Pax's Alternate History Snippet repository.

[ATP]

I thought about something - soviets get materials and money from Wall Street in OTL,becouse they:
1.Gave them tsar gold
2.When it ended,robbed churches and gave Wall Streey Church gold,and private owners they captured.
3.After Holodomor,they take farmers grain and sold it to Wall Street.

Thanks to that,soviets were capable of making big factories producing tanks,planes,guns and other weapons - in 1939 they arleady have at least 16.000 tanks.
Here,with lesser teritory,they would get less gold and grain to sell to Wall Street- so,they would be weaker.

It is possible,that thanks to that they woud be unabkle to conqer as much Europe as they did in OTL - Czech and maybe Hungary could remain free.
Siberian state should be safe,too.

 

[Imperator Pax]

I thought about something - soviets get materials and money from Wall Street in OTL,becouse they:
1.Gave them tsar gold
2.When it ended,robbed churches and gave Wall Streey Church gold,and private owners they captured.
3.After Holodomor,they take farmers grain and sold it to Wall Street.

Thanks to that,soviets were capable of making big factories producing tanks,planes,guns and other weapons - in 1939 they arleady have at least 16.000 tanks.
Here,with lesser teritory,they would get less gold and grain to sell to Wall Street- so,they would be weaker.

It is possible,that thanks to that they woud be unabkle to conqer as much Europe as they did in OTL - Czech and maybe Hungary could remain free.
Siberian state should be safe,too.

Click to shrink...

This is part of hte reason I don't expect an attempted soviet conquest.

The Czechs diverting the tsarist gold reserves eliminates the immediate capital for bolshevik market attempts under Lenin. Yes lenin still does war communism seizes the orthodox shinies, and anything else not nailed down but that is vastly less than the gold, that means no reconquest.

Ford being an well intentioned idiot c. ww1and its immediate aftermath probably does still go into business in Moscow and build the soviet automotive industry, which probably does go into carden lloyd and christie but much of the soviet tank fleet suffered from the chronic metallurical qc problems and lack of training in the intewrwar years

I don't think that would prevent a soviet invasion of Hungary or Czechoslovakia... now it might admitteddly occur in the winter of 45 as opposed to summer '44 but I suspect a mix of geography and war aims means stalin would demand it happen in some form casualties be damned resources consumed be damned. In which case, Hungary is still kind of fucked there is just not chance of a physical WAllied prescence to block the red army. You might be right Czechoslovakia might make, butthe soviets regardless of where they stop in the west wouldn't have the fuel reserves or spare parts or logistics or ready manpower to then turn around and execute eastwards (posturing aside, which they would almost certainly would try the Red Army was exhausted in 45).

 

[ATP]

This is part of hte reason I don't expect an attempted soviet conquest.

The Czechs diverting the tsarist gold reserves eliminates the immediate capital for bolshevik market attempts under Lenin. Yes lenin still does war communism seizes the orthodox shinies, and anything else not nailed down but that is vastly less than the gold, that means no reconquest.

Ford being an well intentioned idiot c. ww1and its immediate aftermath probably does still go into business in Moscow and build the soviet automotive industry, which probably does go into carden lloyd and christie but much of the soviet tank fleet suffered from the chronic metallurical qc problems and lack of training in the intewrwar years

I don't think that would prevent a soviet invasion of Hungary or Czechoslovakia... now it might admitteddly occur in the winter of 45 as opposed to summer '44 but I suspect a mix of geography and war aims means stalin would demand it happen in some form casualties be damned resources consumed be damned. In which case, Hungary is still kind of fucked there is just not chance of a physical WAllied prescence to block the red army. You might be right Czechoslovakia might make, butthe soviets regardless of where they stop in the west wouldn't have the fuel reserves or spare parts or logistics or ready manpower to then turn around and execute eastwards (posturing aside, which they would almost certainly would try the Red Army was exhausted in 45).

Click to shrink...

Probably right,althought,if it would be Winter 1945,Allies should be there first.And,with FDR dead,Truman could say Sralin fuck off here.Hungary had some oil and rare metals,and Czech was place when germans made their secret Wunderwaffe,including even UFO according to some writers,so USA could want hold it.
Just like they say "no" when Sralin wonted invade Iran and Turkey in 1946.

Countries arleady taken,like Poland and Romania,would be damned on schedule here.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Probably right,althought,if it would be Winter 1945,Allies should be there first.And,with FDR dead,Truman could say Sralin fuck off here.Hungary had some oil and rare metals,and Czech was place when germans made their secret Wunderwaffe,including even UFO according to some writers,so USA could want hold it.
Just like they say "no" when Sralin wonted invade Iran and Turkey in 1946.

Countries arleady taken,like Poland and Romania,would be damned on schedule here.

Click to shrink...

Yeah, I'm historically surprised that Turkey and Iran didn't get invaded that is always one of the things that given Soviet prescence in northern Iran, well situations are already different here which will have knock on effects in the Persian Gulf and with lend lease, but first we have to get through the early twenties before of that

 

[ATP]

Yeah, I'm historically surprised that Turkey and Iran didn't get invaded that is always one of the things that given Soviet prescence in northern Iran, well situations are already different here which will have knock on effects in the Persian Gulf and with lend lease, but first we have to get through the early twenties before of that

Click to shrink...

Truman not only stopped Sralin from taking Turkey,but also made them leave Iran in 1946.In the same time,american ambassador alarmed about faked polish election/i saw Poland betrayed/ ,and nothing happened.

Logical explanation - Iran had oil fields,and Poland do not have.

 

[Faralis]

Truman not only stopped Sralin from taking Turkey,but also made them leave Iran in 1946.In the same time,american ambassador alarmed about faked polish election/i saw Poland betrayed/ ,and nothing happened.

Logical explanation - Iran had oil fields,and Poland do not have.

Click to shrink...

Nop, Russia would not go to war over Iran. After WWII is probable they would go to war over Poland, though.

 

[Imperator Pax]

I expect a lot of the territorial incursions were based off of geography, warm water ports, bodies of water access in general, and less access to resources like oil. I'm not saying oil was a zero factor, just that I expect that strategic level thinking remained at the wider level assets of land space and water access. I expect the soviet invasion of poland was politically determined as early as 1918 whether that was trotsky or lenin impacting the discussion with talks of a land bridge to Germany, or as a response to the polish soviet conflict thats debatable but Poland as a goegrpahic zone of expansion seems to have always impacted strategic thinking.

In the interwar years, Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin in the early twenties had discussed moves, actuated moves to support agitation in northern Persia at the time, so that could have had effects

 

[ATP]

Nop, Russia would not go to war over Iran. After WWII is probable they would go to war over Poland, though.

Click to shrink...

Soviets,not Russia.They killed russians as nation and replaced them with soveks.That is why remains of russians fought for germans during WW2.
And,soviets would not fight without A bomb.

I expect a lot of the territorial incursions were based off of geography, warm water ports, bodies of water access in general, and less access to resources like oil. I'm not saying oil was a zero factor, just that I expect that strategic level thinking remained at the wider level assets of land space and water access. I expect the soviet invasion of poland was politically determined as early as 1918 whether that was trotsky or lenin impacting the discussion with talks of a land bridge to Germany, or as a response to the polish soviet conflict thats debatable but Poland as a goegrpahic zone of expansion seems to have always impacted strategic thinking.

In the interwar years, Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin in the early twenties had discussed moves, actuated moves to support agitation in northern Persia at the time, so that could have had effects

Click to shrink...

Soviets wonted everything,not Poland.On their crest there is map of Earth,not map of Poland.
We were only road to Europe for them.

 

[Imperator Pax]

1920
They were indeed still waiting on Waite to actually show up. He must have been coming on the last train to be sure, which was going to be a spot to argue over, but there was nothing to be done other than to wait. To wait, and to continue to work on all the other things that needed doing. Griswold grimaced flexing his hand, and shook his head, "No, we're not there yet." He muttered.

"Problem?"

"No problem." He replied glancing to his workmen, then gestured to his colt, "Mind if I see it." He raised an eyebrow and pulled the pistol from under his shoulder. "See this is one of Colt's early guns," He remarked turning to the two, as he dropped the gun and racked the slide back, "This pretty finish, see the markings on the slide, but," he snagged up a pair of calipers, you can more importantly see slight differences in the cutting,"

Allen sat down and listened to Griswold carry on about his preferred workmanship. In 1916 they had received the browning patents from FN... they hadn't heard anything about that from Colt. The Norwegians who had done the same thing they had done... buy up the patents from FN while they'd been in a lurch. Argentina had picked up the 1911 as well, and both the French, and the British Empire had taken them along as the war went along its merry way.

