Can see the Norweigans losing this war but Kongsvinger being a combination Thermopylae/Alamo to rally the nation around in time for their next attempt at independence - which hopefully for their sake will be far less haphazard.
Cinco de Mayo
- Thread starter KingSweden24
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More or less deducing my thinking. Kongsvinger already has a symbolic/mythic importance in the Norwegian national consciousness thanks to similar events there in 1814 and this will only add to that
another war of independence would be some ways off though wouldn’t it? Russia is open to weakening Sweden-Norway but won’t openly back Norway for fear of upsetting Germany. Britain supports Norway but at the same time fears destabilizing the region and allowing someone else to fill the power vacuum. Maybe another bid for Norwegian independence could come during the CAW? The German-Italian alliance would be distracted, Sweden can’t count on their friendship. Norway could exploit said window in order to defeat Sweden with or without foreign backing.
Correct. Norway will have to bide her time properly, too many people are either invested in the status quo or not invested enough in Norway to upset the status quo.
(And we'll have the denouement soon. My goal is to have Part VI all wrapped up by tomorrow afternoon - after that I head on vacation and then can properly plan out what comes next!)
Hispania, Hispania!
"...the death of Leopold had not occurred in a vacuum, for intrigues were afoot across Spain as more violence and chaotic politics threatened as the October polls beckoned. Mere hours before he expired, a group of military officers surrounding Linares had suggested orchestrating a coup d'etat against the Moret government, to be known as the Leopoldo Pronunciamento, but were unable to reach the Prince of Asturias in time and the death of the King headed them off. After his funeral, another plot emerged, this time to dismiss the government and install national figure Weyler at the head of a technocratic Cabinet that would curtail civil rights and impose censorship on the anarchist and republican publications and arrest their leadership. Leopold would have dismissed any officer or politician who came to him with such a scheme, but Charles Joseph was not his father. A conservative who had spent much of his early adulthood not in the Spain he would eventually rule but in the Germany of his youth, he admired the Prussian system of government and was of a mind that it should be repeated south of the Pyrenees; he had been of the mind that his father should have refused Moret's gambit the summer before and installed a Prime Minister of his choice if Canalejas refused to continue out of honor. A cabinet of grandees, aristocrats and military officers thus appealed enormously to Charles Joseph, especially as the prestige of the House of Hohenzollern now looked in question after his beloved father's death. This plan, too, went nowhere, albeit not because of the King's commitment to democracy; Charles Joseph communicated to Linares that the idea was "worth considering" but noted that the elections were but three months away and his instinct was to wait to see how they developed before determining if the Cortes would sustain a "suitable" Prime Minister, with the implication plain that a monarchist government would allow him to avoid a constitutional crisis early in his reign.
It was unclear if that result would come, though. The Moret-Canalejas split was so bad that when the Cortes was dissolved ahead of elections, the ousted Prime Minister outmaneuvered Moret back into control of the National Liberals ahead of the campaign, and Moret responded by announcing he and his primistas would form their own party, named the Progressives in honor of Prim's original bloc from the pre-Revolution era. What Moret found though was that there was much more competition on the left than in the center, and the public was susceptible to accusations that it was he who had caved to the Japanese rather than held out for a better deal. This did not necessarily redound to the benefit of Salmeron, who himself found that his Radical Party was splitting in two as well, with a more left-wing alternative forming under the leadership of young demagogue Alejandro Lerroux, of a different generation than much of the political class that had come of age politically in the chaotic 1870s. Lerroux was close to the libertarian syndicalist educator [1] Francisco Ferrer, who shared his arch-republican and anarchist views and saw Salmeron not just as a sellout but also strongly opposed his support of Catalan nationalism, when both men viewed the issue most critical to Catalonia as being anarchism and industrial-scale working class agitation. This made the socialist PSOE, which had its presence primarily in central Spain and the Basque country, seem practically centrist in comparison and an afterthought politically. This circular firing squad on the left [2] ate into the potential vote base a unified radical or anti-establishment party could have enjoyed in possibly the best opportunity to conquer caciquismo and generally reform what had become a lethargic, rotten system.
As it were, it was the Conservatives, of all the parties, that emerged as the alternative to the system and promised a democratic impulse of the right to sweep away the corrupt and inept serranista political settlement with a popular conservative alternative that would serve as a new big tent and contain within its mainstream moderate liberal-conservatism such as that of Canovas, a social Catholic strand, radical populist rightism and whatever else may fall under that umbrella. This accommodationist turn on the right was led by Antonio Maura, a much more innovative leader for Spanish conservatism than had come before, and his more modern take on politics as compared to more old-fashioned Conservatives such as Eduardo Dato, the preferred heir to Canovas' political tradition. The tactic worked - disgruntled Spaniards were seduced by his portrayal of the caciques as part of a broken establishment void of new ideas, and the Conservatives emerged with the most seats out of all the parties. Canalejas, for his part, was partially rewarded for pushing out Moret; his National Liberals retained much more of the party's traditional base than the flighty bourgeoise progressives Moret elected to instead chase.
