The Silver Knight, a Lithuania Timeline
- Thread starter Augenis
- Start date
What concessions did the minor powers get, i.e did Britannia get any reparations or arms to study or did they just get to say they helped take a peg off the Frogs?
Britannia acquired a higher share of Africa at the expense of France (you can compare the 1910 and 1916 maps to see the difference), so did Spain. Spain also got the rest of French Basque Country.
Sweden didn't get anything outside of promises.
This would make for a fanTASTIC basis for mini series when this timeline develops it equivalent to film and television is properly developed.
Sadly, i don't have time. Otherwise, I'd have offered contributions on Vallachia-Moldova or local colour to germania.
Both British and French historical consensus is negative on it. France, obviously, sees it as a period of struggle for independence, as they were included into the union by force and were undoubtedly the junior partner despite being the more populous and wealthier nation. Meanwhile, in Britannia, the period of French influence on English culture, language and society, as well as supposed general decadence, is not viewed lightly.
this proplby lead to a more nationalist and more unified France and Britain then our timeline.
Deleted member 97083
Now I see the ulterior motive behind this timeline. EQUATORIAL GUINEA STRONK!
Interesting idea, I didn't think of that, but it's definitely possible.
See, stuff like this is why I've opened this TL to contributions, I just can't think of everything.
Hmm... Would there be an equivalent of the League of Nations in this timeline?
Outside of Indochina, there isn't really any noticeable European influence in Asia. East Asia hasn't really had any long lasting contacts with Europe, India has elevated itself to a similar footing as the European nations, and the Middle East is Unitarian.
Hmmm.
Chapter 75: Craven New World
Part 75: Craven New World (1916-1918)
During the war, the economies of the entire world were geared completely for war. Even countries which remained neutral saw this take place - for example, the VFS and Italy saw a rapid increase in military production to satisfy mass exports to Europe, while Latin Vespucian nations shifted their focus to food and food processing due to the massive demand. And now, the war was over, and with it, the collapse of this fragile military-industrial complex arrived. Factories, witnessing enormous drops in demand and new projects, relieved employees in mass, and at the same time, millions of war veterans returned home and all joined the workforce, both of these factors creating mass unemployment. Other factors played a factor as well - the victorious Coalition witnessed a sharp increase in inflation due to Entente war reparations, which, coupled with unemployment and a drop in GDP, created a period of stagflation. Social factors created problems, too - veterans often returned bitter and radicalized, disappointment over the results of the war spread across the populace, and extreme, radical ideologies like Unitarianism were on the rise. Faced with mass domestic problems and disagreements on the fate of post-war Europe, the Baltic-Adriatic Coalition collapsed, even though many high level politicians across both Visegrad and Germania hoped to transform it into a wider and stronger body to keep peace and order across the world.
The beginning of the Republic of Lithuania was a tough one. All the economic and social problems the Empire had didn't simply go away. The Unitarian movement continued causing trouble, raising the flags of rebellion in a number of towns throughout 1916 and 1917, most importantly Riga, one of the nation's biggest ports. Large portions of the army and the former imperial administration did not recognize the legitimacy of the republican government. The provisional Council of National Restoration found it difficult to cope with all of these problems - however, despite that, it made sure to do it's best in establishing the nation's democratic institutions. On January 6th, the Christmas of 1917, the Council signed the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania, modeled after the French electoral system. The chief legislative body of the republic was the Prezidiumas (Presidium), a parliament composed of 150 local representatives, which elect the head of state of the nation - the Democrat of Lithuania. The latter title was adopted from many republics of the time, starting with the Vespucia Free State - some countries, like Russia, even set their official titles as "Democracies of" to signify that they are governed by a Democrat.
The first election to the Presidium of the Republic of Lithuania was announced almost immediately after the signing of the Constitution, although political parties were starting to form well before that. The nation was getting into the election rhythm very quickly - backstabbing and squabbling was already starting to happen. Antanas Virbalas, the provisional leader of the Republic of Lithuania due to being the chairman of the Council of National Restoration, hoped to form a united Republican movement for the election, but many of his original supporters were put off by his ideas and plans, and thus the Lithuanian Centre Party (Lietuvos centro partija) fractured into a number of movements. The republican forces faced a number of challengers from the red and the blue parts of the spectrum, where a number of Protectionist minor parties molded into the United Christians (Suvienyti krikščionys) led by Artūras Vitalgas, formerly a governor of Samogitia during the Imperial period. The Democratic Unitarians (Demokratiški junitarai) challenged the centre from the blue spectrum, while many monarchist politicians and reactionaries presented the Imperial movement, which picked Simonas Petkevičius, the former Grand Marshal of Lithuania, as their party leader. Ethnic minorities, like Jews, Slavs, Latgalians, Estonians, Ingrians and Germans presented their own movements, and while most of them gained little traction, the most powerful one was the White Russian Council (Byelorusskiy Soviet), representing Ruthenian interests and adopting the historical term "White Rus" for their movement.
