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One of the worst events I've seen... Come to think of it that IS the worst event I've ever seen. The only thing coming close is maybe the Time of Troubles for Russia as The Impaler said or the American Revolution events for England.
What a wonderful post! One of your best, I think.
Have you read any of the Barry Hughart books, the 'Master Li' series? Your style reminds me of his writing and of Bridge of Birds, in particular. They are (if I can remember the quote correctly) novels of 'A China that never was but should have been'. Delightful stuff.
Sounds like you had a proper Civil War even if that wasn't the exact name of the event. Visions of exploded elephant parts kept coming to mind as I read, and I'm glad you and the Mighty Elephant came through in one piece.
You were very wise to keep your military strength up - that is probably what deterred your enemies from taking advantage of your internal problems.
Have you read any of the Barry Hughart books, the 'Master Li' series? Your style reminds me of his writing and of Bridge of Birds, in particular. They are (if I can remember the quote correctly) novels of 'A China that never was but should have been'. Delightful stuff.
Sounds like you had a proper Civil War even if that wasn't the exact name of the event. Visions of exploded elephant parts kept coming to mind as I read, and I'm glad you and the Mighty Elephant came through in one piece.
You were very wise to keep your military strength up - that is probably what deterred your enemies from taking advantage of your internal problems.
Excellent Update and well played. Good thing your enemies did not seize upon you in the midst of the years of Fire and Ash. I can only imagine the destruction that would have happened had you been in a war when that event hit.
Song quiz...
"I don't need no civil war...
It feeds the rich, while it kills the poor..."
After all was said and done, the event you just had was my greatest worry. I mean, it has to be some kind of checking mechanism that kicks in at some point and makes you, well put out fires for the rest of the game (or money, if you don't have it.) Good thing you did.
So, for 5 years, build manufactories, and fine arts academies where you can.
phya Taksin... Mil Very good... OMG. Shut the doors, turn off the lights and CLONE HIM. COPY/PASTE HIM, do whatever it takes. Bad thing is you can't really use him till the RR wears off. But when you Will use him, I suspect someone's gonna hurt.
I see that the Russians are at your borders. How is the situation evolving over there?
"I don't need no civil war...
It feeds the rich, while it kills the poor..."
After all was said and done, the event you just had was my greatest worry. I mean, it has to be some kind of checking mechanism that kicks in at some point and makes you, well put out fires for the rest of the game (or money, if you don't have it.) Good thing you did.
So, for 5 years, build manufactories, and fine arts academies where you can.
phya Taksin... Mil Very good... OMG. Shut the doors, turn off the lights and CLONE HIM. COPY/PASTE HIM, do whatever it takes. Bad thing is you can't really use him till the RR wears off. But when you Will use him, I suspect someone's gonna hurt.
I see that the Russians are at your borders. How is the situation evolving over there?
Chapter 23 - Phya Taksin (1767- fl 1777)
Ayutthaya on the Accession of Phya Taksin
Despite all that had occured within its borders, the Kingdom to which Phya Taksin acceded in 1767 was very much the one which Ekit'at had attempted to ruin in 1760 (1). The borders remained secure, indeed in certain districts colonial populations had even increased, as men and women fled from the turmoil that had engulfed the heartland. Thus the new King could mark his coronation by the recognition of the new province of Tchita, and the settlements in Irkutsk. The boundaries of the known world had even expanded, for two bold captains (2), Makinawar and Jem by name, had made voyage after voyage into the Eastern Ocean, is if to turn their backs on the tragedy of the land. Their expeditions brought little of use, other than knowledge of the vastness of the ocean and the smallness of the specks of land that dotted it, but when the King of Ayutthaya at last had liberty to turn his eyes to the wider world, his banner had been carried far beyond the limits of his predecessor's knowledge.
International Developments
The wars in Europe had continued on their bloody path. Most ended in stalemate, or the payment of greater or lesser indemnities, but occasionally a more decisive result was obtained. England, her American posessions wracked by rebellion and dissention, suffered a disaster in her war with the Bohemian alliance, eventually surrendering no fewer than seven colonies to Bohemian rule (3). Her Swedish allies, by contrast, continued to advance, taking Prussia from Saxony and Memel and Georgia from Courland. The French briefly annexed Flanders, only to surrender it to the Dutch (4), and Mecklenburg would annex Munster a few days after Phya Taksin's coronation. Most significant to Ayutthaya was that the English, doubtless reflecting that the Elephant Kingdom would accomplish its own dstruction, had allowed their embargo to lapse during the Years of Fire.
Closer to home, Persia was once more sunk in political turmoil, and the Russians, having partitioned Poland, were taking an unexpected interest in the injustice that permeated their society. None of this was of much interest to Phya Taksin, who preferred to devote his efforts to the security of the Kingdom's borders. The Buddhist Alliance was renewed, and Bormakot Maja T'ammaraja's policy of seeking good relations with the Ming was renewed. In the summer of 1767, Phya Taksin married the eldest daughter of the Emperor of Mukden and shortly afterwards the Northern Ming formally entered into an alliance with Ayutthaya.
The New Capital and the Constitution of 1770
The King did not long have liberty to consider foreign affairs, or to spend time with his new bride. Ekit'at might be dead, but the after-effects of his misrule still lingered. The central administration was in chaos, many of the provinces were still ruled by the warlords who had claimed them during the Years of Fire, the Basic Law itself was still patchily administered and subject to debate. The new Assembly at Bangkok, having had a taste of power, showed no inclination to disperse or to subject itself to the authority of the King or his ministers. Indeed it was no longer even clear who had the authority to appoint the ministers and governors - the King, the Assembly or the people themselves? And behind every debate loomed the ominous spectre of the army, under the formidable Ponney, watching, waiting, and not quite claiming a right of veto over the new government's decisions.
To make things worse, Phya Taksin, as if worn out by his great exertions, fell ill at the end of 1767 and was bedridden for much of the following year (5). But he summoned the power-mongers to his sick-room, and Ayutthaya's greatest scribes and scholars and men of law as well, and together they forged new foundations for the Kingdom.
By the Constitution of Phya Taksin, begun in 1768 and completed the following year, the Assembly was made a permanent body, comprising two Houses - the House of Nobles (including representatives of the provincial governors, who were given noble rank under the new constitution) and the House of Commoners (including representatives of the Guilds and trading houses as well as delegates from every city and province in the Kingdom). The new Council of Ministers was to be chosen by the King from candidates acceptable to the Assembly (except for the military commands, which remained in the monarch's gift), and the appointment of new Governors was made subject to the Assembly's approval. The Assembly also gained responsibility for the collection of revenue and the submission of new laws to the King. The Basic Law was revised, extended, and made active throughout all Ayutthaya, superceding the various provincial codes.
Negotiations continued behind the scenes throughout 1769, to obtain the agreement of the major factions and procure the 'retirement' of some of the less-acceptable warlords, but eventually a final text emerged. The new Constitution was formally announced to the Kingdom at the start of 1770. Shortly afterwards, the great Ponney resigned, his duty done, and allowed the new King to take his place at the head of the Army.
In token of the refounding of the state, Phya Taksin announced the movement of the capital from the Old City of Ayutthaya to the commercial centre of Bangkok, where he was to build a new palace and a (somewhat larger) Great Hall for the Assembly. And it was in Bangkok that the reorganised Assembly first met, in October 1770, to swear allegiance to the King and the new Constitution (6).
The Eastern Seas
A few months after the coronation of Phya Taksin, the explorer Jem returned from his latest voyage with news of discovery - a substantial chain of islands in the farthest reaches of the ocean, rich, populous and unclaimed by civilised folk. Word of this came to the ears of Rianat Chapawan, the powerful and ambitious Viceroy of New Ayutthaya. Without informing the King (who was preoccupied with constitutional matters) he raised a small army on his own authority and hired the explorer Makinawar to convoy it east. Its first destination was Fiji, a small island kingdom which had long been friendly to Ayutthaya and welcomed its traders, but which had never been part of the Kingdom. Rianat Chapawan's soldiers stormed ashore in November 1768, crushing all resistance and 'recruiting' hundreds of prisoners for the labour gangs. Engineers were brought from Wagga and Towoomba to oversee construction of a fort and a harbour, and Ayutthayan planters and bureaucrats to govern the land. By 1771, Fiji had been 'pacified' as the new province of Viti Levu, and the expedition set forth again, this time to Kauai in the distant Hawaiin sea. Progress was slower there, for the distances were longer, the terrain harsher and the natives fought harder, and Chawapan's 'developers' had to be briefly switched to the Far Islands (7) while the pacification was in progress. However, Kauai was organised as a province before the end of 1775. Rianat Chapawan proudly proclaimed himself 'Viceroy of the Eastern Seas' in addition to his existing titles, and claimed an additional seat in the Assembly on the strength of it, much to the annoyance of his rivals, who thought him already over-priviliged under the existing arrangements.
The Farthest Shore - Hawaii colonised, 1776
Siberia
The coming of domestic peace brought a new wave of expansion to the bordelands of Siberia. Mogotcha was recognised as a province in 1769 as part of the negotiations which preceded the introduction of the Constitution. A minor dispute with the Khan of Sibir concerning the Ural border was settled amicably in 1770, and the traders went into Demjanskoje the same year. A brief local uprising in Amgoun at the end of 1771 delayed things only slightly, and the middle years of the decade saw a succession of colonies raised to provincial status - Barabinsk in 1774, Tomsk in 1775, Amgoun and Krasnoyarsk in 1776 and Irkutsk in 1777. The same years saw the fur traders push down the Ural to Sergino, Mansijk, the copper fields of Igrim and the salt hills of Pimsk (8), while the city of Buriat grew to the largest in Siberia (9), and new settlements sprouted in Ob and Tchany.
Domestic Harmony
For the inhabitants of Ayutthaya, the first ten years of Phya Taksin's reign were a time of recovery. There was peace on the borders, peace at home except for the ever-turbulent borderlands of Cambodia, Brunei and Ajeh. The new Constitution was popular, especially the extension of the Basic Law (10). Trade was returning, despite a brief dispute with Oman in 1768-9 (11); and even the French finally relaxed their embargo in 1776. In 1772, Phay Taksin was able to announce the construction of a new Great Temple (12), to be built in Bangkok as a monument to peace and harmony. On the water, these yearswere notable for significant advances in Ayutthayan shipbuilding techniques, partly brought on by Makinawar and Jen's deep-water voyages and by increased contact with the Europeans (13).
