The World in 1867
Indochina
Long had France sought to fully establish themselves in Indochina, and with the QIng, once seen as the sovereign protectors of the region, falling into turmoil and self destruction, the Third Empire found itself ready to enact its goals. Seizing the moment of Qing weakness, the French embarked on a rapid campaign to place the region securely under their influence, through the usage of both economic and military coercion. The campaign would prove unprecedently successful, with a military expedition forcing the entirety of Vietnam underneath French protectorates by early June, embolding a bellicose attitude within the region. Immediately following Vietnamese annexation, Siam, under threat of war, was forced to recognize a French protectorate over Cambodia, as well as the loss of many of its eastern provinces in exchange for future non aggression between their two states. Considered a great victory for the French Empire, the newly conquered regions allowed for much greater exertion of influence within the Pacific.
China
Embroiled in the Chinese Civil War, all of China existed in a state of constant upheaval and conflict throughout the year. A constant series of military campaigns ensured that no man, woman or child was left unaffected by the war’s wrath. With thousands of lives being extinguished on the front lines and farms being left abandoned and evacuated, it was clear China would never be the same again.
As the second year dawned since the Qing’s shattering, great upheaval occured in the loosely collected Confucius Rebellion. Without a clear ruler or central government, the Rebellion would lay paralyzed throughout the early year as the result of a desperate power struggle among several warlords, allowing the claimants to the Qing Empire to make a steady advance into rebel held territory. The power struggle would abruptly end when, on May 29, the warlord Zhang Wei would lead an army consisting of 50,000 men into the city of Lanzhou, repelling an invasion led by the Empress, and proclaim himself “Divine Emperor of All China,” and Lanzhou his temporary capital. Next, after he declared the rebellion would henceforth be called the “Heavenly Chinese Mandate,” many warlords who had lost land to the advancing enemy forces rallied behind him as vassals, pledging their armies to his cause. In order to prepare a counter attack against the invaders, Zhang would make an alliance with the many Hui, or Chinese Muslims, who lived within his realm, promising tolerance and autonomy in exchange for manpower.
Having secured his realm for now, Zhang would launch a series of ambitious military campaigns, with an army supplied with foreign equipment from an unknown source, against the Qing and Emergency Legislative Body. The enemy, which until then had met little resistance in their march into the rebellion’s territory, would find themselves outmanned and unprepared for the sudden assault, crumbling under the enemy barrage. However, the newly proclaimed “Huangdi” would not be satisfied with repelling the attacks, splitting his forces for an attack upon Tibet and the Qing occupied territories of Mongolia, believing them rightful client states of the Mandate, and proclaiming his two most trusted generals the kings of Mongolia and Tibet, before assigning them to their respective army.
The “Mongolian Campaign for Unification,” as it is called by contemporary Western scholars, would prove to be a great success for the Mandate. The Qing still lay in retreat from their defeats, leaving the Heavenly Mandate forces able to constantly advance while dealing the Qing defeat after defeat. On October 29, the King of Mongolia declared the complete repulsion of the Qing from Outer Mongolia had been achieved, but found himself having trouble marching into Inner Mongolia. This would allow the Qing to recover and launch the short lived “Khovd Offensive,” which only met minor military success.
The “Tibetan War of Liberation” was, however, a much less successful campaign. The Heavenly Mandate found their soldiers unable to cope with the terrain and unable to pursue the retreating ELB forces. Because of this, conflicts between the two sides which exceeded minor skirmishes were exceedingly rare, and little progress was made for either side. In contrast to his counterparts successors in the North, the King of Tibet was humiliated by his lack of ability.
The Heavenly Chinese Mandate would launch one last military campaign before the year's end, as troops from the Mongolian Army, led by Zhang himself, prepared a march into Peking, receiving reinforcements from the resurging Nian rebellion. Not focusing on conquering all of Inner Mongolia, the army broke through a weak point in Qing defense and prepared to continue to march. Bogged down by constant attacks from Qing forces, the army moved at a crawl and as the New Year began, little progress had been made in the Campaign. However, the Qing were forced to abandon much of Inner Mongolia to Mongolia militia in order to hold the Mandate at bay.
