Up, down, flying around
Looping the loop and defying the ground
They're all frightfully keen
Those magnificent men in their flying machines!
IC
"The future is in the skies." - Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
Looping the loop and defying the ground
They're all frightfully keen
Those magnificent men in their flying machines!
IC
"The future is in the skies." - Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
"The War to End War", right? What a joke.
When the Huns took Paris in 1918, they didn't know what they were about to unleash on the world. Or perhaps they did, and knew that even if they couldn't win before the Yanks came marching in, France would never survive.
1919 was a bad year to be in France. The war had been won, but Germany had held onto Paris from April to their surrender in November, and everyone was pointing fingers at everyone else as to which political party, which ethnic group, which family was to blame. It all came to a head on December 12th, a year, a month, and a day after the end of the last war. Radical members from the SFIO split from the party, formed a communist one, and seized control of Le Havre. It all spiraled outward from there - first the Nord-Pas-de-Calais, then most of the Channel coast, and by mid-1920 France was as much a damned checkerboard of power blocs as China, with it spreading as far as the colonies.
The Americans tried to help, they really did, but they had been pulling out their troops almost from the beginning, and while words of support were fine, suggesting to actually help the French government was political suicide, as proven by Wilson's crushing defeat. No one else had the energy to help, and as anti-communist as Germany already was, the Kaiser was uninterested (and by treaty un-allowed) to involve what remained of the Reichswehr.
The French Republic held on to control of Paris just long enough to lay claim to a chunk of Anatolia before the communists chased them into Algeria and declared their People's Republic of France. The next few years saw colonists and locals all across French Africa waging wars of liberation and fury against the Communists and Republicans alike, Germany quietly being given back the Ruhr, and the Republicans solidifying their hold on North Africa and Syria, while fortifying Cilicia from what remained of the Communist's Mediterranean fleet - with help from Britain and, irony of ironies, the Ottomans.
The rest of the world was not idle in this time. America's slide to isolationism continued as her economy continued to soar. A man by the name of Benito Mussolini all but seized power in Italy under his nationalist party and began the long road of building an empire. Greece, united in thought and mind under the King and Venizelos, pushed more and more for the realization of its Great Idea - indeed, it was partly Greece's assistance in crushing the Turkish nationalist movement that has allowed the Treaty of Sevres to be enforced so. Poland, barely two years old, inflicted a stunning defeat on the Soviets and expanded eastward.
Austria soon followed Italy in its march to nationalist fervor as the Fatherland Front gained power, as did Portugal, while Spain, falling to a civil war of its own, went the opposite direction. The German Empire, concerned as it was about Communist influence, was equally worried about fascists, and set about repairing burnt bridges with its enemies from the last war. The remnants of Franco's forces fled the continent. Some went to Corsica, where some of the fascists from France's civil war fled themselves, while others went to the French colonist-led states of east and central Africa, which welcomed them with open arms and recruitment papers.
The 1920s ended with Europe divided among communists and fascists, republicans and monarchists, and totalitarians and puppets. China's warlords slowly eat themselves alive, and Africa is beginning to see the sparks of national identity itself. The American stock market crash in October was disastrous, but President Hoover managed to prevent it from becoming catastrophe. Though it did not save his presidency, the Republicans can at least claim they did their damndest and succeeded. Without a slump to pull America out of, President Roosevelt's plans may be overly ambitious, but he seems intent to steer his charted course.
Here in Constantinople, though, a government of iron hands, or even a strong government, is but a distant dream. As Wyatt Earp put it in a graduation speech he gave to the city's police force academy, it was as if the Wild West had left America and moved to Anatolia. The government's propped up by the League of Nations and the Ottomans both, mostly as a buffer against Greek expansionism, but influence spreads inward by the day and the Greeks already essentially control the Gallipoli Peninsula except for the coast of the Straits themselves.
Besides the government, the Republic of the Marmara's people are ruled, in some capacity or another, by dozens of rebel groups, political cliques, and simple gangs. Two of the three largest are from outside sources. Largest of them is the National Organization of Bosphoran Fighters, or EOBA. Essentially a branch of the Golden Dawn Party, itself an offshoot of the Freethinker's Party, the EOBA seeks little more than unification with Greece. A lot of organizations seek that, especially in Marmaran Thrace and in the south, but the policies EOBA seeks to inflict on the people of Marmara are a step beyond even fascism - like the Golden Dawn, the EOBA is not nearly as tolerant of Jews as the Freethinker's Party is, though both are equally opposed to the existence of other minorities in what they see as rightfully Greek land. The EOBA hates anyone and anything that isn't Greek, Greek Orthodox, and their own twisted strain of Greek Orthodox. Even If that requires cleansing the streets of Constantinople.