Linares and the conspirators, seeing no party even close to a majority and stunned by the revolutionary rhetoric of men like Lerroux finding purchase, once again approached the King, who had invited Maura to see if he could form a government. Charles Joseph this time agreed to appoint a technocratic Cabinet if no government could be duly formed, provided that Weyler agreed to be Prime Minister as the only figure sufficiently unifying to all but the Lerrouxites and other revolutionaries. Weyler, however, refused, and went further by privately informing Canalejas of what was being mulled. Horrified, Canalejas approached Maura and agreed to give the Conservatives confidence, though no formal coalition; thus, with barely a quarter of the seats in the Cortes, Antonio Maura became the first Conservative Prime Minister of Spain under the 1869 Constitution.
There was very much a feeling that with Leopold, an entire era of Spanish politics had ended, and a strange new one had begun..."
- Hispania, Hispania
[1] This may by our binary 21st century standards seem like utter word salad but this is a pretty accurate summation of Ferrer's views
[2] Plus ca change...
It was unclear if that result would come, though. The Moret-Canalejas split was so bad that when the Cortes was dissolved ahead of elections, the ousted Prime Minister outmaneuvered Moret back into control of the National Liberals ahead of the campaign, and Moret responded by announcing he and his primistas would form their own party, named the Progressives in honor of Prim's original bloc from the pre-Revolution era. What Moret found though was that there was much more competition on the left than in the center, and the public was susceptible to accusations that it was he who had caved to the Japanese rather than held out for a better deal. This did not necessarily redound to the benefit of Salmeron, who himself found that his Radical Party was splitting in two as well, with a more left-wing alternative forming under the leadership of young demagogue Alejandro Lerroux, of a different generation than much of the political class that had come of age politically in the chaotic 1870s. Lerroux was close to the libertarian syndicalist educator [1] Francisco Ferrer, who shared his arch-republican and anarchist views and saw Salmeron not just as a sellout but also strongly opposed his support of Catalan nationalism, when both men viewed the issue most critical to Catalonia as being anarchism and industrial-scale working class agitation. This made the socialist PSOE, which had its presence primarily in central Spain and the Basque country, seem practically centrist in comparison and an afterthought politically. This circular firing squad on the left [2] ate into the potential vote base a unified radical or anti-establishment party could have enjoyed in possibly the best opportunity to conquer caciquismo and generally reform what had become a lethargic, rotten system.
As it were, it was the Conservatives, of all the parties, that emerged as the alternative to the system and promised a democratic impulse of the right to sweep away the corrupt and inept serranista political settlement with a popular conservative alternative that would serve as a new big tent and contain within its mainstream moderate liberal-conservatism such as that of Canovas, a social Catholic strand, radical populist rightism and whatever else may fall under that umbrella. This accommodationist turn on the right was led by Antonio Maura, a much more innovative leader for Spanish conservatism than had come before, and his more modern take on politics as compared to more old-fashioned Conservatives such as Eduardo Dato, the preferred heir to Canovas' political tradition. The tactic worked - disgruntled Spaniards were seduced by his portrayal of the caciques as part of a broken establishment void of new ideas, and the Conservatives emerged with the most seats out of all the parties. Canalejas, for his part, was partially rewarded for pushing out Moret; his National Liberals retained much more of the party's traditional base than the flighty bourgeoise progressives Moret elected to instead chase.
Linares and the conspirators, seeing no party even close to a majority and stunned by the revolutionary rhetoric of men like Lerroux finding purchase, once again approached the King, who had invited Maura to see if he could form a government. Charles Joseph this time agreed to appoint a technocratic Cabinet if no government could be duly formed, provided that Weyler agreed to be Prime Minister as the only figure sufficiently unifying to all but the Lerrouxites and other revolutionaries. Weyler, however, refused, and went further by privately informing Canalejas of what was being mulled. Horrified, Canalejas approached Maura and agreed to give the Conservatives confidence, though no formal coalition; thus, with barely a quarter of the seats in the Cortes, Antonio Maura became the first Conservative Prime Minister of Spain under the 1869 Constitution.
There was very much a feeling that with Leopold, an entire era of Spanish politics had ended, and a strange new one had begun..."
- Hispania, Hispania
[1] This may by our binary 21st century standards seem like utter word salad but this is a pretty accurate summation of Ferrer's views
[2] Plus ca change...
Spanish general election, 1905
Spanish general election, 1905
All 401 seats in the Cortes; 201 seats needed for a majority
Conservative (Maura): 117 (+43)
Radical (Salmeron): 86 (-17)
National Liberal (Canalejas): 82 (-125)
Progressive (Moret): 48 (+48)
Republican Reform (Lerroux): 39 (+39)
Integrist (Nocedal): 10 (+3)
Regionalist (Puig): 9 (+3)
PSOE (Iglesias): 4 (+4)
Cuban Nationalist (Palma): 4 (+4)
Independents (N/A): 2 (-2)
Huh, I figured that the radicals would be the biggest beneficiary of Liberal misfortune. But I suppose that reaction would also benefit given that Spain in this period also tends to lean conservative. Is there much daylight between the super corrupt Lerroux and Salmeron and between Canalejas and Moret? Or is it just a clash of personalities with separate groups of followers? Bc it’s looking like either the turno system breaking up or like the profusion of parties under the second republic
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Looks like the conservatives can either form a coalition with the radicals, or with the Progressive and Republican Reform. Wonder what they will pick.
