Paris Temps

[swamphen]

Y'know, I'd missed the "can you swim?" generally obscure reference the first time around.  ;) ;D

[Borys]

OOC
Ahoj!
The "general obscurity" level of "Can you swim"? is quite high :)

Borys

[maddox]

From his admirals quarters on the Napoleon the Great, Admiral Geon sees a massacre unfolding.

Hainan to start, Taiwan following. The Dragon has been awakened by the New Swiss and the voracious appetite of this legendary beast, with a tiger lady leading, will end in a sea of blood.

Even Siam, even with the masterfull diplomatics of the last century has woken the ire of the Great and ancient Middle Kingdom.  And that all just by the eternal arrogance of the Swiss. An arrogance not even the namegiver of the great ship could diminish , Bonaparte could drive the Swiss out of their mountains, but not the arrogance out of the Swiss.

From Paris, the messages are clear. Do not interfere in the Pacific War, just observe. But other points are being made. The Green Cross will become a great , neutral institute of peace and succor. Prepared to give Help to all in need.

Toughts about this all , gently simmering over a snifter of cognac . The firm humanitarian in Geon want to end all the bloodshed, especialy the blood of innocents. Children, sons and daughters, nieces and nephews. Yes even of adults of good will. Mothers, fathers, all who abhorr war and violence. 

"Can I commandeer the Liner Arthemis?And equip her as a Green Cross ship? Can I reach Prince Pu Lun to get my idea to the bloody minded Empress Longyu? The only thing I can do is ask. But will Paris allow it? Or should I just do a Tegetthof on a grand scale?"

The smell of cognac makes his mind drift to the past. The smell reminds him of the gentle questioning from the Prussian captain of the 23th batallion .
His mom, sobbing, telling about the ordeal they suffered. The captain pouring 2 tin cups with cognac, watering the dollop down for the young Français.

Admiral, Admiral, sir, you're needed on the bridge.

[maddox]

Januari second 1908 
Napoleon the Great.

Helm, course 350°, straight to Tourane,
Double the lookouts, mines can be a problem.
Heliograph, send a message to our escort.  Ah, they already are deploying for the task.  Capitain Gironde of the Moncton is his normal self. Very efficient.  He was balking when he got his new command, the quebec class cruiser. And his old sloop scrapped.

Ensign, warn Admiral Geon of our return to Tourane.

[Korpen]

Editorial, Le Monde 3rd of January

The unpleasant news that the Pacific vultures are again nesting on Keeling island have just reached us.
The question is, how long is Glorious France going to stand for the insult to our Glori that that pack of pirates represent? Have the government already forgotten the murder by shells and gas that the Pirates operating from that accursed island visited on our great warships only a few shorts months ago? No I tell you France must not allow the pirates operating from that island to continue to insult and sully the name of France, that island should be blown away from the face of the ocean!

Remember the men of Indomptable & Terrible, who were killed in a valiant attempt to safe woman and children!

Send in by an French Indochinese merchant. Name and Adress known by the redaction.
Le Monde does not accept any liability about this article.

[maddox]

Paris, early januari 1908

Ah, Bonjour monsieur l'ambassadeur, welcome to my small bureau. (Rooseveld wonderingly gazes over the casual grandeur)

How Can Glorious France help you, and the Confederation you so valiantly serve.
Premier Paixhans, the honor is mine, that you could meet me on such a short notice. I have the latest proposals my government has been agonizing over.

You mean, the issue of a closed Caribbean region, the Great Canal that shortly won't need the influx of laborers anymore and the wish for the population growth for the CSA. I must admit, that information campagne started about that is worth to be followed.

Yes premier, it is these matters we of the Confederate States of America have designs and future views about.
One of the things we would like to ask again of Glorious France is the Haïtian problem.
The southern Powerhouse, Gran Colombia, made us worried with their proposal to take over the non profitable West Indies from France. Envoy Jardan did do a good job as negotiator to defuse the tensions between our states over the Caribbean.
And our politicians have found a possible compromise. But this compromise still needs the full approval and generousity of France. As she still would have to sacrifice a part of the Glorious Empire in the name of precious peace.

I'm well aware of the plans on the Caribbean as visioned by Gran Colombia and the Confederated states. And does any of the 2 believe, if France excerts itself, the region wouldn't be peacefull. Possibly under the smoke of many a fire?
But France has grown out of such a barbarisme. And sees the potential of letting beautifull gems of colonies go from the bosom of civilisation.
But such a commitment has a price. Otherwise every state would come to France and beg for a piece of the body that makes up our Glorious Republique.
Is your country willing to pay such a price?

