Thanks for kind words and don't worry, I hope next chapter is going to make all your fears concerning mindless blobbing go away
Loss with BBB or Horde came to your fences? When we can expect new episode?
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Loss with BBB or Horde came to your fences? When we can expect new episode?
CHAPTER 8
1570-1585
SUDDEN BUT INEVITABLE BETRAYAL
1570-1585
SUDDEN BUT INEVITABLE BETRAYAL
As I already said, today we shall concentrate on the Bear. But before we free Russians from Muscovite oppression there is some extra blobbing to be done – after all, I have truce with Muscowy until 1566. Luckily there is plenty of
We start with very good news – Polish settlers in Siberia have decided to found a new colony!
Which is indeed glorious because I don't have any colonists and thus I'm unable to colonize at all. This means however that I'm 2 colonies over my limit (which is zero), so my expenditures soar. But I don't really care about it – my budget may suffer for a few years but I have a pretty strong economy. Plus holy crap, I have two colonies now!
„Right, Polish colonies in Siberia”, you may say. Little do you know but there actually were a sizeable presence of Polish, err, „colonists” in Siberia for centuries, which is not only a very interesting topic but a very painful one. Why? Well, it is estimated that more than 320,000 people were deported to Siberia after 1939 by Soviet Union and that's not counting deportations to other places like Kazakhstan where at least 250 thousands people were deported to:
wikipedia said:
By the way, it was in Kazakhstan where Polish Armed Forces in the East were created. After German invasion on Soviet Union, Polish-Soviet diplomatic relations were re-established and in the end an agreement was reached on 17th August 1941 – some of the c. 1.5 mln Polish citizens (including c. 200,000 POWs) were to be granted „amnesty” so that they could enlist in the Polish Armed Forces in the East and fight alongside the Allies. The Polish Armed Forces in the East are known also as „Anders' Army” because general Władysław Sikorski nominated general Anders - released from prison in Moscow on 4th August 1941 – to become leader of the army. Yes, it's the same guy who was later fighting in Italy in 1943-1945 and who captured Monte Cassino and yes, the same officers who were defending Poland during Soviet invasion in 1939 were enlisted in the Anders' Army.
Of course before they could actually engage in any combat they had to first leave Kazakhstan. Going through Iran.
But I digress. Let's leave the barbaric 20th century (it's not HOI3 AAR, after all) and return to the Siberia in EU4 period, shall we?
[size=+1]SYBIRACY – POLES IN SIBERIA (PART 1)[/size]
What you can see here is a painting by Witold Pruszkowski called “Na zesłaniu w Sybir” (1893) which in English roughly means “During deportation to Siberia”. You can see the exiles escorted by guards slowly making their way through the desolate gloomy wasteland, a dominion of ice and death. On the right you can see crosses, graves of those not strong enough to reach their destination – a forced labor camp somewhere in taiga. On the left you can see landmark with insignia of Russian Empire, a silent reminder of the punishment for which exiles the were condemned to by the authorities – katorga.
[size=+1]Katorga and exile[/size]
In general, “katorga” (Russian term; from Greek “katergon” - galley) was a system of penal labor established in 17th century which survived until the end of the tsardom and later was transformed into infamous GULag (Glavnoye Upravleniye ispravitelno-trudovyh Lagerey – or in English "Chief Administration of Corrective Labour Camps”). Some may even argue that this system functions to this day because „corrective labor colony” are still used in Russia today and thousands of inmates are forced to work. But we're not going to talk about Russian Federation nor Soviet Union – instead we shall focus on the very beginning of the katorga system.
Siberia – prison without walls
The motives for introducing “katorga” to the Muscovite/Russian penal system were as follows:
1. Incapacitation – sending people away from their home made it very hard for them to continue undesired behavior, whether it was escaping the villages of their lords in case of peasants or theft, forgery or desertion in case of general population. Later (18th century) the political, social, national and religious motives were more and more important. After all, it's hard to cause trouble after deportation from, say, Warsaw to Irkutsk.
