WesWorld

14 January 1944

The Armada has broken ground on a new naval base on San Hainando. The facility, at SanYa on the south coast of the island, is expected to be operational in 1945.

Minister of War Felipe Cardona told reporters, "Our base at Haikou was built at a time when the defence of San Hainado was a simpler thing; we did not have the Chinese thumping their chests and we did not have to consider the risk of air attack from mainland China. Now we do. It is logical, then, to develop a new base on the south end of the island, as far away from Chinese land-based airpower as possible, so that the Armada can safely deliver men and material to this vital part of the Confederacion in the event of war."

Sr. Cardona declined to provide details about the base's facilities, but a source within the government indicated that the Armada is more likely to invest in floating drydocks than in fixed facilities. "They can be moved about as the situation demands," the source said.

The move has raised some eyebrows in the Confederacion's Caribbean provinces. Naval historian Dr. Pedro Brey observed, "The Chinese are too busy fighting their various ex-allies to pose a serious risk to San Hainando. On that basis, and given that the Confederacion already has a base in Siam, I would have thought the more logical choice for infrastructure investment was in strengthening our Caribbean coastlines against Mexican aggression."


OOC: As an existing port city, Sanya does not require IP investments to be made a functional base.

Edit: Helps if I spell the city's name correctly.

Doctor Brey may be an eminent historian but somewhat politically naïve; The Confederation has a base in Thailand so long as the Thais allow such. I think that the Armada is making a sound investment.

The Mexican boogie man is obviously not scary enough, now where can I get some Madrid bombers...?

I would be curious to know this myself.

Yeah me too.

There were 6 animals in the woods, a bear, two wolves, a fox and two rabbits. One of the rabbits is friends with the bear and the fox, though the bear and fox aren't friends. The other rabbit is friends with one of the wolves, and the other wolf is a loner. One day the second rabbit punches the fox in the face and they begin to fight. Seeing his friend in trouble, the other wolf comes to help while the first rabbit cheers on the fox from the sidelines. The loner wolf doesn't like the fox either so he keeps an eye on him as well. Then one day while the loner wolf is watching the fox, the first rabbit pulls his tail. Irritated, the wolf turns around and bites the rabbit. The bear comes up and tells the first rabbit "that was a silly thing to do" and also takes a bite out of the rabbit. And so, the wolf and the bear eat the rabbit who didn't know well enough to leave the wolf alone. The End.

Hmm. Never heard that one before - must be a Canadian thing. But rather apropos of the situation.

Silly rabbit, trix are for kids.

Oh that story I made up Bruce.

Wabbits!

6 May 1945

Minister for Foreign Affairs Gabino Conseulos is in Bharat for the beginning of a five day visit to the newly democratic Asian state.
Speaking to reporters at the Karachi Aerodrome, the first stop on the tour, Sr. Conseulos said, "There was a time when Iberia and Bharat were on opposite sides of an intricate alliance system, each concerned about the risk posed by the other to its allies. With the demise of both the AEGIS and SATSUMA alliances, that friction has been alleviated. What remains now is a largely blank slate, upon which we can choose to write a future of our choosing."

The Minister will spend the day touring Karachi, a relatively rare example of a peaceful, modern territorial transfer between regional powers. This will include stops at the blossoming Port of Karachi as well as a textile factory. Subsequently, he will visit Mumbai for a speech to the Bharati Chamber of Commerce. These events are seen as an attempt to gain access to the Bharati economy; though highly protected by tariffs and trade barriers, its four hundred million consumers are seen as a potentially lucrative market by industry in general.

Minister Conseulos will conclude the trip with an extended stop in the capital of Hyderabad, where he will meet with both Prime Minister Sardesei and the Rajaram. Although the Minister and his officials have declined to comment, speculation exists that the Minister will be speaking with his Bharati counterparts about the continued sale of naval armaments to Iberia's primary regional rivals, China and Mexico.

Foreign affairs analyst Dr. Ignacio Montiel, at the University of Cartagena, noted, "There's a long history of India selling surplus warships to Mexico and China, and that arose in no small part because it made sense during the period of tense relations between India's SATSUMA alliance and the AEGIS alliance. Mexican destroyers - and there are a lot of them - reduced Iberia's ability to divert resources into the Pacific in the event of a war. Surplus received by China effectively jump-started their ocean-going fleet, which threatens San Hainando and was at one time a threat to the Netherlands East Indies.

"Yet what we're seeing now is that, absent the alliance system, there's no real benefit to India continuing this practice. I mean, sure, there's the actual cash value of the ships, though India has barely surpassed scrap value in selling to the Mexicans. But there's no direct territorial conflicts between India and Iberia to warrant such a direct and irritating sore. Meanwhile, Chinese aggression against the Philippines and Chosen - in part powered by Indian surplus - has kept the Pacific region in turmoil for several years. So unpredictable are the Chinese at this point that India should be wondering whether its former warships are going to end up being used against them one day."

Doctor Montiel raises a very interesting point in his analysis. China's future is, at this point, a great unknown.

As for the Iberian mission to Bharat, perhaps this signals a change on the part of the Bharati Government. For long it has appeared unwilling to accept visits from other powers; is this now changing? In any event, it is a good development.

