Look to the West Volume VIII: The Bear and the Basilisk

That specific avenue is pretty much closed off for Diversitarians though.
Is it though? I'd think that the UFP as portrayed in Star Trek, with it's "non-interference in the cultures of member worlds, even the weird shit like proxy fights to the death over mating" is most of the way there to Diversitarianism, you'd just have to show more diversity within human culture as well as without.
 
I'm going to say this again, but I feel like Societism is heavily based on The Giver.
I vaguely recall an author's note that it was distilled from all the things he didn't like worked into a cohesive ideology, with Diversitarianism created afterwards by negation but I have no idea if I actually read that or just imagined it
 
Question, but when and why did the republic of Corsica become independent? I can't find its independence from France, anywhere in the first thread.
 
It was never conquered by France, POD is before that.

It was. The French sent a different, more brutal, general to do it though, which is why the Buonaparte family fled to Britain.

Question, but when and why did the republic of Corsica become independent? I can't find its independence from France, anywhere in the first thread.

Sometimes after the French Revolution. Probably because Leo Bone convinced most of the French Navy to go with him to Britain and so the Jacobins couldn't reach the island.
 
I quite enjoyed the last chapter on societist cinematic history; it provided the sort of worldbuilding I'd been clamoring for, and these fictions-in-fictions make the LTTW world seem even more real. The only way you could top it is by filming some of this stuff for real! Also, it would be a shame if we didn't get any further details on stela navis by the time the in-universe 1950s come around. I think a lot of us want to know how much it really parallels a certain OTL show...

On a different note, I've been reading about Chinese history and philosophy lately, and some of it strangely resonates with societism. Particularly the focus on reconstructing ancient cultures has some parallel in how Chinese scholars would call back to the mythical age of the pre-Qin emperors. Beyond that, the way that Imperial Chinese sovereignty was construed, as well as the manner in which its language and administration spread to neighboring countries all seems somewhat proto-societist. They're even mentioned as a prominent source of inspiration for both Sanchez and his Alfarus-era followers. With all this in mind, I'm curious to see how the relation between China and the Combine develops. There have already been significant hints that Russian Japan will turn to the Threefold Eye, but China also seems like a nation rife with societist potential. Then again, perhaps it is the self-assured strength of Chinese traditionalism that keeps it from becoming fully Human. Some sort of Ottoman-style 'Eternal State' would be likelier. In any case, I'm hoping to see this particular connection developed further!

EDIT: Also, while I'm on the topic of the Combine, I just realized that there's likely going to be a supremely ironic discussion in the ASN after the Last War of Supremacy, as they wonder whether Combine culture and Novalatina should now themselves be considered endangered and/or worthy of preservation. Unless some significantpart of the Combine remains, there's a real 'paradox of tolerance' aspect to the question of societist existence within a diversitarian hegemony.
 
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I've been rereading Look to the West again, and something caught my eye in Volume II: one of the sources is The Pyrenean War, written by an A. V. de la Costa in 1924. Considering Spain's then-ongoing...issues, including the King of France supposedly inheriting the Spanish throne, it seems fitting that a book about a French invasion of Spain that leaves the latter in ruin is published around then.
 
Question but why did in part #47, the author said that La Perouse Disappearance was a mystery but in part #84, the author said that he was found and return to France with his own statue? was he being sarcastic or is this a retcon?

Edit: Also what was the legacy of republican France raiding on VOC trading lines?
 
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288.1

Thande

Donor
Part #288: Hate and Rockets

“Tensions continue to mount in the Indian Ocean region as Ceylonese – I’m sorry, Kandyan – forces have tested another medium-range missile, which has reportedly crashed into the ocean about twenty miles south of the Bisnagi-controlled island of Sagar. We go over to our expert on the region, retired Colonel Franklin Hemming. Colonel?”

