AG_AG
I love vegetarian food: it goes great with steak
- Location
- California
- Pronouns
- He/Him
It especially implies full on lore for this "Stangereal" type alternate reality.
Reds! A Revolutionary Timeline
- Thread starter Aelita
- Start date
- Timeline Post-1900 Users' Choice!
Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
- Location
- A haze of forgetfulness
- Pronouns
- She/Her
IRL the USA loves using "Nation X" or something similar as a stand in for the USSR/Russia/China/North Korea during wargames.
Last edited:
- Location
- The left-wing of the impossible
They're actually the most real part of this update
I haven't gotten around deciding all of what's changed with the concept, but it's essentially a fascist-adjacent continental European power conjured up to give some context and allow plausible deniability about opposing forces exercises, which might be seen as too escalatory if you're picking a real nation as your aggressor
Having a fake nation also gives more flexibility for fiddling with OPFOR's equipment and doctrine to reflect either expected advances on existing opposition, or to test possible weak-points in your own doctrine that might need ironing out/reinforcing - and, of course, it also likely offers a degree of CYA if the enemy does something very unexpected, as you weren't training with a direct analogue to them.
Miss XTC
2 kawaii 2 live 2 sugoi 2 die
- Location
- HelLA.
- Pronouns
- She/They
headcanon: the Trigonist accent is an unbelievably bad Afrikaner one.
I think RP means Recieved Pronunciation, AKA the fake middle class accent the BBC uses.
Which makes sense; why wouldn't you use fake Brits for the enemy when you're expecting real Brits?
- Location
- Armchair somewhere
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Immensely important question: since West Germany is split between the Comintern and AFS, and in OTL the West Germans under the USA adopted the American helmet while the East Germans adopted the Stalhelm. In this TL, will anyone keep the Stalhelm? Will the East Germans adopt the American or Soviet helmet instead? Will the West Germans go with the Brodie British helmet? These are important questions.
Mal-3
Fun Tyrant
Well, huh. TIL.
- Location
- Fort Worth, TX
In OTL they used Esperanto as the language.
- Location
- San Francisco, CA, United States
Honestly I could easily just see it being OTL but flipped since West Germany is run by Kaiserreich nostalgists TTL. Hell they might bring back the pickelhaube too, at least for ceremonial purposes.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I could see West Germans keeping the stalhelm seeing as the FBU/Entente was probably not doing well to support third nations army seeing as they had to fully equip two armies with nearly everything (uniforms, guns, support equipment, etc). Meanwhile the UASR just going 'haha war industry go brrrr' and just flooding the nascent Warsaw pact with surplus American equipment. So I could see East Germany adopting the American helmet.
vilani99
POSTING HAGUE INMATE
- Location
- the Salish Sea
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Oh god, an entire army of Americans doing Jerk van de Klerk bits
Makes a bit of sense, that the Trigonists would be the Not!FBU but openly fascist in this timeline as opposed to the Inexplicably Unified Nazbol Europe they were OTL.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Brothers No More
vilani99
POSTING HAGUE INMATE
- Location
- the Salish Sea
- Pronouns
- He/Him
A short little prose teaser/prologue for Part Two of the ANZAC piece Hawktana and I are working on.
Brothers No More
Wuhan; 8:49pm, 20 September, 1939
The air in the dining room was heavy with emotion. Fear, anticipation, desperation. Nerves.
The NRA's 5th Army had been annihilated by the Japanese, and now they and their warlord puppets were screaming up the Yangtze. The United Front had already evacuated Nanjing in July, and now they had to decamp from Wuhan. The War Council estimated they would enter the city's outskirts within 72 hours.
Jiang Jieshi had invited Kung Hsiang-hsi and his wife to dinner despite the ongoing evacuation efforts. "One last dinner in Wuhan," he had said. Many considered it the birthplace of the New China, and many - Jieshi and Hsiang-hsi included - found a great deal of nostalgia in the city. For all they knew it would be the last night any of them would spend in their governments first proper capital. Might as well make some time for family. At least that's what he had said.
Jieshi put his spoon down, and took a gulp of wine to steel himself.
"Hsiang-hsi, I know you have no love for Wang, or the Communists."
"Jieshi, you're being abnormally delicate" he chuckled. "I hate the bastards."
"Hmm." Jieshi smiled. Perhaps this might go better than planned. "As do I, and the social-imperialist sons of bitches they call our fucking allies. So I think it would be appropriate for me to extend you this courtesy, brother."
Hsieng-hsi stopped eating and looked at Jieshi, head tilted.
"I will not be following you or the government to Chongqing in the morning. I will be heading north."
Hsieng-hsi laughed in disbelief. "But you'd be walking straight into the jaws of -."
Jieshi held up a hand. "The Japanese, I know. I've- we've an agreement. I will take what and who I can from the Party and form a new government with Zhang and Liang in Beijing. I would appreciate it if you would accompany us"
Kung was quiet for a moment. When he spoke his voice was cold and hard as iron. "You damned traitor. You'd sell out to the bastards that have kept us from true unification?! Do you really think all their talk of 'pan asianism' and 'asiofuturism' means anything?" He never raised his voice, but there was rage there. Nothing was more dangerous than that controlled anger. "'Concordism' is just another cover for the same imperialism that has plagued us for the last century! One. Hundred. Years. We've spent the last decade and change fighting the likes of Zhang and Liang, and-"
'YOUR MOTHERS CUNT, DO YOU EVER STOP" Jiang thundered. "I have made my fucking choice. Wang is the traitor. He has sold our nation back to the Russians and the fucking Americans. Americans! I know you're fond of their missionaries and their schools. I don't fucking care. I don't care that they have a shiny new fucking flag or that they say that they're helping us. When your eyes are being plucked out, you can't tell if it's an Eagle or a Raven doing the deed. I don't really fucking care either way." He sighed, then put his head in his hands. "Better the devil we know. I have made my choice, you can follow me, or follow that fucking snake Wang and the social fucking imperialists. That is your decision."
Kung stood from his chair. "I will do you this last courtesy as your brother: Wang and the rest of the Committee will not not hear of this. But I tell you this: you are dead to me. After tonight, you are no brother to anyone in China, least of all me." He and his wife turned to leave. He had never raised his voice.
Jiang dismissed his wife, and sat in his chair for a moment. Then came the storm. Shouting curses, he threw his wine glass at the wall, stood, and straightened his uniform. He was expected in Beijing in a few days. If he wanted his "disappearance" to go smoothly, he would have to leave Wuhan within the next few hours.
Time to get to work, then.
Brothers No More
Wuhan; 8:49pm, 20 September, 1939
The air in the dining room was heavy with emotion. Fear, anticipation, desperation. Nerves.
The NRA's 5th Army had been annihilated by the Japanese, and now they and their warlord puppets were screaming up the Yangtze. The United Front had already evacuated Nanjing in July, and now they had to decamp from Wuhan. The War Council estimated they would enter the city's outskirts within 72 hours.
Jiang Jieshi had invited Kung Hsiang-hsi and his wife to dinner despite the ongoing evacuation efforts. "One last dinner in Wuhan," he had said. Many considered it the birthplace of the New China, and many - Jieshi and Hsiang-hsi included - found a great deal of nostalgia in the city. For all they knew it would be the last night any of them would spend in their governments first proper capital. Might as well make some time for family. At least that's what he had said.
Jieshi put his spoon down, and took a gulp of wine to steel himself.
"Hsiang-hsi, I know you have no love for Wang, or the Communists."
"Jieshi, you're being abnormally delicate" he chuckled. "I hate the bastards."
"Hmm." Jieshi smiled. Perhaps this might go better than planned. "As do I, and the social-imperialist sons of bitches they call our fucking allies. So I think it would be appropriate for me to extend you this courtesy, brother."
Hsieng-hsi stopped eating and looked at Jieshi, head tilted.
"I will not be following you or the government to Chongqing in the morning. I will be heading north."
Hsieng-hsi laughed in disbelief. "But you'd be walking straight into the jaws of -."
Jieshi held up a hand. "The Japanese, I know. I've- we've an agreement. I will take what and who I can from the Party and form a new government with Zhang and Liang in Beijing. I would appreciate it if you would accompany us"
Kung was quiet for a moment. When he spoke his voice was cold and hard as iron. "You damned traitor. You'd sell out to the bastards that have kept us from true unification?! Do you really think all their talk of 'pan asianism' and 'asiofuturism' means anything?" He never raised his voice, but there was rage there. Nothing was more dangerous than that controlled anger. "'Concordism' is just another cover for the same imperialism that has plagued us for the last century! One. Hundred. Years. We've spent the last decade and change fighting the likes of Zhang and Liang, and-"
'YOUR MOTHERS CUNT, DO YOU EVER STOP" Jiang thundered. "I have made my fucking choice. Wang is the traitor. He has sold our nation back to the Russians and the fucking Americans. Americans! I know you're fond of their missionaries and their schools. I don't fucking care. I don't care that they have a shiny new fucking flag or that they say that they're helping us. When your eyes are being plucked out, you can't tell if it's an Eagle or a Raven doing the deed. I don't really fucking care either way." He sighed, then put his head in his hands. "Better the devil we know. I have made my choice, you can follow me, or follow that fucking snake Wang and the social fucking imperialists. That is your decision."
Kung stood from his chair. "I will do you this last courtesy as your brother: Wang and the rest of the Committee will not not hear of this. But I tell you this: you are dead to me. After tonight, you are no brother to anyone in China, least of all me." He and his wife turned to leave. He had never raised his voice.
Jiang dismissed his wife, and sat in his chair for a moment. Then came the storm. Shouting curses, he threw his wine glass at the wall, stood, and straightened his uniform. He was expected in Beijing in a few days. If he wanted his "disappearance" to go smoothly, he would have to leave Wuhan within the next few hours.
Time to get to work, then.
- Pronouns
- he/him
Did Chiang actually swear like a sailor IRL?
We knew already that nukes have been used here and there over the years, but end of the alt-alt-hist post once again emphasis how ugly and risky ATL '80es were.
Someone for "Reds" universe reading about our Cuban Missile Crisis and Able Archer would maybe call OTL an "easy mode Cold War".
Someone for "Reds" universe reading about our Cuban Missile Crisis and Able Archer would maybe call OTL an "easy mode Cold War".
I don't think the reds would be calling OTL easy mode!
The Anzac Spirit Part 2
vilani99
POSTING HAGUE INMATE
- Location
- the Salish Sea
- Pronouns
- He/Him
The ANZAC spirit, the Second Fleet and the birth of modern Australasia - Part 2
Excerpts from "Year 9 Modern History Textbook" by the Australasian Department of Education (actually written by @Hawkatana and @vilani99 )
Red May and the Fall of Washington lit a fire under London, Canberra, and Wellington. A country that could be relied on to either remain neutral or friendly in international affairs and one of, if not the most powerful economy in the world, had gone over to the Bolsheviks and become intractably hostile to Britain and its world spanning empire effectively overnight. While agreements with the Japanese bought time for the Commonwealth, the British Empire had to build up military capacity in the southwestern part of the Pacific, and fast. The first of these measures was inducing the Australian and New Zealand governments to pass the National Defence Acts of 1933. The Acts created provisions for the reintroduction of conscription, and expanded the area within which conscripts from both countries could be deployed from their home territories to an area spanning from Hong Kong to New Zealand's Southern Island and from the Pitcairn Islands to Sri Lanka. In Australia, this transformed the part-time Militia and the small Permanent Military Force into the Australian Army, a military force planned to form up to 12 divisions in wartime, and an additional four brigades to the peacetime, five-division Army. New Zealand's army also expanded its wartime size from three brigades to five. In addition, the new de facto Dominion of the Commonwealth of the Philippines also transformed the Philippine Constabulary and Philippine Scouts into a more proper military force, the Philippine Commonwealth Defense Force (PCDF). Through these measures, Britain made it clear that it expected its Dominions to contribute to the utmost to the defence of the Commonwealth.
However, it became apparent by early 1934 that this military buildup, in addition to increased deployment of Indian and British troops, became too much for the already overstretched GHQ India to handle. It became clear to many military and civilian officials that if a war in the Pacific suddenly broke out, GHQ India's overstretched command structure may, at best, fray under the stress, and at worst, collapse entirely. In response, the Imperial General Staff created a new Command out of GHQ India, GHQ Pacific. Under the Commander-in-Chief Pacific based in Singapore, GHQ Pacific had operational authority over all Commonwealth army and air force activity east of Burma. Australasian, New Zealander and Philippine land forces were also organised under the Australia-New Zealand-Philippine Army Command (ANZPAC), with its headquarters in Manila, and was to provide the bulk of the soldiers in the region. Answering to ANZPAC was the I and II Australasian Army Corps (resurrected from the battlefields of the First World War) containing units from Australia and New Zealand. A notable part of this new Australasian Army Corps were the Australasian Divisions, built out of units taken from both countries. Additionally, the Philippines contributed the III Philippine Corps. The Pacific Dominions all gave considerable contributions to ANZPAC on paper but they also kept a considerable amount of their military strength at home. For example, the new Australian Army kept the prominent "First Five" of World War I's Australian Imperial Force and two of the "Expansion Divisions" at home as the I and II Australian Corps, answering directly to the Australian General Staff. New Zealand only contributed a few scant brigades to ANZPAC, with the New Zealand Division only transferred in 1941, with the stipulation that it remain at home until a declaration of war. The vast majority of the PCDF also remained at home, where it became riddled with Concordist sympathisers and infiltrators. Additionally, both the Australian and New Zealand armies did not reach their full paper strength until January 1942, a full six months after both Dominions began conscription and mobilisation after GHQ Pacific announced a state of emergency due to Japanese units beginning to take up positions on the border with Hong Kong.
Of the millions of Chinese that migrated to Australasia over the five years from 1937 to the Commonwealth's entry into the Second World War, none were more influential than HH Kung, TV Soong, and Liren Sun.
HH Kung was born in 1881 to a prominent family of bankers in Shanxi Province, where he attended a Mission School. After seeking an education at North China Union College, and navigating the complicated and dangerous world of North China in the lead up to and wake of the Boxer Rebellions, in 1901 he moved to the United States to attend Oberlin University, facing travails resulting from American anti-Asian racism (chiefly the Chinese Exclusion Act) on his journey to Ohio. While he continued his education after graduating from Oberlin, eventually attaining a M.A. in Economics from Yale, it was at Oberlin that he made the acquaintance that would forever alter his personal and political trajectory: Sun Yat-Sen.
Kung was broadly supportive of the 1911 Revolution, and served in an anti-government militia during the anti-Manchu uprisings in Shanxi. As the new Republic sputtered off into military dictatorship and warlordism, Kung emigrated to Japan. It was there that he once again met Sun Yat-Sen after he had been exiled after the Kuomintang's failed revolution against Yuan Shikai. It was also there that he met and married his second wife, Soong Ai-ling. After Yuan Shikai's death in 1916, the KMT returned from their exile, and Kung returned to his home in Shanxi, then left for the the United States, Britain, and France in 1918, cultivating both business and political connections. After his return in 1919, he split time between the family business of banking and his educational efforts, until 1922, when Sun Yat-Sen enlisted his help to rebuild the Kuomintang and save China from warlordism.
Over the next few years, Kung served as an intermediary between Sun and the various local leaders and warlords in the north. He eventually joined the KMT in Guangdong in 1924, and accompanied Sun north to Beijing. In 1925, he was witness to Sun Yat-Sen's brush with illness, his testament on 10 October, and his death on 24 November. While disquieted by his insistence on a United Front with the Communists, he fully supported the ascendancy of Wang Jingwei and Jiang Jieshi to the KMTs Duumvirate; they were after all his client and his brother-in-law.
Kung, while serving on many cabinet positions in the Wuhan Government (mostly in economics and development portfolios), soon fell in line with Jiang Jieshi's right-wing faction within the KMT, sharing his wariness of their erstwhile Soviet (and later American) allies. There was a shared fear that an overreliance on both the Soviet Union and America would result in a China that remains under domination by foreign powers in the guise of "Social-Imperialism". Kung, with the rest of the faction, remained in good graces with the rest of the party during Jiang's heyday up to the end of the Northern Expedition, but the campaign's stalling removed a good deal of their political capital. Eventually, Kung's insistence on continuing a program of "hedging bets" by maintaining crucial financial and military ties with the British Commonwealth and France led to a dramatic falling out with Wang and he was soon stripped of his ministerial portfolio in January 1938, his only remaining position being a seat on the KMT's Central Committee.
