Originally posted by perdedor99
Trying to make sense of a history for South Africa would create a very nasty nation according to our standards. [...] Creation of some minor nobility of Islamic origin to eliminate resistance in Madagascar and the African east coast to South African control. Use of some tribes, like the Zulus, as sepoys to start conquest of the interior.
Doesn´t sound too bad and the slavery/tribe thing adds a new perspective. All drafts done in the past focused on the European thatre more or less. I´ll add what I discussed and laid out below. Several players and non-players or nomore-players helped with that.
Here´s a draft of a general timeline but other things need to be added. I know there are inconsistencies.
1630s - Dutch came to control the area around the River Plate and several areas of what is now Brazil and Argentina. (or perhaps just Uruguay and southern Brazil along with historical New Holland, and allowing for the Argentinean part to be taken in war.)
1650s- Dutch forces from around Guararapes (New Holland) relocate to the River Plate region and reenforce the area. Added to this they help with the establishment of Cape Colony.
1700s - Despite Spanish and Portuguese efforts, the Dutch Colony of the Plate holds and prospers with heavy trade with the Cape Colony and into Asia.
1795 - France takes the Seven Providences of the Neatherlands.
1798 - the former Dutch colonies declare independance from their motherland (which is held by the French anyway)
1799 - the SAE is a kingdom of two equal states, the Plate and South Africa. Dual administrative capitals are established at Montevideo and Cape Town. The royal court moves between the two cities on a rotating schedule every few years.
1810 - 1830 - As the Spanish/Portuguese/Iberian colonies begin to consider independence, the kingdom supports those movements. This may be out of a heartfelt desire to liberate their neighbours from an imperialist, or it may be a pragmatic recognition that several small neighbours can be easier to handle than one big neighbour.
1830 - the historic French upheavals see the House of Bourbon try to distract the masses from internal issues with some foreign victories. One happens to include a fight picked with the young "Kingdom of the Plate and South Africa". An incident takes place, and the French attack. Raids take place along the African coast. The royal family, whose court is in Cape Town, flee inland, setting up shop at Pretoria, which is out of reach of the French.
1831 - Nordmark gets involved. If we assume the former Marshal Bernadotte is king as he historically was of Sweden, maybe it's out of personal spite. Alternately, it's a result of an alliance of marriage with the proto-SAE. Nordmark sends reinforcements, a few battles are fought at sea, and the French eventually concede defeat. The Bourbons manage to retain power a bit longer as a result of their adventuring, but are replaced by the House of Orleans anyway in 1833.
-->Side Effect: Perhaps France is unable to historically intervene in the Belgian Revolution, allowing the Dutch to defeat it and keep Belgium. Not sure we ever had that explained or not.
-->Side Effect: Could lead to the resurgence of Nordmark as a naval power.
1835 - After the war, the royals decide to stay put in Pretoria, keeping Cape Town and Montevideo as administrative centres. Meanwhile, the RSAN is started.
1840s-1870s - various shifts in power and alliances between the South American powers and the Cape Colony.
1879 - War of the Pacific between Chile-Bolivia-Peru.
~1880 - diamond and gold mining have put the South African portion of the kingdom far ahead of the Plate portion; the two administrative capitals are abolished and the functions moved to Pretoria. The "Kingdom of the Plate and South Africa" becomes the "South Africa Empire".
~1880 - There is no conflict between Argentina/Brazil and the SAE, but the relationships cool as Argentina and Brazil begin to take issue with the SAE going from "liberator" to "colonizer". The concentration of political power in South Africa furthers this schism. Tensions in the early 1880s are sufficient to keep Argentina from working with Chile on Patagonian issues.
1884 - SAE begins to industrialize to maintain its African Empire from opportunistic British and German forces and to build up the RSAN as a first class navy with modern equipment.
1890s - South Africa participates in colonial adventures, clashing with France in particular (as revenge?). This fuels expansion of the empire into places like Gabon, Madagascar, and so on. There is an undeclared, low intensity conflict with some significant battles, but diplomatic pressures on both nations keeps a full-blown war from happening.
