No GNW (or “Peter goes South”)

[Tiger]

Wouldn’t it be better for everybody involved if the army remained in its present state, doing some updates of its weaponry and drill from time to time but generally remaining mostly a “guardian of a regime” rather than something for the aggressive adventures? This way everybody is happy:

Yes, for now, in context of european "unipolar moment" and internal weakness (economical, first of all) this is a wise course.
But army (at least theoretically) is a device for war, not for social policy.
Maybe better to separate Egyptian (and not only egyptian) Ministre of War on ministry, which will actualle prepare military to fighting. and ministry which will design uniforms, organise parades, play in game of soothing the ego of various military bigwigs and so on.

 

[alexmilman]

Yes, for now, in context of european "unipolar moment" and internal weakness (economical, first of all) this is a wise course.
But army (at least theoretically) is a device for war, not for social policy.

From were did you get such an original idea? The army’s goal is to look good in their uniforms and to provide a public excitement as a mandatory part of various official ceremonies. The rest is just a misunderstanding and if it would clarified in a timely fashion Europe (and not only) would avoid a lot of very unpleasant events. 😜

Maybe better to separate Egyptian (and not only egyptian) Ministre of War on ministry, which will actualle prepare military to fighting

See above. In the case of Egypt this would be an obvious waste of money and effort as had been proved numerous tomes through the XIX century.

and ministry which will design uniforms, organise parades, play in game of soothing the ego of various military bigwigs and so on.

This is what the Military ministry is for. 😜

 

[Aluma]

From were did you get such an original idea? The army’s goal is to look good in their uniforms and to provide a public excitement as a mandatory part of various official ceremonies. The rest is just a misunderstanding and if it would clarified in a timely fashion Europe (and not only) would avoid a lot of very unpleasant events. 😜

Now thats a political theory I can subscribe to

 

[alexmilman]

Now thats a political theory I can subscribe to

Ages ago, when I visited Museum of the Austrian Army in Vienna, and saw uniforms of the officers and generals I came to the conclusion that this army should not go to war. And they were relatively modest comparing to some of their contemporaries. Why wouldn’t all these idiots just stick to looking pretty and having a good time? I’d understand if WWI was started by the Germans ( at that time they did not have too much of a style), but it was not. So it looks like all these military types were too dumb to even understand their own interests.😉

 

[alexmilman]

285. Still in Africa

“So 'ere's to you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, at your 'ome in the Soudan;
You're a pore benighted 'eathen but a first-class fightin' man;
An' 'ere's to you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, with your 'ayrick 'ead of 'air --
You big black boundin' beggar -- for you broke a British square!”
R. Kipling, “Fuzzy-Wuzzy” [1]
“Africa is terrible,
Yes, yes, yes!
Africa is dangerous,
Yes, yes, yes!
Don't go to Africa…”
K. Chukovsky, “Barmaley” [2]
“it does not concern us - he drowns himself, let him save himself.”
D.Samoylov, “Puss in the boots”
“Peggy Bundy: It is a simple operation. What could get wrong?
Doctor (entering): Mrs. Bundy? I have to tell you that something went terribly wrong. Instead of the circular incision Mr.Bundy got a circumcision.”
‘Married with children’

​

Egypt
To assess situation it is important to understand who was befriending whom against whom in what was often referenced as “ʿUrābī’ revolution” (I’m tired of cutting and pasting his name so from now on it will be just Urabi). The trigger was, of course, a somewhat insane policy of Ismail’s regime (to a great degree prompted by his western advisors but also by his own desire to modernize his state), which left state in a deep debt that had to be repaid by raising the taxes. The upper positions in Egypt had been routinely held by the Turks and Circassians. The Greeks were deeply involved in the money lending schemas and the Westerners had been pretty much everywhere.

• The popular force of Urabi’s movement was the fellaheen. Hunger drove them into the most bitter opposition to the Turkish and Circassian pashas who collected the taxes with an iron hand, and to the Greek usurers.
• The landowners, especially the smaller ones, were also in opposition to the monarchy. They were Egyptians and as such were antagonistic to the Turkish aristocracy and the Khedive, as the burden of taxes which the king imposed for the benefit of the foreigners affected their portion of the surplus value. This struggle between the Egyptian landowners on the one hand, and the monarchy and Turkish pashas on the other, took on a national character.
• From among the landowners yet another element oppositional to the existing state regime appeared – the government officials – whose influence was undermined by the strengthening of the position of the foreign Powers.
• A more popular segment in opposition to the regime than that of the landowners and officials was the well-to-do peasantry and the village notables. They had a more independent position, more self-assurance and initiative than the masses of simple peasants and in every broad social movement against the pashas and moneylenders they took a central position.

The movement of Urabi was a combination of these different social factors. On the one hand the ‘Chamber of Notables’ which included landowners and officials supported it, and it also claimed the support of 11 out of 14 provincial governors, men who ‘in their hearts opposed the freedom of the fellah. Their antagonism to the fellaheen did not detract at all from their antagonism to the extravagant monarchy as long as the masses did not undertake a real independent struggle. On the other hand, both the poor peasants and the notables of the village also supported Urabi because “with the mass of the fellahin so deeply in debt it was understood … as a war against their Greek creditors, and there is no doubt that this was the chief motive power that sent volunteers to the standard and that unloosened the purse strings of the Notables.”
Everybody was seemingly in the same boat but because the country still remained quite backward and the western-style “nation” notion was not quite there, yet, the movement, rather than creating inner consolidation, stubbornness and persistence, revealed an all-embracing, but short-lived opposition to the existing regime and outside pressure, rent continually with inner class conflicts. The popular force of Urabi’s movement was the fellaheen, but the leadership was composed of members of the upper classes who were bound to water down the demands of the movement, so that it should not go beyond the scope of a few reforms. It did not dare to struggle consistently against the rule of the foreign bankers. Urabi himself expressed himself thus in a letter to one of the Controllers: ‘It has never been our intention or the intention of any in this country to touch the rights of the Controllers or trespass on any international treaty.’

After coming to power Urabi proposed a few political reforms – the dismissal of all the ministers; the convocation of a parliament; the raising of the strength of the army to 18,000 men – and some economic reforms – the abolition of the foreigners’ privileges with regard to taxation, which was upheld under the foreign control of the financiers at the expense of the inhabitants of Egypt; a cessation of the multiplying of the same official positions, which had fat salaries attached to them, and their concentration in the hands of the different foreign nationals; abolition of the supervision of foreigners over the railways and the domains which had passed into the hands of the Rothschilds’ representatives.

The fellaheen were much more radical in their demands. They wanted to tear up the bills of the Greek usurers and the merchants, to take back into their own hands the lands which had fallen into the hands of the Europeans, and in various places they even began to talk about division of the pashas’ domains. But their movement had been lacking cohesion and a meaningful leadership. And it was lacking support in Cairo and Alexandria. The popular revolutionary demands therefore remained in embryonic form and there was no reason for France to take any drastic measures like Egypt’s occupation by a military force, at least until or rather if it becomes absolutely necessary. The military aspect of the possible intervention did not look as a problem: as was stated by the French PM, “It is of the highest importance that there should be no doubt even for a moment, that Musulman or Arab troops could not resist Europeans in the field.” OTOH, is was quite clear that a permanent military occupation, besides causing unnecessary resentment of the locals and quite probable international tensions, was going to be quite expensive while not producing any specific advantages.

Of course, being “nationalist”, did not automatically meant that a person is competent in finances, agriculture, etc. but it would not take a genius to figure out that even just due to a complete absence of any heavy industry, Egypt can’t built its own railroads or supply equipment for the sugar factories. Which meant that after all the foreigners have to be treated nicely. Between 1895 and 1898 a number of concessions were given to foreign transport companies, the Cairo and Alexandria tramways and narrow-gauge railways in the Delta thus being established. Of course, most of the established industries were related to the preparing raw materials for export but they were bringing money into the country. In 1885 - 89 the average annual exports of the cotton were £8,900,000 and total £11,043,000.

