The Silver Knight, a Lithuania Timeline

[Crying]

Hmm... what were those people wearing in the vision? Blue armbands, wasn't it?

 

[Augenis]

Hmm... what were those people wearing in the vision? Blue armbands, wasn't it?

Hmmm

no, not really

 

[Crying]

Hmmm

no, not really

You're right, they were waving blue flags not wearing blue armbands. Silly me.

My point stands, though.

 

[Russian]

Lithuanians - in reality, they were far more like the equivalent of the Vikings in the 13th century. Raiders, looters, conquerors, basically what happens if you place an Early Medieval state in a Late Medieval environment.

That's what I was talking about while speaking about the 'Ruthenians' and the 'Lithuanians'.
I don't believe in their relationships as 'one big happy family' - too good to be true.
Those are the conquered and the conquerors. Like you said.

 

[Augenis]

That's what I was talking about while speaking about the 'Ruthenians' and the 'Lithuanians'.
I don't believe in their relationships as 'one big happy family' - too good to be true.
Those are the conquered and the conquerors. Like you said.

We'll see how things pan out.

 

[MagicalPhantom345]

To some, especially the aristocracy and the more reactionary parts of the masses, the Great German Revolution and the wars that proceeded after it were a time of horror. They would point to revolutionary terror under Maximilian Schwarzburg and the millions dead in the battlefields across Central Europe as proof of the dangers of radicalism and radical changes. This was the ideology of Protectionism, and it's primary ideologues was the French writer, entrepreneur and political figure Emmanuel de Tassigny. de Tassigny was a businessman from Wallonia and watched in terror as the German Revolutionary Army marched across the Rhine and beyond, spreading it's ideology across Central Europe. In his "Contemplations about the German Rebelllion", he wrote that "revolution and rebellion are, by nature, only destructive and counterproductive - within those events, radicalism thrives, and it always leaves blood in it's wake". It is in this book that he formulated the primary ideas of Protectionism, that in some shape or form have survived until this day: "protecting the old structures of society from dangers; moderate, calculated reform with as many positives and as little negatives; mutual trust between the government and the people". It is why the symbol of this ideology is a shield - it sees itself as a means of defense against radicalism.

Red and purple are considered to be primary colors of Protectionism, and while there have been many attempts to explain the reasoning for this pallet with symbolism, the main reason for adopting these colors was the French Red Party, one of the first political movements in Europe to adopt this ideology.

Tassigny's ideology has the most valids arguments for me because all that revolutionary nosense doesn't guarantee the fact they the revolutionaries themselves won't become a new oligarchy, like it does in OTL Venezuela currently.

 

[Augenis]

Tassigny's ideology has the most valids arguments for me because all that revolutionary nosense doesn't guarantee the fact they the revolutionaries themselves won't become a new oligarchy.

You could be a conservative

 

[MagicalPhantom345]

You could be a conservative

I would think passive reformist would be a better way of describing my standing since it was pointed out
that Canada is currently in a place that the original Bolsheviks only ever dreamed of.

And it was achieved through peaceful reform and non violent galvanizing of the Administration.
Which is how Canada became the first country to legalize Gay marriage.

 

[Augenis]

I would think passive reformist would be a better way of describing my standing since it was pointed out
that Canada is currently in a place that the original Bolsheviks only ever dreamed of.

And it was achieved through peaceful reform and non violent galvanizing of the Administration.
Which is how Canada became the first country to legalize Gay marriage.

Well, in OTL, the original Conservative ideology proposed slow, calculated reforms instead of the radical revolution that was happening in France at the moment, like, for example, Edmund Burke.

 

[MagicalPhantom345]

Well, in OTL, the original Conservative ideology proposed slow, calculated reforms instead of the radical revolution that was happening in France at the moment, like, for example, Edmund Burke.

Is that a fact. Then Burke and men of his era are rolling in their grave for the Conservative ideology having evolved into being about halting or even reversing reforms.

 

[Rheinbund]

Interesting chapter, but i didn't see European started to colonise in east india or France took some colony in Africa for eastern trade (as Albreda OTL) it's normal ?

 

[Salvador79]

If Theodore Weber is alt-Marx, he's certainly much more simple-minded. Not saying that that wouldn't work, too. In fact, it's a weird thing of OTL that the ideology most avowed to the interests of the common man is also the intellectually most sophisticated and challenging one.

