Chapter 25: Messy Mexico (1680-1690)
The highlight of the last chapter was the adoption of Naval ideas to unlock the Supply Convoys Policy . It also featured expansion into distant lands like Korea and Mexico. It ended with war with Gurkanis, the largest remaining independent nation. A side peace in that war netted Denmark the province of Taiz in YEmen, which would eventually end up as part of Sheba.
Then Denmark gained her latest Colonial Nation in America, in the region of Mexico . It was called Christian in honor of Christian the Great. This was clearly intended as retort to the very large French Louisiana next door.
Considering the relative strength of France and Denmark, it would stand to reason that Christiana was going to surpass her neighbor. But , as we shall see, things can sometimes turn out in "paradoxical" ways.
Meanwhile, in the Gurkani war , Denmark knocked out Kilwa from the war, taking off a few provinces to Sudafrica.
Slowly but surely , the once powerful Kilwa was being whittled down to nothing. Similarly, Gurkani ally Bengal lost land to Burma
And finally, the great land annexation happened at the expense of Gurkani. Denmark annexed a large amount of land , which she transferred- after concentrating development in London - to her vassals Bactria and Sheba .
The peace resulted in Gurkani losing a lot of their coastline, with their last ports on the Persian Gulf being in the Mashriqi culture provinces . Since these were slated to go to Georgia eventually, they were not taken in this war yet. But having a diminishing Gurkani navy was going to facilitate future troop transport in times of war , particularly that the Suez canal was nearing completion .
Denmark took advantage of the peace to break vassalization with Otomo, triggering a 5-year truce. that means war for Kyoto could happen again in 1686 or so.
In addition to Denmark's rapid expansion thanks to her own efforts, she also benefited from the occasional successful war by a colonial nation. And in the case of Swedish Brazil, it was a nice stomping of Portuguese Brazil that took place.
But those independent colonial wars were not always likely to succeed, and when Canada declared war on New Pangea, Denmark intervened to prevent loss of land by her subject.
During the peace lull, the annexation of Colonia was begun. Then war was declared on the next largest nation after Gurkani, namely Yue
It was obvious by then that Denmark's strategy in picking enemies was to go after the largest nation that did not have a truce [common strategy for world conquest]. And here it was convenient that Yue was allied to Korea whose lands Denmark wanted for herself, and also conveniently there were a lot of troops in Korea already .
While the Emperor's attention was focused on Asia, the integration of Colonia was completed, and Denmark gained a second CN in Mexico, confusingly named "Colonial Mexico". But that happy news was overtaken by the plight of Christiana, the first CN in Mexico.
You see, Christiana was born from former Aztec land after they were defeated by Denmark. That meant that the Aztecs did not have a truce with Christiana , and were free to declare a reconquest war on her. Which they did. But because Denmark had a truce with Aztec, the Emperor Christian could not Enforce a White Peace. And to declare war on Aztec, he had to break the truce, something he was loath to do . So , for now, all he could do was send monetary help to the beleaguered colony .
He then refocused his attention on Asia. And during the war with Yue, Naval ideas were completely adopted by Denmark.
That had two salutary effects. First, it enabled Denmark to confirm her Thalassocracy, gaining another merchant. Second, and more importantly, it allowed adoption of the Supply Convoys policy. This immediately improved the liberty desire of Denmark's vassals , as predicted by Niels the Mad's calculations.
Christian's attention was then drawn yet again to the New World, where Canada declared war on New Sweden. And this time he was unable to Enforce Peace due to the New Swedes not having a great opinion of their indirect overlord [the automatic diplomat does not improve with subjects of subjects]. But at least he could help New Sweden by declaring war on Canada, who was not protected by a truce.
With all the might of the multiple colonial nations in the region ( I counted 6 - Newfoundland, Breton Canada, Pangean Canada, New Pangea, New Azorea, New Atlantis) , he did not need to pay attention to that war and he let the colonials handle it. And in a brief period of time, Canada was made to cede provinces to the various colonials
Back in Asia, the island of Formosa was unified under East Asia with the full annexation of Tungqing, and then Korea ceded her North East to Denmark, leaving only the southern areas independent, while Malay gained a couple of Khmer provinces and Eastasia gained a few Qi provinces.
The annexation of so much land was costly in Diplomatic power, but enlarged Denmark herself quite a bit, keeping her growth on pace with that of her many vassals.
After that, yet again, the Emperor's attention was drawn to the New World, but this time with the dire news of the end of the Aztec-Christiana war with full annexation of Christian, and the sacrifice of its ruling family to the savage Nahuatl