​

To make Egypt attractive to the investments taxation of the foreign subjects and companies had been based upon the mutual agreements between Egypt and specific country. It should come as no surprise that the big landowners also had been getting a preferential treatment.

The peasants, as usually, did not get too much, if anything, but the higher classes, including the newly-appeared bourgeoisie, had been gaining something depending upon their position on a totem pole. If anything bourgeoisie was strongly connected to the foreign capital and as a result was even more attached to the regime than the old feudal class.

Intermission. As long as France did not declare Egypt as its protectorate and did not make any other “proprietary” claim, Britain did not have serious objections. The British politicians still were in ‘We do not want colonies!’ phase. Disraeli called the colonies a millstone round Britain’s neck. Palmerston described Britain’s relation to Egypt in the following terms: ‘When I travel from London to York, I like to find on the road a comfortable inn, but I don’t want to own the house.’ Gladstone reached the height of ‘anti-imperialist’ piety when he declared that British businessmen who ventured to Egypt should not expect any but moral support, as they would not be assisted by any military intervention of their own country in Egypt. Which, of course, did not mean that, given an opportunity, British leadership would not embark upon a military adventure there but, with a broad international opposition to such an action and absence of a compelling reason, such an adventure did not look as a smart move. Well, you can never be 100% safe from the “initiative from the bottom”.

The reforms aside, the new Egyptian government was facing a big dilemma. Formally, Khedive was ruler of Egypt and Sudan. During the reign of Ismail, as a part of the general “westernization”, there was a strong Egyptian administrative presence in Sudan and the local pashas (mostly the same Turks and Circassians) had been working hard to squeeze taxes for repaying the national debt. Administration was headed by Governor General Charles Gordon who worked hard on the “westernization” inviting the British entrepreneurs and abolishing slavery (which, in retrospect, was not such a good idea politically because quite a few local VIPs had been deeply involved in the slave trade). He retired from his position after Ismail’s removal from power. One of the byproducts of the “Urabi revolution” was Cairo’s loss of interest in Sudan and its affairs strengthened by the defeats of the Egyptian forces there by the Mahdists. The government’s intention was to cut losses and get as many Egyptian troops out of Sudan as possible. But this was leaving an issue of the civilians (including the Brits) from Khartum. Actually, Urabi and his colleagues could not care less about the second problem because after the battle of El Obeid in which the British commanders led the Egyptian troops to a terrible defeat (out of the 11,000 7,000 were killed and more than 2,000 captured) the Brits became rather unpopular in Egypt. However, the British government could not be simply ignored and, upon its insistence, Gordon was invited to handle the affairs of Sudan with a clearly defined and straightforward task of evacuating as many British and Egyptian subjects as possible. He was provided with few steamships and sent up the Nile.

What could get wrong? Well, pretty much everything if one tries really hard. On his way to Khartum Gordon assembled the chiefs of the local tribes and explained to them that Sudan is going to be evacuated (which made them think about saving their own hides) but upon arrival to Khartum he decided that governing is much more fun and settled there making couple wasteful attempts to relieve the small besieged garrisons and sending the telegrams to both Egyptian and British governments demanding to send a military relief force. His new idea was that the Mahdists must be defeated and the boring details of the logistics and costs were of no importance. Waiting for the requested reinforcements, he was strengthening Khartum’s fortifications doing the in a somewhat strange way: the formidable obstacles had been created against the land assault from the South but on the West and Northern side there was nothing based upon the assumption that the Blue (on the North) and White (on the West) Nile are enough of the protection. Rather strange assumption because his previous tenure should made him aware of the fact that in a dry season at least the White Nile is getting so shallow that it could be walked across.

Now, the Egyptian government simply could not sent an adequate relief even if it wanted because it had neither enough troops nor money [3]. In Britain, Gladstone’s government, which was against the mission and especially against Gordon, was reluctant to allocate few millions for the task and had a logistical dilemma: how the hell the British troops were supposed to get to Khartum if landing of a major British force in Egypt by whatever reason was going to cause a huge international backlash as a sneaking attempt to occupy the country.

One plausible way would be to negotiate with the Italians a possibility to land such a force in Italian-held Massawa on the Red Sea and to march on Khartum from there. Taking into an account that Massawa was just a modest coaling station, the whole infrastructure would have to be built to accommodate the big numbers of troops with a huge amount of supplies needed for a campaign involving march of at least 400 km to get to Khartum. Even if part of the burden could be taken by the British-held Aden as an intermediate base and probably some cooperation could be expected from the French Djibouti, the logistics still was mind-boggling. Not to mention that this would mean providing Italy with the BIG IOY and, knowing ambitions of its government, this could put Britain in a very awkward position in a near future. The first step would be a request to support Italian wish to occupy the whole Eritrea, which would create problems not only with Ethiopia, after all, screw them, but with France and probably Russia as well.

Another option would be to capture Sudanese port Suakin, turn it into a base and march from it. There would be more complications but not prohibitively so and, with Aden as a coaling base, not too much of anybody’s cooperation would be needed. France long ago made it let be known that it had nothing against the British foothold on the Red Sea (as long as it was controlling entry to it). The port was presently held by the Mahdists so there should be no noises from Egypt. Of course, the whole operation was going to take quite a while but the initial task of capturing the port could be accomplished really fast. Some of the British troops returning from Africa had been diverted there. The port was not defended so the landing did not met any resistance.

On March 10, 1884 the British expedition marched from there against the local Mahdist leader. The force was composed of the same units that had fought at El Teb: 4,500 men, with 22 guns and 6 machine guns. The Mahdists had roughly 10,000 men, most of them belonging to Osman Digna's Hadendoa tribe (known to British soldiers as "Fuzzy Wuzzies" for their unique hair).

On the night of 12 March the British formed an encampment, not far from Osman Digna's positions. From around 1 o'clock until dawn, Mahdist riflemen approached the camp and opened fire, but their shooting was imprecise, and they inflicted few casualties.

At dawn, the artillery was brought to bear against the Mahdist skirmishers and they were driven back. The infantry (which included the Black Watch) then formed into two infantry squares each of brigade-size and advanced. A scouting party discovered that the main body of the Mahdist force was hidden in a nearby ravine, whereupon the British commander, General Graham, ordered the Black Watch to charge to clear those Mahdists out, leaving a wide gap where they had been stationed in the square. A sudden onslaught of Mahdists rushed into this gap. The Black Watch found themselves under intense attack from the Sudanese. The square was flooded with a rush of tribesmen and a brutal hand-to-hand fight resulted. The Black Watch eventually won the contest, driving the Sudanese out, and reforming their square. The Mahdist advance was halted by volleys from the other (Buller's) square, which had survived the attack, and by dismounted cavalry units that had not been engaged until then. The concentrated flanking fire inflicted huge casualties among the Mahdists, who were forced to retreat.

But Khartum was far, far away and getting there still was something of a remote (and not necessarily welcomed) perspective making Gordon with his stubbornness an increasingly greater pain in the government’s posteriors due to the never-ending noise in the newspapers.