Griswold had already had enough experience with their own guns, that by the time commercial guns from the states started being a problem to source they'd been looking for an option. Of course by that point the army had bee in expansion, and was worth calling an army, "Anyway," Griswold said, "this has the grip safety cavalry insisted borrowing from the luger," He shrugged, "Which we will do away with in our production." more and more officers were pinning their grip safeties in place anyway and it would simplify production but the real saving would be the new standardized parker finish... which utilized manganese sources they had put under cultivation to sell to England during the war, whether they could sell it to the states or continue to sell it to the Brits would depend on factors at market but they were waiting for things to settle out... but in part it didn't appear as if the Russians under Lenin would be getting back into the market any time soon.

That was generally considered a beneficial thing to their exports of material that the Russian empire had furnished to market before the war in Europe. It might have been callous but so long as the war in Eastern Europe continued there was some degree of insulation, and there would be a market. "Sam I don't mean to rush you, but need to see about that train."

"I know." He replied, "Just wanted to make a point. You ready?"

Allen returned his browning to ready, and its resting place, "What is that about?"

"The college lectures on the Crimean war, and leaving aside needing to teach why we had to explain out Russia lost that one, we also have to explain why it was a transition between really modern war and the napoleonic fighting." The war between France and England in the 1850s had been against a Russia looking to throw its weight around, but it had been a limited war. A war that France and England had entered in because it disrupted the balance among the powers so to speak on the continent... but it had been the first real war defined by the railroad, and by proxy large volumes of steel production to provide for the army at war.

Six decades later here they were.

The primary rail artery ran east to west. A massive trunk line that had been made possible with steam drivers, dynamite, and standard steel with reinforced caissons to level it out. While they had made the attempt where feasible to be as efficient with time and space as possible, the Transoxiana as it connected through the Gansu corridor took the route of the ancient silk road, close enough that it might as well have been called such officially.

Since they'd never intended to build the Transoxiana line that was coincidental... but industry and the work of engineers made it appear a matter of forethought.... but part of that was demographics. The route through Gansu then across the Altai, and Tian Shan all of it went through and reached caravan cities, and the result was that the railways had a potential ability to support merchant trading towns along the route without needing to build up crossroad towns like the states had done... those existing towns let them build branch lines off the main line.

The massive staging yard west of Xian proper were a cloud of coal smokestacks from all the locomotives, a reminder of the engine shortage more than about the pollution they generated. The inter urbans would be cleaner and less obnoxious, they'd be more space conscious too. "That's Waite then." Sam remarked. "Lets go see what this whole mess is about." The men around them were equipped up to standard.

Triple aught, .000, was a mechanical tolerance, you took a piece of cloth, cotton for example, and you cut it and the machine sewed to that standard. A thousandth of an inch. Where that came into play were in the difference between uniforms. A quality northrop loom could turn out the twill for the engineers rain jackets which then went to mechanical needle machines for that degree of work.

It wasn't even that expensive. The big investment was in the machinery. A northrop loom bought in 1910 still worked ten years later, and paid for itself by saving time, and being precise. Singer machines for sewing handled the needlework. You paid up front for the machine, and it freed workers to do other jobs, or to run more of the same machines.

For military purposes you only needed them for specialty equipment. The British pack gear was really only designed for moving a man station to station. The problem with that logic, was that the reality of war in Europe had shown that sub par stiches came up and tore loose. Thus on a commercial export market the idea was a little more marketing to emphasize a brand name tailoring. "Winter doesn't look like it was all that nice to them." Allen observed regarding the czechs, "And there are a lot of them if he pulled all of them off."

Czechs was a short hand, and a misnomer if that were true, "We'll have to ship the poles to their own country."

"From the sound of it the Poles will at least be fighting the Russians."

"So give them a hair cut, a hot shower, and chow, issue them fresh uniforms and tell them to stay limber, but we'll have them home whenever the shipping situation is settled." That was the problem, there was no telling when that would be. "I hope to hell he's on this train."

"Looks like a lot cargo." Sam replied, "Which is odd because those 122mm howitzers were with tuesday's train, I would have figured the whole artillery park would have arrived by this point. Is there another train?"

"Not unless he plans to ride in after this lot I was told this should be the last of them."

"Maybe this is the last of the supply, but it probably would have made more sense to leave some stuff behind, seeing as the British are likely going to complain about carrying it all, and I doubt the States are going to be much better."

"Yeah, the maritime commission is still a pain," He agreed, then snapped his mouth shut, "Yeah there he is." Waite was in the company of men who were in the officer uniforms. "And their dependents, guess that makes sense..." He trailed off.

It did to a degree... Civilian baggage was possible, but still a bit much. They went to make the rounds and the acquaintances all the same.

--
Several hours later Waite let the bomb drop for the whole affair, "Leaving aside of course that yes I think this is a help to the state department, its more than that." and the state department per se wasn't who might throw bombs over this.

"Get on with it." Sam grunted, and Allen had to agree Waite had been incommunicado long enough that whatever this was would obviously call a stir. "We've cabled the MAK with your antics, and the European commission to let them know." In no small part to avoid having Bert get blindsided by some foreign office man in London.

"The czechs want to go home. To the point that there was a risk of mutiny," Waite spread his hands, "Kolchak's a son of a bitch, Graves is right not to like the man, and if you don't want to take his word Al will probably take Iseburo, but the admiral is the wrong man for the job and he doesn't have the right friends. So I extended a hand to the czechs that if they would do me the favor of making sure that they withdrew in good order we could all help each other." He remarked a conspiratorial lean, "You see," He cleared his throat, "the Tsar's gold reserves were loaded up... and that is where the business arrangement lies. Safe passage."

"Excuse me?"

"We're getting paid, Al."

"No I got that." He replied sharpishly... but the real question was...

"The Czechs aren't in much different straits than us, they have a young nation needs capital," and it wasn't until much later he considered exactly how Waite had meant that comment, "so it wasn't as if I pushed them hard."

The Czechs had in exchange for immediate passage through decided to bypass Kolchak entirely... the Russian admiral had not been happy when the legion had disappeared and had arrived in the northern most station of their trans oxiana line with an offer.

Three hundred tons of gold. Not the entirety of the Tsar's gold reserve. The tsars had been late coming to the gold standard only adopting it in 1897, but in twenty years they had built up a lot of it and then spent a lot of it, but still had a lot over all.

Three hundred tons was ... a lot of god damned money. Griswold put it perhaps best, "And you spring this on us without drink?"

He paused contemplative, "So that means that Kolchak doesn't have the gold, and it is here there is no chance then of Lenin getting it?"
--
Notes: this has been in the cards for literally years, this was part of the original conclusion written for the end of the Romanoff rescue epilogue for ww1, it sets up for a number of interwar facets including also parts of the Polish-Soviet war's references later on. It has effects on international diplomacy and so forth.

But this opens the calendar year 1920, and that's of critical importance from a timeline standpoint, because its here where in ideological terms where the break becomes permanent. The reason in some of the older material Confederation gets used is that the North China Confederation, or Xian's confederation starts with a relatively week consensus based system rather than over federal power. Shansi, Shensi, the western commanderies all have their own constitutions based on the same framework come into legal force this year. There is not explicit federal control over the provinces collectively. There would not need to be in 1919.

In 1920 after the constitutions have gone into effect though things begin to change ideologically, both 'domestically', in the broader Northern China region, and in China as a whole. This contributes to the British especially next year amping up the Prussia comparisons, but at 'home' Xian and its collection of provinces have to contend with political factions, and fallout from the permanent breaking up of the beiyang clique for good, and also Sun Yat-sen down south starts making friendly noises towards the soviets, and he also writes / publishes / revises (whatever one wants to call it) / an overhaul of his political thesis and that coupled with his lack of martial credibility undermines rather than strengthens his position, the other political problem ideologically is one that has been touched on and thats Feng (who is dead by this point, Cao Kun suceeds him) and Duan's espoused views about how the Peking government should move forward.

Specifically this is the issue of Duan pursuing a centralized authority around himself, and a continued aggressive attempt to bring the south into line by military force, versus the 'anti-war' faction under Feng who advocated Federalism and potentially just writing off the south in favor of a more cohesive northern union of beiyang provinces. This got the latter a lot of flak from the former's supporters, but it was out there in the ideological battleground. So what will happen is when the Anhui-Zhili war happens and Fengtien (Manchuria) go at it in the summer and Duan's goverment collapses it makes an ideological break that cleaves apart Northern Chinese unity... and part of that is that Zhili clique burns metaphorical bridges over its attempt to bring back the old parliament to the southern provinces and unlike Manchuria (fengtien) who opts to largely ignore this, ideologically with a new constitution in effect Xian and the western provinces go the old parliament has no legitimacy hold new elections entirely don't just put the old people in there, and that defeats the point of the compromise because the KMT parliament was a concession to power brokers in the southern provinces to get their ascent to a new nominally national unity government... and at home within Xian's public opinion where sentiment is riding high on how things are going, how things look it doesn't break well because the south has no reputation as anything other than a dividing factor.

