The Great War Begins
Introduction
An exponentially growing powderkeg in Western Europe is poised to throw the entire world into chaos. Years of saber rattling and military buildup placed the great powers of France and The Holy Roman Empire at odds, even as the ruling elite maintained doctrinal sympathies. The people of France grow restless, agitated by the murder of their hero, international conspiracy, and the incompetence of the bourgeois power base. As the newly reformed Republic attempts to assert control over the aristocracy, a series of poor decisions and misfortune puts the life of a single man on the line, a man whose fate determines that for an entire culture. The events that follow vividly illustrate how a singular tipping point can unravel the lives of an entire species…
Events
The Aftermath of the Election
With the victory of Auguste Charbonnier on June 3rd, a series of political changes were underway within France. Fear of retribution by the Liberationists drew many to resign or fall in line with the vocal majority. Those more stubborn in government were often threatened in the streets and chose to retreat from public life until the vigor died down. No official acts had yet been taken against the opposition, so for the time being they hoped that things would return to normalcy. Meanwhile, hardline revolutionists supporting the new President were drafting new proposals for government, including changes they hoped would force the remaining monarchists to release their control. Many of these same officials had been in this same fight since the Revolution of 1928, and they hoped to finish the job left undone.
Weaponizing their own supporter’s fears of an Imperial takeover, Liberation Party staffers leaked drafts of the Republic Protection Against Foreign Sedition(Known as RPAFS abroad) Act to the newspaper Les Lorrains. The proposed law would broaden the oversight programs used to assess internal officials, both military and civil, for foreign allegiances of any form. The document emphasized nations that held very active and violent ambitions for the republic, placing The Holy Roman Empire on the same level of alert as that of Japan, who had been engaged in an unofficial war with France for almost three years now. The paranoia held by the general populace skyrocketed over the next few days, which further fueled the call for this legislation to come to fruition. If allowed to pass, any official who had ties to the aristocracy would incidentally be put under extreme scrutiny, as the great houses of Europe were largely intermarried. The strongest powers amongst the Bonapartists were directly threatened by this, with even Emperor Napoleon V receiving threats to surrender to investigation. This enraged the conservative opposition, but they had been placed in a corner. Any government official who openly decried the legislation would only be placed under even heavier suspicion, with many officials making this mistake in the wake of the leak. This led to six more opposition politicians being assaulted in public, with three congressmen injured, one of which being hospitalized, with a fourth who was shot down in a cafe. The deceased senator was found to have very real albeit benign connections to the Empire, which only served as justification for his death.
Support for the Liberation Party burned through Congress, with the newly combined Opposition Party already outnumbered by the end of June. The President increased rhetoric critical of the aristocracy and Napoleon V, blaming recent economic strife on the centralized bank under the monarchy. In conjunction with the growing fears of collusion with the Imperials, an official investigation was opened on Napoleon and his closest allies. Hoping to get the farce over with, the French Emperor surrendered to the newly formed Commissariat of the Revolution’s investigation and was temporarily placed on partial house arrest, unable to travel without the approval and accompaniment of his assigned commissars. What he had not foreseen was that while under investigation, his powers of oversight on the state were relinquished, effectively making him helpless to the barrage of reforms the Liberation Party desired to push through over the coming months.
The first of these reforms addressed potential dissent from the military in the wake of the RPAFS Act. The number of military officers labeled as suspicious as part of RPAFS was incredibly high, far too many for the recently established Commissariat to simultaneously investigate. To better manage manpower, most currently active commissars were deployed to continue their investigations on domestic officials and politicians, snuffing out dissent as the Liberationists solidified power around President Charbonnier. An Office of Internal Security Affairs was established as a self-policing apparatus of the French military. This new department strongly revised standards for maintaining loyalty amongst the armed forces, incentivizing personnel reporting of any suspicious comrades. The initial response was an absolute surge of sedition reports, often with junior officers turning on their superiors for even the slightest remarks in contention. A famous example of this zeal occurred on July 9th, when the staff of General Robert Petiet, led by his Aide de Camp Marie Courtemanche, stormed his office and dragged him before the I.S.A officer. The military oath was additionally edited to assign the loyalty of soldiers primarily to the Republic, rather than to the now under investigation monarchy. With this move, the aristocracy in France was disarmed, the Emperor was disposed of, and the Opposition Party was quickly fading.