______________________
[1] This references either to the Battle of Tamai (1884) or to the Battle of Abu Klea (January 1885). In both cases the British square was broken. In the first case it was not actually broken: the British commander “opened” it by sending part of the formation to attack the enemy and not bothering to reform the formation and in the 2nd case the whole episode had been caused by a pure technical incompetence. One would assume that before embarking upon a military campaign that almost completely depends upon your firepower you have to test the critical elements of that firepower in the conditions close to those in a theater of operations. However, the Gardner gun (an early version of the machine gun) had been tested and found very reliable in Britain, but had not been tested in a desert with loose sand getting into its mechanism. During a battle one of these guns fired seventy rounds and then jammed, and as the crew tried to clear it they were cut down in a rush by the Dervishes. The weight of the rush pushed the crew back into the face of the square (a gun with the sailors’ detachment was placed by impromptu order in front of it lacking a proper protection by the infantry fire) thus opening a gap. Not that this produced and serious tactical results for the attackers because first they had been stopped by the camels herded inside the square and then troops in the rear ranks faced about and opened fire into the press of men and camels behind them, and were able to drive the Dervishes out of the square and compel them to retreat from the field. The whole battle lasted 15 minutes so it would probably take a longer time to recite all British poetry written about it. 😉
[2] By the reasons unknown, author modified a name of the “Bromley” industrial plant in St-Petersburg into “Barmaley” and made it a name of a terrible evil brigand of his verses and fairy tales.
[3] In OTL the total cost of the Sudan war and following occupation to Egypt from 1883 to 1910 was £24,786,208 (£14,241,724 of it under the ‘Egyptian army’ and £11,545,484 under items like public works, irrigation etc.) plus £5,400,774 under “Sudan” item. Obviously it was not the Egyptian masses who gained any benefit from the Sudan.

 

[Tiger]

What could get wrong? Well, pretty much everything if one tries really hard

Great words, appropriate for almost any military campaign.

he was strengthening Khartum’s fortifications doing the in a somewhat strange way: the formidable obstacles had been created against the land assault from the South but on the West and Northern side there was nothing based upon the assumption that the Blue (on the North) and White (on the West) Nile are enough of the protection. Rather strange assumption because his previous tenure should made him aware of the fact that in a dry season at least the White Nile is getting so shallow that it could be walked across.

B-but how? I really don't understand how man "kinda forgot" about such important detail.

 

[alexmilman]

Great words, appropriate for almost any military campaign.

Things not going 100% according to the plan are normal but here we have a complete screwup and Gordon worked hard for it to happen.

B-but how? I really don't understand how man "kinda forgot" about such important detail.

Perhaps he was sure that a nature would comply with his noble goal or perhaps he expected that his political game was going to work out and the relief force comes in time. In the last case he almost won: the British force approached Khartum only couple days after he lost his head (literally).

 

[Kriss]

One plausible way would be to negotiate with the Italians a possibility to land such a force in Italian-held Massawa

Problem here being that Massawa and potentially Eritrea should be Ethiopian ITTL? Or at least kept by Egypt? In otl after Ethiopian-Egyptian war via British "Mediation " Hewett Treaty came into the effect by which Ethiopia was forced to give up on sea port under British pressure and agreed to free transport for all goods through Port of Massawa, later on after treaty was ratified British more or less supported Italy in occupying it.

Now obvious problem here is that British aren't as influential in the region as otl and main powers doing any mediation would be France and potentially Russia. This obviously means that Egypt either cedes Massawa, or some other port to Ethiopia (more probable if Ethiopia has Russian support and given that France probably doesn't approve this particular Egyptian adventure), or similar treaty to otl comes in effect with Russia and France as guarantors (unlikely given that Russia doesn't have any direct assets in the region and that France is probably busy with Egyptian internal problems and doesn't seek to contain Ethiopia).

In any case I don't see France and Russia supporting Italy occupying the port.

 

[alexmilman]

286. Going colonial

“Colonialism. The enforced spread of the rule of reason. But who is going to spread it among the colonizers?”
Anthony Burgess
“Why should a real man stay home when he could be raping a virgin continent?”
Kurt Vonnegut Jr., ‘Bluebeard’
“Wait, filthy savages: soon you will become our happy loyal subjects.”
Karel Čapek
“First, the intellectual community of the West was aware of the vices of the colonial system and criticized them. Secondly, they saw the solution to the problem in the reforms of the colonial system, but not in its dismantling.”
Daniel Podgorny
​

Public enterprise.
In 1876 the Brussels Geographic Conference that consisted of forty well-known experts, who were mainly schooled in the geographic sciences or were wealthy philanthropists declared organization of "International Association for the Exploration and Civilization of Central Africa" (Association Internationale Africaine, and in full Association Internationale pour l'Exploration et la Civilisation de l'Afrique Centrale) with a noble purpose to conduct various humanitarian projects in the Central Africa. The new body was welcomed throughout Europe (contributions were sent by the Rothschilds and Viscount Ferdinand de Lesseps) and the national committees were to be headed by grand dukes, princes, and other royals, but most of them never got off the ground. Taking into an account that accommodations for the conference had been generously provided by Charles I, Emperor of France, he was elected as a honorary chairman but said that he would serve for one year only so that the chairmanship could rotate among people from different countries. It just happened that in an absence of the qualified alternatives he kept being reelected for the years to come. Originally, the stated goal of the group was to "discover" the largely unexplored Congo and 'civilize' its natives.

The Association was intended to be a joint effort on the parts of all European countries present at the Conference, however, each nation formed its own national committee for exploration which would, in theory, share information with the whole of the Association, hence, a cooperative effort. However, national economic interests quickly took precedence over the group's supposedly philanthropic ideals. Each of these committees organized nationalized expeditions into the African interior and there was very little sharing of information, resulting in each nation claiming certain portions of African land for themselves.

In 1879 the International Association of the Congo (Association internationale du Congo), also known as the International Congo Society, was created as a part as a part of the International Association for the Exploration and Civilization of Central Africa with an official goal to spread civilization (and whatever else will be necessary) in the specific region of the Congo Basin. To proceed with the civilizing mission properly, the Committee for the Study of the Upper Congo was created and, because you need money even for the noblest missions, there were shareholders (motivated exclusively by the noble goals, in case anybody had any doubts), French, British and Dutch. One of the French bankers was representing Emperor Charles who, as a chairman of Association Internationale Africaine, volunteered to put his money where his mouth was located [1] and, because he was “in” both as a major shareholder and as a chairman of the umbrella committee, Charles appointed his representative, Colonel Maximilien Strauch, as president of the Committee for the Study of the Upper Congo.

As was the general case with the civilizing missions, in this case as well, the stress turned into the economic aspect of the civilization and an extended work on a ground had been conducted by its employee, Henry Stanley.

At that point there was a certain confusion, not too different from the famous secret du Roi. The full scope of the Emperor’s involvement was not advertised [2] and French government got somewhat concerned with the excessively successful operations of a private company.

As a result, to prevent this company from spreading civilization too far in the terms of the territory, the French government authorized its own mission led by the naval officer Pierre de Brazza, who earlier successfully explored Gabon. By following the Ogoué River upstream and proceeding overland to the Lefini Riverand then downstream, Brazza succeeded in reaching the Congo River in 1880. Brazza then was received by King Makoko Iloo I of the Batéké in what was the most significant encounter of his career as an explorer. Brazza proposed to King Makoko that he place his kingdom under the protection of the French flag. King Makoko, aware of Stanley's advance and interested in trade possibilities and gaining an edge over his rivals, signed the treaty. Makoko also arranged for the establishment in 1881 of a French settlement at Mfoa on the Congo's Malebo Pool, a place later known as Brazzaville.

It took Stanley few months to find out that he was beaten in the “race” but could he do? The private company could not start a military conflict with a powerful government.
Situation started getting messy because Portugal formally claimed the area based upon its control over the mostly defunct proxy Kingdom of Kongo and in 1894 made a treaty with Britain to block off the Congo Society's access to the Atlantic.