Only in foreign matters was Phya Taksin denied complete satisfaction. The Alliance was solid, he was able to come to an understanding with the Shogun of Nippon and even the Qing emperor, but his policies towards the Ming foundered on the rock of Chinese obstinacy. Despite heavy bribes and considerable diplomatic pressure, the Northern Ming repeatedly refused to submit to Ayutthayan overlordship (14).
Europe Burns On
On the far side of the world, the 1770s proved even more violent and disturbed than the preceding decade. In 1770 alone, Tuscany claimed Bayou, Neutin and Tahiti from the Netherlands (15), the Ottomans of Anatolia were stricken by plague, the Russians annouced merchantilist reforms to prop up their tottering economy, and the English, still reeling under the effects of their regressive tax policies in North America, surrendered Wales and Zaire to Genoa. The Netherlands extracted indemnities from Portugal in 1771 (they would attack again in 1777), and the next year Sweden claimed Ionia and Crete from Venice, only for the Venetians to renew the war almost immediately as part of the Genoan alliance. There was a brief lull in mid-decade, only colonial wars being declared, but matters were still so disturbed that France was forced to reject Turgot's reforms in 1774. In 1776, Portugal ws again at war with the Ottomans and their allies, and Bohemia, having finally made peace with Poland, accepted the vassalage of Saxony. The following year saw a return to all-out warfare, as the Netherlands struck again at Portugal and the Bohemian alliance declared war on first Austria and then Poland.
Ayutthaya soon had other things to think about. In November 1777, for causes never made clear, the Russians declared war along the Siberian border. Within a month the Sultan of Delhi had attacked Ayutthayan settlements in India, and had been supported by the Qing. The Three Frontiers' War had begun...
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Notes:
(1) 86 Provinces, 12 Colonies, 36 Trade Posts, Monthly Income 332, Inflation 5%, Tech 26/12/7/7
(2) I got a random Explorer in May 1763 and another one in November 1765 - just what I wanted in the middle of a revolt event. With nothing much else to look for, I sent them off into the Pacific in search of Hawaii - which turned out to take some finding.
(3) Nanaimo, Detroit, Michilimakinak, Nehalem, Sacramento, Belle Isle & Massachussetts. Pity. I was hoping to see the American & French revolutions go off right for once.
(4) France annexed Flanders, then immediately got 'The Dutch Independence' Event - in 1762!
(5) Temporary Insanity of Monarch (I blame overwork), December 1767.
(6) 'Foundation of the Modern Thai State', October 1770. I went with 'It is the beginning of a New Era' (natch): +2 Stability, +1 Centralisation (to 4), +1 Tax in Bangkok, -300 ducats.
(7) New Land Cleared in Timaru, Jul 1773. +2000 population, +1 Tax, +1 Manpower.
(8) I kind of lost interest in further expansion on the Ural when I discovered that the trade went to Mecklenburg (?!). Most of the Siberian corridor goes to Colombo (as does Australia, New Zealand and Hawaii). Fiji's trade goes to Biloxi (!!).
(9) Good ol' Regulation of the Medical Profession, December 1776. (+1,500 Population).
(10) Chief Judges in Wagga & Taiwan (1768), Cambodia, Khmer & Sabah (1771), Sarawak, Bandjarmasin, Selantan, Kalimantan, Makssar, Salabanka, Sulawesi & Manado (1773). Governors in Brunei & Malacca, 1774.
(11) They embagoed in October 1768 and dropped it a year later.
(12) Fine Arts Academy in Bangkok, 1772
(13) Naval Tech up to 17 by September 1777. I was trying to get to 18 (improved sighting range) before my explorers died, but I didn't quite manage it.
(14) This was annoying. China (and Manchu) has a god-Emperor called Qianlong who not only sneers at my offers of vassalisation, but also appears to be immortal. Gnah. Incidentally, China has Manchu culture only (?!).
(15) That has to be some sort of record for Tuscany.
Everyone - Thanks for al the support - it's comments like yours that make AARs worth writing
Arcadian - You've never played China, obviously - or Nippon - or the Timurids. About the worst I've played through - prior to this one - was the Fall of the City of Victory event as Vijayanagar - which gives you a massive revolt but not such a long-term RR. Plus I was a smaller country, so I could get stability back quicker.
Keravnos & Machiavellian - It wasn't quite a Civil War equivalent - one of my armies disappeared but none revolted, and very few provinces went over to the rebels directly. Also, I had the money to just churn out Chief Judges and soldiers. Still, I was facing 2-3 revolts a month in the early years of the event. (Nothing to a true World Conqueror, I know, but...) When I got my stability up to 0 after two-and-a-half years and promptly had the Meteor knock it back down to -1 I thought things might get out of control.
Director - No, I haven't read Barry Hughart's books - but I've had several people recommend them to me, so their on my check-out list.
Ayutthaya on the Accession of Phya Taksin
Despite all that had occured within its borders, the Kingdom to which Phya Taksin acceded in 1767 was very much the one which Ekit'at had attempted to ruin in 1760 (1). The borders remained secure, indeed in certain districts colonial populations had even increased, as men and women fled from the turmoil that had engulfed the heartland. Thus the new King could mark his coronation by the recognition of the new province of Tchita, and the settlements in Irkutsk. The boundaries of the known world had even expanded, for two bold captains (2), Makinawar and Jem by name, had made voyage after voyage into the Eastern Ocean, is if to turn their backs on the tragedy of the land. Their expeditions brought little of use, other than knowledge of the vastness of the ocean and the smallness of the specks of land that dotted it, but when the King of Ayutthaya at last had liberty to turn his eyes to the wider world, his banner had been carried far beyond the limits of his predecessor's knowledge.
International Developments
The wars in Europe had continued on their bloody path. Most ended in stalemate, or the payment of greater or lesser indemnities, but occasionally a more decisive result was obtained. England, her American posessions wracked by rebellion and dissention, suffered a disaster in her war with the Bohemian alliance, eventually surrendering no fewer than seven colonies to Bohemian rule (3). Her Swedish allies, by contrast, continued to advance, taking Prussia from Saxony and Memel and Georgia from Courland. The French briefly annexed Flanders, only to surrender it to the Dutch (4), and Mecklenburg would annex Munster a few days after Phya Taksin's coronation. Most significant to Ayutthaya was that the English, doubtless reflecting that the Elephant Kingdom would accomplish its own dstruction, had allowed their embargo to lapse during the Years of Fire.
Closer to home, Persia was once more sunk in political turmoil, and the Russians, having partitioned Poland, were taking an unexpected interest in the injustice that permeated their society. None of this was of much interest to Phya Taksin, who preferred to devote his efforts to the security of the Kingdom's borders. The Buddhist Alliance was renewed, and Bormakot Maja T'ammaraja's policy of seeking good relations with the Ming was renewed. In the summer of 1767, Phya Taksin married the eldest daughter of the Emperor of Mukden and shortly afterwards the Northern Ming formally entered into an alliance with Ayutthaya.
The New Capital and the Constitution of 1770
The King did not long have liberty to consider foreign affairs, or to spend time with his new bride. Ekit'at might be dead, but the after-effects of his misrule still lingered. The central administration was in chaos, many of the provinces were still ruled by the warlords who had claimed them during the Years of Fire, the Basic Law itself was still patchily administered and subject to debate. The new Assembly at Bangkok, having had a taste of power, showed no inclination to disperse or to subject itself to the authority of the King or his ministers. Indeed it was no longer even clear who had the authority to appoint the ministers and governors - the King, the Assembly or the people themselves? And behind every debate loomed the ominous spectre of the army, under the formidable Ponney, watching, waiting, and not quite claiming a right of veto over the new government's decisions.
To make things worse, Phya Taksin, as if worn out by his great exertions, fell ill at the end of 1767 and was bedridden for much of the following year (5). But he summoned the power-mongers to his sick-room, and Ayutthaya's greatest scribes and scholars and men of law as well, and together they forged new foundations for the Kingdom.
By the Constitution of Phya Taksin, begun in 1768 and completed the following year, the Assembly was made a permanent body, comprising two Houses - the House of Nobles (including representatives of the provincial governors, who were given noble rank under the new constitution) and the House of Commoners (including representatives of the Guilds and trading houses as well as delegates from every city and province in the Kingdom). The new Council of Ministers was to be chosen by the King from candidates acceptable to the Assembly (except for the military commands, which remained in the monarch's gift), and the appointment of new Governors was made subject to the Assembly's approval. The Assembly also gained responsibility for the collection of revenue and the submission of new laws to the King. The Basic Law was revised, extended, and made active throughout all Ayutthaya, superceding the various provincial codes.
Negotiations continued behind the scenes throughout 1769, to obtain the agreement of the major factions and procure the 'retirement' of some of the less-acceptable warlords, but eventually a final text emerged. The new Constitution was formally announced to the Kingdom at the start of 1770. Shortly afterwards, the great Ponney resigned, his duty done, and allowed the new King to take his place at the head of the Army.
In token of the refounding of the state, Phya Taksin announced the movement of the capital from the Old City of Ayutthaya to the commercial centre of Bangkok, where he was to build a new palace and a (somewhat larger) Great Hall for the Assembly. And it was in Bangkok that the reorganised Assembly first met, in October 1770, to swear allegiance to the King and the new Constitution (6).
The Eastern Seas
A few months after the coronation of Phya Taksin, the explorer Jem returned from his latest voyage with news of discovery - a substantial chain of islands in the farthest reaches of the ocean, rich, populous and unclaimed by civilised folk. Word of this came to the ears of Rianat Chapawan, the powerful and ambitious Viceroy of New Ayutthaya. Without informing the King (who was preoccupied with constitutional matters) he raised a small army on his own authority and hired the explorer Makinawar to convoy it east. Its first destination was Fiji, a small island kingdom which had long been friendly to Ayutthaya and welcomed its traders, but which had never been part of the Kingdom. Rianat Chapawan's soldiers stormed ashore in November 1768, crushing all resistance and 'recruiting' hundreds of prisoners for the labour gangs. Engineers were brought from Wagga and Towoomba to oversee construction of a fort and a harbour, and Ayutthayan planters and bureaucrats to govern the land. By 1771, Fiji had been 'pacified' as the new province of Viti Levu, and the expedition set forth again, this time to Kauai in the distant Hawaiin sea. Progress was slower there, for the distances were longer, the terrain harsher and the natives fought harder, and Chawapan's 'developers' had to be briefly switched to the Far Islands (7) while the pacification was in progress. However, Kauai was organised as a province before the end of 1775. Rianat Chapawan proudly proclaimed himself 'Viceroy of the Eastern Seas' in addition to his existing titles, and claimed an additional seat in the Assembly on the strength of it, much to the annoyance of his rivals, who thought him already over-priviliged under the existing arrangements.