The Archduke Has Arrived
As the news coming from Paris grew increasingly troubling, an official response from The Holy Roman Empire was finally decided. In the hope of proving they were not responsible for the assassination of Leon Blum, Heir to the Empire, Archduke Franz Ferdinand of the House of Hapsburg, announced his intentions to make a state visit to France to show solidarity in the country’s recent tragedy, and meet the new President. Accompanying him was a small contingency of his personal guard, a personal secretary, and a reporter sent along to generate publicity for the exchange.
The Archduke met with President Charbonnier for a public luncheon on July 11th, and was met with raucous jeering from local Parisians outside the building. The meeting was cold and abrasive, with the two statesmen’s attempts at cordiality failing miserably. Why Charbonnier was remaining civil, his fellow politicians present were antagonistic towards the Imperial Heir, and the President did little to stifle them. Nonetheless, the aged Franz Ferdinand remained calm, finishing the luncheon as planned before moving on with his itinerary. He then proceeded to Versailles, where he was to meet with Emperor Napoleon V.
The two aristocrats had a very pleasant visit, as the two, while of rivaling nations, had previously met on many occasions. Due to the security detail following Franz Ferdinand, the commissar’s efforts to continuously monitor the Emperor were often being interrupted and superseded by the security of the Archduke. This caused much frustration with the Commissariat, even though they were ordered by President Charbonnier to not challenge the bodyguards. This allowed the two to talk in relative privacy at times, where the French monarch warned his guest of the dangers their two nations faced. His people were more than ready to go to war against The Holy Roman Empire, and were simply waiting for the word to march west. Napoleon recommended that Franz Ferdinand not leave without attempting to smooth relations with the government, as he feared he was no longer in a position to keep the peace. At this recommendation, the Archduke extended his trip from its original three days, hoping that with extra time he could placate the revolution. This choice proved to be the greatest mistake of his life.
The Archduke spent the next few days attempting to gain the trust of the President and the French public. He spent more time making public appearances, as well as attempting to get involved in the investigation. Famed freelance journalist Alain Lavigne was skeptical of this tactic, and if anything grew more skeptical in his reporting of the trip.
“Any man who has read his Dostoyevsky knows that you should not return to the scene of the crime. A statesman of the Archduke’s age should understand that meddling in an investigation that you are a suspect in is incredibly shortsighted. His insistence on being at the center of the public eye will only give him ‘exactly’ what he wants”
Needless to say, the effort to alleviate pressure failed miserably. His security in public ensured that no members of the Parisian mobs tried anything drastic, however the intent was on the air. Franz Ferdinand would continue to stay with the Emperor at Versailles, under the watchful eye of the Commissariat. The fragments of conversation observed on those palatial evenings only fueled government suspicions of the two monarchs, and the decision was made to share this information with the I.S.A. office. The I.S.A. quietly prepared a contingent of its most loyal soldiers, forming the first true unit of the Republican Guard.
As the visit stretched over a week, the Commissariat of the Revolution and the I.S.A. reached a boiling point with their suspicions. The two decadent monarchs must have been scheming at all hours of the night, protected by a unit of soldiers from a foreign power that was seemingly above the law. It was all the bourgeois trappings the revolutionaries hated the most. From what fragments of info they could gather, the monarchs certainly did not have the best intentions for the Republic, but if the Republican Guard is called in on false pretenses, it could prove ill for the nation, or at the least the heads of the I.S.A. Fortunately, the excuse they needed to intervene would come in the form of some poor translation.
On the night of July 20th, the Commissariat attempted to bug the room the French Emperor and Imperial Archduke were meeting in at Versailles. The microphone used was functioning poorly, and the resulting recording was garbled, with gaps in the transcript that at times lasted minutes. However, there was one brief segment when Franz Ferdinand was speaking to Napoleon V in German (with occasional replacement words in French). The transcription from that night read as followed:
“…Weil ich mich über den Schaden freue des volke... Schickt den Staat an den potence(french).” English:…because I rejoice at the damage done to the people… Send the state to the gallows.
