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Kaltorak

Second Lieutenant
73 Badges
Apr 14, 2007
174
3
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This is an AAR in version 1.2 as Abu Dhabi. It will be a combination of minor roleplaying elements and gameplay. I have very little knowledge of the history of the area, this will be largely fictional. This is one of my first AARs so bear with me. I apologise in advance for the amount of writing in the early days. Believe me, the sooner I get to the gameplay the better for all of us. :p Hopefully I will get the hang of it soon. :)

Emirates United: Introduction - British Influence

Waheed Saad looked upon his old home with trepidation from the English clipper whose deck he stood on. He had been sent to England to study by his affluent father, a pearl trader from Abu Dhabi. Waheed became interested in the politics of the day. He spent some time as an aide to an English diplomat.

In 1820, in the name of preventing piracy in the Persian Gulf the English brought ships into the gulf and sunk a number of ships claiming they were pirates. After this a treaty was signed with the emirs of a number of emirates on as it was known then the "Pirate Coast". This treaty was made with Waheed acting as translator and indeed scribe of the treaty documents.

Part of the translated document reads as followed.

"In the name of God, the merciful, the compassionate! Praise be to God, who hath ordained peace to be a blessing to his creatures! There is established a lasting peace between the British Government and the Arab tribes, who are parties to the contract, on the following conditions:

Art. 3. The friendly Arabs shall carry, by land and by sea, a red flag, with or without letters in it, at their option; and this shall be in a border of white, the breadth of the white in the border being equal to the breadth of the red, as represented in the margin, the whole forming the flag known in the British Navy by the title of 'White pierced Red'; and this shall be the flag of the friendly Arabs, and they shall use it, and no other.

Art. 4. The pacificated tribes shall all of them continue in their former relations, with the exception that they shall be at peace with the British Government, and shall not fight with each other; and the flag shall be a symbol of this only, and of nothing further.

Art. 10. The vessels of the friendly Arabs, bearing their flag above described, shall enter into all the British ports, and into the ports of the allies of the British, so far as they shall be able to effect it, and they shall buy and sell therein; and if any shall attack them, the British Government shall take notice of it."

Thus the maritime flags were changed from
omanflag.gif

to
aekalba.gif


The emirates of Abu Dhabi, Ajman, Dubai, Uum al-Quwain and Sharjah all signed the treaty. The Al Khalifa tribe who had recently come to rule Bahrain also signed up to the treaty which included Qatar as it was at the time a dependency of Bahrain governed by the Al Thani tribe. The Al Khalifas received more assurances from the British than the others as they were directly threatened by the Al Sauds in the region that was called Nedj.

The Al Sauds were recovering to form a second state after their first had been crushed by the Egyptians at Ottoman behest. The rivaly between the Al Sauds and the Al Rashids would shape the future of the Nejd region in the future.

The Ras al-Khaimah emirate would be occupied by the British for a number of years as they took the brunt of the blame for piracy in the gulf. They would sign the treaty in 1822. It was then that Waheed returned to England. He rose in the ranks and in 1828 found himself as the premier diplomat to the "Trucial Coasts", as the signees of the treaty were now known.
 
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Abu Dhabi, wow. Bravery. :D
I'll be following!
 
Good luck indeed. I think you will need all the luck you can get not to be crushed by the Great Powers.
 
Abu Dhabi, wow. Bravery. :D
I'll be following!
Heh. I'm not quite going in COMPLETELY blind. I've played a trail game. Good to have you aboard Konnigratz.

I think this is a first. Good luck, I'll be watching.
Well it was between this and the Zulu. Either would be a first I think. Glad to hear your going to be watching scholar. Hopefully I can keep it interesting enough to keep you along for the ride. :)

Good luck indeed. I think you will need all the luck you can get not to be crushed by the Great Powers.
Indeed and hopefully the whole arabian peninsular can stay independent, it will be one of my goals to incorporate them into the fold. Cheers for the luck TekcoR.
 