Though by the end of the year, the Qing Empire and Emergency Legislative Body would sign a temporary ceasefire and eventual alliance to end the rising Heavenly Chinese Mandate, the Qing would launch their own campaign against the Emergency Body in mid February. Known as the “Guanxi Campaign,” it made great progress against the distracted Emergency Body; however, the campaign was forced to draw back in August as the Heavenly Mandate rapidly approached Peking, abandoning their gains. Though the campaign would be unsucessful in reclaiming the south, it was critical in other ways.
As the Emergency Body was forced to draw their forces to the Qing and Tibetan borders, they found themselves unable to fortify the province of Yunnan against the Du Wenxiu Rebellion, also known as the Panthay Rebellion, largely led by the rebellious Hui, though they were also joined by several other tribes, with the goal of expelling the Manchus from China and forming their own separate state. This state, known as Pingnan Guo, the Pacified Southern Kingdom, was led by “Leader of the Community of Muslims” Du Wenxiu and would experience great military success. When faced with the decision of whether to divert forces to face the rebellion from the frontline or not, nearly all of the generals of the Emergency Body refused to commit their forces for fear of providing a weakness for the much stronger Qing and Heavenly Mandate to break through. Because of this, the nation of Pingnan Guo expanded rapidly throughout the province of Yunnan and on November 11, the provincial capital, Kunming, fell into Du Wenxiu hand after a three month long siege. Wenxiu would immediately declare Kunming, though its wealth lay drained from constant besiegement, the new capital of his regime, and exercised control of nearly all of Yunnan.
France would also involve itself as a peacekeeping force and guardian in the Orient, deploying a large portion of its fleet into the region. The fleet’s stated goal was to provide assistance to peacekeeping forces near the coast, and to protect the turbulent region and the European ports within it from opportunistic pirates. La Royale also took upon the task of becoming the guardians of Christians within the region, offering both protection to and negotiating with local Chinese leaders for the safe passage through and out of China for missionaries. The fleet would prove widely successful in these goals, particularly in the coastal provinces of the Qing and ELB, often serving as the de facto law enforcement in many cities. Between French expansion in Indochina and the rising status of France in the eyes of the Chinese, French influence within the region had expanded rapidly.
Lastly, in response to the threat of the Chinese Civil War, the Austrian Empire would increase funding within their treaty ports, creating a small fleet designated for the transportation of goods between the Empire and its overseas possessions. The Austrian navy would be joined by a large portion of the Ottoman Navy in late June, causing many to suspect future naval intervention in the region.
The Ottoman Empire and Persia
As 1867 dawned, it became clear that Persia was unwilling to give up its military advance into the Khanate of Khiva, despite warnings from the Ottoman Empire. Angered by Persia’s disregard for Ottoman strength, Sultan Abdulaziz ordered the state to prepare for war on February 13. Wishing to improve the skill of both his army and their commanders, Abdulaziz ordered the majority of his commanders and army to return into Anatolia and Constantinople, where they would train under commanders sent by the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Italy, leaving only a small portion of the army to garrison the Persian border.
As the military prepared for war, the Sultan sought to further the “civil unification” programs of 1866, granting financial donations to those who spoke highly of Ottoman rule, as well as extending invitations to the highest quality writers to visit the Ottoman Court. These grants and rewards would spur a vast amount of works praising the rule of Abdulaziz, though not necessarily his predecessors, and his reforms to create a greater Ottoman state, often proclaiming themselves citizens of the “New Ottoman Empire.” Perhaps one of the most acclaimed of these writings would be “Of Finance and Government,” written by Grand Vizier and Head of the United Ottoman Railroad Company, Yusuf Edhem Pasha, detailing the Ottoman Court, his friendship with the Sultan, and his rise to one of the most wealthy people within the Empire.
Though the Sultan had prepared to push more civil reform, his court froze in a standstill when on April 19, Persia issued a declaration of a war and began to rush the Ottoman border. The skeleton border force was unprepared for the declaration and was quickly overrun, as the Empire scrambled to redeploy its half-trained forces. Though the Persian Empire had a laudable early advance, pushing deep into Anatolia, they would be overwhelmed by Ottoman forces at the battle of Erzurum losing nearly a quarter of their number in the battle and the resulting retreat. Seeing this as an opportunity to continue to spread Pro-Ottoman propaganda, the recently formed “Brother Brigades” were deployed to the front line and granted the best equipment within the Empire and the most respected commanders. By November, Persian forces had all but retreated entirely from Ottoman territory, instead reorganizing for a defensive campaign to wear down the numerically superior Ottomans. Rather than pursuing the retreating armies into Persian territory, troops were held back in order to wait for reinforcements from Ottoman allies.