The transcription as recorded by the translation staff available that night made it seem as if the Archduke was openly raving about the treatment the French people had directed at him, yet showing glee at the chaos that they had recently faced. This seemed to imply that even if he was not directly involved in the assassination of Blum, he was happy it happened, and hoped the new government would be executed. This was evidence enough for the Commissars to take action against the Emperor, who clearly had no issue with what the Archduke was saying. If this was the case, they also had enough cause in their eyes to arrest the Archduke, though they were unsure if they would have to release him after letting the President know.
It is important to note; a month after the initial event a follow up translation was ordered. The more qualified translator on hand came out with a different transcript:
“...Davon würde ich abraten… Durch die Schadenfreude des Volkes beraubt dich der Staat deiner Potenz.” English:...I would advise against this… Through the people's celebration of your troubles, the state robs you of your potency.
The second translation implies that the Archduke was attempting to coach restraint to the Emperor. Many words of similar sounds were seemingly mistaken for each other, with the German word Potenz being mistaken for the French Potence. The pair had been seen previously communicating via a mix of German and French, so the original report just assumed that the Archduke was substituting the word for gallows into French, as Napoleon may not have known it. Some words picked up in the second transcription were largely omitted by the I.S.A. 's initial investigation, which has led some to believe the organization was grasping at any excuse they could fabricate. Regardless of the meaning, the two rulers were clearly working together closely to fix their current situation, whether or not that was to the detriment of the Republic.
With their suspicions seemingly proven, the I.S.A. deployed their Republican Guard. On the evening of July 22nd, Archduke Franz Ferdinand was accompanying Emperor Napoleon V to a performance of The Life and Death of King Richard the Second, as part of a special exhibition hosted at the Théâtre Lyrique Impérial. The Archduke’s security detail was reduced due to the limitations of the venue, with a majority of his men stationed outside. In the middle of the performance, the Republican Guard stormed through a back entrance, quickly taking down the single guard near the door. They stormed into the emperor’s box and arrested both Napoleon, and the Archduke. The Imperial photographer captured a photo of the guards cuffing Franz Ferdinand, the elderly aristocrat bleeding from his mouth after taking a light blow from a rifle butt. The Archduke seemed to be in a subdued silence as he was dragged from the building, with the Emperor of France writhing about angrily, sent off to prison by his own people.
Incarceration and Hopeful Flight
As the New Revolution cracked down on enemies of the state, a growing bloat of new political criminals placed a strain on the Paris prison population. The decision was made that individuals arraigned by the Commissariat of the Revolution and the I.S.A. needed to be quarantined, not only from the general populace but from each other as well. The fear was that the government prisoners of the Commissariat could rally the support of both violent criminals and the soldiers arrested under suspicions of the I.S.A, so all three populations needed to be left divided. As local prisons were already nearing capacity thanks to years of strife, two temporary detainment facilities were ordered to be constructed. Given the natural geography and significance to the old power of the state, the twin islands of the Seine were chosen for the two prison camps, with I.S.A military detainees held on Île Saint-Louis, and the Commissariat’s prisoners on Île de la Cité. In the aftermath of July 22nd, special quarters were designated for the two monarchs at Notre-Dame de Paris. The Emperor, fifth of his name, was to be incarcerated at the same place his progenitor had been crowned in 1804.
When the news of the arrests reached the Emperor of the H.R.E. outrage broke out at court. Not waiting for the official response of the monarch, Minister of War Reinhardt Stöger-Steiner Freiherr von Steinstätten left the meeting to make preparations for mobilization. He understood that war could be avoided, but he knew that quick preparation was needed in order to stop a sudden French advance. Emperor Karl VIII von Hapsburg was beside himself over the arrest of his uncle, adding to his already poor health. He wanted to supersede the cooler heads in the room, and immediately send troops in to liberate Franz Ferdinand, but eventually allowed them to dispatch officials to negotiate his release.