 

[generalurist]

Tassigny's ideology has the most valids arguments for me because all that revolutionary nosense doesn't guarantee the fact they the revolutionaries themselves won't become a new oligarchy, like it does in OTL Venezuela currently.

Interestingly though many of such "peaceful reforms" are only permitted to happen by the elite because there are a bunch of angry people who WOULD turn revolutionary any moment if they didnt' get those reforms.

EDIT: Sooo... Unitarianism = OTL socialism, "Purple Unitarianism" = National Socialism?

 

[MagicalPhantom345]

Interestingly though many of such "peaceful reforms" are only permitted to happen by the elite because there are a bunch of angry people who WOULD turn revolutionary any moment if they didnt' get those reforms.

EDIT: Sooo... Unitarianism = OTL socialism, "Purple Unitarianism" = National Socialism?

Although doubtful it will go the way it did OTL

 

[Augenis]

Sooo... Unitarianism = OTL socialism, "Purple Unitarianism" = National Socialism?

Sort of, maybe. National Syndicalism might be a better fit for how Purple Unitarianism works, in my opinion.

Unitarianism is also somewhat different from Socialism by the fact that it's a lot more nihilistic. Whereas Marx envisioned a society where everyone is equal, well off and lives happily ever after, Weber imagines a world which is basically turned into a giant anthill and every citizen turned into a cog in such hyper-efficient machine.

If Theodore Weber is alt-Marx, he's certainly much more simple-minded. Not saying that that wouldn't work, too. In fact, it's a weird thing of OTL that the ideology most avowed to the interests of the common man is also the intellectually most sophisticated and challenging one.

It's also interesting to note that in this TL, it would be the Unitarians who pull the "our ideology is human nature" card, as Weber's primary argument for Unitarianism is basically "this is how nature works, and humans would have also been like that if it weren't for capitalism".

 

[MagicalPhantom345]

It's also interesting to note that in this TL, it would be the Unitarians who pull the "our ideology is human nature" card, as Weber's primary argument for Unitarianism is basically "this is how nature works, and humans would have also been like that if it weren't for capitalism".

Seems more comparable to the Grassroots political movement

 

[Pempelune]

Sort of, maybe. National Syndicalism might be a better fit for how Purple Unitarianism works, in my opinion.

Unitarianism is also somewhat different from Socialism by the fact that it's a lot more nihilistic. Whereas Marx envisioned a society where everyone is equal, well off and lives happily ever after, Weber imagines a world which is basically turned into a giant anthill and every citizen turned into a cog in such hyper-efficient machine.


It's also interesting to note that in this TL, it would be the Unitarians who pull the "our ideology is human nature" card, as Weber's primary argument for Unitarianism is basically "this is how nature works, and humans would have also been like that if it weren't for capitalism".

Well
This is basically fascism.

 

[Augenis]

Well
This is basically fascism.

Well, yeah, there are similarities.

Though one difference makes it set apart: Standard Unitarianism (i.e. not Purple) is internationalist and often outright opposed to the idea of a nation-state and ethnic nationalism. After all, it seeks to tear down all differences between individuals, not just class or wealth boundaries. This also makes Unitarianism anti-religion, because, well, religious differences are also in opposition to this utopia.

I hope to finish the next chapter tomorrow.

 

[MagicalPhantom345]

Though one difference makes it set apart: Standard Unitarianism (i.e. not Purple) is internationalist and often outright opposed to the idea of a nation-state and ethnic nationalism. After all, it seeks to tear down all differences between individuals, not just class or wealth boundaries. This also makes Unitarianism anti-religion, because, well, religious differences are also in opposition to this utopia.

It's unrealistic to think that it's possible to eliminate ethic cultures since there will be fierce backlash at such a thing.