That end result is that where 1919 was tumultuous, 1920 proves to an ideological breaking point.

 

[ATP]

You could get 0.50 from Browning here,too,would be useful.
Or maybe not? if you buy german 20mm AA gun later taken by Oeriklion,you do not need 0.50

122mm Schneider howitzer - i knew,that you buyed 105mm Krupp,but here you could follow soviet road,modernize howitzers with german help,and mass produce in M.30 version/mod 1938/
The same range,almost the same wight,but bigger schells.

Kolczak - he fucked up a lot in OTL,his putch against civilian goverment damned Siberia - i read,that after that peasants there stopped supported whites.When red come and made gulags everywhere they undarstandt their mistakes,but it would be too little for fighting then.

But,he was certainly brave.Here,fragment of russian move from 2008 named Admiral :


Watch entire movie,if you have time.

 

[Imperator Pax]

You could get 0.50 from Browning here,too,would be useful.
Or maybe not? if you buy german 20mm AA gun later taken by Oeriklion,you do not need 0.50

122mm Schneider howitzer - i knew,that you buyed 105mm Krupp,but here you could follow soviet road,modernize howitzers with german help,and mass produce in M.30 version/mod 1938/
The same range,almost the same wight,but bigger schells.

Kolczak - he fucked up a lot in OTL,his putch against civilian goverment damned Siberia - i read,that after that peasants there stopped supported whites.When red come and made gulags everywhere they undarstandt their mistakes,but it would be too little for fighting then.

But,he was certainly brave.Here,fragment of russian move from 2008 named Admiral :


Watch entire movie,if you have time.

Click to shrink...

Yeah doctrinally the 50 Browning will show up, but in a different role than the 20mm, the 20mm autocannon will be an aircraft weapon once the planes are big enough. the Browning will be an infantry weapon, it will be a vehicle mounted anti- infantry support weapon where as the 20mm as we saw briefly in the Romanov Rescue will be mounted on armored fighting vehicles with an emphasis towards anti-structure roles in situations where you don't have a mobile protected gun platform or motorized gun carriage to do the job. With a browning its an infantry weapon first, its the replacement heavy machine gun it fills that heavy machine gun role where the 20mm is explictly a vehicle based system

Admiral is movie I've been meaning to watch, I just watch so little television its been there

 

[Imperator Pax]

March 1920
It had been a couple months since those few days in January spring was coming, the days were getting longer. He sat surrounded by papers in a warm well lit office, but his mind was elsewhere. Before the congress had ordered the class graduated early there had been a confidence at West Point, a confidence among most everyone that they were 'the vanguard of civilization and progress' as one paper had put it. As the class prepared to graduate early prepared to don the cadet gray one last time before going to the khakis and going over the sea that was all the papers could talk about.

Twenty years later. A hundred thousand didn't seem like so many for an army. The European war had shattered that far beyond the war between Japan and the Russians. There was an optimism though that came with where they stood as well. There was good reason for optimism in the ranks though... the Taiping had run rampant from December 1850 through Perry's black ships opening Japan, and through basically the breadth of the war between the states. Japan had seriously undertaken modernity, and the old dynasty hadn't, and the result had been an end to the Manchu's rule even if it had taken a long time for that to be born out.

They still war gamed the battles of the Taiping. They had added other conflicts, and battles. The college endeavored to have men understand the terrible battles of the somme and verdun at least relative to what could made sense of.

This year inaugurated a step towards modernity in other ways. The constitutions for the provinces were in effect now. Admittedly the promulgation of the one for Tibet was optimistic, and he wondered if the eastern half of the province knew they had a constitution, but it was still something. Tibet was the least developed of all the regions, it had textiles, it had a growing textile industry, it produced textiles that would have a market for luxuries exported to the states. That would bring in money, that would buy things that Tibet needed after a fashion.

It was more complicated than simple business.

There was so much that needed to be done.

There was a knock on the door. "Enter." He answered, and the door opened, and he put the hydro electric drafting plans to one side. It was time. He stood up and his boots echoed across the hardwood floors, "How are things?"

Powell shrugged, "They could be better. The situation in Europe isn't great. The French tariffs are going to crush Latin American exports, I wish that was hyperbole but its the damned truth, France is going to turn their colonies into captive markets, I figure its an attempt for autarchy, the British will reply tit for tat."

That was no surprise Powell's statement was something already recognized... because it was what happened with tariffs came out. People still remembered mercantilism... "Frankly the French and the Germans were never free markets anyway," He replied, "What do you propose doing?"

"I want to stabilize things, I want to build a railway goes all the way down to the canal."

"Yeah?"

It wouldn't get that far. Powell would build the railway across three of the four republics but that coupled with Costa Rica's instabilities further south and then the onset of the depression stalled further development, and that prevented his ideal. "Its about economic integration, middle America has talked about it beat around the bush before. A common market, and before the capital just wasn't there. Especially once Britain went to war but we can do it."

They pushed through the double doors to join the seventy odd other men, more than half in gray uniforms... which was the other development. The MAK had adopted its own lighter version of the uniform but it was still gray. Lighter in the sense the twill was better suited for closer to the tropics.
--
The start of spring conference had opened with a look at everything that was going on in Europe. Steel was the foundation of industrial society. Hence the Emden Endowment for the Metallurgical Society to establishment of a college and research institution as such... they hadn't really done much in the way of pure research since the college had been founded. The war and all, but the war had had to come to an end.

To that end there were limits on studying the process of galvanization... or at least there had been, "I am all for just sticking my finger in the Russo-Asiatic Bank's eye," Or at least he would have been if it had still been in the 1914 leadership.... no was sure who was supposed to be in charge now, but they'd always met in Paris, and there was French capital involved, "Now vindictiveness aside do you you think this real?"

Allen shrugged to Dawes's question, "I think it is," But it wasn't his area, "We'd have to fund the research, but if he's right," If Sedzimir was on to something, "then we should see an industrial process by the end of the decade." It was always best to be conservative with these things. Never assume something was going to be revolutionary but don't dismiss it out of hand... and what would happen of course was that in a decade when the wall street crash had plunged the states into the worse depression in history and knackered western Europe... well in ten years China would be more insulated from the financial crisis. "What do you think Powell, you agree?"

"I do." The MAK cadre head responded. "This has automobile applications of the first order, I've picked through, expand the number of rollers, put those electric motors to drive them, that by itself is worth delving into it." Which was not something the MAK had the ability to act on at the moment, so the work would have to be done here in Xian.

The probably with a hundred men, well total, was that it was often difficult to catch everyone... they had been talking about some kind of switchboard and headset apparatus but it hadn't gone anywhere yet. "Should we move on to radios? Or the Pyrex patent licensure," Dawes questioned... rhetorically.

"Radios," Came the chime in from almost a third of the table in unison, a couple of the locomotive men protested... and the pyrex patent needed to be seen to for safety reasons, it would help safety but it lacked the perceived broadness of radios. Of everything they would do.

The meeting went on throughout the day. The conference of Spring 1920 focused on allocating resources, and the argument to integrate improvements from the work, and work on leads to better sciences and the industrial world. A lot of it was still focused on their 'bread and butter' on trains, and steel manufacture, metallurgy in general. Steel was the building block. It was what the trains needed, the bridges, cities.

The tooling.

The machinery was expendable. Buy use it up, use the profits to buy newer better machines, or een build them in house... the latter had been the lesson of the war as supply of new Hartford tooling dried up... and people still grumbled about tooling that had gotten shipped off to Tsarist Russia only to be appropriated by the Bolsheviks. It was 1920, they were looking forward to a new decade... and one with a different and potentially brighter future than what things would have been without the influx of capital from the war. The demands to make more for export.

"Speaking of capital there is the bank minutes, you want 'em?"

"I might as well." That also wasn't his area of expertise. There had been a reason that the central bank had been set up independent of direct cadre control, and with explicit clear goals. Wilson should not have overruled his own bank during the war, "What's this?"

"They say recession actually started before the armistice. The number crunching on the machines bears out the theory."

It made sense... the market had been overheating in materials the year before, and price controls had let off pressure from the boiler, but not enough. "That's interesting, but the consensus is that prices will come down then?"