The next year, after the disastrous Battle of Shanghai and the rout from Nanjing to Wuhan to Chongqing, Jiang - Kung's last remaining ally - disappeared, only to reemerge weeks later at the head of Japan's client Reorganised Government as "Protector of the Chinese Nation."
Suddenly left adrift in the morass of Chinese politics, Kung faced a tough choice; face the Japanese with his hated political enemies, join the Social Imperialists tearing the country apart, or leave China. No stranger to exile, Kung opted for the latter, using his connections with British and French politicians and financiers to secure a place for himself and his capital in the diasporal Chinese communities rapidly forming in Britain's Pacific Dominions. When Kung landed at Sydney in January 1940, it was via the invitation of his protege and brother-in-law, TV Soong.
Born in Shanghai and educated at St Johns in Shanghai, Harvard, and Columbia University, TV Soong sat at the centre of KMT politics by ties of blood and marriage. By virtue of his sisters' marriages, he was brother-in-law to HH Kung, Sun Yat-Sen, and Jiang Jieshi, the three most powerful men in the "New China". Eventually joining the Wuhan Government, he worked for several posts in the nascent republic's economic infrastructure, typically under his brother-in-law HH Kung. Soong, alongside Kung, soon developed ties within British, French, and pre-revolutionary American finance, industry, and politics. These ties, along with his reaction to the Red May Revolution in America, lead to Soong's anti-communism, despite America joining the Soviet Union in backing the United Front between the KMT and CCP.
As the KMT's factionalism became intractable in the 1930s, he found himself aligned with neither his sister Soong Ching-ling's left-wing faction nor his brother-in-law Jiang Jieshi's right-wing faction. By attempting to remain aloft of the increasingly vicious internal party struggles, Soong soon found himself alienated from almost every major player within the KMT except for HH Kung, who, along with being his brother-in-law, had become something of a mentor. Soong's small centre faction soon saw itself being increasingly marginalised as the feuds between Jiang, Soong Ching-ling, and Wang Jingwei increasingly polarised Nanjing political circles, splitting the KMT into irreconcilable camps. Furthermore, the realities of the United Front with the Communist Party of China had led to the KMT aligning with Moscow and Deleon-Debs. Soong's deep anti-communism eventually led to a disastrous falling out with his increasingly communist-sympathetic sister, and the two had not been on speaking terms for almost a year when he finally left Nanjing for Hong Kong in 1935.
When the brushfire wars against the northern warlords began to escalate, Soong saw the writing on the wall, and took advantage of his connections with British and Australian financiers and moved to Hong Kong in 1935. After renewing his ties with his European associates, he decided to move to Sydney in 1937. From there, he began an energetic effort in organising the Chinese population in Australia, ingratiating himself (and them by proxy) with the Australian and New Zealand governments. He even expended the last of his political capital back in China to create an agency to route internal refugees from the conflicts in the north through Shanghai and to Australia and New Zealand. This would lead to a near tripling of the flow of immigrants when the war against Japan and the warlords escalated in 1939, creating an internal refugee crisis in China. All the while, he built a network of financial and political machinery centred around a core of businesses he had founded and bought in Sydney and Brisbane. Soong invested heavily in growing his businesses in Australia, and he was able to use the income from these investments to build a mid-sized banking empire. This, and his political ties, is what led to his appointment to senior positions in the Bank of England's Australia Office in Canberra[1] in 1941. Using his political and economic position, he, along with Kung after 1939, was able to start exercising a great deal of political influence within Australian politics. The greatest example of this was when he was able to secure Liren Sun's commission into the Australian Defence Force.
Liren Sun, "Australasia's Rommel," was born to an unremarkable family in an unremarkable village in Anhwei Province. He would rise to become one of the most remarkable officers in Australasian history, and one of the most remarkable military figures of Chinese birth.
In 1923, he moved to the United States to attend his senior year at Purdue University, and received a degree in Civil Engineering before enrolling at the Virginia Military Institute in 1924, graduating in 1927. After touring Europe and Japan as a military observer and attache, he returned to China and enlisted in the National Revolutionary Army. By 1930, he was made a colonel, a meteoric rise that spoke to Sun's military capability. However, he was in murkier waters politically. Sun was deeply mistrustful of the KMT-Left and their allies in the Communist Party of China, the Comintern and the Soviet Union. This initial mistrust soured into hatred when he learned of his beloved Virginia Military Academy being overrun by the Revolutionary Army during Red May - many of his friends amongst the faculty had declared for MacArthur and perished defending the school against Navy mutineers. This was further exacerbated when the new UASR began furnishing the KMT with aid in what he saw as an attempt to buy the Wuhan Government out from its people.
However, despite shared political sympathies, Sun despised Jiang even more than the leftists. The actual reason for this mutual dislike is largely unknown. Most historians believe that it is likely due to Sun's links to America and thus perceived "foreignness," as well as his meteoric rise, which Jiang might have perceived as a threat. Sun also likely resented Jiang's somewhat dictatorial control over Whampoa and what he saw as missteps in the curriculum. Sun was also staunchly opposed to the Japanese and their puppet warlords, despite their shared anti-communism. Whatever their reasons, there was not much love lost between the two, so Sun was shunted off to politically unimportant attache roles, and was not brought into Jiang's conspiracy against the Wuhan Government.
This was why Sun was abroad, working with ANZPAC in Manila when he learned of Wang Jingwei's ultimatum to the Japanese and the war's escalation into an all-consuming conflict that led to the fall of Shanghai, Nanjing, and Wuhan. As part of the last dregs of HH Kung's "hedging" program, the NRA had been continuing a pre-Red May exchange program with the Commonwealth. In this capacity, Sun had been seconded as an observer for the annual ANZPAC wargames in the jungles of Luzon. It was during these wargames when the young Colonel heard of his homeland falling into open war between what he considered to be two unacceptable governments. To Sun, both were backed by foreign powers with nothing like China's best interests at heart. The China that he knew and loved, it seemed, was already lost. That is, except for the diasporal lifeboat of refugees, supported by an exile splinter of the KMT that had lodged in Australasia and nurtured by TV Soong.
After extensive talks with ANZPAC HQ and a series of letters and telegrams between Singapore, Manila, Sydney, and Canberra, Sun came to a decision; he would leave the NRA behind - Jiang's and the Left's - and sign up with the Australian Defence Forces. The expanding military was in desperate need of field officers, and Sun was more than qualified. Sun accepted a commission as a brigadier in the Australian Defence Force in September of 1939, and moved to Sydney early the next year. This decision would take him to a brigade command in the 3rd Australasian Division "Meat Grinder," and as far afield as Malaya, Iran, the Levant, and eventually to Rome.
All three, by and large, represented the trend of the politically active Chinese who had emigrated to Australia and New Zealand in the 1930s: former KMT members or sympathisers who were firmly part of the party's anti-communist Right, while not having much love lost for either Japan's puppet warlords or Jiang Jieshi, politically or personally. This "centrist" segment of ex-KMT cadres would form the core of the grassroots support for what would be known as the "Kung-Soong Network".
The Network, which was started by TV Soong and was supercharged by HH Kung's political and monetary capital in 1939, would quickly make its imprint on the fabric of life across Australasia. Kung had made a name for himself in governing China, and quickly became a notable in Sydney, Canberra, and Wellington society and politics. Kung and Soong had initially discussed the possibility of creating a KMT-in-exile and a "Third Government" for the Republic of China in Australia but this was ultimately scrapped due to most of the potential membership in the Chinese community in Australia and New Zealand intending to remain as immigrants. The final nail in the proposal's coffin came in 1942 with the entry of the Commonwealth into the war against Japan. Being co-belligerents with the Wuhan Government made hosting, let alone recognizing, a pretender government politically infeasible for the Commonwealth.
Without that possibility, the Kung-Soong Network concentrated into building a powerful political lobbying organisation to represent the interests of the rapidly growing East Asian community in Australia and New Zealand. This political machinery was put into great use by furnishing Kung and Soong's political allies with donations and personnel. The Network would be brought to bear against racist local officials and business owners, communist agitators, anti-war activists, and anyone else Kung and Soong saw as enemies or even potential enemies. After arriving in Sydney in 1940, Brigadier Liren Sun would become the Network's man in the military, lending them credence when lobbying on military issues. The activities of dignitaries like Kung, Soong, and Sun would spread the influence of Tridemism [2] within the halls of Australian and New Zealander power, and it was the Kung-Soong Network that would form the core of the National Solidarity Party after the war and unification.
When the war came to the southwest Pacific in 1942, it was not this war that was expected. Rather than a war against Communist America, the enemy was Concordist Japan. In Insulindia and Mindanao, the Japanese exploited their agreements with the Dutch and the British to foster fifth columns, enabling a lightning campaign across the region when the war began. Manila fell within days of Japanese landings due to KALIBAPI uprisings. The Dutch were expelled from their holdings and were replaced by local collaborators in a single day in a breathtaking coup. However, the most fighting that the Japanese saw in those first few months was not in these campaigns but in Malaya and in Indochina, with Malaya considered to be the most strategically important. Yasuhito knew that taking or isolating Singapore and thus securing the Straits of Malacca would effectively shut the Entente out of the theatre, giving the Japanese a free hand to consolidate their new holdings and press the advantage. The task of making this a reality was given to Yamashita Tomoyuki and the 25th Army.
After landing at ports on the Thai side of the border, and establishing beachheads at Alor Setar and Kota Bharu, the 25th Army began its march down the Malayan Peninsula and towards Singapore. Facing them was the 11th Indian Division, the 51st British Infantry Brigade, and three divisions of the I Australasian Army Corps. While the Commonwealth Forces were, on paper, numerically superior, they had a few disadvantages. While the troops stationed in Malaya had trained for jungle fighting, their training had been a rough coverage of the basics. The Japanese had been extensively drilled on Formosa since 1941, creating probably the best jungle fighters on Earth. Additionally, the three divisions of the 25th Army had been in China until they began their jungle training, creating a core of hardened veterans compared to the relatively green Commonwealth troops. This, combined with the use of bicycles to increase march speeds, allowed for the Japanese to punch well above their weight in the Malayan Campaign. Finally, Pacific GHQ found itself far from the top of the Imperial General Staff's priority list after 1940, as the Imperial General Staff began to prepare to fight a war in Europe. As such, the local air forces were considerably depleted and out of date, and while the Japanese only had enough tanks in Malaya to form a single brigade, the Commonwealth had none. This resulted in the Japanese attaining air superiority within the first two weeks of the campaign. Within a month, the bulk of I AAC had been isolated in Malacca as the Japanese corralled the rest of the Commonwealth forces into Singapore and began to set up siege works. While two of I AAC's divisions managed to evacuate back to Australia and be replaced by fresh Indian troops - thanks to a bloody but successful days-long rearguard action on the part of the 3rd Australasian Division. Outside of Malacca, the Commonwealth forces in Malaya were dead, captured, or isolated in Singapore. Only the destruction of the bridges and some ingenious fortification of the city prevented it from falling. The most notable of this was the concreting of the battlecruiser HMS Repulse into HMNB Singapore's dry dock - where she remains to this day - to act as an impromptu bunker and shore battery. Despite years of brutal siege, Singapore remained steadfast throughout the war.
The military disasters that befell the Commonwealth in 1942 made the existing theatre command system untenable. Singapore, and GHQ Pacific, was cut off from in-theatre Commonwealth forces by IJA siegeworks and an IJN blockade. The Philippines and most of the rest of the new Entente's Pacific holdings were now in the hands of Concordist Japan and its client regimes. ANZPAC had been effectively made ineffective within a few months of fighting. As such, a total reorganisation of the command structure was undertaken by the New Zealand and Australian governments, with London's approval. Australian, New Zealand, and the few remaining Indian, British, and Philippine army units in the theatre would be placed under Australia-New Zealand Army Command, with General Sir Thomas Blamey as CinC. Taking its name from the old colloquial term for the Australasian Army Corps of the last war, ANZAC would be a joint command with responsibility shared between the two sister Dominion governments and the Philippine Government-in-Exile. While naval operations remained in the hands of the Entente Admiralty, all Commonwealth land forces in the Southwest Pacific would fall under ANZAC's operational purview. Along with the Australasian General Staff Committee and the Joint War Production Committee, it would be among the first true shared organisations between the two nations, and would form the genesis of the modern Australasian Defence Forces. Most notably, and unlike Pacific GHQ, ANZAC was, by and large, led and staffed by Australians and New Zealanders. While British officers held positions in ANZAC's staff (and the Entente representative to the AGSC was its Chairman), it was clear that London was placing the war in the southwest Pacific in the hands of its farthest flung Dominions.
The tenacity, skill, and zeal of ANZAC, and the soldiers of the Australian and New Zealand Defence Forces, during both the First and Second World Wars, has been colloquially referred to as the "Anzac Spirit." Both Australia and New Zealand would quietly take pride in this to this day, and it serves as the bedrock of Australasian national identity. Even to this day, the men and women of the Australasian Defense Forces are unofficially known as "the Anzacs".
On the homefront, the declaration of war was neither unwelcome nor unexpected. Australia and New Zealand were quick to begin full-scale mobilisation efforts; with factories in Sydney, Melbourne, and Auckland, as well as new factories in Newcastle, Geelong, and other countless new hives of industry burning bright with the smelting and assembly of weapons, tanks and other equipment, and their armies received many new volunteers at recruitment offices. On the other hand, the declaration of the Franco-British Union on the 1st of March brought a question to the forefront of the minds of people and politicians alike on both sides of the Tasman: what should the pace of unification be? The 1938 Treaty of Wellington had already made Australasian unification an inevitability, but it had been four years since its ratification, with the pace of integration becoming excruciatingly slow. The realities of the Commonwealth entering a second global war in thirty years likely meant that the timeline for unification would slow down even further. Further discussions of the topic, however, would be quietly shelved for the foreseeable future so the war effort could be focused on.
While opinion in Canberra and Wellington was mixed - many wanted to contribute to as many fronts as possible to show their countries' dedication to the new Entente and the Commonwealth - the leadership of both Dominions and the Entente Chiefs of Staff Committee saw the Empire of Japan and its new client states as the greater threat and best use for the troops at ANZAC's disposal. The exception was a single token division: the 3rd Australasian Division "Meatgrinder '' - having earned a divisional sobriquet in Malaya - left Australia for West Asia and the fighting in the Levant in October 1942. With them was Brigadier Liren Sun and his 2nd Brigade, consisting mostly of Chinese and Daehanese immigrant volunteers from the cities of Australia, eager to show their loyalty to their new homes. They would not return for nearly three years, when the war had taken them all the way to Rome.
While the Pacific Dominions spent the first year of the war on the defensive, they would begin counter-offensives in early 1943. They would begin pushing into the Co-Prosperity Sphere at New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, and eventually throughout insular Southeast Asia, with help from Royal Navy ships from across the Commonwealth and American Red Navy submariners. The Pacific War had begun, and it would not end until either the Co-Prosperity Sphere or the United Nations saw the other broken and defeated.
[1] With the monetary policy of the Dominions remaining with London after TTL's Balmoral Declaration, it follows that the Bank of England would maintain local offices in the Dominions to coordinate policy.
[2] Referring to the ideology based on Sun Yat-sen's Three Principles of the People.
Excerpts from "Year 9 Modern History Textbook" by the Australasian Department of Education (actually written by @Hawkatana and @vilani99 )
Red May and the Fall of Washington lit a fire under London, Canberra, and Wellington. A country that could be relied on to either remain neutral or friendly in international affairs and one of, if not the most powerful economy in the world, had gone over to the Bolsheviks and become intractably hostile to Britain and its world spanning empire effectively overnight. While agreements with the Japanese bought time for the Commonwealth, the British Empire had to build up military capacity in the southwestern part of the Pacific, and fast. The first of these measures was inducing the Australian and New Zealand governments to pass the National Defence Acts of 1933. The Acts created provisions for the reintroduction of conscription, and expanded the area within which conscripts from both countries could be deployed from their home territories to an area spanning from Hong Kong to New Zealand's Southern Island and from the Pitcairn Islands to Sri Lanka. In Australia, this transformed the part-time Militia and the small Permanent Military Force into the Australian Army, a military force planned to form up to 12 divisions in wartime, and an additional four brigades to the peacetime, five-division Army. New Zealand's army also expanded its wartime size from three brigades to five. In addition, the new de facto Dominion of the Commonwealth of the Philippines also transformed the Philippine Constabulary and Philippine Scouts into a more proper military force, the Philippine Commonwealth Defense Force (PCDF). Through these measures, Britain made it clear that it expected its Dominions to contribute to the utmost to the defence of the Commonwealth.
