Sequel de Mayo (Cinco de Mayo, Vol. II)
- Thread starter KingSweden24
- Start date
@KingSweden24 I wanted to ask you some alternate history from the Great American War. The thing is I wonder what would have happened if the war broke out a couple of years earlier? Or if it was that the Confederates, Brazilians and Mexicans navies together beat the US Navy and destroyed their battlefleet, in reverse? Or if I am going over board then what if they severely crippled the American Fleet? What if Argentina was overrun by the Brazilians?
One can only wish him good luck. He never came to rule India OTL but but such Mao level social planning will reap plenty of dividends that he will not like at all.
Beatriz
Gone Fishin'
I already have one
| Devanagari | TTL | OTL |
|---|---|---|
| अ | a | A |
| आ | aa | aa |
| इ | i | i |
| ई | Ii | ee |
| उ | U | U |
| यू | Uu | oo |
| ए | E | e |
| ऐ | Ai | Ai |
| आ | O | o |
| ओ | Au | Au |
| प | P | p |
| फ | Ph | ph |
| ब | B | b |
| भ | Bh | Bh |
| म | M | m |
| व | V | V |
| त | T | t |
| थ | Th | Th |
| द | D | D |
| ध | Dh | Dh |
| न | N | N |
| स | S | S |
| ल | L | L |
| र | R | R |
| च | Ch | Ch |
| ज | J | J |
| छ | chh | Chh |
| झ | jh | Jh |
| श | Sh | Sh |
| ट | T’ | T |
| ठ | Th’ | Th |
| ड | D’ | D |
| ढ | Dh’ | Dh |
| ष | S’ | Sh, s |
| ण | N’ | N |
| क | K | K |
| ग | G | G |
| ख | kh | Kh |
| घ | Gh | G |
| ह | H | H |
| फ़ | F | F |
| ज़ | Z | Z |
| ख़ | x | Kh |
| ँ | ‘N | N |
| झ़् | Zh | Zh |
| ग़ | G’ | Gh |
Last edited:
in fijii the govenor general was traditionally one of the local nobles.not quite the same especially because Ireland is right there but still.
I wonder if part of the deal could eventually be "lord Lieutenant is from ulster or protestant " the duke has to retire sometime and I doubt if any catholics at the moment would even want the job.
The Root of the Problem: The Tumultuous Term of America's 29th President
"...assumption that remains today that Stimson was forced out at the War Department, or resigned in frustration. The latter is probably closer to the truth, though what led to Stimson's retirement from the Cabinet and return to New York to practice law was less frustration than exhaustion and burnout; Stimson had in the war years been legendary for getting as little as four hours of sleep a night and for having a dedication to his work that likely shaved several years from his life. Stimson's good friend from New York and chief deputy Mayhew Wainwright was appointed as his replacement, and Stimson never ceased regarding Root as not just a colleague but a mentor - a falling out between the men was not what ended Stimson's tenure at War in January of 1918.
The longstanding hearsay and rumors about Stimson's exit find their origin in the times themselves, with stories quickly circulating about Stimson resigning because he had been overruled by Root in favor of Mellon too many times, or his disagreement with how the occupation of the Confederacy was being conducted - Roosevelt's Journal in particular tried to land a salacious interview with the famously reserved Stimson, only to fail. There was a kernel of truth to the idea that not all was well at the War Department, however, though that was not necessarily Stimson's fault, and Wainwright was perhaps unfairly left holding the bag in public perception as well. The fact was that the transition from total war to occupation had not been smooth, despite Stimson and Wainwright's best efforts, and much of that blame can be laid at the feet of Peyton March, the new Army Chief of Staff. March had been an outstanding deputy to Bliss during the war and was an able modernizer and liaison to civilian leadership, which was what he had been primarily tasked with as Deputy Chief of Staff. Once in the main job, however, much of the strategy and logistics of the job were increasingly on his plate, and while he was not without talent and insight, he was found wanting for the task. In particular, March badly underestimated the manpower that would be needed to successfully occupy the Confederacy, and his focus on modernizing and streamlining Army kit and procurement in the wake of the war after the outrages outlined in both LaFollette Reports took up too much of his attention. He was also constitutionally unable to set aside his distaste for John Pershing, now his own Deputy Chief of Staff, whom he resented for having been given more stars than him (thus nominally outranking him) and he suspected that Pershing was, on behalf of a slew of other officers such as John Harbord, the source of the sentiments that he was downplaying the threat that hillboys and NRO militias in Dixie actually posed to the Army.