Indeed, an interesting point. It's worth noting (as I did at the time) that the Chinese backed the Persian Nationalists in the Persian Civil War (and they provided a lot of very potent gear) while India backed the victorious Monarchist powers. That could very well have been remembered in Bharat, and likely not with particular fondness...

Bharat's open to some visits from not-unfriendly powers, but you'll note they're not initiating any of their own at this point.

18 September 1945

The Royal Elections Commission has tabled its report on the 1944 confederation elections with the House of Deputies' Governance Committee.

Royal Commissioner Pablo de Gongora told the committee that overall, the election was well executed and virtually free of irregularities. "While there were allegations in eight districts of vote-buying and ballot-stuffing, our investigations found proof of just two incidences, both committed by members of a far-left fringe party. I am pleased to say that all allegations leveled against the major parties represented in the House proved to be without merit."

Apart from reporting on the past election, the report also naturally makes recommendations for the 1948 election. "Based on GDP and demographic data across the Confederation, it is the recommendation of the Commission that the total number of seats in the House of Deputies be adjusted to three hundred seventy," Sr. de Gongora testified.

Although the report does make modest adjustments to the number of districts through the Confederation, a notable decrease would be felt in San Hainando, which would go from twenty-four districts to nineteen. The Commission's report notes, "While the population of San Hainando continues to grow at modest rates, its GDP has been negatively impacted by external geopolitics. Both domestic and foreign investors remain wary of investing in the state given its proximity to a warmongering China whose appetite for aggression appears unabated."

In Haikou, reaction to the recommendation was mostly negative. City councillour and democratic activist Tang Miguel said, "This is absolute nonsense. The entire foundation of our electoral system is blatantly unfair to begin with; why should wealth determine the voting power of a population? Why should Portugal, with two hundred thousand fewer people than San Hainando, be entitled to fifty deputies and San Hainando just nineteen? And why punish Hainandese for circumstances that are entirely outside their control?"

Similar concerns were also noted by Nicholas de Balboa, a deputies from Santo Domingo and the only one representing the fringe Equality Party in the House. Speaking in Madrid, he noted, "We see the same issue in the Caribbean that the Hainandese do. The populations of Cuba and Santo Domingo are quite similar, yet Cuba has twenty-two deputies - soon to be twenty-four, apparently - and Santo Domingo just thirteen. That is unjust. It sends a dehumanizing message that the value of one's pocket-book determines the value of one's self."

But Deputy Jose Salcedo, representing Spain's Forty-Sixth District, dismissed these concerns. "This is an effective system of governance that has served the Confederation well for over a century. The linkage to economic strength is entirely sensible - those with more wealth are paying more taxes, and are thereby more heavily impacted by the decisions of the House of Deputies. Of course they should also have more say in the matter."

The Governance Committee is expected to hear from other witnesses over the next few weeks before voting on acceptance of the Commission's report next month.

An interesting perspective, which begs a several questions.

First, what is the overall distribution of districts between the Metropole and the overseas territories? Since the number and distribution of districts is driven by GDP and not population per se I would expect that the overwhelming number would be in Iberia proper, but the distribution would be interesting.

Second, the mention of an Equality party suggests that some portion of the electorate sees the current arrangements as undesirable. How strong is that undercurrent?

Difficult to say exactly how strong that sentiment is; I never saw any comment on the model of vote distribution in older Iberian news items beyond the fact that it was linked to GDP. I'm guessing the mainstream political participants do their best to marginalize holders of such views and that the mainstream media generally goes along with it.

As to the first part, I eyeballed Iberian populations and assigned some pretty arbitrary GDP ratios to them. Spain gets a 10 as most industrialized and everything is compared to it:

Spain: 25.9 million, GDP = 10
Portugal: 7.8 million, GDP = 8

Cuba: 4.2 million, GDP = 7
Santo Domingo (Hispaniola): 4.4 million, GDP = 4
San Juan Batista (Puerto Rico): 1.9 million, GDP = 4
Gautemala: 5.2 million, GDP = 5
Panama: 0.6 million, GDP = 8 (Canal and related facilities do this)
Ecuador: 2.5 million, GDP = 5

Sierra Leone: 2.6 million, GDP = 2
Angola: 3.7 million, GDP = 3

San Hainando: 8 million, GDP = 3
Macau: 0.4 million, GDP = 7 (trading enclave)

Population * GDP value * 0.8 gives the following recommendation for the next election:

Spain: 207 seats
Portugal: 50 seats

Cuba: 24 seats
Santo Domingo: 14 seats
San Juan Batista: 6 seats
Guatemala: 21 seats
Panama: 4 seats
Ecuador: 10 seats

Sierra Leone: 4 seats
Angola: 9 seats

San Hainando: 19 seats
Macau: 2 seats

...which indeed puts a safe majority of seats in Spain all by itself, and around 2/3 in the Iberian peninsula overall.

Hmm...

With a distribution like that, I can see why the Equality party might find some traction in various places.

I might just start funneling money to the Equality Party. In Socialist Mexico everyone gets fair representation. Seems like the colonies remain colonies, they need to shake of the yoke of Imperialist Iberia...

I have no out-of-character objections to such a notion.

I guess that the money Mexico funnels to the Equality Party will probably end up in the hands of the Iberian Government and then used for their Unequality Program...