Chapter 19:
The International Confederation of Wizards, called the ICW, represented the interests of all magical governments. However its votes were not actually by governments, but by their delegates sent to their meetings. This was an area that my memories from Lucius's past were very helpful. Delegates are people, who can bribed, threatened, convinced, often all three at the same time.
With our constant publication of new dangers from non-magical technologies, we used lobbying also as a tactic. I didn't invent astroturfing, which is organizing and funding apparently regular people demanding a political result. I didn't even get that idea from the future, as the Tobacco industry in the US created the National Smokers Alliance in 1993 to lobby for what they called smokers rights.
Our legislation was purposely broad and vague, to take necessary actions to secure weapons of mass destruction in non-magical hands to responsible governments only, and which themselves have magical supervision to prevent their use. We also added an addition to study, and implement if feasible, methods of preventing computers and cameras that communicate from threatening the Statute of Secrecy.
The more difficult step was giving Khan Noonien Singh and his organization responsibility in implementing this new legislation. It was explained that his organization, assisted by mine, have the global reach and knowledge of non-magical society to accomplish these goals.
In this timeline there was no actor named Ricardo Montalban. Khan looked and sounded like him, a little younger than he was in his portrayal of Khan in Star Trek the Original Series. All of the actors who in my timeline portrayed characters in either the Harry Potter or Star Trek franchises did not exist in this timeline. The same was true for the creators of those franchises.
Khan was addressing the operatives, "Coup d'etat, What does it mean? It is French for a cutting stroke against a state. The larger meaning goes back to an analysis as to how the authority of a state is maintained. As a general state of affairs, there are some who are loyal to a ruler, some who are loyal to various enemies of that ruler. Many more are loyal because they think they are backing the side that can reward or punish them. Others are more worried about their chain of command.
I have copies of a book available for you, Coup d'État: A Practical Handbook by Edward Luttwak.
When a coup is underway, much of the available forces in the country are waiting to see who is in control over the capital. That is where the true battle takes place. Coup forces do not need to defeat the forces of the regime. They can convince them to wait and see, they can have a few supporters in their ranks to delay their movements. Causing confusion can also work to prevent forces from joining the fight. Disruption of their normal chain of command can cause those receiving orders to wonder who their orders are even coming from and if that is the original regime or the coup.
Always the goal is to secure the capital, remove the previous leading figures from having a voice, and securing a voice through normal communications channels. Statements made through those channels should be nice sounding, not giving anyone cause for fear, and therefore desperate fighting instead of wait and see. Announce elections for years later, tell foreign nations that good relations with them will be upheld.
A coup, just as in sword fighting, is a blade employed precisely with very selected actual violence. It is to make use of the human nature of obeying the winning side, and presenting the coup as being that winning side.
Let us look at a recent failed example. 1991 Soviet Union, the coup leaders detained the regime leader, but then starting using forces loyal to them to fight opposition in Lithuania. They should have concentrated on the capital Moscow, secured it, and then eventually use the power of the state to deal with the periphery. They also failed to understand a parallel chain of command that already existed in the republics of the Soviet Union. Yeltsin should have been as much of a target of the initial move as Gorbachev was.
Another factor to consider is that many regimes are familiar with the risks of coups. They often have separate military structures, often called presidential or revolutionary guards, designed to be able to fight against the regular military of the same country. There are sometimes ethnic militias of the same group as the leader of the country. Often there are separate military commands and efforts made to not have them even socialize with each other. This makes their military less effective in wars against foreign enemies, but reduces the chance of coup.
I'll give an example. South Korea had such an arrangement until the US demanded in 1977 that they have a joint defense command to actually be able to fight North Korea. Two years after South Korea implemented the demanded changes, Chun Doo-hwan, a 2 star general, in 1979 conducted a coup and became president.
We will be engaging in coups across the world. As you have already been briefed, we have the following basic tactics to deal with leading members of the chain of command. Some have too much of a negative reputation to be useful. Saddam and his sons in Iraq would be an example. Others can be usefully controlled, either during the takeover process or afterwards. Boris Yeltsin would be an example. Benazir Bhutto would be another. Then there are those who can be won over to our side with our usual methods. These are usually found in the ranks just below the country's leader. Finally there are those who can be ideologically convinced to join our side. For some of those being offered a bribe would be insulting, and a threat would redouble their efforts against us. They can be convinced or not.