Yes Premier. After a lot of closed sittings my government has hopefully found a fair transaction to conclude this transfer of lands.
For the transfer of Haïti the CSA offers France the compensation of lost income for at least 6 years.
And the fifth of the Rattlesnake cruisers. This ship, and all the technology it represents will be French. Our engineers will welcome any of the French shipbuilders and engineers wishing to gain the total and complete knowledge of these technologies.

Monsieur Roosevelt. France would accept the offer. But I have to ask for a few changes. Not big ones, nor a demand for more money.
As you know, the Rattlesnake cruisers were build in Halifax. And Halifax has its share of UKN engineers. Whose knowledge about propulsion has no equal on the world. They remarked that the turbine units as used on your tough cruisers are a bit out of date. We also know that your country possesses more modern turbines. Even if we have our turbine supplier,the UKN, we are most interested in the new Conferated turbines.

That seems a reasonable change to the proposal. I do not see any reason why I can't set that in the contract.
Any more, Premier Paixhans?

Yes. And that is to avoid people or countries getting upset. France would like to keep Port Au Prince as a fleet base. Of course we can share the berths there for the patrols we have to execute to keep the Caribbean free of monsters like Agrival.

Didn't France got the information that Agrival is dead, killed in a sword duel with a Rohirrim swordsmaster?

Of course France has heared those rumors, but Peru is a secretive country, and we don't put Agrival above faking his own dead. So we refrain from making statements in that respect.
But I think we could use a bit of refreshment, care to join me for lunch?

[Borys]

Vienna mid January 1908

Clip-clop ...
Jean Pierre Quity-Pierdoly, a journalist of the Le Monde, was making his way down a narrow Viennese street. He was cold, longing for coffee and a Viennese cheesecake. In this state he could not bring himself - or rather his mind - to his newest assignment, which was covering the Viennese Court. It was a promotion, he admitted, but still he didn't like this primitive, backward, clerical, traditional, and COLD place, so much unlike progressive, warm Paris.
clip clop
the sound of hoofs got louder ... messed up his thoughts ... must be the dragoons he had spotted turning the street corner earlier ...
- "Von der Strasse weg !" - he heard a young female voice commanding him to get off the street, swept clean of ice and snow, and onto the sidewalk - with geneorous topping of loose snow ... not a dragoon .. cold or not, he decided he must keep up to form and charm this fraulein with his Gallic manners and eloquence.
- "Belle Mademoiselle ... " he turned and started to speak and his jaw dropped.
- "Yhh ... yhh ... " he was aware that this was not very eloquent.
- "Auf .... Trottoir " - the young woman gesticulated with some exasperation, trying to make the Civilian understand what was  expected of him, and to clear the way for the carriage.

Jean Pierre staggered, like a drunk, to the wall and turned around to watch. His highly honed journalistic mind was on autopilot, taking in the scene, to update him at a later date.

These were dragoons.  Five dragoons. With helmets, sabres, carabines and all that. And all were women in their twenties. Two in front, one alongside, and two behind a small carriage with a woman and a little girl inside. The one addressing him was a junior NCO. Having cleared the street of the obstacle - him! - the amazon cavalcade clip-clopped beside him.

It was only when thawing out over coffee in the Konditerei that more facts came back to him. The dragoness next to the sled was a senior NCO, with a medal of some sort. With a thin scar across the cheek, showing as red against her frost-whitened skin. More significantly, she had the black-cross-on-white campaign armband. How could she be a Brasilian Crusader? That was a story!

Inquiries with the staff were fruitful, if confusing.
- "Scandalous!" - exclaimed a redding with emotion waitress in her early 20s. - "Lightskirts! T-o-t-a-l-l-y indecent like - in BREECHES? How do they hope to get a half decent husband, ever?"
- "You ranting on the girls in the army again, Brumhilde?" - asked another waitress, of similar age. She also put on some colour in her cheeks, but for different reasons. - "Oh, so e-x-i-t-i-n-g, like Wachtmeisterin Emilia, fighting those Anuhuak or whetevers. Seeing the ocean! Other places! Maybe now she'll fight those bad Swiss! I'm half a mind to enlist when I'm 21 - today Pa would drag me home by my tresses ...  "
- "They'll shave your empty head bald the first thing they do, you just see, Anne-Marie! And Pa will be cross with you again, spewing such nonsense to customers, and it may backfire on me, his SENSIBLE daughter!"

Before leaving his table suddenly Jean-Pierre himself reddened and hid his face in his hands - it dawned on him that the woman in the carriage was the Kaiserin, and she WAS amused ...

[maddox]

Paris, offices of Premier Paixhans  16th of may 1908.

Bonjour Monsieur Vidocq, it seems you have found disturbing news?