2. Deterrence – hard work in harsh conditions caused many to think twice before breaking the law.
3. Retribution – those sentenced to “katorga” surely suffered, forced to live and live far away from their home, family or country.
Other important factor was also desire to populate the Russian Far East – while “katorga” was a punishment in form of a penal labor, it was always accompanied by exile. These two instrument were separate, so even when period of “katorga” - for example, 20 years in gold mine somewhere in northern Siberia – was finally over, the sentenced was still forbidden from coming back. He was free to move within “gubernia” (Russian administrative division) and although his freedom was still limited (especially in case of political prisoners, who couldn't for instance work as lawyers, doctors or clerks) he was no longer a slave forced to work hard every day and subjected to beating. But since the exile was often a life sentence, the rest of his life was spent on trying to survive in harsh conditions of Russian frontier.
The most cruel thing about the whole system was that – despite handful of cases – there really was no escaping from Siberia. In instances of the most remote mines or lumber mills, the sentenced was hundreds of kilometers of frozen wilderness from civilization. To leave the camp meant death of starvation or exposure. Oh, and vast majority of prisoners were forced to reach their destination on foot, walking 20-40 km every day in chains with 1 day of rest every 2 days. It's not surprising that going on foot and in chains from, for instance, Kiev or Warsaw or even Moscow, to Irkutsk – basically walking through half of Asia – was sufficient to break spirit in most of the prisoners by forcing them to realize how desperately alone and far from home they were.
Zsyłka & katorga before 1649
First case of “katorga” and “zsyłka” (Polish for “exile” but mainly in context of Siberia) I know about comes from the very end of 16th century when the whole population of small town Uglicz (I don't know what's the name of it in English) was sentenced to “katorga” because allegedly few of the city dwellers had something in common with assassination of tsarevich Dmitry, son of tsar Ivan the Terrible. There is also a known case of some members of Romanov family – yes, the Romanov family – sentenced to Siberia in 1602. What's most interesting for us is what happened in 1617, when for the first time prisoners of war were sentenced to “katorga” and exile – and guess what, they happened to be Poles and Lithuanians. In general, during 1593-1645 period c. 1500 people were sent to Siberia, including more or less 600 POWs, mostly citizens of the Commonwealth but also Swedes and members of other nationalities.
Zsyłka & katorga in 1649-1822 period
In year 1649 “katorga” was introduced as a penalty for peasantry for escaping from their village. It was also extended to include those sentenced for crimes like murder, theft, robbery and so on. In general, death penalty was becoming slowly substituted by “katorga”. What's important is that in this period the punishment became an important element of political oppression. Revolting Cossacks from today's Ukraine from lands taken by Russia in 1654, bojars (Russian nobles) who were opposing empress Anna Ioannovna Romanov, members of the Old Believers movement – tens thousands of people were sentenced to Siberia in this period. But it got worse.
Zsyłka & katorga in 1822-1917 period
In 1822 there was a reform of the prison system in Russia which made the conditions slightly better for prisoners but on the other hand allowed to accommodate much more of them. In total, between years 1807-1870 more than 460 thousand people were sentenced to “katorga” or “zsyłka”. It got much worse after the revolution of course but we won't delve into details – after all, EU4 ends in year 1820.
[size=+1]Sybirak[/size]
“Sybirak” (plural: “sybiracy”) is a Polish term for resettled to Siberia or – to be more precise – a term used when talking about Poles exiled or imprisoned in Siberia, mostly in 19th and 20th century. To this day vast majority of Poles have very negative connotations with the word “Siberia” alone, not to mention “katorga” - there is even expression “katorżnica praca” (work performed by those sentenced to katorga) which means more or less “exhausting, unpleasant, very hard work”. I mention this because for many people it's not only a history but a very vivid memory – there are still thousands of Poles or their children who live in former Soviet republics who were deported there from Poland after 1939. There is even a state decoration called Siberian Exiles Cross awarded by president of Poland to “recognize and commemorate the suffering of Polish citizens deported to Siberia, Kazakhstan and Northern Russia in 1939-1956 and their devotion to the ideal of freedom and independence”. Hell, where I live (Warsaw) there is even Sybirak Roundabout more or less in the city centre.
