Thanks for the very cogent remark, which shows that I should have taken more time to be more detailed.
You're quite right the Chinese aren't doing these things so much for the benefit of the local Africans, but to expand the influence of their empire by securing rare mineral resources that the now very indebted country will be forced to provide at probably below market prices when the various interest charges and service fees are included.
But the Chinese are also milking their appearance as the only current serious foreign investor, since the cold war's over and Europe has largely exhausted its willingness to invest over seven decades of seeing very little real progress or return for its charity.
Africa should model itself more on the example of the Asian tigers, encouraging internal investment and industry, growing their middle classes, education etc; but who is actually doing that?
Hoping for the best, despite all the present evidence to the contrary.
L
ywing14 wrote:quote="lyonheart"Hi ldwechsler,
Excellent points as usual.
I think the situations are more unlike than like since Manticore is not interested in expanding its responsibilities and commitments further, that is letting its half of Silesia go when they're ready, possibly to be incorporated into the Andermanni as their borders fell pinched by elsewhere by the Talbot Sector, which after a few decades to a century or so, may seek more of a commonwealth status; associated with Manticore, but more independent.
It was the encroaching 'little England' attitude on the part of too many British politicians and Whitehall bureaucrats, many of them Rhodes scholars quite opposed to his vision of the empire and determined to transform or destroy it.
England having bankrupted itself in World War One, then failing to properly invest after the war was unable to financially support the second world war, and the US Congress made sure Lend-Lease compelled the British to sell off remaining assets at fire house prices, putting the empire at the mercy of ignorant or prejudiced American policy makers from FDR on down, who for over 20 years had little interest in understanding its value or preserving it.
Indeed they forced the European empires to plague their colonies by granting 'independence' long before any sane observer would agree they were ready, to prevent soviet liberation wars, but the result despite hundreds of billion$ in foreign aid since has not improved most African etc lives much in almost 70 years.
Few empires have had such friends.
Ironically, it appears the new Chinese empire may change some of that by investing more in local infrastructure and education, though it could take another generation or two to bring Africa to to the level of the Asian 'tigers'...
Despite the cost of the second war with Haven and then the League, its brevity (3 years and about 9 monthes) compared to the decade plus of the first war means far more can be devoted to rebuilding its orbital industry sooner, probably with more foreign investors, while the wormhole traffic continues to grow and the MMM has even larger markets to pay for it; rather unique eternal assets not shared by England, Egypt, or China.
Now RFC has apparently implied someplace a while back that eventually honorverse warships at least will be able to generate their own wormholes, reducing the importance of Manticore's junction etc, but given how many centuries starships last, it may be a millennia or two [given the energy requirements etc] before commerce could ignore it.
Given how plugged into the rest of the honorverse Manticore and Haven are [or will be again in Haven's case], and the effect of the streak drive on transit times (could we see fast freighters and passenger liners with streak drives in 20 years?) means the communications loop will soon shrink by at least 50%, so messages to Talbot may have answers in 3 weeks, and even less as research continues over the decades and centuries.
For decades Manticore has been the true communications and financial heart of the human star civilization, since it hears everything far faster than earth.
The fact the league newsies have largely ignored Manticore and its WHJ, rather than making it their chief news conduit with large permanent staffs, is just one more example of solly folly.
But given the reality of how generous Honor and the GA's terms were, compared the lies of E&I's shills, a far bigger ex-league newsie presence in Manticore and the SEM is quite predictable.
I expect them and the empire's own newsies to seek out and boldly discover all the empire's mistakes and judgement errors, that will largely keep both Haven and Manticore on the more honest and correct path, thanks to their legal protections.
Unless RFC gets bored with Manticore and Haven as the good guys, we should expect them to continue to clobber the MAlign.
Until next time, Manticore...
quote="kzt"China and Egypt changed in government and details of borders over millennia, but were pretty much still China and Egypt the whole time. So the argument that a nation cannot sustain itself for millennia is not as solid as you might think.quote
That gets trickier. The two nations had many governments. Egypt in particular was occupied one way or another for millennia.
China had changes but the 'mandarin' system kept a lot similar. Note also that it was a victim of conquest and imperialism at different times.quote
Given what it is costing African nations to finance those projects I'm not sure how much I agree with you. Many of the nations are taking out massive loans with the Chinese they can't hope to pay back. Additionally, they're shipping in mostly Chinese workers to support the projects so the locals aren't even earning any money.
