanes bombed radio towers and fishing ports, cutting the revolutionary groups off on scattered islands, before heading to Maropia where they gathered substantial volunteers and conscripts, equipping them with munitions taken before the communists had overrun depots.
This force mounted an attack whose brutality came from lessons learned of the IJA and USAF in the Pacific War. Bombers swept over civil areas, soaking them in gasoline before lighting them aflame. Anyone suspected of supporting the communists was shot, deserters were hung and quartered, and free reign to rape and pillage was granted in the PKB's Java strongholds. The revolution, which had begun sending troops back to their homes for the harvest season, was scattered… guerrilla cells were soon eradicated by the burning of villages neighbouring suspected hideaways, and thousands were arrested or ‘dissapeared’. A moderate estimate ranges between 300 thousand and 500 thousand alleged members of the PKB killed or imprisoned in the aftermath.

Following the turmoil of the PKB coup and its suppression, the Federal military was left firmly in control of the republic. An election soon followed, though armed 'vote inspectors' revealed it to all as a sham. The Presidency was taken by the Sea Marshal of the Federal Navy, 'hero' of Malaya and the Maropian Coast, Gustav Adolphus.
Adolphus set about reshaping Bonstock to secure his power and the military agenda. Parliament was dismissed, and reconvened with only three political parties: a fifth of seats were granted to Maysumi, which was forced to represent both muslim and left-wing ideologies. Another fifth was granted to the Republican Party, tasked with representing Christian and right-wing beliefs. The remaining 60% of seats were filled by the Federal Party, consisting exclusively of active military officers.
Local administrations were re-organised to prevent the formation of power blocs as the PKB had amongst the Javanese: minority groups in a given area were granted military and administrative posts, their status dependent upon upholding the Federal system. Large corporations were established to administer export production of such materials as rubber, coffee, and oil, with large shares paid to the military in order to fund far-reaching programs. Organization of labour, collective bargaining, and all things associated with communism or socialism were banned outright, and advocating the overthrow of the state was made a crime of high treason. In an attempt to distract the population from dissent, a subsidy was implemented on fossil fuels, dropping the price to a fraction of that paid in neighbouring countries.
However, the process of consolidation did not go smoothly for Adolphus. The PKB had been all-but destroyed, its power base shattered, but a few elements remained: the surviving leadership fled into exile on Hainan (PRC, later moving to Naisho, PRS after the rise of General Liu), where they continued to provide an international voice for Bonstock's socialist movement. In Malaya, several armed units of the Communist Party of Malaya (which predated the Bonstockian Communist Party, but was largely confined to ethnic Chinese on the Malay peninsula, rather than the Javanese-Malay base of the PKB), led by Chin Peng, had managed a withdrawal into the jungle, where they began a campaign of guerrilla warfare (with early support from the PRC and Marimaia) that lasted until the 1980s. A new threat to the FRB was also born: the 'secularization' of the Maysumi movement saw several of its more extremist members vanish into hiding, accusing Adolphus of seeking to suppress the rise of a proper Islamic state in Southeast Asia. Those individuals went on to found the Jemmah Islamiah, accused of low-level terrorism such as car bombings and occasional kidnappings until its rise within the Islamic Republic of Indonesia following the collapse of Bonstock.

1966
During the 1950s, the Japanese archipelago had been undergoing a destabilizing shift. A nihillistic cult, the Ringists, had risen to prominence amongst the disheartened populace, and was consolidating its political power. The remnants of the post-war government had retreated first to Okinawa, until the departure of USQ forces there, and then back to the Sakishima Islands. There they remained precariously perched until December of 1966, when cruisers of the Federal Navy of Bonstock opened fire on a patrol boat moving amongst the southernmost rocks. The 'Japan War' had begin.
Attempting to find a victory like that which had secured his military post sixteen years before, Adolphus had decided to take advantage of the Ringist turmoil to sieze a new piece of territory just off the coast of Maropia. Declaring that the FRB was moving to protect the 'freedom of the Japanese people from pagan cultists', Adolphus ordered a force of marines and warships to take control of the Sakishimas. The task was not a difficult one: the local defence force was poorly armed and suffering from low morale, while Federal marines were supported by intense aerial and gun bombardments. Within four hours, the islands had surrendered, and scattered resistance was terminated within a month.
The Ringist Shogunate, concerned with Yamato suppression at home, wrote off the islands after a few shugendo curse-rituals, leaving the Federal Republic in control of the Sakishimas. Documents captured after the fall of Bonstock revealed that Adolphus had intended to pursue the war northward to Okinawa and Kyushu, but that condemnation by both Communist and Western blocs, coupled with the need for manpower closer to home in Malaya and Vietnam, caused these plans to be aborted before they were officially declared to the Bonstockian public.

At the close of the 1960s, matters closer to home had begun to develop as well. France had been ousted from Vietnam, and Roycelandian 'police action' there seemed unable to produce concrete results. Not wanting to see another domino fall into the communist maw, the FRB began to provide troops and limited air support to South Vietnamese efforts. The attempt did not proceed smoothly: neither Roycelandia nor Adolphus saw the effort as simply about South Vietnamese independence, and imperial ambitions tend to clash when directed at the same target. Frustrated at the mounting costs of the conflict, and increasing political friction, FRB forces withdrew in 1971.

The FRB also looked northward in its war on communism, to the nearby Philippines, where the communist New People's Army was gaining ground. Filipino security forces were soon furnished with Bonstockian arms, in the hope that they might be able to stem the ‘red tide’. This cooperation lasted until 1986, when Bonstock-supported leader Ferdinand Marcos was ousted from power, and is generally seen as having been ineffective, with FRB rifles now as common amongst the NPA as Filipino security forces.

1967
The FRB had taken the island of Timor with little effort in their earliest days, with neither Tulgary nor the Portuguese providing much resistance. The island had subsisted as an impoverished backwater, notable only as the home of the Federal Navy's primary weapons-testing range (known by the identifier 'Field 77'). During the early 1960s, ek-PKB and native resistance elements joined to form the Revolutionary Front of Independent Timor (FRETIN), which engaged in a guerilla campaign aiming for independance. These fighters had widespread popular support, but little military capability, and were unable to achieve their goals. As elsewhere, FRB suppression of dissent on Timor was both thorough and brutal, but the island had one major difference: whereas the prisons and forced-labour-factories of other regencies were bursting with dissidents, those on Timor remained empty: Field 77 had better uses for its captives.

Field 77 performed a number of weapons tests on live targets through the mid-60s, and it cannot be denied that the data so accumulated made Federal artillerists some of the most effective in the world at efficient delivery of mustard gas. In 1967, scientists working at Field 77 successfully detonated a nuclear weapon over a coastal village, raising international attention.

FRETIN shouted of systematic genocide being perpatrated by the FRB, and identified the residential nature of the test target. The FRB dismissed the accusations as the ludicrous ramblings of Maoist terrorists, producing photographs of the area which showed 'no bodies'. While the evidence was suspect, FRETIN was a leftist revolutionary group while the FRB was ostensibly a participant in the fight against communism, and it was easier for most Western nations to not examine the matter too closely. Only Hindustan took concrete measures to curtail FRB actions in the area, sending a trickle of funds and a liason to join FRETIN on Timor.

Despite the absence of international action, the natives of Timor were galvanized by the mushroom cloud that had risen over them: from 1968 to 1970, FRETIN gained the upper hand and forced the FRB to evacuate its scientists due to frequent assassinations. In mid-1970, however, the Federal Army deployed its elite Kopassus counter-insurgency forces to crush FRETIN once and for all. Their methods were no more brutal than before, but they extended far further, with families and villages being held responsible for the crimes of their members, and open season granted to the Kopassus for rape and pillage. By 1980, when the FRB declared resistance to have been terminated, an estimated quarter-million people had lost their lives on Timor.

1968
In the late 1960s, discussions were progressing between the governments of the UK and Tulgary, and local groups on New Guinea, with the aim of eventual independence for the last East Indies colony. Such talks received political condemnation from the FRB, which had claimed the island as its territory since 1945.

By the end of 1968, public support for the Adolphus regime was sagging: the great anti-communist crusade (pursued in Malaya, Vietnam, and the Philippines) had seen the military increasing demands on the population without producing significant results, while rumours swirled that the great victory in the Sakishimas had in fact been the defeat of invasion plans for Japan. Quinntonian embargoes, following the FRB’s first nuclear weapons tests in 1967, had exacerbated already-existing problems.

Adolphus needed a triumph to maintain the prestige of the military government, and he chose to make New Guinea his battleground. In December, 1968, Bonstockian paratroopers and marines were deployed onto New Guinea. Resistance was limited: most colonial forces had already withdrawn as a result of secret negotiations, where the FRB had used lucrative trade contracts and its military might to force agreement. After limited firefights with local police, and a concentrated heavy bomber campaign when resistance units were sighted, the Federal Republic declared the addition of a new territory.

A year later, in 1969, 100% of Papuans were reported to have voted in favour during a referendum on annexation. This ‘Act of Free Choice’ is seen by many observers to have been marred by widespread corruption and military threats. Rumours of genocide leading up to the Act further marred the FRB’s already-tarnished reputation in the region.

1972
Hated by its neighbours and riddled with corruption, the FRB was not doing well. Internal dissatisfaction extended even to the upper echelons of Bonstockian society, as wealthy industrialists found the military to be an increasing obstacle to economic prosperity. With the suppression of muslims and socialists keeping the Maysumi legislators as little more than corrupt recipients of patronage, the Republican party became increasingly assertive in demands for economic liberalisation and privatization of state-owned armaments factories, culminating in a bid for power. On August 14th, 1972, a group of military officers and thugs loyal to the Republican Party stormed the Chancellery. Gustav Adolphus was killed, and a Republican (Christian Burns, elderly owner of the FRB’s largest oil company, Federal Shell) was put in place as president.

Most historians suspect that the party hoped it could wield its financial clout to buy the loyalties of ranking officers, while gaining international support as a change from the oft-condemned government of Adolphus. While the latter goal was partially met, with many Western governments welcoming a pro-market regime in Singapore, the armed forces had no intention of surrendering their hold on power in exchange for bribes. There was some fighting in outlying regions, but the coordinated action of elite Federal Army brigades and Federal Navy marines saw the new government decapitated before it had a chance to consolidate. The Army retook the Chancellery on September 9th, raising up Adolphus’ son, Harald Gustavsson, as president.

The Republicans were stripped of their positions in both the legislature and corporate world, with the appointment of active military officers to the top positions of almost all major enterprises. While not 'nationalization' in a strict sense, the will of the military was thus placed securely in control of the economy. Harald invoked the strength of nationalism, and massive military expansion, to distract from continuing domestic difficulties, convinced that the footholds established by his father would soon be transformed into a much broader federation... existing records reveal plans for expansion into Marimaia, Taiwan, and northward into East Asia.

Several plans were initiated in this regard... the funneling of arms to Tordian nobles during the Glennite Crisis (1975), the funding of opposing ethnic forces in the Solomons (1988), and attempts to expand intelligence networks from the USQ to Ringist Japan. Harald also authorized numerous grand projects, designed to ensure Bonstockian military dominance of Asia.
Some of his first projects were the ‘terror ships’, the Draken Superbattlerships, triggering the ‘Race of Fools’ which saw the Strainists of Lyong construct their own vessel to counter the Draken, and the FRB employ its superior industrial power to produce seven models in addition to its first two. Development also went into the ‘Raptor’ superiority fighter and an advanced heavy stealth bomber.

These efforts produced only limited results, and despite a concerted indoctrination effort, internal conflicts continued to rage. More worrying was the international reputation of the FRB, which saw its movements increasingly watched by a hostile world community which had recently been freed of Cold War tensions.


?*

The FRB was not the only power to have experienced political shifts. In Marimaia, the Stalinist regime had been replaced by a new fascist government favourable to the free market. Seeking to expand its regional influence, Marimaia had launched an invasion of neighbouring Myanmar (Burma), with the intent of replacing its military junta with a more favourable regime. The FRB, perhaps seeking to establish a new foothold for expansion, agreed to join the effort and provided forces to secure the country and suppress continuing warlord resistance. Several months into the occupation, a number of Federal Army soldiers based in the town of Mergui were slain by local guerrillas. The affront enraged Harald, who vowed that Megui would pay for its defiance. In a harsh response in keeping with its own policies of domestic repression, FRB heavy bombers reduced the town to rubble. The Massacre of Mergui was a propaganda boon to the warlord resistance, and saw FRB relations with other Asian powers plummet to new lows. War was discussed from Mumbai to Sithin, but Federal troops retreated to their bases in Malaya and little came of the matter.

Barely a year later, the Federal Republic of Bonstock decided to impose a tariff on all shipping through the high-traffic Strait of Malacca. This move, intended to bring in needed funds as well as punish hostile Asian governments, led to the Malacca War and the demise of the FRB.

Notes

Above is history relating to Bonstock (edited into a timeline from the less specific source post on the off-site forum, so it may be a bit crudely fit). Will try to finish a Spyr timeline soon… its been sitting about half-done since AMW was founded ^_^.

*On dating the Malacca War, I am uncertain… it was AMW’s first RPed event, so one might assume it predates matters RPed afterwards, and Sujava/Indonesia seem to have had a half-decade at least to rise and sink as they have, assuming about a year of postwar occupation. However, Malacca comes only after Mergui, and Mergui was initiated by Chiisu Suun, who is a rather young fellow, so I’m not sure how far it can be pushed back without having Tian knock off Mikada when Chiisu was still a preteen. Up to DNK to determine the framework on that one, I think.

A few notes on what has already been posted.

Firstly, on the Shah of Iran… I don’t believe there ever was a Shah, or ‘Iran’, or even Muslim presence in Armand/Persia. Rather there was a collectivist culture that would one day form the Armandian Combine… they wrote epic poems about cheese if I recall correctly. AC posted their timeline somewhere, I think, hopefully he’ll peep in and clarify.

Secondly, a similar case exists for Pol Pot and Cambodia… neither exists in AMW’s past. Cambodia-Laos-Thailand became Marimaia in the post-war, under the Stalinist dictatorship of Mikada Suun. I’m sure there were hardships and political killings, but nothing on the scale of Pot’s killing fields. Cambodia as a political entity dates from the division of Marimaia into ethnic Lao, Khmer, and Thai states, where again DNK will probably be needed to provide framework for fitting it all into the timeline.

There are a lot of errors in the whole Putin affair, and the Shah never existed in AMW. (Although the Higher One did flee to Tulgary.)

Mikada bit the dust when Chiisu was 18; as Shinseiki Tenno I last updated Chiisu as age 29. So there's an eleven year gap to be filled with his dictatorship over Marimaia, his time in Peru and the subsequent liberation of Japan from the Ringists.

My personal timeline had Chiisu fleeing to Peru at around 25-26, maybe one to two years there and then the move to Japan. I have to be honest, I've always regarded character age with a Simpsons-esque disregard, so I may need some time to get ages sorted out and whatnot. I guess Chiisu is now in his early-thirties.

As far as Cambodia goes, well, Mikada was a bit of a nutjob and Marimaia was going down the North Korean route of starvation when he 'caught pneumonia', but I wouldn't say it was in the same league as Pol Pot. Cambodia as a state would have emerged when Chiisu fled to Peru, so it's been around for at least five years.

I realise that this info doesn't help that much, but I'll spend some time getting things sorted.

Well, I do like the idea of everyone posting their timelines in an easy to find space, and perhaps that leading to more cohesion about the place. When I was telling Fleur about AMW, it was a nightmare. Just try and o it yourself, sit someone down and explain the history and cultures involved in AMW. It is brutal.

I think I will wait to do the USQ time-line for a little while, as I think that I should try to be sensitive to everyone else’s timelines. You guys are pretty much writing it for me.

But NG, I must say that the whole point to Quinntonia is that it is peopled with committed Christians who practice their faith with innocence of purpose and clarity and purity of vision. So, perhaps you could tone down some of the shady dealings you have the USQ involved in? Not that we are perfectly sinless or anything, but a lot of it we wouldn’t have done on moral grounds.

Unlike France in AMW, Christianity is not just pomp and a measure of control for the people, etc., for Quinntonia, it is everything we are. Not an excuse to get involved and then its morality to be ignored when it becomes inconvenient, but something which we as a nation, military and government try to live as best we can. Just FYI.

WWJD
Amen.

I love where this is going. AC, the High One then, as long as well, oh you get it.

Quinn, I think that you must realize that as Quinntonia you had almost everything to do with the formation of post war earth. I didnt try to make you a black force, in my view you simply did what the real USA had done, with only benevolent intentions, e.g. doing what needed to be done to prevent a very likely world communist takeover following WWII.

I posted the only main event you participated in was the Tulglarian Restoration, as per my conception of the Domino theory. I stated you more or less just turned a blind eye to France. I kind of liked the idea that Quinntonia, nearly unaware, created the ground work for the Holy League. As a historian, thats the only thing I could come up with that made sense.

All that said, every criticism is valid. After all, what we seek to do here is throw everything we have on the table, fine tune it, then get it up in one agreed upon and final form. So lets just get our ideas done here, then we debate, then we shall have a pad to launch of so to speak.

AMW France Timeline continued*

*A detailed history of both the Baltic Wars, Tsarist Restoration, and Battle of New Caledonia are being omitted due to need input of Armandian Cheese, Estenlands and Beth Gellert and Roycelandia respectively.

1996 Russian Restoration and Baltic War

-Awaiting input.

February-May 1997 Battle of New Caledonia

In an ideological response to the absorption of the Republic of Algeria into the Kingdom of Algeria/Roycelandian Southern Algeria and subsequent Bourbon vassal state, Beth Gellert embarks upon a surprise assault of the strongest French Pacific outpost, New Caledonia. Vicious fighting, however the Igovians are not able to break past a beach head before Quinntonia enforces a cease fire.

Roycelandian troops are involved fighting with the French.

-Awaiting further input.

September 1999

King Glenn of Tord, a minor nation on the Lyong Peninsula, is overthrown by leftist forces and placed under arrest. In a farcical operation French special agents of the Ordu du Saint-Louis (a group of ambitious nobles who watched too much James Bond) succeed in rescuing Glenn from imprisonment but fail to deliver him from the country.

Relations with Spyr, the key Lyong power, are ruined from this point on. Due to the ODSL’s methods many previously neutral Asian powers become suspicious of the Bourbon Monarchy.

January 2000

The Bourbon Restoration under Louis XX has now been in power for twenty years. France is again a major world power, and the Holy League following its victories in Lavrageria, the Baltic, and the disputable win in New Caledonia is seen as a resurgent Atlas.

In Versailles the largest fete since the opening of the palace complex in the 17th Century is held to celebrate the Vicesimus Anniversary Celebration. All monarchs of the Holy League are in attendance: Tsar Wingert, King Philip VI, Caesar Maximus del Piedmont, Grand Duke Papan and even Emperor Royce I.

Unfortunately for Louis XX, the exiled Royal House of Beth Gellert, Crown Prince Llewellyn and Prince Bedwyr are also in attendance to celebrate. Prince Bedwyr, unbeknownst to his father, has developed a radical taste for politics and a burning hatred for Louis XX. At the height of the party, Louis XX entertains a few select friends, among them Emperor Royce, by having his ravishing Mistress Mlle. du Barry dance for them at the Temple of Love in the Menu Parc.

Following the entertainment, King Louis retired to the Petit Trianon to enjoy his mistress’ company in a more personal manner. Following their tryst, while on his way under light guard back to le Grand Château, Louis XX was ambushed by Prince Bedwyr, who being a royal was not subject to search. In the Grand Parc, several hundred meters from le Château, Bedwyr detonated a fused bomb killing himself instantly and exploding Louis’ ornate horse drawn carriage…mortally injuring the monarch. Prince Llewellyn, the Crown Prince of Beth Gellert, is seized at once and placed under arrest.

King Louis XX managed to hold onto life for several days, and put his events in order, including verifying the secession of his son the war-hero Dauphin Louis-Auguste.

Then he died.

Louis XX was dead, and his son took the name Louis-Auguste to rule under rather than the expected Louis XXI, as a sign of devotion to his fathers’ memory.

His Most Christian Majesty Louis-Auguste brings the ambitious Ministre d’Etat Monsieur le Comte de Maurepas as his chief advisor. With the military behind him, and drawing on the devot or ultra-conservative faction at Court, Louis-Auguste makes a smooth transition to power.

He became His Most Christian Majesty Louis-Auguste, King of France and Navarre, Suzerain of Algeria, Master of the Colonies and Defender of the Faith at thirty years of age, having had three children: Peter and Catherine, twins, who were in line for the Tsarist Throne, and Louis-Auguste Xavier Charles de Bourbon et Parma, the tiny baby French Dauphin.

The first act of the Louis-Auguste Government is to publicly and summarily execute Prince Llewellyn, without a trial by the new King’s fiat. He was lashed, boiled in oil, broken on the wheel, and finally drawn and quartered as an example of what happens to those who attack sacred monarchy.

October 20th 2000

HMCM Louis XX was able to rule by a sort of charming consensus. He was loved by everyone and hated by few, as he played all sides against the middle. HMCM Louis-Auguste, however, was not the playboy his father was. Louis XX had over a dozen mistresses and several lovers, the most infamous of them Mlle. du Barry. He was a gourmet who liked heart meals and drinking nights filled with gambling. In short, though he was an absolute ruler, he was more governed by his pleasure than he himself governed France. The quintessential French chief of state.

With such high popularity on all levels, it was impossible for a cabal of French Republican and opportunist lawyers to make any attempt to change the regime. With the blunt Louis-Auguste, who took no mistresses and was in love with his fecund wife Tsar Wingert’s daughter Queen Jillesepone, who was a gruff ex-soldier whose favorite activity was not gallivanting around Paris but engaging in the hunt for weeks at a time, who made appearances to the public rarely and only acted in the lavish Court rituals of Versailles when needed; it was now possible.

So the October Revolution occurred, staged by a strange quasi-mystical democratic group the Illuminati, and liberal nobles with their common retainers. The impetus for the Revolution came from a ‘sex tape’ released to the public which contained the youngest of the Princes of the Blood, le Duc de Aquitaine (youngest brother of Louis-Auguste) engaging in the most dissolute kinds of acts imaginable.

In short order the Parlements, made of liberal nobles who had been lawyers before the Restoration, declared the Sixth Republic and elected le Duc de Chartres, a distant cousin of the Royal Family, President. Several divisions of Gardes Francaises mutined and swore loyalty, along with returned French exiles, to Chartres.

They failed, however, to estimate the martial nature and reactionary ability of Louis-Auguste. M. de Maurepas was made Prime Minister, and given sweeping powers. His Most Christian Majesty gave all power in France to his brothers and himself, along with the brilliant Maurepas. In a week the rebels had been arrested, many were executed. The rebellious divisions were decimated and placed under arrest. Over 60,000 persons were shipped off to life sentences on Devils Island.

Following the All Saints Day Reclamation, Louis-Auguste made himself the absolute ruler of the Kingdom in fact as well as name. All law courts were crushed, in their place were Intendants who wielded absolute power in the provinces under the King’s name. The Estates General was disbanded, many of its members arrested and executed.

The most important results of the revolution were the following: the creation of a Draconian secret police, la Marechaussee, the creation of a ultra-conservative Royal Court staffed entirely by devots with an intense loyalty to the King and Church, and the removal of all obstacles to the Crown’s power.

La Marechaussee were the most efficient secret police since the Gestapo, who operated in France and to a lesser degree the Kingdom of Algeria. No one has accurately gauged their number, although estimates range from 50-150,000 uniformed, plains clothed, and secret agents. They were given the ability to operate outside all law (not that there was much codified law in Restoration France per se) and were answerable only to the Most Christian King: not His family, nor His ministers, nor his representatives. They infiltrated every strata of society from the highest to lowest, and though terror tactics such as public floggings for remarks against the Crown to disappearing people at night wiped aside all resistance to Versailles’s will. The Bastille grew full, and torture of prisoners became routine. A shady man named Monsieur le Noir was made Director of the Secret Police, not even a noble, but a man who had no qualms doing anything to anyone if he thought it would uphold the divinely sanction absolute monarchy. There are no pictures of this man, and he leaves no paper trails, although in Versailles some claim to have seen him at a few of Her Serene Majesty Jillesepone’s soirees.

The Most Christian King Louis-Auguste’s Conseil d’Etat was now fanatically loyal to the Bourbon Monarchy, with all liberals wiped aside. A key example was the replacement of M. de Saint-Germain as the War Minister by le Duc de Broglie, that rash warrior who fought with the then Dauphin in the Lavragerian War. He completely reversed the prior ministers policy of building fortifications at various points to defend prior French holdings, most famously the Philippines and Ft. St. Paul, which he stopped the funding to leaving the fort only a husk. He replaced the policy, with the King’s sanction, with an idea to reclaim through massive and brutal war the former regions of French West Africa, in the process abandoning all French Pacific holdings save New Caledonia and Ft. St. Martin.

Finally there were no obstacles left to any of the King’s wishes. The state now ran all media, the Catholic Church had been running education and health without resistance for some time. Lawyers were jailed or re-educated, and the purges had either exiled to hard labor or executed directly all major figures opposed to the Bourbon Monarchy.

February 2001

After disastrous investments in Ft. St. Paul and the Philippines, the King through le Duc de Broglie and M. de Maurepas recalls nearly all French troops, equipment, and finance from the Pacific abandoning the Imperialist friendly Aznar Government. Only New Caledonia remains a fortified and well protected French possession, everything else is more or less ‘leased’ to Roycelandia in exchange for future loans and aid.

Plans and supplying begins for the conquest of Africa, which also with Spain include Iberian unification and the taking of Gibraltar.

June 2004 Grand Congress of the Holy League

The Grand Congress of the Holy League establishes the unity of Europe’s Orthodox Christian (Eastern and Western Rites) absolute monarchies. Grand plans are made for future Holy League expansion and unity. Depkazia is brought on board as a new member, flushing the Holy League delegates with enthusiasm at their own longer reach and the apparent apathy of the democratic west for all they intend.

Le Duc de Broglie announces his intention to ‘liberate’ Africa for the Glorious Sun King Louis-Auguste.

The west, reluctant to deal with the Holy League prior to this, sees the writing on the wall, prompting Walmington and Australasia to enter into close alliance with one another.