“Thank you, Miss Jaxon. Well, yes, your viewers could be forgiven for thinking your station had started showing repeats of the news” (VO: nervous laughter) “or that they’d accidentally slapped in a cart from where they caught last month’s news after magging the big film. But joking aside, I can assure you this is happening now. The Kandyan military continues to rattle its sabre, in the form of its expanded missile arsenal, undermining the current negotiations in Baroda between Bisnaga and Kandy over resolving their disputed fishing rights.”

“I see. What do you think the – the Kandyans seek to accomplish with this? It seems as though they want the talks to fail.”

“That’s a difficult question to answer, Miss Jaxon. Kandyan politics are notoriously opaque and analysts disagree on how unified their response is. It could well be that Nayak Sampanthan is negotiating in good faith, but has less control over his army than we might imagine. We should not forget that it has been less thant twenty-five years since the Kandyan army – allegedly, that is – removed a Nayak from office against his will in a quiet coup.”

“Do you think that is a real possibility, Colonel?”

“Well, perhaps so. Certainly, there have been protests from all quarters at this missile falling so close to an island which is a holy place of pilgrimage to Hindus, a faith which the Nayak shares himself...but the Kandyan army leadership is dominated by Buddhists, who might be less careful dropping their weapons around such a site...”

– Transcription of a C-WNB News Motoscope broadcast,
recorded in Waccamaw Strand, Kingdom of Carolina, 16/04/2020​

*

(Dr David Wostyn’s note)

While those idiot rosbifs indulge in drinking themselves to death, I think this is an opportune moment to reintroduce a book we have found very useful in our previous expeditions, rather than one which we have encountered since our arrival here...

*

From “12 Inventions that Changed the World” by Jennifer Hodgeson and Peter Willis (1990):

We are cheating by including the rocket in this work, yet not strictly counting it towards our number of 12. Everyone, even a child – especially a child – is aware of the great impact that rocketry has had upon our world in the twentieth century. Yet rocket technology does not belong solely to its own field, but developed from, and in parallel with, two other inventions we have discussed: gunpowder and the aerodrome. We could even make the argument that rockets, as we know them, would have been impossible without the invention of the ypologist as well, or of modern chemistry. Rocketry therefore represents the fusion of many fields of invention and research, the whole greater than the sum of its parts but without seeking to replace them.

Despite this, rocketry is also an ancient science. The first recorded rockets were invented by the Song Dynasty of China in the thirteenth century, building on the Chinese invention of gunpowder and an interest in fireworks for display purposes. Yet it did not take long for the potential of rockets in war to become obvious, and the Song Chinese deployed incendiary rockets as a kind of fire-arrow launcher in their wars with the Mongols, as well as developing a variant for naval warfare. The Mongols, as was their wont, adopted this weapon that had been used against them, and their conquests subsequently spread early rockets to India, the Arab world, and Europe. Though somewhat useful as incendiary devices to set besieged cities alight, these early rockets were mostly seen more as entertainments and toys, with military technological advancement more focusing on conventional gunpowder-driven firearms and artillery.

Rockets would not be able to punch on the same level as conventional firearms until breakthroughs made in the Kingdom of Mysore (today part of modern Bisnaga) in the eighteenth century. The Mysoreans improved the rocket technology by using iron tube cases for the gunpowder propellent; this focused the thrust more effectively and lent the rockets much greater range (over a mile). A few Mysorean rockets were equipped with explosive warheads, but these were usually too unpredictable to be useful except as terror weapons; more commonly, rockets would be fitted with blades or solid iron tips to inflict harm more directly on their targets. Seasoned troops, inured to their mates being mown down by the clockwork death of enemy musketry or cannonballs, would panic and run at the terror inflicted by a Mysorean cushoon rocket-platoon; missiles would scream down around them, sometimes arcing unpredictably in circles, with all the arbitary death-dealing of a plague. The English troops who faced the Mysoreans during the Jacobin Wars were deeply impressed, and resolved to adopt this war technology themselves and take it back to Europe.[1]

European developments of the Mysorean rockets rapidly spread across Europe, being used extensively by Lisieux’s French Latin Republic as well as its enemies. Following the Jacobin Wars, interest continued in the further improvement of rockets for military purposes. Rocket trajectories and explosive warheads remained erratic for many years, though they continued to function effectively as terror weapons and incendiaries. Their use in naval warfare helped bring an end to the era of wooden ships, whereas armourclads proved more resistant to them.