They are, to an extent, but decide to eat each other's vote share up with the Lerroux/Salmeron split over Catalonia (that's their big clash, plus Lerroux being allied with Ferrer). Moret and Canalejas are a personality clash as both are relatively moderate, Moret more a Primista and Canalejas more a Serranista, but the former's knifing of the latter did not go over well and Moret has more followers to lose to the real item (plus PSOE running and winning seats for the first time).
So it's really just a giant cluster, sort like a much more muted version of the 2nd Republic, as the Philippine War basically collapses down the steady establishmentarian machine (in OTL, the Turno; here, the caciquismo that has propped up the NatLibs for thirty years).
Not a formal coalition, but Maura enjoys the outside confidence of Canalejas, which also restricts how much he could do. Some more statist economic ideas from the Conservatives might get one-off Radical or Progressive support, of course
Scandinavia: The Birth of Union
"...by mid-to-late July, the Swedish had built up from its activated reservists two additional Corps - one (the IV) that would reinforce Lillestrom and thus not only guard the rear of the III Corps that would attack Christiania after crossing the Nitelva but also thus control the main railroad east and north out of the city at the point where they split, and a second that would attack with the I Corps from the south via the hills around Ski. Border fortifications at Fredriksten, Aurskog, and Orje had been overrun and the two most important chokepoints for defending southeastern Norway at Kongsvinger and Oscarsborg were fully invested, though had held out ably.
Michelsen was faced with a dilemma; the Swedish had mobilized their entire standing army of professionals and conscripts [1] and pulled in reservists and training volunteers, while Norway had already lost key ground and the enemy was at the gates of the capital in advance of what they expected. Farmers were out shooting at Swedish soldiers - with some success - and villagers were building rudimentary bombs with military assistance, but it had not halted the advance. [2] Officers had had to be evacuated from Christiania's defenses in order to train Norway's volunteers as the reservist-heavy army was concentrated either in the capital or in Kongsvinger, already separated by 25 miles of rugged woodland along the Glomma and with a Swedish army now parked directly in between, having cut their most direct communications. How long could the capital hold out? Norway's dedicated people would fight on if Christiania fell, of that there was no doubt; west of the city the terrain turned to mountains and fjords fast, perfect for guerilla warfare. As Peter Holst, his Defense Minister, put it: "If the Filipinos can fight in their mountains to free themselves from Spain, cannot we do the same to free ourselves from Sweden?"
Commanding General Wilhelm Olsson saw it differently. Losing the capital would likely lead to the collapse of the Kongsvinger garrison as well with it so entirely isolated, and it was now the only strategic point on the Glomma Norway held; Sweden operating behind it was more than possible, it was highly probable, and that opened up the mountain routes to Trondheim overland. Evacuating the government to Kristiansand, as Michelsen favored, would just be delaying the inevitable and be a cowardly abandonment of tens of thousands of dedicated Norwegian partisans to the Swedish Army. [3] The response of the nationalist Cabinet was to hurl invective at the long-loyal Olsson, declaring him just as much a traitor to the storsvensk as the monarchist officers who had resigned or even defected rather than take up arms in what they considered an unlawful rebellion against the rightful King. Michelsen was unwilling to go that far and admired Olsson's candor and bravery before such a hostile audience in being very clear-eyed about what a successful campaign would entail ("We can have a free Norway, sir, but you must decide now how much of it you will allow to burn and how much blood of its sons you will allow to be spilled to secure it."), but for the first time since the crisis had been triggered two eternal months earlier was indecisive and could not bring himself to give up now, when Norway had risen up for herself. The polarized public opinion in both countries could not now be undone, and there was no way to back down and save face. One side had to win, and one side had to lose, and the proving ground would be Christiania.
The other side gets a vote, too, of course. Sweden's successes in the war had kept a lid on potential popular discontent until now (the increasingly radical Young Socialists were of particular concern to the government), but the great test was coming; the supply lines and forces had been built sufficiently for Oscar II to feel confident in earning his coup de grace and taking the Norwegian capital ("to re-hallow the ground on which my son's blood was spilled," he declared to his Cabinet) would likely invite foreign intervention to find a negotiated peace. Though compromise was far from his mind, a number of his advisors had begun to coalesce around being satisfied that Stockholm's point had been made and that the passage of the New Laws defining the relationship of Norway and Sweden under their respective constitutions were a non-negotiable outcome, and were certain that at this point, with Norwegians having hoped to taste independence, that was a sufficient loss for the errant sister kingdom and secured the outcome Sweden had desired all along without committing them to a lengthy occupation or years of instability.
And so, while Michelsen and his Cabinet debated whether to finally flee the city, on July 23 the sound of cannon fire echoed from the nearby towns of Oppegard to the south and Strommen to the east, just miles away, loud enough that they could hear. The Battle of Christiania had begun..."
