AN: Credits to Vasilisa, perfect_shade, Readhead, BrettFire and geo_113 for feedback and revisions.
1953 August 18th, evening in Berun, on Weiss's boat on the Spree River:
I took a sip of beer as the boat cruised down the river, reflecting on the stories that the former 203rd mage battalion members had shared.
Neumann retired from military service and married Birgit. They now have three adorable kids, with a fourth one expected soon.
General Weiss will be retiring from the air force soon. Privately with me, he shared his excitement for Germania's first supersonic jets entering mass production for the Air Force, and the Navy were modifying the jet design for their upcoming aircraft carriers. There were also plans for a cross-licensing deal with the Akinese for them to share their magic emissions homing missiles in response to the CSR's high powered mages, while we would share our upcoming improved radar guided missiles that also had the accuracy and maneuverability to engage individual mages. The Akinese were also very interested in buying both the standard and carrier capable supersonic jets with increased fuel tank capacity, and later licensing the production of them.
I'm just thankful that I'm no longer an aerial combat mage in this age of jets and missiles, even if I had my stealth orb with me. The jets can always just run away back to base if none of their missiles take down their target and come back refueled and rearmed to have another go at the poor mages whose only option is to drop to the ground and hide. Speaking of the stealth orb, Dr. Schugel was tinkering with the next generation solid state electronic orbs based on prototype "printed" silicon transistors, in pursuit of ever more efficient orbs. The silicon transistors weren't ready for commercial mass production, but that didn't stop the mad scientist from plowing ahead on trying to build the perfect computational orb.
And then there's Koenig. Just when he thought he was going to retire, the BND offered him an extremely generous compensation for him to help train their large number of newly recruited or borrowed mages during the peak of the chaos in Francois Republic. He was exhausted from that and is taking an extended vacation.
If there's one thing they all have in common, it is that they can all enjoy their retirement or will soon be able to do. Meanwhile I'm stuck running Germania because no one else is willing to step up to take my place!
As I gazed out at the illuminated lights of Berun and the Presidential Palace, Weiss broke the silence.
"It's nice that we could have this casual get-together after years of doing our own things. Where's your wife?"
I rolled my eyes and shuddered a bit. "Visha's gone out dancing with Elya and some of their friends; they're having a 'girls' night out in the town'."
"But why didn't you join them? I mean, aren't you a woman too…" Neumann then awkwardly turned his face to stare at his drink when I glared at him intensively.
I went back to staring at the water for a short moment before Koenig spoke up.
"Something is bothering you," he remarked.
"Bit of a personal crisis," I shrugged my shoulders.
"Have you talked to others, maybe Serebryakov? Or your cabinet members?"
"No, absolutely not," I looked at Koenig. "They are the last people I can confide in, because I'm having problems with them directly!"
"I didn't know there was a lot of drama in the background, everything seems to be running so well. Do you have a specific problem with them?" Weiss had a look of confusion.
"Have you seen the news about Volksauto?"
"Something about their company president being fired for 'loss of confidence'. Why?"
"I had instructions for my cabinet to find legal ways to persuade Volksauto to cease lobbying the Unified States to stop exporting oil to OZEV, as Volksauto was busy trying to curry political favors in the Unified States to expand their market share there."
Everyone turned their heads.
"Well that's ridiculous for them to directly undermine OZEV's economy and not expect consequences," Weiss snorted. "Of course it had to be dealt with."
I put my head in my hands in frustration for a moment. "The problem is that Serebryakov and Chancellor Adenaue interpreted my instructions in a way for them to claim that I delegated my emergency powers to the Chancellor for him to threaten Volksauto with nationalization of their assets in Germania if they didn't fire their president and cease conducting actions that harm OZEV. And it's not the first time where my wife and subordinates constantly misunderstand me and recklessly run off on wild adventures behind my back! How can I trust them to not cause trouble?!"
Neumann put down his beer. "Can't you just order them to do exactly what you want?"
"Easier said than done," I sighed deeply. "I'm still only one person, there's a limit to what I can do; every leader has to rely on her subordinates to carry things out, and they all have their own minds and will."
"And I'm assuming that makes it hard to reprimand them, when what they are doing accomplished what you said you wanted them to do." Koenig chuckled. "Have you at least sat down with them to thoroughly explain your intentions?"
"Yes, it's hard to tell them they did a horrible job when they carried out my orders to find some way to solve the Volksauto issue. They did succeed, in the worst possible way. Well, second worst considering they didn't actually nationalize Volksauto's assets. And I have been explaining my intentions for years! Free market principles and minimal government intervention in the economy! I even wrote books on economics! What more can I do? Or are they just pretending to agree with me?"