In Versailles, Louis-Auguste, over-confident for victory and brimming with pride at his unchallenged power, gives the final ‘go-ahead’ planning for the African Campaign, in effect throwing caution to the wind. Le Duc de Broglie rises in favor along with Maurepas. The Royal Family (King Louis-Auguste, Queen Jillesepone, Princes of the Blood le Comte d’Artois, le Comte de Provence, le Duc de Normandie and le Duc de Aquitaine) are now the omnipotent and unchallenged rulers of all France’s domains.

The unstoppable final preparations for the African Campaign begin, along with assisting Spain to begin Iberian Unity. The decision is made in secret by Louis-Auguste and Queen Jillesepone personally to utterly destroy Gibraltar, by Monsieur le Noir makes their wishes possible without actually tying their name to any document.

The Holy League is at the apparent apex of its power, encompassing the majority of continental Europe and with strong influence in Central Asia. Economically a solid entity…although admittedly the common people do not share much in the wealth.

2006 World War Three Begins

Voila!

((So, I think that hopefully covers Restoration France up until the firing started. Comments and criticisms are welcome and of course needed.))

((Now, the hard part, doing the War. Is everyone thinking this project is going well so far, and that soon we shall be able to organize the war timeline?))

Sorry if I came off as abrasive, my time is short so I have to be quick. I've glanced over most of it and I approve grandly; I plan to get back into the swing of things in December, once my college applications are finished up.

Ah, very interesting, having sat reading all that I now haven't time to post anything myself, but I'll think about it while I'm away from the computer.

1950-1982: First Indo-Bedgellen War

1947

India achieves its independence from Great Walmington, although Portugal and the French Republic maintain colonies at Goa and Pondicherry respectively. Despite the efforts of various respectable statesmen and public figures, partition of the nation cannot be avoided, and Walmingtonian India is split four ways. Largest of the four nations by far is the Indian National Union, led by Sardar Vallabhai Patel. Kashmir is left in the hands of Maharaja Hari Singh, with the intention of later holding a referendum on joining the Islamic Republic of North Pakistan, headed by Jinnah. Gelatian-dominated southern India becomes the Principality of Beth Gellert, under young Llewellyn. Of the four states, only the Indian National Union could be called pleased with the terms of partition.

1949

Upset over Sardar Patel's and the ruling INC's marginalization of Walmingtonian-appointed Maharajahs, and not satisfied with the level of government support for the military, the Indian Army stages a coup d'etat. Ten thousand soldiers revolt and overthrow elected legislatures and move on Mumbai, where the still-loyal Indian Navy waits to evacuate the government. Polish-born colonel Stanislaw Syzko is promoted to General and defeats the coup with aid from the Labour government of Clement Attlee. The Indian Army is subsequently purged and reorganized as the Indian National Army, not affiliated with Subhash Chandra Bose's army of the same name.

1950

Prince Llewellyn takes advantage of domestic unrest in the Indian National Union to launch an invasion, and the First Indo-Bedgellen War begins. In spite of Union superiority at sea and in the air, Llewellyn's battle-hardened soldiers make significant gains on every front. Local police units and hastily re-mobilized army formations do not take the steam out of Llewellyn's offensive. Calcutta is taken after a week of bitter fighting, opening the door to the northern part of the Indian National Union. The small INA is forced to pull-back into Maharashtra in order to avoid total destruction. Rear-guard actions do manage to slow the Bedgellen advance somewhat, but not before half the Indian National Union's territorial extent is lost. It is the monsoon season, plus the intervention of Clement Attlee's government, that causes the invasion to cease at the beginning of the monsoon season.

1951

Armandians in Uttar Pradesh, long dominated by an Armandian majority, mount a revolt and secede from the Indian National Union after causing a small National Army force to withdraw. The province is renamed North Sienna and becomes politically unified with the Armandian Combine in Persia. Rajput nobles in Rajasthan revolt as well, and succeed in defeating another small National Army force. Rajasthan is declared independent under a loose confederation of Rajput princes, who quickly seek an alliance with Armandians in North Sienna. Thanks to desperate diplomacy on the part of Union politicians, this is prevented.

1955

Although the government of Winston Churchill is less amiable to Mumbai than that of Clement Attlee, he does not prevent the sale of defense equipment to the Indian National Union. Rearmament is begun in earnest by Parliament, which makes Stanislaw Syzko Field Marshal of the Indian National Army. A special convoy of freighters from Great Walmington delivers new fighter jets, Centurion tanks, and enough Second World War surplus to equip the nation for many years to come. Recruitment initiatives are given high priority and Parliament is given the power power to enact conscription of the half a million man army target is not achieved.

1962

Field Marshal Stanislaw Syzko launches his long-awaited January offensive into Madhya Pradesh, using new Walmingtonian equipment and a 750,000-man army raised largely by Parliament. Llewellyn's forces are taken by surprise, and for two months the Indian National Army inflicts defeat after defeat upon the enemy in Madhya Pradesh. That province is recaptured, but still-superior Bedgellen numbers cause the advance to stall and eventually stop, and the opposing forces settle-in for the monsoon. Destroyed infrastructure is rebuilt and democratic practices re-instituted during the monsoon lull.

1963

Indian Navy vessels undertake a raid in force against Jaffna on Victoria & Salvador. Much Bedgellen shipping is destroyed and a detachment of marine commandos briefly occupies the town in a repeat of Operation Archery. The raid does not have great strategic value, but serves to demonstrate Mumbai's superiority at sea and diverts troops away from the main front to guard against similar attacks in the future.

1968

The Indian National Union begins to funnel weapons and finances to resistance movements on Timor, following the FRB's detonation of a nuclear bomb there. Captain Farooq Abdullah becomes the first National Army soldier to deploy outside the Indian Subcontinent since independence in 1947. Bonstockian shipping is made subject to search and seizure in the waters of the Indian National Union and Bonstockian nationals are expelled from the country. Indian Navy submarines are ordered to monitor Bonstockian shipping in international waters, and make supply runs to both Timor and Papua. Affairs in Bonstock see the Indian National Union's first covert involvement within another state.

1974

Border skirmishes with North Sienna result in a full-fledged war over possession of the city of Gwalior, located near the Indo-Armandian frontier. Armandian forces initially force the smaller Indian forces into a withdrawal, but a fierce counterattack destroys North Sienna's attack spearheads and forces troops back to a line approximately even with the border. After combat between regular forces dies-down, irregular units made up of civilians belonging to either the Indian or Armandian ethnicities do battle on a local scale, for control of council legislatures and infrastructure. As many as 50,000 people are killed in skirmishing, lasting approximately four months. Although strategically inconclusive, Armandian forces made a net territorial gain at the expense of the Indian National Union, which at the same time destroyed much industrial infrastructure in North Sienna with its more capable air force. Llewellyn's forces take advantage of the temporary distraction to launch a cross-border offensive, which results in the seizure of modern-day Adilabad.

1979

Baloch tribesmen begin small-scale raiding operations in southern Afghanistan against USSR and DRA troops and administrative structures. This prompts further inconclusive clashes with the Armandian Combine along its Persian frontier and frustrates Russian ambitions.

1982-1989: Second Indo-Bedgellen War

1982

The Indian Navy conducts large-scale raids against Victoria & Salvador, directed against overthrown Prince Llewellyn who found shelter there. Colombo is bombarded and Galle briefly invaded by a force of marines while the Naval Air Arm flies strikes inland with the carrier [i]Viraat[/b]. Although initially taken by surprise, Llewellyn's air force causes the Indian raiders significant casualties, and under the cover of darkness ships and troops are withdrawn from Victoria & Salvador.

1983

Parliament releases a report detailing the social and economic effects of the Indo-Bedgellen War on the Indian National Union. The monetary drain imposed by a large military is shown to be taking a heavy toll on public health and education programs, while industrial development continues to suffer as well at the hands of both combat and a lack of resources.

1985

For the second time, Beth Gellert mounts a large-scale offensive into the Indian National Union, this time under the leadership of Bolshevist Premier Sopworth, and with help from the USSR. Unlike the first offensive, in 1950, the Indian National Army is largely able to blunt the attack. Bedgellen logistics are disrupted by the superior Indian Navy and Indian Air Force, which allows attack units to be cut-off and destroyed by National Army troops after minimal territorial loss. Losses in men and material are high on both sides and the front line is stabilized along the present-day border between the Igovian Soviet Commonwealth and the Indian National Union. Sopworth concentrates his efforts on breaking Victoria & Salvador, and on the border neither side is left with resources sufficient to mount serious offensive operations. Parliament begins to concentrate on long-delayed social programs and government decentralization. Smaller-scale fighting continues for the next four years.

1987

Fifty thousand National Army soldiers, plus a significant portion of the Indian Navy, are deployed to South Korea to counter Director Hotan's invasion in the Unification War. Indian troops, allied with Quinntonian, Hudecian, and South Korean forces, face initial difficulties. Drapoel control of much of South Korea is broken by the defeat of UPA efforts to ford the Nakdong are thwarted at Pohang, and an allied offensive recaptures close to two-thirds of South Korea's former territorial extent. Indian soldiers are responsible for defeating the Drapoel counterattack at Andong. After heavy losses on both sides, the war grinds down, and a peace treaty is signed.

1989

After the removal of Sopworth Igo as head of Beth Gellert, and the accession of his father, Graeme, to prominence in the new Igovian Soviet Commonwealth, Parliament recommences diplomatic relations. Borders are set where they stand and subsequently demilitarized in the new spirit of cooperation. Economic recovery is experienced in the Indian National Union as resources become free for the reconstruction of destroyed industrial areas and as social programs are made first priority. Parliament completes the decentralization of sovereign powers and their distribution amongst local councils. Military conscription is ended and replaced with wholly volunteer service. Very friendly relations between the Indian National Union and the Igovian Soviet Commonwealth become largely constant from then on, with the result of mutual economic and political progress.

1990

The Indian National Army deploys in support of Marimaia's invasion of Burma, which sees the military junta in power there deposed. Lower-level fighting ensues, pitting nationalists and regime loyalists against the occupation authority and the new government established by Marimaia. Efforts undertaken by Marimaia, Spyr, Hudecia, United Elias, Fiji*, and the Indian National Union meet with initial difficulties. The Federal Republic of Bonstock, an unexpected contributor to the occupation, destroys the city of Mergui as a deterrent to guerrilla activity there. Most occupational units, outraged by Singapore's actions, expel Bonstockians from Burma. Military action is discussed but not carried-through with. International anger over the destruction of Mergui helps to cause the subsequent Malacca War.

1991/1992**

The Federal Republic of Bonstock places a tariff on the Strait of Malacca, a waterway vital to commerce in Asia. Outraged over what is seen as a violation of international law and goodwill, the nations of Asia, increasingly angered over the Federal Republic of Bonstock's actions both within and outside its borders, give Singapore an ultimatum. Either the tariff will be lifted, or there will be war. Bonstock, under Lord Harald, son of the FRB's first ruler, Gustav Adolphus, refuses to lift the tariff and war is promptly declared. See Malacca War (http://ns.goobergunch.net/wiki/index.php/Malacca_War). The allied war effort secures Bonstock's defeat and internal collapse. Renewed tensions arise over the subject of Singapore's sovereignty, and a war between the Igovian Soviet Commonwealth and the Sinoese junta of General Liu is narrowly avoided. Singapore continues to exist as an independent nation. The Indian National Defense Forces play a prominent role in the Malacca War, especially in the Sakishima Islands in close cooperation with the People's Republic of Spyr and Hudecia. Indian soldiers continue to occupy Sulawesi jointly with the Hudecians until the summer of 1993.

1994***

Lavrageria, under Larionko Adirov, is invaded by monarchist France and the Ukraine, triggering the Lavragerian Defensive War. Despite clear-cut superiority in equipment and numbers, monarchist soldiers prove insufficiently trained and without proper knowledge of the local geography. Lavragerian guerrillas are able to conduct a highly successful campaign against the invasion, although territorial loss ensues. After the war's main pitched battle, outside the city of Hia'Itakchi, Lavrageria's main population center, the Franco-Ukranian assault grinds to a halt and peace is sought. Military advisors from the Indian National Union, as well as an air commando unit, take part in the fighting, although commitments elsewhere in Asia prevent a more significant intervention.

1996

Nepalese King Nyanendra is toppled by Maoist revolutionaries, prompting an invasion on the part of the Chinese kingdom of Xiaguo, temporarily in possession of territory usually under the sway of General Liu's junta. Chinese soldiers attempt to occupy Nepal, but are opposed by an expeditionary force of nearly 100,000 Indian National Army troops, who are supported by the Igovian Soviet Commonwealth. Heavy losses are incurred on both sides as Chinese forces try to take mountain positions from Nepalese and Indian units. After a brief but terribly brutal contest, Chinese troops are forced to withdraw from the country due to pressures from within China itself. The Maoist government in Kathmandu is left intact and the Indian National Army largely withdraws from the country. Indian forces are left unable to react to the joint invasion on the part of Russia's Vladimir Putin and the Ukraine's Tsar Wingert of both the Baltic countries and Moldova.

2004/2005

Fighting on the Philippines sees President Azar sign away his country to Roycelandia. The difficulties of combatting several guerrilla movements prompts Roycelandia to invite French forces to the island of Palawan, slated to become a French colony. This is an unacceptable state of affairs in most Asian capitals. Preparations are made to forcibly evict Roycelandia and France from the Philippines, before a suspected attempt at recolonizing Cambodia materializes. The Indian National Defense Force deploys in strength to Sujava and serious plans are drawn up for military operations aimed at destroying Franco-Roycelandian forces and the Azar presidency. Overwhelmed by the expenses involved in running a wholly military outpost on the other side of the world, surrounded by hostile navies, France and Roycelandia begin phased withdrawls from the Philippines. At the same time, the Indian National Union undertakes an invasion of Rajasthan, under Rajput rule since secession from the Indian National Union, prompted by the arrival of a French diplomatic mission. Rajasthani forces are crushed and many Frenchmen are killed.

(OCC: Not very complete, but will be soon.)

Popping in again, to contribute the Saharawi timeline (mostly just copied from RL sources, as they dont differ much until the mid-90s).

I do have one major objection to matters posted above, however... the timing of the Philippines affair has been knocked back much too far. That act has influenced recent attitudes/policies/electoral results in a number of areas, and putting it at 2001 introduces a gap of some five years for an event that I see as having occured less than a year ago in relation to current RP.

Saharawi Timeline

1884/85
Several European powers assemble at the Berlin Conference to divide Africa. Western Sahara placed under the "protection of Spain".
1899
Battles at Daora between Saharawi tribesmen and Moroccan troops.

1900
Franco-Spanish Convention defines the southern border of Spain's Saharawi colony (June 27).

1912
Spanish-French Convention demarcates the borders of W.S. (Nov. 27)

1923
Bloody clashes between the French army and the Saharawi begin, lasting just over a decade.

1934
Final "Pacification" of the interior of Western Sahara. Spain takes full possession of the northern part of the territory. Saharawi armed resistance is successfully suppressed.

1949
Manuel Alia Medina, a Spanish geological engineer, discovers phosphates in Bucraa. The discovery reveals one of the biggest high grade phophate deposits in the world. The reserves of this zone were initially estimated to be more than 10 million tons and 70 to 80% pure.

1956
Riots and bloody battles begin between Spanish colonial troops and the Saharawi, lasting two years.

1958
A series of agreements are signed between regional powers: Saguia el Hamra and Rio de Oro are affirmed as Spanish territories, Spain ceded Tarfaya to Morocco, and a Franco-Spanish military treaty (with Moroccan approval) resolves to eliminate Saharawi resistance in the region.

1960-66 [(these years in RL see a series of United Nations resolutions and declarations affirming the rights of the Saharawi to independence, and calling on Spain to decolonize… in the absence of the UN, I’m not sure how widespread such calls would have been… certainly from Hindustan, certainly not from the emerging monarchists, but as to powers such as Quinntonia or even Walmington I am uncertain)].

1967
Mohamed Sidi Brahim Bassiri returns to the territory and starts organizing the anticolonial movement that came to be known as “Harakat Tahrir Saguia El Hamra wa Uad Ed-Dahab" (Organization for the Liberation of Saguia El Hamra y Rio de Oro).

1968
Rebirth of the Sahrawi resistance movement with the formation of Liberation Movement for Saguia el Hamra y Rio de Oro under the leadership of Sidi Brahim Bassiri.

1970
Bassiri's movement organizes a large, peaceful manifestation at Zemla (El Aaiun), demanding the right to independence. It ends with the massacre of civilians and the arrest of hundreds of citizens (June 17).

1973
-Foundation of Polisario Front, which begins armed struggle against Spainish occupation.
-First Polisario attack on a Spanish post El-Khanga (May 20th). Seven Saharawi fighters take the garrison by surprise and occupy it.
-Leaders from the nations of Algeria, Morocco, and Mauritania meet to call for self-determination to be exercised in Western Sahara.

1974
-Spanish and Polisario forces clash at Galb Lahmar and Aoukeyra. Polisario supporters sabotage two control stations of Fosbucraa (phosphate) conveyor belt, temporarily halting phosphate exports.
-Algeria begins for first time to give some low-key support to Polisario Front
-Spain announces plan to hold a referendum on the future status of W.S. in the first six months of 1975. King Hassan II of Morocco begins an international campaign against granting W.S. independence (claiming it to be part of Morocco), warning that if full autonomy is placed on the ballot, Morocco will invade.

1975
-Spain announces a postponement of the referendum in W.S.
-Algerian foreign minister, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, contests the Moroccan claim to Western Sahara.
-Two units of Tropas Nomadas mutiny, take 15 Spanish officers and soldiers prisoner and join the Polisario Front with their arms and equipment (May 10 and 11)
-Polisario guerrillas seize the commander of Spanish forces in Guelta Zemmur (May 14)
-Algerian President, Houari Boumedienne upholds the right of the Saharawi people to self-determination (June 19)
-The Spanish foreign minister, Pedro Cortina y Mauri, meets El-Ouali Mustapha Sayed in Algiers agreeing to hand power progressively to the Polisario Front in return for major concessions to Spain over phosphates and fisheries, and the Polisario releases 13 Spanish prisoners (Sept 9)
-Spanish troops are withdrawn from several small outlying posts (October)
-The Saharawi Djemaa (native advisory body to the colonial government) declares support for the Polisario Front at a conference at Ain Ben Tili (October 12)
-International Court of Justice declares that the people of Western Sahara have the right to self-determination (October 16)
-Gomez de Salazar (Spanish governor) and El-Ouali Mustapha Sayed hold talks in Mahbes on the transfer of powers to Polisario Front, and Polisario leaders are given authority to enter El Aaiún (October 22)
-12,000 Saharawis demonstrate in support of Polisario in El Ayoun (October 26-27)
-Ahmed Laraki and the Mauritanian foreign minister, Hamdi Ould Mouknas, hold talks with Spanish officials in Madrid (October 28-30). Algeria warns Spain against making a trilateral agreement with Morocco and Mauritania.
-The Moroccan army crosses Western Sahara border, clashing with Polisario Front as it tries to occupy Farsia, Haousa and Jdiriya (October 31)
- Spanish authorities launch Operation Golondrina, a compulsory evacuation program for Spanish civilians (Nov. 3)
-King Hassan of Morocco orders 350,000 civilians to cross into the Western Sahara--the "Green March" (Nov 6).
- Madrid Agreement is signed, granting Morocco and Mauritania ‘deputy governors’ to assist the Saharawi Djemaa an Spanish governor as Spain withdraws. (Nov. 14) A transitional tripartite administration, headed by the Spanish governor-general, is set-up, following the arrival in El Aaiún of a Moroccan deputy governor, Ahmed Bensouda, (Nov.25) and a Mauritanian deputy governor, Abdellahi Ould Cheikh, (Nov. 27)
-Morroccan troops enter Smara (Nov. 27)
-67 of the 102 members of the Saharawi Djemaa sign the Proclamation of Guelta Zemmur, declaring the assembly's dissolution and the creation of a pro-Polisario Provisional Saharawi national Council (Nov. 28)
-Saharawi refugees begin to leave the cities (November-February), many settling in the desert hinterland.
-Moroccan troops arrive in El Aaiún (December 11)
-Mauritanian troops occupy Tichla and La Guera (December 20)

1976
-Moroccan aviation forces bombard Saharawi camps in the desert causing hundreds of deaths, and the exodus towards the Tindouf area (in Algeria) begins.
-Polisario Front attacks the Fosbucraa conveyor belt, forcing a halt to phosphate mining for several years (January)
-Moroccan troops arrive in Dakhla (January 9)
-Spanish troops are withdrawn from El Aaiún (January 9)
-Mauritanian troops arrive in Dakhla and the last Spanish troops leave the territory , departing from Dakhla (January 12)
-Spanish Foreign Minister, Areilza, communicates that Spain has not transferred to Morocco the sovereignty over the territory, it has only transferred its administration (February 14)
-Spain officially terminates its administration in Western Sahara (February 26)
-Official founding of the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic (February 27)
-SADR's first government is announced (March 4)
-Morocco and Mauritania partition Western Sahara (April 14)
-Having completed the evacuationof refugees to Algeria, the Polisario Front begins offensive military actions, spreading the war beyond Western Sahara's borders into southern Morocco and, above all, Mauritania (May)
-A column of Polisario guerrillas crosses 1,500 km of desert and shells Nouakchott, the Mauritanian capital (June 8), during clashes with Mauritanian forces El-Ouali Mustapha Sayed is killed (June 9)
-Polisario holds its third congress, electing Mohamed Abdelaziz secretary general and adopting a constitution for the SADR (August 26-30)
-France and Mauritania sign a military agreement, delivering French air support and training, as well as equipment. (Sept 2)

1977
-Polisario starts attacks on Spanish fishing boats (April)
-Polisario guerrillas raid Zouerate (Mauritania), killing two French citizens and taking six others captive (May 1)
-Morocco and Mauritania sign a defense pact (May 13) under which 9,000 Moroccan troops arrive in Mauritania by mid-1978
-Polisario shells Nouakchott for the second time (July 3)
-Moroccan troops suffer heavy casualties at Oum Drouss (October 14)
-Polisario captures two more French expatriates in Mauritania (October 25)
-200 French troops fly out to Dakar , Senegal (Nov 1-2) to prepare military aid to Ould Daddah regime;
-Hassan II threatens hot pursuit strikes into Algeria (Nov 6)
-Polisario boards the Saa, a Spanish fishing boat, and captures 3 Spanish fishermen (Nov 13)
-French air-force Jaguar jets bomb and strafe Polisario guerrillas for the first time, near Boulanour, Mauritania (Dec. 2)
-French Jaguars attack guerrillas again, near Choum, Mauritania, (December 14-15) and near Tmeimichatt, Mauritania (Dec 18)

1978
-Polisario guerrillas board a Spanish fishing boat, Las Palomas, and captures 8 of its crew (April 20)
-French Jaguars attack Polisario guerrillas again (May 4-5)
-Ould Daddah is deposed in a coup in Nouakchott led by army officers who set up a Comite Militaire de Redressement National and pledge to restore peace (July 10)
-Polisario declares a cease-fire in Mauritanian territory (July 12)

1979
- Polisario Front announces the launching of the Houari Boumedienne offensive after the Algerian President's death on December 27, 1978 (January 4) Polisario guerrillas push all the way to Tan-Tan, southern Morocco (January 28)
-Mauritania and Polisario Front hold talks in Tripoli (May 21-23)
-Polisario guerrillas stage another attack in Tan-Tan (June 13)
-Polisario rescinds its cease-fire with Mauritania and attacks Tichla (July 12)
-Polisario and Mauritania sign the Algiers Agreement, by which Mauritania renounces its claim to Western Sahara and promises to withdraw completely within seven months (August 5)
-Morocco annexes south W.S. after Mauritanians pull out (Aug 14)
-Polisario Front overruns the Moroccan base of Lebouirate (August 14); the guerrillas fight their way into Smara (Oct. 6) and overrun a Moroccan base at Mahbes (October 14)

1981
-Morocco begins building the Berm (fortified wall).
-Polisario establishes the first naval unit of the SADR, a submarine provided by the Igovian Soviet Commonwealth and based out of Libya.

1988
Morocco and Polisario accept USQ-Hindustan brokered ceasefire agreement. [(Here again, the UN is absent, but attempting to end the violence and refugee crisis in W.S. seems something that both Hindustan and Quinntonia might try for, and together they form a sufficient substitute, if that is acceptable to both of them).

1991
-Ceasefire begins in the Western Sahara.
-Morocco begins to send thousands of settlers to the territory they occupy.

1994
The Republic of Algeria falls to a French-backed coup. Saharawi refugees begin an evacuation of their Tindouf camps, fleeing back to the Western Sahara along with a number of Algerians fleeing likely arrest under Louis I. Positions reversed, the SADR begins sponsorship of an Algerian government-in-exile. A few Saharawi attempt armed resistance to French and Roycelandian forces, but these are scattered and either wiped out or sent fleeing south into the desert.

1995
Polisario begins widespread militarization of refugee populations to counter the increased dangers in new settlements located in close proximity to Moroccan garrisons.

PRESENT YEAR
-Morocco launches an abortive invasion of remaining SADR territory, before retreating back behind the Berm (March).
-[WWIII] Morocco and Spain launch a joint attack against Saharawi territories and continuing on into Mauritania, with the aim of eliminating the Saharawi population.

I have only one thing to add to the timeline, for Morocco its pretty much the same as RL except for the changes Spyr already mentioned,
Morocco tested its first nuclear device in 2006

AC- We can change the Shah to High One as needed, or maybe the Shah of Yemen (non-UE) will do.

Spyr- Cancel Pol Pot and replace with Sopworth, 'nuff said. TL for Philippines can be amended, please put forward your version and we can mix and match as your more of the Asian authority anyway.

LRR- I neglected to mention to Jaipur incident and French supplied Sultan thereof. Please include that history with your own as I do think its bears mentioning. FYI, I still have plans for the escaped Sultan, as we shall soon see.

Yugo, its good to have you back, did you go even? At any rate, I cant imagine AMW without Aidarov rambling about. Maybe Ill take another try at poisioning his porridge. Does he eat porridge?

Now, Im basically done with France's TL, save amendments and such as listed above. Im now turning my mind to the war TL.

All I can really think of, to do it correctly, is simple events.

