Raleigh, North Carolina, United States of America, 8 August 1930
He wasn't much of a drinker, these days. Alcohol, anyways, ever since he learned he had more of a taste for soda than he ever did whiskey or beer.
That didn't stop him from going to the bar, though. Bars were just as much a place to drink as they were a place to talk, and his friend Henry was working a shift as a bartender right now.
"You know," he said to the friendly bartender, "Those uptimers ain't so smart as some people think."
"Smart enough to come up with all those medications you like, Joshua. Heck, they're probably the reason why your son doesn't have Polio, either."
"Yeah, I know, I know," Joshua groaned, before taking another sip of his soda. "And without them, I'd probably be a Hell of a lot worse person than I am right now. But you know what I always found weird about them?"
"Go on..." Now the bartender
had to hear this, and it was getting good. "I'm listening."
"I'm talking about all that wasted potential. Think about it. We have conmen, klansmen, lunatics, and all sorts of scum of the Earth who'll tell you what you want to hear for a pretty penny. But for all our problems, we didn't have the world's knowledge at our fingertips. They do. So what's their excuse?"
"Hell if I know," the bartender sighed. "Maybe it's not that they aren't smarter than us. If anything, they're just as dumb and prejudiced as we are."
"I wouldn't go that far, Henry" Joshua pointed out. "These Uptimers are a lot more tolerant of women and N- I mean, black people. Sorry. Still getting used to not using that, you know?"
Well, that's what they were told at the meeting with the Testers, anyways. He could still hear that passionate reverend telling the mixed-race crowd, "God doesn't discriminate, then why should you?!"
That wasn't all it took, of course. Joshua knew for himself that conversion wasn't a matter of just saying the magic words and winning people over. Sure, some religious people thought it worked like that, but those people were fools who watched too many movies.
He'd seen for himself that it was a whole journey. It had been for him.
He'd been part of the Klan, for Christ's sake! Sure, that had been over a decade ago, and he was still pretty embarrassed about it, but conversion was a journey for him.
A
very long journey that took a lot of time and even more patience from everyone in his newfound community, but he'd come out better for it.
Heck, the fact he was chatting with a Black man in a bar mostly full of Black people was a testament to that. That, and the fact that he was sort of
persona non grata among his former circle by virtue of A, Leaving the Klan and B, Joining the Testers.
"So I've been thinking, Henry," Joshua asked his fellow Tester. The bartender nodded, as if to tell him to go on. "If a racist goes to Heaven, how do you think they'd react if they saw a Black man, an Irishman, and an Asian standing there in line?"
"I'd think they'd think they were in Hell, Joshua," the bartender chuckled. "All of them."
"How so?"
"Well, the racist is going to have to live for all eternity knowing that Asians, Black people, and the Irish all go to Heaven, too."
"And what about the Asian, the Irishman, and the Black man? How's it Hell for them?"
"Oh, them?" Henry just smirked. "Well, they're stuck with the guy for all eternity who'll never stop complaining about it."
Peking University, Beijing, Hebei Province, Republic of China, 29 August 1930
"It's amazing," said Professor Tsai to his physics class, "About what a society can accomplish in a short period of time. To think that work had started on this, over fifteen years ago."
Which, if he was being honest, wasn't the entire truth. True, work the Circular Particle Collider (because physicists are absolutely
boring at naming things) had been started in around 1915, but it wasn't explicitly intended to serve as its actual function.
No, it was a hallmark of the corruption of the Modernization Era of the nascent Republic, back when the government would throw money and resources at projects left and right in the name of "Modernization," without much thought when it came to oversight.
This was one such project that was, in truth, designed to give a juicy contract to some Taiwanese construction company that had connections to Nanjing.
Add in two decades, a corruption probe, an economic boom, and the invention of plasma-based tunnel-boring machines, and you had the makings of the world's largest (and only) particle collider, with all sorts of happy contractors who had the decency to
actually do their job when they got rich off of a government contract.
"Now, the particle collider won't be ready for another few months, but it does have some promising results. On to our current subject: Tachyons. Who wants to tell me what a Tachyon is?"
One student raised her hand.
"Who wants to tell me what a Tachyon is that
isn't Miss Xie? Come now."
That took a few seconds, but eventually a teenaged boy raised his hand.
"Yes, Peng?"
"A Tachyon is a hypothetical particle that a;ways travels faster than light. Its existence is in violation of all known laws of physics."