"I think you're just being paranoid," Weiss smiled. "I've read your books, but your actions suggest something... different."
"What do you mean by that?!" I gave him a shocked look.
"The continuation of President Paul's heavy nuclear power policy and trying to get Germania and the rest of OZEV off of foreign oil imports. And that's the only most recent economic intervention you have done. We could go back further, such as the education bill for war veterans. Or even before that, where you rescued Germania from the hyperinflation and economic depression."
"Those were all necessary actions at the time to prevent far worse outcomes. Just temporary…" I trailed off as the realization of what Weiss said hit me.
He had a point. I expanded the Germanian and OZEV bureaucracies. And set a trend towards centralization that is now drifting forward on its own momentum! Everyone completely misunderstood what my goals are, because they were mimicking my actions!
I shuffled away from the three men to ponder. I had to do something, but what? Maybe show an alternative of how things could be if we all continue down this path, such as a frightening vision of the future? But how?
1953 August 19th, Londonderry, Pennsylvania, Unified States:
"What's the damage?" Taft looked out at the busy site. Numerous construction workers and trucks swarmed over the remains of the facility, transporting supplies and assembling arrays of new buildings, scaffolding and cranes.
"Other than patching small cracks in the containment shell and building another layer of concrete around it, it's been contained," Secretary of Defense Carl Windsor pointed towards a busy cluster of activity. "The engineers came up with the idea of horizontally ramming pipes through the soft, wet soil under the concrete pad to later run coolant through them or fill them with concrete if the concrete pad's temperature continues to decline, and also injecting enormous quantities of grout under the pad to stabilize the foundation. My main concern is what we do next after we brush this incident under the rug."
"Our nuclear weapons program isn't going to stop, so we will continue to need a large domestic production capability for weapons grade nuclear material. And with this many people involved, someone will talk and the media will catch wind. Telling a panicking public that we're pushing ahead on these reactors in pursuit of nuclear weapons isn't an easy sell," Taft frowned as one of the grout injection machines coughed a plume of black smoke as it fired up. "We don't have many options out of this madness, do we?"
"It's the future of warfare," Windsor confidently touted. "When the communists have their own nuclear weapons and enter a war against an enemy alliance that has nuclear weapons, it's only a matter of time before someone thinks they can deliver a quick, decisive blow by using their nuclear weapons to try to destroy their enemy's nuclear weapons first to secure an overwhelming advantage. I'll have a word with Dullas to see if there's any dirt we can dig up on the communists' progress of their nuclear weapons development to rile up the public and overshadow any news of our reactor accident."
"You're implying we also need to invest in new delivery systems?" Taft raised an eyebrow.
"Dropping bombs out of a plane is simple," Windsor chuckled. "But planes are slow and anyone with radar sites and some jet fighters, which the communists will have by the time our nuclear weapons are ready, will see those bombers come in and shoot them down. What good is a stockpile of bombs when the enemy can stop them from being delivered?"
He paused for a moment to let the rhetorical question sink and for the noise to subside from a horizontal hydraulic press-in machine pushing a pipe under the pad. "The only way to stay ahead of that madness is to have a delivery platform capable of rapidly delivering our payloads to our enemy with minimal detection and even when detected, be difficult to stop."
"Do you already have a plan in mind?"
"The science boys are proposing a treetop skimming supersonic nuclear powered missile with the range to fly across the entire Pacific Ocean, using the curvature of the Earth to avoid detection until the last possible moment. I know, it's insane, but the plans for building a missile with enough conventional rocket fuel to make it across the ocean have run into major delays. Meanwhile the air force boys want their long-range supersonic bombers with the payload to carry nuclear bombs, but I don't like how they have been optimistically dismissive of the CSR's growing missile capability that could easily be repurposed to bring down bombers. They assumed that their bombers could evade missiles with enough airspeed and altitude." Windsor rolled his eyes. "As for the nuclear powered missile, it will require a highly compact, high-power reactor that operates at temperatures that would melt steel. And all the more reason why we need to maintain good relations with Germania for their expertise."
"I'm not even sure if they have such a reactor," Taft gave a skeptical look.
"Even if they don't, they should at least have some information on what potential requirements are needed for an air-cooled reactor." Windsor shrugged his shoulders. "They won't know that it would be for our nuclear weapons delivery."