However, rockets could potentially destroy even an armourclad if, by chance, their erratic flight happened to place them where a spark could fall through a crack into the enemy magazine and detonate it. This, as well as their use for bombardment, meant rockets were frequently used on warships throughout the nineteenth century. Most infamously, in 1851 the rockets of the American armourclad HIMS Lord Hamilton were hijacked by Howden terrorists in order to inflict the Manhattan Massacre on New York City.[2]

Rockets therefore remained deployed on ships. However, their hazardous nature meant that they were often stationed in pods or sections of a ship carefully separated from the rest (especially the magazine). This logic would continue into the twentieth century, being used on the French Conquérant super-lionheart for example. In Russia and some other countries, rather than risk placing rockets on lineships at all, specialised dentist escort ships would be equipped with rockets almost exclusively[3] to separate the dangerous weapons from the valuable lineships they guarded.

On land, one particular area of interest for rocket technology was as a counterdrome, or more precisely, counter-steerable weapon.[4] Steerables had been used to great effect by both sides of the Great American War, which in hindsight would be seen as their heyday. Up to this point, counterdrome weapons had primarily taken the form of light, long-barrelled rifled cannon like the Italian Vespa.[5] These were effective enough at short range – the original Vespa was first designed for Alpine fighting where spy steerables could be ambushed while crossing the mountains – but rapidly fell victim to the limitations of ballistics for longer confrontations. The first effective counterdrome rockets appeared after the Great American War, using incendiary warheads to ignite aquaform-filled steerable gasbags; the development of inert coronium steerables led to the use of fragmentation warheads instead to burst them.[6] Ironically, however, rockets proved even more effective as a weapon for steerables to shoot back; though their ignition could prove hazardous, carrying a small number of rockets was much more feasible than a cannon. There were even occasional air duels between steerables wielding rockets in the early part of the Pandoric War, though these rarely led to kills thanks to their inaccuracy, and would soon be obsoleted by aerodromes.

Throughout this period, the focus of research and development of rockets had been on refining the basic formula that already worked. Better ways of containing and directing the gunpowder propellent, improving on the Mysoreans’ old breakthrough; new propellent formulae, in parallel with the development of xylofortex and other new explosives; better warheads, detonators and timers. The invention of solution engines for artillery also led to their use for the more complex mathematics of rocket trajectories; unlike the unchanging mass of a cannonball or shell, a rocket posed the additional complication that its mass decreased over time as its propellent was used up.

These improvements certainly made rockets an ever more effective weapon, but they were fundamentally restrictive. Rockets made in this manner could never be anything more than a short-range weapon, which in turn meant that they never fully supplanted conventional artillery in ground warfare. They always retained a reputation of being something in parallel with conventional military forces rather than part of them, an uncomfortable cuckoo in the nest. But as the Black Twenties dawned, this was about to change forever.

There are many inventions which provide much fodder for Heritage Points of Controversy, as several inventors in different nations seem to have come close to a breakthrough around the same time. Perhaps this is just a coincidence, driven by the need that other developments need to have happened before the breakthrough becomes possible, so attempts at that breakthrough then naturally seem to cluster. Yet we feel that the more poetic interpretation – of an Idea whose Time has Come – is also valid. There is more to invention than mere metal and pseulac and mathematics. Ingenuity is not wholly rational, and oft fortune may favour the bold.

