The Most Sublime Porte - An Ottoman AAR

[Riotkiller]

Welcome back, I hope everyone had a safe, healthy, and happy festive period! If any readers have not yet perused the excellent community AARlander review of 2020 I highly recommend you pop over to enjoy the content there. I shall also take the opportunity to remind people of the opportunity for readAARs to vote in the Q4 ACA's and the 2020 year AARLand awaards, which are a fantastic chance to reward some of your favourite writers by community recognition.

We're now into the final stretches of this AAR: I have in fact finished playing the campaign through to the end date. There are of course a few more updates to come still, and there shall be a few wrap-up epilogue posts too. I've greatly enjoyed having you all along for the ride, and I hope the conclusion provides a fitting finale to the campaign.

I don't know what it is, but it's just really satisfying to see the UK getting the tar beat out of it.

It's certainly deeply satisfying to see how rapidly the British Empire unravelled after the immense casualties it suffered in the invasion of Mesopotamia in the First Great War

The dynamic in America really seems impossible for the central government in Washington, and it's hard to see how they pull out of it.

Meanwhile, it is a delight to see the British Empire get dogpiled by the nations of the world. The Clausewitz Engine is churning out nothing but schadenfreude against the great English-speaking powers of the world.

Indeed, the anglophonic world is having a pretty terrible time all round (except perhaps for the Kingdom of Canada - which clearly made an excellent decision to leave the British Empire in the 19th century)

With the US and UK imploding, the Ottomans now have a genuine shot at topping rhe power list. As does every other great power, it must be said.

The next war is therefore going to be quite large...

It'll take a hell of a change to dislodge the French from the top at this point, but never say never. Britain and the USA are certainly plummeting down the order, and the German involvement in the Spanish colonial war has proven that Berlin has finally begun to grow its teeth back.

All the storylines around the world are going great, and it hurts me to know the end of the game is drawing nearer and nearer. One uneasy peace after another, and it seems the currents wars will leave the world with more tension than they started with as well.

At least we're filling the coffers selling to every side

Yeah, there's a certain irony in the fact that the general peace that followed the end of the Third Great War, after two decades of constant warfare between all the great powers... Has now given way to a world in which pretty much every Great Power is involved in some conflict or another.

I was going to comment on how bizarre the situation in America is, what with all of the back and forth between the Alliance and the Confederacy, but frankly news from Britain far eclipses it in oddness. Chamberlain gone over a Chinese invasion, Halifax of all people taking over and then getting dog piled by the rest of the world powers is… well, it’s strange. I suppose it does at least go to show that Neville Chamberlain is capable of tripping up on a flat surface.

The British have seemingly been pretty bereft of leadership for a long time, it has to be said. Whilst the First Great War is easy to pinpoint as the beginning of the decline of their army, with the massive losses in India triggering the withdrawal of British power from the majority of the subcontinent, I'm not entirely sure how they've fallen so far down the order that the battered remnants of Germany could combine with two (admittedly quite large) secondary powers to shut the Royal Navy into its ports. Or indeed that the Chinese could believe they could take the British on by themselves... And by the looks of it, succeed!

I think I have a hypothesis. I call it 'everything Britain has ever done in the timeframe of this game'.

Pretty accurate

God grey Mexico is ugly!

A very interesting update as always. I have to admit I feel a twinge of sympathy for the Brits...

Mexico being the largest & seemingly strongest fascist power is certainly a slightly bemusing twist of fate in this game, though America looked like it was very close to going fully fascist itself before the end of the dictatorship.

The Porte feels no sympathy for its hated former oppressors

Just finished catching up and I must say, excellent work! This was a good read and I look forward to new updates.

Thank you! Glad you have enjoyed it

This reversal of roles is quite fitting. At the beginning of the game, it was the Sublime Porte which was fighting for its very life while Britain just looked to make a quick profit. Now its Britain's turn to feel the heat. Very interested to see how these wars go. No matter what happens, new opportunities are sure to be open for the Empire.