"I'll help ensure the project funding is prioritized…" Taft's face then hardened and he pointed his hand at the frenzy of operations at the site. "But I'll expect your resignation if a nuclear-powered missile or its reactor blows up and causes another major incident."
1953 August 21st, Streets of Hambrück:
Ah, it's good to get away from official business. Visha and I were enjoying a casual stroll through the charming streets of Hambrück in our magic disguises, thanks to 'legitimate' identification papers, courtesy of the BND.
Although the thought of what to do about how Visha resolved the Volksauto issue continued to eat at me. I know she did what she thought I wanted, but I can shake the feeling of mistrust and resentment.
"I know it's been a while since we've visited this city, doesn't it feel a lot emptier, 'Marie'?" Visha tugged on my arm. "Closed businesses and empty street vendor stalls."
"You're right, 'Elissa'. There's also less road traffic," I pointed at the row of automobiles where some were starting to collect dust on them and around their wheels, as if they hadn't been moved in sometime.
"And Hambrück is actually doing better than the national average, thanks to the economic stimulus from the Granadian deal. Doesn't bode well for how things will look when our strategic oil reserve starts to run low if the Aegyptian war drags on. We can't dip into our reserves too much without becoming strategically vulnerable. The disrupted international trade that originally went through the Suez Canal was already a hard hit on its own."
I examined one of the street vendors that was still in operation. Several footballs hung from his cart, in solidarity with New Granada. I scanned the menu.
"The price of pretzels and sausages are higher than what I remembered. I'd hate to see what the consumer goods prices look like outside of Germania in other countries that are also dependent on oil imports."
"Rising unemployment and inflation rate… How do we handle that again this time?" Visha looked at me with a worried expression while I walked over to a vendor to buy ice cream for us.
Right, we're staring down a potential stagflation, and this one was primarily triggered by oil supply shock along with trade with Asia having to be rerouted all the way around the horn of Africa. Sitting on a massive reserve of US dollars helped, but the only thing we'd accomplish with mass purchases of oil during a global supply disruption would be angering all other oil importers in the world and transferring much of our money straight to the oil producers.
But does it have to be a stagflation? I racked my brain to think of how the oil importing countries responded to the 1970's oil supply shocks, and their different approaches. Regardless if they had high or steady inflation, or even deflation, or their monetary policies essentially ignored the issue. They were all hit with increased unemployment. Which makes sense because monetary policy alone can't fix an economy in a supply shock. Throwing more money to buy the limited supply just sends prices rocketing upward, followed by everything downstream that was dependent on the supply.
The economy has to restructure over time to do less with the restricted supply. It's a good thing that Germania was already one step into that restructure phase and dragged the OZEV members along with us. Although completely removing OZEV's need for foreign oil import is still a very tall order with 1950's technology. I am incredibly glad that we were able to secure the massive cash flows from the Americans to fund the preparations for an oil crisis.
"The only thing I can think of is to keep inflation under control and work on weaning OZEV off oil imports," I handed one of the ice cream servings to Visha. "But that's a cold comfort to those who lose their jobs or businesses, homes or even their life savings."
"Basic assistance, something to at least keep roofs over people's heads and for them to afford food," Visha took a small bite of the ice cream. "What about tuition assistance and a small allowance for people to pursue higher education or technical training, when they otherwise would be idling from unemployment? When all of this is over, Germania would have a large pool of skilled labor."
Dammit, I really don't want to keep going down this path, but telling people to just deal with the crisis on their own would result in me getting lynched by a hungry mob instead of peacefully retiring!
"That could work. I'll have to check with Adenaue to get his input. Technically it's his responsibility to create and implement an economic relief program, or he could wait until after the Diet is in session for them to create and approve such a program for him to implement."
As we approached a plaza, a GDU political rally was just starting. I hadn't seen signs of other political parties yet, which left me concerned about a potential rubber-stamp Diet unable to create their own original ideas instead of just doing everything that I tell them to do. Which would set Germania up for the same problems all over again. I strolled over to one of the tables, pushed aside a football and grabbed one of the pamphlets, then stepped off to the side to read through it. Visha read over my shoulder.
"This is disgusting. It can be summarized as, 'do exactly what President Degurechaff has done in the past and expressed support for'. How can a democracy function like this?" I turned to Visha with an annoyed expression bordering on disgust. The first thing approaching a diverse democracy was such a disappointment.
"Maybe you could allow some people to take credit for your ideas and continue delegating responsibilities, so it doesn't look like you're the only one who's running the entire country," Visha shrugged as she finished the last of her ice cream, then pointed at my hand. "You haven't eaten your ice cream yet and it's melting."