The Farthest Shore - Hawaii colonised, 1776
Siberia
The coming of domestic peace brought a new wave of expansion to the bordelands of Siberia. Mogotcha was recognised as a province in 1769 as part of the negotiations which preceded the introduction of the Constitution. A minor dispute with the Khan of Sibir concerning the Ural border was settled amicably in 1770, and the traders went into Demjanskoje the same year. A brief local uprising in Amgoun at the end of 1771 delayed things only slightly, and the middle years of the decade saw a succession of colonies raised to provincial status - Barabinsk in 1774, Tomsk in 1775, Amgoun and Krasnoyarsk in 1776 and Irkutsk in 1777. The same years saw the fur traders push down the Ural to Sergino, Mansijk, the copper fields of Igrim and the salt hills of Pimsk (8), while the city of Buriat grew to the largest in Siberia (9), and new settlements sprouted in Ob and Tchany.
Domestic Harmony
For the inhabitants of Ayutthaya, the first ten years of Phya Taksin's reign were a time of recovery. There was peace on the borders, peace at home except for the ever-turbulent borderlands of Cambodia, Brunei and Ajeh. The new Constitution was popular, especially the extension of the Basic Law (10). Trade was returning, despite a brief dispute with Oman in 1768-9 (11); and even the French finally relaxed their embargo in 1776. In 1772, Phay Taksin was able to announce the construction of a new Great Temple (12), to be built in Bangkok as a monument to peace and harmony. On the water, these yearswere notable for significant advances in Ayutthayan shipbuilding techniques, partly brought on by Makinawar and Jen's deep-water voyages and by increased contact with the Europeans (13).
Only in foreign matters was Phya Taksin denied complete satisfaction. The Alliance was solid, he was able to come to an understanding with the Shogun of Nippon and even the Qing emperor, but his policies towards the Ming foundered on the rock of Chinese obstinacy. Despite heavy bribes and considerable diplomatic pressure, the Northern Ming repeatedly refused to submit to Ayutthayan overlordship (14).
Europe Burns On
On the far side of the world, the 1770s proved even more violent and disturbed than the preceding decade. In 1770 alone, Tuscany claimed Bayou, Neutin and Tahiti from the Netherlands (15), the Ottomans of Anatolia were stricken by plague, the Russians annouced merchantilist reforms to prop up their tottering economy, and the English, still reeling under the effects of their regressive tax policies in North America, surrendered Wales and Zaire to Genoa. The Netherlands extracted indemnities from Portugal in 1771 (they would attack again in 1777), and the next year Sweden claimed Ionia and Crete from Venice, only for the Venetians to renew the war almost immediately as part of the Genoan alliance. There was a brief lull in mid-decade, only colonial wars being declared, but matters were still so disturbed that France was forced to reject Turgot's reforms in 1774. In 1776, Portugal ws again at war with the Ottomans and their allies, and Bohemia, having finally made peace with Poland, accepted the vassalage of Saxony. The following year saw a return to all-out warfare, as the Netherlands struck again at Portugal and the Bohemian alliance declared war on first Austria and then Poland.
Ayutthaya soon had other things to think about. In November 1777, for causes never made clear, the Russians declared war along the Siberian border. Within a month the Sultan of Delhi had attacked Ayutthayan settlements in India, and had been supported by the Qing. The Three Frontiers' War had begun...
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Notes:
(1) 86 Provinces, 12 Colonies, 36 Trade Posts, Monthly Income 332, Inflation 5%, Tech 26/12/7/7
(2) I got a random Explorer in May 1763 and another one in November 1765 - just what I wanted in the middle of a revolt event. With nothing much else to look for, I sent them off into the Pacific in search of Hawaii - which turned out to take some finding.
(3) Nanaimo, Detroit, Michilimakinak, Nehalem, Sacramento, Belle Isle & Massachussetts. Pity. I was hoping to see the American & French revolutions go off right for once.
(4) France annexed Flanders, then immediately got 'The Dutch Independence' Event - in 1762!
(5) Temporary Insanity of Monarch (I blame overwork), December 1767.
(6) 'Foundation of the Modern Thai State', October 1770. I went with 'It is the beginning of a New Era' (natch): +2 Stability, +1 Centralisation (to 4), +1 Tax in Bangkok, -300 ducats.
(7) New Land Cleared in Timaru, Jul 1773. +2000 population, +1 Tax, +1 Manpower.
(8) I kind of lost interest in further expansion on the Ural when I discovered that the trade went to Mecklenburg (?!). Most of the Siberian corridor goes to Colombo (as does Australia, New Zealand and Hawaii). Fiji's trade goes to Biloxi (!!).
(9) Good ol' Regulation of the Medical Profession, December 1776. (+1,500 Population).
(10) Chief Judges in Wagga & Taiwan (1768), Cambodia, Khmer & Sabah (1771), Sarawak, Bandjarmasin, Selantan, Kalimantan, Makssar, Salabanka, Sulawesi & Manado (1773). Governors in Brunei & Malacca, 1774.
(11) They embagoed in October 1768 and dropped it a year later.
(12) Fine Arts Academy in Bangkok, 1772
(13) Naval Tech up to 17 by September 1777. I was trying to get to 18 (improved sighting range) before my explorers died, but I didn't quite manage it.
(14) This was annoying. China (and Manchu) has a god-Emperor called Qianlong who not only sneers at my offers of vassalisation, but also appears to be immortal. Gnah. Incidentally, China has Manchu culture only (?!).
(15) That has to be some sort of record for Tuscany.
Everyone - Thanks for al the support - it's comments like yours that make AARs worth writing
Arcadian - You've never played China, obviously - or Nippon - or the Timurids. About the worst I've played through - prior to this one - was the Fall of the City of Victory event as Vijayanagar - which gives you a massive revolt but not such a long-term RR. Plus I was a smaller country, so I could get stability back quicker.
Keravnos & Machiavellian - It wasn't quite a Civil War equivalent - one of my armies disappeared but none revolted, and very few provinces went over to the rebels directly. Also, I had the money to just churn out Chief Judges and soldiers. Still, I was facing 2-3 revolts a month in the early years of the event. (Nothing to a true World Conqueror, I know, but...) When I got my stability up to 0 after two-and-a-half years and promptly had the Meteor knock it back down to -1 I thought things might get out of control.
Director - No, I haven't read Barry Hughart's books - but I've had several people recommend them to me, so their on my check-out list.
merrick said:
Here it appears you have run into one of the few game design features that I truly hate. As far as I know, and what I've heard from other players, only European nations get new COTs (i.e. in colonial provinces). So no matter how extensive your colonial empire is, or how advanced your nation, you never get the benefits of a COT except by conquest or perhaps a lucky defection. I was really angry at this when I played Oman and Dai Viet, both with very large colonial empires.
Your new "Three Frontiers" war does not sound promising. I doubt Delhi will be too much trouble, but Russia could be a real problem. Though they will have long lines of communication, yours will be even longer. And they probably have a couple of leaders (maybe even Suvorov?) I hope you can hang tough until the Pugatchev rebellion hits them.
I definitely agree with you on the value of naval tech 18. For any sea power, this advance is the most critical one IMHO.
I'm glad you've been able to recover from the terrible revolts of the really bad monarch. And it was nice to see the elephants in Hawaii!
Damn, I should have kept my big mouth shut. The russians probably heard me...
Let's look at the options available.
Front 1 Russia From what I recall you fortified the border states in the Urals. So, you only need to bring in more troops. But I suspect that the provinces near there are really not that populous, so problems begin. Well, will your northern china friends (and Tibetan allies) either aid you or let you get some troops over there? I wonder. Truth be told, by the time you get there, the war will probably have ended for better or worse. I would try to buy out the Russians (or whitepeace' em) if things get sour.
Front 2 India From what you wrote, it seems to me that Mughals are on a downward spiral. They can still gather big armies tho. You and Tibetans should have no problems, dealing with them, BUT on the first stage let them break their teeth on the walls of your westernmost provinces. You can afford to deal with them at a later time. Then cavalry KO's enemy forces while the troops keep on the siege. Easy stuff, once the Mughals can't build any more troops.
Front 3 China This should be interesting. DO you want the northern chinese to win? Will that make it so much more difficult to diplo-annex? I don't know. You must strike first, denying the innitiative to the Chinese, since you have such a good monarch (on military affairs). Put him in charge of the bigger army and occupy the easternmost half of Lower china (the provinces next to Guingzu). Your friends from the north should do the rest and you should gain a province or two.
PS> Don't be afraid to " assume direct control" if one of your allies tries to commit suicide, like the dai viet in the earlier game.
PS.2... After Hawai, how does California sound? You are not THAT far, after all?
Let's look at the options available.
Front 1 Russia From what I recall you fortified the border states in the Urals. So, you only need to bring in more troops. But I suspect that the provinces near there are really not that populous, so problems begin. Well, will your northern china friends (and Tibetan allies) either aid you or let you get some troops over there? I wonder. Truth be told, by the time you get there, the war will probably have ended for better or worse. I would try to buy out the Russians (or whitepeace' em)
if things get sour.Front 2 India From what you wrote, it seems to me that Mughals are on a downward spiral. They can still gather big armies tho. You and Tibetans should have no problems, dealing with them, BUT on the first stage let them break their teeth on the walls of your westernmost provinces. You can afford to deal with them at a later time. Then cavalry KO's enemy forces while the troops keep on the siege. Easy stuff, once the Mughals can't build any more troops.
Front 3 China This should be interesting. DO you want the northern chinese to win? Will that make it so much more difficult to diplo-annex? I don't know. You must strike first, denying the innitiative to the Chinese, since you have such a good monarch (on military affairs). Put him in charge of the bigger army and occupy the easternmost half of Lower china (the provinces next to Guingzu). Your friends from the north should do the rest and you should gain a province or two.
PS> Don't be afraid to " assume direct control" if one of your allies tries to commit suicide, like the dai viet in the earlier game.
PS.2... After Hawai, how does California sound? You are not THAT far, after all?