In this case, the Idea the world was waiting for was the realisation that rockets need not be powered solely by solid fuel such as gunpowder. The basic definition of a rocket is that it is a missile or vehicle powered by a combustion reaction between a fuel and an integral elluftiser, rather than using the elluftium in the air like a surge engine.[7] Up until now, rockets had used solid fuels which incorporated this elluftiser; for example, in black gunpowder this came in the form of nitre (a.k.a. saltpetre), today scientifically known as illuftate of kalium. There were certain disadvantages associated with this setup, notably that solid-fuel rockets could not be throttled up or down once started, which in term limited the ability to use them as guided weapons. (Despite this, guided solid rocket weapons have since been developed). They were also usually less efficient than the technology that was about to appear: liquid-fuel rocket engines.

This breakthrough was not as simple as it may sound on first hearing. Liquid-fuel engines are remarkably more complex than solid ones, requiring extensive tanks, pipework and pumps to funnel the liquids into the reaction chamber; usually they must mix a fuel and an elluftiser; both of these may be liquefied lufts, requiring cryogenic storage headaches as well. The pressure of the liquids must also be carefully controlled, as this can easily lead to oscillation, liquids ‘sloshing’ due to changing speed, or even an explosion. Solid rockets already had a reputation for being hazardous to work with, but research into liquid-fuel rockets would therefore see this danger increased considerably further. Therefore, it is, perhaps, small surprise that the only people willing to work on the idea in the 1910s and 1920s all seem to have been eccentric geniuses working alone.

This is, of course, a bit of an exaggeration – no lone researcher could produce rockets of the scale that eventually appeared – but is a more-or-less accurate description in the early years. Our story will naturally focus on Umberto Pazzaglia, the man whom most historiographies attribute ‘the invention of the rocket’ to. Pazzaglia was one of the heirs to a mobile manufacturing fortune, but left his older brother to run the company while focusing on his own inventive interests. After several minor contributions to aerodynamic theory at the new Technical University of Asti, Pazzaglia decided he wanted to get away from academia in order to conduct a long-term research project. Not naturally secretive, Pazzaglia was nonetheless fed up by the climate of industrial espionage he had grown up with in his father’s company, and wished to avoid inquisitive spies. In 1916 he therefore set up an extensive workshop in Sicily, a choice partly driven by his admiration for Archimedes and partly by pragmatic concerns. The Sicilian Republic was a government in which state power often rubbed shoulders with organised crime, but this did mean that anything was for sale – including privacy. Few would ask questions if gentlemen with notepads and cameras unaccountably washed up on the beach missing their heads, while Pazzaglia merrily continued his work.

As hinted above, Pazzaglia was not the only individual researching liquid-fuelled rockets at this time. He was not even the only one to seek out a testing ground at the back of beyond away from prying eyes. A remarkable similar parallel story can be seen among a number of nations at the time. America’s Edith Harrison did her experiments west of Caloosa in Carolina’s East Florida province, French-born Pérousien Benoît Campeau worked in the Arrière-pays of his adopted homeland, and Russia’s Pyotr Kolenkovsky’s rocket tests in the Yapontsi city of Ozersk infamously resulted in part of it burning down in 1923.[8] Pazzaglia was merely sufficiently fortunate to make certain breakthroughs first. His first prototype rocket, named Mercurio-3 (1 and 2 had exploded) successfully flew in September 1920. By this point, the Panic of 1917 had bitten deep on Pazzaglia’s brother’s company and he needed additional funding, turning to wealthy friends for patronage. It was by this manner that Pazzaglia’s experiments became known to Salvo Orsini, cousin of the politician Antonio Orsini.

