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Emperor Ike

Karelian Buccaneer
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Jul 17, 2006
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Just Good Business - Legation Cities KR AAR
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International Mandate for the Concessions, Settlements and Legations in China had one job in the East, to ensure open access to the Chinese markets for the Western powers. Formed as the result of the Shanghai Conference in 1928 to stop the conflicts over former British possessions in China. Cities of Shanghai, Tianjin, Hong Kong, Ningbo, Fuzhou and Shantou with several concessions all based under Legation Cities hosted a number of foreign delegates and companies all after the riches of the East, much to the dislike of the Chinese warlords. After the troubled aftermath of the Weltkrieg Legation Cities is currently under major influence of the American Chamber of Commerce with Chairman of the Council being Nelson Trusler Johnson, an American Ambassador, who tries his best to keep the council going forward and ensure that the money will flow in the ports of Legation Cities. In this, he has the International Volunteer Corps at his disposal and help, consisting over many foreign volunteers and exiles willing to fight and defend the idea that is Legation Cities.

How will Nelson T. Johnson and rest of the international council members fare against the local Chinese powers and the unity of Qin Empire? Will the Legation Cities prosper or will all of China fall under chaos and the age-old conflicts continue? Only time will tell. But one thing is true, it's just good business.

States of interest in the East

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This could provie interesting.
 
Free trade
Free Trade makes peace

Aim of the Legation Cities had always been to ensure peace in Asia and free trade on the Chinese port between major powers of the world. Mostly Germany, Japan and the United States of America. And to prevent any conflicts between them concerning Asia. On the Council sat ambassadors from United States of America, German Empire, Empire of Japan, Flanders-Wallonia and The Austrian Empire. These five controlled the council with their votes and nothing would get done or approved without their permission. Not much got done since the powers all shared conflicting interests on matters concerning China. Because of these interests, each nation on the council tried their best to grow their influence and hold in the Cities. Even though the British didn't sit on the council and didn't have voting rights their presence was still great especially in Hong Kong that was a former crown jewel of the British Empire. The Hong Kong Club tried it's best to maintain British influence in Legation City policies alive in hopes that one day they would have a vote on the council again.

The Americans, even though they tried to act as a neutral member and a mediator, still had their own interests in the trade and had established steel trade agreement between USA and the Cities.
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Germans held a major presence over Asia and had on established tungsten trade between their own colony in east Asia and the Cities.
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The Cities prospered and trade flowed in from all doors and windows. There seemed to be no end to the good economical situation of Europe and Germany which prospered the trade in the Cities thanks to German investors and The Deutsch-Asiatische Bank which was the most stable of them all and their money reserves seemed to be inexhaustible. So The Council voted on taking a loan from the DAB. Because what could possibly go wrong.
 
What indeed?
 
This should be an interesting development overall. Especially with all those various powers around you, and, if I recall correctly, China can get pretty crazy in the KR mod.
 
Politics make the head hurt


Politics. It always comes down to politics to hamper the progress of a nation. The Cities weren't any different. Even though the power in politics was controlled by the Western powers, Japan still had a presence in them as a Council member, together with Japanese paid troops protecting their companies in the Cities.
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The American Chamber of Commerce in the Inter*national Mandate or AmCham as it was commonly known, held the majority on the councils in the Cities. They had their hands full in keeping order in the Cities so that the ports will stay open and trade would flow, to the United States. Nelson T. Johnsson currently acted as both the head of AmCham and the Legation Cities Council.

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Siegmund Bodenheimer was in charge of Ostchina Direktorium, the German tentacle in the Cities. All part of the bigger AOG and German influence in Asia. Always complaining and trying to get more funding for German projects in the region. Japan had its own organization too called The China Agency, led by Katsuo Okazaki. Though rumour was that The China Agency was directly controlled by the Japanese War Ministry instead of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but no one had been able to prove this. The Agency mostly acted as Japanese security force tasked to keep the Chinese in check and Japanese interests safe.

