So Far From God- A Mexico AHD AAR

Out of the barrel of a gun

The Liberals had not given up.



Not that he expected them to. Why should they? If he were them, he wouldn't. Politics was about struggle. Everyone believed they were in the right, and so everyone fought for what they believed in. In their heart of hearts, he was sure they believed that what they pushed for would make Mexico stronger.

But it wouldn't. Mexico had not followed, thankfully, the Liberal program, and here we were. In a position to take the next step.

Atjeh was ours, it was just a question of seizing it. The rest of the world, perhaps not ready for a new player on the stage, was not as understanding.



Oh well, it would pass. He didn't blame them either. Alarm at a new power excersing itself abroad for the first time meant their tidy little empires were less secure. The trick was to gain power quickly, but not too quickly, to be a good player of the system of balance of power that had defined the world since Napoleon had almost destroyed it one too many times. He didn't want to be Napoleon. His aim was at the same time grander and more humble: to be Robert Jenkinson.

Not that there weren't dirty sides to the whole affair.



Selling it to the international world was one thing, selling it to the people was another, and here things were easier, if a bit more sordid. A "diplomatic expedition to South East Asia to explore Mexico's interest in the markets there", a fabricated incident or two, and all of a sudden the press was was afire with the threat of a country no one in Mexico had probably even heard of before his Presidency.

As the solders were shipped off in his new navy, they were sent off with flowers and parades, and the enthusiatic support of the very populace that had been so troublsome as regards its "rights under the constitution." It was all so absurdly simple, really.



Perhaps the populace was not stupid, perhaps they actually saw things his way, but the "Atjeh menace" was their way of expressing it. The premise of the war, after all, was that Mexico was establishing a "protectorate" of Atjeh. Protecting it... from it being taken by someone else. The "Atjeh menace" was that Mexico would be left behind by the other Great Powers and cease being a Great power altogether. The menace was that Mexico would not be able to be all it should be. Not "destined" to be, but could be. The people, however ignorant, were not ignorant. The idea of an "Atjeh menace" was ridiculousness on its face. He decided that really, it was jsut the lie the people told themselves to give themselves permission to take what was needed to assure Mexico's greatness.



The war itself was absurd. A joke. Not even worth describing. Now he understood what the Europeans had learned! It was so easy! if you wanted the resources, they were there for the taking. Sure, it no longer took just three hundred men and some muskets to take what you wanted, but it was still absurdly easy. The power was there...if just had the will to take it.



One year, nothing, next year, the beginnings of an Empire. Why would you *not* do this when it was so fundamentally simple? Why bother to buy, negotiate, placate, and wheedle for resources when it could simply be seized, easy as that!



The army that had struggled against a rag tag bunch of rebels ten years ago dispatched a foe half way around the world in a year.

This was power! Concrete, simple, power, as sharp and as lethal as a gunshot. He felt almost like a young man in a city without his parents and a pocket full of money. He could do practically anything without permission or resistance. He looked at a map he had placed in his Presidential suite and ran his fingers over the territory that was now his.

Then he began to consider what he should do next...

Willum said:

Why didn't I start reading this sooner? This is one aar I enjoy more than playing the game, and which enhances my own experience playing the game. If it is not impertinent to ask, may I inquire as to what your background is?

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Why thank you, that's a rather powerful compliment. I'm glad you liked Pablo, that Chapter remains among the things I am proudest of. Ricardo is a reinterpretation of a character I've used in various contexts, so his "voice" is one I am familiar with.

Your question is not impertinent, especially in the context of this AAR, which among other questions is exploring the power and limitations of personal perspective, so *my* personal perspective is relavent here as well. Since a full on biography is probably overdoing it slightly, let me answer your question in brief.

Firstly, I spent several years of my childhood in Mexico before returning to the United States, where I was born and where, by now, I have spent most of my life, so I have some experience in the tangled relationship of the two countries as well as the history of each of them in a way that's been rather helpful in my approach to this AAR.
In terms of education, well, its complicated.
I failed college the first time I went after finishing High School (what Europeans would usually call Secondary School) and am actually currently a semester and change (I gradute in Spring) away from getting a Bachelors in English as well as History, which means I spent most of my 20's working while taking the occasional class.
I've always been a bit of a generalist, I know just enough to be dangerous about alot of different things, partly as a result of aforementioned complicated academic career
In the United States, in the college/higher academia scene you are expected to find a specialty to make yours, but I have never settled on one in particular. I keep jumping around. I'm currently on a labor history in the late 19th century streak with a focus on the United States, but before that it was feminist history in the mid 20th century, and before that it was Abolitionist movement, and so on and so forth.