"Eh, you can have it, Elissa." I gave my ice cream to Visha, then ripped up the pamphlet.
And apparently I did that a little too loud and with a bit too much enthusiasm because someone came storming over to us with hostile intent.
"What, you aren't a fan of the President?!" The agitated man, probably in his 60s, yelled at us.
I could make the excuse of it being a misunderstanding and walk away… Just ignore the entire matter on our rare day off…
Or I could see if there was a viable political alternative here that I could encourage by discrediting my own rule if need be. The country needed a viable political opposition to keep Adenaue and Dertinge on their toes when it's time for my actual retirement. Paul went down the rabbit hole of stupidity and dragged everyone else down with him because no one could stop him. While Adenaue and Dertinge are far more competent than Paul, my experiences of working with corporate leadership repeatedly confirmed that being surrounded by yes men and women will doom even the most competent leader, and sometimes an entire company. I had some skill in these matters, and with a little bit of luck this would just do the trick.
And the best part is that this is where I can demonstrate the danger of extremism without my actual identity being associated with it!
"You're smiling about it now. What's your bright idea then?!" The old man appeared to have taken notice of my involuntary smile.
"Are you familiar with the concept of the bus factor, where the question for an organization or government is how many key members can they lose before it is crippled?" I smiled indulgently at the man. "Let's say that President Degurechaff suddenly dies tomorrow, who could pick up the slack then?"
"How would you run things then?! If something as preposterous as the Argent falling ill actually happened?" The man blustered loudly, drawing further attention from other members of the crowd and conveniently setting my stage. "The previous President was worse than having no President!"
Seeing the agreeing nods around me felt like being back in time, masses grumbling yet lacking direction. Ah, it's been ages since I've done fiery political speeches, advocating for things that would have been considered extreme by others.
And this time I had the opportunity to make my true opinion known rather than what international political realities forced my hand to sign. It was almost too easy, though I had to make sure to sprinkle in some actually viable arguments to give my future opposition some teeth and legs to stand on that wouldn't come back to bite them too badly.
Keep them from drifting into some ridiculous anti-establishment sentiments but also make sure they wouldn't flip too many voters at the same time since either would be a headache to deal with. I wanted someone that could take my place when I retire, not people that screwed me over like Paul had out of a sense of… anti-Degurechaff politics.
"President Degurechaff has taken an extremely passive stance against the Allied Kingdom and Francois Republic, especially with the ongoing Aegyptian War that is directly responsible for the recent hardship," I gave a disappointed look to the old man.
"Passive?!" He shouted enraged, but I cut him off before he could properly rant.
"People are out of work and have to conserve fuel because Degurechaff is content to do nothing and sip coffee in her office. And let's not forget about the countless atrocities being committed in Aegyptus, Algeria and elsewhere by the two powers! We must stand on our own two feet up to the Albish and Frankish!"
"Are you willing to risk war against them when we have the communist threat in the east?" He looked at me with a confused face.
"If they refuse to listen to reason, Germanian peacekeepers and our allies should be sent to Aegyptus to force an end to the hostility. Or have we forgotten the Rheinland?!" I was pleased to see that that old indignity still got a reaction, reminding the crowd of what they had in common with the men and women in Aegyptus denied the right to their own country. "And they ought to remember it as well, should they not? Would do well to fear going to war with us for the ruin it would bring and the danger to the rest of Europe from the communists," I then smiled. "A strange situation of mutually assured destruction."
"This is madness!" A look of astonished horror was blossoming on his face.
"Madness? Isn't letting others push you around time and time again just that? Forcing you into hardships not of your choosing while they remain untouched?" I further challenged the crowd. "Would you rather die on your feet or live on your knees waiting for what fear tomorrow will bring?"
At this point it looked like most other people took interest in our little debate. Visha appeared to have distanced herself from me, observing from the sideline while finishing my ice cream.
Someone shouted, "That's all fine and good, but how would you fix our economy in the meantime? I can barely afford taking my family to the beach, much less the diesel to drive a tank there like in the war!"
"There isn't enough relief for those who are suffering," my face shifted to a sad expression. "While there are unemployment benefits and other social safety nets, they assume that people will eventually find work again within a few months when this crisis could last far longer. Nor do they provide sufficient protection to small businesses that are struggling due to no fault of their own."