Disturbing Premier, and, annoying, very much. This info could set the world aflame.

So, you have looked trough a lot of bookkeeping books from several naval yards. Yes, you asked to do that, and the approval was from my office. But what prompted you to search in those, and what did you expect to find?

What pompted me. A story of an uncle during the wedding of his daughter.  He claimed that the hull of the Napoleon class battleship was further progressed that what was in the books, and that a lot of the equipment wasn't French at all. He couldn't read the gauges, nor comprehend the manuals that were stored just before she was towed out. As far I did understand his descriptions, it was a kind of rune based something, like what the old norse plunderers used.

Why would the shipyard put unreadable manuals on the hull to be scrapped? Or fit in gauges?

That inspired me to look for the money trail, just to see who and why that money was spend.
That brought me to some astonishing conclusions.  But to cut it short.  The shipyard was payed to tow the hull out, but not to the scrapyard.  A way to get the hull out of the hands of the shipyard, what was losing time and money on it.
The manuals and gauges in the runic writing, weren't Baltic. As they use the modern numerals and writing style. Only one modern country does.

Oh shit,oh shit. You're kidding .  Not them.

Yes premier, them.



To be continiued

[swamphen]

ommminous hummmmm

[The Rock Doctor]

I knew I should have taken a linguistics course in university.

[maddox]

continued

How did you come to that conclusion, Vidocq. As you say, there isn't much worse than that at this moment. France is weakened by the stagnated economics, the sale of 4 BB's, and the "reserving" of 2 others.

Sorry premier, but I suspect we see the duplicity of Premier Palpaté working.
To conclude my rapport.
I found out that the top of the Chantiers Navale in Brest recieved serious amounts of money, what they camouflaged in the working funds our governement of that were paying to keep the yards available for Glorious France, from a foreign source.
In the end it benefitted France, as it did got rid of a hull that was blocking a valuable slip.
Also, the added value on the hull before towing off didn't cost France a cent.
The only cost, and that was one France had payed whatsoever, was the cost of the hull, armor plating and part of the armament. Even if the ship would have been scrapped, the return on that would have been minimal.

The strange part is, non of the admirals, or the procurement department of the Marine national did sign the towing off , nor the scrapping of a modern battleship hull. But even with no one in the right place signing, all the paperworks seems ok. On that part. I found a few seals and signatures that look dubious, but nothing that would raise suspicions. In effect, somebody high in the governement was cleaning tracks afterwards.

So, somebody, or a group of somebodies in the governement did play a double take with "them" so 1 rusting hull could be stolen? I don't get it. As insider to the ministry of defence I should have known of such manipulations. Also, we would have gladly sold that hull to the best bidder. Even Them. Still, if they ask France to sell a ship we wouldn't hesitate if it fits in the plans.

One of the obvious answers is that the 'real" buyer wasn't interested at all, but was wanting to hurt the image of "Them". What seems logical for the time. Agrival was at the peak of his power. But I didn't find any clue to that. Also, equaly dry was the trail towards the New Swiss.
Everything indicates that the new owner of that ship contrived the theft. But in a honnest way, so nobody made a loss on it, nor that there was any way to point fingers. Honorable as it were.

But still, if that is possible, the theft of an entire battleship, France is in dire straits. We cannot allow that.

Premier Paixhans.I don't wish to insult you. But France doesn't have any other option than to allow that.
It is obvious to every working man in the street, to every tax payer that France is in decline.
Isn't it true, that the current negotiations with Gran Colombia and the Confederate states of America are about selling  the West Indies?
Isn't it true that the Great Canal is a open wound in the Glorious Republiques side?
As an independent researcher I found out a lot of things in the 2 year search I conducted.
The welfare given to the unemployed, sick, inferm, elderly are great achievements in humanity, but is it needed to tax the working man out of his house?  Is it needed to give every politician an avarage year income of 150 families?
Before you start to flail around, search inside your heart, talk to people on the street, incognito prefered, or just listen to them talk. And then get angry.

Damn you, Vidocq. I know you're right. But I'm not ready to admit it. France is an aging lady, clinging to her beauty of the past, with all her might.

to be continiued

[Desertfox]

Finally! Something for which New Switzerland is NOT blamed for.

[Ithekro]

Yes.  Amazing isn't it?  ;D

[swamphen]

Finally! Something for which New Switzerland is NOT blamed for.

...yet.  :D

[Desertfox]

I'm surprised Russia didn't blame NS for the Tunguska Explosion, but then I almost blamed myself for it! ;D

Yeah, so if something goes wrong, be sure to blame New Switzerland. Maybe I should start charging, take the blame but get payed for it! :D