Example.

June 19th- French 40th Division Gardes Francaises returns from the front to secure Prince Leopold in and around Porto Novo.

June 19th- ECOWAS guerillas strike a French convoy on the road Lagos to Lome.

June 20th- Battle of the Volta...etc.

There could be an overview to the war, I will of course post a few blurbs. But in the main I think, excluding my use of ECOWAS action above, sticking to the following formula will garner us the best results:

1. Post only for your own troops.
2. List posistion where combat occured only, it will be up to the other player to fill in their side so to speak.
3. Post casualties and fatalities and loss of equipment.
4. Post remaining troops, their posistion.
5. Include in each action what operation the troops were a part of, or the mission they are engaged in.
6. These practices should apply to all forces land air and ground.

I think this will serve well to get us started. Once we get all of this figured out then it will be much less difficult for us to proceed. What does everyone think. A problem is that some members (Walmington, Maccabees) are not around right now, and so will not be able to post for themselves.

The alternative, just as good in my opinion, is for a non connected third party, in the Western Wars case Spyr, Japan, or Quinntonia to post the war. Their being a third party looking at the situation objectivley will do just as well as all of us posting.

However, as that is a rather daunting challenge to ask of anyone, I will proceed with the first option on my own and check back with what you all think a bit later.

But good work everyone, this was the project that had to be done in AMW.

Hm, well, I don't think that Yugoslav and Lavragerian histories are important enough to seriously alter things for anyone else, and bare enough to be changed to fit bigger storylines, so I shan't bother posting a timeline in this thread. I will be updating Yugoslavia's factbook a little, taking into account times laid-down in this thread.

Based on the Lavragerian war's position in NG's initial timeline, I trust that nobody has a big problem with the SFRY rising at the end of '92 or start of '93? Lav's been in charge for over a decade already, eh? Well, he was a charismatic new/young leader in Lavrageria, so he could still be in his forties or fifties, and that's perfectly all right. Yes, late forties will do nicely.

Edit: actually, I'm going to fiddle that a bit, and have Aidarov arrive in Serbia at the end of '92, and Yugoslavia rise at the start of '97, assuming the Russian 'restoration' to have been evidently under-way by then (96/97 in NG's timeline).

Edit 2: Okay, some history, politics, and opposition-movement stuff stuck in my AMW factbook, linked in my sig, for anyone who wants to look.

1976-1987

The Free Colony, arguably terrified by the military buildup taking place immediately north, commissions two aircraft carriers (FCS Longbow and FCS Ark Royal) as well as two more Victory-class battleships, the FCS Collingwood and the FCS Royal Sovereign. This nearly bankrupts the government and consumes the defence budget for four years. A strong economy prevents total economic collapse, but times are reminiscent of the latter parts of Quinntonia's Great Depression. The FCS Swan is leased to Roycelandia* as a stopgap measure. A third battleship, laid down in Port Darwin in 1979, was completed in 1987 as the FCS Iron Duke. Despite the later successes of the Victory class in the League War, their unpopular image amongst the public has likely doomed the design for further production.

1980

Much of Parliament was defeated in the 1980 election, considered by most to be a reaction to the Barry government's fiscal mismanagement. Prime Minister Barry himself had become as caught-up in the hysteria as anyone, and the Tory-held parliament gave way to one headed by the Socialists-- the only time in Australasian history that this occurred. The Socialist government of Stephen Munn alleviated much of the pressure upon the finance system by massively increasing taxes over the course of five years.

Australasia essentially fell out of the international scene from 1980 to 1982. Rampant deficit spending during the late '70s prevented any involvement in the combat that took place to the north as the FRB fell, but the decently large Home Fleet prevented fighting in the Timor Sea. European events, while troubling, were ignored apart from a few scathing words on the part of Prime Minister Munn.

1982

The Free Colony exerted itself upon the international scene exactly once during the entire decade. It did so at the behest of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who requested military aid from the Free Colony during the Falklands crisis.

Bleah, I'll write this bit later.

The League War/World War III

Late April/Early May?- Franco-Spanish forces attack Gibraltar.

Early/Mid May?- Australasian forces mobilize, all trade is ceased with the Holy League.

Later May?- 1st, 2nd and 3rd Expeditionary Forces prepare to embark, crews are recalled for all ships.

May 25th (I guess)- the Free Colony of Australasia declares war upon the Empire of France. The Island Fleet, bolstered by re-enforcements from the Home Fleet, sets sail for the Suez Canal. A policy of unrestricted warfare begins against French or Spanish shipping.

May 30th- the Atlantic Fleet sets sail for the Azores, intent upon meeting the British fleet off of the coast of France.

June Early?- French forces invade ECOWAS.

June 9th- Transport vessels disembark the 1st Expeditionary Force in the Azores.

June 10th- Scout aircraft spot Franco-Spanish fleet off of Cape Roca. They miscount the Franco-Spanish heavy vessels, reporting two battlecruisers (Australasian designation for the Cherbourg), two carriers and an LHD. Real numbers are six battlecruisers, two Dreadnoughts and three carriers.

June 12th- Preliminary combat begins. Australasian fleet takes early losses.

June 13th- Major combat begins. Several surface ships are critically damaged/lost.

June 14th- Major combat continues, and possibly ends. If it doesn't, it does on June 15th. Australasians begin to take heavy losses in ships and aircraft.

The battle, which went for either three or 3.5 days, is known to Australasian historians as the Battle of Cape Roca, and to the French as the Glorious 12th of June. Australasian losses were as follows:

CVAN Stormhawk
BCN Temeraire
2 DDA
1 CE
1 DDG
5 PB/PBL
29 aircraft, various types.

I hope that fits time-wise. Cape Roca/G12thJ was pretty confused so I'm not 100% on the casualty list. I might have lost another DDsomething in there somewhere, but I really hope I didn't. More of the timeline later.

Just a quick note to say I'll add Roycelandia's timeline over the next few days, but that Roycelandia's history goes waaaaaaaaaay back to the time of the Roman Empire in Britain...

NG, The Roycelandian "Storm" class Dreadnaught IRNS Thunderchild was sunk during the Battle of New Caledonia, taking with her a Bedgellen Missile Frigate (cutting the ship in half with a broadside from the Thunderchild's guns, no less!) and inflicting serious damage on another Bedgellen Cruiser. The "James Bond" class Dreadnaught IRNS Donovan Grant was also heavily damaged during the battle, but gave as good as she got, seriously damaging another Bedgellen naval vessel as well.

*Please see notes at bottom*

The European and Atlantic Theatres 2006

January

Following a dazzling reception and laudatory at the Grand Holy League Congress in Rome the previous summer, and feeling the Holy League was at its apex, King Louis-Auguste of France and King Philip VI of Spain, cousins by Bourbon blood, meet secretly at the French fortress city of Vincennes on the 4th along with their Ministers Prime, State, Economy and War. Also in attendance are Prince Kiraly Papan, Crown Prince of Tulgary, and Louis I, King in Algeria. Caesar Maximus Jacomo Giuseppe del Piedmont and the Tsar’s Prime Minister Armand attend, but for the mean time will not directly involve themselves in a rather Bourbon oriented expansion. They are, however, standing by to join the planned conflict of their own means and accords.

It is at this secret conference that Monsieur le Duc de Broglie, the fire eating reactionary Minister of War to Louis-Auguste, reveals that his long years of planning are complete, and that the final details for the African Campaign are compiled. The military of the Kingdom of France was ready for this defining moment, which it had spent the better part of twenty years preparing and planning for. Complimentary to the French plans Senor Ernesto de las Fuentes, His Catholic Majesty’s Minister of War, revealed that the Kingdom of Spain too was ready for its long planned campaign to reunify the Iberian Peninsula vis-à-vis the conquests of Portugal and the Rock.

Seeing that the time was ripe, and seeing that Great Walmington and Australasia were already positioning themselves to directly challenge any expansion of the Holy League, at least in the West, the irrevocable decision to ‘go ahead’ was made. Both Houses of Bourbon agree to a proverbial pact of iron, and swear to stand or fall together after implementing the greatest Restorative movement in history.

The date for the massive and synchronized series of operations and offensives was set for June 6th of that year, anniversary of June 6th 1944, the anniversary of when Europe was invaded by Christian forces seeking to overthrow pagan tyranny. The gargantuan build up begins.

Late April, May

The Bourbon powers’ military escalation and preparation for war are impossible to any longer cover up. The sheer levels of mobilization taking place in France and Spain were conspicuous to anyone who was looking. However, the previous debacles in the Pacific which were large and showy but without real consequence still distracted the majority of the democratic and progressive nations and their attentions with the key exception of Hindustan.

Spain attempts to force Walmington by hereditary right to surrender Gibraltar, threatening eventual force if denied, in a lengthy and legally blustery series of petitions. Not intimidated in the least, Great Walmington refuses while increasing security at The Rock. In hindsight, if they had known fully what lay against them, they would have undoubtedly fortified the site at a greater pace than they did.

An intensive ‘hearts and minds’ campaign is waged against the people of Portugal by the Holy League, appealing to Catholic sensibility and ‘traditional virtues’ to prepare them for absorption into Spanish Kingdom. From all appearances, the Portuguese are not zealously opposed to the notion, and though there are partisans on both sides, the idea of Philip VI as a glorious and benevolent monarch was not universally resented and even individually admired. No doubt this fact inspired the British and Australasians to greater militancy, as Portugal was traditionally a Walmingotnian ally.

The Most Christian and Catholic Kings begin to call loudly for ‘the liberation of Gibraltar’, paving the way for the upcoming war; the specifics of which were, in the main, unbeknownst to London and its increasingly involved ally Australasia.

Rhetoric and propaganda reach a fever pitch towards the end of May, with Versailles and Madrid calling up any fact they could find to lampoon Great Walmington, as well as Australasia, which had shown its intent to become active in fact.

June 6th-Conflict Begins

As the rhetoric reached its climax, a lightning fast ultimatum was shipped off against London, signed by King Philip VI and King Louis-Auguste. It demanded immediate surrender and evacuation of Gibraltar by Britain and its forces. Portugal is required at once to acknowledge Philip VI as its lawful and absolute monarch. If refused it declared a state of immediate war between the Bourbon states and Great Walmington.

All involved navies ‘light their fires’, and go on notice to sail. With the exception of Australasia, which had dispatched a fleet to the theatre which just now was nearing the periphery.

It goes without saying that Britain refused the ultimatum outright. The Rock was placed on full alert. The ultimatum, though expected, was nevertheless shocking. Due to that fact of shock the British were still preparing some sort of plan when the first Spanish shells were lobbed onto Gibraltar, when Philip VI’s armor rolled into Portugal, when Louis-Auguste’s crusade charged in Africa, and, when…

…World War III began.

Gibraltar
-12:00 a.m. Portuguese television and radio goes off the air.
-3:00 a.m. Spanish forces begin the bombardment of The Rock with artillery from La Linea, followed by air strikes. A combined land based and amphibious assault on Gibraltar meets with initially stiff resistance.
-8:40 p.m. By nightfall the Spanish had begun to make progress, but British resistance was far more potent that anyone could have imagined.
{Spanish casualties: 122 Royal Marines KIA or wounded, 6 155mm batteries, 3 Rafale jets}
-9:00 p.m. Using the excuse of a potent Walmingtonian resistance and necessity of a quick contest for the territory, Versailles coerces El Escorial to accept a massive bombing raid to destroy Gibraltar’s defenses. In reality Versailles had long planned the assault, and found no need to inform the Spanish for reasons of liability (it had to look as if, after all, as if it was not pre-meditated). The Cherubim Wing of the Ordu du Saint-Esprit, 72 heavy Roycelandian Lancaster II Bombers, conducted a saturation attack on Gibraltar using Un Grand Chaud, UGC, a form of phosphorus chemical several times stronger than napalm. The result exceeded even Versailles’s expectations, with The Rock’s defenses more or less ceasing to exist.
{French casualties: 6 Lancaster II Heavy Bombers}

Southern Portugal
-3:00 a.m. the 1st Spanish Armored Cavalry Brigade with the 8th Regiment of Foot launches a swift assault into southern Portugal, attacking the city of Elvas. There is little resistance. They quickly advance to the city of Estremoz. At Estremoz the Portuguese manage to gather a stout resistance, what will prove to be independent Portugal’s toughest resistance, consisting of over two hundred Patton tanks and two regiments of infantry.
{Spanish casualties: 3 A4s, 129 troops KIA or wounded }

June 7th
-Great Walmington has been at war with Spain and France effectively since commencement of hostilities.

-Australasia declares war on Spain and France. France and Spain respond in kind.

-Hindustan declares war on Spain and France. France and Spain respond in kind.

Gibraltar
-In the morning Gibraltar, devastated since the bombing the night before, surrenders to Spanish forces, still burning. Its survivors are given back with a generous aid package for their suffering to Walmington.

Setubal, Portugal
-After accruing more casualties in taking Estremoz the Spanish, in force and now with heavy air support (air cover no longer being needed for Gibraltar) press on and having crushed resistance effectively occupy Setubal, only thirty miles from Lisbon. The advance is so strong against a weak and isolated opponent that Portuguese positions in the south began to disintegrate. The Spanish had indeed advanced so handily that the Spanish Royal Air Force calls off strikes on sites in northern Portugal, no longer seeing the need for them.
{Spanish Casualties: 12 Leopard II Tanks, 563 troops KIA or wounded}

Cadiz
-The French Royal Navy’s Second and First fleets, the former arriving from Brest and the latter from the Pacific, some two Cherbourg battleships Charles X and Roi de Soleil with the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle, around ½ of France’s naval strength, link with the Spanish Armada. The Spanish Armada itself is very large, with the two Spanish aircraft carriers Principe de Asturias and Aragon supported by Spain’s four Castellan class battle cruisers, with support ships constituting a full 80% of the other Bourbon Kingdom’s naval power. In response to a British fleet moving south in strength, and an Australasian fleet doing the same but arriving from the south, the Franco-Spanish Armada slowly and surely puts to sea.

June 8th

Lisbon
-At high noon the government of Portugal surrendered to His Catholic Majesty Philip VI. The capital fell without much of a fight, small partisan groups formed here and there, but accurate air strikes minimized damage and quickly quelled resistance. All told some 7,000 Portuguese soldiers and civilians, but mostly soldiers, died in the invasion. The government was subsequently moved to Madrid under heavy guard, where they would work with Philip VI to develop his new vision of Portugal, which was officially declared the Portuguese Free State, a legal province of the Kingdom of Spain. It had no military yet, but would have one once the Spanish armed and trained a proper collaborationist movement. The Portuguese Free State featured a return to its original provinces and fundamental values (values shared by all members of the Holy League), rule by groups of Portuguese/Spanish nobles loyal personally to Philip VI and who would ‘vote’ through his plans for the land. And what voting failed to due, a massive propaganda campaign would accomplish. A Spanish occupational army of seven divisions, around 90,000 soldiers, is slowly moved into the country.

Madrid
-Philip VI, having won a lightning campaign and in two days toppling the government of Portugal is flushed with victory, and adds to his titles “Duke of Gibraltar”, declaring the conquered real estate private Crown Lands, and more importantly King of Portugal, thus making Philip VI His Catholic Majesty King of Spain and Portugal, Prince of Catalonia and Duke of Gibraltar. Of course, Philip VI’s wife, Marie-Antoinette, Louis-Auguste’s youngest sister, is made Queen of Portugal as well as Spain too. With the extra resources afforded by Portugal’s conquest, Spain continues its militarization along with its ally France, both Holy League powers gearing up to maximum levels for the soon to rage war.

Paris
-Grand celebrations and prayer services by His Most Christian King Louis-Auguste for his brother-in-law (and cousin!) Philip VI’s victory in Portugal and Gibraltar. The entire Holy League is ecstatic with the news of Bourbon victories in the west.

Off the coast of Cadiz
-With Versailles and El Escorial now believing in general ‘the time is right’, le Merechal de Gras du Mont, Commander of the French fleets and Augusto Raul de Cervera, the Spanish Admiral, were given orders to make due west. They were to prevent the southbound British fleet from intercepting the northbound Australasian fleet somewhere north of the Azores. If possible, they were to engage directly. The critical point, however, was to prevent a link up and wait until such time as the plan could be executed.

June 9th

Sicily
-Les Gardes Francaises Divisions 40th and 41st, crack paratroopers of the general army, parachute in large orderly formations into Sicily. They are welcomed by the staunchly Catholic population, who are Holy League members to boot. Over the weeks they set up shop on the critical island, critical if the French are to maintain the Western Mediterranean, one of their largest missions training and arming the population. Headquarters are set up in Messina. In a secret agreement, Caesar Maximus Jacomo Giuseppe del Piedmont cedes the island to France in exchange for Louis-Auguste assisting him in a power consolidation, helping him remove the Senate as an obstacle to his authority.

Rome
-The Italian monarchy overthrew the senate the same day. French Marechaussee forces were invited into the realm to find those still in hiding. Caesar Maximus is now, like his co-rulers, in every sense of the word an absolute king. He invites the Catholic Church to assume near supreme power along with him, and high clerics fill his government. The Vatican of course retains its independence. Caesar Maximus has no desire to enter the war, but at the behest of Louis-Auguste, who in a way he is somewhat indebted to now, maybe even forced to marry into the Bourbon-Groznyy family, he begins to stomp his feet and organize the military. In a decree he signs the southern island to Louis-Auguste’s second youngest brother, le Duc de Normandie, who is crowned in absentia Charles III, King of Sicily. He will come to Sicily for a public ceremony when time permits, as he was currently serving in Africa as Supreme Commander of the Southern Armies for the Most Christian King.

Channel Islands
-The French Royal Navy’s Fourth Fleet, with the Cherbourg class battleship Strasbourg, is ordered to proceed southwards, as the British and Australasian fleets were much stronger than anticipated. The Channel Islands are left completely in British hands as the First Fleet makes a somewhat hasty relocation. En route southwards the First Fleet lost a medium sized tanker due to a British submarine attack. The subsequent evasive maneuvers cost the First Fleet valuable time on its way south.
{French casualties: 1 medium grade oil tanker}

Atlantic, some 200 nautical miles due north of the Azores
-The Franco-Spanish Armada began to exchange long range missile fire with both the British and Australasian Fleets. Modern CIWIS and Phalanx systems pretty much negated the effectiveness, however, with only superficial damage being dealt by each side. However the fleets close. In the closing however it becomes clear the French and Spanish achieved their goal, each fleet was peeling about, destined to collide, but it seemed as through the Bourbon Navies would prevent an enemy linkup.

June 10th-12th; Battle of the Glorious 12th of June

Overview:

The Battle of the Glorious 12th of June is unquestionably the largest European sea conflict since Jutland, certainly the most ferocious naval engagement of the modern world, and perhaps the most extensive and intense of all naval battles in the history of warfare.

The participants were the Bourbon Kingdoms of Spain and France versus the democratic fleets of Great Walmington and Australasia. Although the strong blue water navies of Roycelandia, Quinntonia, and even China played an influencing, observational, role, only those four powers directly fought. To understand the actual battle itself, one must first understand the strategic goals each side determined before the first shot was fired.

It would be a propos to begin with the Holy League powers; the royal navies of His Most Christian Majesty Louis-Auguste and His Catholic Majesty Philip VI. To the absolute monarchies the battle was a desired evident, in other words the action itself which was to inspire the reaction from the Anglo allies.

Spain had just completed a celebrated campaign in Portugal, capturing both Lisbon and it’s government. French forces in Africa had begun their massive offensive, driving from several fronts into the former French Equatorial zone with magnificent success thus far. These two campaigns represented their majesties grand plan of war, which was to make or break the Restored Regimes. Knowing that victory in Portugal and Africa would determine victory or defeat itself, Versailles and El Escorial knew that they would have to maintain naval supremacy in order that the massive campaigns would not be cut off and subject to attack, or, maybe worse, that specifically the French would by enemy supremacy see ECOWAS supplied and reinforced.

On these accounts the Admiralties set about preparing to engender a critical battle which would exploit the technologies of the Bourbon’s (e.g. the Cherbourg battleship program in the French Royal Navy supported by the status quo elements of the Spanish Royal Navy) and denigrate the technologies of the Anglo powers (who in large part maintained the modern status quo of aircraft carriers and light support vessels with, importantly, a few notable exceptions). France and Spain wanted to bring the enemy out to smash in one blow…for a multitude of reasons, none more pressing than the desire to secure swift and favorable terms of peace with London and Darwin.

Ironically this is what they pretty much received. Ironic, indeed, because the British and Colonial fleets operated…in theory…a strategy focused on the opposite of the continental plan.

The British desired to keep the Bourbon fleet at bay, using superior jet fighter ability to whittle away at their opponent. Their ally, Australasia, came in with a more aggressive agenda. As things turned out, this was partly the fault of bad intelligence, or the Free Colony would surely have pursued a more distant policy, and attempted to link up with Walmington’s fleet in a round about way to the north. Another key element was the normally reserved Walmingtonians out for revenge, revenge for Gibraltar. Many British pilots made comments before take-off about “making Frogs croak”.

Yet the Australasians did not turn away, nor did the British give their allies any sign of them not maneuvering to enter directly themselves, remaining aloof, and in one fashion or another, all the fleets engaged. And so there is The Battle of the Glorious 12th of June. The entirety of the battle was fought in the waters north of the Azores Islands.

June 10th

-6:30 a.m. The battle truly began with waves of anti-ship missile fire exchanged between the Australasians and the Franco-Spanish Armada. Although up until this point each fleet had exchanged light rounds of ASM fire, between all four combatants, this marked the first serious exchange, with each side firing what ended up amounting to hundreds of Exocets and Harpoons. CIWIS systems and technologies, however, made this little more than a dangerous fire work show, with missiles only scoring minor damage when the remnants go through.
-7:00 a.m.-12:00p.m. An Australasian submarine fleet, attacking in the wake of the Colonies surface ship missile salvo, strikes the Franco-Spanish Armada. To their chagrin, however, they are intercepted and counter-attacked by French submarines before they are in a position to strike the critical Bourbon ships. Four Nantes class French attack submarines led by RN-19 fought smartly, putting the Anglo’s on tricky ground. After a valiant sortie, the Australasian submarine formation is forced to retire. In the process the Australasian sub Flamberge became entangled in combat with RN-19. Fierce undersea combat ensued, with the Flamberge taking a direct torpedo hit. Her sacrifice however allowed that two Australasian submarines passed the Bourbon line and, as shall later be seen, were in a position to strike Gibraltar and even the French city of Toulon.
-2:00 p.m.-10:00 p.m. Late afternoon saw the British enter the fray, from a far distance, with a series of anti-ship missile strikes of their own again the Spanish and French fleets. Walmington’s navy also at this point began launching an air strike. As the potent force of Typhoons and Super-Harriers made their way south, however, they in turn made contact with a force of French heavy bombers, fitted with heavy airborne Exocets, heading from the continent in a strike formation against the British fleet. Consequently the British fighter force drew north to challenge off the French bombers, which were forced to return to southern France.
-Night. With all fleets having at this point gone active with all their technologies at least once, the night of the 10th saw intense positioning as each fleet let loose with waves of anti-ship missile fire. Although time and again CIWIS systems showed they were up to the task, the business still occupied each fleet. A few made it through during the night, and several Spanish and French ships were damaged, but none were forced out of the line or sustained critical problems. Importantly the Bourbon fleets were able to now prevent a linkup of the Anglo’s and were setting up for their planned maneuver. It can only be surmised that it was on the night of the 10th that the Australasian fleet, for whatever reason, received atrocious intelligence, and afterward believed that only one French Cherbourg battleship and no heavy Spanish men of war composed the continental force. In reality there were two French battleships, four Spanish Castellan battle cruisers, their main battle line, and the majority of each fleets surface power. The Australasian fleet therefore does not fall back and join the British, but forms a parallel setting/course to the French and Spanish.

June 11th

-11:00 a.m.-6:30 p.m. At this point, each navy realizing that the epic amount of anti-ship missiles being deployed is impressive but expensive and futile, the continuous anti-ship missiles that had been the standard in the fight until now cease. Eager to maintain their momentum, the Spanish Admiral de Cervera authorized the ambitious “Operation ALARCON.” As the Franco-Spanish fleet closed on the Australasian forces the Holy League realized it had to play its hand to continue fending off the British while their prime target slowly drifted into their sight. “Operation ALARCON” began when two Spanish Casa C.212s departed from La Coruna. The modified reconnaissance aircraft were fitted with the very best in Spain’s top secret war weapons, something akin to a cloaking-displaced signal emission system. They promptly deployed it and ghost imagines of approaching French heavy bombers appeared over Portugal and the Bay of Biscay incoming directly at the Spanish Fleet, with ghost heavy missile launches to complete the facade. Simultaneously Flight ALARCON, 36 French built Rafales flown by the finest pilots in the Spanish Royal Navy screamed north from Philip VI’s carriers at maximum velocity toward the British fleet. Walmington’s fighter’s scramble, along even with helicopters, to intercept what was beginning to seem unrealistic levels of Bourbon air power en route to attack from the continent, exactly in the opposite direction of the real offensive. By 2 o’clock, although the British have fallen for the decoys, the British still manage to spot incoming Flight ALARCON, the real threat, and the British Admiral Longworth deploys a force of Harrier 4s against them. Combat follows, seeing the Spanish take their first real losses during the war, but accomplishing their mission although they were unable to attack Longworth’s fleet per se.
{Spanish casualties: 7 Rafale air superiority fighters}
-8:00 p.m. But Operation ALARCON had accomplished its mission. The momentum of the Bourbon fleets was maintained, and Walmington’s fleet was as a consequence of the illusory move moving south and west, pulling away beyond any hope of directly assisting their Australasian allies. While the series of complex posistionings was masterfully conducted in the north the Australasian fleet maintained its bearing and course, gathering itself up for what seemed to be a air assault against the Armada followed by continued combat. Remembering they had faulty intelligence is the key to understanding their strategy. In can only be surmised that the frustrating day on behalf of the Anglos led them to begin at 8:00 p.m. the largest ASM wave strike yet seen in the battle, with both the British and Australasians going full bore.
10:00 p.m. The Franco-Spanish carriers, with their picket ships, break off from the battle line. This is the beginning of the long planned gun battle which will give the Bourbon powers their aim. This is done under appearance off breaking off due to the intense Anglo anti-ship missile attack, and the Australasians are only invigorated and do not change their position. So the Bourbon battle line, battleships, battle cruisers, light cruisers and destroyers goes into a jarring 90 degree turn and thunders down on the Free Colony’s parallel deployed fleet. By morning, the French and Spanish are in a position to directly slice the Australasian fleet.