As the war with Persia came to a stand still, the Sultan would issue one final decree, ordering a naval blockade around the rebellious isle of Crete and the bombardment of rebel strongholds on the island. Though the Empire was able to cut off the island from any foreign supplies, should it be receiving any, it was unable to make any territorial onland advance.
Western Europe
As France pursued an active, if not belligerent, foreign policy on the global stage, it also sought to further the nation’s strong economy. To further this end, the French state would fund the construction and expansion of several cotton plantations in Algeria, as well as the funding of other agricultural pursuits and mines within the rest of the Empire’s vast colonial possessions. A long term investment, it remains to be seen how successful it shall prove.
The government would also order the seizure of small plots of land to be set aside for industrial growth and the construction of railways with cooperation between the government and several companies. However, the Empire’s rising corruption would see the initiative result in increasingly unprofitable deals, abandoned projects, and the seizure of unneeded land. This ineptitude would result in those whose land had been taken grew increasingly discontent against the current administration. This dissent would spread across the general populace as the corrupt government continued to divert resources into the failing project, and away from other more needed projects.
In response to the rising discontent, Napoleon III would order a second review of corruption throughout the government. While the review of 1866 had miserably failed, even leading to the rise of many of the Empire’s more corrupt officials, this examination would be more closely followed by Napoleon and parliament itself. The examination was focused on rooting out the most corrupt officials of the empire, rather than shake up the entirety of the system. Where the previous exam had failed this excelled, detaining several of the most high-profile and causing many to “fall in line” to avoid being caught. Will this proves optimistic for future years, damage had been done to the trust between population and state. And from this damage once more sprouted the left, long since relegated to the backlines of French politics, seeking their place in the sun.
While France experienced only discontent, Spain lay in full blown Civil War. Having directed much of its military attention towards the rebellious islands of Hispaniola, the Spanish government found itself losing consistently to the Carlist rebellion. Forced to order the complete evacuation of Hispaniola to the Iberian Peninsula, the Spanish Parliament could only watch in horror as the Carlists secured the Northern Coast. Though the Spanish were able to deliver a defeat to the Carlists at the Battle of Bilbao(April 17-April 19), this was not to last, as Spanish forces were decisively pushed out of Galicia a month later. As October dawned, Spanish forces seemed defeated and demoralized, and the Carlists were seemingly left an open path to Madrid. As the rebellion victoriously advanced into Central Spain, it seemed that no force would be able to stop the capitol from falling.
However, the situation would be completely reversed after the Spanish made one last gesture of resistance, at the Battle of Madrid, a battle which would go down as one of the greatest military failures of the 19th century. The Carlists, numerically superior and haughty from their previous victories, wrote off the battle as an assured victory, and many commanders only gave the most general of commands to their troops. The Loyalists did not give up, however, and had ordered the construction of several makeshift defences around Madrid; meanwhile, a thick fog set upon the city and its surrounding region. As the battle began, the Carlists recklessly charged into the fog, where they found themselves surprised by the defending Spanish. After an initial clash, the Spanish were ordered to retreat deeper in, however, the Carlists lay unaware. Believing the battle to be continuing, Carlist troops continued to fire on eachother in the fog, killing many of their companions and even their generals. Underneath constant fire, without leadership, and in a state of confusion, the rebellion broke: many of the most loyal lay dead as the fog lifted, and the less loyal scattered amongst the countryside fearing for their lives. The battle having begun on October 30 and ending on November 1, was perhaps the bloodiest battle in Spanish history leaving 30,000 Carlists dead and another 9,000 Loyalists, and ending in a complete Carlist retreat.. Though the Carlists continued to exercize de facto control of Northern Spain, their army lay crushed and scattered, and the Loyalists grew hungry for revenge.
As the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland entered 1867, it was suffering from a multitude of domestic problems, problems it could not ignore. The Great Famine had killed millions in Ireland, the Panic of 1866 had led to an upset of the nation’s strong economy, and the Canadians in America continued to petition for their independence. And as the Empire looked out from its shores, it saw a world changing.
