DBWI: Alternative Brides for the Japanese Royals (Collaborative TL)

[Jaenera Targaryen]

One of the more curious aspects of the 'modern' League of Three Emperors were the marriages of the past two generations of Japanese royals. The Dowager Empress was born Grand Duchess Svetlana Alexeyevna Romanova, daughter to Tsar Alexei II of Russia, while the Empress was born Princess Cecilia Viktoria von Preussen, daughter of Emperor Louis I of Germany.

My question is, what alternative brides could either the Heisei and Reiwa Emperors have taken? Keep in mind the political aspects of the marriages, both internationally and domestically. Remember that then-Crown Prince Akihito's marriage to Grand Duchess Svetlana was especially controversial, despite decades of excellent Russo-Japanese relations dating back to the 1920s, as it went against over a thousand years of limiting Japanese royal marriages to a closed circle of clans in the Japanese Court.

 

[ASUKIRIK]

. Remember that then-Crown Prince Akihito's marriage to Grand Duchess Svetlana was especially controversial, despite decades of excellent Russo-Japanese relations dating back to the 1950s, as it went against thousands of years of limiting Japanese royal marriages to a closed circle of clans in the Japanese Court.

That Crown Prince Akihito and Grand Duchess Svetlana is themselves a tale of a Love Match during their stay at Berlin (then Prince Akihito attended Prussian Military Academy while Princess Svetlana also stayed there for her education). Remember that they don't even recognize each other as royals before, with them initially introducing themselves under their pseudonyms (Akihito pretended to be just a son of a Japanese officer, and Svetlana pretended to be just a daughter of a Russian businessman).

It was after Tsar Alexei ordered the Japanese boyfriend of his daughter to be investigated (and then revealed as the Japanese Crown Prince all along), that the scandal blown out of proportion, to the point that Prince Akihito almost send his request to be removed from Japanese Imperial Succession, that is, Emperor Hirohito pointed out about there is no rule regarding of the nationality of the future Empress, only that she must be of sufficiently highborn in status (and daughter of the Ruling Royal Family of Russia definitely fit the definition, which ironically bypassed most Japanese nobility anyway).

The Romanovs themselves turned out to be pleasantly surprised by this development, and as the Princess is the youngest daughter of Tsar Alexei (with two married elder brothers), there is little to no chance that she or her descendants will end up inheriting Russian throne, so far and now, with the Tsar Boris having five sons and three daughters, they are just further behind in line.

To seek an alternative bride for then Crown Prince Akihito would be spitting on their beautiful romance story, immortalized by the (2014 production) film "1000 days at Berlin", which detailed the romance between "Josuke Tojo" and "Natasha Ilyovich" (their pseudonyms). The old Emperor and Empress even attended the first airing, commemorating their 60 years of marriage. Even if it was controversial back then (with the Empress being Orthodox Christian and such), today it was regarded as the Romance of the 20th century.

 

[Jaenera Targaryen]

*scratches head*

Well, on a more practical note, the marriage did bring plenty of benefits to the Japanese Imperial Family. The 1000+ years of cousin marriages between the Imperial House and the Fujiwara Clan had made them something of Habsburg-lites, but the fresh Romanov (and later on Hohenzollern) blood has made the retired Emperor's children and grandchildren the healthiest and most physically impressive among the Japanese royals. Though Alexei himself is partly to thank for that. While he himself was hemophiliac, the disease stopped with him, and was not passed onto his children.

 

[ASUKIRIK]

Though Alexei himself is partly to thank for that. While he himself was hemophiliac, the disease stopped with him, and was not passed onto his children.

Quite ironically, then Tsarevich Alexei himself married a Dutch Princess Juliana, twin sister of King Julius of the Netherlands, which was pretty much a political marriage to encircle Germany in events of Kaiser Wilhelm II the Senile tried anything funny (not that anyone would not understand, being a monarch who lived until 109 years old with relatively good physical health is one hell of an achievement).

But yeah, the Old, Senile Kaiser Willy is the one who ordered all funny things in Germany back then, like when he ordered an essentially random street artist from Vienna a job of painting the Reichstag Walls with epic murals from Norse Mythology (Adolf Hitler is just an upjumped, talentless artist, I told you!), but he also responsible for relaxing the restrictions of marriage of the nobility too...

