Caliphate of Cairo Meltdown

[Borys]

Posted with the approval of Maddox, this popped into my mind a few days ago while studying my atlas as a possible explanation for the sudden silence of the Caliphate of Cairo.

Stamp of Approval by Maddox
This is Part I, covering events through the end of Q1/01. Part II will follow tomorrow...

***************************************************************

The Collapse of the Caliphate of Cairo
excerpted from The ACM and Caliphate Collapses of 1900-1901 by Erika König, Kaiser Wilhelm Institute, Neue Danzig, 1939

The fall of the Caliphate of Cairo surprised many at the time. Nobody had ever imagined that what had previously seemed to be two of the strongest countries on the globe could totally and utterly implode within nine months of each other. However as the dust settled and investigations were made, it became clear that the first collapse had guaranteed the second.

In 1863, a young and foolish Caliph found himself short of the necessary funds to complete his latest palace. The ambassador of the Associacao Comercial du Mundo, through his myriad connections in the human cesspool that was, and is, Cairo, became aware of this fact, and approached the Caliph with an offer of a "generous" loan. Despite his advisors warning of the predatory tactics practiced by the ACM, the Caliph gratefully accepted the money - and the hook was set.

Over the next fourty years, the Caliphate found itself falling deeper and deeper into debt to the ACM. Offering "bargain" loans for everything from the finest French wines to the mightiest ships-of-the-line, interest rates soared. The Caliph, realising his mistake, attempted to stop the practice - only to realise that doing so would utterly wreck Cairo's economy.

By the 1890s, things had deteriorated to the point where the Caliphate was only able to keep one ACM director from defaulting on Caliphate credit by accepting a loan from another one. This proved to be both a cause and a symptom of the rot that had set into the Associacao. This also set up the events of 1900-1901; the Caliphate unwittingly helped to destroy the ACM, and the fall of the ACM was the straw that broke the Caliphate's back.

When the Australian dispute threatened to esclate and Caliphate military forces were deployed on a war footing, the increased expenditures strained the economy to the breaking point. Although it was not realised at the time, the collapse of the ACM had, ironically, prevented war between the Caliphate of Cairo and the Triple Alliance, as the Caliph suddenly found his only reliable source of cash abruptly terminated.

When the Caliphate's budget for 1901 was brought before the Caliph, it carried shocking news. The Caliphate was not only bankrupt, but without Associacao loans it was bankrupt twice over - and that was before military expenditures were considered. The realisation that a moment of youthful folly had caused the inevitiable ruin of his country was too much for the elderly Caliph, who collapsed of a heart attack, dying the next day.

The Caliphate was now thrown into chaos. The Caliph, continually beset by tidings of finanical woe, had never designated any of his many sons as his successor. Realising that if word of this got out other countries would likely descend upon the country like hungry vultures, the Caliph's advisors immediately closed off virtually all contact with the outside world.
   
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JLDOGG    
Posted: Jan 28 2006, 12:49 PM


The Flying Dutchman
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Very good story. Really explains things. Now I know why the Congo northeast has been quite.

Now what????
Will the Ottomans take the rest of the Arabian Pennisular???
Will West Australia seek indepedence from Cairo???
Will the Abyssinian Empire or France or ???
The world wonders!!!!!!!!!!!!!

rolleyes.gif



   
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swamphen    
Posted: Jan 28 2006, 02:09 PM


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Hate it when I discover obvious spelling errors after the fact...fixed now.

QUOTE
Now what????
Will the Ottomans take the rest of the Arabian Pennisular???
Will West Australia seek indepedence from Cairo???
Will the Abyssinian Empire or France or ???
The world wonders!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Don't worry, all will be revealed tomorrow.


Well, most of it anyway. tongue.gif
   
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DanielSBen    
Posted: Jan 28 2006, 06:36 PM


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QUOTE (swamphen @ Jan 28 2006, 02:09 PM)
Hate it when I discover obvious spelling errors after the fact...fixed now.

QUOTE
Now what????
Will the Ottomans take the rest of the Arabian Pennisular???
Will West Australia seek indepedence from Cairo???
Will the Abyssinian Empire or France or ???
The world wonders!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Don't worry, all will be revealed tomorrow.


Well, most of it anyway. tongue.gif


Incidentally, that draws the subject of Dubai and its surrounding areas, which are highly desired by the Peacock Throne....

(BTW I'm new. I'm just starting to set up - via PMs with the moderator - the Persian Empire. I think, if Cairo has indeed collapsed, that I would like to claim the area as Persia's one and only colony).
   
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Maddox    
Posted: Jan 28 2006, 06:58 PM


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Dispatch from the Caliphate of Caïro to the Peacock throne.


The Colonies at Dubai are negotiable. But only for the followers of Allah.
   
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DanielSBen    
Posted: Jan 28 2006, 07:55 PM


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QUOTE (Maddox @ Jan 28 2006, 06:58 PM)
Dispatch from the Caliphate of Caïro to the Peacock throne.


The Colonies at Dubai are negotiable. But only for the followers of Allah.

Well... that leaves Persia, the Ottomans, the Mughals, and Afghanistan as possible buyers.... I think Afghanistan can be eliminated tongue.gif.
   
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Desertfox    
Posted: Jan 28 2006, 08:03 PM


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Now the question is: Would the land hungry tongue.gif Swiss have done a peace keeping operation in Western Australia? biggrin.gif
   
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swamphen    
Posted: Jan 28 2006, 08:24 PM


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QUOTE (Desertfox @ Jan 28 2006, 08:03 PM)
Now the question is: Would the land hungry tongue.gif Swiss have done a peace keeping operation in Western Australia? biggrin.gif

Stay tuned. wink.gif
   
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dougwise13    
Posted: Jan 28 2006, 08:40 PM


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Just as a note, Firanj has 16,000,000 people, if we go by the accepted 1 MP= 4,000,000 people. It is unlikely that any one, non-Muslim power is going to occupy without serious trouble the territory belonging to that many angry Muslims, especially ones with a decent industrial capacity, military technology (Advanced, IIRC), and a capable if modest fleet.