"That it is," Professor Tsai confirmed. "Now, has there been any proof of Tachyons?"
Xie raised her hand again, but Tsai waited a few seconds in the hope that anyone who didn't answer half his questions knew the answer.
He was wrong.
"...Miss Xie."
"Weren't there readings that were consistent with tachyons during the Great Journey?" she asked. From how she talked, she sounded unsure for the first time in her life. "It's still up for debate, but from what little we have observed, it does seem to be similar to the diagrams we have, yes?"
"Yes, I suppose so," Tsai confirmed. "Though it isn't as if we can replicate the effect for the time being. Well, at least until the CPC finally starts running tests in a year or two."
Madison, Wisconsin, United States of America, 11 September 1930
"It is clear," said Senator Robert "Young Bob" La Follette to the listeners in the crowd and on public TV, "That our history has seen no equivalent of the United Nations or the League of Nations. While the Great War could be seen as an equivalent of the World Wars of the Lost History, unfortunately the world does not have the... political will to create such an international organization."
"And why do you think that," asked President Emeritus Birge, "Are there not several examples of international cooperation such as the Red Cross and Red Crescent?"
It was a rhetorical question, of course. International cooperation wasn't exactly a new concept, but the difference between the Red Cross and the United Nations was that the former was largely a humanitarian mission, while the latter had at least some trappings of a global government.
Birge knew that. La Follette knew that.
"There are several, I would say," the senator figured aloud. "Though there are religious concerns from the Revelationist Evangelical sects about the theological implications of a world government in any form, I believe that the failures of the UN and the League of Nations in the Lost History have discouraged people. To many, unfortunately, the UN and League of Nations are seen as ineffective at preventing global conflicts and atrocities such as Srebrenica, the Holocaust, and the Rwandan Genocide."
"I see..." said the former head of UW-Madison, "But what about a more cultural and educational-oriented organization? The UN, after all, did more than just peacekeeping in the Lost History. It also fostered cultural and educational growth through UNESCO, relief through UNICEF, and advanced healthcare through the World Health Organization. If such an organization were proposed with those goals in mind, would you support it?"
"I would," La Follette said without hesitation. "Just as I have supported the Historic Sites Act, as well as the Foreign Assistance Act, the formation of the Peace Corps former President Cox's orders, and the National Environmental Protection Act. If Congress were to pass legislation to found or join of such an organization, I would do everything in my power to see it through Congress, the White House, and the State Department."
"Would you propose such legislation yourself?" It was an obvious question, but it had to be asked for the sake of the conversation.
"Yes. However, I do think that we ought to start smaller, at first. Regional organizations such as the Pan-American Union, Paris Agreement, and the Nanjing Accord seem to be viable foundations on which we can build a truly global, cooperative organization."
Outside Managua International Airport, Managua, Nicaragua, 20 September 1930
Zhao Bolin had come a long way. Once an American national, he had been one of Beijing's greatest deep-cover assets in Taiwan. Be it industrial espionage, signals intelligence, or HUMINT (Human Intelligence), he had done it all in the service of the People's Republic.
It was that loyalty and dedication that gotten him sent back in time during the Great Journey, after which he would fall under the command of the upstart "Watcher." Truth be told, he didn't know much about her... him... or whoever they were. All he knew was that they had tasked him with keeping Mao alive, along with various other missions over the last twenty years.
That was why he was here, on what had been the mother of all examples of "Mission Creep." Because what had started as a simple operation to help the Mexicans arm General Sandino's rebels had now spiraled into himself holding an FIM-92 Stinger MANPADS (Man-Portable Air Defense System) while President Somoza fled the country in a Cessna private jet.
The very fact that he was even doing this was a testament to the mission's success, seeing that General Sandino had walked into the National Palace after a months-long rebellion that very day, aided by his Mexican "advisors" in practice and the PRC remnants in secret.
Still, the reality of his expanded mission had not been lost on Zhao:
Kill the Somozas as they flee the country, and Central America would take another step towards socialism.
So he breathed, peered through the sight, and aimed at the sole airplane in the sky. In spite of the darkness, it wasn't too hard to see its flashing lights or hear the roaring of the engines.
Once he heard the tone, all Zhao had to do was pull the trigger.
Ministry of Culture, Nanjing, Capital Autonomous Region, Republic of China, 10 October 1931
Shannon had thought that she'd left the days of ceremonies behind when she retired from the military to become an artist. She was never one for the spotlight, outside of the occasional fan convention Rachel had to push her to attend.