As should be expected, the 1917 election was packed, and the people were excited to try democracy for the first time in their lives, resulting in a very high turnout rate.
Vincas Kudirka, chairman of the Lithuanian Unitarian Party and the leader of the blue rebellions in Vilnius and later Riga
The main parties in the young republic continued to fracture. The Centre Party continued to split along ideological lines and disintegrate, and even other, seemingly more stable parties began to crack. The Imperial movement saw many of it's most radical members, many of them war veterans, extreme nationalists and sympathizers of Purple Unitarianism, leave the party to form the extreme Revival Movement (Atgimimo sąjūdis). The leader of this party was a famous former piano virtuoso turned battle scarred veteran of the Eastern Front, Augustinas Stankevičius.
But anyway...
The events in Lithuania may be not so fine and dandy, but the focus of the world was on an entirely different region.
The Mughal Empire.
To this 400 year old empire, the Great European War was a Pyrrhic victory. Sure, they forced their main rival in the Islamic world to collapse and were finally recognized by the Europeans for their efforts, but it came at a high cost. The Great Indian Famine was only the beginning of mass economic and social problems within the nation, Hidden, forgotten, but present social strife came back to light and began to multiply, and the public calls for democracy and reform were now joined by dozens of rising nationalist movements in the Deccan, Afghanistan, Baluchistan and the recently acquired puppet nations of Burma, Persia and Khiva. The end of the war appeared as if it would solve all of the nation's immense problems, but it only signified them and strengthened them - returning war veterans were often radicalized by the events in the Ottoman Empire and the experiences in the front, and they returned to a nation full of hunger, anger and disappointment. The expected relief coming from military spending cuts never seemed to arrive - after all, maintaining order within the occupied puppet states required a lot of resources.
However, many people across the nation were fearful of a disintegration of the Empire, and this is where they got acquainted with the Indian Unitarian movement... Unitarianism in India treaded a very different path from the rest of the world. In fact, the Unitarian World Congress considered them to be traitorous and cut contacts with them. The idea espoused by the leaders of the Indian Unitarian movement, the Nijasure brothers, Sanjay and Ranjit, was that India lacked the thorough industrial "infiltration" that was common in Europe, the majority of it's population were farmers and unskilled workers, so they believed that the common "equalizing the classes to create a just and equal society" rhetoric would not work in their nation, so Indian Unitarianism focused on the "unity" part of the ideology - destroying the varna and jāti systems, creating one unified language, culture and religion for the entire subcontinent and uniting all the peoples of India and thus make it strong enough to have it carve it's rightful place in this new world. In this regard, "Nijasurism" much more resembled Purple Unitarianism, the fringe extreme nationalist distortion of the ideology, and it appealed not to industrial workers and disenfranchised classes like in the West, but to farmers, the lower castes and "untouchables", and also to those higher castes which feared to lose their positions in a disintegrated Indian subcontinent.
1917 was the year of the breakthrough. An another famine was the straw that broke the camel's back, and mass armed revolts erupted across the nation. A similar chain of events as in Turkey a few years ago followed. In the chaos, the Unitarians rallied their supporters and executed a bloodless coup in Delhi, taking over the city within hours and pretty much decapitating the imperial government, and follow-up uprisings took control of much of the Ganges Plain. However, unlike in Turkey, the Nijasure brothers avoided a bloody civil war - the popularity of the Mughal government was at it's possible lowest, and the Unitarians enjoyed wide support across the population and the armed forces. Still, many loyalists took up arms throughout this chaotic period, while others fled the nation. Many border provinces, including Afghanistan, Baluchistan and Assam, liberated themselves from their chains, while Persia, Khiva and Burma threw off their Indian yoke. Sanjay Nijasure became the first overlord of the Unified Indian State.
Flag of the Unified Indian State
The events in India came as a massive shock to the rest of the world - the Mughal Empire was one of the victors, how did it manage to fall into revolution? A beating heart of Unitarianism gave birth to itself in Western and Southern Asia.
Was the world Hegel prophesied really coming to life at last?..
Things continue to tumble...
Maybe, but the Indian resemblance to Purple Unitariaism does not paint the best sign.
I am curious to see if we will get something akin to the Cold war of OTL happening in this timeline.
At least no Spanish flu.
I don't expect Nijasurism to really work like fascism; the subcontinent is just too heterogeneous and its political culture even ITTL too remote from totalitarian mindsets. Maybe it ends up more like what OTl's 1950s Indian socialists had in mind. Or maybe the two brothers fall into dischord?
I don't expect Nijasurism to really work like fascism; the subcontinent is just too heterogeneous and its political culture even ITTL too remote from totalitarian mindsets. Maybe it ends up more like what OTl's 1950s Indian socialists had in mind. Or maybe the two brothers fall into dischord?