Of course Poles were not the only victims of “katorga”. Among those sentenced to Siberia were such famous convicts like Fyodor Dostoyevski or Józef Piłsudski, but also i infamous ones likeFelix Dzerzhinsky or even Joseph Stalin himself. But all were changed by this experience one way or another. As Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote in “The Gulag Archipelago”:
“Prison causes the profound rebirth of a human being... profound pondering over his own ‘I’... Here all the trivia and fuss have decreased. I have experienced a turning point. Here you harken to that voice deep inside you, which amid the surfeit and vanity used to be stifled by the roar from outside... Your soul, which formerly was dry, now ripens from suffering...”
I digressed a lot but I hope you'll forgive me – it's hard to remain completely impartial when we touch the subject like this. I'm the first one to admit that as a Pole I'm obviously biased while describing “katorga”. But don't worry, this was just an introduction – next time we shall take a closer look at what convicts from Commonwealth/Poland actually did in the Russian Far East during exile. Apart from being used as a free labor in mines and lumber mills, that is.
Ahem. Yes. Meanwhile in December 1572 I got this lovely event:
Smaller AE impact? Oh boy, that's exactly what I'm going to need...
It's January 1573 and it's about time to kick out Denmark from Inflanty. And in case you are wondering what the hell this, just take a look at the map – Inflanty is the name of the territories which are within the blue circle (more or less):
We could talk about differences between Semigalia, Liwgalia, Łatgalia, Kurlandia and so on, but it's not that interesting. What's important is that we're about to kick some Danish arse. Well, not only Danish as it turns out.
Burgundy is still kicking and it joins the party. After long chase I finally catch up with them and defeat their main forces in October 1578. No, it didn't took me 5 years to destroy one relatively small army – I was just busy sieging down the whole Denmark as I decided that my allies can handle themselves against Danish allies.
And I was right.
I finally peace out with Burgundy in June 1579. But wait a moment, what's Finland doing here? Well, they made a big mistake of giving me Trade Dispute CB, so I kinda annexed them a month before signing peace with Burgundy, because frankly why not?
As for Burgundy...
Good riddance, I say! The event firing in November 1580 is a nail to the coffin I guess. Although it's impressive that the AI managed to survive so long anyways. And speaking about survival, I think Denmark is ready to sign the peace treaty.
Yup, definitely.
The war is over on 1st December 1580 - Denmark is done. On the spur of the moment I decide to postpone reclaiming Inflanty for a time being and instead I squeeze every single core of my puppets Sweden and Norways out of the realm, thus freeing Swedes and Norwegians from Danish oppression.
Another glorious victory for the Commonwealth! But it's far from being over in this update and there is one more war ahead of us. Some of you have probably guessed it by now who is going to be my next target – it's not like I was being subtle using title like this.
Don't tell me you didn't see this coming – I have Russian as an accepted culture (ha!) and with Sweden as my vassal the merchants surely have outlived their usefulness. Oh Novgorod, believe me that I don't want to do this. It's just that I need the basetax. It's nothing personal, really – I'm sure that in another world we would be... well, probably enslaved by Muscowy. Err. I don't know where this metaphor is going.
The war begins in February 1582 and it seems it will be an easy victory – but surprisingly I lost a few battles.
Okay, mainly naval ones but still, my entire fleet is destroyed by combined forces of Novgorod and Hansa. Damned merchants. On land however they don't stand a chance – for extra cruelty I use the same Muscovites we were fighting together for the last 100 years to lead the attack.
Soon the republic is overrun.
There's not much to be said really.