However, it became apparent by early 1934 that this military buildup, in addition to increased deployment of Indian and British troops, became too much for the already overstretched GHQ India to handle. It became clear to many military and civilian officials that if a war in the Pacific suddenly broke out, GHQ India's overstretched command structure may, at best, fray under the stress, and at worst, collapse entirely. In response, the Imperial General Staff created a new Command out of GHQ India, GHQ Pacific. Under the Commander-in-Chief Pacific based in Singapore, GHQ Pacific had operational authority over all Commonwealth army and air force activity east of Burma. Australasian, New Zealander and Philippine land forces were also organised under the Australia-New Zealand-Philippine Army Command (ANZPAC), with its headquarters in Manila, and was to provide the bulk of the soldiers in the region. Answering to ANZPAC was the I and II Australasian Army Corps (resurrected from the battlefields of the First World War) containing units from Australia and New Zealand. A notable part of this new Australasian Army Corps were the Australasian Divisions, built out of units taken from both countries. Additionally, the Philippines contributed the III Philippine Corps. The Pacific Dominions all gave considerable contributions to ANZPAC on paper but they also kept a considerable amount of their military strength at home. For example, the new Australian Army kept the prominent "First Five" of World War I's Australian Imperial Force and two of the "Expansion Divisions" at home as the I and II Australian Corps, answering directly to the Australian General Staff. New Zealand only contributed a few scant brigades to ANZPAC, with the New Zealand Division only transferred in 1941, with the stipulation that it remain at home until a declaration of war. The vast majority of the PCDF also remained at home, where it became riddled with Concordist sympathisers and infiltrators. Additionally, both the Australian and New Zealand armies did not reach their full paper strength until January 1942, a full six months after both Dominions began conscription and mobilisation after GHQ Pacific announced a state of emergency due to Japanese units beginning to take up positions on the border with Hong Kong.
Of the millions of Chinese that migrated to Australasia over the five years from 1937 to the Commonwealth's entry into the Second World War, none were more influential than HH Kung, TV Soong, and Liren Sun.
HH Kung was born in 1881 to a prominent family of bankers in Shanxi Province, where he attended a Mission School. After seeking an education at North China Union College, and navigating the complicated and dangerous world of North China in the lead up to and wake of the Boxer Rebellions, in 1901 he moved to the United States to attend Oberlin University, facing travails resulting from American anti-Asian racism (chiefly the Chinese Exclusion Act) on his journey to Ohio. While he continued his education after graduating from Oberlin, eventually attaining a M.A. in Economics from Yale, it was at Oberlin that he made the acquaintance that would forever alter his personal and political trajectory: Sun Yat-Sen.
Kung was broadly supportive of the 1911 Revolution, and served in an anti-government militia during the anti-Manchu uprisings in Shanxi. As the new Republic sputtered off into military dictatorship and warlordism, Kung emigrated to Japan. It was there that he once again met Sun Yat-Sen after he had been exiled after the Kuomintang's failed revolution against Yuan Shikai. It was also there that he met and married his second wife, Soong Ai-ling. After Yuan Shikai's death in 1916, the KMT returned from their exile, and Kung returned to his home in Shanxi, then left for the the United States, Britain, and France in 1918, cultivating both business and political connections. After his return in 1919, he split time between the family business of banking and his educational efforts, until 1922, when Sun Yat-Sen enlisted his help to rebuild the Kuomintang and save China from warlordism.
Over the next few years, Kung served as an intermediary between Sun and the various local leaders and warlords in the north. He eventually joined the KMT in Guangdong in 1924, and accompanied Sun north to Beijing. In 1925, he was witness to Sun Yat-Sen's brush with illness, his testament on 10 October, and his death on 24 November. While disquieted by his insistence on a United Front with the Communists, he fully supported the ascendancy of Wang Jingwei and Jiang Jieshi to the KMTs Duumvirate; they were after all his client and his brother-in-law.
Kung, while serving on many cabinet positions in the Wuhan Government (mostly in economics and development portfolios), soon fell in line with Jiang Jieshi's right-wing faction within the KMT, sharing his wariness of their erstwhile Soviet (and later American) allies. There was a shared fear that an overreliance on both the Soviet Union and America would result in a China that remains under domination by foreign powers in the guise of "Social-Imperialism". Kung, with the rest of the faction, remained in good graces with the rest of the party during Jiang's heyday up to the end of the Northern Expedition, but the campaign's stalling removed a good deal of their political capital. Eventually, Kung's insistence on continuing a program of "hedging bets" by maintaining crucial financial and military ties with the British Commonwealth and France led to a dramatic falling out with Wang and he was soon stripped of his ministerial portfolio in January 1938, his only remaining position being a seat on the KMT's Central Committee.
The next year, after the disastrous Battle of Shanghai and the rout from Nanjing to Wuhan to Chongqing, Jiang - Kung's last remaining ally - disappeared, only to reemerge weeks later at the head of Japan's client Reorganised Government as "Protector of the Chinese Nation."
Suddenly left adrift in the morass of Chinese politics, Kung faced a tough choice; face the Japanese with his hated political enemies, join the Social Imperialists tearing the country apart, or leave China. No stranger to exile, Kung opted for the latter, using his connections with British and French politicians and financiers to secure a place for himself and his capital in the diasporal Chinese communities rapidly forming in Britain's Pacific Dominions. When Kung landed at Sydney in January 1940, it was via the invitation of his protege and brother-in-law, TV Soong.
Born in Shanghai and educated at St Johns in Shanghai, Harvard, and Columbia University, TV Soong sat at the centre of KMT politics by ties of blood and marriage. By virtue of his sisters' marriages, he was brother-in-law to HH Kung, Sun Yat-Sen, and Jiang Jieshi, the three most powerful men in the "New China". Eventually joining the Wuhan Government, he worked for several posts in the nascent republic's economic infrastructure, typically under his brother-in-law HH Kung. Soong, alongside Kung, soon developed ties within British, French, and pre-revolutionary American finance, industry, and politics. These ties, along with his reaction to the Red May Revolution in America, lead to Soong's anti-communism, despite America joining the Soviet Union in backing the United Front between the KMT and CCP.
As the KMT's factionalism became intractable in the 1930s, he found himself aligned with neither his sister Soong Ching-ling's left-wing faction nor his brother-in-law Jiang Jieshi's right-wing faction. By attempting to remain aloft of the increasingly vicious internal party struggles, Soong soon found himself alienated from almost every major player within the KMT except for HH Kung, who, along with being his brother-in-law, had become something of a mentor. Soong's small centre faction soon saw itself being increasingly marginalised as the feuds between Jiang, Soong Ching-ling, and Wang Jingwei increasingly polarised Nanjing political circles, splitting the KMT into irreconcilable camps. Furthermore, the realities of the United Front with the Communist Party of China had led to the KMT aligning with Moscow and Deleon-Debs. Soong's deep anti-communism eventually led to a disastrous falling out with his increasingly communist-sympathetic sister, and the two had not been on speaking terms for almost a year when he finally left Nanjing for Hong Kong in 1935.
When the brushfire wars against the northern warlords began to escalate, Soong saw the writing on the wall, and took advantage of his connections with British and Australian financiers and moved to Hong Kong in 1935. After renewing his ties with his European associates, he decided to move to Sydney in 1937. From there, he began an energetic effort in organising the Chinese population in Australia, ingratiating himself (and them by proxy) with the Australian and New Zealand governments. He even expended the last of his political capital back in China to create an agency to route internal refugees from the conflicts in the north through Shanghai and to Australia and New Zealand. This would lead to a near tripling of the flow of immigrants when the war against Japan and the warlords escalated in 1939, creating an internal refugee crisis in China. All the while, he built a network of financial and political machinery centred around a core of businesses he had founded and bought in Sydney and Brisbane. Soong invested heavily in growing his businesses in Australia, and he was able to use the income from these investments to build a mid-sized banking empire. This, and his political ties, is what led to his appointment to senior positions in the Bank of England's Australia Office in Canberra[1] in 1941. Using his political and economic position, he, along with Kung after 1939, was able to start exercising a great deal of political influence within Australian politics. The greatest example of this was when he was able to secure Liren Sun's commission into the Australian Defence Force.
Liren Sun, "Australasia's Rommel," was born to an unremarkable family in an unremarkable village in Anhwei Province. He would rise to become one of the most remarkable officers in Australasian history, and one of the most remarkable military figures of Chinese birth.
In 1923, he moved to the United States to attend his senior year at Purdue University, and received a degree in Civil Engineering before enrolling at the Virginia Military Institute in 1924, graduating in 1927. After touring Europe and Japan as a military observer and attache, he returned to China and enlisted in the National Revolutionary Army. By 1930, he was made a colonel, a meteoric rise that spoke to Sun's military capability. However, he was in murkier waters politically. Sun was deeply mistrustful of the KMT-Left and their allies in the Communist Party of China, the Comintern and the Soviet Union. This initial mistrust soured into hatred when he learned of his beloved Virginia Military Academy being overrun by the Revolutionary Army during Red May - many of his friends amongst the faculty had declared for MacArthur and perished defending the school against Navy mutineers. This was further exacerbated when the new UASR began furnishing the KMT with aid in what he saw as an attempt to buy the Wuhan Government out from its people.
However, despite shared political sympathies, Sun despised Jiang even more than the leftists. The actual reason for this mutual dislike is largely unknown. Most historians believe that it is likely due to Sun's links to America and thus perceived "foreignness," as well as his meteoric rise, which Jiang might have perceived as a threat. Sun also likely resented Jiang's somewhat dictatorial control over Whampoa and what he saw as missteps in the curriculum. Sun was also staunchly opposed to the Japanese and their puppet warlords, despite their shared anti-communism. Whatever their reasons, there was not much love lost between the two, so Sun was shunted off to politically unimportant attache roles, and was not brought into Jiang's conspiracy against the Wuhan Government.
This was why Sun was abroad, working with ANZPAC in Manila when he learned of Wang Jingwei's ultimatum to the Japanese and the war's escalation into an all-consuming conflict that led to the fall of Shanghai, Nanjing, and Wuhan. As part of the last dregs of HH Kung's "hedging" program, the NRA had been continuing a pre-Red May exchange program with the Commonwealth. In this capacity, Sun had been seconded as an observer for the annual ANZPAC wargames in the jungles of Luzon. It was during these wargames when the young Colonel heard of his homeland falling into open war between what he considered to be two unacceptable governments. To Sun, both were backed by foreign powers with nothing like China's best interests at heart. The China that he knew and loved, it seemed, was already lost. That is, except for the diasporal lifeboat of refugees, supported by an exile splinter of the KMT that had lodged in Australasia and nurtured by TV Soong.
After extensive talks with ANZPAC HQ and a series of letters and telegrams between Singapore, Manila, Sydney, and Canberra, Sun came to a decision; he would leave the NRA behind - Jiang's and the Left's - and sign up with the Australian Defence Forces. The expanding military was in desperate need of field officers, and Sun was more than qualified. Sun accepted a commission as a brigadier in the Australian Defence Force in September of 1939, and moved to Sydney early the next year. This decision would take him to a brigade command in the 3rd Australasian Division "Meat Grinder," and as far afield as Malaya, Iran, the Levant, and eventually to Rome.
All three, by and large, represented the trend of the politically active Chinese who had emigrated to Australia and New Zealand in the 1930s: former KMT members or sympathisers who were firmly part of the party's anti-communist Right, while not having much love lost for either Japan's puppet warlords or Jiang Jieshi, politically or personally. This "centrist" segment of ex-KMT cadres would form the core of the grassroots support for what would be known as the "Kung-Soong Network".
The Network, which was started by TV Soong and was supercharged by HH Kung's political and monetary capital in 1939, would quickly make its imprint on the fabric of life across Australasia. Kung had made a name for himself in governing China, and quickly became a notable in Sydney, Canberra, and Wellington society and politics. Kung and Soong had initially discussed the possibility of creating a KMT-in-exile and a "Third Government" for the Republic of China in Australia but this was ultimately scrapped due to most of the potential membership in the Chinese community in Australia and New Zealand intending to remain as immigrants. The final nail in the proposal's coffin came in 1942 with the entry of the Commonwealth into the war against Japan. Being co-belligerents with the Wuhan Government made hosting, let alone recognizing, a pretender government politically infeasible for the Commonwealth.
Without that possibility, the Kung-Soong Network concentrated into building a powerful political lobbying organisation to represent the interests of the rapidly growing East Asian community in Australia and New Zealand. This political machinery was put into great use by furnishing Kung and Soong's political allies with donations and personnel. The Network would be brought to bear against racist local officials and business owners, communist agitators, anti-war activists, and anyone else Kung and Soong saw as enemies or even potential enemies. After arriving in Sydney in 1940, Brigadier Liren Sun would become the Network's man in the military, lending them credence when lobbying on military issues. The activities of dignitaries like Kung, Soong, and Sun would spread the influence of Tridemism [2] within the halls of Australian and New Zealander power, and it was the Kung-Soong Network that would form the core of the National Solidarity Party after the war and unification.
When the war came to the southwest Pacific in 1942, it was not this war that was expected. Rather than a war against Communist America, the enemy was Concordist Japan. In Insulindia and Mindanao, the Japanese exploited their agreements with the Dutch and the British to foster fifth columns, enabling a lightning campaign across the region when the war began. Manila fell within days of Japanese landings due to KALIBAPI uprisings. The Dutch were expelled from their holdings and were replaced by local collaborators in a single day in a breathtaking coup. However, the most fighting that the Japanese saw in those first few months was not in these campaigns but in Malaya and in Indochina, with Malaya considered to be the most strategically important. Yasuhito knew that taking or isolating Singapore and thus securing the Straits of Malacca would effectively shut the Entente out of the theatre, giving the Japanese a free hand to consolidate their new holdings and press the advantage. The task of making this a reality was given to Yamashita Tomoyuki and the 25th Army.
After landing at ports on the Thai side of the border, and establishing beachheads at Alor Setar and Kota Bharu, the 25th Army began its march down the Malayan Peninsula and towards Singapore. Facing them was the 11th Indian Division, the 51st British Infantry Brigade, and three divisions of the I Australasian Army Corps. While the Commonwealth Forces were, on paper, numerically superior, they had a few disadvantages. While the troops stationed in Malaya had trained for jungle fighting, their training had been a rough coverage of the basics. The Japanese had been extensively drilled on Formosa since 1941, creating probably the best jungle fighters on Earth. Additionally, the three divisions of the 25th Army had been in China until they began their jungle training, creating a core of hardened veterans compared to the relatively green Commonwealth troops. This, combined with the use of bicycles to increase march speeds, allowed for the Japanese to punch well above their weight in the Malayan Campaign. Finally, Pacific GHQ found itself far from the top of the Imperial General Staff's priority list after 1940, as the Imperial General Staff began to prepare to fight a war in Europe. As such, the local air forces were considerably depleted and out of date, and while the Japanese only had enough tanks in Malaya to form a single brigade, the Commonwealth had none. This resulted in the Japanese attaining air superiority within the first two weeks of the campaign. Within a month, the bulk of I AAC had been isolated in Malacca as the Japanese corralled the rest of the Commonwealth forces into Singapore and began to set up siege works. While two of I AAC's divisions managed to evacuate back to Australia and be replaced by fresh Indian troops - thanks to a bloody but successful days-long rearguard action on the part of the 3rd Australasian Division. Outside of Malacca, the Commonwealth forces in Malaya were dead, captured, or isolated in Singapore. Only the destruction of the bridges and some ingenious fortification of the city prevented it from falling. The most notable of this was the concreting of the battlecruiser HMS Repulse into HMNB Singapore's dry dock - where she remains to this day - to act as an impromptu bunker and shore battery. Despite years of brutal siege, Singapore remained steadfast throughout the war.
