OOC: Several million more corpses will hardly improve matters.
Capto Iugulum
- Thread starter EQandcivfanatic
- Start date
OOC: Several million more corpses will hardly improve matters.
To Vinland
From the Confederation
Does the United Kingdom really believe our alliance with Russia to be other than purely defensive?
All the evidence demonstrates that our alliance is indeed purely defensive. Why would we want to attack the Germans? to set off a revolt in the Rhineland and to have Russian armies on our doorstep? and why would we not have cancelled our alliances with the Austrians and Spanish ourselves and why would we have repeatedly stated our willingness to renew them? and why, indeed, would we forswear and deny at length that we have anything but a defensive alliance if our intention all along was to demonstrate our protestations untrue by acting in precisely the opposite fashion and by attacking the GEL?
Yes, as a matter of fact, we do believe that the British have no particular inclination towards maintaining the European peace, and a very strong inclination towards advancing their own interests on the Continent, a policy whose disastrous effects can be seen in the Great War. They do not actively desire the slaughter of millions, but they are happy to use the genocide of thousands for their own political ends, and would not shrink from the death of millions (mostly of other peoples' soldiers, of course) for the ostensible sake of justice if we were not there to prevent it. Furthermore, we believe that the more strongly they object to our alliance, the more it suggests that they intend to act in a fashion that would invoke it (i.e. to act in a fashion that would even without our participation bring war on Europe) and the more patent it becomes that it is necessary for us, and our duty, to counteract their policy.
From the Confederation
Does the United Kingdom really believe our alliance with Russia to be other than purely defensive?
All the evidence demonstrates that our alliance is indeed purely defensive. Why would we want to attack the Germans? to set off a revolt in the Rhineland and to have Russian armies on our doorstep? and why would we not have cancelled our alliances with the Austrians and Spanish ourselves and why would we have repeatedly stated our willingness to renew them? and why, indeed, would we forswear and deny at length that we have anything but a defensive alliance if our intention all along was to demonstrate our protestations untrue by acting in precisely the opposite fashion and by attacking the GEL?Yes, as a matter of fact, we do believe that the British have no particular inclination towards maintaining the European peace, and a very strong inclination towards advancing their own interests on the Continent, a policy whose disastrous effects can be seen in the Great War. They do not actively desire the slaughter of millions, but they are happy to use the genocide of thousands for their own political ends, and would not shrink from the death of millions (mostly of other peoples' soldiers, of course) for the ostensible sake of justice if we were not there to prevent it. Furthermore, we believe that the more strongly they object to our alliance, the more it suggests that they intend to act in a fashion that would invoke it (i.e. to act in a fashion that would even without our participation bring war on Europe) and the more patent it becomes that it is necessary for us, and our duty, to counteract their policy.
I'm going to point out right now that Serbia DID NOT sign the Balkan alliance mentioned on the last page. Serbia's player has been inactive and will be NPC, and is not signing the said alliance.
Mickzter97
The One and Only
I sent Bair a pm and he responded saying yes
Yes, but he's missed two sets of orders in a row, therefore, he's no longer with us.
EDIT: Unless of course, he gets in orders before I close it off completely.
Serbia signs the Alliance with the King of Hungary.
EDIT: Unless of course, he gets in orders before I close it off completely.
Serbia signs the Alliance with the King of Hungary.
Update's coming along very slowly, it's looking like I'll be busy most of this afternoon. We're looking at completion being probably on Friday night.
Crezth
i knew you were a real man of the left
To: The Confederation
From: The United Kingdom
All our policies on the European continent during the Great War were aimed at the maintenance of our allies in the face of the unstoppable Russian juggernaut. In this we failed. Poland, Hungary, Serbia, and Georgia all now lay under the Russian boot, and as penitence for their resistance Russia has put their people and lands to the torch. They will stop at nothing to cement their eternal lordship over those realms. They are willing to slaughter hundreds of thousands in cold blood to see to that.
Now that the Krakow Pact has been single-handedly dispatched by Russia, we seek to contain them and see to it that never again is a European nation forced to suffer under their yoke. We carry the heavy burden of the guilt of Poland's death on our shoulders, something we may never atone for, but we can be damn sure that we'll fight to avenge it.
Franco-Burgundy, meanwhile, has proven to be complicit in Russia's expansion into the Krakow Pact. Yes, they may have won a war against your enemies, but there was no protest from Paris when Russia began shooting Poles in the streets. Two European nations were wiped from the face of the planet, replaced with graveyards and the deafening sound of countless Russian soldiers trudging up and down now orderly but spookily vacant streets.