Emirates United: Chapter 1 - The Task At Hand

Waheed was shortly on dry land in Abu Dhabi. The island village of his youth. Before embarking on the voyage to the Trucial Coast, Waheed had been tasked with primarily one task, to unite the emirates into one political, economical and military entity. He looked again at his map of the coast, trying to work out how his grand undertaking could be acheived.

uaeenmap.png


The emirate of Abu Dhabi had by a vast margin claim to the most land. Most of this land was desert and scarcely populated. Sharjah held claim to the most populous land. Ajman was clearly the smallest emirate with claim to a small population as well. Umm al-Quwain was also reasonably small in area and population, the second smallest in both categories. Ras al-Khaimah help one of the more popular ports for the British Indian shipping as well as boasting reasonable land and population. Ras al-Khaimah was however slightly resented by the other emirates as its role in pirating had brought the British upon them all.

His political colleagues in Britain all thought that these emirates should be organised into two provinces for easier governorship. Waheeds inclination was to make Abu Dhabi one of the provinces. His ideas for the other emirates would likely be unpopular. Thankfully he was given certain political leverage by parliament in Britain to guarantee the emirates would remain independent of Ottoman rule so long as they played like 'good chaps'.

Waheed's plan was to make the other province Dubai as they had been far more co-operative to the British treaty. The emir of Dubai would rule the province with the caveat that the emirates of Sharjah and Ras al-Khaimah voted in favour of his desicions. Umm al-Quwain and Ajman would be made dependecies of Sharjah. They would remain autonomous, but had no vote on provincial affairs. Ras al-Khaimah would gain most of Sharjah's eastern lands.

This would make the Trucial Coast into four provinces of Abu Dhabi, which contained the capital of the same name, Dubai, Bahrain and Doha (the capital of the Qatar peninsular).

It took Waheed a great deal of heavy negotiations to gain the support for his plan from all the emirates. Umm al-Quwain and Ajman been the most stubborn. Waheed had granted their regions slight exemptions from the new tax system that would be put in place along the coast. Eventually Waheed managed to succeed and the new state and country of Abu Dhabi was born, to very little international reaction.

Next: Chapter 2: The State of the State... and finally some gameplay! :eek:
 
A very unusual choice of country, and one I will be following! Good start!
 
This looks like it could be very good.

I have no idea how you plan on achieving anything of note though :p

Your population is tiny, your poor and uncivilised.
 
A very unusual choice of country, and one I will be following! Good start!
Unusual.. yes. But it is the first country available at the start of the game alphabetically! :p
Thanks for following Selzro! I may well need all the support possible if this goes catastrophically!

This looks like it could be very good.

I have no idea how you plan on achieving anything of note though :p

Your population is tiny, your poor and uncivilised.
Well time will certainly tell. You definately are right on all counts with your analysis though Tommy4ever. We have no choice but to turn our weaknesses into a strengths.

You are insane!

Good luck!
I would have hoped that my psychologist would have told me this by now! :p
Thanks for the wishes of luck Plank of Wood.

If you unite Arabia you might, might, have a chance.
Its not really the strength of any of the countries in the area that makes me want to unite them. Most of the bedouin cultured pops are around here and also in the Ottoman empire. It wouldn't be fair to leave them out of the fun. Cheers scholar.

This is going to be fun :)
I definitely hope so too garudamon11.