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Even though the British had lost their status in the world politics and their seat on the council, the British in Hong Kong still held influence in the Cities politics. The Governor of Hong Kong, Norman Lockhart Smith represented the British interests in the cities together with The Hong Kong Club, a club of mostly British businessmen living in Hong Kong. Though the British exiles are currently far away in Canada, Governor Smith is constantly working together with the Australasians who look after the British interests in Asia.

Shanghai Municipal Council led by Cornell Franklin, a lawyer and a judge, is not involved in the Council politics too much but holds control of Shanghai, at least so they claim, others would say the Triads ruled the cities and the streets. The Triads, who many said that even had their hands in the Council, as in form of The Vermillion Society, full of businessmen of "Chinese origins" and "eurasians" was led by Robert Ho Shai La and according to him the Vermillion Society was simply a club of wealthy Chinese businessmen acting for the Chinese people living in the cities, even though everyone knew that Vermillion Society had funded every uprising in China starting from 1911.

The Kuomintang had a presence in the cities, a small one but still a presence. Two factions Minquan and Minsheng were present in the cities. Along with Syndicalist and even more radical forms of socialism.
 
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Money comes

The Council finally finalized the budget of 1936 in January and more money was allocated for the Council to use in developing the Cities. There was a lot to develop to keep the trade going and ensuring that the latest technologies were used.
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While only Japan was the closest of the Great Powers to our West there was China, a vast nation divided between Warlords, all with different agendas. Qing under Pu Yi controlled the faction known as Zhili, a strongly anti-japanese faction in China and quite lenient towards foreign business owners and concessions in China. Fengtian acted as the leader for Anguojun, a more Japanese oriented faction fo the Chinese.
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What indeed?

It's free money....

This should be an interesting development overall. Especially with all those various powers around you, and, if I recall correctly, China can get pretty crazy in the KR mod.

Oh China...yes once there is 5 different China all working against each other it's going to get interesting for sure.
 
News of the World

Year 1936 did not start so good for everyone. In Russia President Kerensky had been assassinated while making his way to the Senate. The police had gone with "shoot first, ask questions later" method so no one knew who the assassin was or why did he shoot Kerensky. For years Kerensky had held the country together even with some failures in his policies but once again the country could fall into chaos. Irakliy Tsereteli from the social democratic RSDRP assumed Kerenskys position while the military men schemed on the background.
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For those British still longing for the Return of The Empire joyous news arrived from Canada when Edward was crowned as the king. Huge celebrations were held in Hong Kong and only minor amount of debauchery was reported by the police. We shall see how this affects the Cities.
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But then it happened. On a fine February morning, the Berlin Stock Exchange finally crashed. "Sell, sell, sell" was the keyword heard everywhere and the day will forever be known as Black Monday. The effects will soon hit economies all over the world and we must be prepared to do everything to make sure our economy survives.
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And the foundation of the Cities is shaken, and they yet find themselves torn asunder.
 
Money Goes?!



Not even a week later the effects of Black Monday hit the finance hub of Shanghai. Selling of German related stocks boomed, mostly those of bigger industries while the initial arrival of Black Monday didn't seem to touch the smaller service providers. For now. "The horror! The horror! A Belgian Trader called Kurtz was quoted saying by the Shanghai News Service as he had looked at his portfolio full of German stocks.
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To some Black Monday was a financial disaster and to some not so much. The Ostchina Direktorium was quick to blame Americans of insider trading since a large group of American businessmen had survived the crash by taking short position on German bonds just before the crash. This caused major trouble for the state-backed Deutsch-Asiatische Bank, the same bank a loan was taken from earlier. The DAB was in huge financial trouble now and the Germans demanded investigation to the alleged insider trading.
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To appease the Germans a bit before and investigation could start the Council of the Cities decided to vote on whatever the Cities should bail out the DAB or not. All in hopes of that the bank would recover and thus the economy would stabilize, at least for a bit.
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The blame game has started :)