The horror of that peace treaty shocked the sensibilities of the court in London. The proud Danish Empire - global, cosmopolitan, tolerant- was humiliated by heathen savages. Furthermore, seeing the name "Louisiana" emblazoned in large letters on the map with no Christiana next to it added insult to the injury. Emperor Christian almost declared a revenge war in anger, but then held his impulse and decided to wait for the truce to end. But he vowed that the Aztec empire will meet its demise sooner rather than later, even if it meant that all of it ended up under Colonial Mexico without the chance of cultural acceptance [with only one CN in Mexico, it is unlikely that most native cultures will get accepted]. And to take his mind off that debacle, he took a personal trip to Egypt to preside over inauguration of the Suez Canal, completed in May 1685, 11 years after it was commissioned.
And then he directed the diplomats to sign peace with Yue, taking land for his vassals Burma and Eastasia based on culture boundaries ( at this point, all land being given to Eastasia was Chinese culture group, as they were not anticipated to gain any more land outside their group being large already).
During the peace lull, the Emperor considered creating a new successor state to Colonia ( to follow the lineage of Pangea-Azorea-Atlantis-Colonia). But decided against it to save on Diplomatic power. And besides, Denmark now had so many merchants from the Colonies that they outnumbered those from the Trade Companies. And so he resumed the strategy of declaring war on the largest nation not truce-bound . ANd that was Vijayanagar
That war was a bit difficult as it took time for armies to arrive and the Vijayanagaris had plenty of troops. And it saw the first use of the Suez Canal by the Danish military when the Atlantic fleet was summoned to transport troops to India and help the Indian ocean fleet fight the VJ navy.
Meanwhile the truces with Otomo and France expired, and that meant another war for Kyoto, and another war in Europe.
The aim of the war with France was to fully annex so as to gain their colonial nations. And in that endeavour, a problem was soon encountered.
France had two provinces in the heart of Mexico ( how they were able to annex those two , I am not sure). Denmark was unable to ask for them in a peace treaty due to being inaccessible for coring. And so, to get a path towards those two provinces , the Emperor decided to declare war on Portugal who had just gained some provinces themselves from Aztec. And one of those provinces separated Danish Colonial MExico from France's two Mexican provinces.
ANd while that war was started, the Otomo war was completed with the annexation of Kyoto . A new upgrade of the Imperial City netted Denmark enough diplomatic power to finally upgrade her diplomatic corps and obtain access to the Imperialism casus belli
And the main benefits of this upgrade were to be the savings on diplomatic power, because recent peace treaties have been very costly as Denmark was annexing large numbers of provinces at a time thanks to high Absolutism. In addition, the Client State Act was now mostly superfluous and could be retired, further saving on diplomatic resources.
As the decade grew to a close, the Emperor became a bit impatient with the wars. Vijayanagar was practically defeated, but he needed to finish all the wars simultaneously to be able to apportion provinces to vassals in peace time . And the French war could not be concluded before the Portuguese war. So he again took advantage of the Suez Canal and ordered the Atlantic fleet back to Iberia to speed up the siege of Lisboa, after which he was able to demand the key Mexican provinces from Portugal.
Denmark only took provinces in Mexico- there was not enough score to take more without prolonging the war. But those provinces were enough to allow the full annexation of France with the French Mexican provinces going to Colonial MExico, and the ones in France proper to Denmark ( and of course, Denmark took provinces from France's allies Milan, Cologne and Tuscany).
The full annexation of France meant that French Louisiana and French California and Cascadia all became direct possessions of the Danish crown, putting most of North America under Wittelsbach control.
This was followed by the annexation of a large swath of land from Vijayanagar, divvied up between India, Saurashtra and Bactria based on culture lines.
The annexation of so much land was very, very costly in terms of diplomatic power. But hopefully, with Imperialism casus belli now available, such exorbitant costs will not be encountered going forward. And the first use of the new CB was against Japan, who had predictably accepted to buy Kyoto from Denmark .
ANd the second use of that war was against the Aztec , in a war of revenge that should see most - if not all - of their Empire destroyed.
And those wars bring us to the end of the decade. As you can see from the dominion map, Denmark's growth is accelerating. ANd thanks to her policies geared towards keeping subjects in submission, she is facing no threats of revolts from her many vassals. Even large and recently acquired Louisiana is loyal.
The highlight of the last chapter was the adoption of Naval ideas to unlock the Supply Convoys Policy . It also featured expansion into distant lands like Korea and Mexico. It ended with war with Gurkanis, the largest remaining independent nation. A side peace in that war netted Denmark the province of Taiz in YEmen, which would eventually end up as part of Sheba.