- Scandinavia: The Birth of Union
[1] Sweden introduced universal conscription in 1901 OTL and I see no reason why that'd change here
[2] Ironically, a Norwegian would invent the modern hand grenade... one year later
[3] This is of course standard procedure when the enemy is at the gates, and the Norwegians should have done this a while ago, but they are still betting on their concentrated forces defending the city when the inevitable attack comes
Michelsen was faced with a dilemma; the Swedish had mobilized their entire standing army of professionals and conscripts [1] and pulled in reservists and training volunteers, while Norway had already lost key ground and the enemy was at the gates of the capital in advance of what they expected. Farmers were out shooting at Swedish soldiers - with some success - and villagers were building rudimentary bombs with military assistance, but it had not halted the advance. [2] Officers had had to be evacuated from Christiania's defenses in order to train Norway's volunteers as the reservist-heavy army was concentrated either in the capital or in Kongsvinger, already separated by 25 miles of rugged woodland along the Glomma and with a Swedish army now parked directly in between, having cut their most direct communications. How long could the capital hold out? Norway's dedicated people would fight on if Christiania fell, of that there was no doubt; west of the city the terrain turned to mountains and fjords fast, perfect for guerilla warfare. As Peter Holst, his Defense Minister, put it: "If the Filipinos can fight in their mountains to free themselves from Spain, cannot we do the same to free ourselves from Sweden?"
Commanding General Wilhelm Olsson saw it differently. Losing the capital would likely lead to the collapse of the Kongsvinger garrison as well with it so entirely isolated, and it was now the only strategic point on the Glomma Norway held; Sweden operating behind it was more than possible, it was highly probable, and that opened up the mountain routes to Trondheim overland. Evacuating the government to Kristiansand, as Michelsen favored, would just be delaying the inevitable and be a cowardly abandonment of tens of thousands of dedicated Norwegian partisans to the Swedish Army. [3] The response of the nationalist Cabinet was to hurl invective at the long-loyal Olsson, declaring him just as much a traitor to the storsvensk as the monarchist officers who had resigned or even defected rather than take up arms in what they considered an unlawful rebellion against the rightful King. Michelsen was unwilling to go that far and admired Olsson's candor and bravery before such a hostile audience in being very clear-eyed about what a successful campaign would entail ("We can have a free Norway, sir, but you must decide now how much of it you will allow to burn and how much blood of its sons you will allow to be spilled to secure it."), but for the first time since the crisis had been triggered two eternal months earlier was indecisive and could not bring himself to give up now, when Norway had risen up for herself. The polarized public opinion in both countries could not now be undone, and there was no way to back down and save face. One side had to win, and one side had to lose, and the proving ground would be Christiania.
The other side gets a vote, too, of course. Sweden's successes in the war had kept a lid on potential popular discontent until now (the increasingly radical Young Socialists were of particular concern to the government), but the great test was coming; the supply lines and forces had been built sufficiently for Oscar II to feel confident in earning his coup de grace and taking the Norwegian capital ("to re-hallow the ground on which my son's blood was spilled," he declared to his Cabinet) would likely invite foreign intervention to find a negotiated peace. Though compromise was far from his mind, a number of his advisors had begun to coalesce around being satisfied that Stockholm's point had been made and that the passage of the New Laws defining the relationship of Norway and Sweden under their respective constitutions were a non-negotiable outcome, and were certain that at this point, with Norwegians having hoped to taste independence, that was a sufficient loss for the errant sister kingdom and secured the outcome Sweden had desired all along without committing them to a lengthy occupation or years of instability.
And so, while Michelsen and his Cabinet debated whether to finally flee the city, on July 23 the sound of cannon fire echoed from the nearby towns of Oppegard to the south and Strommen to the east, just miles away, loud enough that they could hear. The Battle of Christiania had begun..."
- Scandinavia: The Birth of Union
[1] Sweden introduced universal conscription in 1901 OTL and I see no reason why that'd change here
[2] Ironically, a Norwegian would invent the modern hand grenade... one year later
[3] This is of course standard procedure when the enemy is at the gates, and the Norwegians should have done this a while ago, but they are still betting on their concentrated forces defending the city when the inevitable attack comes
I forgot about Catalonia. What happened to the Conde de Romanones? I thought maybe Canelejas and Moret would lack the authority to really lead the liberals. Is it purely caciquismo propping then up?
The Sword Draws Ink: Circulation Wars, Newsman Rivalries and the Rise of the Modern Media in the 19th Century
"...Pulitzer complained bitterly of the "thumb on the scale" that Roosevelt's mayoralty represented; the Journal enjoyed unprecedented access to the inner workings of government, and while the Sun and Herald had the advantage of being able to both support the Democratic line of the popular President Hearst as well as not critique Tammany, the Liberal papers seemed adrift in this new era of Rooseveltian dominance both in the press and in the city's culture. It did not help that in an overwhelmingly Democratic city, the two most prominent Liberal papers were so openly feuding; the older they got, the more Pulitzer and Reid sparred in the pages of their own papers and even got in shouting matches more than once at social events where they stumbled across one another. An old world seemed to be ending; indeed, both in poor health and turning over their empires to sons or delegates whom they nevertheless didn't quite trust to run their affairs [1], they would die soon enough, Pulitzer in 1908 and Reid four years later, before their long-standing publications merged in the late 1910s at the behest of Reid's son Ogden to form the New York World Tribune, the city's definitive Liberal publication and mouthpiece.