 

[Jaenera Targaryen]

Yeah, that alliance was pretty much ironic, considering the Dutch later allied themselves with Russia and Germany against the Entente during the Second Great War. As if oft said in sporting events, Flanders and Brussels are Netherlands

EDIT: And don't diss Opa Willy's reputation: sure, it was mixed, but he was the one who pushed the German space program to its greatest achievements. The first artificial satellite. The first man in space. The first Lunar impactor probes. The Freya landers sent to Venus. The first men and first permanent settlement on the Moon. There's a reason that last is called Neue Wilhelmshaven, after all.

 

[Dolan]

And don't diss Opa Willy's reputation: sure, it was mixed, but he was the one who pushed the German space program to its greatest achievements. The first artificial satellite. The first man in space. The first Lunar impactor probes. The Freya landers sent to Venus. The first men and first permanent settlement on the Moon. There's a reason that last is called Neue Wilhelmshaven, after all.

Opa Willy is immortalized by everyone referring to the first two-thirds of 20th century as the Wilhelmine Era, but yeah, he is quite a controversial figure in his days and even after.

His notable refusal to give up smoking (and becoming a Centenarian at that, who died without clear medical cause in his sleep), while flaunting his cigars everywhere, ended up causing the German monarchy to be the posterboys of Smokers everywhere, to the point that Kaiser Louis, his grandson and successor, caused a scandal when he STOPPED SMOKING in 1990s (because Smoking has become one of the chief German men's identity at that point).

And let's also remember that, before all the Satellite lending revenues coming, Opa Willy was derided as a senile fool for almost bankrupting Germany, Russia, and Japan's coffers with him "scamming" the other two Empires to help financing the Space Program. But yeah, once the sattelite, GPS, and various other telecommunication revenues started coming in due to the Three Empires' monopoly of Space, Opa Willy was then landed as a visionary instead of a madman.

 

[Jaenera Targaryen]

Or lunar and asteroid mining, as of late. The tree huggers might moan and gripe about 'despoiling the Moon's pristine environment' and whatnot, but there's much money to be made.

Though it has allowed the Americans to catch up, with their Eagle-series solar sail prospector craft, specifically-designed for long-duration trips to the belt.

 

[Dolan]

Or lunar and asteroid mining, as of late. The tree huggers might moan and gripe about 'despoiling the Moon's pristine environment' and whatnot, but there's much money to be made.

Though it has allowed the Americans to catch up, with their Eagle-series solar sail prospector craft, specifically-designed for long-duration trips to the belt.

Asteroid minings are not really there yet, the cost is still high and American companies were involved to help sharing the burden of Asteroid and Mars explorations.

The Moon though, is legally owned by German, Russian, and Japanese ownership, with the Germans owning the third side closest (and always facing) Earth, with Russian and Japan owning the West and East sides, partially away from Earth. There has been talks of the British and American wanting to bought their own Moon Land, though, but the sheer profits of Rare Metals mined there made the three Empires to refuse the proposal.

 

[ASUKIRIK]

There has been talks of the British and American wanting to bought their own Moon Land, though, but the sheer profits of Rare Metals mined there made the three Empires to refuse the proposal.

It's THE SCAM OF THE CENTURY until Telecommunications, low-g manufacturing and synthesis, rare metals mining profits, as well as the prestige of course, started to pay off handsomely to the investors, then it's the Franco-British bloc's time to panic as theirs tried to salvage the situation by causing The Second Great War, only for Germany to initiate "PROJEKT-RAGNAROK", resulting in total destruction of France due to orbital bombardment (by the "ridiculous" weapon system that is basically dumb space rocks guided by simple guidance systems). Britain was lucky that they managed to surrender quickly enough that they were spared of further destruction, but not so with France (and Belgium, unfortunately).

To be really fair, though, Germany's Projekt-Ragnarok has achieved the intended goal, which is proving that the control of the ultimate high ground means simple guidance systems strapped on what are basically large, dumb space rocks, could result in such destruction with so little cost being involved (even if 75% of meteorite rocks thrown down to France basically burned out in the atmosphere, and their accuracy is ridiculously low, remember that the Germans actually targetted Brittany and Marseille, but it caused French-wide destruction in the end). The Ragnarok of 1984 also basically made the League of Three Emperors realized that any sort of infighting between them would only end up in mutual destruction (because Russia and Japan also had similar weapons already in place), and thus, agreed to basically help rebuild France to show their good intention for humanity.

Seriously though, "The Ragnarok" is the only large-scale use of kinetic bombardment against other nations, and it basically permanently broke French morale with that biblical scale of destruction involved. No wonder everyone is now trying to be extremely civil with the Three Empires.