The military disasters that befell the Commonwealth in 1942 made the existing theatre command system untenable. Singapore, and GHQ Pacific, was cut off from in-theatre Commonwealth forces by IJA siegeworks and an IJN blockade. The Philippines and most of the rest of the new Entente's Pacific holdings were now in the hands of Concordist Japan and its client regimes. ANZPAC had been effectively made ineffective within a few months of fighting. As such, a total reorganisation of the command structure was undertaken by the New Zealand and Australian governments, with London's approval. Australian, New Zealand, and the few remaining Indian, British, and Philippine army units in the theatre would be placed under Australia-New Zealand Army Command, with General Sir Thomas Blamey as CinC. Taking its name from the old colloquial term for the Australasian Army Corps of the last war, ANZAC would be a joint command with responsibility shared between the two sister Dominion governments and the Philippine Government-in-Exile. While naval operations remained in the hands of the Entente Admiralty, all Commonwealth land forces in the Southwest Pacific would fall under ANZAC's operational purview. Along with the Australasian General Staff Committee and the Joint War Production Committee, it would be among the first true shared organisations between the two nations, and would form the genesis of the modern Australasian Defence Forces. Most notably, and unlike Pacific GHQ, ANZAC was, by and large, led and staffed by Australians and New Zealanders. While British officers held positions in ANZAC's staff (and the Entente representative to the AGSC was its Chairman), it was clear that London was placing the war in the southwest Pacific in the hands of its farthest flung Dominions.
The tenacity, skill, and zeal of ANZAC, and the soldiers of the Australian and New Zealand Defence Forces, during both the First and Second World Wars, has been colloquially referred to as the "Anzac Spirit." Both Australia and New Zealand would quietly take pride in this to this day, and it serves as the bedrock of Australasian national identity. Even to this day, the men and women of the Australasian Defense Forces are unofficially known as "the Anzacs".
On the homefront, the declaration of war was neither unwelcome nor unexpected. Australia and New Zealand were quick to begin full-scale mobilisation efforts; with factories in Sydney, Melbourne, and Auckland, as well as new factories in Newcastle, Geelong, and other countless new hives of industry burning bright with the smelting and assembly of weapons, tanks and other equipment, and their armies received many new volunteers at recruitment offices. On the other hand, the declaration of the Franco-British Union on the 1st of March brought a question to the forefront of the minds of people and politicians alike on both sides of the Tasman: what should the pace of unification be? The 1938 Treaty of Wellington had already made Australasian unification an inevitability, but it had been four years since its ratification, with the pace of integration becoming excruciatingly slow. The realities of the Commonwealth entering a second global war in thirty years likely meant that the timeline for unification would slow down even further. Further discussions of the topic, however, would be quietly shelved for the foreseeable future so the war effort could be focused on.
While opinion in Canberra and Wellington was mixed - many wanted to contribute to as many fronts as possible to show their countries' dedication to the new Entente and the Commonwealth - the leadership of both Dominions and the Entente Chiefs of Staff Committee saw the Empire of Japan and its new client states as the greater threat and best use for the troops at ANZAC's disposal. The exception was a single token division: the 3rd Australasian Division "Meatgrinder '' - having earned a divisional sobriquet in Malaya - left Australia for West Asia and the fighting in the Levant in October 1942. With them was Brigadier Liren Sun and his 2nd Brigade, consisting mostly of Chinese and Daehanese immigrant volunteers from the cities of Australia, eager to show their loyalty to their new homes. They would not return for nearly three years, when the war had taken them all the way to Rome.
While the Pacific Dominions spent the first year of the war on the defensive, they would begin counter-offensives in early 1943. They would begin pushing into the Co-Prosperity Sphere at New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, and eventually throughout insular Southeast Asia, with help from Royal Navy ships from across the Commonwealth and American Red Navy submariners. The Pacific War had begun, and it would not end until either the Co-Prosperity Sphere or the United Nations saw the other broken and defeated.
[1] With the monetary policy of the Dominions remaining with London after TTL's Balmoral Declaration, it follows that the Bank of England would maintain local offices in the Dominions to coordinate policy.
[2] Referring to the ideology based on Sun Yat-sen's Three Principles of the People.
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Mexican Constitution
- Location
- The Union of Latin American Socialist Republics
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Consider this a "Part 2.5" of the Mexico lore, not a Part 3 properly speaking, which will come later. I hope you enjoy.
POLITICAL CONSTITUTION OF THE SOCIALIST REPUBLIC OF MEXICO
Promulgated in the City-Commune of Mexico on May 5, 1936
Promulgated in the City-Commune of Mexico on May 5, 1936
The Mexican working people who, since the independence of our country, have had neither their own will nor the free use of their voice, are today emerging from the oppression in which they have lived.
The heroic efforts of Mexican workers and peasants, who decided to assault the heavens and break their chains, have been rewarded, and the capitalist and landlord state apparatus that for so long crushed our brothers and sisters was finally destroyed in the year nineteen hundred and thirty-four. In its place is the government of Workers, Peasants and Soldiers of all Mexico, established in transition towards the future communist society that will bestow true freedom of a completely emancipated Humanity, free from all chains of hunger, slavery, violence, and, of any form of exploitation of Man by Man.
Free and Revolutionary Mexicans, having seized power through organized class struggle, must now move forward. The Mexican workers' republic salutes the fraternal republics of America, Chile, Nicaragua, Peru and the Soviet Union, and its workers who also succeeded in overcoming the adversities of the capitalist-imperialist menace. United in solidarity, we proclaim all together our joint struggle against world capitalism, against semi-feudalism, against every kind of oppression against the free peoples of the whole world, whether liberal or fascist.
Thus, for all these reasons, that the working people of Mexico, represented in the I All-Union Congress of Soviets, assembled in the City-Commune of Mexico, desirous of contributing actively in the struggle against world capitalism and semi-feudalism, have decided to guarantee the formation of a more just Union, to promote the General Welfare, and to ensure the benefits of socialist democracy for us and our descendants, for which purpose it fulfills its charge, decreeing the present Constitution, and in turn, proclaiming the formation of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico on the fifth of May of nineteen hundred and thirty-six, the third year of the Revolution.
The heroic efforts of Mexican workers and peasants, who decided to assault the heavens and break their chains, have been rewarded, and the capitalist and landlord state apparatus that for so long crushed our brothers and sisters was finally destroyed in the year nineteen hundred and thirty-four. In its place is the government of Workers, Peasants and Soldiers of all Mexico, established in transition towards the future communist society that will bestow true freedom of a completely emancipated Humanity, free from all chains of hunger, slavery, violence, and, of any form of exploitation of Man by Man.
Free and Revolutionary Mexicans, having seized power through organized class struggle, must now move forward. The Mexican workers' republic salutes the fraternal republics of America, Chile, Nicaragua, Peru and the Soviet Union, and its workers who also succeeded in overcoming the adversities of the capitalist-imperialist menace. United in solidarity, we proclaim all together our joint struggle against world capitalism, against semi-feudalism, against every kind of oppression against the free peoples of the whole world, whether liberal or fascist.
Thus, for all these reasons, that the working people of Mexico, represented in the I All-Union Congress of Soviets, assembled in the City-Commune of Mexico, desirous of contributing actively in the struggle against world capitalism and semi-feudalism, have decided to guarantee the formation of a more just Union, to promote the General Welfare, and to ensure the benefits of socialist democracy for us and our descendants, for which purpose it fulfills its charge, decreeing the present Constitution, and in turn, proclaiming the formation of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico on the fifth of May of nineteen hundred and thirty-six, the third year of the Revolution.
TITLE ONE
CHAPTER I
On the Federal Union and its form of government
CHAPTER I
On the Federal Union and its form of government
Article 1. The Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico is constituted as a federal union of Soviet Socialist Republics, as formed by the councils or soviets of Workers, Peasants, Soldiers, and Citizens of the whole country, which exercise their legitimate power by means of a dictatorship of the proletariat. All Mexicans, without any distinction whatsoever, shall enjoy the guarantees granted by this Constitution.
Article 2. National sovereignty resides in the working people, as represented through the Soviets of Workers, Peasants, Soldiers, and Citizens of the country. The working people shall have, at all times, the inalienable right to remove their representatives, if it is decided that they do not work for their benefit.
Article 3. The political apparatus of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico shall be based on the principles of democratic centralism, to guarantee power from the base, that is, from the working people.
Article 4. The economy of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico shall be guided by the principles of democratic centralism. All workers may elect their representatives in each industry or economic sector in free association, as well as have the right to remove them if it is in the collective interest of said workers. Every worker shall have his rights guaranteed through the Confederation of Workers of Mexico and every minor union affiliated to it, which shall also be subject to the principles of democratic centralism. Every worker shall also have the right to form alternative unions.
Article 5. The socialist system of economy and the socialization of the means of production constitute the economic foundation of the transitional Mexican state, that is the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico. Bearing in mind the continued struggle for the complete abolition of social classes, the end of exploitation of Man by Man, the complete suppression of the bourgeois and landed classes, the abolition of the remnants of semi-feudalism in the country, the establishment of a higher-stage socialist society, and the final victory of world communism, it is resolved that:
Article 2. National sovereignty resides in the working people, as represented through the Soviets of Workers, Peasants, Soldiers, and Citizens of the country. The working people shall have, at all times, the inalienable right to remove their representatives, if it is decided that they do not work for their benefit.
Article 3. The political apparatus of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico shall be based on the principles of democratic centralism, to guarantee power from the base, that is, from the working people.
Article 4. The economy of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico shall be guided by the principles of democratic centralism. All workers may elect their representatives in each industry or economic sector in free association, as well as have the right to remove them if it is in the collective interest of said workers. Every worker shall have his rights guaranteed through the Confederation of Workers of Mexico and every minor union affiliated to it, which shall also be subject to the principles of democratic centralism. Every worker shall also have the right to form alternative unions.
Article 5. The socialist system of economy and the socialization of the means of production constitute the economic foundation of the transitional Mexican state, that is the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico. Bearing in mind the continued struggle for the complete abolition of social classes, the end of exploitation of Man by Man, the complete suppression of the bourgeois and landed classes, the abolition of the remnants of semi-feudalism in the country, the establishment of a higher-stage socialist society, and the final victory of world communism, it is resolved that:
- Each and every one of the natural resources within the territory of the Union, at land and sea level, are the property of the entire Mexican working class, which has at all times the right to dispose of them to use them for their joint benefit, as well as for the development of the productive forces in the country. All forests, lands, and waters of public utility shall likewise be considered common property.
- A Supreme Economic Council is to be established to allow and guarantee the power of the workers, peasants and soldiers over the exploiters, in order to ensure correct and complete control of all existing and future means of production and transportation in the country.
- All private property in land for agricultural use is declared abolished, and the land is socialized, considered common property, and distributed to the peasants who inhabit it in an appropriate manner, without compensation as much as possible to its former owners.
- In cases where it is deemed necessary, the development of private investment is to be permitted under strict regulation for further development of the productive forces and for the complete elimination of the semi-feudal remnants that the Union currently possesses. The transitional State, in conjunction with the Confederation of Workers of Mexico, and all the other unions, shall at all times have the right to expropriate any remaining private industry or capital and use it for societal and national benefit, with minimum compensation to its former owners. All private industries are obliged to provide protection to the workers who work in them, as provided by law.
- The existence of private monopolies, tax exemptions, or hoarding of products or goods of any kind is prohibited within the Mexican republics. The Mexican State is obliged to combat by any possible means such illegal types of concentration. However, monopolies developed by the national State shall not be prohibited, by virtue of the development of capital within the Mexican Nation. Associations formed by workers to protect their interests shall not be considered monopolies.
- Each and every bank that would have come into existence before the Revolution will be considered the property of the workers, peasants and soldiers of Mexico.
- To ensure the protection of the Revolutionary Government of the workers, peasants, soldiers, and citizens against any internal or external threat, as well as to eliminate any attempt by the bourgeoisie and the landed class to regain power, it is decreed that all the workers and peasants of the country be armed, and that their free bearing of arms is to be guaranteed. The police and the army of the previous government is now abolished, decreeing in turn the formation of a Militia, a Revolutionary and Popular Army, Navy and Air Force. Members of the bourgeois and landed class who were part of the previous organs of state repression cannot be part of the new revolutionary bodies, unless cleared of wrongdoing and treason by the appropriate authorities of the Revolutionary Government.
Article 6. The official languages of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico are Spanish and Mexican, also known as Nahuatl. All laws, decrees, orders and other documents shall be available in both languages. Primary education shall be conducted in both languages. The federal and national Mexican State is obliged to provide interpreters for any native Mexican citizen who speaks another language, while any other ethnic group has the right to speak the language of their choice. The People's Commissariat for the Nationalities of the Union shall determine whether another language may be elevated to a national language, as well as protect the existence of other native or indigenous languages existing in the country, through the mechanisms it deems necessary, based on the provisions of Article 11 of this Constitution, and the laws emanating therefrom. While not a national language, English shall be considered as an official language of the Union and, along with Spanish, functions as the official language of business, trade, and diplomatic negotiations.
CHAPTER II
On the national territory of the Federation
On the national territory of the Federation
Article 7. The national territory of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico includes the constituent parts of the current national federation and also the adjacent islands in both seas. It also includes the islands of Guadalupe and Revillagigedo, located in the Pacific Ocean. The All-Union Congress of Soviets, representing the entire Union, may add other territories by law.
Article 8. The constituent parts of the national Federation, which at the time of the formation of the socialist Republics constituted the Free and Sovereign States of the United Mexican States, are now to be constituted as Integral Socialist Republics. These Integral Socialist Republics shall have the following characteristics:
Article 8. The constituent parts of the national Federation, which at the time of the formation of the socialist Republics constituted the Free and Sovereign States of the United Mexican States, are now to be constituted as Integral Socialist Republics. These Integral Socialist Republics shall have the following characteristics:
- None of these Republics has the right to secede from the country, since their status as integral members of the Federation is permanent;
- Each Integral Republic may negotiate with another to modify their respective borders, with consultation of the People's Commissariat for the Nationalities of the Union if it is deemed necessary by law, but further approval for border changes shall be given by the Central Executive Committee. The All-Union Congress of Soviets shall provide final confirmation of the actions undertaken in its name by the Central Executive Committee in regards to this matter;
- The law shall determine the faculties and prohibitions of each Republic in the exercise of its powers and functions.
Article 9. Every Republic shall be composed of subdivisions known as municipalities. Each municipality shall be governed by a municipal Soviet, composed of delegates from each city, town, or other form of settlement existing in said municipality. The representation of each settlement in the municipal Soviet shall be proportional to its population, according to the specific law that determines it. Likewise, each settlement shall be governed by a local Soviet. Every Republican Congress of Soviets shall also guarantee proportional representation of each municipality within it, as established by law.
Article 10. The City-Commune of Mexico, formerly known as the Federal District, shall be the capital territory of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico. Furthermore, the city-commune shall be composed of the territory it possessed prior to the Revolution, and may be extended with the prior approval of the All-Union Revolutionary Government and the governments of the Republics and municipalities affected.
Article 11. The government of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico openly recognizes its status as a nation of nations. Consequently, all native peoples inhabiting its borders have the right to self-determination, as well as the right to choose their political status and pursue their own economic, cultural and social development. Accordingly, be it resolved that:
Article 10. The City-Commune of Mexico, formerly known as the Federal District, shall be the capital territory of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico. Furthermore, the city-commune shall be composed of the territory it possessed prior to the Revolution, and may be extended with the prior approval of the All-Union Revolutionary Government and the governments of the Republics and municipalities affected.
Article 11. The government of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico openly recognizes its status as a nation of nations. Consequently, all native peoples inhabiting its borders have the right to self-determination, as well as the right to choose their political status and pursue their own economic, cultural and social development. Accordingly, be it resolved that:
- The revolutionary government undertakes to delimit the boundaries for the establishment of Autonomous Republics for all native peoples who so desire, by virtue of their self-determination. These Autonomous Republics will not have the right to secede from the country, but will have autonomy to administer their cultural practices, as well as autonomy in relation to economic development plans directed by the government of the entire Union. Likewise, each Autonomous Republic shall have the right to form its own internal borders for the benefit of its inhabitants.