The reality was, as an age of mass journalistic innovation came to a close, a new one was beginning and for all their contributions Pulitzer and Reid had not seemed to understand it, both creatures of a long bygone age, like many Liberals of their generation (or partisan Democrats like Bennett, for that matter). Roosevelt on the other hand was cutting edge; he had in the summer of 1905 bought his first magazine, Cosmopolitan, [2] which since its founding twenty years earlier had been aimed at families, particularly wives and mothers, but also gave him the opportunity to sponsor investigative journalism in more long-form and intellectual format, with his dream still being to own a respected broadsheet rather than his family of tabloid Journals. In that magazine he was able to further build his name and reputation on exposes of the wealth and corruption of Senators, publish novellettes in serialized form, and create a base of income to help subsidize his expansions elsewhere; the "Journal Group," which eventually would hold that name formally as a corporate title, in 1905 expanded from eight to eleven papers, and in the following year added two more. The breakneck expansion of his national footprint certainly didn't seem to affect his capacity for his day job; after a brutal, drawn-out political battle for control of New York City politics with Tammany Hall in which his longtime friend Hearst even had to stay neutral to avoid offending the powerful machine boss Silent Charlie Murphy, Roosevelt secured a new city charter that gave the Mayor much broader powers and which streamlined city governance dramatically and, crucially, owned for municipal ownership of utilities and transportation companies (while also extending the Mayor's term to four years), and he won election under said new charter that fall.
As always, success left him anxious - there were bigger fish to fry, bigger goals for him to achieve, now that his name was in a number of households across America, and Mayor of New York City was an insufficient office for what he really wanted to do..."
- The Sword Draws Ink: Circulation Wars, Newsman Rivalries and the Rise of the Modern Media in the 19th Century
[1] Succession, only set in the early 1900s!
[2] Cosmo wasn't Cosmo until the 1960s, really
The reality was, as an age of mass journalistic innovation came to a close, a new one was beginning and for all their contributions Pulitzer and Reid had not seemed to understand it, both creatures of a long bygone age, like many Liberals of their generation (or partisan Democrats like Bennett, for that matter). Roosevelt on the other hand was cutting edge; he had in the summer of 1905 bought his first magazine, Cosmopolitan, [2] which since its founding twenty years earlier had been aimed at families, particularly wives and mothers, but also gave him the opportunity to sponsor investigative journalism in more long-form and intellectual format, with his dream still being to own a respected broadsheet rather than his family of tabloid Journals. In that magazine he was able to further build his name and reputation on exposes of the wealth and corruption of Senators, publish novellettes in serialized form, and create a base of income to help subsidize his expansions elsewhere; the "Journal Group," which eventually would hold that name formally as a corporate title, in 1905 expanded from eight to eleven papers, and in the following year added two more. The breakneck expansion of his national footprint certainly didn't seem to affect his capacity for his day job; after a brutal, drawn-out political battle for control of New York City politics with Tammany Hall in which his longtime friend Hearst even had to stay neutral to avoid offending the powerful machine boss Silent Charlie Murphy, Roosevelt secured a new city charter that gave the Mayor much broader powers and which streamlined city governance dramatically and, crucially, owned for municipal ownership of utilities and transportation companies (while also extending the Mayor's term to four years), and he won election under said new charter that fall.
As always, success left him anxious - there were bigger fish to fry, bigger goals for him to achieve, now that his name was in a number of households across America, and Mayor of New York City was an insufficient office for what he really wanted to do..."
- The Sword Draws Ink: Circulation Wars, Newsman Rivalries and the Rise of the Modern Media in the 19th Century
[1] Succession, only set in the early 1900s!
[2] Cosmo wasn't Cosmo until the 1960s, really
The Conde de Romanones will make an appearance sooner or later!
Well, that, and a stable economy, an end to the Carlists and a functional political system their leading lights helped design. The National Liberals have genuinely delivered, especially under Serrano. But a whole generation of Spaniards don't really remember what came before and just remember unemployment post-1890, the Salmeron Affair, and now the decade-long humiliation in the Philippines punctuated by Yaeyama.
Are we going to get an update on china before Part VI ends? if not, what's the situation there as of late 1905?
Sure. The difference is only (give or take) 15 thousand kilometers.
I have a brief one in mind that's meant as a mild cliffhanger/jumping off point, fear not!
Lol yes exactly! Glad you picked up on that haha
Path of Darkness: Europe's Illiberal Hour
"...though he had very little operational authority over the actual campaign, Prince Carl would for years after be praised in Sweden for serving in the army that attacked Christiania as part of the push, as he put it, "to avenge my slain brother." His diaries remain a detailed, rigorous primary source document for the first major urban battle of the modern era in Europe. Compared to some of the stunning military and civilian casualty counts that would be common in the wars of the 1910s and early 1920s [1], Christiania was barely a light skirmish, though to its participants its pitched six days of combat was an experience of savagery and hell. The most intense fighting was in the southern approaches, hilly and wooded and with the highest concentrations of troops due to its excellent defensible terrain. The Norwegian plan was to bleed the Swedes for every inch between Ski and the Akershus Fortress, and the fighting was grim.