As we have stated, Franco-Burgundy has made it plain to the world that they do not care about the dead in Poland. They only care about the eternal preservation of their own property. All of Europe may burn if Russia doesn't lay a finger on the Confederation's meagre holdings, and those the Confederation has green-lit as willing to fall in line. But the moment a nation decides that it has principles and values, the moment that heroic nations such as Brandenburg, Austria, and Spain put their foot down and say "no" to the mass-slaughter of Prussians and Poles, the Confederation declares open season on them. Russia may invade Brandenburg, you say, and they may occupy their country and kill every single German. It is the price they pay for failing to bow to you.
If you want to prove that you care about Europe and European peace, then pick Europe. Not Russia.
From: The United Kingdom
All our policies on the European continent during the Great War were aimed at the maintenance of our allies in the face of the unstoppable Russian juggernaut. In this we failed. Poland, Hungary, Serbia, and Georgia all now lay under the Russian boot, and as penitence for their resistance Russia has put their people and lands to the torch. They will stop at nothing to cement their eternal lordship over those realms. They are willing to slaughter hundreds of thousands in cold blood to see to that.
Now that the Krakow Pact has been single-handedly dispatched by Russia, we seek to contain them and see to it that never again is a European nation forced to suffer under their yoke. We carry the heavy burden of the guilt of Poland's death on our shoulders, something we may never atone for, but we can be damn sure that we'll fight to avenge it.
Franco-Burgundy, meanwhile, has proven to be complicit in Russia's expansion into the Krakow Pact. Yes, they may have won a war against your enemies, but there was no protest from Paris when Russia began shooting Poles in the streets. Two European nations were wiped from the face of the planet, replaced with graveyards and the deafening sound of countless Russian soldiers trudging up and down now orderly but spookily vacant streets.
As we have stated, Franco-Burgundy has made it plain to the world that they do not care about the dead in Poland. They only care about the eternal preservation of their own property. All of Europe may burn if Russia doesn't lay a finger on the Confederation's meagre holdings, and those the Confederation has green-lit as willing to fall in line. But the moment a nation decides that it has principles and values, the moment that heroic nations such as Brandenburg, Austria, and Spain put their foot down and say "no" to the mass-slaughter of Prussians and Poles, the Confederation declares open season on them. Russia may invade Brandenburg, you say, and they may occupy their country and kill every single German. It is the price they pay for failing to bow to you.
If you want to prove that you care about Europe and European peace, then pick Europe. Not Russia.
To the United Kingdom
From the Confederation
We have had quite enough of your rhetoric and calumny, and we have had more than enough of your machiavellian scheming in Europe. The Krakow Pact was only involved in what ought to have been a colonial war in any case because they declared war on us at your instigation, not vice versa. The Germans know that our alliance is open to them on terms which are not for them to set unilaterally, but which are entirely reasonable, and we cannot help it if they wish to declare open season on themselves. If they have need of our help, they can ask for it, and if they do ask for it without requiring us to accede to one-sided demands, or if they give us a fair proposal - as we are quite open to any form of reasonable offer - they can receive it. We have explained ourselves fully already, and will do so at no greater length.
From the Confederation
We have had quite enough of your rhetoric and calumny, and we have had more than enough of your machiavellian scheming in Europe. The Krakow Pact was only involved in what ought to have been a colonial war in any case because they declared war on us at your instigation, not vice versa. The Germans know that our alliance is open to them on terms which are not for them to set unilaterally, but which are entirely reasonable, and we cannot help it if they wish to declare open season on themselves. If they have need of our help, they can ask for it, and if they do ask for it without requiring us to accede to one-sided demands, or if they give us a fair proposal - as we are quite open to any form of reasonable offer - they can receive it. We have explained ourselves fully already, and will do so at no greater length.
Crezth
i knew you were a real man of the left
To: The Confederation
From: The United Kingdom
If the Confederation does not understand why nations do not want to be allied with her and, by proxy, a gigantic, aggressive, bloodthirsty empire, we would gladly explain. But frankly, we give you more credit than that.
Does the Confederation or does the Confederation not care little about the fate of European nations that refuse to bow to her and Russia? If your alliance with Russia is really just a thing of convenience, it ought to be trivial to swap them out with the remainder of Europe.
From: The United Kingdom
If the Confederation does not understand why nations do not want to be allied with her and, by proxy, a gigantic, aggressive, bloodthirsty empire, we would gladly explain. But frankly, we give you more credit than that.
Does the Confederation or does the Confederation not care little about the fate of European nations that refuse to bow to her and Russia? If your alliance with Russia is really just a thing of convenience, it ought to be trivial to swap them out with the remainder of Europe.