"As long as the war in Aegyptus continues, Germania will have high levels of unemployment as our economy once more starves from a lack of fuel to keep the industrial engine going. We can only do so much about that now that crisis is upon us. Oil doesn't just spring from the ground in Germania, it never has and what we haven't prepared for before is not available now. It is as simple as that." I paused to take in the stony faces around me, at least they did appear aware of their reality. That was good, easier to work with than an entirely rabid crowd. More reasonable for a moderate opposition I was looking for. Now to offer them a way out to keep them from radicalizing. "We only have so many resources with which to build right now."
"However!" I continued after another timed pause. "However, it will not stay this way forever! We have the opportunity to prepare our workforce for once the shortage is over and make it so that we can recover lost profits as soon as possible! To that end I will send the idle hands of Germania into technical training or higher education. There will be plenty of need for more advanced expertise, highly productive jobs with high wages once industry picks up steam. Voluntary military recruitment will also be expanded to provide jobs and training, and when people leave military service, they will be the ready reserve for when Germania is threatened. A prosperity for all!"
I could see the words sinking in as listeners mulled it over, quickly finding purchase as a promise of opportunity and money always did. The perfect incentives, but discontents did of course remain.
"And what about Volksauto?" Someone else confronted me. "They haven't raised my salary in years despite record profits!"
"A slap on the wrist just results in businesses continuing to put their interests far ahead of society," I stamped my feet angrily, real annoyance simmering under the surface. "Imagine if the Unified States completely stopped selling oil to OZEV due to Volksauto lobbying! No, this is where society has to remind them what their purpose is. You work for them, but they should provide service to society, not the other way around!"
The arguments showed no sign of abating anytime soon, instead raged on for quite a while longer until the GDU rally had been thoroughly disrupted with the crowd's focus forming around me. I wasn't too concerned. The way I saw it, they hadn't seen a credible political opposition to me in a long time thanks to Paul, and this is the first time that someone spoke out against me, even if it's me in disguise. So of course everyone not entirely on board with my recent decisions would flock to the first reasonable alternative. Thankfully I was in position to provide just that by happenstance rather than one of the less well intentioned actors looking to turn the crowd into useful idiots. Just another reason why I had insisted on a proper democratic system so nobody got any extreme ideas!
And once there is a quality challenger that can take my place, I can finally retire!
Visha finally spoke up after I had extricated myself and we walked far away from the political rally location. "So… What was your plan of stirring up unrest against yourself there? Isn't that going to make passing laws more difficult again?"
"I was trying to encourage political opposition against me so that the Diet wasn't full of yes men and women, never questioning what I do even if I'm making a grave error. No one wanted to create and lead the opposition, so I had to prime the pump," I rubbed my forehead in annoyance.
"Dear, do you realize by the end of the rally your disguise has practically become the face of the opposition you just created?" Visha looked at me with worry.
"It's not like it's going to be popular enough that I end up being elected to the Diet or as Chancellor," I shrugged my shoulders nonchalantly. "I'm not even on their lists or anything. Besides, this will help encourage others to step up to run for politics after I put the idea in their head that a viable political opposition is possible."
Visha looked at me if she was going to say something, but opted not to. Instead frowning for a couple more steps before commenting. "You're right, Marie Kirschmann could disappear easily enough."
1953 August 22nd, Mosul, Mesopotamia:
General Ali Pasha smiled a bit as he read the report on the ongoing Battle of Fallujah. Some of the southern Qajarian forces were encircled during their panicked retreat from the city. His southern force commander asked if he should make preparations to attack Baghdad to give chase to the broken Qajarians, or race north to Mosul.
He then looked up at the map of Mosul and scowled. Enemy forces were now in control of the eastern half of the city and launching probing assaults over Tigris River, undeterred by the blown bridges. Just four days ago, it looked like his forces could hold the outskirts of the city when the initial wave of Qajarians were repelled. And then it all changed when the North Bharatians launched widespread night-time attacks that routed his forces from their outskirt defenses, resulting in significant chaos in eastern Mosul from the street to street fighting.
It was also apparent that the North Bharatian mages acted unconventionally during the night-time attacks. They positioned themselves undetected for surgical strikes, and after one or two devastating volleys, blended back into the masses of regular infantry to repeat the process. There were many rumors of North Bharatian mages infiltrating defensive positions to slaughter the unsuspecting men, then disappearing like ghosts.
To make matters worse, his assumption that his forces could rest and recover for a few days upon falling back across the river were shattered when it became apparent that the North Bharatians expected that from early on, and had brought numerous armored and heavily armed boats with them to harass his river defenses.
'It's a good thing that I listened to my subordinates' suggestion of having multiple lines of defenses to wear down the enemy. They won't be able to break through the earthen embankments that we constructed on our side of the Tigris River.