When the better-known Orsini became Prime Minister of Italy in 1922, his cousin’s stories led him to approve a request for a little government funding. Pazzaglia had by now moved on to his Venere series of rockets; the name Mercurio had originally been chosen merely as a reference to the swift-footed messenger of the gods, but one of Pazzaglia’s increasing number of collaborators at his facility suggested working on through the planets. Like many of the liquid rocket pioneers, Pazzaglia saw the rockets not only as a potential weapon of war, or for more mundane purposes such as sending mail between continents, but a way to escape the Earth’s gravity altogether and travel into space as the scientific romantics had long written of. Such a day seemed to lie well in the future, but the planetary naming scheme was a wry reference to it. As early as March 1923, Pazzaglia’s rocket flight Venere-4 would, according to a majority of the definitions agreed by ASN member states, become the first manmade object to cross the boundary of outer space. As those definitions, of course, also lay well in the future, this was not recognised as a particular milestone or celebrated at the time (though often incorrectly portrayed as such in biopics).[9]

While Italian military observers would come to see Pazzaglia’s work in 1923, it would not be until the Two Years of Hell began in April 1924 that serious attention was devoted. The plague had undermined both Russian and allied armies in Poland, resulting in a near-static front that offensives from neither side could break. It was natural for both to turn to new weapons in an attempt to break the stalemate, and Pazzaglia’s rockets were suddenly more than a curiosity. With the improved performance of ypologetic calculations, military theorists realised, they could function to effectively put Russian military bases far behind the lines ‘in artillery range’. It was also uncomfortably observed that the same would be true of civilian targets such as cities; perhaps it is a blessing in disguise that the Shiraz Massacre had resulted in a retreat from considering such an attack before it became possible. What was valid for aerodrome bombing was also valid for this strange new world of rocket warfare.

Anibale Fioravanzo, commanding general of Italian forces in Germany and Poland, was initially sceptical of Pazzaglia’s weapons. After reluctantly leaving the front and uncomfortably travelling in a sterilised Standard Crate to make an observation himself, he was converted – but also produced warnings. Fioravanzo feared that Orsini would want a quick victory, ordering Pazzaglia’s limited number of Venere rockets equipped with warheads and immediately launched against the Russians. Fioravanzo had already seen too many innovative weapons and tactics squandered due to a desire for a quick breakthrough, after which the enemy had adapted. He therefore proposed an audacious gamble that would require Italy to hold her nerve; to stand on the defensive while Pazzaglia worked on a new rocket designed for military purposes, and producing it en masse, until the capabilities existed to strike a blow heavy enough that it would break the Russian lines permanently. In the meantime, absolute secrecy would have to be maintained.

Orsini was predictably sceptical, and Fioravanzo had to threaten to resign before he got his way. Controversially, his ‘absolute secrecy’ extended to not informing Italy’s allies, and much bad blood would occur in hindsight with France and especially Germany, who wasted men on fruitless attacks, unaware of the Italian plan or why the Italians refused to participate in those attacks. Even then, inevitably some hints and rumours leaked out of Sicily, and there is some evidence the Russians, Americans and Societists became aware of Pazzaglia’s project, though not perhaps its extent or import. The Societists in particular appear to have already been working on liquid rockets of their own (further confusing the question of who got there first). But perhaps it was Pazzaglia’s successes, as he tested the new and appropriately-named Marte (Mars) war rocket, that convinced the Societists their own researches were worth pursuing further...






[1] As previously described. This is very similar to the order of events in OTL; in OTL the British developed the Congreve rocket from the Mysorean weapon. These were used in both against the French in the Battle of Leipzig and, more famously, to bombard Baltimore’s Fort McHenry during the War of 1812 (inspiring the ‘rockets’ red glare’ in the American national anthem).

[2] See Part #192 in Volume IV. The phrasing here clearly indicates where the authors’ sympathies lie, given the ambiguity over what David Johnson’s men actually intended.

[3] Confusingly worded – they mean that the Russians mounted rockets on them instead of guns (mostly). Dentists still have other weapons such as dive bombs and steelteeth (depth charges and torpedoes) as their primary mission is to counter ironsharks (attack submarines).