To the United Kingdom
From the Confederation
The fact remains that the nations in question have the offer of our alliance, and they appear to be so worried about the concept that somehow they would be allied by proxy with Russia - a feeble and incredible objection if ever we heard one, as we see no way in which we could possibly force them thereby to act in concert with the Russians against their inclinations - that they will not turn their minds to the question of their own security against any Russian attack. In our opinion, the notion of a direct Russian attack is a distant possibility, but, we will admit, not totally impossible: the notion that we should somehow use our alliance with the Germans and our alliance with the Russians to force them to act in concert or to become the best of friends is completely impossible and not, at any rate, an existential threat to the GEL. The Germans need to sort out their priorities and come to understand that they can only afford the luxury of being worried about one danger - and which is it a more sensible danger for them to be worried about, the threat of Russia actually attacking or the threat of being "allied by proxy" with Russia? To our minds there should be no competition between the two: the former is a threat that severely threatens their lives, the latter is a threat that barely threatens their dignity at all.
From the Confederation
The fact remains that the nations in question have the offer of our alliance, and they appear to be so worried about the concept that somehow they would be allied by proxy with Russia - a feeble and incredible objection if ever we heard one, as we see no way in which we could possibly force them thereby to act in concert with the Russians against their inclinations - that they will not turn their minds to the question of their own security against any Russian attack. In our opinion, the notion of a direct Russian attack is a distant possibility, but, we will admit, not totally impossible: the notion that we should somehow use our alliance with the Germans and our alliance with the Russians to force them to act in concert or to become the best of friends is completely impossible and not, at any rate, an existential threat to the GEL. The Germans need to sort out their priorities and come to understand that they can only afford the luxury of being worried about one danger - and which is it a more sensible danger for them to be worried about, the threat of Russia actually attacking or the threat of being "allied by proxy" with Russia? To our minds there should be no competition between the two: the former is a threat that severely threatens their lives, the latter is a threat that barely threatens their dignity at all.
Crezth
i knew you were a real man of the left
To: The Confederation
From: The United Kingdom
Nowhere do I see in your moral calculus an accounting for the dimension of right and wrong. They should not have to choose between being allied with an ally of Russia or being subjected to the threat of domination by the same. You are exercising nothing more than coercion.
From: The United Kingdom
Nowhere do I see in your moral calculus an accounting for the dimension of right and wrong. They should not have to choose between being allied with an ally of Russia or being subjected to the threat of domination by the same. You are exercising nothing more than coercion.
To the United Kingdom
From the Confederation
We will show you right and wrong: you would bring war to Europe, maybe not today, but whenever it was convenient for you to do so. That is wrong. We are making it inconvenient for you and thereby delaying or preventing the deaths of millions. That is right. We will show you coercion: we had alliances with all the greatest powers of Europe, as part of a constant and deliberate policy of opening our arms in friendship to all our neighbours, and now there is a concerted and deliberate attempt being made by numerous and powerful nations to cause us to drop our policy and choose a side, not out of free choice, but because they will not allow us to act freely. That is coercion.
As for the idea that they "should not have to choose," why, it is ridiculous. We should not have to choose between alliance with the Germans and alliance with the Russians, and indeed we have not chosen; the Germans have chosen for us. If they desire, they can unmake that choice and allow us to revert to our previous policy; alternatively they can do without our alliance. It is entirely up to them, and, while we do of course prefer to be their allies than not to be, they are absolutely free to choose whatever alliances they desire.
From the Confederation
We will show you right and wrong: you would bring war to Europe, maybe not today, but whenever it was convenient for you to do so. That is wrong. We are making it inconvenient for you and thereby delaying or preventing the deaths of millions. That is right. We will show you coercion: we had alliances with all the greatest powers of Europe, as part of a constant and deliberate policy of opening our arms in friendship to all our neighbours, and now there is a concerted and deliberate attempt being made by numerous and powerful nations to cause us to drop our policy and choose a side, not out of free choice, but because they will not allow us to act freely. That is coercion.
As for the idea that they "should not have to choose," why, it is ridiculous. We should not have to choose between alliance with the Germans and alliance with the Russians, and indeed we have not chosen; the Germans have chosen for us. If they desire, they can unmake that choice and allow us to revert to our previous policy; alternatively they can do without our alliance. It is entirely up to them, and, while we do of course prefer to be their allies than not to be, they are absolutely free to choose whatever alliances they desire.
Bulgaria signs this treaty.
OOC: all good on the flag, i was gonna use that one anyway.
Crezth
i knew you were a real man of the left
To: The Confederation
From: The United Kingdom
You would kill four-hundred thousand unarmed Prussians and countless more Poles to save millions of their murderers. That is what is wrong.
Do not skirt around the issue. If the GEL is not allied with you and Russia attacked them, annexed them, and murderer all of the inhabitants thereof, would you or would you not allow them to do so - except, perhaps, for a token irrelevant denunciation? You have already answered in the affirmative so you need not respond directly, but it is nice to know that you care only about peace so long as the nations of Europe pledge allegiance to you.