Wainwright did his best to manage this clash of personalities within the General Staff and, to his credit, halted further demobilization plans, as Stimson on his way out suggested to him that they had indeed under-prepared for the occupation initially. It was not enough, however. Stimson was something of a public hero, the bespectacled and modest technocrat who had rescued the war effort at the nadir of the Hughes Presidency, and with Root's popularity already well in the tank, the sight of his most capable Cabinet Secretary going out the door was taken not just as the ordinary turnover of public office but as a confidence crisis.
Less than a few weeks after Stimson had left, an actual crisis reared its head, one which he may have been better positioned to solve. Stimson had regarded the suspension of the Grain Board the previous spring as a colossal mistake and despite his personal antipathy towards the strikers in Minneapolis, he considered what unfolded over the summer of 1917 across the Upper Midwest as an inevitable and understandable downstream effect of that mistake. Accordingly, Stimson had been the most resistant figure in the Administration to the idea of re-privatizing the railroads, an endeavor in which he found he had unlikely allies in Congressional Democrats; Stimson believed that nationalized railroads through the USRA, which fell under the purview of the War Department, were necessary for the occupation to function. Every time Root debated promulgating an executive order, often encouraged by Mellon, to begin the process, it was Stimson who angrily objected. Wainwright, though Stimson's good friend and ideological fellow traveler in many ways, lacked that same cachet.
Root nonetheless had listened to Stimson enough to understand that a full and total privatization similar to the abolition of the Grain Board would be too much of a shock to the depressed economy and thus devised a plan to gradually wind the USRA down, region by region. Executive Order 1108 was drafted on February 10th, 1918, which would starting on April 30th return rolling stock and locomotives in six states in New England and four states in the Pacific Northwest to private operators while keeping the trackage in public ownership; on July 31st, similar provisions would be made in the Upper Midwest, and on October 31st all trackage in the United States would be open to private operators once again. This on its own was not necessarily controversial, and indeed is how freight rail and some low-budget passenger services in the United States operate today: private rolling stock on public rights-of-way via negotiated contract and rates. What was controversial was a provision of the order which proposed selling the trackage back to private operators in competitive auctions in full by December 31st, 1920 - ten days before Root's term would end.
The contents of the Order were published, as all non-secret executive orders were, and the public reaction was immediately swift and angry. Logistically, after nearly four years, there weren't even private operators left to take over by late April, which meant that trusts and conglomerates would need to be formed on the quick and, considering some of the personalities in Root's orbit, it seemed inevitable that Liberal cronies would quickly snap up ownership of those routes. Beyond simply the practical difficulties and potential for corruption, the idea of the hated rail trusts returning after the war irked millions of Americans, but the biggest obstacle was labor in the ARU and its fiery leader, Eugene Debs.
The ARU had won significant concessions during the war on working hours and conditions in exchange for not striking and for accepting wage caps; Debs was already frustrated with Stimsonite leadership at the USRA for dragging their feet on getting wage controls removed as he had been promised, and despite their frequent and considerable political disagreements Debs was genuinely dismayed to see Stimson go, because at least he was confident the man would keep his word even when he told him what he didn't want to hear. But the deals struck with the USRA had been struck with the USRA, and there was no guarantee that private railroads would honor such agreements, and for as angered as Debs was about the lack of forward progress, what he refused to countenance was backsliding in the rights and privileges of his critical union.