The attack from the east, however, showed the insufficiency of the Norwegian preparations, as the III Corps swept much of the less organized resistance from its path once it had broken clear of the bloody fighting in Strommen. It turned out that perhaps dying for an esoteric liberty was not worth it. The cause of independence was one that had inspired the Norwegian people tremendously and the resentment towards Sweden was real, but the Union had, for all its considerable flaws, not been some oppressive overseas empire tightening the vice. The news that the Michelsen government was fleeing by train and carriage to Kristiansand as ordinary people made barricades out of dining tables, school desks and pub chairs sparked massive outrage and as the Swedish Army finally pushed into the city proper, a great number of Norwegians threw down their weapons and surrendered. Fears that the old heart of the city would be flattened did not occur, scarred as it was by artillery shells and bullet holes; rumors of mass rapes and wanton murders did not occur either. Each side suffered between six to seven thousand casualties with the typical killed-in-action ratio of one fifth of that number perishing, and something on the order of that number of civilians perished as well. The Sack of Baghdad, it was not, and compared to the heinous barbarism of China or the Philippines just years earlier it was practically cordial.
Michelsen was met in Kristiansand by a Royal Navy cruiser carrying a very pointed message from London - the Norwegians had made their point, but it was time to stop before things got out of hand. The Christianafjord was unbarricaded by the Swedish fleet and foreign vessels could enter again, foregoing a potential food shortage in August; outside of scattered shootings or nighttime attacks on drunk Swedish soldiers, the occupation was light. The war, for all practical purposes, had ended barely two months after it began. Michelsen agreed to order a general stand down if the Swedes evacuated Norwegian territory; this was mostly refused, but Christiania was relinquished on September 1st as the Swedish Army retreated to more distant positions so negotiations could begin between the belligerents, this time under London's supervision in Aalborg with the soon-to-be dead Christian IX [2] of Denmark acting as arbitrator, albeit quite a pro-Norwegian one. A stipulation of the Swedes, however, was that Michelsen immediately resign along with his whole Cabinet, and Hagerup was re-appointed Prime Minister in Christiania and Lovland in Stockholm, precisely as it had been before the May Crisis just a short but history-altering four months earlier. This was a particularly grim denouement in Norway, where it felt like the whole ordeal had been for no change whatsoever and just a humiliation for all of Europe to see.
The War of 1905 remained for that reason in contemporary annals a strange curiosity. It had been destructive and hard on eastern Norway, yes, but the vast majority of the country had gone untouched and the casualties of the entire campaign were well below fifteen thousand for both belligerents, nearly half of which had been sustained at either Aurskog or Christiania. It changed little; the Union of Sweden and Norway endured, and the Norwegian Cabinet, in return for full Swedish evacuation of Norwegian territory, passed the New Laws that bound them tighter to Sweden and created joint councils for economic and military policy, thus making it in theory quite difficult for any future Norwegian domestic cabinet to prepare another war of independence against Sweden. To further accentuate that point, the Swedes demolished border fortifications at Fredriksten, Oyre and Aurskog as they pulled out of Norway entirely; Kongsvinger was left to stand only due to its distance from the border.
Norway had retained numerous liberties considering the thirst for revenge in Sweden, however. Her Parliamentary prerogatives were not curtailed, nor were any sanctions placed on her remarkably universal suffrage. The New Laws stipulated that, like in Austria-Hungary, the Norwegians could appoint their own consuls and ministers overseas, which had been one of the major sticking points with the original Union. And, of course, they needed only royal asset to their laws, so no Viceroy of Norway could ever intercept laws from reaching the King again. That all said, though, 1905 dramatically changed Norwegian attitudes toward the Union. They were no longer lillebror, a junior partner in a partnership forced upon them 91 years earlier, but felt more like a conquered people now. "We are the Irish of the North," Michelsen lamented in a newspaper interview in Denmark, where he moved after the war. Blood had been spilt to keep Norway in the Union after years of rising tensions in which Christiania had always backed down, and Sweden had lost its crown prince over the ordeal. Resentments were real and now ran quite deep, on both sides of the border. Europe had not heard the last of tensions in oft-forgotten Scandinavia.
But the real impact of the crisis had been on the lessons learned by other powers, for both offensive and defensive warfare, about the efficacy of train transport (the Norwegian evacuation from Fredriksborg and Moss was a cause celebre among military planners for years) and timetable mobilization and how to manage professional soldiers, conscripts, reservists and volunteers, logistics and the like. It was a general European war in miniature for other powers to observe at a safe distance and ponder how new technologies and doctrines would affect them in future combat.