"Yeah, maybe this year, but certainly next." Dawes agreed. "Now," He coughed, "We don't expect to see a return to pre war lows. That's makers, that's gonna be consumers as well, people with money in their pocket are going to want to buy stuff, so I expect that things get moving after all the boys are home there will be a demand for things, but prices in general should decline from where they've so maybe 1914 prices."
--
Notes: We have officially entered 1920 as a calendar year main story whatever you want to call it. By this point and time Reinsch has not only resigned, but he has been replaced as US legation, Alston has finally succeeded John Jordan there are other personnel changes to the combined anglo America legation in Peking. As mentioned in this section the Asiatic bank which nominally held the Russian manchurian lines is in financial turmoil due to the Bolshevik seizure of power, no one is readily clearly on who holds what there are several changes of leadership various attempts to restructure RAB had been prone to making legal challenges really between the period of 1902-1916 against various Anglo, Japanese, and American investment attempts throughout China, this included in Hankow with the floundering russian investments in what is today Wuhan. There were other litigations while WW1 was going on, and then of course there was well the 1917 revolutions and the floor fell out but by that point there was a lot of animosity between the various banks. The RAB's behavior was not unique it was just the one that got the shaft from starting from an already weaker position (post 1905 especially, but then 1917).

Anyway, and also the situation in Manchuria, and Siberia here, will effect how Manchuria acts in the future, but Zhang Tso-lin always kept ties to the Manchu court and that will play a role later when we start getting into both Manchuria as well as Mongolia with Ungern in 21.

 

[ATP]

March 1920
It had been a couple months since those few days in January spring was coming, the days were getting longer. He sat surrounded by papers in a warm well lit office, but his mind was elsewhere. Before the congress had ordered the class graduated early there had been a confidence at West Point, a confidence among most everyone that they were 'the vanguard of civilization and progress' as one paper had put it. As the class prepared to graduate early prepared to don the cadet gray one last time before going to the khakis and going over the sea that was all the papers could talk about.

Twenty years later. A hundred thousand didn't seem like so many for an army. The European war had shattered that far beyond the war between Japan and the Russians. There was an optimism though that came with where they stood as well. There was good reason for optimism in the ranks though... the Taiping had run rampant from December 1850 through Perry's black ships opening Japan, and through basically the breadth of the war between the states. Japan had seriously undertaken modernity, and the old dynasty hadn't, and the result had been an end to the Manchu's rule even if it had taken a long time for that to be born out.

They still war gamed the battles of the Taiping. They had added other conflicts, and battles. The college endeavored to have men understand the terrible battles of the somme and verdun at least relative to what could made sense of.

This year inaugurated a step towards modernity in other ways. The constitutions for the provinces were in effect now. Admittedly the promulgation of the one for Tibet was optimistic, and he wondered if the eastern half of the province knew they had a constitution, but it was still something. Tibet was the least developed of all the regions, it had textiles, it had a growing textile industry, it produced textiles that would have a market for luxuries exported to the states. That would bring in money, that would buy things that Tibet needed after a fashion.

It was more complicated than simple business.

There was so much that needed to be done.

There was a knock on the door. "Enter." He answered, and the door opened, and he put the hydro electric drafting plans to one side. It was time. He stood up and his boots echoed across the hardwood floors, "How are things?"

Powell shrugged, "They could be better. The situation in Europe isn't great. The French tariffs are going to crush Latin American exports, I wish that was hyperbole but its the damned truth, France is going to turn their colonies into captive markets, I figure its an attempt for autarchy, the British will reply tit for tat."

That was no surprise Powell's statement was something already recognized... because it was what happened with tariffs came out. People still remembered mercantilism... "Frankly the French and the Germans were never free markets anyway," He replied, "What do you propose doing?"

"I want to stabilize things, I want to build a railway goes all the way down to the canal."

"Yeah?"

It wouldn't get that far. Powell would build the railway across three of the four republics but that coupled with Costa Rica's instabilities further south and then the onset of the depression stalled further development, and that prevented his ideal. "Its about economic integration, middle America has talked about it beat around the bush before. A common market, and before the capital just wasn't there. Especially once Britain went to war but we can do it."

They pushed through the double doors to join the seventy odd other men, more than half in gray uniforms... which was the other development. The MAK had adopted its own lighter version of the uniform but it was still gray. Lighter in the sense the twill was better suited for closer to the tropics.
--
The start of spring conference had opened with a look at everything that was going on in Europe. Steel was the foundation of industrial society. Hence the Emden Endowment for the Metallurgical Society to establishment of a college and research institution as such... they hadn't really done much in the way of pure research since the college had been founded. The war and all, but the war had had to come to an end.

To that end there were limits on studying the process of galvanization... or at least there had been, "I am all for just sticking my finger in the Russo-Asiatic Bank's eye," Or at least he would have been if it had still been in the 1914 leadership.... no was sure who was supposed to be in charge now, but they'd always met in Paris, and there was French capital involved, "Now vindictiveness aside do you you think this real?"

Allen shrugged to Dawes's question, "I think it is," But it wasn't his area, "We'd have to fund the research, but if he's right," If Sedzimir was on to something, "then we should see an industrial process by the end of the decade." It was always best to be conservative with these things. Never assume something was going to be revolutionary but don't dismiss it out of hand... and what would happen of course was that in a decade when the wall street crash had plunged the states into the worse depression in history and knackered western Europe... well in ten years China would be more insulated from the financial crisis. "What do you think Powell, you agree?"

"I do." The MAK cadre head responded. "This has automobile applications of the first order, I've picked through, expand the number of rollers, put those electric motors to drive them, that by itself is worth delving into it." Which was not something the MAK had the ability to act on at the moment, so the work would have to be done here in Xian.

The probably with a hundred men, well total, was that it was often difficult to catch everyone... they had been talking about some kind of switchboard and headset apparatus but it hadn't gone anywhere yet. "Should we move on to radios? Or the Pyrex patent licensure," Dawes questioned... rhetorically.

"Radios," Came the chime in from almost a third of the table in unison, a couple of the locomotive men protested... and the pyrex patent needed to be seen to for safety reasons, it would help safety but it lacked the perceived broadness of radios. Of everything they would do.

The meeting went on throughout the day. The conference of Spring 1920 focused on allocating resources, and the argument to integrate improvements from the work, and work on leads to better sciences and the industrial world. A lot of it was still focused on their 'bread and butter' on trains, and steel manufacture, metallurgy in general. Steel was the building block. It was what the trains needed, the bridges, cities.

The tooling.

The machinery was expendable. Buy use it up, use the profits to buy newer better machines, or een build them in house... the latter had been the lesson of the war as supply of new Hartford tooling dried up... and people still grumbled about tooling that had gotten shipped off to Tsarist Russia only to be appropriated by the Bolsheviks. It was 1920, they were looking forward to a new decade... and one with a different and potentially brighter future than what things would have been without the influx of capital from the war. The demands to make more for export.

"Speaking of capital there is the bank minutes, you want 'em?"

"I might as well." That also wasn't his area of expertise. There had been a reason that the central bank had been set up independent of direct cadre control, and with explicit clear goals. Wilson should not have overruled his own bank during the war, "What's this?"

"They say recession actually started before the armistice. The number crunching on the machines bears out the theory."

It made sense... the market had been overheating in materials the year before, and price controls had let off pressure from the boiler, but not enough. "That's interesting, but the consensus is that prices will come down then?"

"Yeah, maybe this year, but certainly next." Dawes agreed. "Now," He coughed, "We don't expect to see a return to pre war lows. That's makers, that's gonna be consumers as well, people with money in their pocket are going to want to buy stuff, so I expect that things get moving after all the boys are home there will be a demand for things, but prices in general should decline from where they've so maybe 1914 prices."
--
Notes: We have officially entered 1920 as a calendar year main story whatever you want to call it. By this point and time Reinsch has not only resigned, but he has been replaced as US legation, Alston has finally succeeded John Jordan there are other personnel changes to the combined anglo America legation in Peking. As mentioned in this section the Asiatic bank which nominally held the Russian manchurian lines is in financial turmoil due to the Bolshevik seizure of power, no one is readily clearly on who holds what there are several changes of leadership various attempts to restructure RAB had been prone to making legal challenges really between the period of 1902-1916 against various Anglo, Japanese, and American investment attempts throughout China, this included in Hankow with the floundering russian investments in what is today Wuhan. There were other litigations while WW1 was going on, and then of course there was well the 1917 revolutions and the floor fell out but by that point there was a lot of animosity between the various banks. The RAB's behavior was not unique it was just the one that got the shaft from starting from an already weaker position (post 1905 especially, but then 1917).

Anyway, and also the situation in Manchuria, and Siberia here, will effect how Manchuria acts in the future, but Zhang Tso-lin always kept ties to the Manchu court and that will play a role later when we start getting into both Manchuria as well as Mongolia with Ungern in 21.

Click to shrink...

Yes,keep Sendzimir for China,let USA engineers come to beg for his patents to you!

War games - considering what kind of forces have your China and potential enemies,you should rather focis on russian civil war battles,maybe polish-soviet 1920,too.
There is no enemies and places where your China could fight second Verdun.