- The delimitation of borders and the formation of Autonomous Republics shall not take more than ten years. A Commission subordinate to the People's Commissariat for the Nationalities of the Union shall be formed to determine the transition to the formation of each Autonomous Republic.
- Each Autonomous Republic shall have the right to use the native language or languages for educational, administrative and documentation purposes that best suits the interests of its citizens, in addition to Spanish, Mexican, and any other language considered to be in national use.
- Those peoples who do not wish to form Autonomous Republics, or who are not considered sufficient to form an Autonomous Republic, will have the right to form autonomous territories within the borders of each or between several Integral Republics. Each Integral Republic shall be obliged to defend the autonomy of each of its autonomous territories. Likewise, any people not desiring autonomy shall have the right to become part of an Integral Republic, while maintaining at all times the right to modify its status.
Article 12. Each Republic, Integral or Autonomous, shall be governed by its respective Republican Congress of Soviets, composed of delegates elected by all the municipal Soviets that make up each Republic, in proportion to the population of each municipality, according to the specific law that determines it. In times of congressional recess, the highest constitutional and political authority of each Republic shall be its Central Executive Committee, subordinated to the Congress of Soviets.
TITLE TWO
CHAPTER I
On the All-Union Revolutionary Government and Division of Powers
CHAPTER I
On the All-Union Revolutionary Government and Division of Powers
Article 13. The All-Union Revolutionary Government shall be divided into the following branches: Executive-Legislative and Judicial. At no time may the exercise of the powers of these branches be exercised solely by a single person.
CHAPTER II
On the Executive-Legislative Branch
SECTION I
On the All-Union Congress of Soviets
On the Executive-Legislative Branch
SECTION I
On the All-Union Congress of Soviets
Article 14. The supreme executive-legislative power in the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico is vested in the All-Union Congress of Soviets, the highest representative of the exercise of the dictatorship of the proletariat, through its representation of the totality of the Soviets of Workers, Peasants and Soldiers of the whole country. When the Congress is not in office, this power shall be transferred to the All-Union Central Executive Committee and its subsidiary organs, within the limitations set by Congress before its recess.
Article 15. The All-Union Congress of Soviets shall be composed of different delegate-deputies, appointed by the Congresses of Soviets of each Republic of the country, elected for a term of two years. The ratio of delegate-deputy representation by population within Congress can be freely changed by Congressional act, if Congress so deem the initial ratio unwieldy. However, at the moment of the promulgation of this Constitution, there shall be one delegate for every 50,000 persons or fraction of 25,000, taking into account the general census of each Integral and Autonomous Republic, as well as that of the City-Commune of Mexico. Each delegate shall also have a substitute, in case the owner is temporarily unable to perform his duties, or permanently if he is replaced. At any time, any delegate-deputy may be replaced, if so desired by the people who are represented by them.
Article 15. The All-Union Congress of Soviets shall be composed of different delegate-deputies, appointed by the Congresses of Soviets of each Republic of the country, elected for a term of two years. The ratio of delegate-deputy representation by population within Congress can be freely changed by Congressional act, if Congress so deem the initial ratio unwieldy. However, at the moment of the promulgation of this Constitution, there shall be one delegate for every 50,000 persons or fraction of 25,000, taking into account the general census of each Integral and Autonomous Republic, as well as that of the City-Commune of Mexico. Each delegate shall also have a substitute, in case the owner is temporarily unable to perform his duties, or permanently if he is replaced. At any time, any delegate-deputy may be replaced, if so desired by the people who are represented by them.
- No proprietary delegate may be appointed more than once, under any circumstances, under the principle of "effective suffrage, no re-election". Substitute delegates who assume office in the event of the permanent replacement of the proprietary delegate may be reappointed only once, assuming their new office as proprietary delegates.
Article 16. In order to be appointed delegate-deputy to the Congress of Soviets and to the Central Executive Committee, the following requirements are necessary:
- Be at least 25 years of age at the time of appointment.
- Not to be a minister of any religious cult.
Article 17. The All-Union Congress of Soviets shall meet in ordinary session at least twice a year by order of the All-Union Central Executive Committee. The Congress may be convened in extraordinary form in such cases:
- By express order of the Central Executive Committee and/or the Presidium.
- If the Congress deems it pertinent, under previous justification.
- If convened by Soviets representing at least half of the national population.
Article 18. The All-Union Congress of Soviets shall elect the members of the Central Executive Committee. All its members shall be subject to the Congress of Soviets and shall render an account of all actions taken by the Committee to the Congress during the ordinary sessions to be held each year.
SECTION II
Of the All-Union Central Executive Committee and its organs
Of the All-Union Central Executive Committee and its organs
Article 19. The All-Union Central Executive Committee shall be divided into three sub-organisms: The Council of People's Commissars, the Soviet of the Union, and the Soviet of the Republics. During its sessions, the Committee shall be the highest Executive-Legislative body of the entire Union. During its governmental recesses, the Presidium of the Committee shall be the highest executive-legislative body of the whole Union.
- The Soviet of the Republics shall be composed of delegates elected by the Congresses of the Soviets of each Republic of the country. Each Republic shall be represented by two delegates. The City-Commune of Mexico also has the right to be able to elect two delegates to the Soviet.
- The Soviet of the Union shall be composed of delegates elected by the All-Union Congress of Soviets in proportion to the total population of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico. Each delegate shall represent at least 100,000 people, with the ratio subject to future change by law if necessary.
- The Council of People's Commissars shall be composed of those members whom the Central Executive Committee deems fit to act as Commissars of the various Commissariats which make up the National Administration of the Mexican State. The Central Executive Committee shall elect the members of the Council, but the final decision of approval shall be taken by the Presidium of the Committee and the Congress of Soviets.
Article 20. In addition, the Central Executive Committee shall be directed by the Presidium, which shall convene the Committee for ordinary joint sessions at least three times a year. The Presidium may convene extraordinary joint sessions of the Committee if:
- The representatives of the Soviet of the Union and the Soviet of the Republics demand it.
- At least half of the Committee members demand it.
- The members of the Presidium demand it.
- The Congress of Soviets demands it.
SECTION III
On the faculties of the All-Union Central Executive Committee
On the faculties of the All-Union Central Executive Committee
Article 21. The All-Union Central Executive Committee has the right to suspend any proposed legislative amendments or orders coming from the All-Union Congress of Soviets, or from the Congresses of Soviets of each Republic of the Union, if it so deems. However, the suspension is not permanent, and the Committee has no power to annul any legislative amendment. The Committee must explain the reasons for the suspension, but the Congress of Soviets has the power to ignore the suspension and force the Committee to comply with the final decision. If no agreement is reached, then the Congress of Soviets has the power to force the resignation of the Committee, and call for new elections.
Article 22. In addition to the foregoing, the Central Executive Committee shall have the following faculties:
- Represent the Union of Republics in foreign relations matters, such as ratification and negotiation of various treaties with other countries;
- To declare war or peace in an armed conflict, subject to approval by the Congress of Soviets;
- To supervise the observance of the Political Constitution of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico and to ensure conformity between this Constitution and the Constitutions of each of the Republics that make up the country;
- Organize the defense of the country and lead the Revolutionary and Popular Armed Forces;
- To regulate foreign trade with other countries, as well as to determine the cases where tariffs may or may not exist, always trying to defend the national monopolies that the government forms;
- Safeguarding the security of the transitional state from all enemies, foreign and domestic;
- Establish national economic plans for the Union, at all times pursuing the collective interests of the workers and the people of the country;
- Determine where the use of private capital is necessary for national development;
- Approval of the Budget of Expenditures and Revenues of the Union, that of the Republics of the Union, and that of the municipal Soviets;
- To administer all banks, industrial and agricultural establishments, industrial enterprises and merchants of importance to the entire Union;
- Manage the means of communication and transportation throughout the country;
- To conduct the monetary and credit system of the Union;
- Organizing insurance of all kinds;
- Obtaining and granting loans;
- Establish guidelines, laws, regulations and other legislative documents that regulate the appropriate use of all soils, waters and forests in the country;
- Establish guidelines, laws, regulations and other legislative documents that form, regulate and strengthen the national health and education system throughout the country;
- In the event of an epidemic or pandemic, to direct health policy aimed at containing and eradicating any infection resulting from such an epidemic or pandemic;
- Organize a uniform system of national economic statistics;
- Establish guidelines, laws, regulations and other legislative documents that determine the labor legislation of the entire Union without exception, as well as the strengthening of workers' rights, under the principle of non-regression;
- Legislate on the judicial system, court procedures, criminal and civil codes;
- To enact, regulate or amend laws and other legislative documents on citizenship, naturalization, the legal status of foreigners in the country, the settlement of uncultivated land, emigration and immigration throughout the Union;
- Grant amnesty, the right to pardon, and rehabilitation of citizens convicted by the judicial and administrative bodies of the different Republics of the Union, or by the Supreme Revolutionary Court, after having argued the reasons for such a concession.
- Jointly depose the members of the Presidium if they are accused of serious crimes, misconduct, or treason, in the company of the All-Union Congress of Soviets, which shall form a Special Court to judge the Presidium.
- Such other faculties may be granted to it when this Constitution is amended by the Congress of Soviets.
SECTION IV
On the Soviet of the Union and its faculties
On the Soviet of the Union and its faculties
Article 23. The members of the Soviet of the Union shall hold office for a total of two years, without the possibility of re-election. Its members shall at all times be obliged to give information of their activities in a transparent manner both to the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee and to the All-Union Congress of Soviets, when ordinary meetings of both bodies occur.
Article 24. The members of the Soviet of the Union shall elect a Chairman, who shall act as the representative of the Soviet. The Chairman may convene a session of the Council if they deems it necessary. Extraordinary sessions may take place if so demanded by the Presidium of the Committee or the All-Union Congress of Soviets.
Article 25. The Soviet of the Union shall act as a working body for the formation, deliberation, amendment or repeal of all laws and other legislative documents of importance for the whole country. Any proposal, jointly discussed with the Soviet of the Republics, shall be given to the Presidium for consideration for approval or rejection.
Article 24. The members of the Soviet of the Union shall elect a Chairman, who shall act as the representative of the Soviet. The Chairman may convene a session of the Council if they deems it necessary. Extraordinary sessions may take place if so demanded by the Presidium of the Committee or the All-Union Congress of Soviets.
Article 25. The Soviet of the Union shall act as a working body for the formation, deliberation, amendment or repeal of all laws and other legislative documents of importance for the whole country. Any proposal, jointly discussed with the Soviet of the Republics, shall be given to the Presidium for consideration for approval or rejection.
SECTION V
On the Soviet of the Republics and its faculties
On the Soviet of the Republics and its faculties
Article 26. All members of the Soviet of the Republics shall hold office for a total of two years, without the possibility of re-election. Its members shall at all times be obliged to give information of their activities in a transparent manner both to the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee and to the respective Congresses of the Soviets of each Republic from which their respective delegates come.
Article 27. The members of the Soviet of the Republics shall elect a Chairman, who shall act as the representative of the Soviet.
Article 28. The Soviet of the Republics shall possess the faculties mentioned in Article 25 of the Constitution jointly with the Soviet of the Union. In addition, it possesses the following faculties:
Article 27. The members of the Soviet of the Republics shall elect a Chairman, who shall act as the representative of the Soviet.
Article 28. The Soviet of the Republics shall possess the faculties mentioned in Article 25 of the Constitution jointly with the Soviet of the Union. In addition, it possesses the following faculties:
- Propose amendments to legislation coming from the Soviet of the Union, which the Soviet of the Union can refuse without appeal;
- Conduct independent and official investigations in each of the Republics belonging to the Union;
- Monitor Union-wide elections and make allegations of violations of Union election law;
- Ratify or deny border alterations between the country's Integral Republics;
- Confirm the emergence of Autonomous Republics in the country;
- Confirm the emergence and monitor the continued development of autonomous territories in the Integral Republics of each country;
- Any other faculties that may be given in the future.
SECTION VI
On the Council of People's Commissars and its faculties
On the Council of People's Commissars and its faculties
Article 29. The members of the Council of People's Commissars may only govern for a maximum term of four years, as elected by the joint session of the Central Executive Committee's Soviet of the Union and Soviet of the Republics. Re-election of any member is not permitted in the immediate term. Its members shall render an account of the activities of their Commissariat under charge to the Soviet of the Union, the Soviet of the Republics, the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee and to the All-Union Congress of Soviets, when the ordinary meetings of such bodies occur.
Article 30. The joint session of the Central Executive Committee shall elect a Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars, who shall act as the highest representative of the Council. Said Chairman may convene a session of the Council if they so deems. The Chairman of the Council shall serve as the head of government of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico.
Article 31. The Council of People's Commissars acts as the administrative and executive organ of the All-Union Central Executive Committee. While its current composition may be subject to change by law, the current Council of People's Commissars shall consist of the following members:
Article 30. The joint session of the Central Executive Committee shall elect a Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars, who shall act as the highest representative of the Council. Said Chairman may convene a session of the Council if they so deems. The Chairman of the Council shall serve as the head of government of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico.
Article 31. The Council of People's Commissars acts as the administrative and executive organ of the All-Union Central Executive Committee. While its current composition may be subject to change by law, the current Council of People's Commissars shall consist of the following members:
- The Chairman of the Council;
- The Vice-Chairmen of the Council, of which there shall be a total of six;
- The People's Commissar for Internal Affairs;
- The People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs;
- The People's Commissar for Agriculture and Development;
- The People's Commissar for Welfare;
- The People's Commissar for War and Navy;
- The People's Commissar for Justice;
- The People's Commissar for Communications, Transportation, and General Works;
- The People's Commissar for Education;
- The People's Commissar for Labor;
- The People's Commissar for Health;
- The People's Commissar for Finance and Treasury;
- The People's Commissar for the Nationalities of the Union;
- The People's Commissar for the State Planning Committee;
- The People's Commissar-Director for Public Safety;
- The People's Commissar-Director for the Supreme Council of National Economy;
- Any other position of People's Commissar created in the future.
Article 32. Each People's Commissariat may be subdivided into Sub-Commissariats, or Minor Commissariats, if so deemed by the People's Commissariat in charge at the time. The appointment for Minor Commissars shall be given to the People's Commissar, but the final approving decision shall be made by the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee, with the confirmation of the Soviet of the Union.
Article 33. The Council of People's Commissars, as a whole, may form dependent bodies thereof, modify them and dissolve them if it deems necessary. Each dependent body shall have a Chairman and such number of Vice-Chairmen as the Council of People's Commissars deems necessary for the proper management of such a body, with the similar appointment process of Minor Commissars. Likewise, the Chairman of any agency shall serve on the Council of People's Commissars in an advisory capacity, with the right to deliberate, but without the right to vote.
Article 34. The Supreme Council of National Economy shall be the body that fulfills the role of the Supreme Economic Council, until the development of the productive forces in the Union is considered valid for transformation into new People's Commissariats. The Council shall cooperate actively with the State Planning Committee for the realization of industrialization and the development of the productive forces in the country. The composition of the Supreme Council of National Economy shall be regularly determined by a joint compact between the People's Commissariat for Labor and the Confederation of Workers of Mexico.
Article 35. At the moment of taking office, each People's Commissar shall take the following oath before the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee: "I do solemnly swear/affirm to keep and uphold the Political Constitution of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico and the laws emanating therefrom, and to loyally perform the office of People's Commissar for [insert specific Commissariat] that the working people have conferred upon me, looking in everything for the good and prosperity of the Union; and if I do not do so, may the federated Nation of nations demand it of me."
Article 36. The Central Executive Committees of each of the Republics of the Union may object to the decrees and orders established by the Council of People's Commissars of the All-Union Central Executive Committee. Any complaint must be notified to the Presidium of the Committee, but any decree or order coming from the Council shall not be suspended until the Presidium makes a final decision.
Article 37. If the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee considers that the members of the Council are not fit to continue working, a new Council shall be installed by means of an extraordinary joint session of the Central Executive Committee.
Article 33. The Council of People's Commissars, as a whole, may form dependent bodies thereof, modify them and dissolve them if it deems necessary. Each dependent body shall have a Chairman and such number of Vice-Chairmen as the Council of People's Commissars deems necessary for the proper management of such a body, with the similar appointment process of Minor Commissars. Likewise, the Chairman of any agency shall serve on the Council of People's Commissars in an advisory capacity, with the right to deliberate, but without the right to vote.