All these activities led to the substantial change of the British attitudes toward to issue of a colonization. Initially, it was mostly about India, some peaces of the Indo-China and few strategically located small spots on the African coast, mostly to provide a safe travel to the East. But now ot looked like the French are getting very active in Africa and Britain simply had to get a fair share of the continent. The British control over the Madagascar was already reasonably secure and the old Portuguese friends had been squeezed to the South of the Zambezi River with the Brits actively moving inland and Northward to the Ruvuma River. The idea was to reach the source of the Nile and, along the coast, all the way to the Celedi Sultanate (and then to take it as well) thus taking control over pretty much of the Eastern Africa South of the French-controlled territories, Sudan and Ethiopia. This would allow to take charge of a big part of the ivory and spice trade (plantations growing cloves and other spices on the Zanzibar Archipelago). Strictly speaking, the Congo region was out of the scope of the British immediate interest but why not make others’ life difficult and then getting something for removing an obstacle? Stanley's charting of the Congo RiverBasin (1874–1877) removed the last terra incognita from European maps of the continent, delineating the areas of British, Portuguese, and French control. These European nations raced to annex territory that might be claimed by rivals.

Now Germany and Italy also joined the race and it definitely made sense to discuss situation and agree upon who is going to civilize what to avoid unnecessary military confrontations. Based upon the general consensus Bismarck called on representatives of the interested European nations as well as the United States to take part in the Berlin Conference in 1884 to work out a joint policy on the African continent. Some of the attendees (Russia, Austria, Sweden, Hungary, the US) did not have any colonies but there was a certain interest in formulating the rules of trade in other countries’ colonies.

Intermission. Funny as it may sound, around that time Austria had and missed three chances for getting some colonies:

• 1st, in 1858 SMS Novara landed in Car Nicobar with a purpose to research its usefulness as a penal colony but then the government decided not to use that opportunity.

• 2nd, in 1873, an Austrian expedition was sent to the North Pole tasked with finding the Northeast Passage. [3] The ship was named after the Admiral Wilhelm von Tegetthoff. The Tegetthoff left port at Tromsø, Norway in July 1872. Soon after arriving in the Arctic Circle, the Tegetthoff became locked in pack ice and drifted for the remainder of their journey.[10] While drifting within the ice, the explorers discovered an archipelago and decided to name it after the then-current Emperor Franz Joseph. The crew later was able to dock and performed several sled expeditions on the island chain. Two years later in May 1874, Captain Weyprecht decided to abandon the ice-locked Tegetthoffand believed the crew could return to the mainland by sleds and boats. The expedition then arrived at Novaya Zemlya, where a Russian fishing vessel rescued them. They missed an opportunity to claim the Franz-Joseph Land as a colony.
• In 1877 a Hong Kong-based merchant sold his rights to North Borneo to the consul of the Austrian Empire based in that city, Baron Gustav von Overbeck, who later purchased more land to form “North Borneo Protectorate”. The happy owner travelled to Europe trying to sell the land to a number of the European states, including Austria, as a penal colony but nobody was interested and he sold land to a British merchant. Technically, Baron von Overbeck, though German, was the Austro-Hungarian consul in Hong Kong, so control of Borneo under an Austrian citizen would define it as a possession of Austria.

Besides haggling over the territories to loot, the conference formulated some general principles:

• To end slavery by African and Islamic powers. This was easier said than done but the general public had to feel good.
• The properties occupied by International Congo Society, the name used in the General Act, were confirmed as the Society's. Soon enough it was named “the Congo Free State”.
• The signatory powers would have free trade throughout the Congo Basin as well as Lake Malawi and east of it in an area south of 5° N.
• The Niger and Congo rivers were made free for ship traffic.
• The Principle of Effective Occupation (based on "effective occupation", see below) was introduced to prevent powers from setting up colonies in name only. After a heated argument between Britain and Germany it was decided that “effective occupation” could be defined as an European power establishing some kind of base on the coast from which it was free to expand into the interior.
• Any fresh act of taking possession of any portion of the African coast would have to be notified by the power taking possession, or assuming a protectorate, to the other signatory powers.

To show how the established principles are working and to spoil the British game a little bit, a hastily arranged German expedition landed some …er… “effective occupation” personnel North of the Ruvuma River to outline southern border of the said occupation.

The main flotilla steamed to Dar Es Salaam to turn situation into one of “beyond contestation”.

Then, working upon the momentum, the Germans established protectorate over Zanzibar Archipelago [4].

Britain reciprocated by creating the Imperial British East Africa Company by “leasing” 240 kilometres (150 mi) of coastline stretching from the Jubba River via Mombasa to German East Africa which were leased … from the Sultan of Zanzibar whose territory now was split between two colonial powers. Within few years the East Africa Company started having financial problems and was replaced by a protectorate. Following the agreement of Berlin Conference, Britain began expansion inland.



___________
[1] Actually, the idiom about money and mouth is a little bit confusing because in pre-Petrian Tsardom the people going to the market place had been putting the (small size) coins behind the cheek as the most secure place.
[2] As a true humanitarian, he was too modest to brag about his achievements.
[3] Geographically, this is rather confusing unless they were planning to sail through the North Pole.
[4] In OTL by the treaty of 1890 Germany recognized the British control over Zanzibar by getting some strategic territorial compensations. ITTL the Germans got there first and Britain has little to offer (it does not possess the Heligoland, Caprivi Strip and and the heartland of German East Africa).

 

[alexmilman]

Problem here being that Massawa and potentially Eritrea should be Ethiopian ITTL? Or at least kept by Egypt?

Nope. ITTL Italians are keeping Massawa and small area around it. But not the whole Eritrea. Egypt lost Massawa after the war with Ethiopia and Ethiopia, while claiming general sovereignty over Eritrea, has only a theoretical control over it and can’t prevent Italians from obtaining the port. It is OK with France (it holds control over both “entries” to the Red Sea and Italian port in the middle is not a strategic problem) and Russia not concerned to a degree warranting action regarding an obscure port. Whatever little trade it has with Ethiopia goes through the French Djibouty and then by a railroad and the rest of its interest is on the same scale, aka, rather low. Helping to prevent the future Italian attempt of conquest is a different issue: why to allow it if Italy is not Russian ally or a major trade partner? Then, again, the help mostly is along the business lines: selling weapons (and sending instructors). Ethiopia is buying the Russian products that Italy would not so whom Russia is going to support?

As for the religious argument, Ethiopia is Orthodox but Eritrea is not so by taking Massawa Italy is not hurting anybody’s religious feelings. Ethiopia later establishing a tighter control over most/all Eritrea is a matter of the future and Russian interest is a big question mark: without a railroad inland the area is of a limited value and the volume of trade too low to warrant expenses on construction of one more railroad.

In any case I don't see France and Russia supporting Italy occupying the port.

And I don’t see them objecting. 😜

 

[Aluma]

“Colonialism. The enforced spread of the rule of reason. But who is going to spread it among the colonizers?”

Me!

*loads shotgun*

Originally, the stated goal of the group was to "discover" the largely unexplored Congo and 'civilize' its natives.

Of course, because they so needed that

But now ot looked like the French are getting very active in Africa and Britain simply had to get a fair share of the continent.

Ah the british tradition of always sticking their noses where they don't belong
What could we do without it

Now Germany and Italy also joined the race and it definitely made sense to discuss situation and agree upon who is going to civilize what to avoid unnecessary military confrontations

So civilized!
...that without borders they'd kill each like a bunch of angry bonobos
Truly a great example to the world!

• To end slavery by African and Islamic powers. This was easier said than done but the general public had to feel good.

Please make us feel good

Soon enough it was named “the Congo Free State”

Uh oh

 

[alexmilman]

Me!