20mm gun for tanks would be good idea,PZII and L6 was too heavy,but you could use future polish design for recon tank:/from 1938/
4tp.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjXgtKhqMuDAxX7VfEDHa_3CBsQFnoECA0QAQ&url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4TP&usg=AOvVaw0ib8fI2AAUgWyYjA3o1Nbl&opi=89978449

it weight 4,35 t,had 4-17mm armour,and was 55km/h fast on road.We do not produced it,becouse in 1940 it would be arleady obsolate,but in,let say,1925 China,against Japan or soviets? it would be good there maybe even till 1960 - as recon tank,of course.

It had also PZinż 160 AT 37mm gun on tank chasis,which also would be good till at least 1940,and
Pzinż 152 tractor for artillery.

 

[Imperator Pax]

War games - considering what kind of forces have your China and potential enemies,you should rather focis on russian civil war battles,maybe polish-soviet 1920,too.
There is no enemies and places where your China could fight second Verdun.

Click to shrink...

Like, at the modern US Army (and the naval war college) war college we still war game out WW1 battles its more about staff level understanding of order of operations. Its not that we expect to refight those battles, we don't, its about if you have x and the enemy has y why does Z happen. Its about asking the attendees do you understand why and how of doctrine.

Yes, the Russian Civil war and P-S are probably more reflective of the actions you're likely to fight but if you're running that course is there going to be the documentation to dissect those battles the Army War College in WW1 was looking at San Juan Hill and the spanish-american war because we understood both sides and it was wanted that the officers taking the course work would recognize and think about this (largely because most of west points grads were being promoted rapidly, and 2 most of them hadn't had serious staff work for that size of units) no one in the 1920s in China is going to refight Verdun the resources for that just aren't there, Verdun was very much a battle that occured due to geographical constraints and no ability to move latterally.

 

[ATP]

Like, at the modern US Army (and the naval war college) war college we still war game out WW1 battles its more about staff level understanding of order of operations. Its not that we expect to refight those battles, we don't, its about if you have x and the enemy has y why does Z happen. Its about asking the attendees do you understand why and how of doctrine.

Yes, the Russian Civil war and P-S are probably more reflective of the actions you're likely to fight but if you're running that course is there going to be the documentation to dissect those battles the Army War College in WW1 was looking at San Juan Hill and the spanish-american war because we understood both sides and it was wanted that the officers taking the course work would recognize and think about this (largely because most of west points grads were being promoted rapidly, and 2 most of them hadn't had serious staff work for that size of units) no one in the 1920s in China is going to refight Verdun the resources for that just aren't there, Verdun was very much a battle that occured due to geographical constraints and no ability to move latterally.

Click to shrink...

Good point.And good reasons to consider Verdun and 1898 war in your games.If you need more info about russian civil war battles - hire white officers who run to Siberia.
P.S About officers who run there in OTL - Ferdynand Ossendowski,who fought for mad baron and later run from soviets,could deliver some info.Including where Gate to Agharta is,becouse locals show him that place !.

Although,if Mad baron survived here,he could be still there ....

 

[Imperator Pax]

Alright first and foremost this is an Alternate History scenario that I consider broadly plausible, its outside of my specific wheelhouse and tis a new video so I can't say I've had much time to consider. It is unlikely to effect the broad timeline course.... probably at least not a significant impact

But in summary Whittle was a british engineer and due to Air Ministry (UK) Shenanigans was more or less ignored due to political queue system that the UK worked under, but hypothetically his work if funded could have resulted in early gas turbine for both jet aircraft and destroyers/ships.

Fair warning it is a long british style lecture its like two hour video, but I figured I'd share.

 

[ATP]

Alright first and foremost this is an Alternate History scenario that I consider broadly plausible, its outside of my specific wheelhouse and tis a new video so I can't say I've had much time to consider. It is unlikely to effect the broad timeline course.... probably at least not a significant impact

But in summary Whittle was a british engineer and due to Air Ministry (UK) Shenanigans was more or less ignored due to political queue system that the UK worked under, but hypothetically his work if funded could have resulted in early gas turbine for both jet aircraft and destroyers/ships.

Fair warning it is a long british style lecture its like two hour video, but I figured I'd share.

Click to shrink...

I skip to finale,and i do not belive,that jets would change much.Only difference would be Mig 19 class fighters in 1945,not 1950.
Sips - dunno,i knew to little to say anything here.

 

[Imperator Pax]

I skip to finale,and i do not belive,that jets would change much.Only difference would be Mig 19 class fighters in 1945,not 1950.
Sips - dunno,i knew to little to say anything here.

Click to shrink...

I honestly think Clarke is optimistic on the arrival of airpower I certainly don't think they would be available for a strike a meaningful strike as bombers against Wilhelmhaven at the start of the war, as for ships I don't think, I think Clarke is engaging in wisheful thinking that the Admiralty would commit to a naval build up (or that treasury would let them have the money) to start a cruiser and capital ship expansion with the new turbines before Geneva and 2 London fail so I don't think those would be available.

I think you could have turbines and I think there would be an impact, you might see faster earlier jet aircraft but I think the real impact would be after the war an into the coldwar but I did think it was an interesting perspective

 

[ATP]

I honestly think Clarke is optimistic on the arrival of airpower I certainly don't think they would be available for a strike a meaningful strike as bombers against Wilhelmhaven at the start of the war, as for ships I don't think, I think Clarke is engaging in wisheful thinking that the Admiralty would commit to a naval build up (or that treasury would let them have the money) to start a cruiser and capital ship expansion with the new turbines before Geneva and 2 London fail so I don't think those would be available.

I think you could have turbines and I think there would be an impact, you might see faster earlier jet aircraft but I think the real impact would be after the war an into the coldwar but I did think it was an interesting perspective

Click to shrink...

I think the same.Besides,early jets were good only as fighters against heavy bombers and recon planes,becouse bomber jets could drop bombs,but not hit anytching smaller then average town.
So,early jets would help only those who :
1.Faced many heavy bombers
2.Have problems with air recon.

Which mean,Axis powers,noy Allies.

But,quicker development after WW 2 could mean planes like Su57 and F22 mass produced when soviet fall,and that would mean even better planes now...or not?
Maybe everybody would think "this is good enough?"

 

[Imperator Pax]

I think the same.Besides,early jets were good only as fighters against heavy bombers and recon planes,becouse bomber jets could drop bombs,but not hit anytching smaller then average town.
So,early jets would help only those who :
1.Faced many heavy bombers
2.Have problems with air recon.

Which mean,Axis powers,noy Allies.

But,quicker development after WW 2 could mean planes like Su57 and F22 mass produced when soviet fall,and that would mean even better planes now...or not?
Maybe everybody would think "this is good enough?"

Click to shrink...

For mass production the 57, probably not, the 22... is a maybe but that depends on other factors... like one of the planes in this timeline where more are produced is the F 4 Phantom (which isn't saying that much because a lot of those were made anyway) and that has repercussions later in the timeline in aircraft production and choices... but even if you have earlier faster mass produced aircraft I think what you really see is the increase in numbers of things like the Phantom, and the F 15 and MiG 25 get emphasized in production in terms of your fighter platforms I expect that you would probably see an emphasis on more air frames rather than the move to the 22 I see that as a very late doctrinal development which is divorced from having more engine development early.

By the time you get to the fall of the soviet union, the collapse yes there would probably be better planes but I doubt the emphasis would necessarily focus on Stealth per se, until BVR is really nailed into people's heads, and in order to do that you're going to need experience with where doctrine fails in air war combat.

 

[ATP]

For mass production the 57, probably not, the 22... is a maybe but that depends on other factors... like one of the planes in this timeline where more are produced is the F 4 Phantom (which isn't saying that much because a lot of those were made anyway) and that has repercussions later in the timeline in aircraft production and choices... but even if you have earlier faster mass produced aircraft I think what you really see is the increase in numbers of things like the Phantom, and the F 15 and MiG 25 get emphasized in production in terms of your fighter platforms I expect that you would probably see an emphasis on more air frames rather than the move to the 22 I see that as a very late doctrinal development which is divorced from having more engine development early.

By the time you get to the fall of the soviet union, the collapse yes there would probably be better planes but I doubt the emphasis would necessarily focus on Stealth per se, until BVR is really nailed into people's heads, and in order to do that you're going to need experience with where doctrine fails in air war combat.

Click to shrink...

Certainly both sides would have more B1 and Tu 160 bombers build here,too.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Certainly both sides would have more B1 and Tu 160 bombers build here,too.

Click to shrink...

Right I would definitely agree on that, better engines would mean that the B52 would also get overhauled with these newer more developed engines especially as cruise missiles develop, the B 52 can be used is used as a stand off attack platform from the air (Gulf 1 comes to mind, we might very well see that sooner) but the B 1 being funded and more of seems more likely, but we might still see the same program delays for the B 2

And more B1 and a greater support for the B1 will in turn push Soviet procurement for more Tu 160s for the sake of bomber parity, and vice versa is likely true, can't have a bomber gap.