Article 34. The Supreme Council of National Economy shall be the body that fulfills the role of the Supreme Economic Council, until the development of the productive forces in the Union is considered valid for transformation into new People's Commissariats. The Council shall cooperate actively with the State Planning Committee for the realization of industrialization and the development of the productive forces in the country. The composition of the Supreme Council of National Economy shall be regularly determined by a joint compact between the People's Commissariat for Labor and the Confederation of Workers of Mexico.
Article 35. At the moment of taking office, each People's Commissar shall take the following oath before the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee: "I do solemnly swear/affirm to keep and uphold the Political Constitution of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico and the laws emanating therefrom, and to loyally perform the office of People's Commissar for [insert specific Commissariat] that the working people have conferred upon me, looking in everything for the good and prosperity of the Union; and if I do not do so, may the federated Nation of nations demand it of me."
Article 36. The Central Executive Committees of each of the Republics of the Union may object to the decrees and orders established by the Council of People's Commissars of the All-Union Central Executive Committee. Any complaint must be notified to the Presidium of the Committee, but any decree or order coming from the Council shall not be suspended until the Presidium makes a final decision.
Article 37. If the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee considers that the members of the Council are not fit to continue working, a new Council shall be installed by means of an extraordinary joint session of the Central Executive Committee.
SECTION VII
On the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee and its faculties
On the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee and its faculties
Article 38. The Presidium of the Central Executive Committee shall consist of, at least, twenty-one members of the Central Executive Committee, elected in a joint session of the Soviet of the Union and the Soviet of the Republics. In addition, when the formation of Autonomous Republics is established, there shall be a representative of each Republic in the Presidium. Between sessions of the Committee, the Presidium shall act as the highest legislative-executive and administrative body in the Union.
Article 39. The Presidium shall be headed by a Secretary-General acting as Chairman of the Presidium. The Chairman shall be accompanied by five other members of the Presidium elected as Deputy Chairman, coming from the general membership of either the Soviet of the Union or the Soviet of the Republics. However, the Secretary-General can be an individual not belonging to the All-Union Central Executive Committee itself in order to guarantee impartiality of the Presidium's decisions, even if it is not a requirement.
Article 39. The Presidium shall be headed by a Secretary-General acting as Chairman of the Presidium. The Chairman shall be accompanied by five other members of the Presidium elected as Deputy Chairman, coming from the general membership of either the Soviet of the Union or the Soviet of the Republics. However, the Secretary-General can be an individual not belonging to the All-Union Central Executive Committee itself in order to guarantee impartiality of the Presidium's decisions, even if it is not a requirement.
- The Presidium is jointly the collective Head of State of the Union.
- The Secretary-General shall be considered "first among equals" within the collegial nature of the Presidium.
Article 40. Each and every member of the Presidium shall hold office for a term of five years, without the possibility of re-election in the immediate term. This may only be disregarded in time of war or national emergency, and upon prior acceptance by the All-Union Congress of Soviets, in which case the members of the Presidium may be re-elected only once.
Article 41. The Presidium has the following faculties:
Article 41. The Presidium has the following faculties:
- To oversee the strictest compliance with the Political Constitution at the national level, as well as all laws, decrees, orders and other legislative documents emanating from the Constitution, and their fair application in the State;
- To suspend, ratify or nullify any legislation from the Central Executive Committee, on the advise of the Council of People's Commissars, except upon the concurrence of 2/3rds of both the Soviet of the Union and the Soviet of the Republics;
- Ratify, under the advise of the joint session of the Soviet of the Union and Soviet of the Republics, the candidates to serve as People's Commissars, and also to ratify the candidates to serve as Minor Commissars, under the advise of the People's Commissar appointing them;
- To publish all legislative documents by the All-Union Congress of Soviets;
- All published documents must be translated into national and official languages recognized by the Union of Socialist Republics.
- To establish all orders and medals in the Union, as well as the awarding thereof;
- To represent the Union in matters of foreign affairs, by receiving envoys, and approving or removing ambassadors and other plenipotentiaries, subject to ratification by the Central Executive Committee;
- Appoint the Ministers or Judges of the Supreme Revolutionary Court, with the approval and advice of the Congress of Soviets;
- Under extraordinary circumstances, suspend congressional legislation temporarily, on the advise of the Council of People's Commissars, but without having the capacity to nullify them;
- Any other faculties that may be granted in the future.
Article 42. The Presidium shall be accountable to the All-Union Central Executive Committee, as well as to the Congress of Soviets. In the event of the loss of confidence of the Committee in the members of the Presidium, the members of the Presidium shall be immediately replaced via election by the Central Executive Committee, with the final confirmation of such actions undertaken by the Committee through the Congress of Soviets.
Article 43. The Presidium of the Central Executive Committee shall be able to continue serving in office despite the implementation of Article 21 of this Constitution, as it is only acting to suspend a Congressional act on the advice of the rest of the All-Union Central Executive Committee. In this capacity, the Deputy Chairmen that serves concurrently within the Soviet of the Union and the Soviet of the Republics may continue to serve in the Presidium in an acting capacity until their replacements can be elected.
Article 43. The Presidium of the Central Executive Committee shall be able to continue serving in office despite the implementation of Article 21 of this Constitution, as it is only acting to suspend a Congressional act on the advice of the rest of the All-Union Central Executive Committee. In this capacity, the Deputy Chairmen that serves concurrently within the Soviet of the Union and the Soviet of the Republics may continue to serve in the Presidium in an acting capacity until their replacements can be elected.
SECTION VIII
On the Directorate for State Security
On the Directorate for State Security
Article 44. The All-Union Directorate for State Security shall act as the agency dedicated to the national security of the entire country. It shall be subordinate, in general, to the Council of People's Commissars, and in particular, to the People's Commissariat for Public Safety. Its work shall consist of protecting the revolutionary efforts of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico from political and economic agents that constitute a danger to the dictatorship of the proletariat. It shall serve as an organism of internal and external security, carrying out surveillance, counterintelligence, espionage, and any other faculty that the Council of People's Commissars grants it within the limitations of the law.
Article 45. The Directorate shall be governed by a Director, who shall be the same person holding the office of People's Commissar for Public Safety. The Director shall be accountable for their actions both to the members of the All-Union Supreme Revolutionary Court and to the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee. In the event of loss of confidence of both of these bodies, the Director shall be replaced by another person on the recommendation of the Central Executive Committee.
Article 46. Each of the Councils of People's Commissars of each Republic of the Union shall have a republican section of the Directorate. Each section shall be headed by a Junior Director, who shall be accountable to the Commissar-Director, the Supreme Court of their Republic, and the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee of their Republic. In case of loss of confidence, a process similar to that mentioned in Article 45 shall be followed.
Article 47. The Directorate shall actively cooperate with other organizations belonging to countries friendly to Mexico in matters of national security, as well as actively work at the international level for the preservation of the Revolution and the joint defense of the Communist International and the Vladivostok Compact.
Article 45. The Directorate shall be governed by a Director, who shall be the same person holding the office of People's Commissar for Public Safety. The Director shall be accountable for their actions both to the members of the All-Union Supreme Revolutionary Court and to the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee. In the event of loss of confidence of both of these bodies, the Director shall be replaced by another person on the recommendation of the Central Executive Committee.
Article 46. Each of the Councils of People's Commissars of each Republic of the Union shall have a republican section of the Directorate. Each section shall be headed by a Junior Director, who shall be accountable to the Commissar-Director, the Supreme Court of their Republic, and the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee of their Republic. In case of loss of confidence, a process similar to that mentioned in Article 45 shall be followed.
Article 47. The Directorate shall actively cooperate with other organizations belonging to countries friendly to Mexico in matters of national security, as well as actively work at the international level for the preservation of the Revolution and the joint defense of the Communist International and the Vladivostok Compact.
CHAPTER III
On the Judiciary Branch
On the Judiciary Branch
Article 48. The supreme judicial power of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico is vested in a system of courts which, at the national level, make up the All-Union Supreme Revolutionary Court, and at the local level, by all the lower courts established by law. At the national level, the All-Union Supreme Revolutionary Court shall be, in ex-officio, the primary judicial organ of the All-Union Congress of Soviets.
Article 49. The All-Union Supreme Revolutionary Court shall be composed of fifteen incumbent ministers, of whom one shall be elected to be Chairman, two more shall act as Vice-Chairmen, and one more shall be a representative of the Directorate for State Security. In all cases, however, the ministers will only be placed in office if they receive the approval of the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee after election by the All-Union Congress of Soviets. Beyond this, however, all members have equal powers.
Article 49. The All-Union Supreme Revolutionary Court shall be composed of fifteen incumbent ministers, of whom one shall be elected to be Chairman, two more shall act as Vice-Chairmen, and one more shall be a representative of the Directorate for State Security. In all cases, however, the ministers will only be placed in office if they receive the approval of the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee after election by the All-Union Congress of Soviets. Beyond this, however, all members have equal powers.
- In addition, for each Autonomous Republic that is formed, there shall be a minister representing that Republic.
Article 50. The Judicial power shall extend to all cases, in law and equity, arising under this Political Constitution, the laws of the Union, and treaties made; to all cases involving ambassadors, other public ministers, and consuls; to all cases of maritime jurisdiction; to international controversies; to controversies between two or more parts of the Union; between citizens of different parts of the Union, and between a part of the Union or citizens thereof, and foreign States and citizens.
Article 51. Additionally, in the Supreme Court there shall be a Chief Prosecutor and two Assistant Prosecutors, appointed by the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee after election by the All-Union Congress of Soviets. The functions of the three individuals are:
Article 51. Additionally, in the Supreme Court there shall be a Chief Prosecutor and two Assistant Prosecutors, appointed by the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee after election by the All-Union Congress of Soviets. The functions of the three individuals are:
- Deliberate on all matters within the jurisdiction of the Supreme Revolutionary Court;
- Prosecute cases brought before the Supreme Court;
- To inform the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee about reasons for controversy, in case of lack of agreement among the justices of the Supreme Court.
Article 52. By virtue of what is mentioned in Article 50, the Supreme Revolutionary Court has the power to form colleges specific to different areas of civil, criminal, and military courts. The Supreme Court shall determine the number of deputy ministers who shall be part of these colleges and may propose the members it deems suitable for the position, but the final approval shall be given by the Congress of Soviets. The specific faculties of each college shall be determined by law.
Article 53. In order to be appointed Minister or Prosecutor of the Supreme Revolutionary Court, or member of any of its subordinate colleges, it is required:
Article 53. In order to be appointed Minister or Prosecutor of the Supreme Revolutionary Court, or member of any of its subordinate colleges, it is required:
- Be at least 35 years of age at the time of appointment;
- Not to be a minister of any religious cult;
- Possess a professional law degree, issued within a period of not less than ten years by the competent authority.
Article 54. The Supreme Revolutionary Court possesses the following faculties:
- To grant the Supreme Courts of each of the Republics of the Union the correct interpretation of questions of federal legislation;
- To examine, at the request of the Chief Prosecutor, any decree, law or legislative document originating from the Supreme Courts of each of the Republics of the Union, in order to ascertain whether there is an infraction or violation of the federal laws, or an infringement of the interests of other Republics, which shall be reported to the All-Union Central Executive Committee;
- To decide, at the request of the Central Executive Committee, on the constitutionality of the laws passed by the Republics of the Union;
- Resolving legal disputes between the Republics of the Union;
- To examine accusations brought before it by senior officials against whom charges have been brought in connection with the exercise of their functions;
- Any other faculties that may be granted to the Supreme Court in the future.
Article 55. All members of the Supreme Revolutionary Court, without exception, shall be in office for a term of ten years. In case of war, the provisions of Article 40 of this Constitution may apply.
TITLE THREE
CHAPTER I
On the basic rights of all Mexicans
CHAPTER I
On the basic rights of all Mexicans
Article 56. In the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico; slavery, servitude, and any other form of subordination that threatens the freedom and equality of all the working people is prohibited. The slaves and serfs who enter national territory will attain, only by this fact, their freedom and protection of the laws.
Article 57. In the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico; discrimination of an ethnic, sexual, religious, marital status, health, or any other nature that violates human dignity is prohibited. The State shall combat with all possible means any type of discrimination, while proclaiming the universal fraternity of all workers, without distinction.
Article 58. All Mexicans, whether men or women, are equal before the law, but recognizing the necessary struggle against the degradation of women, the national and transitional State shall guarantee full labor, political and social equality of both sexes.
Article 59. All Mexicans have the right to receive education. The education to be imparted in the Union shall be of a socialist and laborist nature; primarily based on the revolutionary principles of Marxism and the defense of the Mexican Revolution; the struggle against prejudice, superstition, discrimination of any kind, and fanaticism of all kinds; and on the contrary, the defense of the values of universal fraternity, tolerance, and the friendship of all nations shall be sought. The State shall offer all levels of education free of charge, as well as support scientific and technological research, and encourage the strengthening of the new revolutionary culture. The dissemination of all types of religious propaganda is prohibited within the educational system, while the educational curriculum shall be secular.
Article 60. No person may be prevented from engaging in the profession, industry, trade or work that suits them, provided that they are lawful. The State is obliged to develop job and vocational training programs for the optimal, continuous, and integral development of all workers at the social, cultural, and economic levels, as well as to eliminate unemployment. The law shall determine the jobs that require qualifications, as well as the procedures for obtaining them.
Article 61. All Mexicans without distinction shall have the right to health, both physical and mental. The State, through the Council of People's Commissars, shall ensure the continuous and integral development of the national health system and of each of the Republics of the Union, which shall be totally free of charge. This right shall be applied both at the labor and civil levels, in order to guarantee a dignified and clean working and collective environment. The State is obliged to guarantee the defense and teaching of hygiene to all Mexicans, as well as to promote a modern food and environmental culture that contributes to the general health of the national population. All Mexicans, without exception, will have the right to social security.
Article 62. All Mexicans without distinction shall have the right to water consumption and to food, which shall be nutritious, of quality, and sufficient for their basic needs. The People's Commissariat for Welfare shall guarantee this, using all the necessary mechanisms it deems appropriate to use, based on this Constitution and the laws emanating from it. It is the obligation of the State to promote the development of the productive forces to guarantee the development of new and better methods for the development of agriculture, livestock, and in general, any industry directly related to food.
Article 63. The State is obliged to promote, protect, and foster revolutionary culture and art, in favor of the free expression of all workers. The State shall promote the means for the dissemination and development of these, attending to cultural diversity in all its manifestations and expressions with full respect for creative freedom and the free development of the personality, except for the exceptions established by law.
Article 57. In the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico; discrimination of an ethnic, sexual, religious, marital status, health, or any other nature that violates human dignity is prohibited. The State shall combat with all possible means any type of discrimination, while proclaiming the universal fraternity of all workers, without distinction.
Article 58. All Mexicans, whether men or women, are equal before the law, but recognizing the necessary struggle against the degradation of women, the national and transitional State shall guarantee full labor, political and social equality of both sexes.
Article 59. All Mexicans have the right to receive education. The education to be imparted in the Union shall be of a socialist and laborist nature; primarily based on the revolutionary principles of Marxism and the defense of the Mexican Revolution; the struggle against prejudice, superstition, discrimination of any kind, and fanaticism of all kinds; and on the contrary, the defense of the values of universal fraternity, tolerance, and the friendship of all nations shall be sought. The State shall offer all levels of education free of charge, as well as support scientific and technological research, and encourage the strengthening of the new revolutionary culture. The dissemination of all types of religious propaganda is prohibited within the educational system, while the educational curriculum shall be secular.
Article 60. No person may be prevented from engaging in the profession, industry, trade or work that suits them, provided that they are lawful. The State is obliged to develop job and vocational training programs for the optimal, continuous, and integral development of all workers at the social, cultural, and economic levels, as well as to eliminate unemployment. The law shall determine the jobs that require qualifications, as well as the procedures for obtaining them.
Article 61. All Mexicans without distinction shall have the right to health, both physical and mental. The State, through the Council of People's Commissars, shall ensure the continuous and integral development of the national health system and of each of the Republics of the Union, which shall be totally free of charge. This right shall be applied both at the labor and civil levels, in order to guarantee a dignified and clean working and collective environment. The State is obliged to guarantee the defense and teaching of hygiene to all Mexicans, as well as to promote a modern food and environmental culture that contributes to the general health of the national population. All Mexicans, without exception, will have the right to social security.