And, perhaps most importantly, the war had crushed whatever liberal push there had been for reform in Sweden; Oskar II had after all dismissed his entire Cabinet and dissolved Parliament to conduct war, and he had won and kept his Norway, which was lucky to have kept its constitution intact. There was no way he was going soft now, nor would the aristocracy that backed him. For the autocrats around Europe, this was the true godsend - the sign that perhaps the liberal ascendancy of the last quarter century was cresting and beginning to now ebb back to the proper order of things..."
- Path of Darkness: Europe's Illiberal Hour
[1] Tipping my hand a bit here
[2] He would die in January of 1906
The attack from the east, however, showed the insufficiency of the Norwegian preparations, as the III Corps swept much of the less organized resistance from its path once it had broken clear of the bloody fighting in Strommen. It turned out that perhaps dying for an esoteric liberty was not worth it. The cause of independence was one that had inspired the Norwegian people tremendously and the resentment towards Sweden was real, but the Union had, for all its considerable flaws, not been some oppressive overseas empire tightening the vice. The news that the Michelsen government was fleeing by train and carriage to Kristiansand as ordinary people made barricades out of dining tables, school desks and pub chairs sparked massive outrage and as the Swedish Army finally pushed into the city proper, a great number of Norwegians threw down their weapons and surrendered. Fears that the old heart of the city would be flattened did not occur, scarred as it was by artillery shells and bullet holes; rumors of mass rapes and wanton murders did not occur either. Each side suffered between six to seven thousand casualties with the typical killed-in-action ratio of one fifth of that number perishing, and something on the order of that number of civilians perished as well. The Sack of Baghdad, it was not, and compared to the heinous barbarism of China or the Philippines just years earlier it was practically cordial.
Michelsen was met in Kristiansand by a Royal Navy cruiser carrying a very pointed message from London - the Norwegians had made their point, but it was time to stop before things got out of hand. The Christianafjord was unbarricaded by the Swedish fleet and foreign vessels could enter again, foregoing a potential food shortage in August; outside of scattered shootings or nighttime attacks on drunk Swedish soldiers, the occupation was light. The war, for all practical purposes, had ended barely two months after it began. Michelsen agreed to order a general stand down if the Swedes evacuated Norwegian territory; this was mostly refused, but Christiania was relinquished on September 1st as the Swedish Army retreated to more distant positions so negotiations could begin between the belligerents, this time under London's supervision in Aalborg with the soon-to-be dead Christian IX [2] of Denmark acting as arbitrator, albeit quite a pro-Norwegian one. A stipulation of the Swedes, however, was that Michelsen immediately resign along with his whole Cabinet, and Hagerup was re-appointed Prime Minister in Christiania and Lovland in Stockholm, precisely as it had been before the May Crisis just a short but history-altering four months earlier. This was a particularly grim denouement in Norway, where it felt like the whole ordeal had been for no change whatsoever and just a humiliation for all of Europe to see.
The War of 1905 remained for that reason in contemporary annals a strange curiosity. It had been destructive and hard on eastern Norway, yes, but the vast majority of the country had gone untouched and the casualties of the entire campaign were well below fifteen thousand for both belligerents, nearly half of which had been sustained at either Aurskog or Christiania. It changed little; the Union of Sweden and Norway endured, and the Norwegian Cabinet, in return for full Swedish evacuation of Norwegian territory, passed the New Laws that bound them tighter to Sweden and created joint councils for economic and military policy, thus making it in theory quite difficult for any future Norwegian domestic cabinet to prepare another war of independence against Sweden. To further accentuate that point, the Swedes demolished border fortifications at Fredriksten, Oyre and Aurskog as they pulled out of Norway entirely; Kongsvinger was left to stand only due to its distance from the border.
Norway had retained numerous liberties considering the thirst for revenge in Sweden, however. Her Parliamentary prerogatives were not curtailed, nor were any sanctions placed on her remarkably universal suffrage. The New Laws stipulated that, like in Austria-Hungary, the Norwegians could appoint their own consuls and ministers overseas, which had been one of the major sticking points with the original Union. And, of course, they needed only royal asset to their laws, so no Viceroy of Norway could ever intercept laws from reaching the King again. That all said, though, 1905 dramatically changed Norwegian attitudes toward the Union. They were no longer lillebror, a junior partner in a partnership forced upon them 91 years earlier, but felt more like a conquered people now. "We are the Irish of the North," Michelsen lamented in a newspaper interview in Denmark, where he moved after the war. Blood had been spilt to keep Norway in the Union after years of rising tensions in which Christiania had always backed down, and Sweden had lost its crown prince over the ordeal. Resentments were real and now ran quite deep, on both sides of the border. Europe had not heard the last of tensions in oft-forgotten Scandinavia.
But the real impact of the crisis had been on the lessons learned by other powers, for both offensive and defensive warfare, about the efficacy of train transport (the Norwegian evacuation from Fredriksborg and Moss was a cause celebre among military planners for years) and timetable mobilization and how to manage professional soldiers, conscripts, reservists and volunteers, logistics and the like. It was a general European war in miniature for other powers to observe at a safe distance and ponder how new technologies and doctrines would affect them in future combat.