[4] Because of the cumbersome term ‘counter-steerable’, almost every historian in TTL refers to anti-air weapons in this era anachronistically by the modern term ‘counterdrome’. These authors at least have the decency to note the anachronism before reverting to that term.

[5] See Interlude #18 in Volume IV. The success of the Italian weapon means ‘Vespa’ would likely have become the generic term used for all counter-steerable weapons at the time. Antonio Rizzi, the man who developed the Vespa, did actually also try using rockets to shoot down steerables (not noted here for simplicity of narrative) but without as much success.

[6] Recall that aquaform and coronium are the terms in TTL for hydrogen and helium, respectively.

[7] Surge engine is the term used in TTL for jet engine. Recall that elluftium means oxygen.

[8] Caloosa is OTL Fort Lauderdale, FL; the Arrière-pays is the Pérousien term for what we would call the Australian outback; Ozersk is the Russian appellation for a Japanese city known in OTL as Nagahama (the one in Shiga Prefecture on the shores of Lake Biwa).

[9] Opinions on the arbitrarily defined boundary of outer space have also varied in OTL, with the two most common definitions now being the Kármán Line of 100 kilometres or 62 miles above Earth’s mean sea level, and the United States’ definition of 50 miles or 80 kilometres above it. (Their later adoption means some US pilots flying high-flight experimental planes were later retroactively recognised as technically astronauts). Both definitions are derived from Theodore von Kármán’s original attempt at calculating the point at which a vehicle would need to travel faster than orbital velocity to gain sufficient aerodynamic lift to support itself. However, in reality this varies on the atmospheric conditions, meaning there is no strictly correct definition. In TTL, it is something of a point of pride that every major nation defines space slightly differently (in part so they can disagree over claiming various ‘firsts’), with the most common definitions being France’s at 25 French leagues (97.5 OTL kilometres or 58.5 miles), America’s at 55 miles, Russia’s at 100 versts (106.7 OTL kilometres or 64 miles) and Italy’s at 50 miglia or Neapolitan miles (57.4 OTL miles or 91.8 kilometres). Italy being ranked among the others is a point of globally recognised pride due to their space pioneering heritage rather than a measure of modern relevance. The Societists, of course, also have their own system...
 

Thande

Donor
Thanks for the comments everyone as always - I will respond to some of those above when I get a chance. In the meantime, I had my second Oxford/AZ vaccine jab a few days ago, so I've run through my buffer while recovering from the side effects (fortunately minor) and will now knuckle down to writing more LTTW so we don't run out!

In the meantime, thanks to everyone who's bought a copy of Volume V (see sig, shameless plug) and I hope you are enjoying it. A reminder that if you have Amazon Prime, you can read LTTW books on Amazon for free through the Kindle KENP or whatever it's called programme, and I still get royalties for that (in fact a big share of my revenue from LTTW comes from this source, due to it being calculated as pages read and, um, I write a lot of pages...)
 
In TTL, it is something of a point of pride that every major nation defines space slightly differently (in part so they can disagree over claiming various ‘firsts’), with the most common definitions being France’s at 25 French leagues (97.5 OTL kilometres or 58.5 miles), America’s at 55 miles, Russia’s at 100 versts (106.7 OTL kilometres or 64 miles) and Italy’s at 50 miglia or Neapolitan miles (57.4 OTL miles or 91.8 kilometres). Italy being ranked among the others is a point of globally recognised pride due to their space pioneering heritage rather than a measure of modern relevance. The Societists, of course, also have their own system...
This somehow reads way more ominously than I can imagine it deserving. Like, you can't concoct a plot against the nations of the world on the basis of "we have different semantics of outer space"... or can you?
 
This somehow reads way more ominously than I can imagine it deserving. Like, you can't concoct a plot against the nations of the world on the basis of "we have different semantics of outer space"... or can you?
I think it's referring to the Societists' system of measurement, which I don't think has been developed (or at least revealed to us) yet.
 
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