Because of that, in terms of this AAR, I know enough to either sound like I know things or know enough to quickly do useful research on the topic.

The Hegel post is an example of both the promise and perils of the approach. I haven't read Hegel, I simply googled the shorter logic, skimmed parts of it, combined it with what I generally "knew" about the era, and off I went, which may be the source of the misunderstanding. It's possible I also had the character deliberately misunderstand Hegel from his perspective, its been awhile since that post.

Finally, this entire AAR has really been shaped by a class I took spring of last year as I was writing it. Go back to Ch. 3 and reread it, its essentially me retelling the class as a story in miniature, as I was taking it, and was the moment where the fundamental approach of this AAR really gelled. To explain it would take too many words in an already too long post, but google "Critical Literacy" or read about Paulo Freire (notice the name...) and you'll begin to see the connections.

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Hope to update tomorrow, no promises, etc etc.

Merrick Chance' said:

I don't know if that's the sort of thing that you're interested in, but I'm similarly a generalist, and after graduating I moved straight into public policy. Great field, very broad, and you have to constantly sum up the long and inpenetrable works of experts into something short and plain enough than some elected official can understand.

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I've considered that, actually. I may still end up here. For the moment, I'm heading in the direction of being a teacher in the High/Secondary School setting, in addition to the Bachelors, I've put in alot of course work towards receiving a teaching certificate, which actually means that about two years ago when I transferred to a four year institution after getting an associates in History and Government at a Community College, I essentially decided to become a triple major. This is especially ironic since my becoming a full time student in 2009 (economic downturn, unemployment, yadda yadda), is what led to the abandonment of my previous AAR, but that course load was as nothing compared to what I've been juggling during this AAR. Oh well, I guess partly I'm just used to it by now.

In any case, to a certain extent, being a teacher shares a similar skill set to the public policy thing: making the seemingly incomprehensible seem rather familiar to audience that may not realize why this is important.

Out of the wallet of a rich man

Napoleon had been beaten by a nation of shopkeepers.

There was a lesson there. If god sided with the big battalions, then by extension he sided with the person with the deepest wallet. Big battalions cost big money.

Part of his determination to expand the empire was simply because Mexico needed more wealth. More wealth meant more taxes, more taxes meant a better and bigger army, a better and bigger navy, more forts, more artillery, more of everything. Mexico had lots of land to defend, and that meant alot of money needed to defend it.

And so the Conservative party had come to a simple conclusion: government must help industry. As much as possible. The Liberal Laizze Faire experiment had failed, and the Conservative answer had proven to be more powerful. And so corporate interests and government interests were increasingly becoming one and the same.

He intended to further that, expand it, and make Mexico, its capitalists, corporations, government, and himself richer. Even the ungrateful unionists would win out over the growing industrialization of the economy. The only losers were the artisans, and there was simply no future in them, no power. One capitalist had enough money to make a difference. One artisan was nothing.

Nor was all the growth potential abroad: the north still had alot of untapped potential.



Oklahoma was booming with the help of the government. With his help. Industry was starting to take off as its population soared.

And all that had been necessary was for the government to work with land speculators to draw in immigrants, labor to make the state more productive.

And it wasn't only farms that were being exploited.



The growing number of factories in Mexico were reaching up there as well, which could only help. The more firm the Mexican presence, the less realistic the American pretensions to the territory would be, pretensions that still floated about like a dark cloud, distant and threatening.

He had no idea if the Americans would actually, at any point, make a move on their occasionally voiced territorial ambitions, but he knew the only thing he could do is prepare. Every factory, every peso made in the country, every good produced, made him stronger and more confident. And the new colonial empire in the east represented entirely new opportunities for expansion, exploitation and profit.

The capitalists would be ever stronger, and that meant the country and the conservative party would be stronger, for their relationship was one of symbiosis. Their money gave him power, but his power gave them more money, and so the cycle of the power, progress, and stability would continue.

He would make sure of it. It was time for the next move.

loki100 said:

does seem very Bismarckian in its conception of the focus of the state, and how to co-opt others into it ...

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Precisely! Our President is very much focuses on the state, which he naturally sees as an extension of himself.

@Merrick Likely, but only time will tell.
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Due to school work, a bit of a schedule slip. Next intended update (may) occur on Wednesday.

Of all the passions none is more powerful than ambition



Time was limited. The Liberals were recovering, regaining ground. They might, in a decade, a decade in a half, be able to ever so slightly expand the franchise, and the minute that happen, the game would change. Whatever he wanted to do, he must do it in that amount of time.

Complicating this was the fact that his goals would be ruined if he moved too fast. But, likewise, they would never reach fruition if he moved too slowly. He must choose the right moment, build towards it.