The negotiator, Colonel-General Ernst Kopfmann, arrived in Paris on the morning of July 24th, immediately jumping into negotiations on behalf of the Empire. He also requested a confirmation of the Archduke’s health, but his aides were denied access to Notre-Dame. His initial demands were the immediate release of the Archduke, and the opportunity to take Emperor Napoleon V into exile in the H.R.E. In exchange, they would slowly disarm the Franco-Imperial border, which had doubled its troop counts in the past few days. They would also officially recognize The New French Republic as the rightful government.
The French representatives only saw this as confirmation the two monarchs were in collusion, and were initially very antagonistic towards Kopfmann. The evidence indicated the two were conspiring against the revolution, so even if they agreed to release Franz Ferdinand, they would never allow Napoleon to leave French custody. The negotiations continued to spiral around this point, especially since the Colonel-General insisted on his Archduke’s innocence. The daytime talks dragged on into the evening, with very little common ground found at the negotiation table.
Two more days of this meandering affair continued, with Emperor Karl VIII growing impatient. While normal negotiations can take time, having his uncle and heir being held prisoner by a radical anti-monarchist government rapidly preparing for war made this a race against the clock. He feared that if The New French Republic was allowed time to properly reassemble for war, they’d be more brazen in their retention of the hostages, backing their demands with the sword. It was also only a matter of time before the people demanded Franz Ferdinand’s execution. He waited to hear good news from Kopfmann for one more day, but knew he could not hesitate any longer.
On the morning of the fourth day of negotiations, Karl checked in personally on the situation at the negotiations, though his report left him disappointed. Kopfmann apologized deeply for the lack of progress, and insisted that he could reach a deal with more time. Karl ordered the Colonel-General to continue negotiations through the day, but leave for the border when the day’s affairs conclude after dinner. He did not elaborate further in the event of wiretapping, but Kopfmann understood well enough that something big would come next. His aide reported that after his reception of the message, he looked noticeably paler, before taking a bracing swig of cognac and stepping out of his quarters.
The Emperor had ordered the war cabinet to assemble the night before, commanding the Minister of War to prepare a strategy for a precision strike into Paris, with the goal of liberating Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Károly Bartha, Commander-In-Chief of the Royal Honved, had taken the liberty of gathering an elite strike team, dubbed Mohacs, from his branch’s finest, but had no suggestion for an insertion strategy. Paris was far behind enemy lines, and it would be difficult to travel that far on land without discovery, no matter the strike team’s size. A dangerous, but cunning option was proposed by none other than the illustrious Air Marshal Manfred von Richtofen. His personally funded Romberg Institut für Luft und Äther had been testing cutting edge advances in zeppelin technology, including Low Shield Emission-based RDF Modulation, a proposed method of reducing long range vessel identification. If outfitted on a stripped down zeppelin operating at cruising speeds, the vehicle would be safe from most detection methods. With a plan quickly organized, the strike force and aircraft were transferred to the front line.
At 7 P.M. on July 28th, the stealth craft, dubbed Perchta, launched from the city of Frankfurt, beginning its five hour journey behind French lines. The operation’s CO, Captain Tibor Ambrus emphasized that the pilot avoid flying directly over settlements when possible, as he was worried the zeppelin’s fresh coat of nighttime camouflage would not hold up to scrutiny. The vessel was able to easily avoid detection over the French countryside, with the flight report citing an “eerily muffled engine hum”. The Perchta reached the edge of Paris just after midnight, where the operation crossed the point of no return.
The one fault in the research on the Perchta’s stealth tech was how the RDF Modulator would interact with other shields. Paris’ city-wide shield was not operating in a hard barrier setting, as the military saw no reason at the time. It was however operating at a perimeter frequency, where the shield is tuned to provide simple electrostatic feedback when objects pass through it. This feedback is easily tracked by rudimentary sensor suites, and as a result a military can use the setting as an alert system for incoming and outgoing flights. When an unscheduled and seemingly nonexistent vessel entered Parisian airspace with no contact, local air defenses were scrambled. Within five minutes, the stealth craft was discovered and fired upon. As the Perchta was nearing the prison islands, its Balfour drive was struck by a lucky shot flying into the personnel compartment. With no way of maintaining altitude, and no chance of winning an open dogfight, the rescue vehicle made an emergency landing along the banks of the Seine. Franz Ferdinand could likely see the smoke from his prison, as his best chance at escape went up in flames only a few blocks away.