As such, he requested a meeting, personally, with Root on February 18th, 1918 at the Lemon Hill Mansion in Philadelphia's emerging "Federal Quarter." Mellon and Wainwright were present as well; Debs considered it a poor omen that James J. Davis, the Labor Secretary, was not present as well, much as Debs loathed Davis. [1] Debs, despite being vehemently opposed to any form of re-privatization, elected not to start off his meeting with the President with a threat and instead came to "express his concerns" about the contours of the executive order, namely that it did not seem to contain any guarantees of the ARU's wartime privileges. Root was about to answer when Mellon audibly scoffed, which according to Debs made Wainwright rub his face in consternation. Root tried to politely suggest that "war makes for strange bedfellows," which only angered Debs more, and the labor chieftain pointedly stated that "we will not retreat an inch from the ground we have won, as our soldiers would not have retreated an inch at the Susquehanna!"
Had the more diplomatic Stimson still been around, the meeting may have gone better; indeed, Debs could probably have just gone to him directly, or perhaps Stimson would have interceded before Order 1108 was even drafted. It went worse from there, with Mellon dismissing railroad workers as "upjumped rabble" and storming out after telling Debs he should learn his place; Root tried to salvage matters by telling Debs he would "consider" his input, but he declined to guarantee legislation solidifying the ARU's rights and made things worse when he refused to pressure the ICC, which traditionally regulated railroads, into formalizing regulations accordingly if privatization were to forge ahead. Debs stated bluntly at that point that "we shall not go unprotected," and thanked Root for his time. The next day, he announced from the steps of Philadelphia City Hall that the ARU would call a national railroad strike if the proposed privatization moved ahead as planned, and would not cease until "we are either shot by the National Guard, or we have prevailed."
It goes without saying that many ARU locals were less than excited about Debs' proclamation or his militancy on the matter, having grown comfortable and cozy with the establishment during the war, but Debs' centralized, top-down leadership of the industrial syndicate made direct opposition difficult. As such, the clock was ticking down the days until a rail strike would indeed start, a rail strike that would cripple American transport from coast to coast and be the most massive labor action since the 1880s, dwarfing even the Midwestern strikes of the Red Summer - indeed, a national rail strike by the ARU would have likely been one of the largest strike actions in history. It was avoided, albeit narrowly, by Root quickly withdrawing the Order at March's angry demand, with the general stating that the occupation would collapse overnight if the rail system was crippled. More militant laborists proposed proceeding with the strike anyways to rid of wage controls, but Debs did not want to overplay his hand, sensing that he may already have damaged his public credibility as it was.
Indeed, only Democrats came out of the ordeal strengthened, and that was by having not touched it at all. The Rail Crisis of 1918 turned thousands of Americans who were drifting left after the labor actions of 1917 off of Debs specifically and the Socialist Party generally, with Democrats once more cementing their position as the moderate face of organized labor, and the affair also made Root look even more inept and craven than he already did, at crosswinds of being pushed into unpopular positions by Mellon and then stared down immediately thereafter by Debs' threat. Roosevelt's Journal gloated, "Who governs?", a catchphrase that would immediately become part of American lexicon ahead of the 1918 midterms. Root's Presidency was already spiraling from events outside of his control - but as the Rail Crisis reveals, he was nonetheless often his own worst enemy when it came to matters where he could make decisions..."