He heard something move behind him and he spun around. In a dark corner, the mysterious Chinese man was standing there.
"I stopped by to learn why the arms shipment to Caucasia hasn't happened yet, and now I understand why. In fact, you are in greater danger than you think you currently are in."
Ali had a puzzled look on his face as he tapped on the marking of the river defenses on the map. "They have to cross wide-open water while my men are sitting behind earthen walls. Sure they have their boats, but any landings against the embankments would be suicide."
"I take it that you haven't really studied how the Bharatian War was fought," the Chinese man sounded as if he was disappointed.
"Why would that matter?" Ali rolled his eyes. "Mesopotamia is completely different from the Bharat subcontinent, and the war was mainly fought by non-Bharatians."
"We're short on time, so I'll make this quick." The Chinese man prepared to leave. "The CSR, along with North Bharat, witnessed how the coalition against them seized control of rivers. They painfully learned many lessons of how to counter those amphibious operations. North Bharat in particular lost their entire army and almost all of their reserves, forcing them to rebuild their army from scratch while much of its territory was occupied. Then they spent months launching attacks across rivers into defensive fortifications that were on the other side of the river bank. They took tremendous losses but had no other option. And with every casualty taken, they learned more lessons on how to conduct such operations. Ranging from coordinated artillery barrages with river assault operation to the usage of high pressure water cannons to blast their way through earthen embankments like the ones your forces built."
The Chinese man pointed at Ali. "And this time there is no overwhelming enemy air supremacy against them, so they will be even more aggressive with the river crossing and also include aerial bombings and mage attacks. Their success in using mage hit and run and infiltration attacks, breaking fortifications and fighting in urban areas was no coincidence, they watched the CSR on how all of that is done, and that was how they broke your forces on the outskirts of Mosul a few days ago."
"I haven't seen much use of artillery, aerial bombings and aerial mages from them. We will hold on against these infidels!" Ali confidently boasted.
The Chinese man shook his head and slipped away into the shadows.
AN:
wiki/Mikoyan-Gurevich_MiG-19
The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-19 (Russian: Микоян и Гуревич МиГ-19; NATO reporting name: Farmer) is a Soviet second generation, single-seat, twinjet fighter aircraft and was the world's first mass-produced supersonic aircraft.
wiki/Vought_F-8_Crusader
The Vought F-8 Crusader (originally F8U) is a single-engine, supersonic, carrier-based air superiority jet aircraft[2] designed and produced by the American aircraft manufacturer Vought. It was the last American fighter that had guns as the primary weapon, earning it the title "The Last of the Gunfighters".[3][4]
wiki/Planar_process
wiki/Charles_Erwin_Wilson#Secretary_of_Defense
The major features of the New Look included greater reliance on nuclear weapons, using the advantage the United States had over the Soviet Union in such weapons; elevation of strategic air power, the major means to deliver nuclear weapons, to a more important position (not an expansion in the number of Air Force aircraft but rather development and production of better equipment); reductions of conventional ground forces, based both on reliance on strategic and tactical nuclear weapons and the expectation that US allies would provide ground troops for their own defense; an expanded program of continental defense, which, along with strategic air power, would serve as a principal ingredient of the New Look's deterrence program; and modernization and enlargement of reserve forces, enhancing the military manpower base while reducing active duty forces.
wiki/Project_Pluto
On 1 January 1957, the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission selected the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory to study the feasibility of applying heat from a nuclear reactor to power a ramjet engine for a Supersonic Low Altitude Missile. This would have many advantages over other nuclear weapons delivery systems: operating at Mach 3, or around 3,700 kilometers per hour (2,300 mph), and flying as low as 150 meters (500 ft), it would be invulnerable to interception by contemporary air defenses and carry more and larger nuclear warheads (up to sixteen with nuclear weapon yields of up to 10 megatonnes of TNT (42 PJ)) and deliver them with greater accuracy than was possible with intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBMs) at the time and, unlike them, could be recalled.
/the-flying-crowbar-the-insane-doomsday-weapon-america-1435286216
...a locomotive-size missile that would travel at near-treetop level at three times the speed of sound, tossing out hydrogen bombs as it roared overhead. Pluto's designers calculated that its shock wave alone might kill people on the ground. Then there was the problem of fallout. In addition to gamma and neutron radiation from the unshielded reactor, Pluto's nuclear ramjet would spew fission fragments out in its exhaust as it flew by. (One enterprising weaponeer had a plan to turn an obvious peace-time liability into a wartime asset: he suggested flying the radioactive rocket back and forth over the Soviet Union after it had dropped its bombs.)