What tech level are the Ruskies and did they bring any allies in with them? And good work in the Pacific, that's one step closer to mainland North America!
go for the aleutians and the gold in siberia there is also wine in one province iirc. Maybe russia won't have fortified colonies on their easten frontier maybe they will on the direct border but if you search around inland maybe you will find some unfortified.
Chapter 23b - Phya Taksin (fl 1777 - 1782)
The Russian Front
The conflict in Siberia opened quietly. A small Russian army of fewer than ten thousand men took the unfortified outpost of Karaganda and advanced north towards Omsk, but Pharabalat Arlit, Commander of the West, was not to be drawn. Trusting to the winter snows to slow the Russian advance, he slowly built up his forces in Novosibirsk. With the spring thaw, he struck south, against the understrength Russian field force in Nura.
He would have done better to take the first bait. Massive Russian reinforcements poured into Nura from the south, crushing Commander Arlit's attack and driving him back to the Irtych. Meanwhile, still more Russians came to the support of the army in Karaganda. When it finally reached the wall of Omsk in May (1), it numbered more than eighteen thousand men, with a further five thousand in support. Understrength and unprepared, the garrison held out for less than a month, and the Russians struck north again into Nefedova.
Even more worrying was the army massing in Nura. By summer it numbered more than thirty thousand, but that thirty thousand was only the start of it (2). Companies came in from the west and south, the camps grew and grew again, until more than eighty thousand soldiers massed under the eagle banner in Nura. The little city could not support so many, the granaries were stripped and disease spread quickly among weak and hungry soldiers, but the Czar's generals seemed not to care. Only in July did they count themselves ready - small matter that ten thousand had died - and the Russian horde struck north against Novosibirsk. And still the reinforcements came in.
Just slightly outnumbered - the Russian Front
Pharabalat Arlit managed one more attack. Evading the ponderous advance of the great army, he retook Karaganda in the Russians' rear, then pressed on south-west to raid Russian territory in Aralsk. He scattered a Russian detachment and burned the croplands to the walls of the city, but on his withdrawal he was caught by yet another Russian reinforcement army in Turgai. Outnumbered more than two to one, he was forced to break out with what men he could rally and flee north to Semipalatinsk.
News of this final defeat convinced Phya Taksin that the campaign was hopeless (3). So he sent out his diplomats, armed with the wealth of Ayutthaya. As the first snows fell on Siberia, their honeyed words, and generous purses convinced the Czar to release his grip on the western border. Peace returned to Siberia - but the first frontier had seen an Ayutthayan defeat.
The Chinese Front
The war in China opened with a bang, as more than thirty thousand Ming soldiers crossed the Yangtze to engage a slightly-smaller Qing army in Hunan. The Ming had the advantage in the opening skirmishes, but the Qing commanders rushed in reinforcements and might have beaten off the attack but for unexpected intervention from Dai Viet. In a wholly unexpected display of skill and aggression, the Vietnamese General of the Armies, Trinh Sam, led forty thousand soldiers north from Guangxi to fall upon the rear of the Qing army in Hunan. Trapped between foes, the Qing armies were shattered in one of the largest battles of the era. By the start of March, the survivors had fled the province and the Allied forces, still over ninety thousand strong, settled down to besiege Changsha.
Ayutthaya, meanwhile, had temporarily left the Yangtse valley to her allies. The addition of the Ming to the Alliance had opened up new strategic possibilities in North and Central China, and Phya Taksin had determined upon a bold new strategy. As Viet, Ming and Qing soldiers battled and died in the field of Hunan, the Ayutthayan Northern Army struck northwest across Ming territory. Its destination was Hebei province - and the great city of Beijing, the former capital and the key link between Manchuria and the Qing territories in the east and south (4).
The Qing were quick to realise the threat, and throughout the spring and early summer of 1778 battles raged across Shaanxi and Henan. But the disorganised and under-equipped militia they threw against the Northern Army could not stand up to Ayutthayan regulars, and Beijing was reached in August. Meanwhile, the combined Vietnamese/Ming force in Hunan had defeated two Qing attempts to lift the siege of Changsha. The defeat of the southern Qing armies allowed an Ayutthayan army from Mekong to advance unopposed and lay siege to Canton in Guangzhou, while the cavalry ranged even further east, raiding Qing territory and cutting up fugitives from the Qing defeats in Hunan. By autumn, with few formed troops left to them, the Qing were reduced to nuisance raids from their stronghold in Lanzhou on Ayutthayan supply lines north of Guizhou.
The Indian Front
The fighting in India also opened with the march of a mighty army, as almost forty thousand soldiers from Delhi advanced against Bombay. This advance, however, was unopposed, as the local Ayutthayan commanders realised the folly of throwing their few thousand men against the juggernaut. Instead, they withdrew south, leaving the Sultan's men to batter themselves against the fortress of Bombay. Meanwhile, Ayutthayan squadrons swept their opponents from the seas in a series of running battles up and down the west coast of India. Ayutthayan command of the sea allowed the garrison of Bombay to be resupplied, and the Sultan's generals soon abandoned the siege and marched away to the north. Later in the year they were back, with an even bigger army but no more success. Once again they abandoned the siege in disgust and withdrew to the interior (5).
Khandesh
So thoroughly did they withdraw that by the summer of 1779 only a few scattered regiments remained on the borders of Bombay. The apparent weakness of the Sultanate's position was enough to tempt the Kingdom's generals out of their defensive posture and fill them with visions of glory. In July 1779, General Batna led ten thousand men north from Goa, planning to raid the borderlands of Maharashtra and Khandesh. By August, he was hundreds of miles deep into hostile territory. By September, as his scouts brought news of ever-larger enemy forces massing south of him while another great army came down from the north to cut off his retreat, he realised he was in trouble (6). He tried to break out to the south, but the Sultan's men were too quick for him. The last messenger from the Army of India told of a desperate attempt to break through enemy lines north of Pune. In November, the Sultan's forces outside Bombay - now returned to lay siege in deadly earnest - paraded the General's head before the eyes of the garrison (7). Nothing more of his Ten Thousand was ever returned.
Paging General Custer! - Last Stand in Khandesh.
Beijing and Canton
On the Chinese front, the news of 1779 was better. In January, Trinh Sam's Vietnamese/Ming force, after failed assaults in the previous summer and autumn, finally took Changsha. Trinh Sam marched south at once, towards the great prize of South China - Canton. The Ayutthayan Navy meanwhile, after a difficult and prolonged struggle against the brave and numerous, if technologically backward, fleets of the Qing, had obtained control of the Gulf of Tonkin (8), cutting off sea access to the Pearl River. An Ayutthayan army was shipped in from Borneo and marched up country, to lay siege to Nanjing in Anhui.
In April, Beijing surrendered to the Northern Army and the Elephant banner was raised over the ruins of the Forbidden City. A few weeks later, following a forced march south from Anhui, Trinh Sam's Vietnamese arrived outside Canton and launched an immediate assault on the fortifications. For once, Vietnamese optimism wasnot misplaced, and the city fell rapidly. The summer brought more bad news for the Qing, as Ayutthayan troops overran the south-east, crushing the remaining Qing field forces and laying siege to Nanchang and Fuzhou. Beijing secured, the Northern Army turned south and advanced down the coast towards the last bastion of Qing power in the south - Shanghai. It came under siege in August, and Ayutthayan detachments controlled the hinterlands of Zhejian and Shangdong. Cut off from the south by the Ayutthayan garrisons in Beijing and Guiyang, the Manchu emperor could only watch as his hold on south China crumbled.
The Year of Decision
1780 opened badly - Bombay opened its gates to the Sultan of Delhi in January, after a resistance of less than six months. But in the grand scheme of things the defeat scarcely mattered. Without command of the sea, the Sultan could not even threaten Ayutthayan holdings in southern India. More importantly, he could do nothing to aid his ally, and the outright defeat of the Qing was now only a matter of time. Nanjing had fallen in November, Nanchang followed in January and the armies moved on to the walls of Hong Kong (9) and Hangzhou. Only local uprisings by pro-Qing militia in Hebei and Anhui delayed the inevitable.
In April, a Manchu army at last came down from the north to attempt the recapture of Beijing, driving off the militia already besieging the city, but the effort was too little, too late. Shanghai fell in June, Fuzhou in November, in October Trinh Sam routed the western Qing army in Shaanxi. By the end of the year Yanzhou was under siege by Ayutthaya and Yinchuan by the Ming and not a single Qing regiment remained in the field in south China.
Endgame
Given the scale of the victory, it is perhaps surprising that the Three Frontiers War did not result in the total dismantling of Qing power in southern China. For this, two things are responsible (10); the stubbornness of Emperor Qianlong and the strategy of Phya Taksin. Qianlong's position was the simpler, though perhaps the harder to understand. Secure in his Manchurian fastness at Nakodkha, the Manchu emperor flatly refused to yield a square inch of territory to his enemies, particularly not to the 'pretenders' - the Ming Emperor and the Ayutthayan King, who had never formally renounced his predecessors' claims to the Dragon Throne. Defiance of reality it might be, but Qianlong's obstinacy prolonged the war into the spring of 1781, until Hong Kong had fallen and the Northern Army, returning to Hebei, shattered the last Qing army in a bloody battle outside Beijing.
Phya Taksin's postion was more subtle and his motives are still shrouded in mystery. He was the master of the hour (11), acknowledged leader of the greatest military power in East Asia. With the whole of the Yangtse valley under his control, it seemed certain that he would seize it for Ayutthaya or at least grant it to his Ming allies. Did he doubt their capacity to rule what they had once lost or did he, as some commentators have alleged, prefer a weakened Qing in Shanghai to a strengthened Ming? Did he dream the dream of Narai, the Forbidden City and the rule of all China? Was he distracted by the revolts which had broken out in Ajeh (12) and Brunei in the last year of the war? Or did he completely discount the value to Ayutthaya and the Alliance of conquests on the Yangtse, unstable and isolated from the Kingdom as they must be?
Whatever the reason, when the King and the Emperor finally came to terms, the world was amazed at their leniency (13). The King of Ayutthaya claimed not a yard of Qing territory, nor did his fellow-'pretender', the Ming Emperor. No indemnity was levied. The Kingdom's minor allies got nothing, much to their public annoyance (14). The whole of the East China coast and the lower Yangtze, with its great port of Shanghai, was returned to Qing rule. Only the Pearl River lands, Guangzhou and Hunan, were surrendered - to the King's vassal, the Emperor of Dai Viet (15). On the surface, it was a triumph for Qianlong's bull-headedness, for he could claim that he had yielded nothing to either of his rivals, and perhaps even disrupted the Alliance by so raising its junior partner. But those who looked deeper could see that Qing power in South China had been crippled, the great port of Canton, with its vast trade revenues, had been lost - and the Emperor of Dai Viet ruled at the pleasure of the Elephant Throne.