Article 62. All Mexicans without distinction shall have the right to water consumption and to food, which shall be nutritious, of quality, and sufficient for their basic needs. The People's Commissariat for Welfare shall guarantee this, using all the necessary mechanisms it deems appropriate to use, based on this Constitution and the laws emanating from it. It is the obligation of the State to promote the development of the productive forces to guarantee the development of new and better methods for the development of agriculture, livestock, and in general, any industry directly related to food.
Article 63. The State is obliged to promote, protect, and foster revolutionary culture and art, in favor of the free expression of all workers. The State shall promote the means for the dissemination and development of these, attending to cultural diversity in all its manifestations and expressions with full respect for creative freedom and the free development of the personality, except for the exceptions established by law.
- The intellectual rights of all artists shall be protected by the State.
Article 64. All Mexicans have the right to enjoy the benefits of the development of science and technological innovation. The State will support, through the Council of People's Commissars, scientific, technological and technical development for the benefit of Mexican society and all Humanity. All information of this type will be guaranteed as public access, within certain limited restrictions due to public safety and national security.
- The intellectual rights of any inventor or scientific innovator shall be protected by the State.
Article 65. All Mexicans have the right to receive, from the State, access to information concerning the decisions of the State. However, the law shall determine the restrictions to this right insofar as they concern national security and public order.
Article 66. All infants have the right to a name and to a dignified life, which provides for the full development of their capacities as revolutionary individuals. The State will be in charge of attending, as a priority, to the needs of all Mexican children, as well as those of refugees fleeing capitalist barbarism. All children have the right to a friendly family, neighborhood and collective environment, where they do not suffer violence of any kind, so the State must ensure the defense of children's rights against neglect, abuse, mistreatment of any kind, or degradation in any form. The State may take all the necessary measures it deems necessary to guarantee these rights, through what is mentioned in this Constitution and the laws that emanate from it. There shall be no distinction between children born in and out of wedlock, while the State shall guarantee the safety, health and protection of all children.
Article 67. All Mexicans have the right to decent housing. The State must guarantee:
Article 66. All infants have the right to a name and to a dignified life, which provides for the full development of their capacities as revolutionary individuals. The State will be in charge of attending, as a priority, to the needs of all Mexican children, as well as those of refugees fleeing capitalist barbarism. All children have the right to a friendly family, neighborhood and collective environment, where they do not suffer violence of any kind, so the State must ensure the defense of children's rights against neglect, abuse, mistreatment of any kind, or degradation in any form. The State may take all the necessary measures it deems necessary to guarantee these rights, through what is mentioned in this Constitution and the laws that emanate from it. There shall be no distinction between children born in and out of wedlock, while the State shall guarantee the safety, health and protection of all children.
Article 67. All Mexicans have the right to decent housing. The State must guarantee:
- That each housing has the basic and indispensable services that are necessary for the proper accommodation of a family or families, including but not limited to: water, electricity, heating, kitchen, bathroom, etc. At no time may this section be modified to eliminate any of these services, only for the inclusion of new ones.
- The existence of new housing, or its remodeling and distribution in the case of existing housing, for use by all Mexicans, in order to eradicate homelessness;
- The promotion and construction of communal housing, allowing the social interaction of Mexican families, in the search for the fraternity of all Mexican workers, as part of the transition towards the construction of the revolutionary family.
Article 68. No one may be deprived of their liberty or property, possessions or rights, except by means of a trial before the previously established courts, in which the essential formalities of the procedure are complied with and in accordance with the laws issued prior to the fact. No one may be disturbed in their person, family, domicile, papers and possessions, except by virtue of a written warrant issued by the competent authority, which establishes and justifies the legal cause of the proceeding.
Article 69. All Mexicans have the right to freely bear arms, as established in Article 5 of this Constitution, and the regulatory laws that emanate from it. Likewise, all Soviets throughout the country have the right to form militias for public safety purposes in peacetime and for national defense in case of armed conflict.
Article 70. All Mexicans have the right to freely express their ideas by any possible means, including the press, as long as it does not constitute a crime against morality, public peace, or is considered counterrevolutionary content. The State shall determine by law such specific cases.
Article 71. All Mexicans have the right to free association, as long as it does not constitute a danger to Mexican society as a whole. An assembly or meeting whose purpose is to petition or protest any act to an authority shall not be considered illegal, and may not be dissolved, within the standards determined by law.
Article 72. In the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico; no titles of nobility or hereditary prerogatives and honors shall be granted, nor shall any effect be given to those granted by any other country.
Article 73. Extradition of political prisoners and other criminals wanted in countries friendly to Mexico is authorized. Extradition is not authorized for those common criminals who have had the status of slaves in the country where they committed the crime or are considered friends of Mexico and Humanity. The ratification of agreements or treaties by virtue of which the guarantees and rights established by this Constitution are altered is prohibited.
Article 74. No person may take justice into their own hands, nor exercise violence to claim their right. Every person has the right to have justice administered by courts that will be ready to impart justice within the terms and periods established by law, issuing their resolutions in a prompt, complete and impartial manner, completely free of charge.
Article 75. The penitentiary system will be organized on the basis of work, job training, education, health and sports as means to achieve the reintegration of the sentenced person into society and to ensure that they do not reoffend, observing the benefits provided by law. Women shall serve their sentences in places separate from those set aside for men for this purpose. Sentenced persons, in the cases and under the conditions established by law, may serve their sentences in the penitentiary centers closest to their homes, in order to promote their reintegration into the community, except in the most serious cases established by law.
Article 76. No detention may exceed a period of three days, in which the following shall be stated: the crime of which the accused is accused, the elements that constitute the crime, the place, time and circumstances of its execution, and the information provided by the preliminary inquiry, which must be sufficient to prove the corpus delicti and make the responsibility of the accused probable. The accused will have the right to defend themselves, either directly or through an attorney, who will be provided by the State free of charge. The accused shall have the right to have a defense counsel of their own.
Article 77. Defendants shall be guaranteed the following rights:
Article 69. All Mexicans have the right to freely bear arms, as established in Article 5 of this Constitution, and the regulatory laws that emanate from it. Likewise, all Soviets throughout the country have the right to form militias for public safety purposes in peacetime and for national defense in case of armed conflict.
Article 70. All Mexicans have the right to freely express their ideas by any possible means, including the press, as long as it does not constitute a crime against morality, public peace, or is considered counterrevolutionary content. The State shall determine by law such specific cases.
Article 71. All Mexicans have the right to free association, as long as it does not constitute a danger to Mexican society as a whole. An assembly or meeting whose purpose is to petition or protest any act to an authority shall not be considered illegal, and may not be dissolved, within the standards determined by law.
Article 72. In the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico; no titles of nobility or hereditary prerogatives and honors shall be granted, nor shall any effect be given to those granted by any other country.
Article 73. Extradition of political prisoners and other criminals wanted in countries friendly to Mexico is authorized. Extradition is not authorized for those common criminals who have had the status of slaves in the country where they committed the crime or are considered friends of Mexico and Humanity. The ratification of agreements or treaties by virtue of which the guarantees and rights established by this Constitution are altered is prohibited.
Article 74. No person may take justice into their own hands, nor exercise violence to claim their right. Every person has the right to have justice administered by courts that will be ready to impart justice within the terms and periods established by law, issuing their resolutions in a prompt, complete and impartial manner, completely free of charge.
Article 75. The penitentiary system will be organized on the basis of work, job training, education, health and sports as means to achieve the reintegration of the sentenced person into society and to ensure that they do not reoffend, observing the benefits provided by law. Women shall serve their sentences in places separate from those set aside for men for this purpose. Sentenced persons, in the cases and under the conditions established by law, may serve their sentences in the penitentiary centers closest to their homes, in order to promote their reintegration into the community, except in the most serious cases established by law.
Article 76. No detention may exceed a period of three days, in which the following shall be stated: the crime of which the accused is accused, the elements that constitute the crime, the place, time and circumstances of its execution, and the information provided by the preliminary inquiry, which must be sufficient to prove the corpus delicti and make the responsibility of the accused probable. The accused will have the right to defend themselves, either directly or through an attorney, who will be provided by the State free of charge. The accused shall have the right to have a defense counsel of their own.
Article 77. Defendants shall be guaranteed the following rights:
- They may not be compelled to testify against them. Any incommunicado detention, intimidation or torture shall be prohibited and punishable;
- They will be confronted with the witnesses who testify against him, who will testify in their presence if they are at the place of trial, so that they may ask them all the questions conducive to their defense;
- They will be provided with all the information that they may request for their defense and that is included in the process.
Article 78. The penalties of mutilation and infamy, branding, flogging, whipping, beating, torment of any kind, excessive fines, confiscation of property, and all other forms of abuse and torture are prohibited. The death penalty is reserved for the most serious crimes determined by law, but the State is obliged to provide as humane a capital sentence as possible. Any penalty shall be proportionate to the crime it punishes and to the legal right affected.
Article 79. No criminal trial shall have more than three instances. No one may be tried twice for the same offense, whether acquitted or convicted at trial. The practice of acquitting the instance is prohibited.
Article 80. The Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico is a country based on the doctrine of State atheism, therefore it is resolved as follows:
Article 79. No criminal trial shall have more than three instances. No one may be tried twice for the same offense, whether acquitted or convicted at trial. The practice of acquitting the instance is prohibited.
Article 80. The Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico is a country based on the doctrine of State atheism, therefore it is resolved as follows:
- The Mexican State is and will be independent and free from the influence of any religious cult;
- The existence of any law, decree, or legislative document that grants benefits to any cult with respect to others is prohibited;
- All Mexicans have the right to practice the religious belief that pleases them most, as well as to practice the ceremonies, devotions or acts of the respective cult, in temples or in their private homes, as long as they do not constitute a crime or misdemeanor punishable by law;
- All Mexicans have the right to disseminate anti-religious propaganda, which will be sponsored by the State.
Article 81. In cases of invasion, serious disturbance of the public peace, or any other case which places society in grave danger or conflict, the Central Executive Committee, with the approval of the All-Union Congress of Soviets, may suspend in the whole country, or in a particular place, the guarantees which would be an obstacle to the rapid and easy solution of the situation; but it must do so for a limited time, by means of general precautions and without the suspension being limited to a particular individual. If the suspension should take place when the Congress of Soviets is in session, it shall grant the authorizations it deems necessary for the Central Executive Committee to deal with the situation.
Article 82. The Mexican government shall provide asylum to those individuals and their families who, as foreign citizens, are persecuted for defending the interests of workers, for their activities of a scientific and/or cultural nature, and/or for their struggle for the national liberation of their respective countries.
Article 82. The Mexican government shall provide asylum to those individuals and their families who, as foreign citizens, are persecuted for defending the interests of workers, for their activities of a scientific and/or cultural nature, and/or for their struggle for the national liberation of their respective countries.
CHAPTER II
On the right to work of all Mexicans
On the right to work of all Mexicans
Article 83. All Mexicans have the right to work, as well as the obligation to work, under the precept "He who does not work, does not eat". The State is obligated to provide to all the people the possibility of being able to work in all existing and future industries and categories, as well as to provide safety, health and other rights to all workers, through all the measures it deems necessary, based on this Constitution and the laws that emanate from it. The right to work is guaranteed under the following precepts:
[*]The maximum working day shall not exceed eight hours. The People's Commissariat for Labor, in coordination with the Confederation of Workers of Mexico, and all other unions, undertakes to establish, in accordance with the development of the productive forces in the country, the gradual reduction of the working day in the future. In the case of night work, the working day shall not exceed seven hours, with additional remuneration provided;
[*]The minimum age for employment shall not be less than 16 years of age. However, the State is obliged to provide, in addition to the above, extra protection and work restrictions for all workers between the ages of 16 and 18, to ensure their safety and health;
[*]All workers shall have at least one day off from work. In the case of jobs that are considered dangerous or excessively demanding, there shall be at least two days of mandatory work rest, including remuneration. All workers without exception will be able to rest on holidays determined by law, with remuneration included;
[*]All workers will be able to take vacation periods, sanatoriums and rest homes to enjoy their right to rest;
[*]All working women in advanced pregnancy are prohibited from performing physical work that involves a burden on her and her unborn child. The State shall guarantee the continued existence of regulations that allow for the safety of all pregnant women in their workplace. In no case shall they lose the right to remuneration. During the month following childbirth they shall enjoy one month of mandatory rest, without risk of losing their employment or remuneration, which shall be paid in full. The State will guarantee the safety, health and protection of the mother and the baby, once this month of rest is over;
[*]The minimum wage to be enjoyed by the worker shall be that which is considered sufficient to satisfy the normal needs of the worker's life, their education and their honest pleasures. Equal wages shall correspond to equal work, regardless of sex, race or nationality. The salary must be paid with the legal tender, not being allowed to do so using any other representative sign with which it is intended to replace the currency;
[*]At all times, the State is obliged to provide workers with comfortable and hygienic living quarters for their use at work. Likewise, there shall be schools, nurseries, infirmaries and other necessary services to the community. In the event that the workplace has a certain number of workers, collective kitchens, buildings for municipal services and recreational centers will be established, only prohibiting the existence of bars or any other type of establishment for the consumption of alcohol;
[*]The State is obliged to observe in all workplaces, the legal precepts on hygiene and health, and adopt appropriate measures to prevent accidents in the use of machines, instruments and work materials, as well as its organization to ensure the health and safety of all workers;
[*]All workers shall have the right to join together in defense of their respective interests. The formation of alternative unions to the Confederation of Workers of Mexico is a right. All workplaces shall be governed by a Soviet, composed of representatives elected by the workers, who shall look after their joint interests;
[*]Strikes and work stoppages are recognized as a right of workers, as a form of protest against any concern or affectation to their working conditions. The law will determine the necessary restrictions, which will only be applicable for reasons of national security, public order, or the protection of other workers;
[*]All workers have the right to social security, which shall include old age, sickness or accident insurance, or any other insurance;
[*]The State recognizes the enormous burden of domestic work, so it will be obliged to take all measures it deems appropriate to contribute to the socialization of domestic work, only under the restriction of the development of the productive forces in the country;
[*]All workers can gradually climb to a higher level in their workplace, subject only to seniority and competence considerations;
[*]Any other rights that may be added in the future.
CHAPTER III
On Mexican nationality status and obligations
On Mexican nationality status and obligations
Article 84. Mexican nationality is acquired by birth or naturalization.
- They are Mexicans by birth:
- Those born in Mexican territory, regardless of the nationality of their parents;
- Those born abroad of Mexican parents; of either Mexican father or Mexican mother;
- Those born on board Mexican vessels or aircraft, whether war or merchant vessels.
- They are Mexicans by naturalization:
- Foreigners who obtain a letter of naturalization, by means of the requirements requested by law;
- A foreign woman or man who marries a Mexican man or woman and has or establishes his or her domicile within Mexican territory;
- Individuals considered friends of Mexico and of Humanity who have to flee their respective countries.
Article 85. These are obligations of Mexicans:
- To be responsible for their sons, daughters, or wards to attend daycare or school to receive their proper education, as well as to ensure their full development;
- Perform compulsory military service, as well as defend the country in the event of an armed conflict;
- To contribute to the expenses of the Union, in the proportional and equitable manner provided by the tax laws;
- To participate actively in the decisions to be taken in their locality, municipality, Republic or in the whole Union, through the Soviets of Workers, Peasants and Soldiers.
Article 86. The law shall regulate the exercise of the rights granted by Mexican law to Mexicans who possess another nationality and shall establish rules to avoid conflicts due to dual nationality. In times of peace, no foreigner may serve in the Armed Forces or public security forces of the country, this right being granted only to Mexicans by birth or naturalization.
CHAPTER IV
On foreigners
On foreigners
Article 87. Foreigners are those who do not possess the qualities determined in Article 84 of this Constitution. The Central Executive Committee may order the expulsion of any foreigner on the basis of the laws regulating this matter, with the exception of any foreigner who possesses asylum status, in accordance with the provisions of Article 82 of this Constitution. Foreigners may not interfere in the political affairs of the country.
CHAPTER V
On Mexican citizens
On Mexican citizens
Article 88. All Mexican nationals shall also be considered as Mexican citizens once they reach 18 years old, exercising full political rights.
