[X] [ECONOMY] Focus on Rebuilding Sichuan's Agriculture.
[X] [ADMINISTRATION] Recreate Republican Institutions.
[X] [BUREAUCRACY] Attempt to Build a Republican Administration.
[X] [SICHUAN] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
-[X] [SICHUAN] Rely on NRA Forces.
[X] [GUIZHOU] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
-[X] [GUIZHOU] Rely on Liu Xiang's Forces.
[X] KMT - Revolutionary Group
[X] [ECONOMY] Focus on Rebuilding Sichuan's Agriculture.
[X] [ADMINISTRATION] Recreate Republican Institutions.
[X] [BUREAUCRACY] Attempt to Build a Republican Administration.
[X] [SICHUAN] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
-[X] [SICHUAN] Rely on NRA Forces.
[X] [GUIZHOU] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
-[X] [GUIZHOU] Rely on Liu Xiang's Forces.
[X] KMT - Mainline
[X] [ECONOMY] Focus on Rebuilding Sichuan's Agriculture.
[X] [ADMINISTRATION] Recreate Republican Institutions.
[X] [BUREAUCRACY] Attempt to Build a Republican Administration.
[X] [SICHUAN] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
-[X] [SICHUAN] Rely on NRA Forces.
[X] [GUIZHOU] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
-[X] [GUIZHOU] Rely on Liu Xiang's Forces.
[X] KMT - Mainline
[X] [ECONOMY] Focus on Rebuilding Sichuan's Agriculture.
[X] [ADMINISTRATION] Recreate Republican Institutions.
[X] [BUREAUCRACY] Attempt to Build a Republican Administration.
[X] [SICHUAN] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
-[X] [SICHUAN] Rely on NRA Forces.
[X] [GUIZHOU] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
-[X] [GUIZHOU] Rely on Liu Xiang's Forces.
[X] KMT - Revolutionary Group
[X] Plan Revolutionary Republican Rebuilding
-[X] [ECONOMY] Focus on Rebuilding Sichuan's Agriculture.
-[X] [ADMINISTRATION] Recreate Republican Institutions.
-[X] [BUREAUCRACY] Attempt to Build a Republican Administration.
--[X] [SICHUAN] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
--[X] [SICHUAN] Rely on NRA Forces.
-[X] [GUIZHOU] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
--[X] [GUIZHOU] Rely on Liu Xiang's Forces.
[X] [ECONOMY] Focus on Rebuilding Sichuan's Agriculture.
[X] [ADMINISTRATION] Recreate Republican Institutions.
[X] [BUREAUCRACY] Attempt to Build a Republican Administration.
[X] [SICHUAN] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
-[X] [SICHUAN] Rely on NRA Forces.
[X] [SICHUAN] Use the Military to Crackdown on Rebels.
-[X] [GUIZHOU] Rely on Liu Xiang's Forces.
What Remains of the Taiping.
The Qingming Festival of 1914 would be a muted one, less of a festival and more of a quiet, passing, event. The suffering of the former Taiping provinces would see little of the populace putting the effort into the often somber, but no less social connecting of the event, venerating their ancestor's graves every year.
Thankfully, however, the number of those that will be joining their ancestors this year will be far less than the previous one. The Republic's aid, mostly provided by the abundance of Zhili Province, would mean that the shortfall expected to hit the Western Provinces would be far less than expected, and yet still some would suffer greatly. Seeking to fortify the agricultural security of the province, preventing the possibility of a famine in the near future, Lanzhou would make clear that the order of the day would be to restore the great farmlands of the Sichuan Basin.
Much of the aid sent to Sichuan would be directed towards rural investments, finding their way into the hands of the pre-existing landed families and more broadly, landholders, ensuring that the fallow fields of the province would not be fallow for much longer. The common peasantry, the workforce of these landlords, would be enticed back once more to work for the vast farming estates of the comfortable landowning elite, with some slight improvements in comparison to their wages in the Taiping era.
Bar any significant changes to the system in the near future, the agricultural situation will remain stable, as fertile land begins to see new seeds planted once more.
Meanwhile, whilst the economic situation slowly begins to stabilize, the status of the former Taiping bureaucracies would come under heavy scrutiny from the new Republican regime. Dissatisfied with the obvious deficiencies and incompetence of the previous government's administration, Lanzhou would seek to dismantle the entire system wholesale, evicting and demolishing the old civil service established by the Taiping, as skeletal as it was by the end of the West China War. Generations of bureaucratic tradition, begun since the time of Hong Xiuquan himself, erased with a couple of rapid taps of a typewriter.