And let me just say that a certain independent African nation would find it not entirely unpleasant if Eritrea and/or parts of the Sudan came under their control... tongue.gif
   
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swamphen    
Posted: Jan 28 2006, 08:56 PM


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QUOTE (dougwise13 @ Jan 28 2006, 08:40 PM)
Just as a note, Firanj has 16,000,000 people, if we go by the accepted 1 MP= 4,000,000 people. It is unlikely that any one, non-Muslim power is going to occupy without serious trouble the territory belonging to that many angry Muslims, especially ones with a decent industrial capacity, military technology (Advanced, IIRC), and a capable if modest fleet.

*rubs hands together* Don't worry, there is a Veddy Veddy Interestink twist coming...

QUOTE
And let me just say that a certain independent African nation would find it not entirely unpleasant if Eritrea and/or parts of the Sudan came under their control... tongue.gif


AUUUGHH!! SPOILER!!
tongue.gif



   
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dougwise13    
Posted: Jan 28 2006, 09:10 PM


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QUOTE
AUUUGHH!! SPOILER!!


What? I'm sure Liberia has Imperial pretensions...
   
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The Rock Doctor    
Posted: Jan 29 2006, 06:13 PM


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Sounds okay, but I really hope that you guys don't intend to dismember every PC-turned-NPC in the sim.
   
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Maddox    
Posted: Jan 29 2006, 06:27 PM


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don't worry big guy.I'm on the case
   
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swamphen    
Posted: Jan 29 2006, 09:49 PM


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QUOTE (The Rock Doctor @ Jan 29 2006, 06:13 PM)
Sounds okay, but I really hope that you guys don't intend to dismember every PC-turned-NPC in the sim.

I agree; in this case however it was virtually necessary, as the "departure" of the Caliphate in the middle of the Australian Crisis required some sort of resolution to said crisis, and the ACM collapse provided a means to that end. wink.gif

***

Somehow, the Caliphate managed to squeak through the first three months of 1901. However in April, even as the Middle Kingdom and New Switzerland went at each others' throats, the coffers ran dry. The Caliphate's troops in Firanj had been, essentially, doing nothing for nearly a year and a half, and had become bored. A bored soldier is a dangerous thing. A bored, unpaid soldier is a lethal one. When their paymasters refused to disburse April's pay - they couldn't, there was no money to give - a rebellion ensued.

A cavalry corps was the first to raise the black flag of mutiny. Storming the government offices in Firmaj, they found the Governor and his staff preparing to flee - loading what was later, likely exaggerated, described as "twelve trunks overflowing with gold coins" into a wagon. Enraged, they cut down every one of the "Govenment's theives".

They were the lucky ones. Word of the discovery quickly spread throughout the city. The citizens of Firanj had long resented their taxes, which had started out higher than the rest of the Caliphate and had been raised twice since the current crisis had begun. Upon learning the news that the Governor had been keeping the money for his own profit, both they, and the rest of the soldiers in the province, exploded.

Violence quickly spread, and several Caliphate officals were dragged from their homes and literally torn apart by angry mobs. It is possible that the entire city would have been destroyed had not Admiral al-Thrawn, commander of the Caliphate naval force in the colony, trained the guns of his battleships upon the town and declared that, as senior military officer in the colony, the troops would break up the riots "or Firmanj will suffer the fate of Shanghai".

It is said that the mutiny did not end until al-Thrawn had fired a salvo into the officers' barracks near the city centre, at which point things quickly became very quiet in Firmanj. While this has never been proven, it is known that evening he came ashore and, following an all-night conference with the surviving senior officers of the Army units present, announced that the colony was now the "Empire of Firanj", and that he, as "Emperor Thrawn", was now the supreme ruler of the area.

***

In the colony of Oman, on the Arabian Peninsula, the violence was less pronounced. By the time disgruntled artillerymen broke into the government offices in Muscat, they found it vacant, and no trace of its occupants was ever found. Many rumours have stated that the government staff murdered the Governor and his harem, stole his secret treasure, and found refuge in the Ottoman Empire.

Oman had never truly had a stable central government; the local sheiks had maintiained a high degree of autonomy, while the Governor had been little more than a tax collector. With the central authority gone, the colony dissolved, and the area devolved into a morass of petty kingdoms and emirates.

***

The Caliph's advisors, having barely managed to pay the troops in the Caliphate itself and thus avoided an internal rebellion, realised that the loss of the colonies had removed a considerable finacial drain, and that possibly, just possibly, the total collapse of the state could be avoided. Recognising the independence of Firanj - and speaking volumes by their silence on the subject of Oman - was seen as a necessary evil, however the problem of choosing a new Caliph had now taken centre stage. Of the Caliph's many offspring, it was difficult to determine who, if anyone, had the strongest claim to the title. Finally a compromise was reached. Instead of their being a single Caliph as head of state, the twelve eldest sons of the former Caliph would form a Council of Caliphs, each ruling a portion of the remaining Caliphate of Cairo directly. They would meet in Cairo itself four times a year to run the country as a whole, its external affairs, and its (by now greatly reduced) military, by committee.
   
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Ithekro    
Posted: Jan 29 2006, 12:21 PM


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"I am not a committee!"


"You say an Emperor Thrawn, Baron von Letter?" Rohan will ponder this while news sifts in from across the seas.