 

[Imperator Pax]

March 1920
Allen pulled the paper out of the rack. The cadre was a hundred members nominal, that was the paper strength and like any unit rarely met it. They were down a couple members who had yet to have replacements named. There twenty plus members of the body who were proxies for cadre members who were currently abroad.

Underneath the Cadre though were bodies, and organizations connected to the army, and to business and day to day to running of both... and going forward there would be a bureaucracy in the province going forward. They had been planning for that, but it would be the staff officers, there were division commanders to consider, there was the corp of engineers, there were others that developed since Bai Lang's death... but they were doing more now than just talking about staffing government posts. They were talking about implementation of formal bureaucracy.

For the moment though it was just the three of them in the room.

"Are these numbers accurate?"

There was a snort, Waite shook his head, put his glass to one side, "Hoss those are probably optimistic. Leaving aside schooling requirements, housing, and," another snort, "that there is a lot of demand, I mean most of our boys want to make rank. Career sergeants are in high demand too... with reservists and the system we'll get some overlap, but if we have to call those troops up it'll mean disrupting the economy."

That wouldn't be so much of an issue during the calling of the guard was for a flood or to handle a purely short term emergency. "We knew there were going to be teething issues."

Understatement. "I mean, we'll have some people ship out for Powell, the Guatemala city trunk is expanding,"

"Don't remind me," Allen muttered glancing to the other man, but it was standard practice. They needed experienced crews to handle the track." They had agreed to Powell's temporary duty request on the fact that was how things worked, "I didn't need Powell reminding me how much trouble it was to set the first line up." That they had built largely relying on techniques from the corp of engineers... and that had meant setting dynamite in some cases personally. Powell wasn't prepared to do that.

"He wasn't even here for most of that," Waite snorted. "He's got no business talking about that. Especially given him being off, I don't care how well he's laid the foundation over there."

"You agreed to the personnel though."

"Its a major trunk line I'm not stupid I know what he needs... but I also know he wants a battalion of first rate shooters."

The truth was when they had started they had needed much as when Japan had first laid down rails had needed to import steel for the rails... and that had meant going to the states, but they had started securing coal and iron digging and then a mill of their own as soon as possible... and by the time they had started laying the trunk line west from Zhengzhou... well they had steel... never mind after the move to Xian.

"Its for security, there are bandits over there too. Black Jack was jumping the border with Mexico before the States went to go save Europe from the Germans."

Allen glanced to Waite, "I know, we all know that," He replied holding up a hand, "How is Dulles on that affair?"

"He's alright with it... given the yankee in New York, and that Wilson," [is] "a cripple, its better than that since it means we shouldn't have a problem. The House is divided... we will have to see, but its hiring season, and its buying season major, Powell knows it we go in while things are cheap we ship it to Guatemala and we build now while all the competition is struggling to find a sure footing." The former signals officer moved over to liberate the decanter, "Now is the time to move."

"Of that we're in agreement," Waite agreed, "Griswold, Dawes, yeah we're all onboard. Doesn't change the fact its right there in black and white, that we're gonna be short manpower. That's why we're going to expand hiring from Europe." Particularly the defunct empires of old europe... and not just for here... "But the consensus is unanimous, be ambitious boys." Waite took a glass. "And admit you're glad to be here, for more reasons than just the whiskey."

Ah the idiocy of prohibition, another reason not to head back to the states.
--

Percy tucked his handkerchief away, "Always a fine breakfast John Allen, reminds me of home. "

Allen sipped the orange juice, the oranges which come from a ship that had left the states from San Francisco harbor but it was a good thing that things were going back to normal. The French had wanted economic controls to remain... .which bluntly Allen interpreted was that France wanted preferential rates for being French... and it was starting to cost the French, "I told you Wilson had not a chance of getting through the Senate with it," He remarked.

"Yes, you did." And without an American assent to Versailles the British government under the Welsh Wizard had written themselves the nice out of things on the continent. "It toppled Clemenceau's government."

He made a vaguely affirmative noise in the back of his throat and set the glass down. "I assume that must have some effect with regards to Alston."

"It does after a fact." Percy folded one leg and formed a scholar's cradle, "The Japanese, have Vladivostok quite secure. The French have left, and they left significant amounts of material, but well the Poles are fighting the Soviets in the west-"

"Percy would you get on with it,"

"You don't really need rifles, John Allen. That's what the arms embargo, well embargos... but that doesn't hurt you, you have a dozen arsenals now I have a friend at Vickers now that the war is over there are just certain things which well the embargo doesn't say anything about, and the letter of it is the important thing."

He drummed his fingers on the desk, a part of him was tempted to bring up the Vickers Siemens scandal from before the war... but all of that seemed long ago now... so he adjusted the trim of the conversation, "We might not need rifles but I am given to understand that is not a sentiment shared with our Cossack neighbors."

"Yes, that is true. There is a great deal of hardware that under the defense ... plans, spending for imperial defense that are surplus to requirements and will be paid off."

"And you wouldn't want it sitting in Manchuria or Mongolia."

"No."

In hindsight it was a good call. What would happen was that that new, the shiny new weapons left for the allied intervention that hadn't been well planned for and allocated well for at all would leave plenty of equipment and tools beside... but the diversion was merely about ferretting out the other positions. There was no reason not to explore potential agreements, "You're worried about India." You're was really more 'you lot are', meaning the whole British establishment.

"We will always be worried about the jewel in the crown." Percy replied, "yes and that's why, no point pretending," He remarked clearing his throat, "It is what it is you know... part of the problem is Wilson's declaration of the aims of the expedition without consulting either Japan or Britain, and he has acted sense as if our efforts to contain the Bolshevik menace are the problem, can you scarcely imagine what would have been if we had simply allowed Lenin to sell the country off to the Germans. The Germans are beat, they're down for now, but for the rest of it, we must contain the reds... and-"

"The railways."

"Yes. There is no ocean, no sea we can traverse,"

There was always the possibility of Persia, but neither broached it, they wouldn't do that today there were too many uncertainties about that route. "The Cadre has its interests," There were technical, and institutional skill sets that needed to be cultivated, "Vickers opened a laboratory in 1917, and not for rifles, so you could say we'd be amenable to cooperation, and purchases from England." The truth was few if any of the cadre's membership these days could afford to be rigorous laboratory dwellers ... there was too much else to do they were needed elsewhere... and if the body of the university was to expand, if the technical colleges were going to go there needed to be commercial laboratories that provided work. In vickers case it was a matter of electrical power... but not just that Vickers was a big company, "You're correct there are things other than rifles, but its not necessarily ship building either, as you said no seas we can traverse." Better not to let Percy think that Vickers might have a shot at any canal works... even though those needed to be be done.

 

[ATP]

It remind me problems with polish army in 17th century - they get money for,let say,100 soldiers,but becouse gold lost part of ots worth and Sejm do not agreed to gave more money,they must hire,let say,80 soldiers for the same money.

Nobody steal anything,it was all for existing soldiers.

 

[Imperator Pax]

April 1920
He thought about they had built that first line... but the Qing were long gone now... they'd been on their last legs, and now it felt so long ago.

In 1910, a decade earlier, he'd have been appalled with what Wilson had done on behalf of the European war... appalled wasn't the right word per se to what he felt though. Wilson had made mistakes, in particular ignoring his own experts at his own vaunted federal reserve when they told him something he hadn't liked but Wilson had overseen developments that could not be ignored in view of what they had been able to accomplish... but the rush to demobilize was a mistake, that much was clear.

They could learn from the mistakes... they had to learn from the mistakes. They needed to be planning for a decade in the future. That meant keeping up with developments in manufacturing for when hostilities resumed. When, was the question, for them, for here in China, for the Middle American cadre. That meant planning, some things were simple. Up front payment, US Dollars the pound as a secondary, it was probably too much to hope for for actual gold some people would have preferred that, but credit wasn't an option.

Even if the Bolsheviks hadn't defaulted on the Tsarist loans the French noise should have made everyone leery... the French were too mercantilist. Not so mercantilist that if it came to it don't sell to them at all, but selling to the British seemed safer. Carry was another concern, and that was hard to predict.

Production, procurement needed to be more effective. That meant in investing in improved machinery, it meant trying new ideas. Better rolling techniques, larger steam driven hammers, scale production, more efficient mines. There was a note in the file about mines, which had hit his desk, that would have to be followed up on. All of that would be important for making the Ford deal work, as had already been noted the use of automotive industry would be about moving supplies beyond the end of a rail head... the model T or an equivalent or derivative there of would be feasible to sell to the working public, but it wouldn't be as readily available to the work force for at least a few years. Most of the automotive production would be for commercial or military application, and would take the form of trucks, or tractors. They knew that, Ford knew that, and their agreement with Ford was already slated to provide ford trucks, and tractors, the latter from Edsel's branch of the company so really it was the shipping bottleneck than anything... and it was no secret that old man was riding his son hard.