The war lasts for 2 years and on 24th July 1584 it's over – Polish-Muscovite-Austrian-Bavarian-Swedish armies are victorious. Behold the Great Eastern Blob!
Ugh. These borders are terrible. I'm gonna DOW the hordes quickly because this... thing is just disgusting. I think carving some territory out of Crimea, Nogai and Uzbek should do it. Bigger blob → prettier borders → bigger font → ??? → profit.
To make things even better, I got lucky.
Colony in Tomsk is growing and the glorious Polish-Lithuanian House of... err... Lancaster spreads its influence to Bavaria – clearly a sign from RNG that I should focus on dismantling HRE and bringing justice to Austria and Brandenburg!
But for now let's take a moment to look at the Commonwealth with pride.
Next time we shall focus on fixing the ugly borders. We will talk about Siberia a little more and perhaps we will
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Nice work cleaning up the borders of your vassals. As for the colonies, I'm assuming you're sending the peasants there to educate them. After all, they brought a lot of grief to you during the peasants war. Hopefully, they will learn proper lessons and be more civilized. Truth be told, I'm having trouble seeing your blobbing getting contained unless it's extreme (like France, Ottomans and HRE all piling on you).
Meh. With a fleet like that you couldn't even touch my Tunisia.
But that aside, great work at blobbing like crazy! I hope these wrong-culture provinces won't bite you in the ass when you overthrow the Sejm later on, though. You won't need even more rebellions then.
But that aside, great work at blobbing like crazy! I hope these wrong-culture provinces won't bite you in the ass when you overthrow the Sejm later on, though. You won't need even more rebellions then.
You've got some hideous borders - but on the other hand, the Commonwealth is strong and far-flung, so that makes up for the ugliness a bit.
I thought your title referred to the Commonwealth getting betrayed, but I see it was the other way round. I suspect that most of your neighbors must be feeling quite uncomfortable with the PLC now, especially those neighbors that are of an accepted culture...
I thought your title referred to the Commonwealth getting betrayed, but I see it was the other way round. I suspect that most of your neighbors must be feeling quite uncomfortable with the PLC now, especially those neighbors that are of an accepted culture...
Oh no, those borders... more war is needed. I'm loving the history lessons and becoming more and more disappointed in my American history lessons. I've taken classes that were suppose to focus on world history; the only thing I learned about Poland was that Germany curbstomped the Poles during WWII (not an exaggeration, that is how my teacher worded it).
Heh, you're in a good situation.
Here in Israel all I get to learn about is Jews, Jews, Jews and some more Jews. And of course some lessons about nationalism, which leads to Zionism and more Jews.
With internet and Paradox on my side through, I get to learn some other history.
And for the chapter, it's great! The PLC shall defeat its enemies!
It's the same everywhere. You don't learn much about different countries everywhere. I only learned about the Bill of Rights and the Magna Charta in my English classes. Learned nothing about our Polish neighbours or anything about non-western realms besides Russia. It's even hard to find books about history not taking plase in Western Europe, Russia, the US or China - just try finding a book about Japanese history in Germany, for example! I found exactly two of them.
I don't know whether you're talking about high school or university but honestly I can't complaing about either - history was in general on a high level. Granted, I was in a pretty good high school and university but still, we were learning quite a lot about different countries. But yeah, mostly European ones - Asia and Americas only in contex of exploration, Africa appearing in late 19the century etc. To this day I'm ashamed of the level of my knowledge of the Far East...
Well, I am talking Gymnasium (high school). Had 5 lessons per week during my last 2 school years which contained everything from 1789 to 1989. The Polish/Poland were mentioned as:
- a nationality that had an uprising 1848 even before the Germans had one
- a minority in the Reich, having an own political party
- a state founded 1919 that was attacked by Sovjet Russia and German marauders right away after it was founded
- the first target 1939
- the country which had the most relative losses due to the Nazis (and Russia in smaller numbers, too!) killing off the Polish Jews and Polish people they deemed to be intelligent - slaves need no intelligence, after all
- the country whose borders were forcibly changed in 1945 by Sovjet Russia
- Solidarnosc
And that's it. All the historic facts I learned about Poland in school. Well, they got a honourable mention regarding Tanneberg, how Brandenburg got their hands on Eastern Prussia after 1648 and how Prussia divided them with Austria and Russia but that's it. The Swiss never got mentioned, nor did the Netherlands/Belgium, Denmark (beside 1863) or the Czech.