- The Root of the Problem: The Tumultuous Term of America's 29th President
[1] As did most of organized labor
The longstanding hearsay and rumors about Stimson's exit find their origin in the times themselves, with stories quickly circulating about Stimson resigning because he had been overruled by Root in favor of Mellon too many times, or his disagreement with how the occupation of the Confederacy was being conducted - Roosevelt's Journal in particular tried to land a salacious interview with the famously reserved Stimson, only to fail. There was a kernel of truth to the idea that not all was well at the War Department, however, though that was not necessarily Stimson's fault, and Wainwright was perhaps unfairly left holding the bag in public perception as well. The fact was that the transition from total war to occupation had not been smooth, despite Stimson and Wainwright's best efforts, and much of that blame can be laid at the feet of Peyton March, the new Army Chief of Staff. March had been an outstanding deputy to Bliss during the war and was an able modernizer and liaison to civilian leadership, which was what he had been primarily tasked with as Deputy Chief of Staff. Once in the main job, however, much of the strategy and logistics of the job were increasingly on his plate, and while he was not without talent and insight, he was found wanting for the task. In particular, March badly underestimated the manpower that would be needed to successfully occupy the Confederacy, and his focus on modernizing and streamlining Army kit and procurement in the wake of the war after the outrages outlined in both LaFollette Reports took up too much of his attention. He was also constitutionally unable to set aside his distaste for John Pershing, now his own Deputy Chief of Staff, whom he resented for having been given more stars than him (thus nominally outranking him) and he suspected that Pershing was, on behalf of a slew of other officers such as John Harbord, the source of the sentiments that he was downplaying the threat that hillboys and NRO militias in Dixie actually posed to the Army.
Wainwright did his best to manage this clash of personalities within the General Staff and, to his credit, halted further demobilization plans, as Stimson on his way out suggested to him that they had indeed under-prepared for the occupation initially. It was not enough, however. Stimson was something of a public hero, the bespectacled and modest technocrat who had rescued the war effort at the nadir of the Hughes Presidency, and with Root's popularity already well in the tank, the sight of his most capable Cabinet Secretary going out the door was taken not just as the ordinary turnover of public office but as a confidence crisis.
Less than a few weeks after Stimson had left, an actual crisis reared its head, one which he may have been better positioned to solve. Stimson had regarded the suspension of the Grain Board the previous spring as a colossal mistake and despite his personal antipathy towards the strikers in Minneapolis, he considered what unfolded over the summer of 1917 across the Upper Midwest as an inevitable and understandable downstream effect of that mistake. Accordingly, Stimson had been the most resistant figure in the Administration to the idea of re-privatizing the railroads, an endeavor in which he found he had unlikely allies in Congressional Democrats; Stimson believed that nationalized railroads through the USRA, which fell under the purview of the War Department, were necessary for the occupation to function. Every time Root debated promulgating an executive order, often encouraged by Mellon, to begin the process, it was Stimson who angrily objected. Wainwright, though Stimson's good friend and ideological fellow traveler in many ways, lacked that same cachet.
Root nonetheless had listened to Stimson enough to understand that a full and total privatization similar to the abolition of the Grain Board would be too much of a shock to the depressed economy and thus devised a plan to gradually wind the USRA down, region by region. Executive Order 1108 was drafted on February 10th, 1918, which would starting on April 30th return rolling stock and locomotives in six states in New England and four states in the Pacific Northwest to private operators while keeping the trackage in public ownership; on July 31st, similar provisions would be made in the Upper Midwest, and on October 31st all trackage in the United States would be open to private operators once again. This on its own was not necessarily controversial, and indeed is how freight rail and some low-budget passenger services in the United States operate today: private rolling stock on public rights-of-way via negotiated contract and rates. What was controversial was a provision of the order which proposed selling the trackage back to private operators in competitive auctions in full by December 31st, 1920 - ten days before Root's term would end.
The contents of the Order were published, as all non-secret executive orders were, and the public reaction was immediately swift and angry. Logistically, after nearly four years, there weren't even private operators left to take over by late April, which meant that trusts and conglomerates would need to be formed on the quick and, considering some of the personalities in Root's orbit, it seemed inevitable that Liberal cronies would quickly snap up ownership of those routes. Beyond simply the practical difficulties and potential for corruption, the idea of the hated rail trusts returning after the war irked millions of Americans, but the biggest obstacle was labor in the ARU and its fiery leader, Eugene Debs.
The ARU had won significant concessions during the war on working hours and conditions in exchange for not striking and for accepting wage caps; Debs was already frustrated with Stimsonite leadership at the USRA for dragging their feet on getting wage controls removed as he had been promised, and despite their frequent and considerable political disagreements Debs was genuinely dismayed to see Stimson go, because at least he was confident the man would keep his word even when he told him what he didn't want to hear. But the deals struck with the USRA had been struck with the USRA, and there was no guarantee that private railroads would honor such agreements, and for as angered as Debs was about the lack of forward progress, what he refused to countenance was backsliding in the rights and privileges of his critical union.
