Chapter 20: Why does that Welsh flag have my mother-in-law on it?
The Irish navy is still busy protecting the home shores. We intercept a Northumbrian fleet with quite a lot of ships. How does the AI build up such a huge fleet so quickly?
The battle is, luckily, a rather one-sided affair. Sadly, we do not capture or sink any ships.
Scotland offers a white peace -- and, we accept. I could fight Scotland, but it's a major hassle. They have large armies, well-lead. I prefer to first teach Brittany a lesson. Besides, the Scottish and the Irish are long-time allies. Only the temporary confusion of the Scottish king in choosing which side to be on in this war put him on our enemy's side.
The war overview, we are now comfortably in the lead.
Brittany sees the pointlessness of this war and offers peace. They must be mistaken, just because we accepted every other white peace offer, doesn't mean we're going to accept
every white peace offer! This one is soundly rejected.
And why should we accept? The war is going well. We are besieging a number of Breton provinces, and Castille has even sent troops to help us out! Note, Scotland has decided that it will attack England, seeing as they have a truce with us. The Hansa also decided that some English provinces are up for grabs.
We offer Northumbria a peace deal they cannot refuse. They will become our vassals for their previous insolence. No longer will they have any say in foreign matters!
With our original target out of the war, we can now offer Brittany (the war leader) peace. Wales is ceded to Ireland. Relatively poor, but still provinces of the same culture group. Plus, we might need a foothold in England for future wars. It's a risk: We cannot hope to defend the provinces against the armies of Scotland or England, and if they occupy the provinces that will be continuous WE for us. Still, I'm taking the risk, because the provinces will also give us more manpower, and more importantly, force limits.
Soon after the ink is dry on the peace treaty, Brittany guarantees our independence. Talk about short attention span.... oh! Shiny!
Castillian diplomats arrive, asking for our help in a war again. This time against Aragorn, which is allied to England. Luckily for us, England is still soundly beaten from the war against Scotland and The Hansa. We accept the call to arms.
While pondering on how to disguise the non-action of the Irish Alliance Doctrine this time, Castillian diplomats send news that the war was won after barely two years. Portugal was the alliance leader and was apparently only too delighted to give up
Aragonese provinces for peace. They might have stolen a copy of the Irish Alliance Doctrine manual somehow...
We sell Northumberland Lancashire to give them a little boost. Plus, it nicely cuts the English island into two halves.
Brittany decides that it never again wants to be on the losing side of a war against us, and offers us an alliance. We accept. Also note the map of Western Europe in 1490. France is gone, and Castille is expanding steadily. England, while losing provinces on their home island by the minute, is stubbornly defending and holding on to its last remaining French province. Scotland is getting quite scary, we need to concern ourselves with them next!
Tune in next time, with more wars... only against whom? England? Scotland? Kongo? Find out in the next update of Ireland's Teardrop!