The Spoils of Victory - the Qing lose Canton, 1781.
Cleaning Up
With the fighting in China over, the King had leisure to attend to other business. The revolts were put down, and the pacification of Ajeh continued. Colonial expansion had already resumed in Siberia, with new settlements in Ob and Tchany and an abortive one in Touva, which was overrun by hostile natives late in the year. More importantly, the frontier settlement of Karaganda was raised to full provincial status, and hastily fortified against the return of the Czar's armies.
The years of the Three Frontiers War had not been wholly without incident beyond the reach of Ayutthaya's armies. Notably the Genoese and Bohemian wars had ended in Europe, and the Portuguese had won a great victory over the Netherlands, claiming the colonies of Skane, Nipissing, Mogadiscio, Somalia and Santa Cruz. Closer to home, Persia had slipped further into political fragmentation, and one outstanding item remained - the war in India, which had lapsed into stalemate following the fall of Bombay.
Fortunately, the war was proving as costly and tedious to the Sultanate as it was to the Kingdom. At the start of 1782, after lengthy negotiations, Phya Taksin finally persuaded the Sultan to make peace, evacuate Bombay and even pay an indemnity (16). It was almost his last official act. Worn out by his exertions, the great King fell ill in the spring and died in April, to be succeeded by his eldest son, Rama I (17).
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Notes
(1) I was counting on General Winter to cut the Russians down to size, but their army moved so slowly that it didn't arrive in Omsk until the thaw!
(2) I hadn't been expecting anything like this. The Russians must have had a huge number of men standing around Central Asia since the end of their last war.
(3) Actually, I'd given up the war as hopeless once I'd counted the first 100,000 Russians. But I saw a chance to recover a few victory points cheaply - I thought. Peace cost me 400 ducats - shades of China in the sixteenth century!
(4) And despite being a coastal province not a port.
(5) This was fun. I had medium fortresses in Bombay and Goa and no army in the north. Delhi's armies blundered around uselessly looking for something to hit and meanwhile my galleys were racking up the warscore against his fleet.
(6) This year's lesson: Do not pull the tiger's tail. It's not worth it.
(7) This year's other lesson. Despite appearances, unblackaded ports with medium forts are not unassailable.
(8) Taiwan makes a wonderful naval base if you want to control the Chinese coast.
(9) A historical anomaly - Hong Kong did not actually exist at this time.
(10) Actually one thing - at 99% warscore I once again could not vassalise Manchu; and I could demand a whole three provinces, two if one was a CoT.
(11) Great Reputation, August 1780. +20 Relations with Vijayanagar & Annam; +10 Relations with Tibet, Arakan & Russia. Very fitting.
(12) Ajeh continues to hold out against the missionaries. I had another try at 19%.
(13) I wish.
(14) Diplomatic Insult from Annam, August 1781.
(15) I probably should have demanded Shanghai (it was a defensive war, after all); but I'd been trying to build up Dai Viet for so long...
(16) Despite losing a province and gaining none, I was still well ahead on warscore. The Sultan (cheapskate) eventually coughed up 200 ducats.
(17) Adm Very Good, Mil Good, Dip Poor. Arrggghhh! I need a diplomat to vassalise the <deleted> Chinese - so I get the administrator I've been crying out for for the last few centuries. Couldn't you come some other time?
jwolf - The rule that all the profit from your TPs goes to a random trade centre which you may not even have any merchants in is pretty strange to begin with. Why should my trading furs on the Ural profit a bunch of European powers in Mecklenburg, most of whom don't know where the Ural River is? Not getting any new CoTs makes it worse. Oh, and 'hanging tough' against the Russians was a nice aspiration - I thought my tech lead, the forts and the Siberian winter would give me an advantage - but hardly a practical proposition.
Keravnos - I wanted to stand off the Russians, stand off Delhi (the Mughals are indeed going down, but Delhi is huge) and vassalise the Manchu. I was still hoping to force-vassalise Manchu, diplo-vassalise China and have time to annex them both before game end. I didn't want to gain provinces directly due to BB problems. Oh, and while Calafornia does sound nice, I need another explorer to get there. My last one died around the time I was finishing settling Hawaii.
Semi-Lobster - Delhi was land tech 26 (same as me), Russia was 24, Manchu was 22. And no, the Russians didn't have (or need) any allies.
enyo - Did you mean the gold in Alaska? The gold in Siberia is mine already. And the Russians have no colonies on their eastern frontier - I got there first (None of it belongs to Mother Russia!)
The Russian Front
The conflict in Siberia opened quietly. A small Russian army of fewer than ten thousand men took the unfortified outpost of Karaganda and advanced north towards Omsk, but Pharabalat Arlit, Commander of the West, was not to be drawn. Trusting to the winter snows to slow the Russian advance, he slowly built up his forces in Novosibirsk. With the spring thaw, he struck south, against the understrength Russian field force in Nura.
He would have done better to take the first bait. Massive Russian reinforcements poured into Nura from the south, crushing Commander Arlit's attack and driving him back to the Irtych. Meanwhile, still more Russians came to the support of the army in Karaganda. When it finally reached the wall of Omsk in May (1), it numbered more than eighteen thousand men, with a further five thousand in support. Understrength and unprepared, the garrison held out for less than a month, and the Russians struck north again into Nefedova.
Even more worrying was the army massing in Nura. By summer it numbered more than thirty thousand, but that thirty thousand was only the start of it (2). Companies came in from the west and south, the camps grew and grew again, until more than eighty thousand soldiers massed under the eagle banner in Nura. The little city could not support so many, the granaries were stripped and disease spread quickly among weak and hungry soldiers, but the Czar's generals seemed not to care. Only in July did they count themselves ready - small matter that ten thousand had died - and the Russian horde struck north against Novosibirsk. And still the reinforcements came in.
Just slightly outnumbered - the Russian Front
Pharabalat Arlit managed one more attack. Evading the ponderous advance of the great army, he retook Karaganda in the Russians' rear, then pressed on south-west to raid Russian territory in Aralsk. He scattered a Russian detachment and burned the croplands to the walls of the city, but on his withdrawal he was caught by yet another Russian reinforcement army in Turgai. Outnumbered more than two to one, he was forced to break out with what men he could rally and flee north to Semipalatinsk.
News of this final defeat convinced Phya Taksin that the campaign was hopeless (3). So he sent out his diplomats, armed with the wealth of Ayutthaya. As the first snows fell on Siberia, their honeyed words, and generous purses convinced the Czar to release his grip on the western border. Peace returned to Siberia - but the first frontier had seen an Ayutthayan defeat.
The Chinese Front
The war in China opened with a bang, as more than thirty thousand Ming soldiers crossed the Yangtze to engage a slightly-smaller Qing army in Hunan. The Ming had the advantage in the opening skirmishes, but the Qing commanders rushed in reinforcements and might have beaten off the attack but for unexpected intervention from Dai Viet. In a wholly unexpected display of skill and aggression, the Vietnamese General of the Armies, Trinh Sam, led forty thousand soldiers north from Guangxi to fall upon the rear of the Qing army in Hunan. Trapped between foes, the Qing armies were shattered in one of the largest battles of the era. By the start of March, the survivors had fled the province and the Allied forces, still over ninety thousand strong, settled down to besiege Changsha.
Ayutthaya, meanwhile, had temporarily left the Yangtse valley to her allies. The addition of the Ming to the Alliance had opened up new strategic possibilities in North and Central China, and Phya Taksin had determined upon a bold new strategy. As Viet, Ming and Qing soldiers battled and died in the field of Hunan, the Ayutthayan Northern Army struck northwest across Ming territory. Its destination was Hebei province - and the great city of Beijing, the former capital and the key link between Manchuria and the Qing territories in the east and south (4).
The Qing were quick to realise the threat, and throughout the spring and early summer of 1778 battles raged across Shaanxi and Henan. But the disorganised and under-equipped militia they threw against the Northern Army could not stand up to Ayutthayan regulars, and Beijing was reached in August. Meanwhile, the combined Vietnamese/Ming force in Hunan had defeated two Qing attempts to lift the siege of Changsha. The defeat of the southern Qing armies allowed an Ayutthayan army from Mekong to advance unopposed and lay siege to Canton in Guangzhou, while the cavalry ranged even further east, raiding Qing territory and cutting up fugitives from the Qing defeats in Hunan. By autumn, with few formed troops left to them, the Qing were reduced to nuisance raids from their stronghold in Lanzhou on Ayutthayan supply lines north of Guizhou.
The Indian Front
The fighting in India also opened with the march of a mighty army, as almost forty thousand soldiers from Delhi advanced against Bombay. This advance, however, was unopposed, as the local Ayutthayan commanders realised the folly of throwing their few thousand men against the juggernaut. Instead, they withdrew south, leaving the Sultan's men to batter themselves against the fortress of Bombay. Meanwhile, Ayutthayan squadrons swept their opponents from the seas in a series of running battles up and down the west coast of India. Ayutthayan command of the sea allowed the garrison of Bombay to be resupplied, and the Sultan's generals soon abandoned the siege and marched away to the north. Later in the year they were back, with an even bigger army but no more success. Once again they abandoned the siege in disgust and withdrew to the interior (5).
Khandesh
So thoroughly did they withdraw that by the summer of 1779 only a few scattered regiments remained on the borders of Bombay. The apparent weakness of the Sultanate's position was enough to tempt the Kingdom's generals out of their defensive posture and fill them with visions of glory. In July 1779, General Batna led ten thousand men north from Goa, planning to raid the borderlands of Maharashtra and Khandesh. By August, he was hundreds of miles deep into hostile territory. By September, as his scouts brought news of ever-larger enemy forces massing south of him while another great army came down from the north to cut off his retreat, he realised he was in trouble (6). He tried to break out to the south, but the Sultan's men were too quick for him. The last messenger from the Army of India told of a desperate attempt to break through enemy lines north of Pune. In November, the Sultan's forces outside Bombay - now returned to lay siege in deadly earnest - paraded the General's head before the eyes of the garrison (7). Nothing more of his Ten Thousand was ever returned.