Then Denmark gained her latest Colonial Nation in America, in the region of Mexico . It was called Christian in honor of Christian the Great. This was clearly intended as retort to the very large French Louisiana next door.

Considering the relative strength of France and Denmark, it would stand to reason that Christiana was going to surpass her neighbor. But , as we shall see, things can sometimes turn out in "paradoxical" ways.
Meanwhile, in the Gurkani war , Denmark knocked out Kilwa from the war, taking off a few provinces to Sudafrica.

Slowly but surely , the once powerful Kilwa was being whittled down to nothing. Similarly, Gurkani ally Bengal lost land to Burma

And finally, the great land annexation happened at the expense of Gurkani. Denmark annexed a large amount of land , which she transferred- after concentrating development in London - to her vassals Bactria and Sheba .

The peace resulted in Gurkani losing a lot of their coastline, with their last ports on the Persian Gulf being in the Mashriqi culture provinces . Since these were slated to go to Georgia eventually, they were not taken in this war yet. But having a diminishing Gurkani navy was going to facilitate future troop transport in times of war , particularly that the Suez canal was nearing completion .
Denmark took advantage of the peace to break vassalization with Otomo, triggering a 5-year truce. that means war for Kyoto could happen again in 1686 or so.

In addition to Denmark's rapid expansion thanks to her own efforts, she also benefited from the occasional successful war by a colonial nation. And in the case of Swedish Brazil, it was a nice stomping of Portuguese Brazil that took place.

But those independent colonial wars were not always likely to succeed, and when Canada declared war on New Pangea, Denmark intervened to prevent loss of land by her subject.

During the peace lull, the annexation of Colonia was begun. Then war was declared on the next largest nation after Gurkani, namely Yue

It was obvious by then that Denmark's strategy in picking enemies was to go after the largest nation that did not have a truce [common strategy for world conquest]. And here it was convenient that Yue was allied to Korea whose lands Denmark wanted for herself, and also conveniently there were a lot of troops in Korea already .
While the Emperor's attention was focused on Asia, the integration of Colonia was completed, and Denmark gained a second CN in Mexico, confusingly named "Colonial Mexico". But that happy news was overtaken by the plight of Christiana, the first CN in Mexico.

You see, Christiana was born from former Aztec land after they were defeated by Denmark. That meant that the Aztecs did not have a truce with Christiana , and were free to declare a reconquest war on her. Which they did. But because Denmark had a truce with Aztec, the Emperor Christian could not Enforce a White Peace. And to declare war on Aztec, he had to break the truce, something he was loath to do . So , for now, all he could do was send monetary help to the beleaguered colony .
He then refocused his attention on Asia. And during the war with Yue, Naval ideas were completely adopted by Denmark.

That had two salutary effects. First, it enabled Denmark to confirm her Thalassocracy, gaining another merchant. Second, and more importantly, it allowed adoption of the Supply Convoys policy. This immediately improved the liberty desire of Denmark's vassals , as predicted by Niels the Mad's calculations.
Christian's attention was then drawn yet again to the New World, where Canada declared war on New Sweden. And this time he was unable to Enforce Peace due to the New Swedes not having a great opinion of their indirect overlord [the automatic diplomat does not improve with subjects of subjects]. But at least he could help New Sweden by declaring war on Canada, who was not protected by a truce.

With all the might of the multiple colonial nations in the region ( I counted 6 - Newfoundland, Breton Canada, Pangean Canada, New Pangea, New Azorea, New Atlantis) , he did not need to pay attention to that war and he let the colonials handle it. And in a brief period of time, Canada was made to cede provinces to the various colonials

Back in Asia, the island of Formosa was unified under East Asia with the full annexation of Tungqing, and then Korea ceded her North East to Denmark, leaving only the southern areas independent, while Malay gained a couple of Khmer provinces and Eastasia gained a few Qi provinces.