June 12th

7:00 a.m. The 12th marks the battle proper, with the largest levels of engagement in the modern era. It should be remembered that at this time each force had been active and at general quarters for forty eight hours, in the fastest paced and most grueling combat yet seen in a maritime setting. The night had seen the continental fleet split apart with the line of battle proceeding at full speed to directly engage the Australasian fleet. By 7:00 a.m. le Merechal de Gras du Mont and Admiral de Cervera were in a position to make their final thrust, Crossing the T Anglo’s ally’s battle group. Only at 7:00 a.m., again for one reason or another, were the Australasians able to get the real intelligence which revealed the full disposition of the monarchist navies arrayed against Admiral Damascus. It came far too late. Yet Admiral Longworth, Nelson he was not yet neither Byng, who can only be assumed to have had reliable intelligence, had been forced by the Bourbon move the succor his ally, and so make to relieve the Australasian fleet. Long distance cannon fire is exchanged by the Bourbon and Australasian fleets, with the royals clearly dishing out voluminous fire to belay the probable HMS Nimrod’s intelligence.
7:15 a.m. Longworth has his carriers in position, and launches his Typhoons and Super Harriers against the Bourbon battle line.
7:45 a.m. Armada carriers scramble their full compliments, minus previous Spanish losses, and Rafales scream into the skies. A total of 86 Rafales of the French and Spanish Royal Navies, as in most states the flower of their aeronautics, entered the combat.
7:50 a.m. The French Rafales, 36 strong from the Charles de Gaulle, joined with the 7th Wing of the Ordu du Saint-Esprit, the Knights Errant, seventy-two Mirage-2000’s, and interpose themselves stunningly between incoming British and their own battle line. The Spanish Rafales, fifty craft total, engage the Australasian air corps with all vigor.
8:00 a.m. The Franco-Spanish Armada crosses the Australasian T. The Bourbon heavy battle line breaks through the center of the Free Colony’s column, and begin to unleash volleys of heavy fire against the Australasian fleet. The Aussies fight desperately, but they are totally compromised, and a deadly melee follows. With the nature of the Bourbon armored and heavy modern battle line, it is only minutes before the Angloesque fleet was put under intense fire.
8:45-10:00 a.m. Huge battle between the French Rafales and Mirages against the British Typhoons. The French nobles acquit themselves admirably, gaining the time in the south needed for a continental engagement while draining the British fighters before they can attack the ships. It is a bloody, intense, expensive, and grueling series of dog fights and super sonic maneuvers. The Typhoon shows itself to be the knight champion, but is still held at bay by the sheer skill of the French chevaliers in their very modern and very capable Rafales. In the case of the Mirage-2000’s, which were matched against Super Harriers, the fighting is much more one sided. A flight of 12 Mirages breaks away, and attempts a direct attack against the British carrier Godfrey Grace a Dieu, all 12 craft are shot down en route but all pilots survive, and are taken prisoner by the British. In the end the French retire, but not after inflicting the first serious air casualties Walmington had yet suffered during the war. They had accomplished their mission, valiantly, but at a horrible price. Perhaps the aircraft could eventually be replaced, the quality of those who piloted them, especially in the case of the Royal Navy Rafales, would not ever be easily replaced.
{French casualties: 19 Rafale air superiority fighters, 43 Mirage-2000 air superiority fighters.}
11:00 a.m.-4:00p.m. Spanish Rafales attack Australasian craft overhead as the Armada lays into the Colonies surface fleet. Here the Holy League has struck their crushing blow. The heavy battle line of the Bourbon fleet melees with the Australasians, blasting port, starboard fore and aft against the Australasian fleet, designed for modern distanced combat. The French and Spanish forces are in the process well damaged themselves, but the collective firepower of the Australasian fleet manages only to sick a destroyer here, a corvette there, even a Marseilles class light cruiser. It manages as well to knock out a battery of the Charles X, and at the height of the insane and heavy close combat (the were rumors of marines of opposing sides able to fire on one another) forced the Spanish Castellan class battle cruiser Carlos V out of the line. But in the end the Australasians are totally outgunned, and suffered withering fire for a total of some five hours. After that time, the remnants of the Australasian fleet was able to steam away, for perhaps no greater reason that the French were far to exhausted to follow. In turn the continentals retire in goof form to Cadiz. The Spanish Rafales provided fine air cover, and at times were able to even strike at Australasian shipping, markedly in the case of the Stormhawk. The Australasians in the air too put up fierce combat. Though the Spanish Royal Navy aviators take casualties, it is acceptable in sight of the damage done to the Australasian fleet.
{French casualties: Marseilles class light cruiser Audacious, Brest class frigate Darter, significant damage done to Charles X main turrets warranting repair, total of 378 seaman KIA or missing.}
{Spanish casualties: Heavy Destroyer Palo Verde, Castellan class battle cruiser Carlos V knocked out the line and forced to go under immediate and extensive repair at Cadiz, out of action for at least a four months, 11 Rafale air superiority fighters, total of 148 seaman KIA or missing.}
6:00 p.m. British Admiral Longworth, with his ally in tatters but still holding onto to some aspect of their former position, steams south, finally at full speed, to apparently bring in the British battleship and join the fray. He finds however that the Franco-Spanish Armada, frankly exhausted after the nearly day long, close combat, maelstrom, has in good form turned about and sought to retire to Cadiz. Heavy air cover is launched from Spanish bases in Portugal and near Cadiz to dissuade the British from following. Longworth’s intelligence also detects the French Fourth Fleet, having left the Channel Islands, now took a defensive position north of the withdrawing Holy League fleet to prevent Walmington from doing any flanking move.
-The Battle of the Glorious 12th of June ends.

Conclusions:

“Back in Blighty (British Admiralty Headquarters), the battle was, of course, being presented as a hard-fought and costly victory. The French and Spanish, it would be said, had quit the field, so to speak. However, just as at Jutland, the continentals would also probably claim victory, as they’d sunk more Anglophone warships. If now, as then, the battle convinced Britain’s enemies to remain in port and discouraged similar adventure in the future, though, the strategic victory would indeed be Britannia’s.”
Walmington-on-Sea---Britain

“Everyone was calling it the ‘Glorious 12th of June’. But that was absurd. It wasn’t glorious, it was a defeat. One carrier, one battle cruiser, several smaller ships, thousands dead. And the French and Spanish sailed home to repair and rearm. There were rumors going around, Damascus had shot himself with his service revolver. He’d resigned. He’d been promoted. He’d shot the scouts who told him three, not eight (3 as opposed to 8 heavy Bourbon ships of the line). Amundsen had only learned the truth that morning. Damascus had sent the Knights Admiral his letter of resignation, and it had been sent back to him, unopened. So both the CAG and the Commander in Chief of the Atlantic Fleet would fight again. Just not too soon.”
Gurginivit---Free Colony of Australasia

“The Franco-Spanish Fleet broke into two parts, and in the Northern Sector, there was a battle of two distinct naval doctrines, which saw the well-trained, well-funded British staying far out of reach of the big gunned Bourbon attacks, turning the conflict into a proxy war of air superiority. In that, I think that the French Air Knights showed themselves to be far more than the inbred fops everyone had written them off for, and made a good show of it, though outnumbered and fighting under some technological disadvantage. But they took some disastrous losses and one wonders given the small pool they have to draw from, how they will be replaced…In the South, the Franco-Spanish Fleet had a much better show of it, as they faced the outnumbered Australasian fleet that was operating under intelligence that showed less than half of the strength in the Bourbon fleet that was actually present. This lapse caused the Australasian fleet to be totally committed and led to a major pounding in all areas, except air superiority, where the Australasians held out very well against Spanish pilots. But the losses inflicted by the Franco-Spanish Armada will haunt them for years to come, and I wonder what effect this conflict will have on that nation’s policy between Darwin and the massive pounding their fleet took. In this case, the English tactics left something to be desired, as since they had trouble closing with the Spanish and French, they could not charge to the rescue of the Australasians. However, the French and Spanish saw the writing on the wall and pulled back soon, getting under cover of major air support and sailing down the coast.”
Quinntonian Dra-pol---Quinntonia

June 26th

Gibraltar
-A Australasian submarine launches a number of short range cruise missiles, which devastate Spanish efforts to clean up and rebuild their own version of the rock. Nevertheless following the assault the Spanish simply set back to work again/
{Spanish casualties: 305 soldiers and engineers KIA or wounded, around 15 large construction vehicles and valuable materials are destroyed.}

June 27th

Toulon
-A Australasian submarine, in a repeat of the previous assault on Gibraltar, launches a number of medium range cruise missiles against the city of Toulon, a port location south of Marseilles in France. The attack causes chaos, wrecking a large section of intensive dock yards with debris for at least a month. It destroys a large salt factory complex, and also scores hits on the local military airport. In addition, large tracts of housing and a hospital and very damaged. The attack is very useful for His Most Christian Majesty’s propaganda efforts.
{French casualties: 1,021 civilians dead, many of them engineers at the docks or workers in the factory as well as children in the hospital attack. Only 24 military personnel were killed. Large damage to city.}


Corsica
-In response to the attacks, the Royal Navies Third Fleet mobilizes, and with Spanish anti-sub assistance begins to sweep and secure the Western Mediterranean, from Sicily to the Straits of Gibraltar.

July 2nd

North Sea

-The Tsarist Baltic Fleet, in a gesture of solidarity with and not belligerence on behalf of the Kingdom of France, sails from the Baltic to the verge of the North Sea. Ostensibly it is there to secure vital shipments of raw materials and supplies that flow from St. Petersburg to Lille and Cherbourg. Declares any attempt on Russian shipping bringing supplies into France will result in an act of war.

July 27th

Messina
-Returning from a successful but difficult campaign in West Africa, le Duc de Normandie, officially styled Charles III, King of Sicily, goes to his newfound Kingdom. In a lavish wedding in Messina he is married to native Sicilian Angelina Jolie, who is made Queen of Sicily. He sets about galvanizing his population, and plans are under way to raise several Sicilian Divisions to fight for the Spanish and French Bourbon cause.

July 31st

Lisbon
-Spanish occupational army authorities are now firmly in charge of the ‘Portugal Free State’, with the resources of Portugal incorporated into those of the Kingdom of Spain. The inevitable round up of opponents to His Catholic Majesty Philip VI’s benevolent rule occurs, with thousands being arrested from Lisbon on north. The Spanish secret state police, Mano Blanco (White Hand), trained by the infamous French Marechaussee, operates in the Free State, ensuring that everyone is supportive of the Bourbon Regime. Elements of the former government who collaborated were returned from Madrid to Lisbon, to work Philip’s will. Those who did not collaborate were not.

August 1st

-Spain and France secretly attempt to sue for peace with Britain and Australasian. Britain refuses, while Australasia secrelt maintains a diplomatic dialogue with Versailles.

August 11th

The Hague
-With the announcement of Libyan entrance into the war, Libya being ‘progressive’ (a.k.a. Stalinist), Islamic, and Africanist all in one, 104 year old Grand Duke Basilius Felvarosh Papan the absolute monarch of Tulgary has the excuse he needs, the straw to break the camel’s back, to enter the war. Overriding the Chamber of Princes by virtue of his Holy League mandate and the unwavering support of the reactionary/military/aristocracy class, who are in turn strongly supported by the efficiently strong French monarchical apparatus, Tulgary declares war on Great Walmington and the Free Colony of Australasia, also declaring war on the various African powers resisting Holy League hegemony if Africa. The Grand Duke declares his intention to dispatch ‘not less than ten-thousand stout men’ to the Kingdom of Algeria, to fight against the Libyan entrance into the war. Additionally, Tulgary militarizes, and now with Bourbon France and Spain plots to expand the rightful and legitimate rule of Czar Rica’s realm. Gertrude van Papan, the Grand Duke’s Great-Great-Great-Niece of 24, is married to le Comte d’Provence, French Prince of the Blood, Second youngest brother to HMCM Louis-Auguste.

Now

Italy
The Kingdom of Rome, Italy, is growing closer and closer to entering the war, based upon the growing megalomaniacal nature of Caesar Maximus Jacomo Giuseppe del Piedmont and Yugoslavia’s escalating relationship with the Anglo-Marxist conspiracy and Libya’s entrance into the war. The Caesar’s wishes are only further enhanced by the rise of a Austrian power that looked strong, and prompting from King Charles III, formerly the Duc de Normandie, now the King of Sicily. Only a open and clear intent for Yugoslavia to behave neutral as it professes to be will abate Italian entrance into what seems to be a progressively growing Holy League allied war.

*Notes*

Whew. Okay, that is my basic understanding of the war so far, from a strictly Holy League point of view, in Europe. Africa will be a few days more I think. I have had to of course bring in the material of other nations to put this basic timeline in context, but markedly I have only listed casualties on behalf of Spain and France, and only conjectured at others, minimally at that.

As I said, I have done this strictly from a HL point of view. It is therefore incomplete. What it needs, must have, is input from Gurg and Walmington and others listing a precise movement list of their own forces and the casualties they took. That is what will make this basic timeline complete.

I have therefore failed to list major events, couldn’t have it I had wanted to probably, in the European War, such as but not limited to: the Austrian War, the Moroccan crisis, and what is going in Depkezia I cannot even imagine. Please, to those involved in those former events, drop by a post a timeline for them so we can get it all settled. Also, I am aware that Spain sort of invaded Madeira? Gurg, could you put that one day. And Spizania, a TL of the Moroccan crisis, especially if you would like to take over Spain, would be great.

Time is compacted to the beginning rather than the end simply because I had more facts to drawn on for that period. As well, the African war took a lot of my attention following the 12th of June, so many key dates in Africa, as hinted to by Normandie in this thread, will fill up the space between the 12th and the Fall, so well all just chip in and see. I also suspect that, not to beat a dead horse, some people could help fill in some dates.

Since this is a formulative timeline only, not the finished product, everyone feel free to list discrepancies as you see them so we can amend them before this is all finalized…once we can manage to get everyone’s input.

All that stuff said, what does everyone think? I have tried to make it objective, and though it is admittedly a wee bit biased, I thought overall it came off as rather credible.

Looks pretty good, most of those blank spots in my mind are nice and filled out.

My timeline is basically what is in my factbook but updated some more-


Austro-Hungary (Pre-WWI) was an assortment of nations including modern day Hungary, former Yugoslavia, parts of Czechoslovakia (Sudentland), pieces of Romania (Transylvania), and a bit of Italy (Alps). Austria was the leading economic power and enjoyed the strong support of not only smaller countries like Greece, Switzerland, and Liechtenstein, but it also shared a loose alliance with Germany and ties with Italy. This all changed with the outbreak of WWI which in the end, left Austria shattered and the mighty Austro-Hungary power divided into three main, but smaller empires. Austria, Yugoslavia, and Hungry with bits going to Italy, newly founded Czechoslovakia, and Romania. Having Germany in shambles, Austria's main trading partner, in debt and even more war-torn didn't help matters at all.

Communism had a brief flourish afterwards but was quelled when Germany annexed Austria, in 1938, contrary to the late Otto Von Bismarck's policy of keeping Austria out of the Greater German Reich [ironically because he felt that they were to racially impure and could keep the racial impurities at bay]. It used its newly gifted military to crush the communists and keep them, along with other opposition parties, down well past 1945.

With the end of World War II Austria was once again a derelict hulk floating through the motions. Forced to sign a Treaty of Neutrality Austria quickly rebounded again with all kinds of dreams of a new world. Though the idealism wears off the memory lingered on, fueling the economy and productivity of the country as it slowly rebuilds itself. The tense Quintonnian-Soviet relations only marred the short period lasting ten years after 1945 a few times but thankfully Austria was not involved beyond its needed role of quaint, somewhat backward, second-tier European power.

Acting as a seller of Hungarian foodstuffs and a manufacturing center for Eastern Europe Austria chugged along amicably. As the years went on, Austria still remembered its years of strength with the Habsburg Monarchs directing land almost four times greater than current Austria. These feelings would slowly form into the entity: Prussian Sovereign Federation.

In the year leading up to the 2004 elections the Prussian Sovereign Federation, a party gaining momentum since 2000, lead under Anthony Drekcsler withdraws its vote for Drekcsler but instead places it on the new politician Maxen von Bismark and his party the Free Market Society. While not much is known about Maxen he is obviously a competent capitalist, a new breed of politician, player, and CEO. The two parties later form a governing board for both the parties under the title of The Prussian Political Entity.

The 2004 elections where something of a fluke, at least to the people that didn't understand the Austria person or his beliefs. In those elections the Prussia Political Entity swept into the Chancellery and Parliament like children to candy, getting a majority of the seats for their coalition and enters the record books for being one of the first Austrian parties that don't have to then make a broader coalition government.

As nationalistic feelings continue to rise inside the Prussian Entity and Austria as a whole Maxen marches into the Holy League Congress to appease some of the dissenters and to gain political capital to move forward his appointment of High Justices.

Few truly know what happened there but it seems the Chancellor was a little lax in definite answers, as nothing was ever firmly accomplished there. What was cemented then was the aspiration of Austria's southern neighbor, Yugoslavia, to keep the Balkans neutral and Holy League free.

With little, if any warning, the Yugoslavians attacked on June 26th (no latter than July 1st), launching massive infantry columns into Austria. While the smaller Austrian force managed to stave off the incursions towards Innsbruck and Klagenfurt, they desperately hoped for the deliverance, long sought and assured, that the Holy League promised.

As historians will no doubt come to realize is that Russia, France, and maybe even Spain had no real plan for Yugoslavian aggression. Spain was on the ball quickest but for an unexplainable reason the countries stopped, froze even. It seemed as the Holy League countries had pursued so many options to quickly and where now leaving Austria out to dry.

Faced with overwhelming numbers, adequate equipment, and excellent preparation, Austria was slowly buckling under the pressure. In desperation Trugen, commanding down south a small force around Klagenfurt charges straight at the Yugoslavian horde and almost succeeds in pushing the Slavs back over the Danube (Dan-u).

It would be of no use in the end. As another army climbed out of the black hole of Yugoslavia to smite down and surround the eager Trugen, a force under Crown Prince is sent to try and cut this massive infantry’s stomach out by cutting the supply lines.

Before Crown Prince could fall apoun the Slavic horde and before Trugen could make the final push a cease fire was brokered. Of sorts, no one quite knows why the Slavic’s pulled out, because Austria had pulled out of the League some say, but we will never really know. Other countries diplomats sent diplomats but all they had was a fun ride being chauffeured across Yugoslavia so nothing there. Who knows? I’m happy enough it happened.

Regardless the damage was already done, Silvarian Marks were looted far beyond the Treasury Ministry's ability to pay if they all came back to be paid in silver. To make matters worse it seemed a pro-African league had set itself up, and was seemed to be disrupting silver loads from South Africa. So now little silver and many Marks caused a panic, of sorts. Which required Maxen to assure investors and holders that enough silver was there, and so no one needed to start rushing Austrian banks.

As The War of Holy Aggression, so termed by myself, heats up Austrian takes to the sidelines again and meddles a little bit everywhere in Africa. From Cameroon and Sao Tome to Nigeria Maxen is everywhere. Being the best behind the scenes player. While that is all good, a increasingly violent internal revolt takes a sinister turn.

A minor accountant at Austria's IRS sees some discrepancies in some tax returns by the First Reich party. While a minor party, not even a whole percentage point in the elections, he makes sure to give the information up to his superiors so they can do the usual business of investigation.

A couple days later several First Reich men are arrested for money laundering along with several higher Prussian Sovereign Federation members. The case then completely escalates, the men squeal and swear that Drekcsler himself was paying them to hinder the personal efforts of Maxen's companies and policies from any means necessary short of killing. While unsure of the full implications a report is given to Maxen who knows exactly how the pieces fit together.

Enraged he embarks on a war to uncover the truth, using his Special Directive Units (on almost continual loan from his former role of State Treasure) he finds that the evidence is overwhelming. The ideals that should propel Austria into the new feature is being systematically corrupted by money, degrading morally, and is planning to get rid of him. Drekcsler, realizing Maxen has uncovered him uses his party guards to arrest Maxen, form an entirely new party, and seize the reins of the government,

Drekcsler succeeds on August 5th, and then embarks on his vision of Austria. Which includes a authoritarian government, militaristic, and a true empire spanning continents. He mobilizes and strengthens the army, and then promptly invades Mauritania. He lays groundwork for the invasion of the Czech Republic, and is only partly dissuaded by the French into leaving Mauritania for the Spanish, and because a re-invigorated Yugoslavia is now looking edgily over the border in preparation for a new Balkan War.

My Now: A month later than yours, incidentally.

Apart from our dates not matching up exactly (10th-12th rather than 12th-14th) your analysis of the battle looks not too bad. Even so, I'm sort of leery about your few casualties; remember, the Victory mounted 19" shells while the two battlecruisers mounted 15" ones, and unless the Cherbourg class' armour well outdoes its gun size (most battleships are armoured to withstand slightly more than their own broadside, although the Victory class is armoured for 17+ inch shells rather than 19+ iirc) then they should have taken enough damage to put them out of combat for several months at the very least. But really, it's up to you.

Otherwise, I do agree with your assessment, and would point out that I lost two submarines as well (Flamberge and Cheval de Frise), while the RN-19 was sunk by four torpedoes from the Flamberge.

By the way, what does 'cheval de frise' mean? I seem to recall it being a sort of barrier/booby trap placed in breaches by French soldiers, constructed out of a large number of swords or bayonets attached to a wooden post that would prevent the passage of soldiers.

EDIT: It seems as though there's enough here to start working on a unified timeline, no?

EDIT 2:

June 12th: The Atlantic Fleet retires to the Azores for repairs.

July 2nd: Vice-Admiral Damascus is transferred to the post of CO: Home Fleet.

July 5th: Rear-Admiral Alexander assumes command of the Atlantic Fleet.

July 6th: DDA Liveringa, FFH Stuart, CE Warspite depart for Portsmouth for extensive repairs. They are removed from the active list. The Atlantic Fleet assumes position as a destroyer/gunship screen for Walmington's fleet.

July 14th: FCAC Second Forward Command launches an air raid against the Spanish-held Madeira Islands, comprised of 2 squadrons AS-12, 1 squadron AS-17, 1 squadron AF/A-18Es and the 89th Bomber wing, Vulcan bombers. Spain launches some 48? aircraft in response from Madeira, and a force of 72 from Spain itself in a counter-raid on the 2FC's base in the Azores. They are detected by the FAA at sea and are intercepted by roughly 100 aircraft, mostly Harrier 4s with Typhoon and AS-12 support.

Just a little aside for Moorington- Yugoslavia in AMW only rose in the 1990s, and there was no 'first Yugoslavia', no kingdom, as it were. Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian, and other kingdoms and republics existed after the fall of Austria-Hungary and the decline of the Ottoman Empire, but it was only recently that they became unified under the Socialist Federal Republic. That happened when Larionko Aidarov (now Marshal Lav) fled besieged Lavrageria (Belarus) for Vojvodina (northern Serbia), and laid the groundwork for the replacement of the USSR's collapsing influence with a more locally-appropriate socialism.

Otherwise fine :)

In addition to the Spaniards, there are 36 RMAF Super-Mirage Fighter Jets moving to engage the incomming raid, they were probably tanked up by aerial refueling assets based out of either Madiera or Mainland Morocco.

"Cheval de Frise" means Frisian Horse, a term for a spiky barricade meant to thwart cavalry charges, was named for its originators, the Frisians, who were short on actual horses and had to make up for them somehow.

As for the war in West Africa:

June 12

-French paratroopers drop into Parakou, Benin, backed by overwhelming air support. Beninese soldiers put up a brief but spirited fight that claims the lives of a fair few Frenchmen for the near destruction of their own battalion.
-Cruise missiles fall on Porto Novo and Cotonou, destroying important infrastructure and triggering a general abandonment of the city on the part of the civilian population.
-Marines land at San Pedro, Cote D'Ivoire, to Ghanaian opposition, but quickly secure a beachhead and advance inland.
-French ground forces roll across the Nigerian border and meet with stiff, but scattered resistance and widespread sabotage of road infrastructure. Togo's small air force flies a raid against hung-up French columns and achieves some success before being destroyed.
-The day ends with France in possession of much of Benin itself, and with French forces moving on the twin cities of Porto Novo and Cotonou, defended by 2,000 Beninese regulars.

June 13-14

-French forces begin the Siege of Porto Novo with an artillery bombardment and strikes by attack helicopters. Well dug-in, Beninese forces hold their line and manage to down several French helicopters.
-Mali is invaded across the Algerian frontier, with Algerian colonial troops moving to secure the town of Tessalit. Malian forces and Tuareg irregulars fight fiercely but either disperse or are defeated. Malian attack-trainers raid French columns and helicopter formations.
-Bombardment of Accra begins with the destruction of municipal power stations.
-French ground forces move into built-up areas in Porto Novo and Cotonou, meeting determined Beninese resistance. Beninese defenders are overcome by superior enemy numbers and firepower.
-French army regiments are landed at San Pedro and begin to push inland against Ghanaian and Guinean defenders as well as local militants.
-ECOWAS division in Benin withdraws to the Mono River in Togo while the Togolese Army takes-up defensive positions in the Akwapim-Togo Range.

June 15

-Indian and Strathdonian warships congregate at Zanzibar and sail for Senegal by way of the Cape of Good Hope.
-The Royal Vanguard Legion reaches the Mono River. Carpet bombing destroys much of the ECOWAS division's strength, leaving approximately 2,000 men to oppose the enemy crossing. Togo's regular army is left intact and its positions are not challenged.
-Malian armored cars and attack-trainers raid French columns as they advance southwest.
-French forces approach Abidjan, Cote D'Ivoire. Ivoirian forces fortify the city's island geography. ECOWAS forces withdraw to the northeast.
-Porto Novo and Cotonou are secured by French forces.

June 16-17

-French forces capture Lome, and are opposed by tens of thousands of Togolese civilians demonstrating against French return. Cote D'Or is proclaimed.
-Abidjan is surrounded by French forces. The city's harbor is mined and bridges connecting islands to the mainland are demolished.
-Australasian reinforcements arrive by air in Accra. Ghanain F-5s manage to protect Australasian transports and down a Mirage-2000.