And that is a real shame.
- a nationality that had an uprising 1848 even before the Germans had one
- a minority in the Reich, having an own political party
- a state founded 1919 that was attacked by Sovjet Russia and German marauders right away after it was founded
- the first target 1939
- the country which had the most relative losses due to the Nazis (and Russia in smaller numbers, too!) killing off the Polish Jews and Polish people they deemed to be intelligent - slaves need no intelligence, after all
- the country whose borders were forcibly changed in 1945 by Sovjet Russia
- Solidarnosc
And that's it. All the historic facts I learned about Poland in school. Well, they got a honourable mention regarding Tanneberg, how Brandenburg got their hands on Eastern Prussia after 1648 and how Prussia divided them with Austria and Russia but that's it. The Swiss never got mentioned, nor did the Netherlands/Belgium, Denmark (beside 1863) or the Czech.
And that is a real shame.
Wow. I have no idea it's that bad. Nothing about Czechy? Defenestration, White Mountain, hussites, 1968? Nothing at all? And we (Europeans) make jokes about how little USA citizens know about the world
Oh, I forgot the uprisings, the Hussites and the reason for the Thirty-years war. But that's it. And the uprisings (along with Hungary) were more in a Sovjet Russia context.
After all, you don't have many history lessons in school. And if you live in a country with a very rich and diverse/controverse history...there's not much time left for anything else. Austria was mentioned, yes, because they were rich and big and partially German.
During my last two school years we had four terms: 11/1 French Revolution - WWI, 11/2 Weimar + GDR/Unification, 12/1 Industrial Revolution (Early, Late), 12/2 Marx/Engels and Cold War. Maybe I mixed a few of them up in terms of when we spoke about it. But that's it, basically. And I had a special History course with five lessons a week - two lessons a week are normal.
But there is no time in school, I understand that. What I don't understand is that it is incredibly hard to find good history books about countries outside of the Western Hemisphere. Most of the things I know of Poland-Lithuania come from your AAR and one(!) book I own about Forgotten Countries. On the other hand I could show you dozens of books that speak of Nazis in all of their "glory". I think there is no day during the year when you can't see at least one report on one channel containing Hitler in German TV - never forget, after all.
But I guess it's a question of supply and demand. There are two subjects people are proud to know nothing of - History and Math.
After all, you don't have many history lessons in school. And if you live in a country with a very rich and diverse/controverse history...there's not much time left for anything else. Austria was mentioned, yes, because they were rich and big and partially German.
During my last two school years we had four terms: 11/1 French Revolution - WWI, 11/2 Weimar + GDR/Unification, 12/1 Industrial Revolution (Early, Late), 12/2 Marx/Engels and Cold War. Maybe I mixed a few of them up in terms of when we spoke about it. But that's it, basically. And I had a special History course with five lessons a week - two lessons a week are normal.
But there is no time in school, I understand that. What I don't understand is that it is incredibly hard to find good history books about countries outside of the Western Hemisphere. Most of the things I know of Poland-Lithuania come from your AAR and one(!) book I own about Forgotten Countries. On the other hand I could show you dozens of books that speak of Nazis in all of their "glory". I think there is no day during the year when you can't see at least one report on one channel containing Hitler in German TV - never forget, after all.
But I guess it's a question of supply and demand. There are two subjects people are proud to know nothing of - History and Math.