The next largest are the Grey Wolves. In many ways, the Grey Wolves and EOBA are similar. Both are irredentist, extreme nationalist organizations with opinions on members of races besides their chosen one ranging from secretly genocidal to openly genocidal, both have the alleged support of outside forces (though the Nationalist Movement Party disavows any connection to the Grey Wolves), both regularly burn books in the streets, and both have had members arrested for trying to burn people instead of simply shooting at them from cars and aircraft. The Grey Wolves differ from the EOBA in three ways, really - the Grey Wolves are run by and for Turks, the Grey Wolves are Pan-Turkic, and the Grey Wolves are virulently Islamist. While not nearly as extreme or fundamentalist as some fringe organizations in eastern Anatolia and northern Iraq, it nonetheless shares in their desire to force Islamic law down the throats of anyone under their control.
Last and strangest of the big three is the Constantine Club. The Grey Wolves want to revitalize the Ottoman empire, the EOBA seeks a return to Byzantine rule, the Constantine Club seeks to turn the clock back farther, back when Rome was the center of the universe for everyone west of the Urals and north of the Sahel. They see Constantinople as a good enough starting point, hence their name. Unlike the other two, it cares not for skin, race, or even gender amongst its members - only wisdom, knowledge of the system of the Roman Republic, and complete loyalty to the Club is required. As a result, its members are on average more educated than the others - fanatics, yes, but historians and those with a fascination for history have been drawn into its legions, along with the elite who see a bit of senatorial skill in their veins.
In attempting to maintain control, the Republic of the Marmara's government is willing to stop at almost nothing, so long as support continues to come from outside. In that vein, they have ironically taken a Byzantine approach in hiring mercenaries by the score to bolster its military, and like the Constantine Club, anyone is accepted that passes the requirements. Adventurers, mercenaries, sellswords, anyone - men and women, black and white, adult and even a few children, allegedly, in the army, navy, and air force.
You are a member of the latter - the 27th Hetaireia Squadron, a squadron consisting of anyone flying anything capable of serving in a military fashion. Like all Hetaireia squadrons, there is little standardization of equipment, and no standardization of role - everything from counter-insurgency to bomber escort, should the need arise.
And with tensions brewing the world over, and alliances being formed in the open and in darkened rooms, the need will no doubt arise. 1935 is going to be one hell of a year.
When the Huns took Paris in 1918, they didn't know what they were about to unleash on the world. Or perhaps they did, and knew that even if they couldn't win before the Yanks came marching in, France would never survive.
1919 was a bad year to be in France. The war had been won, but Germany had held onto Paris from April to their surrender in November, and everyone was pointing fingers at everyone else as to which political party, which ethnic group, which family was to blame. It all came to a head on December 12th, a year, a month, and a day after the end of the last war. Radical members from the SFIO split from the party, formed a communist one, and seized control of Le Havre. It all spiraled outward from there - first the Nord-Pas-de-Calais, then most of the Channel coast, and by mid-1920 France was as much a damned checkerboard of power blocs as China, with it spreading as far as the colonies.
The Americans tried to help, they really did, but they had been pulling out their troops almost from the beginning, and while words of support were fine, suggesting to actually help the French government was political suicide, as proven by Wilson's crushing defeat. No one else had the energy to help, and as anti-communist as Germany already was, the Kaiser was uninterested (and by treaty un-allowed) to involve what remained of the Reichswehr.
The French Republic held on to control of Paris just long enough to lay claim to a chunk of Anatolia before the communists chased them into Algeria and declared their People's Republic of France. The next few years saw colonists and locals all across French Africa waging wars of liberation and fury against the Communists and Republicans alike, Germany quietly being given back the Ruhr, and the Republicans solidifying their hold on North Africa and Syria, while fortifying Cilicia from what remained of the Communist's Mediterranean fleet - with help from Britain and, irony of ironies, the Ottomans.
The rest of the world was not idle in this time. America's slide to isolationism continued as her economy continued to soar. A man by the name of Benito Mussolini all but seized power in Italy under his nationalist party and began the long road of building an empire. Greece, united in thought and mind under the King and Venizelos, pushed more and more for the realization of its Great Idea - indeed, it was partly Greece's assistance in crushing the Turkish nationalist movement that has allowed the Treaty of Sevres to be enforced so. Poland, barely two years old, inflicted a stunning defeat on the Soviets and expanded eastward.