In its place, the Republic would seek to reconstruct the administrations of the newly-acquired provinces in the its own image, one dominated by KMT loyalists and more compatible to the centralizing program forwarded by the Party. With the old bureaucracies deemed too unreliable and too inept, a new generation of civil servants would have to be raised in order to fill the massive holes left within the newly-found administrations, now temporarily staffed by whatever bureaucrats could be scrounged up to meet the bare minimum of administrative duties in the new provinces. This will prove a problem in our controlling of the provinces, with our bureaucracy stretched thin to accommodate for this situation.
Thankfully, through newly-minted Governor of Sichuan, General Liu Xiang's personal connections with the educated elite of Sichuan and Guizhou, much of the new KMT bureaucracy will be able to meet their own manpower requirements, now staffed with literate men possessing local knowledge able to guide Republic policy in the correct direction on the ground, significantly bolstering our ranks and hopefully securing the province faster.
[Sichuan Food Crisis Resolved...] [Sichuan Bureaucracy Built by Turn 12 10]
[Guizhou Bureaucracy Built by Turn 15 12]
Like Chess Pieces on a Board
"I never thought you'd call on me for help, after all the good luck you've had so far."
The man spoke with a certain tone of sarcasm, one painfully obvious to Liu Xiang as he sipped from his gaiwan.
Liu Xiang inhaled deeply, now was not the time for anger.
"Thank you, sir, I'd never forget serving under your command, brilliant as it was."
The man snorted, "Cut the bullshit, Liu, you need my men, I've heard what the Lanzhou bastards intend to do," he took a hearty sip from his own gaiwan, Liu Xiang continuing to sport a practiced smile, "Clever, but of course, you'd have to be blind to not see it."
"Of course, so you understand?"
"Naturally. Zhang's dead, and your cousin's salivating at a chance to throw you out from your newly found throne himself. That leaves me, your old commander, dear old Xiong, to help clean up the mess you've found yourself in, correct?"
Liu Xiang could only manage a nod.
The man looked inside of his gaiwan for a moment, eyes turning upwards to meet Liu Xiang, the same faux-smile that the new Governor of Sichuan had been sporting since the very start of their meeting.
"I'll do it," he finished his tea in another gulp, "but good luck with that Governorship, I'm sure it'll be a long and stable rule."
God, Liu Xiang hated speaking to that man.
[Liu Xiang Gains 20,000 men.]
[Occupation of Sichuan and Guizhou Begins.]
Now to make sure that Liu Xiang is loyal to the KMT and the Legislature. Or the Sichuan governor considering that apparently there are intrigues to be had there.
Now to make sure that Liu Xiang is loyal to the KMT and the Legislature. Or the Sichuan governor considering that apparently there are intrigues to be had there.
I think that bridge has already been burnt with this turns decisions. Thankfully, we've not actually demobilized yet if those 20k extra troops he's acquired are for fighting against us.
I think that bridge has already been burnt with this turns decisions. Thankfully, we've not actually demobilized yet if those 20k extra troops he's acquired are for fighting against us.
Same reading here. Guess we're going to have to keep stationing NRA troops in Sichuan until we can find a way to either replace him or make him irrelevant.
For now, we focus on other things. I believe we have the Lanzhou reconstruction and Land Reform to look forward to.
I was going to bring that up but the idea wasn't fully formed in my head yet. Sending his troops to Guizhou to restore order + relying on local power brokers means he could very well easily take over the province on the sly. Then again, would we have been willing to reduce our already tenuous hold on Sichuan in exchange for Guizhou?
On the bright side, he doesn't currently have a backer, and any resources for his army or money still have to go through Republic hands. That can very much change though. It's worth keeping an eye on.
The beginning of Spring would not be welcomed with a celebratory mood amongst the armed wing of the revolution, a survival of yet another brutal winter, another year when the idea of the Republic has not died. The officers of the National Revolutionary Army would cheer as they had always had, including those constituting the professional soldiery of the military branch, cheering on the success of the Sichuan Campaign in spreading the revolution towards the oft neglected and ignored western territories of the Chinese nation.
Most of them hailing from the more well-off provinces of China, it was a mood shared by most, viewing the campaign as the beginnings of the importation of the prosperity of the coastal provinces into the inland empire that constituted the Sichuan Basin.
Yet they too would neglect to view their own men in the same manner.
Occupation duties would fall on the NRA's soldiery, as would be expected of any but the most insane persons. Reconstruction of the Sichuan and Guizhou territories would almost certainly include the dismantling of the feudal and semi-feudal systems of government enforced for over two millennia, sure to be faced with discontent and disapproval by the traditional local elites. A discontent that would have to be answered, albeit crudely, with the threat of government violence omnipresent.
Yet, the current NRA was not the professional and ideologically motivated force of the Jiachen Uprising, the core of the NRA, though still composed of the well-trained professionalism of the post-Jiachen years, would be diluted with newer ranks of conscripts. This was, naturally a consequence of the pressing need of mobilization during the West China War, with the mobilized troops having neither completed their full training, nor been put through the proper rigors of the political training that had completely immersed itself into the pre-existing officer corps and troops.