Paging General Custer! - Last Stand in Khandesh.
Beijing and Canton
On the Chinese front, the news of 1779 was better. In January, Trinh Sam's Vietnamese/Ming force, after failed assaults in the previous summer and autumn, finally took Changsha. Trinh Sam marched south at once, towards the great prize of South China - Canton. The Ayutthayan Navy meanwhile, after a difficult and prolonged struggle against the brave and numerous, if technologically backward, fleets of the Qing, had obtained control of the Gulf of Tonkin (8), cutting off sea access to the Pearl River. An Ayutthayan army was shipped in from Borneo and marched up country, to lay siege to Nanjing in Anhui.
In April, Beijing surrendered to the Northern Army and the Elephant banner was raised over the ruins of the Forbidden City. A few weeks later, following a forced march south from Anhui, Trinh Sam's Vietnamese arrived outside Canton and launched an immediate assault on the fortifications. For once, Vietnamese optimism wasnot misplaced, and the city fell rapidly. The summer brought more bad news for the Qing, as Ayutthayan troops overran the south-east, crushing the remaining Qing field forces and laying siege to Nanchang and Fuzhou. Beijing secured, the Northern Army turned south and advanced down the coast towards the last bastion of Qing power in the south - Shanghai. It came under siege in August, and Ayutthayan detachments controlled the hinterlands of Zhejian and Shangdong. Cut off from the south by the Ayutthayan garrisons in Beijing and Guiyang, the Manchu emperor could only watch as his hold on south China crumbled.
The Year of Decision
1780 opened badly - Bombay opened its gates to the Sultan of Delhi in January, after a resistance of less than six months. But in the grand scheme of things the defeat scarcely mattered. Without command of the sea, the Sultan could not even threaten Ayutthayan holdings in southern India. More importantly, he could do nothing to aid his ally, and the outright defeat of the Qing was now only a matter of time. Nanjing had fallen in November, Nanchang followed in January and the armies moved on to the walls of Hong Kong (9) and Hangzhou. Only local uprisings by pro-Qing militia in Hebei and Anhui delayed the inevitable.
In April, a Manchu army at last came down from the north to attempt the recapture of Beijing, driving off the militia already besieging the city, but the effort was too little, too late. Shanghai fell in June, Fuzhou in November, in October Trinh Sam routed the western Qing army in Shaanxi. By the end of the year Yanzhou was under siege by Ayutthaya and Yinchuan by the Ming and not a single Qing regiment remained in the field in south China.
Endgame
Given the scale of the victory, it is perhaps surprising that the Three Frontiers War did not result in the total dismantling of Qing power in southern China. For this, two things are responsible (10); the stubbornness of Emperor Qianlong and the strategy of Phya Taksin. Qianlong's position was the simpler, though perhaps the harder to understand. Secure in his Manchurian fastness at Nakodkha, the Manchu emperor flatly refused to yield a square inch of territory to his enemies, particularly not to the 'pretenders' - the Ming Emperor and the Ayutthayan King, who had never formally renounced his predecessors' claims to the Dragon Throne. Defiance of reality it might be, but Qianlong's obstinacy prolonged the war into the spring of 1781, until Hong Kong had fallen and the Northern Army, returning to Hebei, shattered the last Qing army in a bloody battle outside Beijing.
Phya Taksin's postion was more subtle and his motives are still shrouded in mystery. He was the master of the hour (11), acknowledged leader of the greatest military power in East Asia. With the whole of the Yangtse valley under his control, it seemed certain that he would seize it for Ayutthaya or at least grant it to his Ming allies. Did he doubt their capacity to rule what they had once lost or did he, as some commentators have alleged, prefer a weakened Qing in Shanghai to a strengthened Ming? Did he dream the dream of Narai, the Forbidden City and the rule of all China? Was he distracted by the revolts which had broken out in Ajeh (12) and Brunei in the last year of the war? Or did he completely discount the value to Ayutthaya and the Alliance of conquests on the Yangtse, unstable and isolated from the Kingdom as they must be?
Whatever the reason, when the King and the Emperor finally came to terms, the world was amazed at their leniency (13). The King of Ayutthaya claimed not a yard of Qing territory, nor did his fellow-'pretender', the Ming Emperor. No indemnity was levied. The Kingdom's minor allies got nothing, much to their public annoyance (14). The whole of the East China coast and the lower Yangtze, with its great port of Shanghai, was returned to Qing rule. Only the Pearl River lands, Guangzhou and Hunan, were surrendered - to the King's vassal, the Emperor of Dai Viet (15). On the surface, it was a triumph for Qianlong's bull-headedness, for he could claim that he had yielded nothing to either of his rivals, and perhaps even disrupted the Alliance by so raising its junior partner. But those who looked deeper could see that Qing power in South China had been crippled, the great port of Canton, with its vast trade revenues, had been lost - and the Emperor of Dai Viet ruled at the pleasure of the Elephant Throne.
The Spoils of Victory - the Qing lose Canton, 1781.
Cleaning Up
With the fighting in China over, the King had leisure to attend to other business. The revolts were put down, and the pacification of Ajeh continued. Colonial expansion had already resumed in Siberia, with new settlements in Ob and Tchany and an abortive one in Touva, which was overrun by hostile natives late in the year. More importantly, the frontier settlement of Karaganda was raised to full provincial status, and hastily fortified against the return of the Czar's armies.
The years of the Three Frontiers War had not been wholly without incident beyond the reach of Ayutthaya's armies. Notably the Genoese and Bohemian wars had ended in Europe, and the Portuguese had won a great victory over the Netherlands, claiming the colonies of Skane, Nipissing, Mogadiscio, Somalia and Santa Cruz. Closer to home, Persia had slipped further into political fragmentation, and one outstanding item remained - the war in India, which had lapsed into stalemate following the fall of Bombay.
Fortunately, the war was proving as costly and tedious to the Sultanate as it was to the Kingdom. At the start of 1782, after lengthy negotiations, Phya Taksin finally persuaded the Sultan to make peace, evacuate Bombay and even pay an indemnity (16). It was almost his last official act. Worn out by his exertions, the great King fell ill in the spring and died in April, to be succeeded by his eldest son, Rama I (17).
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Notes
(1) I was counting on General Winter to cut the Russians down to size, but their army moved so slowly that it didn't arrive in Omsk until the thaw!
(2) I hadn't been expecting anything like this. The Russians must have had a huge number of men standing around Central Asia since the end of their last war.
(3) Actually, I'd given up the war as hopeless once I'd counted the first 100,000 Russians. But I saw a chance to recover a few victory points cheaply - I thought. Peace cost me 400 ducats - shades of China in the sixteenth century!
(4) And despite being a coastal province not a port.
(5) This was fun. I had medium fortresses in Bombay and Goa and no army in the north. Delhi's armies blundered around uselessly looking for something to hit and meanwhile my galleys were racking up the warscore against his fleet.
(6) This year's lesson: Do not pull the tiger's tail. It's not worth it.
(7) This year's other lesson. Despite appearances, unblackaded ports with medium forts are not unassailable.
(8) Taiwan makes a wonderful naval base if you want to control the Chinese coast.
(9) A historical anomaly - Hong Kong did not actually exist at this time.
(10) Actually one thing - at 99% warscore I once again could not vassalise Manchu; and I could demand a whole three provinces, two if one was a CoT.
(11) Great Reputation, August 1780. +20 Relations with Vijayanagar & Annam; +10 Relations with Tibet, Arakan & Russia. Very fitting.
(12) Ajeh continues to hold out against the missionaries. I had another try at 19%.
(13) I wish.
(14) Diplomatic Insult from Annam, August 1781.
(15) I probably should have demanded Shanghai (it was a defensive war, after all); but I'd been trying to build up Dai Viet for so long...
(16) Despite losing a province and gaining none, I was still well ahead on warscore. The Sultan (cheapskate) eventually coughed up 200 ducats.
(17) Adm Very Good, Mil Good, Dip Poor. Arrggghhh! I need a diplomat to vassalise the <deleted> Chinese - so I get the administrator I've been crying out for for the last few centuries. Couldn't you come some other time?
jwolf - The rule that all the profit from your TPs goes to a random trade centre which you may not even have any merchants in is pretty strange to begin with. Why should my trading furs on the Ural profit a bunch of European powers in Mecklenburg, most of whom don't know where the Ural River is? Not getting any new CoTs makes it worse. Oh, and 'hanging tough' against the Russians was a nice aspiration - I thought my tech lead, the forts and the Siberian winter would give me an advantage - but hardly a practical proposition.
Keravnos - I wanted to stand off the Russians, stand off Delhi (the Mughals are indeed going down, but Delhi is huge) and vassalise the Manchu. I was still hoping to force-vassalise Manchu, diplo-vassalise China and have time to annex them both before game end. I didn't want to gain provinces directly due to BB problems. Oh, and while Calafornia does sound nice, I need another explorer to get there. My last one died around the time I was finishing settling Hawaii.
Semi-Lobster - Delhi was land tech 26 (same as me), Russia was 24, Manchu was 22. And no, the Russians didn't have (or need) any allies.
enyo - Did you mean the gold in Alaska? The gold in Siberia is mine already. And the Russians have no colonies on their eastern frontier - I got there first
(None of it belongs to Mother Russia!)
Surprisingly good work, and a competant Vietnamese General!?!?! Well hopefully if the Russians come back they'll die outside your city walls in the winter!
Speaking of historical anomalies, I'd hate to pick things out nobody cares about but Rama I was not related to Taksin, whole new dynasty, and the one that's still ruling Thailand today (PS. The only reason I know any of this is because of my research for my Siam AAR)
Good Work merrick, another amazing update!
Speaking of historical anomalies, I'd hate to pick things out nobody cares about but Rama I was not related to Taksin, whole new dynasty, and the one that's still ruling Thailand today (PS. The only reason I know any of this is because of my research for my Siam AAR)
Good Work merrick, another amazing update!
What can you do?
BB being that high, you probably did the right thing. Plus, on the beginning, should you have an opportunity to NOT HAVE a border with china, and thus make it someone elses' problem (Dai Vet's), would you not jump for joy at the opportunity?
So, that leaves Delhi and Russia. Forget Russia. That means Delhi, and possibly California (should an explorer occur). Of course having a tight little alliance against the Manchu_ming should also be top priority. ( A reservoir army for dealing with the inevitable attack of Ming to the Dai viet should exist)
(Having forgotten about Russia, that doens't mean you shouldn't fortify like a madman and try to get any+every little advantage you can against them. Alliances with neighbors on that front is risky, since Russia WILL beat them, and come running for you.). It really does surprise me how little attrition they get.