Austria soon followed Italy in its march to nationalist fervor as the Fatherland Front gained power, as did Portugal, while Spain, falling to a civil war of its own, went the opposite direction. The German Empire, concerned as it was about Communist influence, was equally worried about fascists, and set about repairing burnt bridges with its enemies from the last war. The remnants of Franco's forces fled the continent. Some went to Corsica, where some of the fascists from France's civil war fled themselves, while others went to the French colonist-led states of east and central Africa, which welcomed them with open arms and recruitment papers.
The 1920s ended with Europe divided among communists and fascists, republicans and monarchists, and totalitarians and puppets. China's warlords slowly eat themselves alive, and Africa is beginning to see the sparks of national identity itself. The American stock market crash in October was disastrous, but President Hoover managed to prevent it from becoming catastrophe. Though it did not save his presidency, the Republicans can at least claim they did their damndest and succeeded. Without a slump to pull America out of, President Roosevelt's plans may be overly ambitious, but he seems intent to steer his charted course.
Here in Constantinople, though, a government of iron hands, or even a strong government, is but a distant dream. As Wyatt Earp put it in a graduation speech he gave to the city's police force academy, it was as if the Wild West had left America and moved to Anatolia. The government's propped up by the League of Nations and the Ottomans both, mostly as a buffer against Greek expansionism, but influence spreads inward by the day and the Greeks already essentially control the Gallipoli Peninsula except for the coast of the Straits themselves.
Besides the government, the Republic of the Marmara's people are ruled, in some capacity or another, by dozens of rebel groups, political cliques, and simple gangs. Two of the three largest are from outside sources. Largest of them is the National Organization of Bosphoran Fighters, or EOBA. Essentially a branch of the Golden Dawn Party, itself an offshoot of the Freethinker's Party, the EOBA seeks little more than unification with Greece. A lot of organizations seek that, especially in Marmaran Thrace and in the south, but the policies EOBA seeks to inflict on the people of Marmara are a step beyond even fascism - like the Golden Dawn, the EOBA is not nearly as tolerant of Jews as the Freethinker's Party is, though both are equally opposed to the existence of other minorities in what they see as rightfully Greek land. The EOBA hates anyone and anything that isn't Greek, Greek Orthodox, and their own twisted strain of Greek Orthodox. Even If that requires cleansing the streets of Constantinople.
The next largest are the Grey Wolves. In many ways, the Grey Wolves and EOBA are similar. Both are irredentist, extreme nationalist organizations with opinions on members of races besides their chosen one ranging from secretly genocidal to openly genocidal, both have the alleged support of outside forces (though the Nationalist Movement Party disavows any connection to the Grey Wolves), both regularly burn books in the streets, and both have had members arrested for trying to burn people instead of simply shooting at them from cars and aircraft. The Grey Wolves differ from the EOBA in three ways, really - the Grey Wolves are run by and for Turks, the Grey Wolves are Pan-Turkic, and the Grey Wolves are virulently Islamist. While not nearly as extreme or fundamentalist as some fringe organizations in eastern Anatolia and northern Iraq, it nonetheless shares in their desire to force Islamic law down the throats of anyone under their control.
Last and strangest of the big three is the Constantine Club. The Grey Wolves want to revitalize the Ottoman empire, the EOBA seeks a return to Byzantine rule, the Constantine Club seeks to turn the clock back farther, back when Rome was the center of the universe for everyone west of the Urals and north of the Sahel. They see Constantinople as a good enough starting point, hence their name. Unlike the other two, it cares not for skin, race, or even gender amongst its members - only wisdom, knowledge of the system of the Roman Republic, and complete loyalty to the Club is required. As a result, its members are on average more educated than the others - fanatics, yes, but historians and those with a fascination for history have been drawn into its legions, along with the elite who see a bit of senatorial skill in their veins.
In attempting to maintain control, the Republic of the Marmara's government is willing to stop at almost nothing, so long as support continues to come from outside. In that vein, they have ironically taken a Byzantine approach in hiring mercenaries by the score to bolster its military, and like the Constantine Club, anyone is accepted that passes the requirements. Adventurers, mercenaries, sellswords, anyone - men and women, black and white, adult and even a few children, allegedly, in the army, navy, and air force.
You are a member of the latter - the 27th Hetaireia Squadron, a squadron consisting of anyone flying anything capable of serving in a military fashion. Like all Hetaireia squadrons, there is little standardization of equipment, and no standardization of role - everything from counter-insurgency to bomber escort, should the need arise.
And with tensions brewing the world over, and alliances being formed in the open and in darkened rooms, the need will no doubt arise. 1935 is going to be one hell of a year.
DDDDDDDDDD]