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Wow. I have no idea it's that bad. Nothing about Czechy? Defenestration, White Mountain, hussites, 1968? Nothing at all? And we (Europeans) make jokes about how little USA citizens know about the world
Well I never heard of the Commonwealth in History classes. We must see a blob in East Europe on the map to show how France was in 1600, and then nothing
After there is the duchy of Varsovie on the Napoleonic maps, independance in 1918 (along with the other states), 39, Ghetto and then I think i saw Solidarnosk but I'm not sure ... So yeah outside France (and then when you look at it, it's meh), England, Spain and Germany in middle school we see not many things outside.
In High School, our program was far much better : Citizenship (from Athens to well THE national event if you know what I mean), Discoveries in first year ; well I don't remember second year I was busy playing tic-tac-toe and Hangman
; and last year it was definitely the far most interesting lesson (despite the fact that post-1914 is not my cup of tea) : -Memories of the WW2 in France (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-lGrJrRoHA)
-Socialism in Germany since 1875
-Medias in France
-USA since 1914 ; China since 1918 ; Middle-East since 1918 (I pity the fool who must explain that to highschoolers
)-and another topic I don't remember about France
And that was the year we saw the less French history proper and it's still in three lessons
I'm in high school right now, and it's really bad. This year, we learn about the Jewish Hashmonai state that was in Israel after they were liberated fron the Greeks, Roman occupation of Israel, nationalism which leads to zionism. Next year it will be about the holocaust. It's really important, of course, but I'm disappointed that I barely got to learn about other countries in school- althrough in middle school it was better, with colonialism, the American and French revolutions, industrial revolution and, too bad I wasn't as interested in this era back then as I am now (thanks to CK2), the fall of the Roman Empire (), the HRE and feudalism.
Btw, thanks to you every time my history teacher insults the Romans for treating the Jews roughly I have to ressist the urge to call her heretic
(), the HRE and feudalism.Btw, thanks to you every time my history teacher insults the Romans for treating the Jews roughly I have to ressist the urge to call her heretic
Forgotten Countries.
[size=+1]Forgotten Countries.[/size]
[size=+2]Forgotten Countries.[/size]
[video=youtube_share;OmrGdfusIOw]http://youtu.be/OmrGdfusIOw[/video]
Yeah, this is unforunately very widespread attitude. A great shame, really. In any case, I see that I'll have to spend more time than I thought flashing out history of the PLC
Saint Markos would be proud!Btw, thanks to you every time my history teacher insults the Romans for treating the Jews roughly I have to ressist the urge to call her heretic
So in general it's basically like this:
Polish school - hussar hussar
German school - hitler hitler
Isreali school - jews jews
American school - murica murica
French school - le france le france
Good to know we all have something in common
I think I might have mistranslated the "Forgotten Empires". It's more about countries (and sometimes Empires) that completely disappeared from the maps of Europe. Usually for a long time, some of them forever. It contains PLC as well as Aragon (more like Aragon-Barcelona), Burgundy (or, to be precice, all Kingdoms, Dukedoms and Barony's of Burgundy that existed at different times), Duchy of Krakow, Estonia (pre-Sovjets), Sovjet Russia, Alt Clud. And I forgot some of them. PLC got around 100 pages, I guess? But it is still rare to find something like that here.
I'll stop here, though - I already spammed your nice AAR with things completely unrelated to it.
I'll stop here, though - I already spammed your nice AAR with things completely unrelated to it.
Love the update, and the history lesson (brutal as that was to read about).
And I can confirm that US history classes are frequently "murica murica". It's why you sometimes see a backlash of assuming America is at fault for everything bad in history, too.
And I can confirm that US history classes are frequently "murica murica". It's why you sometimes see a backlash of assuming America is at fault for everything bad in history, too.
I think many countries have this.
I mean in French history we had many many lessons on slavery, colonization and Collaboration. I feel like pushed culpabilization in these lessons even if we don't need to occult bad things. But when you are looking to XIXth century history lessons, it's the contrary and it's funny what the people could learn