 

[Augenis]

Special Chapter

Rise from the Ashes - Visegrad in the 19th Century
​

After the end of the German Revolutionary Wars, it appeared as if Visegrad's days are numbered. This formerly great nation was turned into a battleground between Lithuania and Germania, it was heavily ruined by the fighting and the liberal rebellions and it lost it's former glory. It's no surprise that Grand Hetman Pacas even once proposed partitioning this federated state between Germania, Lithuania and the Ottomans - but his ideas did not come to fruition, and the Union of the Three Crowns was reestablished with King Franciszek (Francis) I as the new ruler. Franciszek inherited an unstable nation - mere years before, all three of it's main pieces were separated, the economy has been turned to shreds and the country is now dominated by foreign powers. However, Franciszek was also an enlightened and educated man, he had formerly served in the Vespucian Liberty Legion and later travelled across Europe to meet with numerous high-profile figures, including Emmanuel de Tassigny, Maximilian Robespierre and even Maximilian Schwarzburg himself. This gave the people of Visegrad some hopes in his rule, however, soon after his coronation, he declared that he "is no Messiah, only a man with an idea".

Franciszek I von Luxemburg, King of Poland, Bohemia and Hungary
​

One of the first things the new monarch did was call Visegrad's first Constitutional Convention to determine the nation's future, and it gathered in Prague in 1771. Franciszek I was sympathetic to Republicanism, although he did not wish to lose his crown over it, and he hoped to appease all sides in the debate. After two years of negotiations, during which the Convention was almost cancelled twice due to stiff competition between the Republicans and the Protectionist aristocracy, the biggest result of the Convention was ratified - Europe's first lasting constitution, the Constitution of June 4th. It established Visegrad as a constitutional monarchy, with the King ruling as a figurehead (although with available emergency powers in face of political collapse), while the civilian government formed by a parliament, the so-called Convention of Three Nations, formed out of representatives from all three constituent kingdoms. Hungary, Bohemia and Poland had their own separate parliaments, which dealt with local matters and the interests of the their kingdom in the overarching union. The Constitution guaranteed a number of liberal reforms, including the extension of suffrage to all free male citizens, the right for all citizens to take up in business and crafts, religious and cultural freedom and a number of other rights and freedoms, a mirror of the ideas of the Enlightenment. Franciszek I managed to convince both the Lithuanians and the French that the events in Visegrad are not the beginning of a revolution, but rather "reforms from above".

The political reform in Visegrad ended up carrying a huge impact in it's future development - much like in Vespucia, Republican style freedoms and rights laid the foundation for a strong and stable system that rejuvenated economic and cultural life in the nation. For outsiders, it appeared like Visegrad was rising like a phoenix - throughout the last decades of the 18th century and the first half of the 19th century, it went through a massive economic and population boom, it became one of the first in Central and Eastern Europe to adopt the developments of the Industrial Revolution, and regions like Bohemia, Central Hungary and Silesia even went as far as to reach standards of living similar or even equal to that of Western European cities. The Visegradian Industrial Revolution would have been almost impossible, however, without the discovery of the vast coal deposits in Upper Silesia during the beginning of the 19th century, followed by the beginning of the exploitation of silver, iron and copper deposits across Poland, Bohemia and Transylvania, and these resources paved the way for the creation of a strong heavy industry in the nation. Visegrad became a net steam engine exporter, it was no longer reliant on foreign coal and steel, while new "boomer towns" like Katowice, Czestochowa, Ostrava and Timisoara were rapidly cropping up. The culture of the nation also reached a new high - Visegrad became a center of Romanticism, especially Prague, which gained the nickname "Paris of the East" for it's past, gorgeou skyline and impact on the nation's culture.

Franciszek I died in 1809, leaving a legacy that would change Visegrad's future for the next 100 years, and beyond, but Visegrad's rebirth continued even after his successors took the helm of the country. As time went on, the federation was starting to stretch it's muscles in foreign affairs as well. It fought a brief war against the Ottoman Empire in 1834, which ended with Bosnia's incorporation into Visegrad and the beginning of the Ottoman Empire's agonizing decline. In this war, Visegradian technological and leadership superiority easily showed, and for some, especially for Lithuania, it was hard to believe that this divided, collapsing nation was reestablishing itself as a great power. Visegrad found an ally in the form of South Germania, an another constitutional monarchy with strong Republican tradition, but while this was taking place, the ancient Visegradian-Lithuanian rivalry for the control of Central Europe had been reinvigorated.

Like a phoenix, Visegrad rose from the ashes, but what happens when your enemies would much rather prefer you in ash?..

---

The name of the next chapter will be a reference to a (somewhat) famous AH.com timeline.

Are you guys enjoying this series of special chapters?