Es Geloybte Aretz - a Germanwank
- Thread starter carlton_bach
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Wow. Lot of ominous notes being sounded.
I think that might be sarcasm on their part.
I think that might be sarcasm on their part.
The gold is still missing. The Czech legion has dispersed. The Russians caught a few and shot them as deserters (impalement was mooted, but soldiers don't do that to comrades). For some reason, none of them were reported to be carrying any gold on their persons by the arresting troops. More disappeared without a trace along the way, in the Caucasus passes or the highlands of northern Persia. About two thirds made it into civilisation, and most of them carried significant amounts of gold. The best organised - altogether maybe two hundred, mostly running in groups of 5-10 people - brought out serious wealth. But even so, there was no way they could carry off seventy tonnes of gold between them.
reality is complicated and will not be pieced together for years to come. The Legion used about fifty kilogrammes of gold in their diversion and made off with roughly ten tonnes when they abandoned the train. Before doing so, they buried several caches amounting to another 10 tonnes altogether along the railway line, hoping to get back there after the end of the war. Many men then buried their own treasures after they found they couldn't carry nearly as much as they had loaded themselves with.
About fifty tonnes were left with the train (much of it actually hidden in ravines and under rocks rather than in the railcars, for no reason other than that's what you do). Locals found it and helped themselves before reporting the train to the authorities. Police and military authorities secured further quantities of gold, reporting back to their respective ministries and commands. The parlous state of communication and the venality of officialdom meansthat while the Russian government knows roughly who made off with their gold and where they left it, they don't know how much of it is still there or who currently has it. Ultimately, a concerted search will recover about twenty tonnes befopre someone realises putting in the effort just to give it to the Germans is absolutely fucking pointless and call it off. Treasure tourism in the area will continue to generate revenues for locals well into the next century.
Well, there was a slight problem with that. Altogether, he was among the better chancellors nonetheless. Not comparable to Caprivi, but a solid mediocrity.
The Ottoman Empire is an amazing place full of obliging officials and helpful merchants who can provide anything for a modest fee: American passports, fashionable wardrobe, travel guides, armed escorts, tickets to Constantinople or Sinop, Basra or Aden, and onwards to Bombay, Shanghai, and San Francisco, or to Suez, Brindisi, Liverpool, and New York.
Faeelin
Banned
A couple of questions:
1) Is the longtime female companion her, uh... companion?
2) I wonder. I'm not going to get political, but it seems like modern Russia has shown the possible benefit of a far right movement in one country propping up useful idiots in others. Think of it as the mirror of the Comintern, showing what a united faithful people can do.
3) "Ultimately, a concerted search will recover about twenty tonnes before someone realises putting in the effort just to give it to the Germans is absolutely fucking pointless and call it off." I burst out laughing.
4) The last post, perversely, gives me hope for Poland.
1) Is the longtime female companion her, uh... companion?
2) I wonder. I'm not going to get political, but it seems like modern Russia has shown the possible benefit of a far right movement in one country propping up useful idiots in others. Think of it as the mirror of the Comintern, showing what a united faithful people can do.
3) "Ultimately, a concerted search will recover about twenty tonnes before someone realises putting in the effort just to give it to the Germans is absolutely fucking pointless and call it off." I burst out laughing.
4) The last post, perversely, gives me hope for Poland.
1) I read it as male companion (aka wilde Ehe)...or was this established earlier. If the companion is indeed a "companion" von Forster should broaden her horizons. Even if they are already broad by the standards of the time.
2) ITL Russias problem is that almost everybody hates them. The Mitteleuropeans and Ottomans for being their sworn enemy, the French for being faithless, the Americans for being barbarians and the Japanese for sitting on Siberia. That leaves the Brits. Who will not engage in a two way fight against the USA and Germany. Or a one way fight against Germany for that matter.
3)
Same here.4) Felix and Karol are both intelligent, knowing that their list of enemies is longer than their list of friends. That said, they both probably know that their best chance at glories, lands and money is to play lancer to the germans. If Felix is extremly devious, he'll try and get III into NSB hands. That could be fun. Especially if they form some sort of federation 80 years later and discover that there is no german secret service, there is just the polish one masquerading as germans.
I got the impression that the companion was female.
Anyway, regardless: excellent writing.
Anyway, regardless: excellent writing.
As per OTL - probably. Those who talk don't know, and those who knew didn't talk.
Integralism is going to be a very influential political philosophy abroad. Even in Germany. It can't last forever, but in real terms what they achieved (and even more so what they stand to achieve) is impressive. This is a world that doesn't have Bolshevism as its comparative foil, so Integralism (Russian, Chinese and Japanese) will be viewed as the only system that managed to drag a peasant culture into the industrial age.
Dzerzhinski is a patient and flexible man. He will do fine under any regime that lets him do his thing, and he will provide a useful counterweight to the monarchist, clericalist and ethno-nationalist factions in the next sejm. .
Breaking open Russia's political isolation is a task for the next decades. It will work, in the end, but like anything in a multipolar system, not as well as they hoped.
That would be fun, but IIIb isn't that bad. He will get a kind of symbiotic relationship going, though, likie the British and US services have. Sharing intelligence and developing a kind of instinctive trust (to the extent anyone in that line of work trusts anyone).
My bad, I should looked her up.
Just so I get my facts straight: III is Aufklärung (Reconnaisance) and IIIb is Politics (Military spooks, basically). This leads me to wonder when Germany will form a civil intelligence service akin to the NSB or if intelligence work will stay the domain of military and diplomats for the time being.
They will, eventually. IIIb is inadequate and the political police forces of the states are disparate and poorly networked. It will, however, take a change in the constitution to enable the formation of the Reichspolizei (Reipo) which will be charged with combating subversion and terrorism as well as running its own counterintelligence operations. Foreign intelligence will stay in the hands of the Generalstab, though the navy, the air force, the foreign office and the economy ministry will be running their own programmes.
I do not really regret to announce that this timeline will again be subject to reduced posting frequency owing to a birth in the immediate family.
I do feel a bit sorry for my regular readers. But not regretful.
I do feel a bit sorry for my regular readers. But not regretful.
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