The annexation of so much land was costly in Diplomatic power, but enlarged Denmark herself quite a bit, keeping her growth on pace with that of her many vassals.
After that, yet again, the Emperor's attention was drawn to the New World, but this time with the dire news of the end of the Aztec-Christiana war with full annexation of Christian, and the sacrifice of its ruling family to the savage Nahuatl

The horror of that peace treaty shocked the sensibilities of the court in London. The proud Danish Empire - global, cosmopolitan, tolerant- was humiliated by heathen savages. Furthermore, seeing the name "Louisiana" emblazoned in large letters on the map with no Christiana next to it added insult to the injury. Emperor Christian almost declared a revenge war in anger, but then held his impulse and decided to wait for the truce to end. But he vowed that the Aztec empire will meet its demise sooner rather than later, even if it meant that all of it ended up under Colonial Mexico without the chance of cultural acceptance [with only one CN in Mexico, it is unlikely that most native cultures will get accepted]. And to take his mind off that debacle, he took a personal trip to Egypt to preside over inauguration of the Suez Canal, completed in May 1685, 11 years after it was commissioned.

And then he directed the diplomats to sign peace with Yue, taking land for his vassals Burma and Eastasia based on culture boundaries ( at this point, all land being given to Eastasia was Chinese culture group, as they were not anticipated to gain any more land outside their group being large already).

During the peace lull, the Emperor considered creating a new successor state to Colonia ( to follow the lineage of Pangea-Azorea-Atlantis-Colonia). But decided against it to save on Diplomatic power. And besides, Denmark now had so many merchants from the Colonies that they outnumbered those from the Trade Companies. And so he resumed the strategy of declaring war on the largest nation not truce-bound . ANd that was Vijayanagar

That war was a bit difficult as it took time for armies to arrive and the Vijayanagaris had plenty of troops. And it saw the first use of the Suez Canal by the Danish military when the Atlantic fleet was summoned to transport troops to India and help the Indian ocean fleet fight the VJ navy.

Meanwhile the truces with Otomo and France expired, and that meant another war for Kyoto, and another war in Europe.

The aim of the war with France was to fully annex so as to gain their colonial nations. And in that endeavour, a problem was soon encountered.

France had two provinces in the heart of Mexico ( how they were able to annex those two , I am not sure). Denmark was unable to ask for them in a peace treaty due to being inaccessible for coring. And so, to get a path towards those two provinces , the Emperor decided to declare war on Portugal who had just gained some provinces themselves from Aztec. And one of those provinces separated Danish Colonial MExico from France's two Mexican provinces.

ANd while that war was started, the Otomo war was completed with the annexation of Kyoto . A new upgrade of the Imperial City netted Denmark enough diplomatic power to finally upgrade her diplomatic corps and obtain access to the Imperialism casus belli

And the main benefits of this upgrade were to be the savings on diplomatic power, because recent peace treaties have been very costly as Denmark was annexing large numbers of provinces at a time thanks to high Absolutism. In addition, the Client State Act was now mostly superfluous and could be retired, further saving on diplomatic resources.

As the decade grew to a close, the Emperor became a bit impatient with the wars. Vijayanagar was practically defeated, but he needed to finish all the wars simultaneously to be able to apportion provinces to vassals in peace time . And the French war could not be concluded before the Portuguese war. So he again took advantage of the Suez Canal and ordered the Atlantic fleet back to Iberia to speed up the siege of Lisboa, after which he was able to demand the key Mexican provinces from Portugal.


Denmark only took provinces in Mexico- there was not enough score to take more without prolonging the war. But those provinces were enough to allow the full annexation of France with the French Mexican provinces going to Colonial MExico, and the ones in France proper to Denmark ( and of course, Denmark took provinces from France's allies Milan, Cologne and Tuscany).

The full annexation of France meant that French Louisiana and French California and Cascadia all became direct possessions of the Danish crown, putting most of North America under Wittelsbach control.
This was followed by the annexation of a large swath of land from Vijayanagar, divvied up between India, Saurashtra and Bactria based on culture lines.

The annexation of so much land was very, very costly in terms of diplomatic power. But hopefully, with Imperialism casus belli now available, such exorbitant costs will not be encountered going forward. And the first use of the new CB was against Japan, who had predictably accepted to buy Kyoto from Denmark .

ANd the second use of that war was against the Aztec , in a war of revenge that should see most - if not all - of their Empire destroyed.

And those wars bring us to the end of the decade. As you can see from the dominion map, Denmark's growth is accelerating. ANd thanks to her policies geared towards keeping subjects in submission, she is facing no threats of revolts from her many vassals. Even large and recently acquired Louisiana is loyal.


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