*loads shotgun*

By that time the machine guns were getting into the picture as a very effective “civilizing” tool. I would not recommend to go with a shotgun against Matabele or Mahdists: being uncivilized savages, they may not fully appreciate your civilizing mission. OTOH, by using Maxim guns (even if rather idiotically mounted and arranged), you are getting a nice age allowing you to demonstrate advantages of the civilization before the uncivilized opponents are getting close enough to kill you with a spear or sword.

Of course, because they so needed that

Yep. Because if they didn’t they would already be civilized and they were not.

Ah the british tradition of always sticking their noses where they don't belong

You mean into the places which are being civilized by somebody else? Yes, of course, but this is just because they had too much of the good intentions. In all other cases, they were just doing their civilizing duty no matter how hard it would be to force the natives to wear a civilized attire so close to the equator.

What could we do without it

I can’t imagine.

So civilized!
...that without borders they'd kill each like a bunch of angry bonobos
Truly a great example to the world!

Yes. AFAIK, there was not even a fistfight over the border issues. That’s civilized.

Please make us feel good

And they did.

Uh oh

The name did not say “free” of what or for whom so there is no reason to complain.

 

[Aluma]

By that time the machine guns were getting into the picture as a very effective “civilizing” tool. I would not recommend to go with a shotgun against Matabele or Mahdists: being uncivilized savages, they may not fully appreciate your civilizing mission. OTOH, by using Maxim guns (even if rather idiotically mounted and arranged), you are getting a nice age allowing you to demonstrate advantages of the civilization before the uncivilized opponents are getting close enough to kill you with a spear or sword.

To be fair I was refering to civilising the barbarians from that one continent with a boot in the middle of it but Ill admit I'd probably need a bigger gun

 

[Chernabog90]

286. Going colonial

“Colonialism. The enforced spread of the rule of reason. But who is going to spread it among the colonizers?”
Anthony Burgess
“Why should a real man stay home when he could be raping a virgin continent?”
Kurt Vonnegut Jr., ‘Bluebeard’
“Wait, filthy savages: soon you will become our happy loyal subjects.”
Karel Čapek
“First, the intellectual community of the West was aware of the vices of the colonial system and criticized them. Secondly, they saw the solution to the problem in the reforms of the colonial system, but not in its dismantling.”
Daniel Podgorny
​

Public enterprise.
In 1876 the Brussels Geographic Conference that consisted of forty well-known experts, who were mainly schooled in the geographic sciences or were wealthy philanthropists declared organization of "International Association for the Exploration and Civilization of Central Africa" (Association Internationale Africaine, and in full Association Internationale pour l'Exploration et la Civilisation de l'Afrique Centrale) with a noble purpose to conduct various humanitarian projects in the Central Africa. The new body was welcomed throughout Europe (contributions were sent by the Rothschilds and Viscount Ferdinand de Lesseps) and the national committees were to be headed by grand dukes, princes, and other royals, but most of them never got off the ground. Taking into an account that accommodations for the conference had been generously provided by Charles I, Emperor of France, he was elected as a honorary chairman but said that he would serve for one year only so that the chairmanship could rotate among people from different countries. It just happened that in an absence of the qualified alternatives he kept being reelected for the years to come. Originally, the stated goal of the group was to "discover" the largely unexplored Congo and 'civilize' its natives.

The Association was intended to be a joint effort on the parts of all European countries present at the Conference, however, each nation formed its own national committee for exploration which would, in theory, share information with the whole of the Association, hence, a cooperative effort. However, national economic interests quickly took precedence over the group's supposedly philanthropic ideals. Each of these committees organized nationalized expeditions into the African interior and there was very little sharing of information, resulting in each nation claiming certain portions of African land for themselves.

In 1879 the International Association of the Congo (Association internationale du Congo), also known as the International Congo Society, was created as a part as a part of the International Association for the Exploration and Civilization of Central Africa with an official goal to spread civilization (and whatever else will be necessary) in the specific region of the Congo Basin. To proceed with the civilizing mission properly, the Committee for the Study of the Upper Congo was created and, because you need money even for the noblest missions, there were shareholders (motivated exclusively by the noble goals, in case anybody had any doubts), French, British and Dutch. One of the French bankers was representing Emperor Charles who, as a chairman of Association Internationale Africaine, volunteered to put his money where his mouth was located [1] and, because he was “in” both as a major shareholder and as a chairman of the umbrella committee, Charles appointed his representative, Colonel Maximilien Strauch, as president of the Committee for the Study of the Upper Congo.
View attachment 804925
As was the general case with the civilizing missions, in this case as well, the stress turned into the economic aspect of the civilization and an extended work on a ground had been conducted by its employee, Henry Stanley.

At that point there was a certain confusion, not too different from the famous secret du Roi. The full scope of the Emperor’s involvement was not advertised [2] and French government got somewhat concerned with the excessively successful operations of a private company.
View attachment 804933
As a result, to prevent this company from spreading civilization too far in the terms of the territory, the French government authorized its own mission led by the naval officer Pierre de Brazza, who earlier successfully explored Gabon. By following the Ogoué River upstream and proceeding overland to the Lefini Riverand then downstream, Brazza succeeded in reaching the Congo River in 1880. Brazza then was received by King Makoko Iloo I of the Batéké in what was the most significant encounter of his career as an explorer. Brazza proposed to King Makoko that he place his kingdom under the protection of the French flag. King Makoko, aware of Stanley's advance and interested in trade possibilities and gaining an edge over his rivals, signed the treaty. Makoko also arranged for the establishment in 1881 of a French settlement at Mfoa on the Congo's Malebo Pool, a place later known as Brazzaville.

View attachment 804934
It took Stanley few months to find out that he was beaten in the “race” but could he do? The private company could not start a military conflict with a powerful government.
Situation started getting messy because Portugal formally claimed the area based upon its control over the mostly defunct proxy Kingdom of Kongo and in 1894 made a treaty with Britain to block off the Congo Society's access to the Atlantic.

All these activities led to the substantial change of the British attitudes toward to issue of a colonization. Initially, it was mostly about India, some peaces of the Indo-China and few strategically located small spots on the African coast, mostly to provide a safe travel to the East. But now ot looked like the French are getting very active in Africa and Britain simply had to get a fair share of the continent. The British control over the Madagascar was already reasonably secure and the old Portuguese friends had been squeezed to the South of the Zambezi River with the Brits actively moving inland and Northward to the Ruvuma River. The idea was to reach the source of the Nile and, along the coast, all the way to the Celedi Sultanate (and then to take it as well) thus taking control over pretty much of the Eastern Africa South of the French-controlled territories, Sudan and Ethiopia. This would allow to take charge of a big part of the ivory and spice trade (plantations growing cloves and other spices on the Zanzibar Archipelago). Strictly speaking, the Congo region was out of the scope of the British immediate interest but why not make others’ life difficult and then getting something for removing an obstacle? Stanley's charting of the Congo RiverBasin (1874–1877) removed the last terra incognita from European maps of the continent, delineating the areas of British, Portuguese, and French control. These European nations raced to annex territory that might be claimed by rivals.

Now Germany and Italy also joined the race and it definitely made sense to discuss situation and agree upon who is going to civilize what to avoid unnecessary military confrontations. Based upon the general consensus Bismarck called on representatives of the interested European nations as well as the United States to take part in the Berlin Conference in 1884 to work out a joint policy on the African continent. Some of the attendees (Russia, Austria, Sweden, Hungary, the US) did not have any colonies but there was a certain interest in formulating the rules of trade in other countries’ colonies.

Intermission. Funny as it may sound, around that time Austria had and missed three chances for getting some colonies:

• 1st, in 1858 SMS Novara landed in Car Nicobar with a purpose to research its usefulness as a penal colony but then the government decided not to use that opportunity.