All in all you are doing amazingly well. Hat's off to you.
BB being that high, you probably did the right thing. Plus, on the beginning, should you have an opportunity to NOT HAVE a border with china, and thus make it someone elses' problem (Dai Vet's), would you not jump for joy at the opportunity?
So, that leaves Delhi and Russia. Forget Russia. That means Delhi, and possibly California (should an explorer occur). Of course having a tight little alliance against the Manchu_ming should also be top priority. ( A reservoir army for dealing with the inevitable attack of Ming to the Dai viet should exist)
(Having forgotten about Russia, that doens't mean you shouldn't fortify like a madman and try to get any+every little advantage you can against them. Alliances with neighbors on that front is risky, since Russia WILL beat them, and come running for you.). It really does surprise me how little attrition they get.
All in all you are doing amazingly well. Hat's off to you.
Congratulations on a fabulous writeup of that war! What a fight! I'll bet you were breathless after playing that part.
I suppose the hordes of Russians weren't too much of a surprise, but it looked like Delhi had a pretty big army, too.
To hold off the Russians you need not just forts, but fairly large ones. In my Khazak game I needed level 3 and 4 forts at the key defensive sites. A level 1 or 2 fort doesn't last long, winter or not, when the Russians come in with 50K infantry and about 80 guns.
That was a great campaign against Qing China. It's really enjoyable when your allies work together more or less coherently. Doesn't happen very often, but when it does, it's really nice!
Well done again.
I suppose the hordes of Russians weren't too much of a surprise, but it looked like Delhi had a pretty big army, too.
To hold off the Russians you need not just forts, but fairly large ones. In my Khazak game I needed level 3 and 4 forts at the key defensive sites. A level 1 or 2 fort doesn't last long, winter or not, when the Russians come in with 50K infantry and about 80 guns.
That was a great campaign against Qing China. It's really enjoyable when your allies work together more or less coherently. Doesn't happen very often, but when it does, it's really nice!
Well done again.
I meant Alaska but the russians still may have some unfortified bits think archangels. It's great fun playing as Sweden using lots of little cavalry armies and one bigger army to beseige moscow and get their maps and rushing in to destroy their eastern frontier and their entire colonial effort in Siberia. Can you explain something though you actually gave up land to a the Southern Chinese why and how?
just another thing I had another go at this a few days ago and I did quite well I colonised all I could etc etc but when it came to the foreign parts which I brought in such as Pegu, Bali, Sabah Malaca and the other little bit on jakarta island these always revolted just at the sight of a loss of stability so I can't see how you have managed to keep all of your possesions with so many massive wars? Of course this wasn't helped by it being dificult to regain stab because of my dp sliders and inflation.
Also I found that after a while the inflation was cripling I never got money monthly I invested all of that and spent it as soon as I got it on the colonies. I realised I would never get to governors so I ended up near 100% inflation and then I had to take out money monthly just to get the money to be able to colonise anything. So what is your inflation and how did you stop it?
Finally when I started I was friendly with everyone in SE asia and the only land I took on land was pegu. I was even friendly with the Muslim and Hindu countries and even with China so how did you get such an inland empire because in my game everyone was happy with each other? Except Champa, Manchu, Arakan. Even Brunei, Bali and Mataram were inoffensive and never declared war.
Also I found that after a while the inflation was cripling I never got money monthly I invested all of that and spent it as soon as I got it on the colonies. I realised I would never get to governors so I ended up near 100% inflation and then I had to take out money monthly just to get the money to be able to colonise anything. So what is your inflation and how did you stop it?
Finally when I started I was friendly with everyone in SE asia and the only land I took on land was pegu. I was even friendly with the Muslim and Hindu countries and even with China so how did you get such an inland empire because in my game everyone was happy with each other? Except Champa, Manchu, Arakan. Even Brunei, Bali and Mataram were inoffensive and never declared war.
Chapter 24 - Rama I (1782 - fl 1787)
A Brief Period of Reconstruction
Rama I had served with distinction in the Three Frontiers' War (1) and would have liked nothing better than to lead the Kingdom to further victories. Moreover, the times seemed propitious, for the Kingdom was now arguably the greatest power in Asia. Victory over the Qing had underlined the strength of the Ayutthayan Alliance (the name 'Buddhist Alliance' had been quietly dropped during the reign of Phya Taksin) and - Delhi apart - it faced no serious military challenge west of Russia. However, the costs of the Three Frontiers War had severely impacted the Kingdom's economy and ever-increasing foreign competition - especially in the rich West Asian and European markets - was threatening the trade on which Ayutthaya depended (2). The Assembly insisted - and the King reluctantly agreed - that tackling these problems should be the government's first priority.
Abroad, there was little that either King or Assembly could do. Regular calls for tariffs and trade barriers all foundered on the rock of probable retaliation - the prospect of being once again excluded from Colombo positively terrified the delegates from India and New Ayutthaya - and diplomatic protests in European courts proved ineffective. All that could be done was to encourage investment and hope that the skills of Ayutthaya's merchants - and her historic commitment to free trade and open navigation - would overcome the xenophobia and merchantilist policies of the Europeans.
At home, there were more options. Efforts were made to improve the adminstration of the Cambodian provinces (3) - as much to combat local nationalism as to improve the economy - and to advance trade in backward parts of the Kingdom such as the Celebes (4). The biggest program of Rama I's early years was a major reconstruction effort in Kwai, which had still not recovered from the Years of Fire. The concentration of so much effort in the Home Province was not universally popular in the Assembly, and was eventually possible only with the support of Rianat Chapawan of New Ayutthaya. His price was high - a similar investment in his personal project, the planting of the 'Ocean Island' of Kauai (5). Kauai was indeed a rich prize, and well worth the effort, but grumbles against the Viceroy's influence and arrogance grew louder. Rianat Chapwan, undeterred, continued to treat the island as his private estate, and the King, not wanting to alienate his most powerful subject, was eventually forced to resort to buying off his critics (6).
Colonial expansion also continued during Rama I's early years. The Touvan tribes having been subdued, settlement proceded rapidly and the colony was raised to provincial status as early as mid-1782. Further west, detachments from the Western Frontier Force seized the unclaimed territory of Turgai and began to develop it as a potential bulwark against the Russians. Improvement of the defences along the Russian frontier was one military project for which the King had no difficulty getting funds from the Assembly, and in addition to Turgai, the defences of Omsk and Karaganda were also rebuilt.
The End of Annam
Deprived of the chance to lead Ayutthaya's armies, the young King sought to expand his realm by other means. The little Vietnamese state of Annam had always been the junior member of the Buddhist (now Ayutthayan) Alliance, and the Ayutthaya's absorption of Cambodia and the extension of the Alliance to the Ming had made its minor status more obvious. Matters came to a head in the early 1780s when the 'Emperor' of Dai Viet, made bold by his nation's gains in the Three Frontiers' War, publically revived his dynasty's age-old claim to Da Nang and the Annamese lands. Annam's weakness limited her ability to respond, but a national desire not to submit to Hanoi was obvious.
It is doubtful whether the 'Emperor' of Dai Viet would have pushed the conflict beyond mere words - he was as aware as anyone of the dependance of his state on the Ayutthayan Alliance - but Rama I was not a man to permit squabbling among his vassals. Nor - unlike his father - was he a man to concede to a vassal gains he might claim for himself. He chose instead to give the cornered Annamese an 'honourable alternative'. With generous bribes and energetic diplomacy - all backed by the unspoken threat of abandonment to Dai Viet - he persuaded the last ruler of Annam to abdicate in his favour in 1784 (7). The Vietnamese - and the Tibetans - were less than impressed, and a further round of diplomacy was required to reassure them that the King had no ambitions to displace their own monarchs. Among the annexation's supporters was the Ayutthayan Navy, which now had the suberb natural harbour of Cam Ranh Bay available as a base in case of further hostilities with the Qing.
News from Abroad
Peace in Europe was always a temporary phenomenon, and in 1782 the trumpets sounded again, with an attack by the Bohemian alliance (now joined by Mecklenburg) on Cologne. The following year saw the rise of the younger William Pitt in England, just in time for his Swedish allies to drag his country into another war with the Germans. Sweden at least did well out of the war, annexing Courland in 1786, while news from London suggested that disturbances in England's American colonies were beginning to cool off. An unexpected development in 1784 was the takeover of the African territory of Ovambo by Venice (8), a move which lead to the first Ayutthayan ambassadors being invited to the Floating City. The same year saw the Ottomans end their war with Portugal and begin one with the Mamelukes and Persia.
France meanwhile won an outright victory in the heart of America, gaining Duluth and Iowa from the Dakota, but even this could not pacify internal dissent. 1785 saw revolutionary tendencies spread across the border to Holland, where the government of the Netherlands reacted harshly. With the state tottering politically and financially, the King of France was forced to sign the Eden Act in 1786. All this, of course, was put in perspective when the Sultan of Delhi and the Qing Emperor declared war again early in 1787... (9)
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Notes
(1) 4/2/4/0 Monarch Leader
(2) Despite being over 100% Trade efficiency, I was losing merchants faster than I could replace them. After finally reaching Naval Tech 18 (September 1782), I switched research back to Trade.
(3) Governor in Cambodia, June 1782.
(4) Internal trade Ordnance in Manado, August 1784.
(5) Refineries in Kwai & Kauai, January 1784; Governor in Kauai, January 1786.
(6) Nobles Demanded Increased Pensions, September 1786. I paid (-200 ducats).
(7) If I was going to vassalise Manchu, I needed to bring it into my alliance as quickly as possible to avoid inter-vassal wars. So Annam got the chop to make room. Also, disbanding their 30,000 man army made it more likely Delhi or Manchu would DOW at the first opportunity.
(8) No idea how this happened. I suddenly got a message that I'd made contact with Venice.
(9) Last chance to pull off Plan A. I have to vassalise Manchu and China by December 1789.
Semi-Lobster - Ooops... My lack of research gets found out. Actually, I was debating whether to make Phya Taksin the founder of the dynasty or not (my Phya Taksin, being the son of the historical one, died fairly young) - looks like I guessed wrong.