I've got all the screenshots for the next installment. Just the matter of writing something up and all the resizing editing jazz. Hopefully I can get it to you guys soon enough. :)
 
Emirates United: Chapter 2 - The State of the State

With local affairs in order, Waheed looked at the bigger picture. How Abu Dhabi was positioned in the world.

abudhabiu.jpg


The tiny state could barely fit its name upon the map. Certainly dwarfed by all of its local rivals.

abudhabi2.jpg


As if he needed any reminding of his situation, the population estimates against the rest of the world weren't terribly promising. Indeed Abu Dhabi sat as the sixth least populous country.

abudhabi3.jpg


This morose looking cloud did have a silver lining however. Abu Dhabi could claim to be the second most literate uncivilised nation in the world behind Japan. Japan also had almost five hundred times the population of Abu Dhabi, surely a power to be envious of from our humble position. Also of note is the presence of Yemen, one of the nations in our neighbourhood, at 21% literacy and four hundred thousand population.

abudhabi4.jpg


Waheed looked over what budget reports he could find. It became clear to him that the people would have to be bled of their money for the Abu Dhabian budget to run at a surplus. Especially if he wanted to play on Abu Dhabi's strength as far as education was concerned. He was committed to further increasing literacy, indeed it was his hope to try to attract as many intellectuals and teachers to Abu Dhabi as possible, by offering high wages.

Administration was also suffering. Waheed couldn't be sure any of the figures and estimations that he was using were accurate. He advertised for bureaucratic roles for reasonably high literacy members of the state. Hoping that he could tax the people and the import of foreign goods more accurately.

Unfortunately at this time, Waheed deemed the military budget a step too far. He would have to sacrifice heavily here to get the results he wished elsewhere. Confident that a few promises, no matter how false, that the British would swiftly aid the state, would placate the emirs. Waheed would like to increase the spending as soon as was possible, but the mere two pounds of national savings this day might be long coming.

abudhabi5.jpg


The ultimate move of this budgetary cut to military spending was the dismissal of the Armies of the Sheikhs. This unit composed men of all the emirates, though mostly from Abu Dhabi province itself. They came bearing swords for the most part, though a few were armed with guns. While Waheed was sure they were all brave souls, they would merely be a bump in the road to any foreign ventures into Abu Dhabi.

Abu Dhabi's neighbours could all boast of five or more brigades of men. These troops would be impossible to resist with one mere regiment of irregulars. Waheed would commit to a national army when he felt the budget allowed it. That army would probably be regular infantry if possible.

abudhabi6.jpg


The education situation was certainly an area of pride in Waheed now, especially in light of recent news on just how many educators were in Abu Dhabi. None the less Waheed was committed to further amplifying this sector. As much as the budget would enable it. Abu Dhabi province was fairly indicative of just how little money was flowing in the national economy.

abudhabi7.jpg


Technology wise, Abu Dhabi was definitely backwards. Thankfully as a military tech they did possess Flintlock Rifles, meaning the production of a regular infantry brigade was within their powers. In commerce techs they had No Standard. Water-wheel Power been their only industrial technology. Waheed would wait to see how his education plan took hold before committing to any research.

The Sheikhs Council, as the united emirates government was called, consisted of votes from Bahrain, Qatar, Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, Dubai and Ras al-Khaimah emirates been committed to most major decisions. The emir of Abu Dhabi had an extra casting vote in the case of a tie. They were quite open on how taxation and foreign trade were implemented. Abu Dhabi was a country of faith. The emirs were for the most part pacifist, hoping to merely have what they held.

abudhabi8.jpg


Lastly, Waheed looked at the census data he had readily available. He had little confidence in these documents accuracy, but would have to rely on them at this stage. Abu Dhabi was for the most part inhabited by farmers. The second largest group was the soldiers, at a rather large 7% considering the size of the state. Waheed was sure this figure would decrease if his budgetary changes were implemented. Clergymen were numbered at 1.6% of the population. This would surely rise in the near future.

The state is predominantly Sunni Muslim with some Shi'a in Bahrain who had emigrated from Persia and adopted the Bedouin way. The people were for the most part in favour of the military, possibly because of the sheer number of soldiers currently employed by the state.

Next: Chapter 3 - The Future is Bright

As an aside. How are people with the size of the screenshots here? I wasn't really sure what would be best and tried to find a happy medium with readability, etc. Hopefully its all pretty easy to follow.
 