The agreement with Ford was to buy Fords in bulk... something they would have done anyway but had been stopped by the War and its board controlling industries so even in that they had an advantage. In 1911 before the Qing had collapsed they wouldn't have been considering making anything more than more coal fired trains, there hadn't existed a demand for more than that not really. The electric generator demand had been limited, too limited that year to be a real priority for domestic production., but the integration of their own copper mines and increased demand changed that, as had the war's strangle. The war had changed everything.

That was the limitation, it was hard to be sure that ... that that change was understood... or that everyone understood it in the same way. That was most apparent in the papers that were coming forward from their own officers ... the men in the lower ranks trying to make sense of it all... especially with the end of the war to look at. To that end it was just about static defense, it was not entirely about the transition to maneuver with overwhelming force, it wasn't just about logistics... and it was not about looking back at the old masters to contemplate and make sense of the strategy. It was all of that together, and more.

"So what is the ETS suggesting?"

Bill shuffled, and glanced to Waite, "It was something I was talking to Fin," His younger brother Phineas, who had been in the Navy, "in March 1862 the Virginia was completed."

"Are you suggesting we need to build river boats," Cole started to speak up, "You want gunships?"

"Yes." Cullen declared succinctly.

"Nah that's not it." Bill answered, "We got to talking, my brother and I were talking turrets like on Monitor became the norm, you see it now on the French tank, the Renault, but we were looking at that as well. Sloping the plate provides protection, it cuts down on internal volume sure, I want to slope the plates on the armored cars,"

"We think it would provide better protection for the machine guns,"

"And you want more than that eventually, I take it?" He guessed, "For what?"

"Mobile gun carriage. A howitzer for close range direct fire."

"Why?"

"Why not?" Waite questioned, "It'll protect my red legs, my red legs bring a moving gun directly against enemy infantry in the open or their positions of defense. "

He held up his hands, "That's fair." He glanced at Cullen, raising an eyebrow before he asked the question, "Do you really want boats?"

"The green gang is running boats in the yangzi, it'd be nice to have something, but we can talk about it later." Cullen turned the office chair around, "So what do you two girls want with this?"

"We want to test the angles to start with."

"Then what change how you cut plate, how you roll it, what?"

"Yeah, something like that, I read the report from Russia, that church bell, that could have been bad nine kinds of ways bad,. The one pounder doesn't give the force of it," For infantry out in the open at close range it was one thing, but other than that, "it hasn't got the range, and it doesn't offer protection adequate for what we need, and its top heavy... which we already know from with third."

These would be the talks that would eventually lead to the formation of the commission that would lead to the Virginia plate tests in a few years down the road. In the spring of 1920 it simply wasn't a priority. The interim solution was simply to make better changes to the Ford trucks, which would supersede and replace the other models of trucks with the army.
--
The ford deal was the major investment for the Corp of Engineers, as well as the rifle divisions. The infantry divisions less so. Second Division would receive trucks probably in a few years, but because the infantry units were intended to operate much closer to the railheads, and occupy defensive strong points it wasn't a priority.

"You want to establish a what?"

Allen frowned covering his ear, "Don't holler Hodges. We're all right here."

"I think we should have an independent air division. An Air Force." Adams replied, rounding in his chair. "For gods sake you were the one who said Vickers is having the feelers out."

The two men were both being watched by the rest of the body. Adams was a junior member his suggestion was a feeler. Allen figured someone else would have put it out there. It had been one thing to talk about buying air planes for the mail service, but even that was a combination of arguments for needing a critical needs ferry service... and also as an excuse for international procurement to skirt Jordan's embargo.

The problem with Jordans embargo is he couldn't, hadn't been able to stop them from bringing in the albatros that they had settled on as their preferred option... and he couldn't stop them from having Hieronymus build more powerful engines for the birds either.

That was going to be slow going for other reasons. There were lessons to learn from war time production to be sure, but planes were not trains. They had different construction requirements, they all accepted that. The automotive industry was more important, had more obvious, more broad civilian generalizability.

In august the British had enumerated a ten year rule. The parliamentarians of old england talking about how a follow on war was not likely for the forseeable future... if they were lucky that meant they'd have those ten years of breathing space... but if they weren't lucky they needed to be ready. Optimism needed to be tempered by prudence.

Hodges shifted his beginning of a portly bulk, the weight gain not helped by the leg break in an accident during the expansion of the war years, he wasn't quite fat yet, but John Adams a thin man with a wide forehead. "An air force?" Hodges grunted, "For what? Because the British have done it, cause they have a Royal Air Force..." Hodges paused heading off that the Signals Corp had held the US birds before the war... and the US had gone into the war unprepared for the air war, and that was the biggest impediment to the talk.

Future arguments for the Air Division becoming the Air Force and an Air Minister was to ultimately follow a model along what shaped the Gendarems structure. It was to be a division largely in name and based in 1920 to study, to conduct staff work, engineering work, on both air messenger service, civilian side duties, as well as defensive, air protection, air reconnaissance, and air attack. It was to be a tall order, but it was also not in 1920 a priority. It was not something they intended to pour money into production or procurement of large numbers of planes until they had a strategy, and framework to answer fundamental questions... by that point Hodges had retired to Tibet, and Adams had shipped to Middle America, where of course they had a larger need for Hieronymus aircraft to fly search missions for the conflict brewing there

 

[ATP]

According to what i read about Wilson,he have great plan for world peace in which great superpowers would do whatever they want with their neighbours -

For example,he was against Lenin,but prefered him to tsar,and belived that Russia would become democracy again,and would rule nearby countries,like rump Poland.
There was no place for Ukraine in his world.

About turrets for various things:

1.Gunboats - you could have small one with 37mm guns,medium one with 75mm guns,and big ones with 120mm gun or even bigger.Rivers in China was big enoug for cruisers to operate there - in OTL China fleet hide in rivers,till japaneese planes sunk it./they had few old crusiser,and 2 new light cruisers/

2.Armored cars - why not ? especially with HMG.

3.Future tanks - sure,but howitzers would be better mounted in chasis.

You could add armored trains,too - Poland build 10 or 20,i forget,with 100mm howitzers or 75mm guns in turrets.They would be useful there.I hope,that you keep armored trains taken from czech,white russians and poles here.There should be at least one railgun there.

Planes - they are actually easier to made then locomotives - for example,Julius von Berg,creator of best A-H fighter, Aviatik/Berg D.1 made it so easy in production,that everybody who made bicycles could made his planes,too.

So,as long as you are making wooden planes,they would be cheap and easy to made.And you could made wooden fighters capable of fighting metal ones even during WW2 !
Here:
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct...usg=AOvVaw0_PL1A0g5lyK8ok6w39Nim&opi=89978449

And,you still could sell Albatrosses with better engines for South American wars - Peru vs Bolivia,i think.

 

[Unique]

How are the cadre finding that many people to fill up the ranks of their organisations? I mean western educated Chinese don't grow on trees during those era. How well educated are their Chinese officers? Also how are they dealing with the landlords? If I remember correctly in every mainland Chinese historical novel the landlords were always the problem. They usually put their interests first. But it's mainland Chinese novel so I'll take it with a grain of salt but I'm just asking how is he dealing with it.

 

[Imperator Pax]

How are the cadre finding that many people to fill up the ranks of their organisations? I mean western educated Chinese don't grow on trees during those era. How well educated are their Chinese officers? Also how are they dealing with the landlords? If I remember correctly in every mainland Chinese historical novel the landlords were always the problem. They usually put their interests first. But it's mainland Chinese novel so I'll take it with a grain of salt but I'm just asking how is he dealing with it.

Click to shrink...

In this case specifically this case its thats most foreign enterprises from the end of the Qing operated schools, this is somewhat died off as practice after ww1 (though for example Siemens does seemed to have funded education for workers children up until ww2) this was just kind of thing that large firms did back in the late 19th century as part of housings, as for the landlords the arguably business problem with landlords would be in western Zhili, Shansi and Shaanxi that is less of an issue demographically and is mostly a division between coopting some and leveraging the others, but in Yan Xishan's province the way he got around it historically was by being available to mediate disputes as personal intermediary, in Shaanxi where the height of the cadre's military leverage is this is mostly done by the imposition of a professional bureaucracy, this goes to the education question where the cadre has been operating schools since 1910, and as mentioned basic military training for recruits is six months which is much longer than even what the Beiyang Army used during its time as the Qing New Army in Zhili which was arguably the height of their quality at individual recruit.