Keravnos - I do still have a frontier with Qing/Manchu - it's in Lanzhou. But it doesn't really matter when Delhi keeps declaring war for them. I have just had a demonstration of what happens when I try to fight Delhi or Russia in the field. So, fortify the Indian frontier, fortify the Russian frontier, concentrate on trying to vassalise both Chinas - and hope for another explorer.
jwolf - I think I've learned my lesson about forts vs Russians (I'd forgotten that low-population provinces only get half garrison). Next time, it's level-3 forts along the whole frontier (just call me M. Maginot).
enyo - While riding to Archangel is a nice thought, I don't think it's really very practical, especially since I don't know the way. (Besides, everything north of Moscow is Swedish). All the Russian provinces I can see are definitely fortified.
I didn't give up anything to the Southern Chinese - I just made an alliance peace with the Qing/Manchu giving Dai Viet the two Manchu provinces it controlled and taking none for myself. (If you look at the maps, Dai Viet is bluey-green, Ming/China is dark brown and Qing/Manchu is the same reddish-brown as me - it's confusing but you can see the borders north and east of Guizhou).
About your game - were you playing 1.07? Life is much harder than on 1.05 because of the increased maintenance costs, changed war taxes and lower possibility of success with colonies. I basically tried to keep the treasury slider at zero, send only the colonists I could afford from annual income, wartax every time I got the chance and rely on random events to keep inflation down until I got governors. When things got tight I used the trick of putting the treasury slider to 100% in December and back down in January (puts all your yearly taxes in the treasury but only costs you one month's inflation). Inflation was around 7-8% when I reached Infrastructure 5 and after that it was easy. Regarding revolts - I had plenty (especially in Bali). Remember Malacca/Ajeh/Brunei/Makassar are Muslim and Mataram/Champa are Hindu - so your religious tolerance sliders will have a huge effect on how often they blow. As to all the peace and love - I'm baffled. Getting into wars was never a problem for me - either ally with a warmonger or wait for someone to give you a CB. All the Burmese countries have permanent CBs on each other, so surely something happened there?
I'm on holiday for a few days, so no more updates until some time next week. Ciao!
A Brief Period of Reconstruction
Rama I had served with distinction in the Three Frontiers' War (1) and would have liked nothing better than to lead the Kingdom to further victories. Moreover, the times seemed propitious, for the Kingdom was now arguably the greatest power in Asia. Victory over the Qing had underlined the strength of the Ayutthayan Alliance (the name 'Buddhist Alliance' had been quietly dropped during the reign of Phya Taksin) and - Delhi apart - it faced no serious military challenge west of Russia. However, the costs of the Three Frontiers War had severely impacted the Kingdom's economy and ever-increasing foreign competition - especially in the rich West Asian and European markets - was threatening the trade on which Ayutthaya depended (2). The Assembly insisted - and the King reluctantly agreed - that tackling these problems should be the government's first priority.
Abroad, there was little that either King or Assembly could do. Regular calls for tariffs and trade barriers all foundered on the rock of probable retaliation - the prospect of being once again excluded from Colombo positively terrified the delegates from India and New Ayutthaya - and diplomatic protests in European courts proved ineffective. All that could be done was to encourage investment and hope that the skills of Ayutthaya's merchants - and her historic commitment to free trade and open navigation - would overcome the xenophobia and merchantilist policies of the Europeans.
At home, there were more options. Efforts were made to improve the adminstration of the Cambodian provinces (3) - as much to combat local nationalism as to improve the economy - and to advance trade in backward parts of the Kingdom such as the Celebes (4). The biggest program of Rama I's early years was a major reconstruction effort in Kwai, which had still not recovered from the Years of Fire. The concentration of so much effort in the Home Province was not universally popular in the Assembly, and was eventually possible only with the support of Rianat Chapawan of New Ayutthaya. His price was high - a similar investment in his personal project, the planting of the 'Ocean Island' of Kauai (5). Kauai was indeed a rich prize, and well worth the effort, but grumbles against the Viceroy's influence and arrogance grew louder. Rianat Chapwan, undeterred, continued to treat the island as his private estate, and the King, not wanting to alienate his most powerful subject, was eventually forced to resort to buying off his critics (6).
Colonial expansion also continued during Rama I's early years. The Touvan tribes having been subdued, settlement proceded rapidly and the colony was raised to provincial status as early as mid-1782. Further west, detachments from the Western Frontier Force seized the unclaimed territory of Turgai and began to develop it as a potential bulwark against the Russians. Improvement of the defences along the Russian frontier was one military project for which the King had no difficulty getting funds from the Assembly, and in addition to Turgai, the defences of Omsk and Karaganda were also rebuilt.
The End of Annam
Deprived of the chance to lead Ayutthaya's armies, the young King sought to expand his realm by other means. The little Vietnamese state of Annam had always been the junior member of the Buddhist (now Ayutthayan) Alliance, and the Ayutthaya's absorption of Cambodia and the extension of the Alliance to the Ming had made its minor status more obvious. Matters came to a head in the early 1780s when the 'Emperor' of Dai Viet, made bold by his nation's gains in the Three Frontiers' War, publically revived his dynasty's age-old claim to Da Nang and the Annamese lands. Annam's weakness limited her ability to respond, but a national desire not to submit to Hanoi was obvious.
It is doubtful whether the 'Emperor' of Dai Viet would have pushed the conflict beyond mere words - he was as aware as anyone of the dependance of his state on the Ayutthayan Alliance - but Rama I was not a man to permit squabbling among his vassals. Nor - unlike his father - was he a man to concede to a vassal gains he might claim for himself. He chose instead to give the cornered Annamese an 'honourable alternative'. With generous bribes and energetic diplomacy - all backed by the unspoken threat of abandonment to Dai Viet - he persuaded the last ruler of Annam to abdicate in his favour in 1784 (7). The Vietnamese - and the Tibetans - were less than impressed, and a further round of diplomacy was required to reassure them that the King had no ambitions to displace their own monarchs. Among the annexation's supporters was the Ayutthayan Navy, which now had the suberb natural harbour of Cam Ranh Bay available as a base in case of further hostilities with the Qing.
News from Abroad
Peace in Europe was always a temporary phenomenon, and in 1782 the trumpets sounded again, with an attack by the Bohemian alliance (now joined by Mecklenburg) on Cologne. The following year saw the rise of the younger William Pitt in England, just in time for his Swedish allies to drag his country into another war with the Germans. Sweden at least did well out of the war, annexing Courland in 1786, while news from London suggested that disturbances in England's American colonies were beginning to cool off. An unexpected development in 1784 was the takeover of the African territory of Ovambo by Venice (8), a move which lead to the first Ayutthayan ambassadors being invited to the Floating City. The same year saw the Ottomans end their war with Portugal and begin one with the Mamelukes and Persia.
France meanwhile won an outright victory in the heart of America, gaining Duluth and Iowa from the Dakota, but even this could not pacify internal dissent. 1785 saw revolutionary tendencies spread across the border to Holland, where the government of the Netherlands reacted harshly. With the state tottering politically and financially, the King of France was forced to sign the Eden Act in 1786. All this, of course, was put in perspective when the Sultan of Delhi and the Qing Emperor declared war again early in 1787... (9)
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Notes
(1) 4/2/4/0 Monarch Leader
(2) Despite being over 100% Trade efficiency, I was losing merchants faster than I could replace them. After finally reaching Naval Tech 18 (September 1782), I switched research back to Trade.
(3) Governor in Cambodia, June 1782.
(4) Internal trade Ordnance in Manado, August 1784.
(5) Refineries in Kwai & Kauai, January 1784; Governor in Kauai, January 1786.
(6) Nobles Demanded Increased Pensions, September 1786. I paid (-200 ducats).
(7) If I was going to vassalise Manchu, I needed to bring it into my alliance as quickly as possible to avoid inter-vassal wars. So Annam got the chop to make room. Also, disbanding their 30,000 man army made it more likely Delhi or Manchu would DOW at the first opportunity.
(8) No idea how this happened. I suddenly got a message that I'd made contact with Venice.
(9) Last chance to pull off Plan A. I have to vassalise Manchu and China by December 1789.
Semi-Lobster - Ooops... My lack of research gets found out. Actually, I was debating whether to make Phya Taksin the founder of the dynasty or not (my Phya Taksin, being the son of the historical one, died fairly young) - looks like I guessed wrong.
Keravnos - I do still have a frontier with Qing/Manchu - it's in Lanzhou. But it doesn't really matter when Delhi keeps declaring war for them. I have just had a demonstration of what happens when I try to fight Delhi or Russia in the field. So, fortify the Indian frontier, fortify the Russian frontier, concentrate on trying to vassalise both Chinas - and hope for another explorer.
jwolf - I think I've learned my lesson about forts vs Russians (I'd forgotten that low-population provinces only get half garrison). Next time, it's level-3 forts along the whole frontier (just call me M. Maginot).
enyo - While riding to Archangel is a nice thought, I don't think it's really very practical, especially since I don't know the way. (Besides, everything north of Moscow is Swedish). All the Russian provinces I can see are definitely fortified.
I didn't give up anything to the Southern Chinese - I just made an alliance peace with the Qing/Manchu giving Dai Viet the two Manchu provinces it controlled and taking none for myself. (If you look at the maps, Dai Viet is bluey-green, Ming/China is dark brown and Qing/Manchu is the same reddish-brown as me - it's confusing but you can see the borders north and east of Guizhou).
About your game - were you playing 1.07? Life is much harder than on 1.05 because of the increased maintenance costs, changed war taxes and lower possibility of success with colonies. I basically tried to keep the treasury slider at zero, send only the colonists I could afford from annual income, wartax every time I got the chance and rely on random events to keep inflation down until I got governors. When things got tight I used the trick of putting the treasury slider to 100% in December and back down in January (puts all your yearly taxes in the treasury but only costs you one month's inflation). Inflation was around 7-8% when I reached Infrastructure 5 and after that it was easy. Regarding revolts - I had plenty (especially in Bali). Remember Malacca/Ajeh/Brunei/Makassar are Muslim and Mataram/Champa are Hindu - so your religious tolerance sliders will have a huge effect on how often they blow. As to all the peace and love - I'm baffled. Getting into wars was never a problem for me - either ally with a warmonger or wait for someone to give you a CB. All the Burmese countries have permanent CBs on each other, so surely something happened there?
I'm on holiday for a few days, so no more updates until some time next week. Ciao!
there were wars its just that tangu became superior very very quickly achieving total dominance.