As such, he requested a meeting, personally, with Root on February 18th, 1918 at the Lemon Hill Mansion in Philadelphia's emerging "Federal Quarter." Mellon and Wainwright were present as well; Debs considered it a poor omen that James J. Davis, the Labor Secretary, was not present as well, much as Debs loathed Davis. [1] Debs, despite being vehemently opposed to any form of re-privatization, elected not to start off his meeting with the President with a threat and instead came to "express his concerns" about the contours of the executive order, namely that it did not seem to contain any guarantees of the ARU's wartime privileges. Root was about to answer when Mellon audibly scoffed, which according to Debs made Wainwright rub his face in consternation. Root tried to politely suggest that "war makes for strange bedfellows," which only angered Debs more, and the labor chieftain pointedly stated that "we will not retreat an inch from the ground we have won, as our soldiers would not have retreated an inch at the Susquehanna!"
Had the more diplomatic Stimson still been around, the meeting may have gone better; indeed, Debs could probably have just gone to him directly, or perhaps Stimson would have interceded before Order 1108 was even drafted. It went worse from there, with Mellon dismissing railroad workers as "upjumped rabble" and storming out after telling Debs he should learn his place; Root tried to salvage matters by telling Debs he would "consider" his input, but he declined to guarantee legislation solidifying the ARU's rights and made things worse when he refused to pressure the ICC, which traditionally regulated railroads, into formalizing regulations accordingly if privatization were to forge ahead. Debs stated bluntly at that point that "we shall not go unprotected," and thanked Root for his time. The next day, he announced from the steps of Philadelphia City Hall that the ARU would call a national railroad strike if the proposed privatization moved ahead as planned, and would not cease until "we are either shot by the National Guard, or we have prevailed."
It goes without saying that many ARU locals were less than excited about Debs' proclamation or his militancy on the matter, having grown comfortable and cozy with the establishment during the war, but Debs' centralized, top-down leadership of the industrial syndicate made direct opposition difficult. As such, the clock was ticking down the days until a rail strike would indeed start, a rail strike that would cripple American transport from coast to coast and be the most massive labor action since the 1880s, dwarfing even the Midwestern strikes of the Red Summer - indeed, a national rail strike by the ARU would have likely been one of the largest strike actions in history. It was avoided, albeit narrowly, by Root quickly withdrawing the Order at March's angry demand, with the general stating that the occupation would collapse overnight if the rail system was crippled. More militant laborists proposed proceeding with the strike anyways to rid of wage controls, but Debs did not want to overplay his hand, sensing that he may already have damaged his public credibility as it was.
Indeed, only Democrats came out of the ordeal strengthened, and that was by having not touched it at all. The Rail Crisis of 1918 turned thousands of Americans who were drifting left after the labor actions of 1917 off of Debs specifically and the Socialist Party generally, with Democrats once more cementing their position as the moderate face of organized labor, and the affair also made Root look even more inept and craven than he already did, at crosswinds of being pushed into unpopular positions by Mellon and then stared down immediately thereafter by Debs' threat. Roosevelt's Journal gloated, "Who governs?", a catchphrase that would immediately become part of American lexicon ahead of the 1918 midterms. Root's Presidency was already spiraling from events outside of his control - but as the Rail Crisis reveals, he was nonetheless often his own worst enemy when it came to matters where he could make decisions..."
- The Root of the Problem: The Tumultuous Term of America's 29th President
[1] As did most of organized labor
I have something niche planned for Liz
In Ireland? Sure.
Hehe. That’s a good point!
And, yes. Decolonization ITTL is going to be a bloodbath.