So by 1920 this is institutional you have people who are coming up through their formative years in the system, at the upper echelon levels you still have officers who are juren, who have degrees in the Qing military examination system, but there are very few of those left given when that system stopped issuing degrees relative to this point.

And yes in popular media the landlord class gets exaggerated, but at the same time yes, in the coastal provinces especially the land lord class did frequently organize its own militias simply due to population density in order to maintain control over plots of land and the warlord era coincided with a series of famines as well as floods that were largely a result of failure to maintain infrastructure (and yes some of that was the landlords threatened to revolt every time the Qing or the Ming before them, talked about that whole taxes thing, and provincial tax remittances were squandered).

 

[Imperator Pax]

.
April 1920
At a little over three years old the Infantry Staff College had graduated three classes under its belt now. Its course work included the classics of literature. The same was true for the elementary schools as well... just in a different scope of study. He had had concerns about Yuan's insistence on the Confucian core curriculum for primary school... but for officers, reviewing Sun Tzu made more sense... but arguably more important were looking at what other people in his day, and age had said about the book. To that extent the Wuzi was at least as important... and probably more important a historical document than Sun Tzu was for certain political lessons.

They would never go back to a society of Confucian literati, but they would also never place the same emphasis and care that the Art of War wanted to place on spies... but that wasn't to say they ignored either. They couldn't afford to do that... because the truth was, "Both books are taught to the Japanese," The Samurai might have been abolished as a caste but their traditions did survive in some measure, "At that their staff colleges." Yan nodded in concurrence... he had after all graduated from the army one, and even though most of them hadn't gone to Japanese schools had been exposed to the Japanese body of literature that they studied.

But just as the domestic literature was important and looking at how other neighboring nations interpreted the old classics there needed to be room for new developments. New technology could still validate old ideals, but they could invalidate old standbys as well.

Only part of today to be the rehashing of the bayonet curriculum. There would be talk about all the toys the artillery had developed, field guns, howitzers, mortars and machine guns, but perhaps as equally important was political inoculation. It was to be teh defining factor of change... and to the British it was a reiteration of the Clauswitzenian maxims.

For the FSO and their dilettante armchair experts within the political elite it played towards their own preconceived notions... and that included super imposing the last two and a half centuries of European political history upon the east.

The Qing had coveted western weapons. The Wuwei corp, and the Hui sharpshooters had rushed for Mauser rifles, maxim machine guns, and Krupp mountain guns. The Qing, the Koreans, and Japanese had all invited Prussian officers.

"Educational, more broadly social reforms are necessary. It has to be the whole populace." Waite remarked, "It was the black and white, modernization had to be pushed forward by an educated populace, success was having locally available skills not simply bringing things in from overseas the war proved that by cutting them off as central governments imposed controls on resources hitherto unfathomable.

Things like the exam system, the eight legged essay, would not return, but the traditions of an educated elite, the value society put on degree holders, and magistrates would still be there. It was about bringing the middle classes, the upper classes into the fold... but even so they weren't attempting to crib liberally from what had allowed the Meiji reformers to modernize Japan unilaterally.

Modernization had to include education for obvious economic reasons, but there was not a nationalist agenda at the higher echelons of command. That was true of the Ma clique's participation and of Yan Xishan with regard to his native province... because in April of 1920 no one was looking at the full break down of the beiyang clique into its composite factions of northern power brokers. This was supposed to be a conference on education, and joint military and civilian political theory. It was not as it would be reinterpreted later perhaps even reimagined as the origin or a step in the direction of a northern Chinese ideological separatism. There was one 'China' no one disagreed with that consensus, but there were ... after a fact regional provincial or even county loyalties that separated north from south.

"We're not in disagreement, but the college itself is intended to prepare majors, and little birds for battalion command," In 1916 after all there had been no brigade generals and the purpose of the Staff college had been effectively as a promotion board running through officers to contend with the expanding army.

"When the new class graduates we should have the officers to fill the ranks forward, but our bigger concern is materiel command ranks." Waite's look was directed to Yan.

The Dujun paused. "As I understand this is a common problem."

Waite grunted in agreement, "Yeah, but if the machine bureau in Taiyuan is going to produce mortars, and brownings something has to be done." The mortars were really less of an issue, no one really expected Stokes's three inch of any of the improvements to it were a problem. It was the wiring and filling out work for things like the three inch pack guns and larger cannons that needed work, or the complex cutting that went into the receiver of a water cooled browning machine gun.

--
His focus was on train tables. Trains to weihaiwei and Tietsin, but trains westward to the Transoxiana line. The British treasury was going to start pinching pennies soon. It was unavoidable... but on the otehr hand the red cavalry the only real expeditionary force the bolsheviks were capable of mustering had been driven back.

It was stupid of them to have attacked in winter anyway, but never mind into a prepared force . That spit balled into too many speculations. Had they done it out of revolutionary zeal, out of the belief that the Japanese couldn't possibly withstand them, ignorance... ay number of mistaken factors... the red cavalry had attacked head forward...

...but instead of forming square the defenses had shattered them, and the Japanese had chased them from the province.... but then they had stopped chasing. They had stopped chasing because Iseburo had insisted they had no mandate to do that, and they didn't have the resources. He wouldn't let the army do what he had already recognized had been the white's problem .

MacKinder didn't think it would be enough. He and a handful of others in the FSO wanted to act, felt it was a duty to act... but they weren't the ones controlling the purse strings. The British were trying to push for other solutions. Since the French weren't reliable sources of troops, the British were redirecting pressure elsewhere, leveraging the French to try and support the new states in the west... or that was what the FSO claimed they were doing.

It seemed a rosy assessment.

It seemed pretty likely that the British were puffing themselves up , or were taking French affirmatives at face value without proof... but that could be cynicism as well... they wouldn't really be sure, couldn't be sure until things settled out.

... but it was April now, if something was going to happen it would have to be soon. "Lenin calls it War communism."

Allen put the tables down, and glanced to Dawes, "Banditry would be more accurate from what we've heard."

"Yeah." The artilleryman agreed somberly, "He's going to cause a famine... and frankly that's the point since hunger is a weapon." Lenin's statements on what was acceptable for revolutionary fighting, or fighting for the revolution was a double edged sword. It was easy for city people, Berliners, Londoners, New Yorkers to wave red banners they lived in the great western urban metropolis it was rhetoric, the same as an city party boss to them. "Its all rhetoric and flourish as long as they aren't the ones hungry."

"I don't like this ten year foolishness."

He got a look in reply, and then a shrug, "Its the anglo-saxon inclination John, the congress will lap it up, why spend the money they'll say? The English will say they shouldn't need to fight a war in Europe, the states will look towards the oceans and they'll all bray about splendid isolation together. Must be nice having all that shoreline," He remarked wistfully, "But we can never afford that sort of optimism hoss. Anyway," Dawes rifled through a set of papers, "Here,"

"Textile reports?" He bit down a groan... it was dry reading even if clothes were a staple good.

"Yeah. I think we can get the cotton we need from central Asia, we make denim out of it turn around, and ship it back out. There are mills state side we can work with, where we do the same thing, its shorter turn around, but local cotton will be insulated against a trade war."

"So you think this loom thing is for real?"

"Hodges thinks so, but its a machine it'll take time and I don't know if he's comfortable waiting. This is more about supplying the mill not the machine, and its also about stability. We can make free trade work to our advantage... if France and England, and the states start tit for tat we don't want to be in the middle of all that. So we insulate where we can preemptive like."

--
Notes: one thing to note is that Clauswitz is not in the US Army's main curriculum at this point in time, it doesn't enter the normal curriculum until the seventies. The Royal Navy is actually more Clauswitzian than the US through theoriticians like Corbett. So thus while it hasn't actually entered the curriculum Xian does adopt Clauswitz, but largely because the Qing and Japanese schools had already had it suggested to them in the 1870s. This has nothing to do with the cadre Yuan Shikai had read Clauswitz, the Wuzi, Jomini (obviously he was the more popular theorist in the 19th​ century) and a wide range of other military treatises. Iseburo and certainly Yamagata Aritomo had read Clauswitz (which is ironic since Clauswitz would have been highly critical of the IJA and IJN's later subordination of civilian control).

Also it occurs to me 'wiring' here in cannon construction, specifically is referring to barrel construction its not referring to electrical wiring just so no one is confused about this

 

[ATP]

I think,that Sun Tzu was more useful for war then Clauswitz. He saw more then battlefield.And his theory that best commanders do not need to even fight to win is true.
Brownings - good idea,pity that they could not copy MG 34 yet.

Soviets in OTL killed 5M of people through hunger to win civil war.West do not cared/well,nobody cared,even Poland - and we SHOULD knew better./

exams are important,but you are right that coming back to confucians would be silly.I read about chineese officials arguing if wind in some poem should roar or rather howl,where their country was falling.