Each of you have your briefings for your area of operations. For some of you after completing one mission you will be assigned to the next. There will be some flexibility needed on how to handle redeployment based on updated circumstances.
Each non-magical government, and as well the magical ones will fall into line. Well, we won't be telling the ICW about that part just yet. For the magical part, it will be part coup, part revolution as a banner that will solve problems and save our planet from dangers. The process of influencing and later controlling magical ministries is far different than the non-magical ones. For now, we want to provide opportunities for them to join in the administration of the non-magical nations, for them to profit, for them to see that dangers to them are being averted."
The approval of the ICW legislation was effective 2nd of April 1994.
That same day, 12 of the nations on our list were silently taken over by using mind control over different members of what were very centralized governments. Other nations needed a variety of methods and some takeovers would need some days to implement. Others would require long term efforts, and full cooperation with magical ministries to be successful.
Members of magical ministries were subcontracted to assist this effort and to be effectively controlled by Khan, but in a gradual way.
In Iraq, approximately 35 high level people were eliminated. About another 24 were mind controlled and followed the orders of a member of Khan's organization. A military force in Baghdad was following our orders, and no one was fighting against them. The nation coalesced around them. The Shiite areas took a wait and see approach. A small number of their leaders were mind controlled to help achieve that.
The new leader, a former general in the Iraqi army, but actually a magical working for Khan, simply announced over Iraqi media that he was now in charge. Other army units were told that they will be part of the new army, and that there will be a general amnesty for previous actions.
The new government announced its full cooperation with the US, and also announced continued autonomy for the Kurdish region. It also made arrangements with the Kurdish region to share oil revenue from the Kurdish region as soon as sanctions would end.
"The government of Iraq announced full cooperation with UN Resolution 687. UN inspectors can go anywhere at any time. Iraq has also arrested all involved in the attempted attack on the former US President, and will turn them over to the US. We ask that sanctions be ended and Iraq be allowed to trade again."
Russia was taken over fairly easily. Just a few months earlier Yeltsin secured for himself dictatorial rule over parliament. We just had to take over Yeltsin. Viktor Chernomyrdin, his Prime Minister, was very cooperative to our outreach. He understood profit and was extremely flexible as to how that might be obtained.
We had some difficulty with the Magical Ministry of Russia, but got that under control with our usual methods. After that we had to head off the Chechenya war before it would have started in November 1994. Chechen leader Dudaev wanted independence. We replaced him with one of Khan's people, who then negotiated a favorable autonomy agreement with Yeltsin who was still under mind control. Everyone was happy enough to not fight at least.
The government in Iran was outwardly the same, but under hidden control. The challenge was going to be what happens when we start making changes.
China was a special case. Their magical ministry would not have stood by if we conducted a coup. The non-magical government also was vigilant against coup attempts or revolution attempts due to some events in 1989.
We had been recruiting among the Chinese magical population, and especially those working in their ministry for months. We mentioned combining magic and technology, and expanding to space. We convinced many that China would be uniquely suited for this role of mass producing magic and technology and that joining our cause would give them an elevated role in the world to be brought forth.
Our approach was a combined one with our agents and recruited members of the magical ministry. Contacts with government were already allowed, and we simply made the case that China's best option for the future would be to join this movement at the beginning and try to dominate the new situation. We outlined scenarios where they would instead try to fight against their neighbor's takeovers, or where they would just watch events, and convinced them that being there in the beginning was their best option.
Of course we had long term plans to balance China with other advanced countries so that they would not end up running everything.
In India, Khan's native country, we could not make any headway. Their political situation was too complex, too decentralized for a coup to likely succeed. A coup that turns into a civil war is not a successful coup. We planned for further persuasion after other coup's were successful. We had to leave aside Sri Lanka, Nepal, and Bhutan due to India's influence.
We did take over Myanmar. The country was run by Than Shwe, but his rule was not solid. We recruited him, showing him how much we can help their economy, how we can protect his rule, and how we can provide a network of many nations that will work cooperatively with him.
We had slower headway in the western nations. In the US, our efforts were with MACUSA, and not yet directly to take it over. Each taken over country emphasized their desire for good relations with the US, including trade relations. Any spying and covert action by the US and its allied intelligence services were stopped by us, while never harming their nationals. Their recruited locals were fair game.
A month after this wave of takeovers, weapons of mass destruction started to be accounted for and moved to Mongolia. It seemed an odd choice of location, but it was also the visible central headquarters of Khan's organization.