This was no exception, as her wife practically had to pull her teeth to get her to show up to her own ceremony.
"As Cultural Minister of the Republic of China, Minister Lai Pin-Yu said to her, "It is my honor to present you, Shannon Wu, with the Medal of Culture for your work promoting Chinese culture both at home and abroad. While many would write off manhua as a genre for children and young adults, it is clear that the spread of your work around the world has helped countless people, young and old, learn and understand our culture as well as our humanity."
Now, if Shannon was being completely honest, the Minister was probably biased. Back in 2020, Lai had become famous as the "Cosplaying Politician," as people on the internet called her. Heck, the Minister
still cosplayed at conventions despite pushing fifty and being the Minister of Culture of the progressive "Green-KMT" government.
But the facts were the facts, and people all over the world enjoyed reading her works, particularly the slice-of-live series she'd been working on the last couple years.
Okay, they weren't exactly
her works now that Gu Xin-yi was doing the writing, but the kid was a prodigy who could write better than Shannon could have ever hoped.
Plus, having a writer meant more time for artwork, and that was where Shannon truly shined. Between the two of them, as well as input from her ever-supportive family and surrogate family, her newest series
Uptime-Downtime had been a success both at home and abroad.
Even if she kept getting letters from Americans asking her when the next translation would come out.
Huliaipole, Yekaterinoslav Governorate, Russian Empire, 24 October 1930
"Progress is progress," Arshinov admitted, before looking at the latest shipment to come into the commune. "Watermelon from Kherson, cherries from Melitopol, and sugar beets from Odessa. All distributed according to the reforms."
"That's good," Makhno agreed, before looking at the stack of ledgers on his desk. "You'd think that in anarcho-communism, there'd be less bureaucracy without a government. Yet here we are, dealing with supply chains and paperwork."
"You were the one who said that logistics would be necessary to improve the average farmer's life, and it has! The quality and variety of food is greater than it's ever been, which puts another criticism to rest. Two, if you count the First Council's latest agreements on distribution and cooperation between the various communes."
"Not to mention," his mentor continued, "the labor cooperative that bought out the fertilizer plant over in Kyiv."
"That went through?" Arshinov nodded. It had been an issue, but the factory workers had gathered enough funds with the workers to effectively buy out the factory. "Well, it looks like we won't have to trade as much for fertilizer, anymore."
After all, the factory had to compensate the communes in some way, and we still have the issue of currency to work out.
"As well as a working example of our system in the industrial sector," the elder libertarian said with great excitement. "The French Model takes a few liberties compared to the rural commune, but those are probably necessary when you're working with industry."
"Alright then." The years (and by extension, sheer practicality) had turned Nestor Makhno into a more-pragmatic man. While he maintained his beliefs, he and Arshinov had learned firsthand that tangible results would be the best argument for anarcho-communism. "So, where does that leave us?"
"The First Council has received complaints from the workers in the fertilizer factory in Kyiv. While they are more than willing to trade fertilizer in exchange for the down payment on the factory and exchange food for fertilizer, the workers' council was pointed out that they are unable to have some of their needs met when it comes to non-agricultural purchases."
"In layman's terms?"
"The workers in the cities aligned with us are fine with trading food for fertilizer, but they can't buy medicine, fuel, or spare parts without money."
"Meaning we'll have to continue to use money for the time being?" Arshinov nodded. "I take it the Council came to the same conclusion?"
"More or less," his mentor figured. "The good news is that the Council has forwarded a motion to create a credit union. It should help with dealing with extra-communal transactions."
Hanoi, Tonkin, Republic of Indochina, 1 November 1930
Pan-Asianism could have been a dirty word. At least it would have, had things been different. In the Lost History, it was an ideal that was corrupted by Japanese ambition in the 20th century and Wolf Warrior Diplomacy in the 21st.
Neither of those two things existed right now. Sure, China and Japan had more weight to throw around, but the two had spent over a decade actively-working to avoid the same mistakes of the Lost History.
Japan had, almost literally, had the imperialism beaten out of them in the dual curbstomps that were the Battle of the East China Sea and the Manchurian Intervention. Any dreams of imperial hegemony had
literally died with the Katsura cabinet, and the new order that had risen from its (also-literal) ashes accepted it.