June 18

-French forces continue to advance into Mali, reaching Bourem. Malian irregulars mount hit-and-run attacks on the long French columns, and L-39s raid troop concentrations.
-Beninese civilians used as slave labor by the French riot and refuse to work, demanding wages and limits on hours.
-Beninese and Togolese irregulars mount effective attacks against French supply columns, prompting French officers to attempt to relocate the rural population.

June 19

-Initial French resettlement efforts are defeated in Benin. French officials accede to the demands of displaced Beninese citizens near the former capital.
-Work begins on the reconstruction of Porto Novo and Cotonou.
-French bombers attack Accra, killing over 50,000 Ghanaian civilians. Lead elements of the Royal Vanguard Legion cross the border into Ghana.
-Guinean forces fight a running battle with French armor and marines in the southwestern corner of Cote D'Ivoire.

June 20

-Franco-Algerian forces approach Tombouctou largely unopposed. Malian irregulars continue to raid the French rear and flanks, but cannot mount any serious counterattack for want of numbers and air cover.
-Gao on the Niger river is taken by Franco-Algerian forces, opposed by a Malian armored car squadron and L-39ZAs.

June 21-22

-French occupation forces in Benin make another attempt at forced resettlement. It is widely opposed, but the change of tactics leads to better results.
-French forces under the Duke of Normandy collect behind the Volta River and make preparations for a major offensive.

June 23

-French troops under the Duke of Normandy launch a major offensive against ECOWAS forces across West Africa.
-After a heavy bombardment, French forces cross the Volta River by boat and engage the 10,000-strong First Front Army under general Theodore Ahafo. Losses are heavy on both sides and fighting continues throughout the day.
-Mercenary paratroopers are dropped over the Burkinabe towns of Bobo-Dioulasso, Koudougou, and Ouagadougou. The enemy is able to secure the first two towns' relatively low-quality airstrips before Burkinabe defenders are able to rally. Ouagadougou and its international airport is defended by 8,000 Burkinabe regulars, and Swiss mercenaries are prevented from taking the airport for several hours. Airport facilities are destroyed and the airfield blocked.

June 24

-The left bank of the Volta River is largely cleared of the First Front Army, although scattered units remain to set ambushes for French lead elements. Ghanaian irregulars wait in Tema for the French advance along the coast road.
-Swiss mercenaries manage to capture Ouagadougou International Airport by using chlorine gas, although many Burkinabe troops break-out and head for the city. Heavy fighting continues there.
-Fighting around Bobo-Dioulasso intensifies as Burkinabe regulars and irregulars arrive to reinforce the beaten garrison. Recoilless rifle positions and ambush parties are deployed to obstruct the French exit from the town and to destroy airlifted armored cars.
-Abidjan is bombarded by French forces, devastating the strongest Ivoirian defensive works but leaving some vital areas intact.

June 25

-French forces battle through Tema and make for the small gap between Accra and the mountains occupied by Ghanaian regular forces, an area largely devoid of roads, much less good ones.
-Franco-Algerian forces reach Mopti, Mali, kilometers north of the largest concentration of Malian regular troops.
-Nigerian troops invade Niger with overwhelming force. The Nigerien army puts up a brief but determined fight before being forced to capitulate. Low-level fighting continues for some time.

June 26

-Indian warships arrive off Dakar, Senegal.

I have just add a brainstorm, one that could make new members (that can write competently) flock to A Modern World. We post our little RPs on FanFiction! I have been going around and seeing what FanFiction has to offer and even though there is a lot of crap, there is some good authors in that morass.

So we could post our timelines, our RP, and then see who reviews. Then "accidentally" let slip that you are part of a big community of writers (FanFiction has a policy on advertising, I think, no reason to test their patience) and see if they come.

It could work. Anyone else think so?

Okay Gurg, proposed amendments carried. I think we went over the fleet action, and my notes are all taken from the actual verbatim RP, your fleet got more or less caught, I took disastrous losses in the airt to the Brits.

Austria, that sounds exceptional. Yugo and Austria, can we get a timeline of your war to fit in?

Spyr, can we get a timeline of your war to put in context?

It is my precise hope that we may allbegin on a unified timeline now Gurg. And please, do a write up of that Spanish thing please.

Spiz, I think I covered Spains start well, please do a TL for the Moroccan thing.

Ill endeavor to have Africa up in a few days...have a week vacation. I think this is going very well.

In addition to the Spaniards, there are 36 RMAF Super-Mirage Fighter Jets moving to engage the incomming raid, they were probably tanked up by aerial refueling assets based out of either Madiera or Mainland Morocco.
I doubt that they'll reach the theatre of combat until the issue is decided though, right? I mean, if the Spanish launched immediately after discovering the raid (which seems only likely) and the Moroccans did the same, there's still a thousand-odd miles between Morocco and the engagement zone. Certainly, they'll make trouble for the aircraft that survive (assuming that my attack isn't totally wiped out, but we'll see).

NG: Sure, and I took disastrous losses accordingly (well, I did after having it pointed out to me ;)). But the point is that there were three battleships equal to yours attacking your line as you did mine. I lost one of them somewhere (we didn't exactly specify how, assume that it got hit by a salvo of missiles or somesuch) but that really only leaves me equal to yours. I dunno, just something I thought of when writing the timeline.

Hm, I'm not too fussed about the dates of the war with Austria, so long as it was within the last couple of years at most.

Are you considering it to have been this year, Moorington?

There's something I want to do with Lavrageria (and Yugoslav involvement) concurrent with the Atlantic battle, if people don't mind me dipping back in time like that. I wasn't able to do anything at the time because both I and, I think, Estenlands were tied up with other things.

It should put the Lavrageria issue to bed, one way or another.

Hm, I'm not too fussed about the dates of the war with Austria, so long as it was within the last couple of years at most.

Are you considering it to have been this year, Moorington?

Yeah, I guess it could be this year, because it would be an interesting excuse Yugo Slavia would have to invent for invading Austria a whole year before the second Holy League Conference.

((Okay guys. Here is my rough shod attempt to forge a Timeline for France, although inevitably other HL powers had to be involved. Please see my comments at bottom when you are done. Have a good one all, adieu!))

History

May 1945

Hitler having committed suicide a few days earlier, Germany under its Nazi masters crumbles, utterly vanquished. Germany is partitioned. World War Two ends in Europe.

September 1945

Tulglary receives its constitutional monarch Grand Duke Papan (already 62) and the Royal Family from exile in Britain following the country’s liberation from the Nazis at the end of World War Two as ceremonial head of state. In the wake of American hegemony in Western Europe following the war the USQ insists that Tulglary maintain a bicameral legislature based on the Quinntonian model where all major powers of state will lie. The Marshall Plan reinvigorates Western Europe.

In France the hero of the French resistance to the Nazi hordes, Charles de Gaulle, is swept into office without any serious opposition, the center holds and for a while it looks as though Anglo-American democracy is totally triumphant. Growing signs of competition and the potential for conflict between the Western Democracies and Communist Powers cast a dark shroud over this assessment for a discord free post war Europe.

December 1945

Miserable economic conditions on the continent allow a radical wing of the socialist party in Tulglary to capture nearly both houses of representation. Tulglary prepares to withdraw from NATO and enter into alliance with the USSR. Anti-American riots occur in the streets, churches are burned. Seeing this as a danger to its national security, Quinntonia supports a coup d’etat in which a radical group of monarchists belonging to Grand Duke Papan’s bodyguard corps storm the Parliament, and massive arrests follow which are kept under wraps by a massive CIA presence. Papan assumes complete control of the state, and re-enters into a stronger alliance with NATO than ever, also personal alliances with the White House itself.

It was during that Christmas that the Grand Duke, now in complete control of Tulglary, begins to ponder as a restored absolute monarch how he might increase his position. The burgeoning idea of a Holy League is formed by Papan, who as a devout Catholic believes with all his heart God has destroyed the Nazi Empire utterly to make way for a Restoration of all that is good and pure in Europe’s history. Namely those virtues being absolute rule of a hereditary monarchy whose powers are balanced by an invigorated Holy Catholic Church and to a lesser extent the hereditary nobility. In his train of thought, and when all was said and done a sound thought, was that both the Fascists and Communists had arisen from the common people, was that they must never be allowed to have power again though election or any form. He begins to house and shelter various exiled and disempowered royal families throughout Europe in his country for the purposes of nourishing them and one day sending them forth to take back their thrones by coups and subterfuge. The CIA is easily thrown off track, as all the peoples Papan has gathered are vehemently anti-Communist, and willing to support monetarily the White House’s agenda. Most important of the royals in exile were the Houses of Bourbon, Spanish and French, the Italian House of Piedmont (which had taken to calling themselves the Piedmont-Caesars) and the House of Groznyy of the Russias. Tulglary becomes a haven for militant monarchists, as it provides money and land for their operations.

February 1946

Louis Charles Henri Alphonse de Bourbon et Parma, the pretender to the Bourbon, or Legitimist as opposed to Orleanist, throne of France was living, with his blue blooded but poverty stricken family in Sardinia, where they had hidden away during the war. When Papan called, the shrewd man, then working as a physician, packed his family up and took off to Mons, where Papan gave them a grand stipend and fine estate.

He was a widower of 53. He had one son, Louis Xavier Auguste Philippe Stanislaus de Bourbon et Parma, is a young boy of 11 whose favorite hobby was fishing off the warm Sardinian coast and bringing home the catch for dinner. It was this boy who would one day take the throne as His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX. Dr. Louis also had a daughter, but she died along with Maria, the doctors Sicilian wife and the future Louis XX’s mother of consumption at the age of only 7. Lawyers held up medical treatment because of statutes and bribery (the Bourbons after all were not Sardinian nationals)…the last remaining Bourbon family from this one tragic event develops a hate for inefficient democracy and the bureaucrats and lawyers who maintain it. A hot hate that is passed on father to son and on. It is a great irony that had the family not suffered two tragic deaths the French pretenders would have been happy to remain in their humble position in sunny Sardinia, and there is every possibility there would have been no French Restoration.

May 1954

Concurring with the Hungarian Revolution, Wingert von Groznyy-Farrah, who would one day pronounce himself Tsar Wingert I of Estenlands and later of all the Russias, sensed the time was right to begin an insurgency against the Communists in his homeland of the Ukraine. He is a brutish man of twenty, and the Grand Duke thought him the most promising of his groomed Restorationist pupils.

Wingert is able to draw on massive CIA assistance as well and donations from Tulglary’s state coffers. Before the year was out Ukraine was in the grips of a massive guerilla war. Beginning in the Crimea it spread like lightning all about the land. Wingert rallied tortured civilians and began brutal campaigns against the Soviet occupiers. By November 1955, it is fair to say the country is experiencing full scale civil war. USSR reprisals are atrocious, with Stalin ordering “the mass liquidation of all ethnic Ukrainians for their intransigence upon contact”. Neither sides give quarter, but to be fair Wingert was much craftier when it comes to brutality: captured communists were left with their bodies flayed of skin on the roadside for their comrades to find.

Dr. Louis, with the help of Papan, soon manages a plot by blackmail and extortion in which they take majority control of Daimler-Benz in French occupied Germany by bribing off French administrators. The Bourbons soon grow to become the richest of the exiled Houses, quickly paying Papan back and gaining a growing horde of their own. They are also large shareholders of United Elias Oil and secretly through their connections in Germany’s French occupied zone ruthlessly exploit the people with everything from smuggling, prostitution, and drug trafficking. The French administrators, bribed and content, soon become quite under the table solid supporters of Dr. Louis. They soon, with huge illicit profits, go legitimate by becoming stockholders of at least forty major corporations, from DeBeers in South Africa to Ford Motors in Quinntonia.

Louis the younger is now 18 years old. A childhood friend of Wingert, he is not so much a warrior as a subtle statesman and conniver. He begins pondering how he one day will go back to France as its savior. He and his cousin Philip Raul Pedro de Bourbon et Castile, the future Philip VI, take to going on lavish foreign vacations, whoring and drinking with equal abandon. This is balanced by Louis the younger’s non-stop machinations of how exactly he will take France back for the Bourbons. So it was that one vacation took them to Port Royal, Roycelandia. There they met the heir to the Palm Throne Royce. With Royce’s help, the future Louis XX was able to buy land the size of a small country in Roycelandian East Africa. He plans to set up camps there to train and equip a professional mercenary army. The beginning of a hearty life long friendship between Louis and Royce.

New Years Day January 1960

Wingert’s CIA trained guerilla forces seize the Soviet Nuclear base of Rostov-on-Lavda after nightmarish fighting, gaining access to some four dozen ICBM’s with the ability to deploy them. At the same time partisans liberate the capital of Kiev.

After a four year war, Ukraine is devastated. But many more communists died in the process than Wingert’s guerillas, and the dead peasants Wingert regarded as an imminently better place for Red bullets than his own troops. With Stalin dead, and the USSR drained and sick of buckets of blood being shed in an un-winable conflict, Nikita Khrushchev opens a dialogue with the rebels. Though hardliners wish to crush Ukraine utterly, even they realize that at this point the entire Soviet Bloc now sees a chance to break free, the Hungarians nearly had, and very well might if even one more year of fighting occurs. The so called Sofia Accords are signed in March, with Wingert agreeing to maintain friendly relations with the USSR and maintain trade. Wingert, crowned Tsar of Estenlands in a quiet ceremony on Easter Day, did not surrender his nuclear arsenal. As a symbol of where he wanted to take the nation, he renamed the country Estenlands, and declares himself answerable to God alone.

Celebrations in Amsterdam, with Grand Duke Papan and all the exiled royal courts celebrating with the Tsar in Kiev. Papan’s dream of a Holy League has taken its first step.
Louis the younger at twenty-two years of age marries Marie-Therese de Savoy, a beautiful disenfranchised Marquise with important political contacts in the de Gaulle cabinet as well as the upper echelons of French corporate concerns. The Bourbons are now the wealthiest private family in Free Europe. Dr. Louis, at the age of 67, is diagnosed with leukemia, but goes into remission shortly thereafter. It is described as a miracle, and taken literally as one by the surgeons adoring son.

April 1960

The Algerian War rose to a climax, following the Battle of Algiers. The de Gaulle Government is torn. On one hand it could not abandon two million plus ethnic French colons, on the other it was impossible to Franconize or even satiate the demands of a fierce Muslim inspired independence movement. The war dragged on, and only became bloodier, with dark atrocities being committed on both sides. The most disaffected were the French troops fighting in Algeria, and among them the elite and mercenary Foreign Legion felt that feeling keenly.

Dr. Louis saw his chance to put his own machinations into motion. Charles de Gaulle was a monumental figure, hitherto with nearly the whole nation standing behind him---left, right and center. He was the symbol of Republican power, and closely allied and admired by the NATO powers and the west as a whole. If the de Gaulle Regime could be undermined by a disaster in the Algeria War, then a leftist government headed by the eloquent and affable Monsieur Mitterrand, already waiting in the wings, would be instituted. Once this happened, the Bourbons could take what Wingert forced as simply as plucking an apple from a tree.

So Louis Xavier packed up, and with his covert connections in the French Military enrolled as a Captain of Le Legion Etrangere under an assumed identity. At the same time his father dispatched large sums of money to aid the fellagha rebels. Serving with distinction, although in the rear lines, he soon became connected to the military serving in Algeria, which was faced with a subtly strengthened rebellion while the government remained torn, even tearing further.

January 1962

The Algerian War was a disaster. De Gaulle, with no where left to turn, purposed peace on Algerian terms and prepared to forcibly remove French colonists to the mother country. Disaffection ran so high that far-right members of the military formed Le Organisation de l’armee Secrete, a die hard group which vowed to fight to the bitter end, even setting in motion plans to return to France and seize the faltering government. In response Charles de Gaulle said he would machine gun any paratroopers over Paris.

The OAF, as Le Organisation de l’armee Secrete was known, was headquartered in the Foreign Legion, and the man who ran it in the Foreign Legion was none other than now one Colonel Guillame Lagier, in truth Louis Xavier de Bourbon.

Dr. Louis’ plan had succeeded. The De Gaulle Government, as its death act, withdrew all Frenchmen from Algeria and recalled the military. Little did he know he invited what amounted to anti-government military extremists, the OAF, having been indoctrinated to the point where they wished to see a strong government, a French government, a monarchist government. Following the humiliating defeat, the de Gaulle resigned and the Gaullists fell apart.

Francois Mitterrand became the President of a torn nation. And though he tried his best, in such an environment his far left and well meaning social agenda would set into motion more than he could ever imagine.

December 1970

At the ripe age of 77 Louis Charles Henri Alphonse de Bourbon et Parma died of natural causes in le Château Beau Mont. The Patriarch of the Bourbons died, and his funeral was attended by all in Papan’s now vast network of active royalists. He lived a full and good life, for the first part healing men, in the latter part attempting to heal his nation from afar.

Yet in the wake of hid birth, on Christmas Day, Marie-Therese gave birth to Louis Auguste Francois Henri de Bourbon et Parma, on a bright and snowy fresh morning. This squealing baby would one day grow up to be His Most Christian Majesty Louis-Auguste.

Louis Xavier now rose to be the claimant to the French throne, and he was ready. He now began to organize his contacts in France, he hired mercenaries from afar with his contacts in the Foreign Legion. He paid them and financed his projects by the now massive Omni Group International, the company his vast holdings had been placed under, the 14th largest corporation on the globe. These mercenary troops, at first made of ex-Foreign Legion members and later constituting the finest soldiers of fortune money could buy, were the first seeds of what would become the French Royal Army.

In France itself, the Mitterrand Government was in trouble. Inflation soared, this was compensated for by government controls. More importantly, massive waves of Muslim Immigrants from North Africa were encouraged to immigrate. The OAF men had gone from complaining to under directions from Tulglary actively preparing to overthrow the government. Yet unpopular though he was, he managed election after election. Soon, with rumors encouraged by the Bourbons, news leaked that he was rigging elections using Muslim immigrants, and was leaning further to the left every year. Rumors, false but believable, even circulated in the mid-decade that he was supportive of Pal Pot’s methods in Cambodia, saying the Khmer Rouge was a natural extension of Rousseau’s thought.

In Italy Caesar Maximus, and Jacamo Giuseppe de Piedmont had come to be known, managed to upturn a weak coalition government by promises of reform. The second state in Europe to fall to absolute monarchy, it was by nature the weakest of the powers. Some credited the decentralized nature of Italian politics, others credited the Latinate nature of the Italians, now Romans, themselves. He does manage to acquire nuclear weapons, however, and heads a respectable if hodgepodge military.

Then the Shah of Iran fell.

Fall 1979, the Winter Troubles

An absolute monarchy the Shah of Iran was overthrown by Muslim extremists. Ayatollah Khomeini returned from his asylum in London to assume command of a radical Marxist/Islamist regime.

Because of Bourbon machinations the Shah went into exile in France. It was not long before Louis, now a clever man of 41, got to the Shah and made him offers and man of sense could not refuse. In Paris the Shah railed against what had happened. He cited a grand plot by ‘Islamo-Marxism’ was in play, a plot which had undermined his government, and now had France as his priority. Muslim groups continued to get more and more rights under the uber-liberal Mitterrand Government, which was by itself Marxist in philosophy by admission.

Starting in October, in what was called the Autumn Addresses, the Shah proclaimed how only a monarch can oppose the might forces of Islamo-Marxism, he was baptized as a Roman Catholic in Notre Dame. The climax came when he pointed out his monarchy had failed because of Mitterrand himself, who was funded by the Ayatollah and Soviet Premier and by these same forces achieved election. Papers were shown, videos watched.

Louis Xavier now believed the time was right, and the Restoration of France began.

On October 24th the Shah was speaking at a Parisian Hotel, when a Muslim suicide bomber, who though was real had been allowed to hit his target by Louis and his OAF contacts, blew up himself, the Shah, and the audience.

A combination of Muslim terrorists and agents provocateurs of the Restorationists systematically began to terrorize France, not doing much actual damage, but frightening the population out of their minds into sheer panic. Mitterand urged calm though it was impossible that would have evaded him. He sounded like a child yelling for the cannons to cease, petulant and unprincipled, though his heart felt strongly for benign social programs and the decency of everyman. That could not assist him whatsoever in that time’s circumstances. Perhaps never was a decent man in such a bad place at the worst time. History must not judge him harshly, for who could have withheld against such webs and traps and insidious brilliances lay against them?

Catholics were terrorized, but Mitterrand did not raise his voice as a Catholic to defend them. Jews were terrorized by the Muslims (a sign of the Bourbon genius, their agents did only phobic damage, where as the Muslim militants were simply let loose to their awful natural inclinations). Christians hand blood thrown on their houses. Perversion skyrocketed, rapes became common, children being victimized in the most horrible manner on a everyday basis occurred, arson and theft seemed mild.

For months the Winter Troubles racked France, a seeming period of hell on earth. Word spread, and it soon became obvious, so called Communists (agents provocateurs of Louis) proclaimed allegiance with the Muslims, and planned to overthrow the national government and ally themselves with radical Islam and Soviet Russia. People lamented in the streets the devil had come to the world and tormented France.

January 1980

The Restoration began auspiciously, with the birth of Louis Xavier and Marie Therese’s second son, le Comte d’Artois.

Then, in a feat of showmanship that would come to characterize the Restored Bourbon Monarchy, Louis Xavier Philippe Stanislaus de Bourbon, who from this time on referred to himself as Louis XX, King of France, appeared on New Years Day.

Attended to by a chapter of the Brotherhood of the Good Brothers of St. Francis, he was discovered in a monks robes singing psalms at the Cathedral of Lourdes. At his side was the Sword of Charlemagne, powerful against the cloth of brown.

He greeted the dazed pilgrims to perhaps the holiest site in France, of which there were an exceeding number due to the chaotic republic and evil days. With his strong demeanor, he declared that angels had proclaimed to him and these monks who he had been praying with, that, quote:

“The Lord Thy God shall not abandon France, He has heard the prayers of our people, and with the wisdom of the Saints and the Glory of Our Savior Jesus Christ sends you a king of old to fight off the evils of the new!”

What followed was an event of singular interest in history. So right was the time and so right the place that, save for the spread of the Gospel, word and excitement, delirious, zoomed about the land saying a king, beyond all hope from the line of Capet and Bourbon had come to rescue France.

That marked the beginning of the fairy tale which was to so characterize the Restored French Monarchy.

Louis XX was far too intelligent, however, to believe that a miraculous appearance would be enough to take the state. As he appeared over the Tulglarian border the mercenary and ultra loyal Royal Army streamed into France. In the early hours of the morning, members of the Republican Army High Command who were not OAF, around five generals, were assassinated. The army, stripped of funding and morale as it was, did nothing to stop the Restoration, in many cases joining with the King’s troops.

The Quinntonians did not prop Mitterrand up because Louis had been quite sure to demonstrate to Jesse Obed that without his coup d’etat France would loose both its Christianity and become a Communist power in the heart of NATO. Once again the CIA aided a monarchist coup to forestall the threat of Communism which it was engaged in mortal combat with.

By the 2nd of January Paris was in the hands of Louis, Mitterrand was placed under house arrest along with the majority of government bureaucrats and representatives. Crime was crushed with clubs and bayonets, order was restored in a blaze of glory, ground under the returning Kings iron wheels.

France celebrated.

May 1980

In what proved to be a remarkably quick seizure of power, France was again a Kingdom.

The son of a pretender physician was crowned His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX, King of France and Navarre, Defender of the Faith at Reims Cathedral in a ceremony as lavish as that of Louis XIV, his direct ancestor. Trumpets sang and church bells rang, white doves were released and choirs and orchestras boomed the Te Deum.

The world stood in awe.

He immediately set about issuing law. All law previous to the Restoration was declared void. The underlying legal principle was that instead of a paper constitution the monarch served as direct and omnipotent living law. Therefore the King ruled by fiat, with ministers tending to government matters. Two major declarations ensued, which were in fact the only codified law issued under the Bourbon Restoration.

Proclamation of Manifest Virtue

Issued on the 9th of May
Anno Domini 1980
Issued by His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX

In order to guarantee the safety and prosperity of the Kingdom of France, let it be known the following:

Preface-Previous items of the criminal penal code, misdemeanors or lesser, shall remain in code but subject to the discretion of a presiding magistrate of the King. Major criminal offenses are subject to the jurisdiction of His Most Christian King’s magistrates in toto.

1. All political parties, groups, or affiliations are illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment, or hanging by the neck until dead.

2. The following beliefs are declared to be wicked in the sight of Almighty God, and are therefore illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment, or hanging by the neck until dead:

-Marxism, a.k.a. Communism, a.k.a. Socialism, a.k.a. Fascism, a.k.a. Democracy, a.k.a. Republicanism, a.k.a. Totalitarianism.

-Practice of or abetting of Islam and or Muslim persons.

-Practice of or abetting of Anarchy and or Anarchist persons.

-Criticism of His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX or the Invincible Royal Family, their retainers, court or vassals is illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment, amended to include drawing and quartering.

-Practice of or abetting of Secular Humanism a.k.a. Paganism, a.k.a. New Age Beliefs, a.k.a. Demon worship and/or Satanism.

3. Any slandering or critical comments pertaining to or suggesting the Holy Catholic Church, or attacks on the inviolable truth of its doctrines, known as heresy, are illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment, or hanging by the neck until dead.

4. All subjects have the right to immediately send for redress of any grievance to His Most Christian Majesty directly and be guaranteed a response before execution of legal sentence.

5. In order to secure the public good, all persons shall be tied to their place and means of work in perpetuity, which shall be the sphere of a peer or noble administrator. Exemptions granted in the case of military service or entering the Holy Catholic Church as a regular of preaching clergy member.

6. The Holy Catholic Church shall be placed in charge of all education, which shall be compulsory and free.

7. The Holy Catholic Church shall be placed in charge of all health care, which shall be compulsory and free.

8. An Estates General shall be established consisting of the Clergy, Nobility, and Commoners to dissimulate the various wills of people to His Most Christian Majesty.

9. France will return to demarcations of her original provinces.

10. The legal wishes of The Most Christian King shall be dissimulated by Parlrements du Loi, one body for each respective province, one for Paris.