We Stand in the Wreckage of the World
Captain Ambrus came to his senses a few minutes after impact. The pilot, who survived the crash, was able to aim the zeppelin into the Latin Quarter of Paris, only a block away from the Musée de Cluny. Six of the thirty-man strike team were either dead or in unstable condition. As they secured the immediate area around the damaged vessel, a crowd of civilians began to gather. As the Imperial troops were armed, the Parisians were hesitant to approach at first, but as they realized that these were not Republican Guards they grew agitated. The captain did his best to ease tensions in broken French, trying to buy time for the pilot to assess the damage. Bolder members of the increasingly tense mob began shouting at the men, demanding that they drop their weapons if they really had no ill intent. As the crowd closed in, Ambrus’ men took aim, trying to frighten them with a display of force. As this happened, a half-dressed police officer, clad only in a nightgown and holding his baton, lurched forward and attempted to swat away one of the soldier’s rifles. The Imperial soldier opened fire, killing the officer almost immediately.
Chaos erupted on the street, a majority of Parisians scattered at the sound of gunfire, while others caught up in their revolutionary spirit charged. Captain Tibor Ambrus at first tried to get his men to hold their fire, but as many of the mob engaged he was forced to defend himself. Civilian bodies littered the streets around the crash site, with many of the strike team coming to the realization of what they had just done. Ambrus ordered the team to split into two groups, insisting that they had no choice but to attempt to complete their mission. Eight men were ordered to stay with the pilot as repairs were made, while the rest of the team would make their way towards Petit Pont - Cardinal Lustiger, the bridge closest to Notre-Dame. They had to move ahead with the operation as quickly as possible before the French military could launch a response.
As the team arrived at the bridge they saw that the prison island was already under heavy lockdown, with lightly armed guards positioned at the gate in heavy numbers. Ambrus ordered his men to open fire. The initial engagement lasted about five minutes, with the better trained Imperial troops walking away with only two casualties. The guards on the outside of the gate had nowhere to run, forced to either fight them to the end, or throw themselves into the Seine. The handful of remaining French troops on the inside bunkered down, attempting to suppress the enemy advance. The strike team responded by blowing open the fortification with heavy ordnance. With the initial wave of resistance removed, Mohacs entered the revolution’s prison.
Back at the Perchta, the rear guard spotted a growing mob of armed Parisians approaching from the south. The previous crowd that they dispersed had alerted the revolutionaries. They immediately opened fire on the militia, hoping that enough force would break their spirit. The crowd’s advancement was stalled as many of them ran for cover, but they were progressively gaining ground. Many Parisians took to the side streets, attempting to flank the Imperials. The growing standoff even alerted some off-duty soldiers, who organized partisan units with what firearms they could gather. They stormed into nearby buildings, taking vantage points to provide supporting fire for the mob. Some of these marksmen were even able to break through the strike team’s shields, wounding 3 of the squad-members. As the swelling crowds closed in, a molotov cocktail impacted the zeppelin, lighting the Perchta ablaze. As Strike Team Mohacs’ escape plan went up in flames, the French militia overran their position, cutting down the pilot and remaining soldiers. They only had to find the remaining invaders now. As the mobs surged through the streets, one of the partisans, Adeline Boucher, gazed down at the destruction in the street. At least two hundred dead Parisians were strewn across the ground, all gunned down by professional soldiers. She knew that the strike team's blood alone would not repay the death caused by this incursion.