View attachment 804962

• 2nd, in 1873, an Austrian expedition was sent to the North Pole tasked with finding the Northeast Passage. [3] The ship was named after the Admiral Wilhelm von Tegetthoff. The Tegetthoff left port at Tromsø, Norway in July 1872. Soon after arriving in the Arctic Circle, the Tegetthoff became locked in pack ice and drifted for the remainder of their journey.[10] While drifting within the ice, the explorers discovered an archipelago and decided to name it after the then-current Emperor Franz Joseph. The crew later was able to dock and performed several sled expeditions on the island chain. Two years later in May 1874, Captain Weyprecht decided to abandon the ice-locked Tegetthoffand believed the crew could return to the mainland by sleds and boats. The expedition then arrived at Novaya Zemlya, where a Russian fishing vessel rescued them. They missed an opportunity to claim the Franz-Joseph Land as a colony.
• In 1877 a Hong Kong-based merchant sold his rights to North Borneo to the consul of the Austrian Empire based in that city, Baron Gustav von Overbeck, who later purchased more land to form “North Borneo Protectorate”. The happy owner travelled to Europe trying to sell the land to a number of the European states, including Austria, as a penal colony but nobody was interested and he sold land to a British merchant. Technically, Baron von Overbeck, though German, was the Austro-Hungarian consul in Hong Kong, so control of Borneo under an Austrian citizen would define it as a possession of Austria.

Besides haggling over the territories to loot, the conference formulated some general principles:

• To end slavery by African and Islamic powers. This was easier said than done but the general public had to feel good.
• The properties occupied by International Congo Society, the name used in the General Act, were confirmed as the Society's. Soon enough it was named “the Congo Free State”.
• The signatory powers would have free trade throughout the Congo Basin as well as Lake Malawi and east of it in an area south of 5° N.
• The Niger and Congo rivers were made free for ship traffic.
• The Principle of Effective Occupation (based on "effective occupation", see below) was introduced to prevent powers from setting up colonies in name only. After a heated argument between Britain and Germany it was decided that “effective occupation” could be defined as an European power establishing some kind of base on the coast from which it was free to expand into the interior.
• Any fresh act of taking possession of any portion of the African coast would have to be notified by the power taking possession, or assuming a protectorate, to the other signatory powers.

View attachment 804976
To show how the established principles are working and to spoil the British game a little bit, a hastily arranged German expedition landed some …er… “effective occupation” personnel North of the Ruvuma River to outline southern border of the said occupation.
View attachment 804974
The main flotilla steamed to Dar Es Salaam to turn situation into one of “beyond contestation”.
View attachment 804973
Then, working upon the momentum, the Germans established protectorate over Zanzibar Archipelago [4].

Britain reciprocated by creating the Imperial British East Africa Company by “leasing” 240 kilometres (150 mi) of coastline stretching from the Jubba River via Mombasa to German East Africa which were leased … from the Sultan of Zanzibar whose territory now was split between two colonial powers. Within few years the East Africa Company started having financial problems and was replaced by a protectorate. Following the agreement of Berlin Conference, Britain began expansion inland.



___________
[1] Actually, the idiom about money and mouth is a little bit confusing because in pre-Petrian Tsardom the people going to the market place had been putting the (small size) coins behind the cheek as the most secure place.
[2] As a true humanitarian, he was too modest to brag about his achievements.
[3] Geographically, this is rather confusing unless they were planning to sail through the North Pole.
[4] In OTL by the treaty of 1890 Germany recognized the British control over Zanzibar by getting some strategic territorial compensations. ITTL the Germans got there first and Britain has little to offer (it does not possess the Heligoland, Caprivi Strip and and the heartland of German East Africa).

You know I wish that somehow Ethiopia becomes a protectorate of Russia or Russia foothold in Africa

 

[Tiger]

“First, the intellectual community of the West was aware of the vices of the colonial system and criticized them. Secondly, they saw the solution to the problem in the reforms of the colonial system, but not in its dismantling.”

Yes. of course. Why dismantle system which provides upper and middle classes of great powers: profit, prestige and even "piece of action"?

However, national economic interests quickly took precedence over the group's supposedly philanthropic ideals. Each of these committees organized nationalized expeditions into the African interior and there was very little sharing of information, resulting in each nation claiming certain portions of African land for themselves.

Who would have thought about such scenario, huh? What a surprise.

All these activities led to the substantial change of the British attitudes toward to issue of a colonization. Initially, it was mostly about India, some peaces of the Indo-China and few strategically located small spots on the African coast, mostly to provide a safe travel to the East. But now ot looked like the French are getting very active in Africa and Britain simply had to get a fair share of the continent.

We mustn't allow colonial gap!(c)

• The Principle of Effective Occupation (based on "effective occupation", see below) was introduced to prevent powers from setting up colonies in name only. After a heated argument between Britain and Germany it was decided that “effective occupation” could be defined as an European power establishing some kind of base on the coast from which it was free to expand into the interior.
• Any fresh act of taking possession of any portion of the African coast would have to be notified by the power taking possession, or assuming a protectorate, to the other signatory powers.

I think at this point will be more effective take a pencil, a straightedge and divide the whole continent at once

 

[Kriss]

I think at this point will be more effective take a pencil, a straightedge and divide the whole continent at once

Problem with that approach (otl approach), is that it requires military intervention and conquest of lot of worthless territories.

It's far easier to claim the coastline, invade potentially valuable lands and have formal fealty of unimportant buffers ( a little hard when you have straight land running through it).

 

[alexmilman]

Problem with that approach (otl approach), is that it requires military intervention and conquest of lot of worthless territories.

To be fair, the OTL system also involved a lot of such military actions but defeat of the natives did not always result in a permanent military occupation of all their territory.

It's far easier to claim the coastline, invade potentially valuable lands and have formal fealty of unimportant buffers ( a little hard when you have straight land running through it).

AFAIK, in OTL this was a general idea. Anyway, providing effective administration from top to bottom would be a much more burdensome than to rule through the local kings/chieftains.

 

[alexmilman]

287. Out of Africa (at least for a while 😉)

“No matter how many people you kill, using a machine gun in battle is not a war crime because it does not cause unnecessary suffering; it simply performs its job horrifyingly well.”
Sebastian Junger
“We may find in the long run that tinned food is a deadlier weapon than the machine-gun.”
George Orwell
“Ah, these diplomats! What chatterboxes! There's only one way to shut them up - cut them down with machine guns.”
Joseph Stalin
“You don't throw rocks at a man with a machine gun!”
Roddy Piper
“I noticed long ago that you are not intelligent, ignorant and stupid. You fully deserve to be a member of my Duma.”
A.K.Tolstoy, ‘Sadko’​

1880s

The best ways of killing people.

Hiram Stevens Maxim was a very peaceful person and inventor of very useful and quite peaceful things. He patented and manufactured a pocket menthol inhaler and a larger "Pipe of Peace", a steam inhaler using pine vapour, invented a curling iron, an apparatus for demagnetising watches, magno-electric machines, devices to prevent the rolling of ships, eyelet and riveting machines, coffee substitutes, and various oil, steam, and gas engines, the first automatic fire sprinkler, and developed and installed the first electric lights in a New York City building [1].