1900 to 1916 - stabilization of the Empire´s borders and a relatively quite period before WW1 breaks out and the SAE gets involved in 1916. The SAE takes former German colonies (instead of the British historically).
>1919 - history as written in WesWorld
Other details discussed and agreeed earlier during the SIM.
On Nordmark
I have decided that Gustav V, present king of Nordmark, is born several decades later than Gustav V, king of Sweden, historically was. He is therefore born, in WesWorld, in 1881, was married in 1906 to HR&IH Princess Victoria of the South African Empire, and ascended the throne in 1907. They still have no children (there was a still-birth in 1914).
Princess Victoria was born in 1887.
Present King-Emperor of the SAE is King William I., born 1865. He ascended the throne in 1897 when his father King Hendrik I. died.
Hendrik (born 1833, later first King of the SAE) married Nordmarks Countess Kristina Amalie in 1863.
Late in 1869 the war against the British began by proclaiming the foundation of the Kingdom of South Africa by some seperatists. Several other groups followed and in early 1872 the SAE was established.
It needs to be that early (too early?) because otherwise I wont have enough time to build up an empire, though, during the so called Colony Wars (see history about the Battle of Corsico Bay for example). It took three decades (until ~1903) to secure all the territories the SAE owns today against the British, French, Spanish and also Germans.
The date 1869 was inspired by the inccidents in Germany because they make it impossible for the French to focus on their african territories and leaves Britain alone on that continent to defend their interests.
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Reasons behind a special relationship:
When the South-African Empire in 18?? made a bid for independence, war loomed, as the British Empire was not about to agree to loose this piece of real-estate. In an unexpected move, however, Nordmark (along wiht other nations?) leaned heavily on Britain, managing to bring USA in on its side in the matter, and caused Britain to renege its claims in Southern Africa. As a result, a special relationship form between the two nations, sometimes called the unofficial Pole-to-Pole alliance. It was only reinforced by the first South-African head of state marrying HG Countess Kristina Amalie af Blekinge to make her the first South-African Queen Consort. It was then, perhaps, not unnatural that in turn HRH Prince Gustav in 1906 wed HI&RH Princess Victoria, daughter of the King-Emperor of South Africa. The relationship between the two countries continued to improve over the years, particularly in the world war, when two South African cruiser-squadrons provided invaluable aid in protecting the trade-lanes of an increasingly overstretched Kingdom of Nordmark, the 1915 actions of two light cruisers against two German armoured cruisers standing out in naval history.
History of the SAE and Nordmark so far:
1863 - Hendrik (born 1833) marries Countess Kristina Amalie (born 1845)
1865 - William, first son of Hendrik, is born
1868 - second son of Hendrik, Lukas (later acting minister of Traffic and Transport, is born
1869 - separatists of the Free South Africa - Movement start to fight the British
1871 - Hendrik I. gets his first daughter, Eva Christina
1872 - foundation of the SAE after Nordmark helped, Hendrik I. becomes first King of the SAE at an age of 39
1877 - third son for Hendrik, named Olaf
~1882 - Colony in Uruguay (historical boundaries) established
1886 - William (21 years old) marries a yet unknown princess Anna-Sophie (18)
1887 - Victoria, daughter of William (22) is born
~1892 - Cease fire in South America, boundaries fixed as on Wes´ map
1897 - Hendrik I. dies at an age of 64 and William ascends the throne as King William I. at an age of 32
1903 - the SAE could end the Colony Wars and looks much like in 1920 - with the exception of minor territories it got from the Germans after WW1
1906 - Prince Gustav marries Princess Victoria (19)
1907 - Prince Gustav is Nordmarks new King Gustav V.
1914 - still-birth of a heir to the throne in Nordmark
1921 - death of Gustav, Victoria (34) and their unborn child (William is 56 years old, Lukas 53)