This crazy bastard had so many ways to kill you, it was like a death buffet: should I die in the nuclear blasts of the bombs themselves, or just let the shockwave of the overpassing missile kill me? Maybe I'll just wait for the radiation sickness as this thing circles endlessly overhead, like a colossal demonic robot vulture. It's so hard to choose!
Sources I read on how different countries responded to the 1970's oil supply shocks. The big TLDR is that in a supply shock situation, regardless if the monetary policy pushes for deflation or inflation, unemployment in the long term is not going to budge until the supply shock is over or it goes on for so long that the economy eventually readjusts to making do with less supply (e.g. oil).
r/Economics/comments/jxmxf/i_still_dont_know_how_stagflation_can_happen_to/
A really excellent book on all this written for the general audience is Friedman's Money Mischief. It shows how during the oil shock inflation in the USA surged, in Germany remained flat, and in Japan fell sharply - because the Germans are never going to allow inflation again after their Weimar experience, and the Japanese had started an anti-inflation money policy when they had it at 20% a few years earlier, and stuck with the policy during the oil shock years. But all three had the same recession.
This absolutely refuted, among other things, the claim heard all the time then (and still today) that oil price increases cause inflation. "Significant inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon", not an oil price phenomenon, or a commodity price phenomenon.
The book also has an excellent history of the gold standard (and silver money in the USA) that some of the Paleo-Austrians around here ought to read to learn something.
federalreservehistory's "The Great Inflation" article: essays/great-inflation
Motivated by a mandate to create full employment with little or no anchor for the management of reserves, the Federal Reserve accommodated large and rising fiscal imbalances and leaned against the headwinds produced by energy costs. These policies accelerated the expansion of the money supply and raised overall prices without reducing unemployment.
Bad data (or at least a bad understanding of the data) also handicapped policymakers. Looking back at the information policymakers had in hand during the period leading up to and during the Great Inflation, economist Athanasios Orphanides has shown that the real-time estimate of potential output was significantly overstated, and the estimate of the rate of unemployment consistent with full employment was significantly understated. In other words, policymakers were also likely underestimating the inflationary effects of their policies. In fact, the policy path they were on simply wasn't feasible without accelerating inflation (Orphanides 1997; Orphanides 2002).
And to make matters worse yet, the Phillips curve, the stability of which was an important guide to the policy decisions of the Federal Reserve, began to move.
…
Phelps and Friedman were right. The stable trade-off between inflation and unemployment proved unstable. The ability of policymakers to control any "real" variable was ephemeral. This truth included the rate of unemployment, which oscillated around its "natural" rate. The trade-off that policymakers hoped to exploit did not exist.
As businesses and households came to appreciate, indeed anticipate, rising prices, any trade-off between inflation and unemployment became a less favorable exchange until, in time, both inflation and unemployment became unacceptably high. This, then, became the era of "stagflation." In 1964, when this story began, inflation was 1 percent and unemployment was 5 percent. Ten years later, inflation would be over 12 percent and unemployment was above 7 percent. By the summer of 1980, inflation was near 14.5 percent, and unemployment was over 7.5 percent.
European Central Bank's publication: "THE "GREAT INFLATION": LESSONS FOR MONETARY POLICY": . /pub/pdf/other/mb201005en_
Over subsequent years the Bundesbank fully exploited the freedom of action it had gained when it was relieved of its obligation to defend the parity with the dollar, in March 1973, by pursuing a counter-inflationary policy that was appropriate for the conditions it was facing domestically. This allowed it to bring inflation down to 2.1% in September 1978, and to limit the subsequent inflationary peak, which followed the second oil price shock, to 7.5%, in October 1981.
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The objective of containing inflation by controlling the rate of growth of the money supply reflected the Bundesbank's explicit recognition that inflation is ultimately a monetary phenomenon. Such recognition was, however, far from universal during the 1970s. In their extensive analysis of the broad intellectual climate surrounding monetary policy-making in the United Kingdom during the 1960s and 1970s, for example, Nelson and Nikolov point out that "monetary policy was not seen as essential for inflation control; the latter, instead, was largely delegated to incomes policy (wage and price controls). [...] Essentially, UK policymakers viewed monetary policy as disconnected from inflation for two reasons. First, inflation was perceived as largely driven by factors other than the output gap; secondly, policymakers were highly sceptical about the ability of monetary policy to affect aggregate demand or the output gap appreciably."