Mmhmmm
ill take y’all’s word for it haha
The war breaking out earlier I don’t think is really to anybody’s advantage, though a few less years of the US implementing the Haffen Plan probably means they struggle for longer at the beginning, perhaps with some Confederate penetration across the Susquehanna.
Argentina getting overrun (or at least having an army destroyed in detail in the field) is much more plausible; that probably ends with the collapse of the Drago government, perhaps via military coup, and a Brazil-favoring peace, maybe with territorial concessions. It’s hard to see Brazil successfully imposing a fully friendly regime after that considering how resentful Argentina would be afterwards.
Yeah, a Bose India will… not always be good.
An Irish-born, Protestant Lord Lieutenant as an informal rule seems like an easy sop to Ulster, certainly
Or put otherwise: never interrupt your opponents when they’re making a mistake/
The center-left has to tread incredibly carefully in the US.
In addition to our middle class being genuinely wealthy in historical and international terms, we have an even stronger belief in our own wealth, and a correspondingly strong status quo bias in basically all things.
The entire lesson of the 19th and 20th centuries here is that the small-p progressive faction of the American elite can only sell reforms as being incremental, sensible improvements on proven existing practice even in the midst of grand crises.
A casual reading of Lincoln’s public speeches and writings, skimming TR’s rhetoric, or a long listen to FDR’s speeches shows a deep understanding of this reality, and unfortunately our modern-day, university-educated capital-P Progressive elite doesn’t remember it at all.
Yeah, TTL’s Dems are definitely more of a machine laborist “make things work well” variety than anything more ideological than that
I think the French situation ITTL reminds me a lot of the German position from OTL (and quite purposefully, I believe).
French paranoia means that I think that regime is currently blind to a lot of its weaknesses, sees its primary ally teetering and willing to dissolve the alliance, and really, really want to get the war going before it position gets worse, while Germany and Austria are a lot more level-headed. Italy, I'm not really sure how belligerent they are. But, IMO, you'd just need to get the French going to set off the whole chain reaction that drags Europe into war.
It isn't going to be the French that are going to drag Europe into war, it will be Belgium (or at least that's what I expect)
Italy will be probably in a position that she don't fell very safe, from her pov she is surrounded by enemies (France and A-H) and one of them had just started to heavy rearming, plus there is all the irrendenta.
Basically she want the land but know perfectely that she is not in a great position, her more probable plan will be not search or clamoring actively war but be very ready for one and wait for the right circumstance and looking with a lot of worries her neighbourgh
Which gives me the feeling that there isn't going to be a Belgium by the end, especially if the Dutch get involved (Flanders goes to the Netherlands and a German prince ends up rulling Wallonia).
Which is what they were during the period of their OTL mid-century supremacy.
What began shattering that supremacy was a major, near-revolutionary reform in the form of the Civil Rights Act, which simply couldn’t be portrayed as an extension of existing practice to roughly 40% of the then-existing electorate.
ITTL that entire set of obstacles will not exist in any meaningful form north of Kentucky. GAW-era Refugees will become residents, their kids will become second-class citizens, and they’ll tread a path of assimilation and integration much more similar to willing immigrants (including recent ones from West Africa and the Caribbean) than OTL’s path, characterized by vigorous internal disputes between “integrationists” and “minoritarian nationalists” in the African-American community and hindered by blatant white racism.
In a nation with much stronger ethnic, patronage, and machine politics, Confederate-descended black folks will be a power bloc analogous to Polish or Italian immigrants, their relative position and opportunities for integration shored up gradually by the federal government out of a need for a narrative about how the US is better than the Confederates.
So there will be no point at which basic morality compels the Democrats to do something “radical” and shatter their urban labor-rural populist coalition.
A Bavarian Daughter in the House of Bonaparte
"...unique to the period; modest in appearance, ambition and personality as she may have been, Helmtrud had indeed created just as much of a power node around herself in Annecy as the Dowager-Empress Eugenie had in Biarritz, and Eugenie's continued physical and mental decline on the southwest coast was creating a remarkable vacuum for nobles, priests, businessmen and of course vain politicians who wanted an alternative path to influence that did not involve Poincare's rigid cabal of advisors or having to break through the wall of clergymen and other vapidly devout retainers who surrounded the Emperor like a gaggle of squawking crows.