The remaining members of the Strike Team Mohacs entered the prison island, meeting light resistance from the scattered guards inside. Captain Ambrus ordered his men to release any political prisoners they found, hoping the escapees would either aid them or distract from their movements. The remnant of the Republican Guard had guessed they might make a move for the Emperor and Archduke, and started to fortify outside the cathedral. Another firefight broke out, though the French position this time was not nearly as effective as before. Unfortunately for the Imperials, their shootout had attracted both the Parisian militia and the first responders from the French military. Assaulted from three sides, the tide of the battle quickly turned against the strike team. The last members of Mohacs were subdued just outside of Notre-Dame, mere meters away from their target. Surviving Imperials were dragged away by the mob, where they would be publicly beaten, humiliated, and executed.
While the incursion was over, the Parisian crowd was not yet satisfied. They understood that the only reason they came here was to liberate their precious nobles, their corrupt bourgeois masters. While many of the mob spread through the city to catch escaped prisoners, the more zealous members barged past the remaining prison guards, forcing their way into the cathedral. They pulled Napoleon V and Franz Ferdinand from their decadent cage, dragging them to Place de la Concorde. Members of the mob had run ahead to announce what had occurred, and that those who were responsible were soon to meet the revolution’s justice. Before the bulk of the military response arrived, President Charbonnier called off efforts to recapture the monarchs, as he would not turn on his own supporters and perpetrate further mass bloodshed. The two arrived at the guillotine a little after 4 a.m, where a liberationist spokesman carried out a mock sentencing of the two enemies of the New Revolution. Franz Ferdinand remained stoic, glaring out at the crowd. Napoleon however was panicking, decrying this affair as unjust, occasionally being shut up by his captors. As the sun rose over Paris on July 29th, the Emperor of France and Archduke of The Holy Roman Empire were put to death at the guillotine. Felix Schmidt, the Imperial reporter who had accompanied Franz Ferdinand on the trip, was allowed to attend the event to record the moment for posterity’s sake. As his lord was placed underneath the revolution’s blade, he took a photo with his camera, annotating it with a single phrase:
“Wir stehen in dem Wrack der Welt – We Stand in the Wreckage of the World”
War Is Here
In the wake of the unofficial executions, the French government struggled to regain control over the Parisian mob. For the next three days, revolutionary partisans marched through the streets, hunting any prisoners that escaped the prison during the Imperial operation. Any found escapees were killed, and public opinion demanded the Republic do so to the remainder of its political prisoners on Île Saint-Louis and Île de la Cité. While Charbonnier refused, he pushed to expedite the trials for “enemies of the revolution” and urged harsher sentences. French citizens also cried out for immediate action against The Holy Roman Empire, as no official war declarations were made. Enlistment into the Republican Guard also skyrocketed, as the nation geared up for open conflict.
The Imperial government was equally in chaos, reeling from the death of the nation’s heir. Grief-stricken over his uncle, Karl VIII’s health started to decline, with his advisors acting as proxy, and council meetings occasionally occurring in his residence. While many admit the operation undertaken by Strike-team Mohacs was a poor step in the effort to achieve peace, they remained outraged that the French government allowed a wild mob murder the Archduke, who should not have been arrested in the first place due to agreements made over diplomatic immunity. It was decided that if peace was still to be an option, the French government would have to fully cooperate with the H.R.E. as they address this “unruly mob” that killed their heir.
An official list of reparatory demands was drafted by the Emperor’s council, which would have to be accepted in full if the French wanted to avoid open war. Some of these demands would openly remove France’s autonomy, with the H.R.E. taking an oversight role in French affairs as they dealt with the out-of-control revolution. They were aware that Congress would likely refuse the demands outright, but believed that the slim chance at a diplomatic solution would paint their position as more morally upright. In the background; they were making final preparations for a full mobilization against the Rhine when the formal declaration was made. The French were given until August 10th to accept the terms of the agreement. The terms were obviously laughable, and Congress had no intention of saying yes. President Charbonnier immediately started efforts to retool local industry towards military production, and contacted the U.S. President Rockefeller Jr. to update him on the developing situation. As the deadline of the 10th came and went, a formal declaration was drafted over the next day. In an emergency announcement on the morning of August 12th, 1938, Holy Roman Emperor Karl VIII announced that war with The New French Republic had begun, starting what would later be known as The Great War…
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