I tend to go with 800 pixels in width for screenshots, but your 600-pixel width ones should make it easier for people with monitors with 800x600 resolution, and they look more tidy. The text is easy to read, so I think they're fine.

I knew Abu Dhabi had a small population but I hadn't realized how small until now... I presume you are saving up research points for idealism? Good luck on your next steps!
 
Abu Dhabi, what an exciting choice! And I'm not just being sarcastic - from a geographical standpoint, it's in a region that could very well become a flashpoint. It's good that you can field regular infantry instead of just irregulars, are Nejd and Hedjaz able to do the same, or are they stuck with irregulars? That could give you a real leg up if you turn deeper into Arabia in the future.
 
This promises to be interesting. I don't think it'll be impossible. Indeed, I actually think Waheed is making the best choices one can in such uncertain circumstances. Bolstering Abu Dhabi's educational sector should give a good leg-up in the Westernization race and beyond. The question I would ask - will the first goal of territorial expansion come from within, or without? Also, can Arabia be formed as a nation-state? Sorry if that's a simple question, but given I'm still on 1.1 I am unaware.
 
I tend to go with 800 pixels in width for screenshots, but your 600-pixel width ones should make it easier for people with monitors with 800x600 resolution, and they look more tidy. The text is easy to read, so I think they're fine.

I knew Abu Dhabi had a small population but I hadn't realized how small until now... I presume you are saving up research points for idealism? Good luck on your next steps!

I think in the future I might go for the 800 pixels. I found myself cropping and resizing too much for my own good. That been said we'll see how I'm feeling.
I am indeed saving up for idealism. The prestige and research bonus is hard to resist. One good thing about a small population is that they are reasonably easy to shape and reshape as your priorities change. Thanks again for more luck Selzro. It definitely can't hurt. Heh.

Abu Dhabi, what an exciting choice! And I'm not just being sarcastic - from a geographical standpoint, it's in a region that could very well become a flashpoint. It's good that you can field regular infantry instead of just irregulars, are Nejd and Hedjaz able to do the same, or are they stuck with irregulars? That could give you a real leg up if you turn deeper into Arabia in the future.

Nejd, Hedjaz and Oman all have the fortune of been able to field not only regular infantry, but artillery as well. I guess the restrictions on them will more be a financial constraint. Yemen is an entirely different matter. They start out with no technology (fixed in a number of unofficial fixes, but not before I started this game). That been said at one point I would like to incorporate them all into the Abu Dhabian fold. Thanks for your interest Serek000.

This promises to be interesting. I don't think it'll be impossible. Indeed, I actually think Waheed is making the best choices one can in such uncertain circumstances. Bolstering Abu Dhabi's educational sector should give a good leg-up in the Westernization race and beyond. The question I would ask - will the first goal of territorial expansion come from within, or without? Also, can Arabia be formed as a nation-state? Sorry if that's a simple question, but given I'm still on 1.1 I am unaware.

Waheed is trying his best in difficult circumstances, but turning your back on the military is never a wise idea for a loosely held together state. Hopefully it doesn't backfire. The 'education revolution' gets the movement to westernisation going a lot quicker, that should be apparent when I update next. Territorial expansion is on the back burner for a bit, Abu Dhabi province has only a 1000 man pop for soldiers which departs quickly under the budget Waheed wants put in place. Unfortunately I won't get the fun of forming an Arabian nation, but it should be fun trying to make a state for all Bedouins. Thanks for your comments Communitarian!.


On the note of updating, I am not sure that I will be able to do so during the week. I should have an update on the weekend at the latest, though hopefully earlier.
Cheers!
 
Have you unpaused the game yet? Judging from what you've written I'm not quite sure.
 
Interresting choice, very hard country to get something out of it gamewise i guess,
and the worst country colour of all times ;)
(my MIP made Abu Dhabi bavarian blue if you want to change that)

I can only wish you luck! :)