At Annecy, Helmtrud could also more easily entertain her massive extended family, and it was at Annecy in late January of 1918 that a critical event occurred, in her own life and in European history, during the visit of her brother Prince Franz of Bavaria. Crown Prince Rupprecht, his wife and children had been at Annecy for Christmas and returned, but left Franz behind to spend the following month there, and it was there and then that Franz revealed to Helmtrud a curious thing: that he had been asked by the Kaiser of Germany, personally, to serve as minister to the Habsburg Court in Austria.
It is important to understand the relationship between Helmtrud and Franz - her brother was about a decade older than her but only recently married, to Isabella Antonie of Croy, and had always had a semi-fatherly relationship with Helmtrud due to the age gap, treating her more like daughter than sister as they got older. Though now with three (and soon to be four) children of his own, there was nonetheless still a unique closeness between the two of them that Helmtrud did not share with any of her other siblings, particularly not Rupprecht or Karl. His children were of an age with the twins, and Franz alone seemed to understand that Josephine and Louise-Amalie were not Alfie's. Most importantly, despite their eleven-year age difference, Franz trusted Helmtrud's advice, especially as he had been impressed with how she had so doggedly navigated the toxic familial politics of the House of Bonaparte and thriven in the belly of the beast, even as she withdrew often to Annecy for her own sanity.
The offer to go to Vienna was not surprising on its face. Bavarians and Austrians spoke a similar dialect of German, shared the Catholic faith, and their royal families were deeply intertwined by centuries of strategic marriages. Much like Bavarian princes had, since 1868, informally used Cambodia as a training ground for learning diplomacy and the art of war (including Franz, who had been there in the early 1900s with a deployment to China in the Boxer War in the middle), the Prussian bureaucracy in Berlin often preferred to dispatch Catholic Bavarians as diplomats to the Habsburg capitals of Vienna and Budapest due to their comfort and familiarity with that land. Franz, though a junior son of the King of Bavaria, was thus a typical envoy that someone like Kaiser Heinrich might pick, even if he personally lacked much diplomatic experience.
The ask came at a critical time in German-Austrian relations, however, which had been souring for years and had turned especially grim after Austrian Emperor Ferdinand's subtle overtures to Berlin had been bluntly rebuffed, panicking the French establishment and convincing military planners in both Paris and Vienna that "the Prussians," as they exclusively called the German government, saw both parties as so weak that it cared little for diplomacy. This had led directly to a rising sentiment at the turn of 1917 to 1918 that a war against ascendant Germany was perhaps necessary in the next few years before they fell too much further behind. Franz, a level-headed and amiable man, was to be the tip of the spear in cooling these tensions and, perhaps, extending a helping hand to the Viennese court on solving their increasingly thorny problems dealing with the Hungarian dissidents who had essentially broken constitutional governance in that realm.
Franz was unsure, though, what with his three infant children and Isabella Antonie now pregnant again. Helmtrud reassured him of his capabilities and pointed out the flattery that Kaiser Heinrich himself had picked him as an ambassador. She also noted that, despite rising tensions throughout the last two years across Europe, war seemed highly unlikely, and Franz could be a major piece of keeping it that way, not knowing how crucial his presence in Vienna in late 1918 would be to the total collapse of relations just a year later.
Historians have debated whether Helmtrud's intervention had anything to do with politics - did she want somebody she trusted in the mix in Vienna? Did she see some advantage for France in having her dear brother representing Germany? It is hard to see, but her persuasion worked. Upon returning to Munich, Franz noted to Berlin that he accepted his assignment and made preparations to head to Vienna. The die towards the Central European War was now, unbeknownst to everyone around Europe, fully cast..."