The economy on the homefront suffered some from the mobilization, though not to the severe extent that some had expected, much of the vacancies now being filled up by surplus labor from other provinces, namely Zhili, as a result of continued agricultural mechanization. Furthermore, with the threat of Taiping invasion no longer on the horizon, many of the conscripts had expected demobilization to take place rapidly afterwards, as was tradition for most conflicts between the Taiping and Qing in the previous century.
As such, when the order came down that mobilization was to persist into peacetime, and that the conscripted troops were to serve as garrisons in a land very much foreign to themselves for the foreseeable future, discontent would rapidly spread through the conscripted ranks, and some would begin to plot.
Such plotting would culminate into the short-lived Luzhou Rebellion, beginning on April 13th, precisely one week after the conclusion of the year's Qingming Festival. Elements of the 17th Division, garrisoned in Luzhou in Southern Sichuan, would announce their refusal to obey the orders of their NRA officers as long as they did not include the immediate demobilization of the division and its subsequent disbandment. NRA Officer Gu Zhutong, under the erroneous belief that the incident was an isolated one, would order other units of the 17th to march to suppress the rebellion, only to be faced himself by a revolt of the entire division itself.
Thankfully, the timely response of the 1st Division, located nearby, would see to it that the disorganized rebellion was rapidly put down with minimal losses, with the ringleaders arrested and the 17th ordered into their barracks and placed under heavy surveillance by the 1st Corps.
Suppression of most media sources has, luckily, meant that news of the rebellion has not spread out to the wider Sichuan territories yet, but it makes the need for an urgent solution to be required now, less it spiral into something altogether far dangerous for the Republic.
What is to be Done?
Regarding the Ringleaders.
[] [RINGLEADER] Hold a Military Tribunal
[] [RINGLEADER] Send Them to Prison.
[] [RINGLEADER] Quietly Agree to Their Demands.
This is, naturally, the normal way to deal with soldier mutinies, almost certainly guaranteeing a sentence of death by firing squad. This will place much public attention, however, on the incident, and may lead to similar incidents outside of Luzhou and the 17th Division.
With some discretion, we may be able to extricate the ringleaders and send them directly to a Republic-controlled prison without much fuss. However, the NRA will not be pleased at civilian intervention in such an internal military matter. And, should the knowledge of such an incident leak out to the press, the results could be disastrous...
The Lanzhou government could, of course, agree to the demands of the rebels, disbanding the 17th Division and returning them to their homes. However, this will naturally cause immense displeasure amongst NRA High Command, as well as encourage further copycats.
As this is a purely internal government incident, votes will not be based on legislative seats, but the sum total of votes and their faction's power.
Pick ONE Faction.
[] KMT - Mainline Each Vote counts as 1 Vote. [] KMT - Revolutionary Group Each Vote counts as 0.6 Votes. [] KMT - Independents Each Vote counts as 0.4 Votes.
Would normally vote for the first option but I can go for poking the bear to see how it reacts… if all goes well that second one seems the stealthiest option and thus the least likely to bring up copycat incidents, if it doesn't then there are also some benefits associated with us getting our butts couped.
However, the NRA will not be pleased at civilian intervention in such an internal military matter. And, should the knowledge of such an incident leak out to the press, the results could be disastrous...
I think we should just go with it. On the bright side, this might make military reform a bit easier with the NRA acting all heavy-handed depending on public outcry.
This incident does beg the question of when are we actually planning on demobilizing?
[X] [RINGLEADER] Hold a Military Tribunal [X] KMT - Mainline
Some bad PR but better than it potentially leaking to the press instead with the prison sentence plus we aren't getting anything past the military at this point so what's the point?
I dislike capital punishment as a rule, but the circumstances here are not exactly great for opposing it. Sigh. Fine. It's a military matter to be handled by the military, I suppose.
Well, I was hoping on having demobilization progress as reconstruction does but that would take quite a long time. I'm not too sure right now to be honest. Next turn perhaps, depending on what else happens this turn...
I'm hardly salivating for it? Just a lot of people have previously voiced that they don't like the party system and that would clear that stuff out of the way and return to internal factions. Literally "some benefits" as I wrote as opposed to total loss.
I'm with letting NRA have this one. That said, we'll have to demobilize as soon as the option comes up now (immediately next turn?).
On the "benefits" of NRA dictatorship - I've lost my confidence of the NRA since they agreed to the shittiest deal possible re:Sichuan. "Resolving Lanzhou's waffling" means jack shit when they pick the worst possible option.
Edit: I have to acknowledge my hypocrisy on this issue tho - my preferred gameplay would be KMT single party rule as long as civil war is ongoing lmao. I just prefer the quest aesthetic of KMT vanguard over NRA vanguard.