11. Degradation of the public good is illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment, or hanging by the neck until dead.

12. Use of abortion and or contraceptive agents is illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment or hanging by the neck until dead.

13. Sumptuary laws are to be obeyed with full compliance, failure to do so is illegal on pain of fine or imprisonment.

14. Any section of the Proclamation of the above is subservient to the King’s Law and is at his pleasure.

15. Every subject shall acknowledge the righteous and invincible nature of The Most Christian King as a divinely inspired ruler.

16. Usury is illegal on pain of fine, imprisonment or hanging by the neck until dead.

Edict of Nantes

Issued on the 9th of May
Anno Domini 1980
Issued by His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX

In order to guarantee the spiritual health and righteousness of the Kingdom of France be it known the following:

1. The Holy Catholic Church shall be the official religion of the Kingdom of France.

2. The Jewish faith and people shall be protected by His Most Christian Majesty, and granted the right to free worship in accordance with their beliefs.

3. *Quinntonian Christian Brotherhood Amendment* Protestant Christians shall have the right to worship in accordance with their beliefs.

4. All members of the Muslim faith shall convert to Catholicism in mind and soul or shall be subject to intense government labor programs on pain of fine, imprisonment or hanging by the neck until dead. Emigration is not permitted.

November 1980

Using a very similar method to the French coup d’etat, the Spanish Bourbon His Catholic Majesty took both his title and throne in Madrid. Philip VI was, as well as Louis XX’s cousin, much of his same mind, and the Catholic King tended to follow the trends set by his Gallic neighbor. 1980 was declared by Time Magazine “The year Time went back.”

Monarchs, absolute in Spain, France, Ukraine and grand-fatherly Tulglary in the space of a few years transformed both the Cold War and world politics radically. Truth be told, at this point most of the world was simply too dumbfounded to react, with revolutions in Asia causing equal changes. As of yet the Restored states maintained their allegiance with NATO, all save Estenlands by necessity of course, thus throwing the USSR into a spending frenzy, which, as time would show, devastated the corruption and inefficiency laden communists. Also as of yet, though, Grand Duke Papan had yet to unite these power flushed resources, and already in his late 80’s had problems of his own to tend to, things went far to quickly for him, he was startled.

The Restoration had been a smashing success. The first two symbols the Restoration chose to build were the Bastille and Versailles, actually Versailles was more rehabitated rather than rebuilt.

The Bastille however was raised on its original site, save it was twelve times the originals proportion. Huge and made of reinforced steel and concrete, it was a veritable fortress in the city of Paris. Though it was not the highest structure its squat medieval visage dominated the Paris skyline, the Bourbon Coat of Arms flying high from the parapets. Each hour it sounded its cannon. When the King visited Paris it gave a twenty four gun salute, for any other member of the Royal Family sixteen.

It here that the thousands upon thousands of former Republicans were sent, along with Marists of all kinds and other “suspectedly dangerous persons.” Only a few very dangerous persons were hung, most were simply locked away in dark, cold, impregnable oubliettes, cones of iron, man eating, where you put people to forget about them for good. Mitterrand got an oubliette larger than most, it even caught a bit of sunlight for about five minutes a day.

Versailles again was the capital of France, glittering and sublime. Once again balls and military parades, playing of fountains, fetes, and illuminations heralded the glory of the Sun King.

The Eiffel Tower now bore four massive golden fleur-de-lys on its quadrilateral side, a symbol that the monarchy intended not to destroy but to create. Statues to the King were going up all over France, from Lille to Grenoble to Bordeaux.

Now the most adored monarch of them all, Louis XX called together a conference of the absolute monarchs. A symbol of his new found position as the most dashing and debonair member of the clique, he brought them in splendor to Versailles. There, in the shade of magically symmetrical forests and gardens, with the sounds of fountains and string quartets, His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX, sitting with the Royal Hand clapped on Grand Duke Papan’s shoulder, proposed they solemnly create the alliance and power network the Tulglarian benefactor had organized for generations:

The Holy League.

November 11th 1980, The First Congress of the Holy League

In the Hall of Mirrors His Most Christian Majesty Louis XX, His Imperial Majesty Tsar Wingert I of the Estenlands, His Eminence Grand Duke Papan of Tulglary, His Catholic Majesty Philip VI and His Excellency Caesar Maximus of Italy, now Rome, signed into being the Holy League. Papal nuncios and Orthodox ministers blessed the alliance.

There has rarely even been such an event, an event which took the world by storm jus as the storms had brought crowns to the respective nations of the Holy League. It had four points, that was all:

1. All League members shall defend one another from external aggressions if attacked.

2. All League members shall defend one another from internal uprisings and shall preserve at all cost the legitimate monarch of each League member.

3. All League members shall recognize the state of divine right absolute monarchy as the supremest form of government on the face of the earth, and moreover shall do their best to house monarchs seeking their throne or assist ennobled persons creating their own.

4. All League members shall recognize Orthodox Christianity, both Roman Catholic and Eastern Rites, as the official form of religion and the greatest aid in maintaining a divine order upon the earth.

And so an ideology had erupted like a volcano out of the small garden Grand Duke Papan had planted. The Holy League crowns withdrew from NATO while maintaining amicable relations. Simultaneously the USSR began to suffer a series of strokes it would not recover from, seeing as a huge nation with a huge border with the failing Communist state was now armed to the teeth and allied with fellow absolute divine right monarchs bearing the same arms.

The stage was set for the modern era, an era where occurrences in Europe had bewildered the world, and as events will show, continued to.

Current Events

The Golden Summer 1985

The current era of France began when Louis XX had borne the last of his six children. One after another, year after year, they came, birthed by Her Serene Majesty Marie-Therese. In order there came le Comte de Provence, le Duc de Normandie, and le Duc de Aquitaine. The last to be born was le Comtesse de Noailles, Marie Antoinette, his charming daughter.

It was called the Golden Summer because Louis XX and Tsar Wingert, the major figures of the Holy League, reclined in the salons of Versailles between hunting parties, discussing how to ‘make the Holy League a credible power.’ It was then Wingert, egged on by Louis, formulated a plan to ravage and seize an annoying neighbor of his, Lavrageria, a small and fiercely independent nation headed by a democratic demagogue Larionko Aidarov. So from that moment on the Holy League focused on the tiny, landlocked, poverty stricken yet stubbornly democratic nation.

With the USSR faltering more everyday, the Most Christian King and Imperial Majesty began a plan of re-armament, deciding that the best way to secure their, in the final analysis, precarious thrones was to gain a relatively easily military victory which would still have international repercussions. With their lead the Holy League en masse began to arm itself like the feudal knight it portrayed, but Estenlands and to a lesser degree France led the way.

It was also decided that, to show the blood brotherhood between the French and Estenlandic monarchs, the Dauphin of France Louis Auguste would marry Wingert’s daughter, also five at the time, Arch Duchess Jillesepone. Shortly thereafter, the King of France married off his baby daughter Marie Antoinette to the Spanish Bourbons Principe de Asturias, also around one year old. Le Comte d’Artois was married to Papans great-great-niece, la Duchesse de Ypres. Thus the Holy League became tied together in blood as well as deed.

So it was called the Golden Summer, and so the Holy League slowly and surely secured itself internally and prepared itself to smashing weak socialist democracies and giving them proper divinely ordained governments, first in Europe, later beyond.

The Lavragerian War February-August 1992

After seven years of preparation, France and Estenlands were ready to demonstrate to the world both their power and intentions.

The plum fell from the tree when the USSR, for the better part of a generation now tossing and turning on its sickbed, racked by strokes and corruption at all levels…so much that it was said the most efficient part of the regime and responsible was the Red Mafia...now began to disintegrate.

In a last ditch effort, the Central Committee opted for a free election, a sure sign of the critical nature of the crisis, the elections were not even rigged.

So it came to pass that the USSR ceased to exist, fell apart, and in its place was a young and charismatic Vladimir Putin. Putin was a Quinntonian trained capitalist, whose primary agenda was a ‘war’ on crime. War was what he got. With chaos boundless Louis XX and Wingert made their move.

Critically important for future events was that the then Dauphin, at the age of twenty-two, was a heroic soldier during the war and leading the charge in person smashed the enemy stronghold of Hia’Itakchi. His companions at the front were none other than le Duc de Broglie, who would become Louis-Auguste’s Minister of War, and Monsieur le Noir, his intelligence chief who would one day preside over the greatest terror police since the Gestapo, la Marechaussee.

A fuller account of the Lavragerian War can be found, a fine history, penned by Lunatic Record Robots.

For our purposes the Holy League smashed Lavrageria, sent what members of its government remained alive (unfortunately this included Aidarov) into hiding, and partitioned the country. This war was critically important for several reasons:

1. It showed that Western Democracies would not interfere if their own welfare was not threatened, and would smile on if such wars did damage to their ‘progressive’ and more importantly ‘anti-capitalist’ enemies.

2. Demonstrated the Holy League was now the premier military force in the world, vicious and brave, able to conduct a blitzkrieg with fanatically loyal troops.

3. Set the group for global acceptance of civilian deaths not as collateral but as a process of the new age of warfare.

In the aftermath of the Treaty of Washington D.C. Tsar Wingert and King Louis were now poised to exert themselves to the status of a world power, which in short order they began to do.

1994

This is the year that Louis XX groomed puppet, Omar Abdullah---who would soon assume the throne in Algiers as Louis I King in Algeria---returned to his country and with large assistance from ex-OAF forces, as well as Louis XX crack mercenary troops, launched a coup which made Algeria a vassal state to France. He marries as his queen Louis XX’s niece, Yolande de Polignac. The northern half of the country, from the Laghouat line northwards, became the Kingdom of Algeria. The vast empty spaces below were given as a present to Roycelandia, and to this day are know as Roycelandian Southern Algeria.

Resistance was present, but was crushed. Radical Islamists were arrested for life sentences or worse. While the population was allowed to maintain its faith, the rulers were to a man and woman devout Catholics along with their Court. This fuels the French Restoration handily, and resources flow in. In France serfs have rights, in the Kingdom of Algeria the peasants are given only rites.

Russian Restoration and Baltic Wars 1996-7

After the total failure of the Putin Government, which in hindsight must be said to have had the greatest chance of truly reforming Russia, it was now relatively easy for the Estenlandian Tsar to move in and declare himself Wingert I Lavragerianus, Tsar of all the Russians, Master of all the Realms.

A brutally efficient consolidation of power followed, with communists being forced to basically lick his boots and hold his massive cape at state functions. Putin was killed by the Tsar in hand to hand combat, so like a tribal chief Wingert captured his prize. The hard word of the previous regime coupled with Wingert’s drive to power and Tsarist Russia soon became a power on par with the Americans once again. The Tsar had no problem properly punishing the Red Mafia, in a few weeks their dead bodies were removed from the meat hooks and thrown unceremoniously in the icy waters of Archangel.

To further demonstrate his power, he quickly crushed and occupied Baltic Nation of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia in the so called Baltic War, which was in reality a victory easier than the Lavragerian struggle.

((Okay guys, that is as far as I have made it so far. I have yet to do, in order, the following: New Caledonian Skirmish, assassination of Louis XX and Coronation of Louis-Auguste, and of course THE WORLD WAR. I am going to need your help on this though guys, although I can handle the assassination myself (AC’s help would be grand though), I should like to have BG if possible help me with New Caledonia, and LRR and Gurg with the worlds war in Africa and the Atlantic especially.))

((Can you all see where I am going with this now? I want all of us to create a grand timeline, the recent war will be the coup de gras after which we can continue more heartened than ever, with everyone on the same page, and with a history to power our nations. Ill check back tomorrow with my New Caledonia War, leaving it open for BG to amend. Also the Tsar could elaborate on the Baltic War. But in any case, the most important thing I think, is that we all get a common history set up, Id love to put a grand timeline up on NSwiki, that anyone can refer to if they have a ?. I do think the war will be the most difficult part, the longest and most detailed (Id like to try and add casualties and losses on the war history if I could. Anyway, please let me know what you all thing, and lets all get this excellent project done so we can resume AMW more realistically than ever with far more invigorated spirits.))
Well......... somebody's done there homework...

Not to be rude, but this is a closed thread. And yeah, NG does write a lot.

I’m delaying a bit in putting up a timeline for the conflict in Indonesia, at least until there’s some ‘meat’ to the matter… political developments and a few foreign deployments have likely taken place over the course of a week or two, but tactical posts are still largely confined to the first 32 hours since hostilities began.

Until then, Ive been considering my own timeline impressions as they relate to the Philippines, which are below:

1542
Spain claims the islands of what is now the Philippine archipelago, naming them the ‘Philippines’ after Prince (later King) Philip.

1896
Rebellious activities intensify in the Philippines after execution of pro-independence author Jose Rizal. As Spanish-Quinntonian hostilities mount, independence forces are supported by the USQ*.

1898
Philippines declares independence from Spain.

1899
Spain cedes Philippines to Quinntonia (for a small payment) as part of the Treaty of Paris, which ends the Spanish-American War. Philippine-American War begins as USQ forces arrive to take control.*

1902
USQ authority over Philippines cemented through a combination of economic improvement and harsh measures against resistance. Sporadic fighting continues for several years, and independent Moro fighters continue to resist.*

1913
Moro resistance ends*.

1934
USQ implements Tydings-McDuffie Act, beginning transition to Philippine independence in 1946.*

1941
Empire of Japan invades and takes control of Philippines. Rebellion begins, the largest being the Communist ‘Hukbalahap’ (People's Army Against the Japanese, known as Huks).

1944
USQ retakes Philippines from Japan.

1946
USQ acknowledges Philippine independence. Huks begin resistance against the government, and are successful in the first few years of their campaign, though these victories begin to reverse as the state brings increasing military power to bear.

1954
Government forces finally bring an end to organized Huk resistance, save for small pockets in remote areas.

1965
Ferdinand Marcos becomes President of the Philippines, and engages in crackdowns against Communist and Islamic rebels in the Philippines. He is sponsored by neighboring Bonstock, despite increasingly totalitarian methods and corruption*.

1968
(December) Communist Party of the Philippines founded on Maoist principles, by José María Sison, after a split with the Philippine Communist Party (a more orthodox and less active Leninist group).

1969
Having risen to primacy amongst Philippine socialist movements and surviving Huk enclaves, the CPP reorganizes resistance forces (including Huk remnants) into the New People’s Army, which engages in a guerilla campaign against the government.

1977
Sison arrested and imprisoned by the Marcos regime.

1980(s?)
NPA begins to receive support from the Igovian Soviet Commonwealth.^

1986
Marcos flees into exile amidst public protests against his regime. Early hopes for democracy are quashed by successive governments mired in allegations of corruption. Sison released from prison in the Philippines, but continues to direct the CPP from exile.^

2000
After the fall of Bonstock removes FRB influence, Roycelandian government begins increasing activities in the Philippines.#

2004
(Late summer) France begins construction of fortifications on Palawan. Widespread protests begin to issue from various Asian governments.
(Fall and winter) Minor naval engagements occur in the region, with French attacks on Hindustani shipping and Soviet strikes against French vessels. Rhetoric between ‘imperial’ and ‘progressive’ states becomes increasingly hostile. Soviet forces begin to build up in Vietnam, and supply to Khmer Rouge also rises sharply.

2005
Government of President Aznar engages in widespread ‘anti-corruption’ efforts, including summary executions of numerous officials (parliament, several top generals, as well as regional figures). This endeavour is assisted by Russian agents.

(July) Soviet supply of NPA limited by loss of WiG vehicle due to technical failure.
(August) Construction of French fortress on Palawan completed.
(September) Spyr begins covert supply of arms to NPA via submarine.
(October) Hindustani troops arrive in Sujava to coordinate plans for military action to remove imperial presence from the Philippines. French forces depart Palawan.
(December) Roycelandia, continuing to face opposition to its presence from regional powers, withdraws from the Philippines.

2006

(January) First contingent of international peacekeepers arrives in Manila.

Notes

* On USQ involvement… it’s rather difficult. Puerto Rico may have been the main motivator for war with Spain, rather than Cuba? In any event, the USQ got Guam, and likely the Philippines as well.
The difficult part comes with Quinntonia replacing America in occupation… in some ways, such as education scholarships and economic development, the two might run parallel, but I’m not sure if the USQ, holding much more strongly to its moral compass, would have engaged in some of the suppression measures that were seen in RL. Would the USQ, having supported independence fighters, turn on them once they had been granted control by the Spanish? Would they have pursued operations against civilians (burning of villages, executions of family members, etc), or against those of Islamic faith (bullets coated in pigs blood and the like)? Would they have even wanted control of the area at all?

One solution would be that the Philippines gained independence from the Treaty of Paris… USQ support for Philippine independence was genuine, and they fought Spanish forces for that ideological goal rather than for territorial gains in the Philippines. This is perhaps the easiest solution… Filipino-Quinntonian ties arise from friendship and gratitude, supplying bases (vital to threaten a blockade of Vichy Indochine, provoking Japan to war in hopes of restoring its supply lines) and trade ties (Filipino raw materials were quite important to US industrial development in the early 1900s). Japan invades a republic rather than a colony, but given their other deviations in practice from their anti-imperial rhetoric it’s not a stretch to see them going for Manila whether it was a US possession or not.

One might say that history unfolded as normal, but without the ‘bad stuff’… If that is the case, then things will still be markedly different. In the southern islands and northern mountains of Luzon in particular, sentiments widely favoured independence (from the Philippines, not just imperial occupation), and national unity in the modern Philippines owes quite a debt to American efficiency at destroying the centres of opposition, not to mention the fact that it took concentration camps and scorched earth campaigns to impose US control in the first place. If independence was not quashed, then it would likely have risen even with benevolent Quinntonian presence (nationalist sentiments, as evidenced in places such as Quebec or Flanders, are not necessarily linked to one’s overlords being exploitive), likely leading to independence much earlier than ’46, with the southern islands as an independent Moro republic rather than part of the Philippines.

Or perhaps there’s another solution. Something that ought be thought about, anyway.

^I’m assuming support of the NPA arose under Sopworth, which I think would put the date somewhere in the 1980s (?). Sison’s exile is a question… he’d hardly have gone to the Netherlands in an AMW context, would he? I had first thought he would have gone to Beth Gellert, as they sponsored him, but the Third Commonwealth approach was not the JoMa’s style… however brilliant he may be in many respects, he has proven to be quite rigid in his revolutionary outlook, a Maoist to the core. Honestly, I think he’d react to Commonwealth attempts to shift the NPA towards a more anarchistic path with a purge rather than open arms, so one wonders at his fate. Would he have moved on to somewhere (Spyr, perhaps Bihar or Nepal) where he would feel less pressure to alter his ideology? Would he have choked on some poisoned tea served by a Geletian who hoped that the NPA, free of his influence, would reform itself to become more Soviet in its views? Would the Commonwealth have decided, given his known attitudes, that a Maoist was better than nothing so they ought not push the issue of ideology (at least until the fight against the reactionaries was over with)?

# Bonstock’s influence in the Philippines is, I think, a necessity. The FRB was a massive military power with substantial imperial ambitions, located right next door, yet it did not attempt to assume control there, going instead beyond to Taiwan and the Sakishimas. Ferdinand Marcos seems an excellent explanation if he plays the role of FRB-backed dictator… totalitarian, anti-Communist and anti-Islamic, just like the regime in Singapore, and unlikely to be backed by USQ as he was (for a time, at least) by the USA. After his ouster in the mid-80s, with their economy already declining and internal matters a continuing concern, FRB influence was likely waning, and the fall of Singapore would have put it to an end. In the following years, Roycelandia may have moved into the area, influence limited by the relative weakness of individual governments until Aznar proved to be more stable by shooting his parliament.

Given DNK’s requirements, the FRB may have fallen around 1998? Still early in Chiisu’s reign, perhaps too much so even, but alternately it was the first roleplay of AMW and thus it seems odd to have it occur after such events as the Lavragerian War and the French coup in Algeria.

Heh, probably why NationStates is home to so few unified timelines… even bloody Lyong is crazy to fit together, and there were just three of us.

Speaking of which, I’ve got to find where in the hell the Tordians came from in Europe. My thought was Brittany, as it has the requisite Celtic and Catholic connections, and they’re excommunicated and in flight by 1200 so there won’t be any remnants to affect things later on. Might have an impact on bloodlines, though I don’t think either the Houses of Bourbon nor Walmington originate that far back.

Well, I like what you have done here, I will just comment. I think that the idea of the USQ genuinely working towards a common ideological goal may have been the way to go. We definitely would not have done the heavy suppression that the USA did. I think that we don’t really need to touch on what started the Spanish-Quinntonian war here just that it did happen. After all, Guam is pretty important to my deployment in that region.

Now, perhaps some form of occupation did take place, but we would have only entered at the request of the people and let them make most of the decisions as we poured billions into developing their nation. Perhaps the occupation that took place was more political than military though. The government in power cooperated and depended on Quinntonia so much, and allowed us to have military bases to help them retain sovereignty within and protect them from the rising powers without that some nationalistic groups saw it as imperialism anyways.

This may be some of the explanation as to how Quinntonia was duped by Dra-pol. We had been invited in and made it a national project to get other nations on their feet before, and we assumed that Dra-pol would have been as grateful as the Philippines were.

As for support from Quinntonia for totalitarian dictators, I am allowing that Quinntonia could make mistakes in the past, and if we desperately needed an ally in the region against Communists and militant Islamists, perhaps we did get into bed with them, but we would have withdrew as soon as it was driven home that we had gotten duped.

WWJD
Amen.

The First Commonwealth (Igovian) rose in 1982, though I suppose it's fair to say that de facto control of certain rural areas and slums was probably with revolutionary elements before then, and sympathisers were found throughout the government and military.

Erm, sorry, I'm finding contribution hard as all my Word documents are in another country. I now wish that I'd E-mailed some of the more concise ones to myself, but as things were at the time, well, it didn't happen.

I did have it written that the Soviets started helping the NPA/CPP et cetera in the late '80s and early '90s (end of the 1st and start of the 2nd Commonwealths) when they broke their long policy of self-reliance and asked for help (in reality). The Soviets jumped in, even if the tide of anti Bolshevist/Leninist/Maoist/et-cetera thought was rising in India at the time, because it just couldn't be ignored, and because, well, it was Sopworth who started it.

Since then, the Soviets have periodically tried, in fact, to purge the CPP/NPA, which may surprise some, in pursuit of a more left-wing approach to Filipino communism. It is entirely possible that GSIC or the PLS (Philippines Liberation Soviet) may have done away with the likes of Sison.

Unfortunately, political will to keep-up this sort of approach has waxed and waned, and set-backs like the loss of the WIG combined with that may well have made Soviet meddling a bit of a disaster in some ways, and given the Strainists every chance to stick their oar in.

On another note, I've often supposed the USQ's USA-equivalent ...unpleasantness has come from a sort of innocence out of step in the rest of the world. If all Quinntonians (virtually all, anyway) are true believers and practitioners of their faith, it may be all too easy to forget -or struggle to understand- the motives and circumstances of foreigners. They might often have backed... visionaries and leaders in good faith, and been rather let down, much as Q. suggests they were surprised by the Drapoel.

I'm sure that at times influential Quinntonians have strayed a little from the path, too, or come-up with unorthodox readings of this scripture or that precedent, applied them to unsavoury situations, and been able to cause problems that the population and government at large would later seek to redeem.

Ah, but I'm rambling because I don't often get the chance, these days =)

"Cheval de Frise" means Frisian Horse, a term for a spiky barricade meant to thwart cavalry charges, was named for its originators, the Frisians, who were short on actual horses and had to make up for them somehow.

As for the war in West Africa:

June 12

-French paratroopers drop into Parakou, Benin, backed by overwhelming air support. Beninese soldiers put up a brief but spirited fight that claims the lives of a fair few Frenchmen for the near destruction of their own battalion.
-Cruise missiles fall on Porto Novo and Cotonou, destroying important infrastructure and triggering a general abandonment of the city on the part of the civilian population.
-Marines land at San Pedro, Cote D'Ivoire, to Ghanaian opposition, but quickly secure a beachhead and advance inland.
-French ground forces roll across the Nigerian border and meet with stiff, but scattered resistance and widespread sabotage of road infrastructure. Togo's small air force flies a raid against hung-up French columns and achieves some success before being destroyed.
-The day ends with France in possession of much of Benin itself, and with French forces moving on the twin cities of Porto Novo and Cotonou, defended by 2,000 Beninese regulars.

June 13

-French forces begin the Siege of Porto Novo with an artillery bombardment and strikes by attack helicopters. Well dug-in, Beninese forces hold their line and manage to down several French helicopters.
-Mali is invaded across the Algerian frontier, with Algerian colonial troops moving to secure the town of Tessalit. Malian forces and Tuareg irregulars fight fiercely but either disperse or are defeated. Malian attack-trainers raid French columns and helicopter formations.
-Bombardment of Accra begins with the destruction of municipal power stations.
-French ground forces move into built-up areas in Porto Novo and Cotonou, meeting determined Beninese resistance. Beninese defenders are overcome by superior enemy numbers and firepower.
-French army regiments are landed at San Pedro and begin to push inland against Ghanaian and Guinean defenders as well as local militants.
-ECOWAS division in Benin withdraws to the Mono River in Togo while the Togolese Army takes-up defensive positions in the Akwapim-Togo Range.

June 14

-Indian and Strathdonian warships congregate at Zanzibar and sail for Senegal by way of the Cape of Good Hope.
-The Royal Vanguard Legion reaches the Mono River. Carpet bombing destroys much of the ECOWAS division's strength, leaving approximately 2,000 men to oppose the enemy crossing. Togo's regular army is left intact and its positions are not challenged.
-Malian armored cars and attack-trainers raid French columns as they advance southwest.
-French forces approach Abidjan, Cote D'Ivoire. Ivoirian forces fortify the city's island geography. ECOWAS forces withdraw to the northeast.

June 15

-French forces capture Lome, and are opposed by tens of thousands of Togolese civilians demonstrating against French return. Cote D'Or is proclaimed.
-Abidjan is surrounded by French forces. The city's harbor is mined and bridges connecting islands to the mainland are demolished.