There was no plan. How could there be? To go to war against a European power...it was not something Mexico had done. To have an army travel most of the way around the world and conquer some uncivilized nation there was one thing. It was already more than anyone had dreamed possible even a decade and a half ago, when Mexico seemed to struggle to hold on to what it had.

But to take on a colonial power was an entirely different mater. Grander, more rewarding, and more dangerous. There could be no planning for it. It might, after all, never happen. The Netherlands had a much bigger navy, and an army equal to that of Mexico. It had an ally in Austria, whose entrance into the stage would mean Mexico would be forced to walk away from the peace table with nothing.

So there was no plan, there were, however, preparations, if the moment ever became ripe.



Overseas ports would allow Mexico a better ability to project naval power in the new colonies, and provide a hub for commerce as well. If Mexico was going to have colonies half way around the world, she would be forced to be a naval power. Never mind that the army was only now truly becoming modern. Never mind that so much needed to be done for industry. these things would have to progress as well. There was no end to the choices, the conundrums. He needed more of everything and anything, and would just have to make do with some of the things.



There was so much to keep track of! Trying to wrench Brazil away from the French, trying to get the other Spanish speaking nations to be part of his planned common market. Progress was being made, but it was slow. France seemed to feel it's business was everywhere. It threatened to be interested in Dutch affairs as well, but thankfully the British kept them stymied. Perhaps the rising power of Prussia in North Germany could also keep them distracted.

Up till now, Mexico had pursed a very simple diplomatic course: befriend the United States and the United Kingdom. But now, things were more complex. The opinions of France, of Prussia, of Russia, were relevant to Mexican interests now. The small expansion into South Eats Asia made Mexico face the world.

He enjoyed every minute of it, jockeying for position, working to gain favor. France was the nation whose interests obviously clashed with his and his plans. Their interest in Brazil and the Netherlands would always be stumbling blocks to his plans. And so, he must begin to be friendly to Prussia and England, her competitors on the continent. The circle grew ever wider.

As the army grew stronger and his presence in South East Asia became firmer, things began going his way. Somehow or somewhere Austria and the Dutch had parted ways. The French were struggling in the war of influence against Britain. Things were not quite ready yet..but they were heading in the right direction.



There were always unpredictable occurrences, however. This is why there were no plans, only contingencies. The Colonial Incident between his forces and the Dutch was the perfect moment to begin to build pressure. His forces wouldn't be ready in time for the incident to provide a adequate justification for things, but it would up the pressure and make his eventual deceleration of war an easier sell.

Thank God that even if the Liberals were making gains in the Upper House winning elections for the Presidency were still done the right way.



Whatever choices the people thought they had made, he and his party by now had the machinery in place to make sure the decisions, in the end, were the right ones. Too bad such a mechanism was unworkable for the Upper House elections....

Ah well. If everything went the way it should, its not like the damn Liberals enacting a few reforms would even matter that much. He would have secured the future power of Mexico, and after that happened, they could let all the indios vote as honestly and openly for whoever they wanted for all he cared. They would never be able to take the step back once it was taken, and it was already taken. Mexico was an imperial power, and all that meant. Imperialism was about exploitation, control, power, wealth, prestige...the kinds of things that a powerful military, a respected church, and a well organized system of authority were required to carry about. Once Mexico truly had an empire, even the Liberals would find themselves being Conservatives.



One everything was ready, it really seemed to all fall into place with ridiculousness ease. Justifying the war was all too easy. The public at home clamored for justice, for revenge, for a place in the sun.

When the moment came, he considered it carefully. Was Mexico truly ready? This war, once unleashed, would not be the predictable affairs that the Texan rebellion or the conquest of Atjeh had been. While all appeared well, the truth of things going wrong was very well. A few bad battles, or one of the other Great Power interfering, were very real possibilities.

Well, now was the time to prove Mexico deserved its spot as a Great Power, then. To prove its power in the only way, in the end, that really mattered: on the field of battle.

enf91 said:

After reading this, I feel tempted to reply with something from a soldier's perspective, but 1) people might think it was one of yours and hate it so much that they get turned off from this great AAR or 2) it would totally upstage you and leave me the stAAR. [/egostroking][/fantasy] Altogether, it might be better if you did it, if it were to be done.

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Three guesses for what the next chapter's point of view was already planned to be when I started this chapter. The first two don't count.

Tapscott said:

Congrats Chilango2, you've just won the Best Character Writer of the Week Award!

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Why thank you!

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This semester is a monster, so for the moment I'm officially changing the expected update schedule to once a week. That way, if you get two in a week as I can sometimes manage, you'll be pleasantly surprised.