We are not allies with much of Europe, much less all of it, yet we will not tolerate Russian expansionism. That we will always act to defend any nation of Europe from Russian aggression, and this is our pledge, should be telling. We don't seek to coerce anyone. We just seek to disarm Russia. And so far, you have been their right arm.
From: The United Kingdom
You would kill four-hundred thousand unarmed Prussians and countless more Poles to save millions of their murderers. That is what is wrong.
Do not skirt around the issue. If the GEL is not allied with you and Russia attacked them, annexed them, and murderer all of the inhabitants thereof, would you or would you not allow them to do so - except, perhaps, for a token irrelevant denunciation? You have already answered in the affirmative so you need not respond directly, but it is nice to know that you care only about peace so long as the nations of Europe pledge allegiance to you.
We are not allies with much of Europe, much less all of it, yet we will not tolerate Russian expansionism. That we will always act to defend any nation of Europe from Russian aggression, and this is our pledge, should be telling. We don't seek to coerce anyone. We just seek to disarm Russia. And so far, you have been their right arm.
We would not have killed them if it had been up to us, but you forget the millions of their murderers' opponents, and millions of unfortunate civilians, and it is right that their deaths should be avoided.
An alliance is not a "pledge of allegiance"; it is a mutual agreement, and it involves us helping them, in fact, much more than it would be likely to oblige them to help me, in the likelihood of things.
If you don't seek to coerce anyone, stop trying to coerce us. As for defending nations from Russian expansionism, that's up to you. We will happily defend anyone in Europe who desires our help. We understand, and we think that everyone understands, that the Germans hate the Russians, and so we find it a fairly unreasonable objection that somehow being allied to us might give out the wrong message, as if someone is going to get the impression that, just because the Germans are allied to me, they are friends with the Russians. We do not demand allegiance; we merely demand freedom of foreign policy. Your entire tone reveals quite clearly that you and the Germans are hardly particularly enthusiastic about acquiring our alliance, and we will not be browbeated into being anyone's ally. If the Germans ever decide that they are serious about cooperating with us as allies, then we are open to any proposals they may have.
Crezth
i knew you were a real man of the left
The Confederation said:
So you admit that, by allying with the Russians, you have freely elected to help them? You will help murderers? You choose to help murderers?
The Confederation said:
We would gladly work with the Confederation if it was at all obvious that they cared about stopping Russia's reign of terror. Such as it is, we see that Franco-Burgundy is quite pleased with the unceremonious slaughter of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians. Bravo.
On the contrary, you misunderstand us: we were referring to our prospective alliance with the Germans; that is to say that, if we were allied to the Germans, then we would be helping them - in case of Russian or other attack - and they would not be swearing allegiance to us.
If you still believe that we are pleased with the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians, you do so in direct contravention to our ample explanation of our policy.
Crezth
i knew you were a real man of the left
The Confederation said:
Then it still does not address the following point:
"Do not skirt around the issue. If the GEL is not allied with you and Russia attacked them, annexed them, and murdered all of the inhabitants [of the GEL nations], would you or would you not allow them to do so - except, perhaps, for a token irrelevant denunciation? You have already answered in the affirmative so you need not respond directly, but it is nice to know that you care only about peace so long as the nations of Europe pledge allegiance to you."
One you elected to respond to with a discussion on semantics. We have bolded the relevant phrase. Please speak to it directly. This is what we mean when we say you require the nations of Europe to follow you or else you will be complicit in their possible demise.
The bumbling babbling of your diplomats does not constitute a sufficient refutation that you are quite tolerant of Russia's policies of ethnic cleansing, or at least are tolerant enough to fight by their side should it come to it.
We wonder if Franco-Burgundy is truly as non-partisan as they say, or if they have an ulterior agenda here.
Because you were trying to use our words against us and twist them into meaning something we never said, and it was therefore incumbent upon us to refute you.
We see no reason why we should make promises on the subject when they are quite unwilling to do the same for us with regard to any enmities we may incur. Alliances are supposed to be reciprocal, and it is hardly reasonable for you to expect us to give you a one-sided commitment on the matter. In the event of a war occurring wherein our alliance with Russia is not invoked, i.e. a case of Russian aggression, and where we had no alliance with the Germans, our policy would depend on a number of factors. Provided German antagonism towards us was not too severe before then, it is entirely possible that we might find it necessary to defend them, but quite possible that we might remain neutral.
We are not quite sure what our ulterior agenda is meant to be, apart from the obvious fact that we desire to maintain peace in Europe, to maintain the balance of power, and to avoid any unwelcome British intervention in Europe closeted under the pretence of justice.