Both the Great Famine and the Panic of 1866 had left many starving, jobless, and without a home, and the English government would consider this to be their greatest threat to stability. In contrast to the uncaring view towards the Irish which had been prevalent during and immediately after the famine, Parliament would soon deem it necessary to send provisions and cash to help alleviate the starvation and poverty which was prevalent throughout the region. Dedicating a good portion of the budget towards the relievement project, for once it seemed the Empire cared for its Irish subjects. However, despite the funding placed into it, and its temporary lessening of economic pressure on the region, the problems continued to persist throughout the year. Out of fear that the English might abandon the project, the Irish population would continue to drop as thousands fled their homeland in search of a brighter future.
However, this would not deter the British. Believing that an increase in jobs would provide the basis for a strong economic recovery, the British turned to the military to provide the openings. Parliament would pass the Glorious Enrollment Act in late April, declaring the conscription of all male citizens between the ages of twenty five and fifty within the Empire who was not in possession of a residence or domicile. This law, the first of its kind in the Empire, was to be enforced by military police and the reports of civilians. Many skeptics believed the law would prove useless, arguing that many would disobey the conscription and those that obeyed would not necessarily be healthy enough to work under military conditions. However, this would prove largely untrue as many who had been displaced by the aforementioned economic panic, found themselves eagerly signing up for military service in search of a job, allowing the military the luxury to dismiss the unhealthy.
Seeking for a use for this large increase in manpower, the British called for the strengthening of their famous navy and the construction of several Ironclads. Using the recruits as a labor force, the British would be able to construct 50 new ships, six of which were Ironclads. The “Ships of Conscription” would reside in London throughout the entirety of the year, awaiting deployment by the British powers.
Sweden
1867 would be a time of peace in Northern Europe, and a time dominated by the resurgence of Pan-Scandinavian ideals. It would be in the midst of this rising nationalism that the first ever Riksdag elections would occur. As elections were held across the country in both Norway and Sweden, the government steadily sponsored and promoted candidates favoring Scandinavian unification. Between public and government support, the Pan-Scandinavian candidates held a stranglehold upon votes, and when results were counted, it became clear the ideology was completely dominant. The United Scandinavian party held enough seats in both the First and Second Chamber to pass their bills without compromise.
The party acted swiftly upon its election and would begin to rapidly pass a multitude of legislature. The first of these acts was the establishment of an arts fund dedicated to the funding of projects emphasising a common Scandinavian destiny as one people. Artists and writers clamoured for the grants as they embraced the concept of a unified Scandinavia. In celebration of the success of the art fund, the Riksdag would order the hosting of state-funded art shows in both Stockholm and Oslo, displaying the artwork which it deemed best promoted the concept. The art show would prove highly successful, winning critical acclaim by both the middle class and the elite for the illustrious artwork it displayed and the powerful concept which it promoted.
The Riksdag would also order the creation of a united Scandinavian language, commissioning a team of a hundred linguists from across the northern realms to detail the new language. Due to the many similarities between the separate Scandinavian languages, the new language was developed in under six months. The language largely followed Swedish grammar and pronunciation, while using a Danish writing system. Spelling varied between Swedish and Norwegian, taking an emphasis on making the language as similar to it’s bases and as easy to learn as possible, with a special emphasis on ensuring no grammatical exceptions. The new language would be dubbed Scandinavian and would be compiled together to be published across the Union. The book would also be distributed throughout the education system and would be labeled as a mandatory and enforced part of learning.
In celebration of its achievements, the Swedish Government would invite prominent Liberal and Pro-Scandinavian intellectuals and politicians not only from the Scandinavian nations, but also extending the offer to those from the Baltic and Finnish regions, to discuss a united future. This would severely anger the Russian Empire, but despite a multitude of threats, the Swedish government maintained its invitations to the Russian territory. The Russian Empire would be further infuriated when the invitations were actually accepted, as bright and prominent men met at the Stockholm Conference. The Conference was dedicated to the proposal of a political union of Sweden-Norway and Denmark, and the establishment of close relations with the former territories of the Swedish Empire. Many ideas and proposals were discussed during the Conference’s twenty days, ranging from a simple economic union to a war of liberation against the Russian Empire. However, as the pleasantries ended, representatives left with a stronger faith in the united Scandinavian state.
((I will be going away for the next three days, but I didn't want to leave you guys in the dark. The above is only missing Austria, Italy, and the Americas, and should prove to be comprehensive. I'll do my best to answer any questions one might have in my spare time, and will edit in the remaining section of the report when I am done.))
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