LRR, I think thats done it for Africa then. I don't suppose I could get you to do a comprehensive casualty count (please) too? I think I fairly clearly stated casualties, and quite and markedly better than the European war threatre the African situation is much easier to follow; for the reasons that there were basically only two major, OOCly, players involved, excepting Gurg and latterly BG---you and I. Plus I think you have the right to do a casualty count for ECOWAS to boot. I think I covered enough of the European war situation in depth, is someome wants to do the socio-politico thing with Africa as well please help yourselves.

Oh, and Id like to think that I do not write too much. Rather, as in life, I think that to do something properly is to do it properly. I have seen fine short posts and atrocious long ones. It is not quantity, rather quality. It was never my intention to be long winded for selfsame purpose.

Uh, bump?

The Complete and only Slightly Abridged History of The Empire of Roycelandia (Without the Boring Bits)- A Work In Progress

The Roycelandians themselves confess to being a bit unsure where their ancestors came from, but it's generally thought to be a Flotilla of Anglo-Saxon trading vessels blown horribly off course in approximately 995 AD.

What is known for sure is that the memoirs of the Duke Of Dorque in 1326 make reference to "Islands inhabited by Whyte Menne to the Weste of the Pillarse of Hercules, who are as Civilised as any Nation inne Europe"- this is generally accepted to be the first written reference to Roycelandia in Westen literature.

In 1470 the Portuguese Explorer Vasco di Sectomi made landfall on Jamaica, near the modern-day capital city of Port Royal, and was astonished to find "A countrie of Europeans, who speaketh and writeth Englishe, and whome are in all wayse and mannerse European".

Di Sectomi also noted "These People, who calleth themselves Roycelandianse, are skilled withe the Crossbowe and can shooteth a Birde on ye winge at fifty paces with ease".

It would appear that, until this point, Roycelandian contact with Europe had been limited, although the Roycelandians had established an incredibly lucrative trade network with the other Carribbean Islands, as they were "Reknowned Merchantes of Spiritous Liquors, Sugare, Timbre, and a plante they calle 'Tobacko', which they rolleth into tubes and then ignite, drinkinge ye smoke thereofe".

Furthermore, the Roycelandians "Had a Greate and Wise King, Whome Treated all his Subjectes equallie, regardless of Race or Sexe", and "Evene allowed Womynne to Vote on matters of Importance!"

The Portuguese visit was to have lasting consequences on the Roycelandians, as History has subsequently shown...

c. 1350: The Roycelandians Discover Gunpowder

One of the many important results of di Sectomi's visit was that Roycelandians were introduced to the Arquebus, a primitive musket. As the Portuguese Explorer noted, Roycelandians were skilled Crossbow shots, and had even found a way of mounting short spears or blades on their crossbows to create the earliest known Bayonets. Gunpowder was well known to the Roycelandians, who had been using primitive cannon (including hand-held versions known as "Handcannone" since the mid-1300s, but the Arquebus represented a major leap forward in Firearms technology for the Roycelandians, and it was only a matter of time before Roycelandian Merchants traded for cases of Arqubuses and spare parts, and by the time another Portugese trading Caravel arrived in 1473, the Roycelandians had completely abandoned the Crossbow and were now armed with Muskets, "Whiche they derived greate Pleasure from firinge at everye oppurtunitie".

1473: The Age of Roycelandian Imperialism Begins

Roycelandian Cartographers traded with the Portugese for maps of "The Olde Worlde" in 1473, with the Roycelandians providing extremely detailed and accurate maps of Central America, as well as he area around the Gulf of Mexico and northern South America. These maps subsequently found their way to the Spanish in the late 1490s, and several reputable Historians have pointed to them as being one of the causes of the Spanish Conquest Of The New World.

Later that year (1473), King Martin II ordered a Caravel be built, and that an expedition "Cross the Eastern Sea, seek out new lands and peoples, and boldly go where no Roycelandian has gone before". Nearly 500 years later, the Roycelandian Government won a lawsuit against the TV show Star Trek, citing blatant plagarism of the Charter of the Royal Africa Company.

The maps acquired from the Portuguese showed most of the coast of Africa, and it was from these Maps that Roycelandia established a "Plan For A Glorious And Expansive Empire"

1475: Cape Verde Islands- Roycelandia's First Colony

The Royal Africa Company's expedition made landfall on the Cape Verde Islands on February 6th, 1475, and established a settlement at Sunderland Bay (named after the Captain of the expedition, Sir Thomas Sunderland). Nominally, the Islands had been claimed by Portugal, but the Roycelandians bought shiny baubles, promises of a better life, and Firearms, thus ensuring the resident Portuguese and the Islanders came around to their way of thinking rather quickly.

The Cape Verde Islands provided an excellent base for Trade in the West African area, and the Royal Africa Company made a lot of money trading with Native Peoples in the region, although attempts to establish Colonies on the West African mainland were thwarted by the fact that although the Roycelandians had guns, the Natives had sharp spears and extremely large numbers, as well as Voodoo, which unnerved the largely agnostic Roycelandians.

The Royal Africa Company (and, by extension, The King) sent expeditions right around the Coast of Africa, rounding the Cape of Good Hope, and in 1495, finally winding up near present day Dar-Es-Salaam.

There were numerous Roycelandian Trading Settlements established all along the west coast of Africa in present day Cameroon, Gabon, Angola, Namibia, and South Africa, as well as in Mozambique on the East Coast.

1495: Roycelandian East Africa

On March 28th, 1495, Captain Zaphod Brannigan stepped ashore at Dar-Es-Salaam and claimed the area on behalf of the Roycelandian Crown. Relations with Arab Traders and local Native Tribes were both prosperous and friendly, and the fledgling Colony prospered, with Captain Brannigan as the first Governor. At its peak, Roycelandian East Africa occupied most of East Africa, in a region from the Egyptian Border to the South African Border, and west to The Congo.

1502: The Spanish-Roycelandian War

In 1501, the Spanish began to aggresively explore the New World, and soon Roycelandia found Spanish ships in her territorial waters (ie, the islands of Jamaica, Hispaniola, and Tortuga).

Initially the Spanish came in search of Gold, but when they discovered the Roycelandians wouldn't give them any without trading for it, and more importantly that the Roycelandians "Knewe No God and did not believeth the Holy Bible to be True", it was an excuse for War.

The Spanish hoped to conquer the fledgling Roycelandian islands, subjugate the Roycelandians, convert them to Catholicism, and make the Islands part of the Spanish Empire.

As History records, the Roycelandians beat the stuffing out of the Spanish, in a long, protracted, and bloody war that lasted until 1521 when the Roycelandian Army, under the command of William Enfield, stormed and captured the Spanish port of Havana in Cuba, and from there, annexed the rest of Cuba and most of the rest of the Caribbean for good measure.

After signing the Treaty Of Lisbon, the Spanish agreed to leave the Roycelandians alone, and the Roycelandians agreed to leave the Spanish to do their thing in South America. What ensued, of course, was 460 years of sabre-rattling and sniping (literal and figurative) between the two Empires. Roycelandia claimed victory by proxy in 1898 when the Quinntonians captured Manila in the Spanish-Quinntonian war, ending the Spanish Empire.

1560: The Roycelandian Empire Expands Again

By 1560, Roycelandian trading vessels were regularly sailing to the East Indies, and a small trading post had been established in Goa, on the Indian west coast, to resupply these ships and trade with the Indians. As trade with the East Indies grew, Goa expanded to become a sort of Merchant Hub, Bazaar, and Military Garrison all in one. To this day, Goa is Roycelandia's Hong Kong, providing a Gateway to the Subcontinent, a Bazaar where anything can be acquired for the right price, and a very large Naval, Airforce, and Imperial Guard base.

By 1914, the Roycelandian Empire had expanded to encompass most of Sub-Saharan Africa (Including a very convenient treaty with the British Government awarding the Sudan to Roycelandia), several Islands in the Pacific and Asia, as well as Port Arthur in China, several other concessions thereof, several trading posts in Burma and India, and a very close relationship with Great Britain and the US.

The late 19th century was characterised by the Scramble For Africa, and the Imperial Guard were involved in innumerable conflicts

1914-1945: World Wars I & II

When World War I broke out in 1914, Roycelandia joined in on the Allied side, sending troops to the Dardenelles as part of the ill-fated Gallipoli Campaign. Unlike the ANZACs and the British, however, the Roycelandians realised that the whole thing was a lost cause and decided to focus their efforts on the Middle East and Pacific theatres, with the Imperial Roycelandian Camel Corps causing untold havoc along the Hejaz Railway, famously riding on Aqaba with Lawrence of Arabaia and his Arab Irregulars, and causing all sorts of havoc with anyone silly enough to try and tangle with the Empire's soldiers.

Rather disappointingly, the sole Post-WWI concession to Roycelandia was the island of Socotra, which had been occupied by the Roycelandians in the 1880s anyway, but never formally recognised as part of the Empire until that point.

Roycelandia declared War on Nazi Germany and Japan on September 3rd, 1939, fighting alongide Commonwealth Forces throughout the war- and losing most of their Pacific Colonies and Concessions to the Japanese, (The telegram famously sent by Emperor Hirohito to Emperor James IV in March 1942 simply said: "All your base are belong to us"), and which were not regained after the war due to the political situation in China.
Having said that, the Roycelandian Economy was immeasurably boosted by the war (and their subsequent victory with the other Allied nations), and entered the post-war years with a massive economic boom and a future full of prosperity... before getting involved in Vietnam.

1954: The Vietnam War

The French colony of Indochina had been occupied by the Japanese during WWII, and the Roycelandians found themselves helping the French (a fellow Colonial Power) re-establish control there after the war, much to the displeasure of the locals. Things eventually developed into a full-scale Guerrilla War in the late 1940s, and culminated in the French Defeat at Dien Bien Phu, after which the French felt that their position in Indochina could no longer be maintained. Iin July 1954, the French formally ceded Indochina to Roycelandia, which was then known as "Roycelandian Indochina".

Roycelandia's attempts to retain control of the Colony were long, bloody, protracted, and ultimately unsuccessful. As the situation in Africa worsened, Roycelandian eventually withdrew from Vietnam, attempting to destroy large chunks of the country's infrastructure and/or lay waste to parts of the land as they left.

c. 1965: Decolonisation In Africa

By the mid-1960s, Colonialism was no longer seen as being politically acceptable, and the other European Powers began to wind down their African holdings. It wasn't long before Roycelandian East Africa was the only major European colony in Africa (besides Mozambique and Angola, which were thoroughly neglected by Portugal). Unlike the other European colonies, however, the Natives in Roycelandian East Africa were divided on the idea of the area being Decolonised. The Roycelandian Constitution, law, and society recognised all men and women as equals- regardless of skin colour, and so as many of the other African countries collapsed without the Europeans propping up the country, tensions in REA rose as both sides of the debate grew more heated and proactive in making their views known.

1975: Lusakan War of Independence

In 1975, the area now known as Lusaka became embroiled in a protracted Guerrilla war, with the Natives there determined to rid themselves of the Roycelandians and establish themselves as independent.
The war dragged on until 1982, by which time Roycelandia realised she couldn't fight a Colonial War in both Indochina AND Africa. The Roycelandian people were getting sick of the constant wars, and in the end Roycelandia gave up on both campaigns, pulling out of Vietnam and Lusaka (although the Lusakan war has never officially ended- Port Royal still regards Lusaka as Roycelandian territory, albeit under foreign control).

1989: Operation Bayonet (The Gabonaise Civil War)

The Gabonaise Civil War seemed like a strange war for Roycelandia to get involved in... after all, it was on the other side of the continent and really had nothing to do with Roycelandian East Africa. But the Lusakans were involved. And so was the African Commonwealth. And then United Elias got dragged in- something to do with an attempted use of an Atomic Bomb on United Elias- and it wasn't long before the Special Operations Command were in there training Gabonaise irregulars to fight the Lusakans... then the Imperial Foreign Legion were fighting with them... then Roycelandia somehow acquired control of the South-Western quarter of the country, and then UE withdrew in the mid-90s, ceding their quarter of the country to Roycelandia. The whole thing was an outstanding success for Roycelandia, with the Empire gaining the majority of Sub-Saharan Africa's oil reserves, a Colony on the Western Coast of Africa, and a much needed morale and PR boost back home. A popular joke runs thusly- "Q: Who won the Gabonaise Civil War? A: Roycelandia!"

2001: The Second Golden Age Of Imperialism Begins

(Pretty well covered by other posts here, in the sense of the rise of Imperialism again, the French Restoration, etc... I'll need to co-ordinate with others, notably NG, Quinn, and Gurg about how things have panned out since Roycelandia acquired Southern Algeria and Polynesia from France as part of the French efforts to recolonise Africa and the Pacifica...)

Royce, I was thoroughly delighted by your timeline. I have never laughed while reading a timeline before...kudos. I especially love the Early Modern European Type. ex: "Whyte men". As well, delightfully eloquent---"drinking the smoke thereof"! Sublime.

Well, as far as Im aware you got Southern Algeria in 1994, French Polynesia would be later, after Palawan, like 2004 or so. Drop the q's aqui if you have any.

All your base are belong to us!

*Pounds table in laughter*

That's right! All your base!

I particulary enjoyed teh references to "Handcannone"

Tsar Wingert the Great.

Glad you all like the timeline thus far! Of course, it does prove that I have rather too much spare time on my hands, and have read far too many history books... ;)

I more or less finished the West Africa time line. There are still some points open for contention, though, since I have the war approaching two weeks there, and that might not be agreeable to everybody. But it does not really matter, in the great scheme of things. One thing is certain; the war has not gone on for long in the historic sense, not long enough for any sweeping social or political changes to take effect.

It would appear that, until this point, Roycelandian contact with Europe had been limited, although the Roycelandians had established an incredibly lucrative trade network with the other Carribbean Islands, as they were "Reknowned Merchantes of Spiritous Liquors, Sugare, Timbre, and a plante they calle 'Tobacko', which they rolleth into tubes and then ignite, drinkinge ye smoke thereofe".

The Roiks invented tobacco? Was it Nicotiana tabacum, the variety that Europeans liked, because I thought that came from Bermuda.

This was a cleverly articulated bump by Fleur.

I wrote in some Anglo-Roik co-operation during the 1520s for my history (which is nowhere near done and possibly never will be)... sound all right to you? It was mostly Harold Wendselybury showing up and spending time in Roik ports, nothing major.

Excellent history from a laughing out loud standpoint (I refuse, now and forever, to type the phrase 'LOL' without a certain amount of irony), as well as from a... historical standpoint. Especially the historical quotes, which are deliciously absurd.

I'm actually surprised there hasn't been more Roycelandian-Australasian co-operation, to be honest... we should probably fix that somehow.

Retcon Ahoy! :P

Well, Australo-Roycelandian co-operation would only have happened since... what, 1900 when Australasia (and Australia RL) became a nation, but you know your nation's history better than I would, I imagine. Certainly, there would have been plenty of Anglo-Roycelandian co-operation during the various wars that Britain fought with Spain.

I'm also sort of writing in that Roycelandians aided the English in their invasion and capture of territory in Portuguese Brazil (1520s and 30s) through arms and supply sales, so there's that. And, ah, I dunno.

Damn, be glad you aren't an American. I've eaten so much bloody turkey in the last few days, I can't even look at the stuff.

Australia, in RL, became a Commonwealth on 1/1/1901...

But of course, I think it's more than reasonable that there had been Australo-Roycelandian co-operation even before then, in some form or another.

Ahem, yeah. Right. I read Australia's history before signing on as Australasia, of course I did!

I'm sure that there would have been, but major diplomacy would have been worked out with London rather than Raleigh. Well...technically speaking, they wouldn't have been working with Raleigh until... what, 1911 when they founded RL Canberra? I really ought to do my research, but I have Humanities papers to write about modernist lit.

"If I told him, would he like it? Would Napoleon, if I told him, would he like it? Would he, Napoleon, like it if I told him?"-- Gertrude Stein.

Sydney was Capital first, then Melbourne- Canberra was built because it was situated between the two, as a sort of compromise.

Of course, things may have been different in AMW, but that's how it went down in RL. ;-)

First Draft, so nitpick away!


1969: Thailand is taken over by Stalinist insurgents led by 'Mikada Suun'; Laos and Cambodia are soon united with Thailand as the Suunist People's Republic of Marimaia. What is not common knowledge is that Mikada is actually Toyama Mamoru, a disgraced Japanese ideologue who was booted out of the family for being one-hundred percent behind the Chrysanthemum Throne. The Ringist takeover in Japan is regarded as having shut the door on Mikada's potential return, so he founded his own state in Southeast Asia.

1974: Chiisu Suun is born, his mother dies in childbirth. Mikada is overjoyed to now have an heir to his state, while Amaterasu Omikami weeps with joy as her chosen one is born (that last bit might be propaganda).

1986: Chiisu meets Tian Yao at the Suunist Youth League, Tian wards off bullies who are jealous of Chiisu's status. Chiisu also befriends such luminaries as Kangtian Wei, Wanfa Kong, and Rongyi Bei.

1992: Chiisu appointed Assistant Vice-Premier, appoints Tian Yao as his bodyguard. Mikada continues to get unstable as he believes in his own personality cult. In a continuation of Mikada's 'tough love', he berates and then backhands Chiisu...in front of Tian. Tian snaps and beats the 69 year old tyrant to death; a massive cover-up results in an announcement that Mikada died from pneumonia. Chiisu takes short holiday with Tian before assuming his position as Premier, firing any remaining Mikada loyalists and appointing his friends from the Youth League to cabinet positions. Marimaia enters a 'golden age' as numerous reforms turn the backward Stalinist state into a functioning leftist dictatorship.

During this time, Chiisu and Tian became lovers and ultimately got married in a state ceremony; it is unknown if the marriage is still recognised due to the later collapse of the state.

1998: Suunism is replaced by NeoSuunism, which calls for expansionism and recognition of Marimaian greatness. Myanmar becomes the first target, with eventual Marimaian victory and the installation of Aung San Suu Kyi as leader of the new Burma. Chiisu is crowned 'Tiger King' in a lavish ceremony and attempts to turn Marimaia into a beacon for Buddhists everywhere. The nation is renamed as 'The NeoSunnist Prosperity Sphere of Marimaia'.

1999 (?): Peacekeeping efforts in Burma set back by FRB actions in Mergui, leading to a serious rift which ultimately led to Marimaian intervention in the Malacca War. The victory over the FRB results in a more peaceful Burma as well as establishment of a pro-Marimaian regime in the newly created Malaysia, led by Prince Jamil bin Hasan.

2000: Everything goes horribly wrong. Marimaia's first genuine attempt at elections leads to deep divides forming along ethnic lines; Laos and Cambodia attempt to declare independence. Chiisu and his most loyal supporters steal most of the national treasury and flee to Peru; Jamil bin Hasan follows suit by stealing from Malaysia's coffers and joining them. Marimaia splits into Thailand, Laos and Cambodia.

Chiisu and company are given asylum by President Vasco Garcia Ramirez; Chiisu buys the Peruvian government, and sets himself up with a number of businesses. After being approached by old criminal allies of his, Chiisu also becomes head of the Pacific Lotus, a syndicate which soon spreads throughout Peru and into neighbouring nations. An alliance with the Russian Mafiya is soon concluded.

2001: Vasco Garcia Ramirez 'catches pneumonia'. The March on Lima sees the newly-created Partido NeoSuunista gaining power under the leadership of Juan Delgado. Snap elections then reaffirm the party's position. Links are established with the Japanese expatriates in Peru, who recruit Chiisu into their fold. He finally learns of his Japanese heritage and adopts the name Toyama Chiisu; plans are started for a campaign against the Ringist Shogunate of Japan.

Tokyo is rocked by bomb blasts, causing the military to declare martial law. A small army of mercenaries and Japanese ultranationalists is landed at Narita International Airport, led by Chiisu. A civil war begins between the Ringists on one side and the Yamato Restorationists on the other.

2002: The Japanese Civil War ends with the victory of the Yamato Restoration; Toyama Chiisu is crowned as Emperor Shinseiki and democracy begins to return in earnest. The quickly-organised elections see victory for the Japan Renewal Party, led by the civil war cabinet of the Restorationists. China and Quinntonia both court the new Japanese regime, with the JRP eventually choosing to sign an alliance with Quinntonia. Dra-pol conducts a missile test over Japanese territory, sparking off tensions between the two.

2004: Elections see the JRP victorious once again, but the nationalist Aikoku Toko become the second-largest party in the Diet. The nationalists begin advocating a return to traditional Japanese values, including the Emperor's divine status.

2007: Snap elections in the wake of much controversy see the victory of the New Democracy Party, a union of nationalist and conservative parties which seek the 'true restoration of Japanese greatness'. Several former members of the JRP cabinet are given employment by the Imperial Household.

-----------------------------------

I've got the most recent elections as 2007 because they are extremely recent and I haven't finished the thread yet, plus the new government hasn't actually done anything yet, so I figure it should be okay.

Sounds fun, a lot like the Europe revival (which is a good thing) and I like imagining about how their life was during the period between going from Asia to Peru and then back to Asia.

*Thinks about writing story along those lines.*

BUMP for new membership interests.

WWJD
Amen.

BUMP for new membership interests.

WWJD
Amen.

Who wouldn't want to be part of this amazing venture into realism? Who would want to stay in the mainstream NS RPs of 'I attack u wth 5000 tact. nukes, LOL, u ded!!11!' while such a viable option such as our RP exists?

Step on up, and embark on your mind's adventure in a real nation simulator.

Appreciating the overview offered by all this. I'll take responsibility for moving what United Elias has written here, in some reasonably coherent form, then updating it for Mesopotamia.
(Ok, glorified tag.)

Quinntonian History-

Long a colony of various states, with Spanish, French and English interests battling for supremacy in the new world, the United States of Quinntonia (USQ) declared its independence on July 4, 1776 with the signing of the “Declaration of Independence.”

Tensions had long run high in the 13 Colonies due to misunderstandings between the British and the Colonials, and this was made all the worse with the mass exodus of Catholic and Protestants from Europe fleeing the anti-spiritualism of the enlightenment. This led to a massive upsurge in religious faith in the colonies, with three major movements emerging; Mainline Protestantism, Roman Catholicism and Anabaptist Enthusiasts. The Anabaptists were mostly to the south, and the Roman Catholics represented mostly French and Spanish descendents, with Lutherans and Anglicans making up the balance of the rest. Time and again, the representatives from England attempted to support and in some cases enforce conversion to the Church of England, as the Anglicans enjoyed powerful support, especially in the House of Lords.

Eventually, there were some demonstrations against the ruling class, which included things like the Boston Tea Party and Worship Service, where to protest the religious oppression and tax regime demonstrators dressed as Native Americans and threw a shipload of tea into the Boston Harbour while canvassing the neighborhood with copies of hymns.

In 1775, open military conflict occurred, with many Anglicans being branded as loyalists and these “Tories” often fleeing to Canada and England after they were accosted by the Colonial Revolutionaries. George Washington, a strong Anglican, led the Continental Army against the occupation of the British Empire, and presided over the Continental Parliament in 1776. The Quinntonian Revolutionary War took place from 1775-1783. In 1777 Parliament adopted the Holy Articles of Confederation and founded the Council of Bishops. In 1788 enough states had joined confederation and the Council of Bishops were satisfied enough to form a new government, which took office in 1788, under Prime Minister George Washington. It should be noted that major Roycelandian support was instrumental to victory, as the Roiks aimed to “Stick it to the tea-drinkers!”

From 1803 to 1848, the size of the new nation nearly tripled as settlers (many embracing the concept of Manifest Destiny as an inevitable consequence of American exceptionalism) pushed beyond national boundaries even before the Louisiana Purchase. The expansion was tempered somewhat by the stalemate in the War of 1812, but it was subsequently reinvigorated by victory in the Mexican-American War in 1848.

This series of conflicts left the Anglicans as an extremely small and fractured group, with the Lutherans absorbing the vast majority of Anglican parishes, and the Roman Catholics the rest, with the Anabaptists remaining dominant in the South.

Religious and state’s rights tensions grew over the years to lead to the Civil War. Issues like laws passed in many southern states requiring “believers baptism” and condemning Roman Catholics and what they viewed as Papist theologies, even among the Lutherans, along with the major issue of slavery being abolished by the northern states, but the southern states depending on it for their livelihood led to the secession of the Confederate States of Quinntonia in 1860. The victory in 1865 of the Union north under Rev. Abraham Lincoln, a Lutheran powerful speaker, settled these issues, and began a decline in the power of the Anabaptists.

After the Civil War, an unprecedented influx of immigrants, who helped to provide labor for American industry and create diverse communities in undeveloped areas—together with high tariff protections, national infrastructure building, and national banking regulations—hastened the country's rise to international power. The growing power of the United States enabled it to acquire new territories, including the annexation of Puerto Rico and the Philippines after victory in the Spanish-American War, which marked the debut of the United States as a major world power.

Note: The Spanish-American War did still occur, but was obviously not due to Cuba as that was controlled by Roycelandia. Rather, the war occurred due to overlapping spheres of influence and Spanish attempts to support certain Catholic insurgent groups in USQ.

At the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the United States remained neutral. In 1917, however, the United States joined the Allied Powers, helping to turn the tide against the Central Powers. For historical reasons, American sympathies were very much in favor of the British, Roycelandian and French, even though a sizable number of citizens, mostly Irish and German, were opposed to intervention. After the war, the Council of Bishops did not ratify the Treaty of Versailles because of a fear that it would pull the United States into European affairs. Instead, the country continued to pursue its policy of unilateralism that bordered at times on isolationism.

During most of the 1920s, the United States enjoyed a period of unbalanced prosperity as farm prices fell and industrial profits grew. A rise in debt and an inflated stock market culminated in a crash in 1929, triggering the Great Depression. After his election as President in 1932, Franklin Delano Roosevelt instituted his plan for a New Deal, which increased government intervention in the economy in response to the Great Depression.
The nation did not fully recover until 1941, when the United States was driven to join the Allies against the Axis Powers after a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor by Japan. World War II was the costliest war in economic terms in American history, but it helped to pull the economy out of depression because the required production of military materiel provided much-needed jobs, and women entered the workforce in large numbers for the first time. During this war, scientists working for the United States federal government succeeded in producing nuclear weapons, making the United States the world's first nuclear power. Toward the end of World War II, after the end of World War II in Europe, the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. The Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs were the second and third nuclear devices detonated and the only ones ever employed as weapons until the Bonstock attacks and the rogue use of a small nuclear weapon during the Russian Tsarist uprising under Vladimir Putin, then the recent Gelletian Soviet attack on French strategic bombers over Libya.