- A Bavarian Daughter in the House of Bonaparte
At Annecy, Helmtrud could also more easily entertain her massive extended family, and it was at Annecy in late January of 1918 that a critical event occurred, in her own life and in European history, during the visit of her brother Prince Franz of Bavaria. Crown Prince Rupprecht, his wife and children had been at Annecy for Christmas and returned, but left Franz behind to spend the following month there, and it was there and then that Franz revealed to Helmtrud a curious thing: that he had been asked by the Kaiser of Germany, personally, to serve as minister to the Habsburg Court in Austria.
It is important to understand the relationship between Helmtrud and Franz - her brother was about a decade older than her but only recently married, to Isabella Antonie of Croy, and had always had a semi-fatherly relationship with Helmtrud due to the age gap, treating her more like daughter than sister as they got older. Though now with three (and soon to be four) children of his own, there was nonetheless still a unique closeness between the two of them that Helmtrud did not share with any of her other siblings, particularly not Rupprecht or Karl. His children were of an age with the twins, and Franz alone seemed to understand that Josephine and Louise-Amalie were not Alfie's. Most importantly, despite their eleven-year age difference, Franz trusted Helmtrud's advice, especially as he had been impressed with how she had so doggedly navigated the toxic familial politics of the House of Bonaparte and thriven in the belly of the beast, even as she withdrew often to Annecy for her own sanity.
The offer to go to Vienna was not surprising on its face. Bavarians and Austrians spoke a similar dialect of German, shared the Catholic faith, and their royal families were deeply intertwined by centuries of strategic marriages. Much like Bavarian princes had, since 1868, informally used Cambodia as a training ground for learning diplomacy and the art of war (including Franz, who had been there in the early 1900s with a deployment to China in the Boxer War in the middle), the Prussian bureaucracy in Berlin often preferred to dispatch Catholic Bavarians as diplomats to the Habsburg capitals of Vienna and Budapest due to their comfort and familiarity with that land. Franz, though a junior son of the King of Bavaria, was thus a typical envoy that someone like Kaiser Heinrich might pick, even if he personally lacked much diplomatic experience.
The ask came at a critical time in German-Austrian relations, however, which had been souring for years and had turned especially grim after Austrian Emperor Ferdinand's subtle overtures to Berlin had been bluntly rebuffed, panicking the French establishment and convincing military planners in both Paris and Vienna that "the Prussians," as they exclusively called the German government, saw both parties as so weak that it cared little for diplomacy. This had led directly to a rising sentiment at the turn of 1917 to 1918 that a war against ascendant Germany was perhaps necessary in the next few years before they fell too much further behind. Franz, a level-headed and amiable man, was to be the tip of the spear in cooling these tensions and, perhaps, extending a helping hand to the Viennese court on solving their increasingly thorny problems dealing with the Hungarian dissidents who had essentially broken constitutional governance in that realm.
Franz was unsure, though, what with his three infant children and Isabella Antonie now pregnant again. Helmtrud reassured him of his capabilities and pointed out the flattery that Kaiser Heinrich himself had picked him as an ambassador. She also noted that, despite rising tensions throughout the last two years across Europe, war seemed highly unlikely, and Franz could be a major piece of keeping it that way, not knowing how crucial his presence in Vienna in late 1918 would be to the total collapse of relations just a year later.
Historians have debated whether Helmtrud's intervention had anything to do with politics - did she want somebody she trusted in the mix in Vienna? Did she see some advantage for France in having her dear brother representing Germany? It is hard to see, but her persuasion worked. Upon returning to Munich, Franz noted to Berlin that he accepted his assignment and made preparations to head to Vienna. The die towards the Central European War was now, unbeknownst to everyone around Europe, fully cast..."
- A Bavarian Daughter in the House of Bonaparte
A predominantly French speaking area with a German Prince, that should make it a running sore in Europe for a generation or two...
The question is whether the role of Brussels iTTL will be played by OTL Sarajevo, OTL Beirut, OTL Belfast or OTL Mogadishu...
I say a mix of Belfast and either Sarajevo or Beirut, as I don't think none of the neighboring states would want TTL's Mogadishu in their borders.