As stressed by Nelson and Nikolov, this led to both a loose monetary policy and attempts to control inflation by non-monetary means, and contributed decisively to the UK's inflationary outburst of the 1970s. Only when, in 1979, monetary policy began to be based on an explicit recognition of the monetary nature of the inflationary process, could the Great Inflation in the United Kingdom be brought to an end.
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Although this section focuses on a comparison between the macroeconomic performances of Germany and the United States, it is worth stressing that the Swiss experience during the 1970s was similar to Germany's, both in terms of monetary policy strategy – which placed great importance on the rates of growth of monetary aggregates – and in terms of overall inflationary performance. The main difference was that, following the first oil price shock, Swiss inflation peaked at 11.9%, a significantly higher rate than in Germany and close to the peak in the United States. Subsequently, however, precisely as in Germany, the tough counter-inflationary stance adopted by the Swiss National Bank led to a sharp deceleration of inflation, which remained below 2% between mid-1976 and early 1979. Following the second oil price shock, inflation peaked at 7.5% in the second half of 1981, before falling over subsequent years.
Productivity developments provide a further, important perspective on the differing macroeconomic performances of the United States and Germany during the 1970s. A crucial shortcoming of US monetary policy during those years was its inability to detect the 1970s productivity slowdown in real time, which resulted in a systematic over-estimation of the actual extent of slack existing in the economy. Given the extensive reliance of US policy-makers on output gap measures as indicators of future inflationary pressures, such over-estimation automatically translated into the excessively loose monetary policy discussed above.
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…the experience of the Great Inflation decisively refuted the notion of a permanent, exploitable trade-off between inflation and economic activity, which had become part of the conventional wisdom of macroeconomics following the publication of A.W. Phillips' seminal 1958 article. Phillips' discovery, based on almost a century of British data, of a negative correlation between inflation and the rate of unemployment was interpreted by many as offering policy-makers a range of combinations of inflation and unemployment to choose from. In particular, it was thought that society could opt to trade off a permanently higher inflation rate against a permanently lower level of unemployment.
wiki/Keynesian_economics#Postwar_Keynesianism
With the oil shock of 1973, and the economic problems of the 1970s, Keynesian economics began to fall out of favour. During this time, many economies experienced high and rising unemployment, coupled with high and rising inflation, contradicting the Phillips curve's prediction.
In AYWPR's Chapter 9, it mentioned how the Empire came to be, such as how Pullska was integrated.
wiki/Liberum_veto
The liberum veto (Latin for "free veto"[a]) was a parliamentary device in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. It was a form of unanimity voting rule that allowed any member of the Sejm (legislature) to force an immediate end to the current session and to nullify any legislation that had already been passed at the session by shouting either Sisto activitatem! (Latin: "I stop the activity!") or Nie pozwalam! (Polish: "I do not allow!"). The rule was in place from the mid-17th century to the late 18th century in the Sejm's parliamentary deliberations. It was based on the premise that since all of the Polish–Lithuanian noblemen were equal, every measure that came before the Sejm had to be passed unanimously. The liberum veto was a key part of the political system of the Commonwealth, strengthening democratic elements and checking royal power and went against the European-wide trend of having a strong executive (absolute monarchy).
Many historians hold that the liberum veto was a major cause of the deterioration of the Commonwealth political system, particularly in the 18th century, when foreign powers bribed Sejm members to paralyze its proceedings, causing foreign occupation, dominance and manipulation of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and its eventual destruction in the partitions. Piotr Stefan Wandycz wrote that the "liberum veto had become the sinister symbol of old Polish anarchy". In the period of 1573–1763, about 150 sejms were held, about a third failing to pass any legislation, mostly because of the liberum veto. The expression Polish parliament in many European languages originated from the apparent paralysis.
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Until the early 1990s, IBM had a decision-making process called "non-concur" in which any department head could veto a company-wide strategy if it did not fit in with their own department's outlook, the disagreements being then sent to the superiors in the hierarchy, often taking several months. This effectively turned IBM into several independent fiefdoms. "Non-concur" was eliminated by CEO Louis Gerstner, who was brought in to revive the declining company.[30][31][32][33]
wiki/Polish_parliament_(expression)
"Polish parliament" is an expression referring to the historical Polish parliaments (Sejm walny).[1] It implies chaos and general disorder, and that no real decision can be reached during sessions. The term originates from the Swedish Polsk riksdag and German Polnischer Reichstag, and exists in the languages of many Scandinavian and neighboring countries.[2]