Japan surrendered soon after, on 2 September 1945, which ended World War II.

After World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union became superpowers in an era of ideological rivalry dubbed the Cold War. The United States officially promoted liberal democracy and capitalism, while the Soviet Union officially promoted communism and a centrally planned economy. This was probably the most extreme and major turning point in Quinntonian/Roycelandian affairs, as they participated in the Cold War against the Soviets together at every stage.

It is also at this time that NATO was founded, with Quinntonia, Roycelandia, Canada, and the United Kingdom signing the purely defensive agreement. NATO and Quinntonia often participated in proxy wars during this era, such as the Roycelandian venture in Vietnam, which Quinntonia did not directly participate in, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, which saw Quinntonia supporting insurgents, and most especially, Korea.

The Dra-pol series of conflicts began in the late 1970’s, with Quinntonia tracking a boatload of Southeast Asian refugees that were heading for Quinntonian friendly Republic of Korea. They were shipping past the hermit nation of Dra-pol when Quinntonia lost contact with them, later finding out that the Dra-pol had fired upon and sunk the ship, killing all hands. Quinntonia launched an immediate rescue operation/investigation, led by Rev. Gerry Westgaard. Unfortunately, this led to a conflict that is now referred to as “The Three Days War.” Refusal by the government in Dakhiem to cooperate with the search led to a small scale attack being performed on the capitol of the hermit nation, and led to their de facto by Kurosian I. The surrender was not accepted by the Quinntonian group, and instead negotiations were opened that led to Quinntonian promises to help them modernize their nation, which existed in a pre-WW2 state. Quinntonians took this to heart, as did their government, which at that time was led by a young and charismatic Jesse Obed. The Council of Bishops ordered the treasuries of the Church be opened and billions upon billions in Quinntonian aid flowed into the nation. A portion of the nation around Hamhung was leased to Quinntonia, allowing them to build at their expense an international airport and international harbor. This also included building a giant industrial complex that would all be turned over to the Dra-poel when the Quinntonians were done building them. Millions of Dra-poel fled their oppressive regime to live in the huge modern mega-city and work in the factories, and many, though not a majority, converted to Christianity. The area was referred to as Quinntonian Dra-pol, and swelled to over 6 million in population. It also served strategically as a major Quinntonian military base as the Ringists in Japan was not conducive to a large Quinntonian presence.

Due to some internal machinations, a Quinntonian patrol was lured into firing at some Dra-poel smugglers, which was then used as a thin pretext by the current Dra-poel leader, Kurosian II, to attack the Quinntonians in his nation. This meant that over 100,000 Quinntonian teachers, engineers, missionaries, nurses, doctors, etc. were massacred in bloody fashion by the brutal dictator in less than a month, with public torturing and crucifixions becoming commonplace. This was followed by an all-out military attack on Hamhung, which was defended by a combination of Quinntonian military personal and ex-pat Dra-poel that refused to accept domination by the old regime. The battle led to Quinntonia becoming embroiled, with most of its allies and even Hindustan, in a massive war in North Korea that ended in a stalemate, with some 2 million dieing on the Dra-pol side and nearly 1 million on the Quinntonian and allied side, with Quinntonia taking more than 75% of the losses, including civilian losses.

It was during this time that an assassination attempt on Jesse Obed’s life left him confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life/career.

This led to the construction of the Westgaard Wall around Hamhung, making it one of the most militarized places in the world and the establishment of many redundant tactics designed to stop the Dra-poel military machine in its tracks. It is at this time that Beth Gellert really emerged as an enemy of Quinntonia, as it supplied Dra-pol with massive help without which it could not have stood against the Quinntonian actions.

There were later conflicts including the Dra-poel invasion and occupation of Seoul. In these, Quinntonia tried to stay out of conflict, as they were concerned that Hamhung would fall under sustained attack in less than 6 weeks. Now, with all of the redundant strategies, it is not certain that Hamhung would fall at all, and if so, it would take a sustained attack of the magnitude that Quinntonian Dra-pol was attacked with before or more for at least 4 months.

After this, Quinntonia founded WEC, the World Economic Council as a way to support capitalism and develop underdeveloped nations, and retains the Chairman position to this day.

Quinntonia continually focused throughout this affair on force projection, with the priority going to the Air Force, and a close second going to the Navy. Of course this led to massive expansions of its many bases around the world, and it has retained a high level of militarization since.

Quinntonia deployed peacekeepers to Russia during the civil war that threatened the Putin regime, to which it was quite friendly, and has also intervened several times in foreign affairs, which included the cooperation with many world powers against Bonstock.

It is at that time that the Tripartite Pact was signed between Japan, China and Quinntonia, which was followed some time later with SEATO, between Roycelandia, Quinntonia, Australasia, and Japan.

Well, this brings up to present day, pretty much. Any questions, comments, concerns?

WWJD
Amen.

Just... Wow... I can hardly put any words to paper now without thinking about this, its like a history lesson. Not like a fake history lesson, but one that was so well written and real that I had to ask myself if America was the fake country and Quinntonnia the the real.

A bump, in a way, and a query or two on timing issues, while several things are paused as fleets clash in the Atlantic.

A number of RPs have been evolving simultaneously, and in figuring out Spyr's positions and actions I've been struggling to figure out just what is where, and (as such is tied to military and/or economic capacity) how active the Strainists might be in each particular event.

May-June saw major fighting in Africa and the Atlantic, including the clash between League and Aussie-Wally navies. The French fleet is, I think, repaired and back to sea for the latest clash against the Indians, which would put it somewhere in mid July?

Fighting continues in Africa, but there are a lot of movements both large and small going on there, so I'm having trouble comparing events there to matters in the Atlantic. Are they roughly concurrent, or has one progressed further than the other?

The Suez... RP started after the League war in Africa and first battle in the Atlantic. Was the collapse of UE a midsummer occurence, putting tensions there concurrent with the Franco-Indian naval clash, or is it a later development that just happens to be RPed before its 'past' has played out?

Australasian involvement in Singapore... Strainist assault on Indonesia starts in June, and in a few posts ought be caught up with the Atlantic battle. Akabania's introductory RP dates corporate takeover at October (?), Australasia enters after Akabanian bankrupcy. Would that put it happening in November?

I do love concurrent RP... keeps everyone's minds on the problem of infinite problems, limited resources... but its hard keeping it all straight in my head.

Yeah, I'm not any more sure, myself, I'm afraid.

I think generally it is considered that the Indian invasion of Abassamara has been building in the weeks and months prior to the Indo-League clash off West Africa, and I qualify that by noting that the rise of Aiyana in Abassamara has been played-out largely in retrospect, starting some years ago. During his abuses the Indians have become interested and started planning for operations, partly because of the Union presence in Eritrea.

I now consider that the fleet action and the Abassamari conflict are happening roughly concurrently, though the latter may be progressing more rapidly so I'm not sure for how long that will remain true.

My memory concerning Xiaguo and Dra-pol is a little hazy : Did he ever get involved in the wars against Quintonnia?

Xiaguo, briefly almost friendly to Da'Khiem, actually invaded the CPRD in the end. Chinese forces crossed the Yalu aiming for Pyongyang, mistakenly taking it for the national capital. Unfortunately Xiaguo also took the rapid collapse of the People's Army's front for a genuine victory on their part and romped merrily into an army-sized trap, receiving a serious drubbing before abandoning the whole idea of pushing Dra-pol around and pretty soon collapsing as a national entity.

It's a funny old place, Korea. Nobody has been completely consistent in either loving or loathing the Drapoel, with the possible exeption of Lyong. Though I think that love may be an overly strong term for their relationship.

Oh, we do love them, we do. Like a little brother. A little brother whose been convicted of manslaughter, but hes-a-good-fellow-at-heart-it-was-self-defence-and-all-just-a-misunderstanding-anyway-everyone-deserves-a-second-chance.

Though, outside the former exiles, I doubt the average Drapoel sees Lyong as anything more than that place which drops off food crates every so often.

[OOC Note: A bit late in coming, I’m afraid, and perhaps it may be disjointed or rough here and there… compiled from several different collections of notes and ponderings, some of which predate AMW and others which needed much revision .
Fitting Lyong into RL history works rather well, if one assumes that it replaces the northernmost Korean kingdoms (Goguryeo and Balhae), which stretched across Primorye and portions of Manchuria. This seemed fitting, as their RL ‘footprints’ correlate to what seems likely to have emerged from Lyong, and because Dra-pol seems likely to have been more unified behind its curtain of mist than was Korea in RL.
Attempts were also made to fit Lyong into existing history to avoid the need for major rewriting of Russian history in absence of Port Arthur/Lushun and the Maritime Province, and international economic history in absence of Japan as a leader in electronic developments and growth from the 1970s through 90s, as well as an alternative source for medical aid to leftist efforts in the absence of Castro’s regime in Havana. Earlier Lyong Peninsular roleplays have also been preserved in some form, though changed somewhat, the most notable being in relation to Tord. If there is question around their origins in Brittany, I attempted to select a European origin for them which fit with Gallic roots envisioned pre-AMW but which would have no impact on later history there, or on modern events and attitudes.
Some areas may have too much detail, others may be lacking… will attempt to revise and/or elaborate in spots where the text is insufficient as time and opportunity permit, likely in the off-site forum for additional detail].

The Lyong peninsula first saw human habitation as nomadic hunter-gatherers moved southward down its length from roots in present-day Mongolia. This nomadic population eventually settled, establishing tribal territories in the peninsula's most fertile river valleys. They shared similar languages, loosely part of the Altaic family, as well as a common set of animist beliefs, though at this early time there seems to have been little concept of political unity. In fact, as populations and prosperity grew, these tribes began to fight amongst themselves for control of territory and locations of religious significance. These conflicts saw the absorption of losing tribes by the victors, with concentration of power eventually marking the beginning of what the Lyongese term the 'Five Cities Era' in the fifth century BCE.

The Five Cities Era (gonken-jitai) bore many similarities to the time before, with rivalries and conflicts between remaining states still occuring frequently. However, no one state had a clear advantage in the struggle, forcing each to seek out connections and alliances with its fellows in order to achieve successes (or ensure its survival against allied rivals). Webs of marriages and agreements became increasingly complex, as did links of trade and culture between the five states, until the balance was tipped in favour of one state in the second century BCE. Over a period of twenty years, the northern state of Su (present-day Sithin) managed to overcome its rivals and emerge as central authority over a unified Lyong (which included not only the peninsula itself, but also regions of present-day Manchuria and Siberia).

The unification of Lyong markes the beginning of the August Era (spyrti-jitai) of Lyongese history, officially commencing with the coronation of the first August Emperor (Lyong-ti) in 201 BCE. The first decades of August rule saw extensive efforts to complete unification of the peninsula, including religious reforms and developments which would eventually forge a theocratic bureaucracy that would last for a millenia, and which most Lyongese still consider to be a 'golden age' for their culture.

The August Empire's power and prosperity made it a major force in East Asia, standing beside states emerging in what would one day become China and Korea.
While some connections existed between the Empire and the Han Dynasty, seeing the spread of Buddhism and Chinese ideograms into Lyong, disagreements saw a brief conflict break out in 313, when August troops overran the Chinese commandery of Lelang (in northern Korea) before a peace agreement was reached. Hostilities intensified again under the Sui Dynasty as it attempted to assert Chinese authority over the Lyong and Korean peninsulas. The August court in Sithin refused to accept tributary status, considering itself an equal to the Sui. Border skirmishes in Manchuria devolved into open warfare in 598, when the first of several Sui campaigns were launched into Manchuria. Here, and again in 612, 613, and 614, numerically superior Chinese forces would be thwarted by logistical troubles and the determination of August troops. The wars resulted in domestic troubles for China, ending them when the Sui Dynasty fell in 618.

The fall of the Sui did not end the Empire's conflicts, however, as it remained a rival to its neighbours. In 668, forces of the newly-unified Drapoel kingdom in Korea moved to engage the Lyongese, allied with the new T'ang Dynasty of China. These efforts proved far more successful than those of the Sui, and within two years the Lyongese had been pushed over the Yalu river in the north and Tumen river in the east. The Drapoel then turned to expel T'ang attempts to colonize northern Korea, gaining victories which are thought to have deterred the August court from efforts to re-assert itself in the region.

Following these tumultuous years of conflict, the Empire began to concentrate more on internal matters than expansion or political rivalry. By 680, the throne in Sithin had dispatched a tributary embassy to the T’ang, a custom which would be continued despite Dynastic changes in northern China. The Empire also fought several border wars with the Khitan empire over control of territories in Manchuria, allied with the closely related Jurchen, whose conquests in China (around 1127) reversed the direction of tributary relations between the two states and further reduced Lyongese involvement in Manchuria proper.

Despite their successes, the Jurchen were weakened by several rebellions and a succession of inept rulers, and despite attempts by allied Lyongese-Jurchen armies to resist their kingdom fell to the Mongols in 1234. The court in Sithin wasted no time in confirming its vassalage to the new Yuan Dynasty established by the Mongols, providing troops and ships for various endeavours including the two failed invasions of Japan (in 1274 and 1281) and patrols against bandits in Manchuria.

In 1290, August Emperor Shai-ti died without having left a clear line of succession. Within five years, various regional officials had begun a struggle to claim the throne, marking the beginning of the Warlord Era (taiken-jitai). Though most foreign historians cite several notable events between 1290 and the end of the Era in 1950 which would seem to indicate separate historical periods, Lyongese histories view the Era as united in its status as a ‘dark age’ following the fall of the August Empire, which would one day end when the descendants of Lyong-ti unified the land once more (naturally, the Strainist viewpoint propagated in the present day holds their own revolution as fulfilling this prophecy).

The first truly notable occurrence of the Warlord Era was the arrival of a European flotilla in 1539… an event whose roots lay some distance away.

Despite being entangled in the political and military struggles between the French and English kingdoms, the Duchy of Brittany (in present-day France) under rulership of the House of Tord had attempted to pursue an independent course. Following the Hundred-Years War, which secured French power on the continent, the Duchy came under increasing pressure to submit to vassalage. When these efforts were repeatedly rebuffed, and Brittany began to look towards England for support, the French crown managed to have the House of Tord declared guilty of Pelagian heresy by the Papacy. This was quickly followed by an invasion, which drove the Tordian monarch and many of his priests and retainers to flee Brittany by sea. In 1532 the Duchy was incorporated into the Kingdom of France.

The Tordian flotilla, meanwhile, proceeded with increasing difficulties on a journey that would eventually lead it to make landfall on the western coast of the Lyong peninsula, where their tactics and technologies proved a potent ally to local warlords, whom they eventually came to dominate (though despite several campaigns Tordian territory remained confined to the southwestern plains of Lyong). Imbued with substantial distrust of other Western elements, particularly those seen as related to the Catholic Church, the Kingdom of Tord remained in isolation from contact with the outside world for quite some time.

While Lyong’s first direct encounter with Europeans came via the Tordian landings, they also faced new arrivals from the north: the Russians. Conflicts between Lyongese warlords and Russian Cossacks moving into Siberia became increasingly common, as did direct political pressure, culminating in the Convention of Peking (1860) which saw the Qing Dynasty of China formally dissolve all claims and tributary relations with Lyong’s now-defunct August Empire, opening the way for Russian expansion in the region as they sought out a Pacific port that would remain ice-free during the winter months. In 1862, in exchange for weapons with which to combat his rivals, the warlord in control of northwestern Lyong leased the city of Gochu to the Russian Tsar for a period of one hundred years. Russian engineers and soldiers were quick to arrive in the port city, renaming it Vladivostok and transforming it to serve as a base for the Tsar’s Pacific navy, at least until Russia’s Pacific squadrons were decimated in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-05), which saw the Japanese-sponsored warlord of Sithin (rival to that of Gochu) join with his backers in pushing the Russians out of Vladivostok and their Lyongese holdings. The treaty at war’s end returned the city to Russian control, though post-war rebellions saw the city briefly ruled by socialists and rebel military units in 1906, until these were put down by a Cossak division from Manchuria and forces in service to the Gochu warlord.
Other warlords also sought foreign sponsors, though none received aid as substantial as that of Tokyo to Sithin, nor granted rights as significant as the lease of Gochu’s port to Russia.

The Revolution which swept across Russia in 1917 had a profound effect on Lyong, and Gochu in particular, in that it saw an influx of ‘white’ Russians and foreign (primarily Czechs and Japanese) troops who sought to preserve a last foothold of Russian control against the Red Army. Though technically unified through the alliance of their patrons, the warlords of Sithin and Gochu did not join the battle against the ‘Reds’, preferring to skirmish with each other for control of border territories. In 1920, most foreign forces departed Vladivostok, though the Japanese remained until 1922, when they were forced to withdraw due to diplomatic pressure from the USQ.

Initially, under Lenin, the Russian Communists did not concern themselves overmuch with their Lyongese leasehold, leaving the warlord of Gochu without a foreign sponsor as he tried to battle an increasingly belligerent rival from Sithin, who enjoyed full backing from Tokyo. When Stalin rose to prominence, recognizing the continued utility of the Vladivostok port, he chose to enter into a new lease agreement for control of the city, as well as several other bases and the last leg of the Trans-Siberian Railway, giving the USSR significant authority over much of northern Lyong, in perpetuity.

Japan’s rise as an imperial power had a profound influence on the Lyong Peninsula, seeing Japanese-sponsored warlords becoming increasingly dominant as Tokyo sought business opportunities and resources for its growing industrial economy. By 1930, the Kanzaki zaibatsu dominated the peninsula’s commercial landscape, though production remained tied to raw materials rather than manufacturing. Lyongese warlords also provided an outlet for retired military equipment when Japan’s Imperial Army underwent attempts to modernize its holdings.

Historians often wonder at Lyong’s fate next to that of the Korean peninsula, which endured brutal occupation by Japan since 1910. It is generally agreed that Lyong’s pliability reduced the urgency of imperial ventures there until, facing increasing resistance in China, Tokyo lost the option of outright annexation. Had the Imperial Army won out over the navy in its push for a northward thrust, the war would doubtless have seen heavy fighting in the northern peninsula, around Vladivostok and the Trans-Siberian rail line, which may have led to an annexation attempt by either major power.

Regardless, Lyong was on the sidelines as the Pacific War raged on, with Japanese-backed warlords assuming a dominant position and putting an end to the system of foreign concessions. Several of the peninsula’s aristocratic families (politically impotent but still holding some wealth) sent their children further abroad during this time, forgoing a decades-old practice of education in Tokyo for more secure universities in North America.

The fall of Japan changed the face of Lyong as much as its rise. Many warlords worried that Russian troops would sweep down to conquer the peninsula, but the USSR was compelled (perhaps by the atomic nature of USQ bombings in Japan) to hold its advances to within the limits agreed to at Yalta. Still, most of Lyong’s warlords were weakened at war’s end, either through pummeling by rivals during the war or, for those sponsored by Japan, loss of their backers in Tokyo in its aftermath. The economy suffered too, having had no source for industrial goods since midway through the war and now lacking its greatest market for raw materials. Many Japanese residents in Lyong, including zaibatsu and military officers, chose to incorporate themselves into local power structures rather than return to an occupied (and then Ringist) homeland.

In the late 1940s, Lyong experienced several years of poor harvests, which coupled with warlord conscription of peasants produced widespread food shortages. Unrest spread quickly through the rural population and the lower ranks of the warlord armies, eventually boiling over in1949, with what would come to be called the Great Strainist Revolution. On the 8th of October, 1950, the founding of the Lyongese People’s Republic was declared in Sithin, encompassing most of the peninsula (with the exception of Russian-leased regions in the north and Tord in the west).

Following the Revolution, the Strainist government began attempts to reform the nation. Land owned by landholding gentry was redistributed to the peasants, former warlord leaders and other feudal-capitalists underwent brutal trials and purges at the hands of a vengeful people. To curtail this destabilizing influence, the Strainists quickly established compulsory education and a conscripted civil defense force (police), as well as widespread reforms in areas such as agricultural practices and linguistics. Within a few years, food production surpassed consumption, though industrial capacity remained limited. Border clashes with Tord were solved by a peace treaty and official border demarcation in 1952.

Initially the Lyongese stood firmly within the ‘Soviet Bloc’, but they followed Beijing during the Sino-Soviet split, and their stance became far more pragmatic following conflicts in northern Lyong between Strainist forces and members of the Communist Party of Lyong, a result of power struggles within the government of Spyr between Western-educated Strainist leaders (most from former Lyongese aristocratic families) and Moscow-educated Communists (usually ethnic Cossacks or Ukrainians from settlements near the Russian leaseholds). When an effort was made by the Strainist leaders to promote former members of the Kanzaki zaibatsu to oversee industrial development, the CPL attempted to stage a coup (1965). Lacking popular support, the Communists turned to Moscow, but were rebuffed by a regime worried that the Strainists (already backed by China) might ask for Western assistance and thus threaten their continued access to the Pacific Ocean. An agreement was reached which saw CPL members turned over to the Strainists and the PRS affirmed as legitimate authority over Lyong, in exchange for public ratification of the USSR’s Vladivostok lease and the right to defend it against foreign aggression. Still, relations between Moscow and Sithin remained only lukewarm as the latter sought Western markets for its growing exports.

1955-60 saw implementation of a ‘National Industrialization Plan’, with the goal of producing a modern industrial economy, starting with the creation of low-level exports to accumulate capital. Food exports at first provided Spyr with capital needed to acquire equipment, then focus switched to textiles. This was followed by a ‘National Prosperity Plan’ (1960-65), which saw such exports joined by steel production, along with shipbuilding and other heavy industries. Innovations in quality control allowed competition with less reliable foreign manufacturers with established systems for local repair and servicing, and Party-organised collusion amongst Lyongese manufacturers provided additional advantages. This period is criticized by some, however, for the disregard shown for human life during the modernization effort. Insufficient safety measures have left a legacy of injuries amongst workers during this era, and (though rarely mentioned in Strainist writings) injections of caffeine were frequently used in textile factories to increase the number of hours that could be worked by each shift.

In 1960, Sithin acquired its first nuclear reactor, a CANDU research unit from Hudecia. Technological cooperation with China concluded with the first Strainist nuclear test in 1965. However, though a technical success, an underestimation of yield led to several deaths and resulted in an official termination of efforts towards production of nuclear weapons. Reactor research continued, bearing fruit during the 1970s as the expense of imported petroleum continued to increase. While the Strainists consider themselves proponents of conservationist and emissions-reduction plans as promulgated in many meetings of the modern Progressive Bloc, some environmental organizations criticize them for seeking to save pennies rather than save the planet.

The 1960s and 70s brought about a boom in population for Lyong, and an increase in urbanization as young people left the countryside in search of industrial jobs and excitement. The Party’s medical branch proved unable to cope with its duties, and in 1966 the Revolutionary Army took control of public health care, incorporating its militia units and propaganda apparatus. This led to the dispatch of Strainist medical teams to join the Communist efforts in Vietnam (1968) and other medical aid efforts in foreign countries, as well as efforts to produce pharmaceuticals more cheaply on the domestic front and to incorporation of traditional treatments into medical procedures.

Production of electronics increased exponentially through the 70s, and Lyong led the world in exports of semiconductors. However, while exports of textiles and heavy industry remained successful, several setbacks occurred as well. The failure of three-wheeled cars in Western markets, when they had been predicted as the next great trend by Lyongese officials, reduced automotive industry in Lyong to production of public transit vehicles and cheaper scooters and auto-rickshaws while German and North American manufacturers came to dominate the world market. Agriculture too was suffering as the rural population decreased, requiring the formation of a ‘Youth Rural Labour Initiative’ and imports of foodstuffs to satisfy domestic demand.

Though the Party maintained a policy of re-investing profits in new infrastructure and production methods, prosperity was leaking down to even the lowest levels of the population, and by the mid-1980s, the Party had shifted its focus. While export was still deemed important, the domestic consumer economy took up position beside it in Strainist planning. Incomes shot upwards while consumer goods and ‘pop’ media appeared in greater quantities than ever before. Artificial inefficiencies in production were produced to maintain higher-than-natural levels employment within the domestic sphere, leaving almost everyone with a few loose sen in their purses. This period was the height of Strainist economic success.

Such growth and prosperity were not to last forever. In 1992, economic growth slowed, and while few would see the ‘recession’ of the 1990s as a severe one, it was certainly a disappointment to many. Export profits were reduced as foreign antitrust laws caught up with Strainist practices, and heavy industries (shipbuilding in particular) proved less attractive than younger competitors in United Elias and Hindustan. Expansion into Tord saw the Party’s funds invested modernizations there rather than re-investment elsewhere.

Meanwhile, the dissolution of the Soviet Union had far-reaching consequences in Lyong. The Strainist government, hoping to negotiate payments and aid with cleanup of the USSR’s nuclear legacy around Vladivostok, opened negotiations with the new Russian Federation in 1991 by asserting that lease arrangements with the Soviet Union did not apply to its successors. To the surprise of the Lyongese, Russia agreed, and confirmed the fact through provisions of the Alma Ata Protocol. Russian staff and mobile equipment withdrew from Vladivostok and other Lyongese bases, replaced by Strainist units and personnel.

The Strainist Revolutionary Army began widespread spending on a major modernization effort during this period, in response to the new international environment. The fall of the USSR, coupled with hostilities with the French during the Tordian Revolution and with the Federal Republic of Bonstock as that power sought to dominate the Pacific theatre. The Malacca War and the emergence of a Strainist People’s Republic in Sujava after the fall of the FRB secured the SRA’s authority in domestic politics, while the Party bureaucracy lost much of the power accumulated during the economic boom of the 70s and 80s. The Sujavan economy became a source of raw materials and markets for processed goods as it underwent post-Bonstock growth during the new milllenium, but the more radical nature of Sujavan politics carried the Party with it on a more activist attitude towards foreign affairs, leading to a boycott on trade with the Holy League after Tsarist absorption of the Baltic republics and then Russia itself and finally culminating in an invasion of the Islamic Republic of Indonesia as the Sujavans led the Party in an effort to spread its view of ‘Islamic socialism’ across the Muslim world.

(OCC: An excellent account, Spyr. I'll try to have my Indian history done sooner or later.)