However, none of these inventions (even the curling iron!) made his name really big. Obviously, he was applying his talents in a wrong direction until in 1882 while being in Vienna he met a fellow-American who put him on a right track by saying: “Hang your chemistry and electricity! If you want to make a pile of money, invent something that will enable these Europeans to cut each others' throats with greater facility.” [2]
Being struck by an obvious answer to his search for the world-wide glory Mr. Maxim moved to Britain and put himself to the task and by 1885 designed an automatic weapon, using an action that would close the breech and compress a spring, by storing the recoil energy released by a shot to prepare the gun for its next shot. He thoughtfully ran announcements in the local press warning that he would be experimenting with the gun in his garden and that neighbours should keep their windows open to avoid the danger of broken glass.[3]

He offered his invention to the Brits but the military did not show to much interest. Maxim regularly organized presentations of his machine gun in London Hampton Garden, offering his invention to the attention of foreign military and state officials and demonstrating its stunning combat capabilities. King Christian IX of Denmark, seeing a machine gun in action, called machine gun shooting aimless waste of ammunition and his opinion was shared by many dignitaries. In addition to regular presentations in London, Maxim went on a foreign tour with a machine gun show in various countries. In Germany young prince Wilhelm was allowed to fire it and was impressed but the military establishment ignored that noisy toy. [4]

After a successful demonstration of the machine gun in Switzerland, Italy and Austria, Hiram Maxim came to Russia with an indicative sample of a .45 machine gun (11.43 mm).Demonstration in Russia also produced mixed results. The “spirit and bayonet” camp led by Dragomirov had been against it. To say that General Dragomirov was an opponent of machine guns is to say nothing. General M. Dragomirov was the most fierce opponent of rapid fire in general. And he consistently published his opinion in almost all military, paramilitary and non-military publications. And it is very talented: it came to the point that the general clothed his objections in a very metaphorical form of "night dream" in which he shot a bear from some magazine rifle: “And cartridges are pushed in the air, trying to get into the chamber. As soon as I had time to release one cartridge, the other climbed into its place.” Somehow none of them managed to kill or even hurt a bear who came close “Opened his terrible mouth and said in a contemptuously mocking, human voice: "Well, what's next? You're a fool! You should play child games, not shoot a gun! Didn't they tell you young people that wealth can't help a stupid son! That's what happened.” The idiotic story had been published in a magazine “Scout” and seemingly nobody asked the author if he proposed to attack bear with a bayonet. Anyway, the 3-line [5] magazine rifle already being adopted notwithstanding Dragomirov’s dreams.

He treated machine guns even more negatively, and, with undisguised sarcasm, wrote "If the same person had to be killed several times, it would be a wonderful weapon, since at 600 rounds per minute they account for 10 per second. In trouble for fans of such a rapid release of bullets, it is enough to shoot a person once, and shoot him then, in catch up while he falls, as far as I know, there is no need.”
The general also had other objections to machine guns: "Every rapid shooter, whether to call it a buckshot or a newly invented beautiful word machine gun (and save us from the evil and metaphor!), still has nothing more than an automatic shooter, i.e. it does not give an independent type of defeat; and if you give a choice to a person who is not obsessed with prejudices that overwhelm a common sense, of course, he will prefer a live to the automatic shooter, at least for the fact that he doesn't have a carriage, he doesn't need horses, he doesn't need cover either and you can use it for any soldier's work.” [6]
Of course, calling to the “common sense” in that type of an argument is a pure demagoguery indicating that there are no factual arguments. But an implication was/is that if you do not agree, then you don’t possess a common sense.

Intermission. On a subject of usefulness of various technical innovations I’m tempted to quote from the memoirs of general Krylov (a famous naval engineer and applied mathematician) regarding a technical discussion in the Russian Admiralty. Conversation was between two admirals so some …er… sailor language was in place:
- Your Excellency, I don’t see the usefulness of that device.
- Your Excellency, if you shove it up yours arse, perhaps then you’ll see it.

The conclusion made by M. Dragomirov was simple: "I think machine guns are ridiculous in a normal field army." And machine guns, according to the military theorist, will be useful on fortress walls and in small expeditions against the natives.

Fortunately, the top level of the Russian military establishment did not consist exclusively of the raving idiots and, as often, the final decision had been made in usual way: on March 8, 1886, Emperor Alexander III shot him. After the tests, representatives of the Russian military department ordered Maxim 12 machine guns of model 1885, few Maxim guns had been bought for practical testing. Experiments in the Western Military District of general Gurko produced positive reviews the license had been purchased and production started in Tula Armory. For the right to manufacture machine guns in Russia, the contract provided for the payment of £80 for each machine gun manufactured over ten years. After 10 years, the Russian military department acquired full ownership of the right to manufacture any number of Maxim machine guns without any payment of remuneration. The cost of producing a Tula machine gun (942 rubles + 80 pounds of commission to Vickers, only about 1,700 rubles) was lower than the cost of acquisition from the British (2288 rubles 20 kopecks per machine gun).

Contrary to Dragomirov’s predictions, the machine gun did not end up as a miniature artillery piece requiring the horses, a crew of five and a heavy carriage with the big wheels (original British model above) [7]. Mass of the initial model on a heavy carriage was 244 kg, most of that weight being a carriage. Of course, it required the horses, a team of 4 - 5 and a cart to carry a team. In Russia it was modified and even with a protective shield and an additional folding carriage was easily transported with an infantry. Machine gun itself weighted 20.2 kg and with a new carriage, shield and water - 67.6 kg. The folding carriage allowed shooting either by laying on a ground or sitting (if the carriage frame was raised) and the gun required a team of two.

To improve the reliability of the 7.62 mm machine gun automation, a "barrel accelerator" was introduced into the design - a device designed to use the energy of powder gases to increase the recoil force. The front part of the barrel was thickened to increase the area of the muzzle cut, and then a spool cap was attached to the water casing. The pressure of powder gases between the muzzle cut and the cap acted on the muzzle section of the barrel, pushing it back and helping it roll back faster.

Navy also displayed a great interest to the new weapon and the production base had to be expanded to satisfy the orders.

After a heated and prolonged debate, with <make a guess who> strongly protesting on a pretext that this would lower the artillerymen spirit, Russian field artillery started being provided with the protective shields. [8]

Things peaceful.
Food. In 1883 Lucien Olivier died. Name of this person is linked to the “Olivier salad” widely known abroad as the “Russian salad”.

The original recipe was kept secret and there were multiple post-morteem attempts to reproduce it which, judging by the contemporaries’ comments, were not the same as the initial dish. Needless to say that none of these recipes had too much semblance to the modern dish.

According to one of the legends, the initial dish was called "Majonnaise from game." For it, the fillets of grouses and partridges were boiled, cut and put on a plate, mixed with cubes of jelly from poultry broth. Nearby there were elegantly boiled crayfish necks and slices of tongue, sprinkled with Provencal sauce. And in the center there was a slide of potatoes with pickled gherkins, and capers decorated with slices of hard boiled eggs. According to the French chef [9] , the central "slide" was intended not for eating, but only for beauty, as an element of the decor of the dish. But soon Olivier saw that many Russians ignorant of his idea were immediately mixing components, destroying a carefully thought-out design, then laid out on their plates and eat this mixture with pleasure. He decided to follow the “popular demand”. There are serious doubts about validity of this story.
The modern version (one of many) involves cut and mixed boiled potatoes, carrots (instead of crayfish necks), eggs, bologna (instead of all meat and poultry components), peas (instead of the capers), minced onion, minced pickled cucumbers (of any size), and mayonnaise. But, unlike the original version, it does not require even a modest culinary talent to make. Which is probably a progress.

TransSib.
By 1885 construction of the TransSib (started in 1872) was finally completed. The final stage was construction of the bridge across Amur near Khabarovsk.

Political intermission. Complexity of the project warranted its discussion in the State Council where a group of the most liberal members (mostly professors of jurisprudence, which made them qualified experts in transportation, finances and pretty much everything else) voted against it [10]. The whole episode fully convinced AIII in the usefulness of top level elective institutions as a good way of burying any unnecessary initiative, providing he can ignore them with the impunity when he choses. It was officially declared that expanded State Council fully justified the Emperor’s expectations and, as promised, the elections into newly-created State Duma are going to be held ASAP or rather as soon as the State Council is going to present the voting rules and other needed regulations.