And, perhaps most importantly, the war had crushed whatever liberal push there had been for reform in Sweden; Oskar II had after all dismissed his entire Cabinet and dissolved Parliament to conduct war, and he had won and kept his Norway, which was lucky to have kept its constitution intact. There was no way he was going soft now, nor would the aristocracy that backed him. For the autocrats around Europe, this was the true godsend - the sign that perhaps the liberal ascendancy of the last quarter century was cresting and beginning to now ebb back to the proper order of things..."
- Path of Darkness: Europe's Illiberal Hour
[1] Tipping my hand a bit here
[2] He would die in January of 1906
The Hamidian Era: The Ottoman Empire 1876-1914
"...pan-Islamism needed to secure the holiest cities in Islam to function, of course, and that was why the growing strength of the Saudis in the Nejd was of such concern. The Ottoman allies in Jabal Shammar under the Rashidis had twice defeated the Saudis only to see what Abdulhamid called "those Wahhabist rats" come back to power from exile in Kuwait and, by late 1905, have taken Riyadh back, marching towards the Rashidi stronghold at Hail and from that tremendous position in central Arabia able to attack either the Hashemite shariffs who governed the Hejaz on behalf of Constantinople or perhaps Palestine or Baghdad.
Thankfully, this concern was shared by the British, who had numerous interests in Arabia such as at Aden, in the Trucial Emirates, in Bahrain and in Kuwait itself. The decline in French prestige in the Ottoman Empire coincided with a rapprochement with London, and British arms, advisors and most importantly money were soon trickling in to the Rashidis as the Porte debated quietly whether it was time to show Ottoman strength in an era where its weakness was still somehow taken for granted and take offensive action into the desert to put the House of Saud to the sword for good..."
- The Hamidian Era: The Ottoman Empire 1876-1914
Thankfully, this concern was shared by the British, who had numerous interests in Arabia such as at Aden, in the Trucial Emirates, in Bahrain and in Kuwait itself. The decline in French prestige in the Ottoman Empire coincided with a rapprochement with London, and British arms, advisors and most importantly money were soon trickling in to the Rashidis as the Porte debated quietly whether it was time to show Ottoman strength in an era where its weakness was still somehow taken for granted and take offensive action into the desert to put the House of Saud to the sword for good..."
- The Hamidian Era: The Ottoman Empire 1876-1914
Interesting Times: A History of the Chinese Revolution
"...that her time was running out; nearly two years of putting down revolts in Sichuan had sapped the Loyalist Xi'an regime of most of its most experienced soldiers, emptied its meagre coffers and destroyed its credibility with the literati in the Republic and Reformed Empire. Zhang's years of consolidation, of building a larger and larger German-trained and equipped army, and cautious preparation had paid off; the animal was so badly wounded he was ready to attack, knowing from his spies that the Peking regime's armies had received much worse training and equipment from their Russian and French patrons, and had bled themselves for quite some time driving the last of Cixi's forces out of Henan into the mountains. The Hongxian Emperor and his reconstituted Qing court would have to wait; the instigators of the Boxer War were a spent force, with barely half of the Sichuan breadbasket in their command and otherwise mountainous Shensi or dry Kansu and little else.
In early December, one of the largest military operations of the Revolution commenced. Zhang had constructed in the Republic a moderately professional core of 250,000 soldiers and an additional auxiliary army of nearly 400,000 conscripts with three months of training. The forces were split approximately in two, with half sent from Guizhou over the passes of the Dalou Mountains during the driest and coolest season of the year to punch into the Sichuan Basin and claim that province for the Republic, while the other half for the first time marched into Henan, destroying a stunned Loyalist Army caught from behind west of Nanyang and thus securing the passes to Xi'an. As the Loyalist forces collapsed on both fronts in the face of an onslaught of rested, well-fed and disciplined Western-equipped soldiers, Peking's own armies finally, with tremendous loss of life, managed to take Taiyuan, and the race to Xi'an was on..."
- Interesting Times: A History of the Chinese Revolution
In early December, one of the largest military operations of the Revolution commenced. Zhang had constructed in the Republic a moderately professional core of 250,000 soldiers and an additional auxiliary army of nearly 400,000 conscripts with three months of training. The forces were split approximately in two, with half sent from Guizhou over the passes of the Dalou Mountains during the driest and coolest season of the year to punch into the Sichuan Basin and claim that province for the Republic, while the other half for the first time marched into Henan, destroying a stunned Loyalist Army caught from behind west of Nanyang and thus securing the passes to Xi'an. As the Loyalist forces collapsed on both fronts in the face of an onslaught of rested, well-fed and disciplined Western-equipped soldiers, Peking's own armies finally, with tremendous loss of life, managed to take Taiyuan, and the race to Xi'an was on..."
- Interesting Times: A History of the Chinese Revolution
And i thought the 1920s would be peaceful. You’ve already alluded to the destruction of Austria Hungary. Are those wars meant to allude to the competition between the successor states and their neighbors? I mean IOTL you did have revanchism, like Hungary with the Treaty of Trianon or Czechoslovakia & Poland with Teschen or Bulgaria with that part they ceded to Romania. But it never actually turned violent in the interwar period
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