Indeed, there's been a lot of role reversal in the rise & decline of the various Great Powers through the course of this campaign - With Britain, Germany, and France all spending long periods as the predominant power and also periods being badly defeated by their neighbours. Russia went from a weaker GP to the strongest and most aggressive power in the world before we brought it back down to earth in our own phoenix-from-the-ashes story. And even Austria-Hungary managed to modernise itself and become a strong and prestigious power, too.

Wow, What a ride. I have spent the last week reading this AAR and enjoying every part of it. I cannot wait to see where the Ottomans go next.

Glad to have you on board for the final stretch!

 

[diskoerekto]

Great episode! twists and turns in succession

Charismatic poet Nazim Hikmet Bey transformed the communists into a true force in Ottoman politics in 1943​

He joins the games as well!

Of course, this was of little concern to Grand Vizier Mehmet Recep Pasha, though. The Grand Vizier had achieved what many people had believed to be impossible; and won a majority under the so-called D’Hondt Method of Ottoman electoral politics. Something which had eluded even his much more personally popular and celebrated predecessors Pertev Pasha, Mustafa Kemal Pasha, and Rauf Bey had now been won by a man fighting his very first election as leader. The Sosyal Demokrat Firkasi had gained an astonishing 149 seats – Including almost the entirety of the African constituencies within the Empire – For a total of 452 seats. Whilst the wafer-thin majority of 2 suggested that the Grand Vizier would still need to deal proactively with other parties to ensure that the party program would pass through parliament, it was nonetheless a momentous achievement for both the Grand Vizier and for his party. The Sosyal Demorkat landslide had crushed everything it is wake, and aside from the communists every single other party had lost seats.

Wow!

The Sosyal Demokrat Firkasi’s celebration of its first governing majority in summer 1943 saw the Grand Vizier embark on an ambitious healthcare reform program with significant funding increases – Something which would never have been passed in a coalition with the liberals, as Recep Pasha looked to illustrate the new power his party now possessed. The vastly increased healthcare expenditure saw the construction of a series of hospitals across Ottoman Africa and the Middle East, where healthcare still seriously lagged behind the European, Anatolian, and Egyptian heartlands of the Empire. But beyond the healthcare reforms, a strengthening of health & safety regulations, and a minor autumn expedition to defend the Sultanate of Atjeh from a left wing nationalist insurgency, the rest of the 1943 passed by peacefully for the Sublime Porte, and the small governing majority was never threatened in parliament.

With such good healthcare and regulations, we should also be attracting a fair number of immigrants from other countries, do they have a preferred destination? What are their profile?

Anti-Greek riots led by the Young Turks sprang up in response to the Greek nationalist insurrection (February 9th 1944)

Instead of uprising they should've just travelled to Thessaly and fight the Greek rebels instead

But then two weeks later, Mehmet Sukru Pasha decided to make a much bigger statement; and prove that he was a much stronger leader than his predecessor. Croatia had not been forgotten. There would be a major war after all.

Uh oh

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

For fucks sake, Ottomans just got a free win and they decided to start a world war anyway.

Damn balkans...

 

[HIMDogson]

This seems to me to be a rather reckless and pointless move. Alienating a European great power and key ally against Russia over what, Croatia?

 

[blitzthedragon]

Been hoping to see the Austro-Hungarians get their share. Let's get Croatia back!

 

[DensleyBlair]

The Austrians played this one about as well as they could, given the circumstances. Incredibly reckless of the Porte not to take the 'loss'.

Is it painfully naive to hope that this is all contained to the Balkans, at least?

 

[Telcharinogrod]

America in ruins, a Ming restoration, all of Europe and the middle east covered in pluralist liberal monarchies, Austro-Hungary and the Ottoman empire as strong and modern states... I like this world!

Here's hoping you don't break the Habsburgs too hard. And that somebody fixes fascist Mexico, then it'll be perfect.