Since 1872, the research for the bridge construction was going on without been interrupted. A competition for the best project of the Amur Bridge was announced, leading bridge engineers took part in it, options for building a tunnel near the Amur were considered. Finally, the project "tied" to the village of Osipovka, located 8 km from Khabarovsk, was recognized as the most suitable.

Metal trusses for the bridge had been implemented in European Russia, disassembled, sent to Odessa and sailed to Vladivostok from where by the Ussury railroad transported to the final destination and assembled. The cost of its construction amounted to 13.5 million rubles. The launch of the Khabarovsk Bridge completed the construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway on the territory of the Russian Empire. Length of the bridge was 2,600 meters. It was 2-track [11] with arrangements for pedestrian traffic on both sides.

The most difficult part of construction was Circum-Baikal road. On the map below you can see RR going from Irkutsk along the Angara River to Baikal settlement and then there is Circum-Baikal road going along the northern coast of the lake to Sludyanka settlement. The map also shows the direct route from Irkutsk to Slydyanka which was built later.

With a track length of only 260 km, 39 tunnels, 47 safety galleries, 14 km of retaining walls, numerous viaducts, breakwaters, bridges and pipes had to be built. The volume of earthworks amounted to 70 thousand cubic meters per km of track. Despite these difficulties, regular train traffic began a year ahead of schedule.

Initially, the road was built in one track; in 1890 - 1893, work was carried out on the construction of the second tracks, which made it possible to increase the capacity of the Circum-Baikal Railway to 48 pairs of trains per day. Eventually, a straightforward RR from Irkutsk across the Olkhin Plateau to Sludyanka had been built providing a shortcut and leaving the old track just as a minor local communication route between semi-abandoned settemns. Why wasn’t it done from the start? How would I know? Perhaps because the route along the lake looked beautiful or maybe the people in charge suffered from a complicated combination of a sado-masochism.

Of course, there is one more (highly implausible due to it being rational) explanation: Baikal settlement was a port of some importance (there was a ferry across the lake) and it was desirable to connect to Irkutsk. 😜


_________
[1] On this account he was involved in several lengthy patent disputes with Thomas Edison over his claims to the lightbulb, which Edison won not because he was the first but because he knew the patent law better.
[2] Name of this person is not mentioned in wiki, which is plain unjust: without his wise advice the humankind may suffer from an absence of the efficient and reasonably instrument for killing people in big numbers for a longer time thus causing an obvious detriment to spreading civilization in many parts of the globe.
[3] As was commented by O.Henry, taking person’s life you are sometimes taking from him very little but breaking windows (in O.Henry’s novel stealing his horse) you are causing a very serious damage.
[4] In OTL he saw it while already being Kaiser and bought patent to its production in Germany (MG 01 and MG 08). The following Russian part is ITTL: in OTL Russian production started in 1905 prior to which time a limited number had been bought from Vickers. By which time neither Gurko was not around. In 1904 Russian field army in Manchuria had 8 of them.
[5] “line” is 2.54 mm. In OTL this rifle was adopted in 1891 and only from 1924 it was named “Mosin rifle”. Taking into an account that ITTL we are talking 1880s, the magazine rifles were already old news (in OTL by 1877 the Ottomans had few thousands of Winchester rifles).
[6] The same argument can be, even to a greater degree, applied to the artillery and a part regarding the horses references to a rather peculiar tradition started by the French mitrailleuses. They were getting the artillery-like carriages, had been arranged in the batteries and used as some kind of a weird artillery easily identified and destroyed by a real artillery due to its higher range. Actually, in a painting of Omdurman battle the British machine guns are shown in the same arrangement: they have big wheels, artillery like carriages and arranged side by side, which definitely minimized efficiency of their usage. But it was OK against the raving lunatics running on the open field into all types of a fire.
[7] To be fair, in OTL this was exactly what the first Maxim guns brought from Vickers looked like but soon enough they were modified into something much less cumbersome.
[8] Protests from the known source were real and artillery got shields only after the terrible losses in RJW.
[9] One of the confusing parts of the story. Olivier was a co-owner of the hotel (with the restaurant), not a chef. Names of the chefs are known.
[10] Happened in OTL but later and it was about construction of the line along the Amur.
[11] In OTL single track.

 

[Aluma]

here's only one way to shut them up - cut them down with machine guns.”
Joseph Stalin

So he is the king who'd shoot the messenger

)

“No matter how many people you kill, using a machine gun in battle is not a war crime because it does not cause unnecessary suffering; it simply performs its job horrifyingly well.”
Sebastian Junger​

Geneva convention? More like a suggestion!
This guy would fit in Nuremberg just fine

“You don't throw rocks at a man with a machine gun!”
Roddy Piper

I mean if you have enough rocks for every soldier then you can just bury the men with machine guns
I stan rock throwing
Every military innovation has been a downgrade since then

while being in Vienna he met a fellow-American who put him on a right track by saying: “Hang your chemistry and electricity! If you want to make a pile of money, invent something that will enable these Europeans to cut each others' throats with greater facility.” [2]

This guy would give a cigar to a pyromaniac
Maybe they should have invented something to cut each other's throat with greater facility?

King Christian IX of Denmark, seeing a machine gun in action, called machine gun shooting aimless waste of ammunition and his opinion was shared by many dignitaries.

Fair complaints and my suggestion of a rebuttal would be providing a empirical demonstration with the dignataries
Im sure the king would love to volunter

The idiotic story had been published in a magazine “Scout” and seemingly nobody asked

Very silly indeed, you're supposed to beat the bear in a boxing battle!

The original recipe was kept secret and there were multiple post-morteem attempts to reproduce it which, judging by the contemporaries’ comments, were not the same as the initial dish. Needless to say that none of these recipes had too much semblance to the modern dish.

According to one of the legends, the initial dish was called "Majonnaise from game." For it, the fillets of grouses and partridges were boiled, cut and put on a plate, mixed with cubes of jelly from poultry broth. Nearby there were elegantly boiled crayfish necks and slices of tongue, sprinkled with Provencal sauce. And in the center there was a slide of potatoes with pickled gherkins, and capers decorated with slices of hard boiled eggs. According to the French chef [9] , the central "slide" was intended not for eating, but only for beauty, as an element of the decor of the dish. But soon Olivier saw that many Russians ignorant of his idea were immediately mixing components, destroying a carefully thought-out design, then laid out on their plates and eat this mixture with pleasure. He decided to follow the “popular demand”. There are serious doubts about validity of this story.
The modern version (one of many) involves cut and mixed boiled potatoes, carrots (instead of crayfish necks), eggs, bologna (instead of all meat and poultry components), peas (instead of the capers), minced onion, minced pickled cucumbers (of any size), and mayonnaise. But, unlike the original version, it does not require even a modest culinary talent to make. Which is probably a progress.

*Furiously takes notes*

[2] Name of this person is not mentioned in wiki, which is plain unjust: without his wise advice the humankind may suffer from an absence of the efficient and reasonably instrument for killing people in big numbers for a longer time thus causing an obvious detriment to spreading civilization in many parts of the globe.

What a pity
I was looking forward to meeting this gentleman* and showing him the fruits of his labour and the glories of civilisation...in first person

*Of course only when time travel cost reduces to an affordable amount
Whats with the taxes and inflation these days, I looked into Amazon and couldnt even find a warp drive for a reasonable price!

 

[dunHozzie]

Those are some mighty butterflies.

on March 8, 1886, Emperor Alexander III shot him.

For a second I was hoping the Emperor shot:

M. Dragomirov