China was a different beast. While yes, Nanjing was well-aware of the fact that they were the strongest nation in the world in almost any sense, there was a near-pathological need to avoid anything that even
resembled the PRC that didn't involve building infrastructure.
While there was also long-term geopolitical strategy at play, as well as a realization that they would not always maintain the same advantages, Nanjing's insistence on being First Among Equals, rather than First Above All, could be attributed to Nanjing absorbing and incorporating Taipei's institutions and the people that came with it.
That was why all of these people were here today. Be it China, Japan, Korea, Indochina, Siam, Australia, Aotorea, Burma, Malaya, the Philippines, India, Nusantara, Russia, Iran, Afghanistan, or the Ottomans, the nations of the East were gathered here. "Pan-Asianism" for these delegates was more than simple hegemony.
It was more than anti-colonialism and military alliance, these days. It had to be, now that decolonization (in one form or another) had happened all over Asia and Oceania.
No, this conference would be a vision of the future for Asia, from technology to diplomacy to economics to infrastructure. The goals were bold, and every delegation had their own agenda.
China wanted infrastructure and resource supply chains strengthened, while India wanted to ensure that their growing industrial sector would not be drowned out by Chinese goods.
The Japanese wanted more technology-sharing agreements, while the Filipinos wanted investment in agriculture and fishing.
Now, none of these were necessarily mutually-exclusive, and every delegation agreed on a general sense of cooperation. Differences aside, they all
wanted it to work. The fact that more than just the Nanjing Accord were here was proof of that, even if Afghanistan and Iran were de-facto members at this point.
But the reason they were here in the first place was to work out all of the details of just what this, "Pan-Asian Cooperation" entailed.
Feng, Lei. On Counter-Insurgency Operations in Africa. Peking University Press, 1952.
CHAPTER 6: The Racial Dynamics of Post-Colonial Insurrection
In the first chapter, I describe the postwar African insurrection as a unique conflict in the wake of the Great War.
First of all, the conflict is the first in history to see a largely-decentralized enemy force that is united by ideology and racial tensions. Through them, we have the first multi-national operation between units under a unified command that will have units working with one another on joint operations.
The racial implications are what separate this conflict from any other post-Great War conflict. Although other post-Great War resistance movements in Oceania and Europe saw armed resistance in one form or another, this conflict is defined by the white supremacist sentiment that was fostered during the colonial era in Africa.
There are those who would argue that this conflict is an issue of economics or government control. These simple-minded people must be made to realize that economic anxiety or opposition to the post-colonial Majority Rule government are rooted in the white supremacist ideology that exists among the proponents of settler colonialism, its practitioners, and its defenders.
This sentiment of white supremacy from the Settler insurgent creates a sense of solidarity between the Asian soldier and the African citizen. The dynamics between the three are listed here:
Dynamics:
- The Settler insurrectionist sees the Asian soldier and the African citizen as beneath them, at best, and an enemy, at worst.
- The Asian soldier sees the Settler insurrectionist as a former oppressor and the African citizen as a kindred spirit through their shared opposition and history regarding Settler oppression.
- The African citizen sees the Settler insurrectionist as a former, present, and potentially future oppressor; the Asian soldier represents an ally against present and future oppression as well as a window to a future without Settler oppression.
Recommendations for Soldier's Behavior:
- Act with efficiency and proficiency in combat.
- Maintain a semblance of dignity within your means.
- Be courteous to all civilians you encounter.
- Compensate those whom you requisition supplies from.
- Treat the dead with respect and prompt burial.
- Act with politeness to all non-hostiles.
- Act charitably when there are sufficient resources and manpower.
- Apply these rules to African civilians and non-hostile Settlers civilians.
In doing so, the white supremacist argument is defanged in every sense. The white supremacist will ideally be defeated on the battlefield by superior training, equipment, and tactics, and off the battlefield by the constant refutation of every white supremacist trope and talking point by the soldiers in real time.
Many argue that these dynamics are oversimplified, but this thinking ignores the historical, racial, and social implications of white supremacist colonialism in Africa and Asia. Asia's colonial history provides the African citizen with an aspiration to strive towards, while Africa's more-recent colonial history provides the Asian soldier with a reminder of what they have freed themselves from, as well as what they must not become.
We win this conflict by rejecting white supremacy in all of its forms: by providing a vision of a life not dominated by racist ideology, by seeing a reminder of the evils of racist colonialism, and by proving the racist white supremacist wrong both on and off the battlefield.