Article 89. All citizens have the right to:
Article 89. All citizens have the right to:
- To vote in the elections of the Soviet to which they belong, whether local, student, workplace, or any other;
- To be able to vote in conditions of parity for all popularly elected offices, having the qualifications established by law. The existence of independent candidates is allowed, under the requirements established by law;
- To associate individually and freely to take part peacefully in the political affairs of the country, whether in union, partisan, independent, or any other form;
- To take up arms in the permanent Armed Forces or in the reserve corps, for the defense of the Republic and its institutions, under the terms prescribed by law;
- Propose amendments to the laws and other legislative documents of their Republic, or at the national level, under the requirements requested by law for deliberation.
Article 90. All citizens are obliged to:
- To be part of the reserve bodies in terms of the law;
- To vote in elections under the terms established by law;
- To hold popularly elected offices of the Union or of the Republics of the Union, which in no case shall be gratuitous.
Article 91. No Mexican by birth may be deprived of their nationality. Mexicans by naturalization may lose it under these circumstances:
- For accepting or using titles of nobility that imply submission to a foreign state;
- For not residing in Mexico for at least five continuous years;
- For committing acts of high treason.
Article 92. Citizenship is lost under these circumstances:
- For accepting or using titles of nobility that do not necessarily imply submission to a foreign state;
- For voluntarily rendering official services to a foreign government that is considered an enemy of the country;
- For accepting or wearing decorations from a foreign government that is considered an enemy of the country;
- In such other cases as the law deems appropriate.
Article 93. The law shall establish the cases in which the status of a citizen may be suspended, his rights and prerogatives, and the manner of rehabilitation.
TITLE FOUR
General provisions
General provisions
Article 94. All public officers of the Union, by popular appointment, shall receive such compensation for their services as shall be determined by law and appropriately paid, but such compensation shall not exceed that of a skilled laborer. This compensation is not waivable.
Article 95. Every public official, without exception, before taking office, shall take an oath to uphold the Constitution and the laws that emanate therefrom.
Article 96. In time of peace, no military authority may exercise any functions other than those having an exact connection with military discipline. Marriage is a civil contract. This and the other acts of the civil status of persons are the exclusive competence of the officials and authorities of the civil order, under the terms provided by law, and shall have the force and validity attributed to them by the same.
Article 97. The law does not recognize any legal personality to the specific religious groups and cults determined by the State, including churches. The ministers of these groups and cults shall be considered as persons exercising a profession and shall be directly subject to the laws on the matter set by the State. The ministers of cults may never, in public or private meetings constitute themselves as a board, nor in acts of worship or religious propaganda criticize the fundamental laws of the country, of the secular authorities in particular, or the general nature of the Mexican State; they shall have neither active nor passive vote, nor the right to associate for political purposes. It is strictly forbidden to form any kind of political grouping whose title has any word or indication that relates it to any religious confession. Meetings of a political nature may not be held in temples. A minister of any religion may not inherit by himself or through an intermediary person, nor receive by any title, a "real estate" occupied by any association for religious propaganda or religious or charitable purposes.
Article 98. This Constitution, the laws of the All-Union Congress of Soviets emanating therefrom, and all Treaties in accordance therewith, concluded and to be concluded by the All-Union Central Executive Committee, under approval of the Congress of Soviets, shall be the Supreme Law of the whole Union. The judges of each Republic shall abide by the said Constitution, laws and treaties, notwithstanding any provisions to the contrary which may be contained in the Constitutions of each Republic.
Article 95. Every public official, without exception, before taking office, shall take an oath to uphold the Constitution and the laws that emanate therefrom.
Article 96. In time of peace, no military authority may exercise any functions other than those having an exact connection with military discipline. Marriage is a civil contract. This and the other acts of the civil status of persons are the exclusive competence of the officials and authorities of the civil order, under the terms provided by law, and shall have the force and validity attributed to them by the same.
Article 97. The law does not recognize any legal personality to the specific religious groups and cults determined by the State, including churches. The ministers of these groups and cults shall be considered as persons exercising a profession and shall be directly subject to the laws on the matter set by the State. The ministers of cults may never, in public or private meetings constitute themselves as a board, nor in acts of worship or religious propaganda criticize the fundamental laws of the country, of the secular authorities in particular, or the general nature of the Mexican State; they shall have neither active nor passive vote, nor the right to associate for political purposes. It is strictly forbidden to form any kind of political grouping whose title has any word or indication that relates it to any religious confession. Meetings of a political nature may not be held in temples. A minister of any religion may not inherit by himself or through an intermediary person, nor receive by any title, a "real estate" occupied by any association for religious propaganda or religious or charitable purposes.
Article 98. This Constitution, the laws of the All-Union Congress of Soviets emanating therefrom, and all Treaties in accordance therewith, concluded and to be concluded by the All-Union Central Executive Committee, under approval of the Congress of Soviets, shall be the Supreme Law of the whole Union. The judges of each Republic shall abide by the said Constitution, laws and treaties, notwithstanding any provisions to the contrary which may be contained in the Constitutions of each Republic.
TITLE FIVE
On the Constitution
On the Constitution
Article 99. The present Constitution may be added to, amended, or revised completely. It is agreed upon by the All-Union Congress of Soviets, acting as the supreme constitutional authority, that amendments or additions be adopted by a simple majority vote of its members. However, a complete replacement of the Constitution will only be approved by a two-thirds vote of the Congress.
Article 100. This Constitution shall not lose its force and effect, even if by any rebellion its observance is interrupted. In case that by any public disorder a government is established contrary to the principles it sanctions, as soon as the people recover their liberty, its observance shall be reestablished, and in accordance with it and the laws that have been issued by virtue of it, those who have been in the government emanating from the rebellion, as well as those who have cooperated in it, shall be judged.
Article 100. This Constitution shall not lose its force and effect, even if by any rebellion its observance is interrupted. In case that by any public disorder a government is established contrary to the principles it sanctions, as soon as the people recover their liberty, its observance shall be reestablished, and in accordance with it and the laws that have been issued by virtue of it, those who have been in the government emanating from the rebellion, as well as those who have cooperated in it, shall be judged.
A Brief History of the Mexican Constitution of 1936
The revolutionary government that rose from the ashes of the United Mexican States, despite the military, technical and economic aid provided by the USSR and the UASR, was not a completely unified government. It is represented by the fact that the ruling Workers' Party of National Liberation was not fully a Communist Party in the common sense of the word, being rather characterized as a "Popular Front acting as a single party".
When the formation of a "Provisional Revolutionary Government of Workers and Peasants of Mexico" was declared in 1934, its main task was to annihilate the Cristeros in the Mexican Bajío, and secondly, to restore economic and political stability to the country. As a temporary solution to the impossibility of forming a stable Constituent Congress to modify or change the Constitution of 1917, it remained in force for a couple more years, although with certain provisional modifications added by the Provisional Revolutionary Government.
After the Cristero Rebellion was quelled long enough for the Cristeros to ceased being a danger to the survival of the new Mexican state, the POLN called for a Constituent Congress, which was to both form the I All-Union Congress of the Soviets, and to delimit how viable it was to maintain or revise the Constitution of 1917.
The members of the Communist Party of Mexico (integrated into the POLN) fully advocated for the creation of a constitution that is designed on Leninist, and in some minimal cases, DeLeonist principles. They argued that with the working class having taken power in a real way, there is no longer any need to maintain the pragmatic decisions that had been taken in 1929, with the formation of the "Workers and Peasants Bloc" [1].
Members belonging to the left-wing of the defunct National Revolutionary Party (also integrated into the POLN), on the other hand, advocated for a substantial modification of the Constitution of 1917, but not its complete abolition, since in their opinion, Mexico's economic development did not allow it to fully transition to a dictatorship of the proletariat, so it was more optimal to create a coalition government, similar to the future South American cases. Laborist Party members, the only other relatively prominent political party that didn't join the POLN, generally supported the decisions of this fraction indirectly.
In addition to these two factions, there was opposition from dissident communists that argued that the reforms needed to go further, rejecting the moderation of those who considered Mexico a "semi-feudal country". These dissidents would eventually become the "Mexican Communist Left".
In addition, the anarchists, heirs of the extinct Mexican Liberal Party, were critical of all the other fractions from a position considered "ultra-leftist". Although they maintained substantial influence within the POLN coalition, they were considered somewhat de facto independent. The trade unionists of the Confederation of Workers of Mexico, led by Fidel Velasquez and Vicente Lombardo Toledano, were also divided, since their own ranks generally represented the political divide of the country between anarchists, left-nationalists and communists.
The Constituent Congress lasted approximately 6 months, and is retroactively considered to be the most exhausting part of the political history of the nascent revolutionary Mexico. Despite the heavy nationalist influence within the POLN, there was a clear communist plurality within the party, which ended up voting in favor of complete revision of the Constitution of 1917.
As can be appreciated, the Political Constitution of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico is, above all, a set of influences coming from the Soviet Constitution of 1924, American legal and constitutional documents like the 1934 Basic Law of the UASR and its Bill of Rights; and the more "progressive elements'' within the Constitution of 1917. The Mexican Constitution of 1936 is also a single codified constitution, not separated into constitutional documents or unwritten "constitutional conventions''.
Logically, one can understand this unique decision to adopt a codified constitution: the factional struggles within the POLN to determine how much political influence they could exert on the Constitution, as well as the informal division of Mexican communists and unionists between pro-Soviet (Marxist-Leninist) and pro-American (Maximalist) camps, resulting in social articles closer to the influence of the American Cultural Revolution (though with certain social questions like that of sexual minorities being ignored or left in legal limbo on purpose), and many political and administrative articles inherited from the Soviet Union.
The moments of greatest unity were those related to those who considered Mexico a "semi-feudal country", a position shared by most communists and all, the left nationalists. As a result, the new Constitution declared Mexico as de facto under an economic model closer to the Soviet New Economic Policy, with additional American economic and technical assistance that helped to avoid the mistakes of the Soviet NEP. Likewise, the anti-clerical influence resulting from the Cristero Rebellion only served to affirm the secular (and atheistic) character of the transitional Mexican State.
On the other hand, the moments of greatest debate and discussions (in some cases reaching shouting and insults, if not fistfights) were those related to the national/native question, which the communists were able to win; and that related to the family, in which some margin was granted to the left-nationalists, which supported a social project of "revolutionary family", against the general communist position of the abolition of the patriarchal family structure. Some members openly stated their distrust of the American influence in the Constitution, under the argument that the Soviets were a better example of a country, but they were generally ignored.
Although there was no explicit article on political parties, the I Congress of Soviets clearly established the supremacy of the POLN over national political life. The Laborist Party could not even serve as a proper and sufficient "loyal opposition", being in the legal "gray zone" of bare minimum toleration and institutional repression. For its part, the fractions of the POLN would be firmly defined around representative figures who would seek to have control of the Mexican government.
Thus, the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico was formally born on May 5, 1936. The new Union would quickly start to adopt its first laws, general documents, national symbols, and in general, to organize the new national life of the country.
When the formation of a "Provisional Revolutionary Government of Workers and Peasants of Mexico" was declared in 1934, its main task was to annihilate the Cristeros in the Mexican Bajío, and secondly, to restore economic and political stability to the country. As a temporary solution to the impossibility of forming a stable Constituent Congress to modify or change the Constitution of 1917, it remained in force for a couple more years, although with certain provisional modifications added by the Provisional Revolutionary Government.
After the Cristero Rebellion was quelled long enough for the Cristeros to ceased being a danger to the survival of the new Mexican state, the POLN called for a Constituent Congress, which was to both form the I All-Union Congress of the Soviets, and to delimit how viable it was to maintain or revise the Constitution of 1917.
The members of the Communist Party of Mexico (integrated into the POLN) fully advocated for the creation of a constitution that is designed on Leninist, and in some minimal cases, DeLeonist principles. They argued that with the working class having taken power in a real way, there is no longer any need to maintain the pragmatic decisions that had been taken in 1929, with the formation of the "Workers and Peasants Bloc" [1].
Members belonging to the left-wing of the defunct National Revolutionary Party (also integrated into the POLN), on the other hand, advocated for a substantial modification of the Constitution of 1917, but not its complete abolition, since in their opinion, Mexico's economic development did not allow it to fully transition to a dictatorship of the proletariat, so it was more optimal to create a coalition government, similar to the future South American cases. Laborist Party members, the only other relatively prominent political party that didn't join the POLN, generally supported the decisions of this fraction indirectly.
In addition to these two factions, there was opposition from dissident communists that argued that the reforms needed to go further, rejecting the moderation of those who considered Mexico a "semi-feudal country". These dissidents would eventually become the "Mexican Communist Left".
In addition, the anarchists, heirs of the extinct Mexican Liberal Party, were critical of all the other fractions from a position considered "ultra-leftist". Although they maintained substantial influence within the POLN coalition, they were considered somewhat de facto independent. The trade unionists of the Confederation of Workers of Mexico, led by Fidel Velasquez and Vicente Lombardo Toledano, were also divided, since their own ranks generally represented the political divide of the country between anarchists, left-nationalists and communists.
The Constituent Congress lasted approximately 6 months, and is retroactively considered to be the most exhausting part of the political history of the nascent revolutionary Mexico. Despite the heavy nationalist influence within the POLN, there was a clear communist plurality within the party, which ended up voting in favor of complete revision of the Constitution of 1917.
As can be appreciated, the Political Constitution of the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico is, above all, a set of influences coming from the Soviet Constitution of 1924, American legal and constitutional documents like the 1934 Basic Law of the UASR and its Bill of Rights; and the more "progressive elements'' within the Constitution of 1917. The Mexican Constitution of 1936 is also a single codified constitution, not separated into constitutional documents or unwritten "constitutional conventions''.
Logically, one can understand this unique decision to adopt a codified constitution: the factional struggles within the POLN to determine how much political influence they could exert on the Constitution, as well as the informal division of Mexican communists and unionists between pro-Soviet (Marxist-Leninist) and pro-American (Maximalist) camps, resulting in social articles closer to the influence of the American Cultural Revolution (though with certain social questions like that of sexual minorities being ignored or left in legal limbo on purpose), and many political and administrative articles inherited from the Soviet Union.
The moments of greatest unity were those related to those who considered Mexico a "semi-feudal country", a position shared by most communists and all, the left nationalists. As a result, the new Constitution declared Mexico as de facto under an economic model closer to the Soviet New Economic Policy, with additional American economic and technical assistance that helped to avoid the mistakes of the Soviet NEP. Likewise, the anti-clerical influence resulting from the Cristero Rebellion only served to affirm the secular (and atheistic) character of the transitional Mexican State.
On the other hand, the moments of greatest debate and discussions (in some cases reaching shouting and insults, if not fistfights) were those related to the national/native question, which the communists were able to win; and that related to the family, in which some margin was granted to the left-nationalists, which supported a social project of "revolutionary family", against the general communist position of the abolition of the patriarchal family structure. Some members openly stated their distrust of the American influence in the Constitution, under the argument that the Soviets were a better example of a country, but they were generally ignored.
Although there was no explicit article on political parties, the I Congress of Soviets clearly established the supremacy of the POLN over national political life. The Laborist Party could not even serve as a proper and sufficient "loyal opposition", being in the legal "gray zone" of bare minimum toleration and institutional repression. For its part, the fractions of the POLN would be firmly defined around representative figures who would seek to have control of the Mexican government.
Thus, the Union of Socialist Republics of Mexico was formally born on May 5, 1936. The new Union would quickly start to adopt its first laws, general documents, national symbols, and in general, to organize the new national life of the country.
[1] The Workers' and Peasants Bloc (Bloque Obrero y Campesino, in Spanish) was the electoral front of the Communist Party of Mexico IOTL. They participated in the 1929 and 1934 Presidential Elections OTL. In Reds! the Bloc is still formed in 1928-1929, but for obvious reasons, it disappears during the collapse of the Mexican government and the Second Revolution.
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- Location
- Hartsville
Those were some great updates.
- Location
- Boston
Where exactly did the siege lines stop? OTL, once Japanese troops established a beachhead on Singapore, the defense was doomed, especially once the lines reached the point of threatening the water supplies for the city. However, even before that point, I can't imagine being penned up on the island with a million civilians was sustainable.