Scramble (October-December, 1883)

Slavic Africa]

On the western coasts of Africa, the Russian port of New Krakow had recently been extended through certain treaties with the natives (generally paid treaties based on alcohol ...).

Cabins and infrastructure had been built for the harbor (small boat building or boat repair), some fishing grounds and shrimp farms, and better conditions for agriculture (fences, basic pesticides) which were taught to the natives so that they could grow your own (and produce more), better roads and also a bar with a homemade alcohol production, allowed by the Russian state. It wasn't alcohol of the best quality, but it was something.

Some natives of the island had been invited to join New Krakow officially, which was accepted (the Russians already owned the island legally, but its population was not recognized as Russian citizens). On the one hand, balancing the most extreme Polish opinions and increasing the tsarist demography of the area.

With this, the Polish-Russian expedition marches to the continental coasts to raise the Russian flag in Africa, extending colonial rule with a ghost shrimp farm from Cameroon.

The Russians named their outpost, in honor of earlier Portuguese discoveries, Kameruna or also nicknamed "Krevetka" (Креветка, krewetka in Polish. Cameroon comes from Rio dos Camarões or river of shrimp/shrimp river, in Portuguese, and Krevetka is shrimp in Russian).

(OOC: Slavic Africa began to expand here)

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[Ben-Yehuda case]

The Jewish community once again held another protest at the unjust imprisonment of Eliezer Ben-Yehuda in France, however even despite Tsar Alexander III offering to give Emperor Napoleon IV some money and hold a 'trial' in Russia, they did not there is much success in getting the liberation of the Russian Jew.

* [Russian-French discussions]

With diplomacy seeming not to be a path, Tsar Alexander III decided to contact Kaiser Wilhelm I's Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, Rudolf I, Umberto of Italy, Napoleon IV, and King Edward VII's Prime Minister William E. Gladstone.

The Tsar used the excuse that due to the 'Tunisian Crisis', the French expansion into the Congo (which put them in minor conflicts with the Belgians), the British takeover of Ottoman Egypt (de-facto) and in general the European colonial expansion towards the black continent, that a conference was necessary to divide the territories of interest in the Pacific and Africa.

As well as possibly resolving minor diplomatic conflicts...

The powers generally agreed that it was a good idea, not only to draw on the vast resources of 'uncivilized' regions but also to avoid future conflicts such as the quasi-war over Tunisia, among many other factors.

Now it only remained to decide where the conference was to be held, Tsar Alexander III offered Saint Petersburg, but Bismarck and Wilhelm I offered Berlin, Gladstone and Edward VII offered London, Umberto I offered Rome and obviously Napoleon IV offered Paris.

A somewhat childish competition between the great powers, which would not be resolved until November 1884.

* Alexandrian perspective.

"On the one hand I hate myself knowing that I will be remembered as one of the artificers of the partition of the African continent between the hungry European powers.

But I hope that my decision allows the Congo not to fall into Belgian hands, a chill runs down my spine just thinking about the suffering that Leopold II would give to the natives of the region.

I also hope that for the moment this will prevent a war from happening in Europe, for the moment I think that a European war will simply be inevitable but it could also improve my relations with other European powers at the conference and avoid bringing Russia in the middle of the hurricane.

Or at least that this conflict does not occur in this decade ... "

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[Vladivostok and the Far East]

* Perspective of Nikola Tesla.

"Are you sure it's ... sanitary, eat there?" Nikola asks Mihajlo.

"100% sure, plus having a bit of recognition among the Korean community should earn us some points with our workers." Mihajlo mentions it as he takes his usually hardworking friend to one of the most notable Korean restaurants in Vladivostok (at that time).

The Serb found the food a bit spicy, but it wasn't too bad.

When approaching the port of Vladivostok, however, Tesla stopped for a few moments, there he was observing how the Russians and Koreans, among other diverse ethnic groups difficult to identify, were working on a particular project (not related to the Bering-Transpacifico telegraph).

'Brotherhood Enlightening the World' (La Fraternité éclairant le monde), the three statues of the Russian nation were halfway, or even less, of being finished.

The city went from being a relatively simple port to honor the title of 'Lord of the East' and many others, Vladivostok especially added Korean migrants with the Japanese and Chinese being the second most frequent non-native Asian minorities in Russia. city.

There were also obviously some American neighborhoods, which were expanding by wave, and how not to forget the native Russians, Ukrainians, etc. Slavs and non-Russian ethnicities associated (Finns, Siberian natives, Ainu, etc.) to the Russian Empire.

Vladivostok just had a fairly multicultural identity, and it was growing financially. The textile industry, the electrical and manufacturing industry, the fishing industry, shipbuilding, extractive industry, etc.

"In 1881 he certainly knew that Vladivostok had potential, but his potential turned out to be even greater than he could imagine, 'the Pearl of the Pacific', a road from Asia and potentially America to Europe.

The Korean community was growing especially, Mihajlo took the time to talk to some of our Korean workers from time to time. I had no interest, and Petar was doing 'more important work'.

Although we contributed to Vladivostok, we were certainly not alone. New companies and merchants arrived daily, contributing to the style and dynamism of the city.

I remember when they laid the first and last stone of the brotherhood statues, when we finished the Bering telegraph and many more achievements of the city. "

-Memoirs of Nikola Tesla.

In June 1884, the SEiPK of Nikola Tesla and associates would test for the first time the advances of their trans-Pacific telegraph, built in conjunction with other companies and the Russian state.

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[Finals]

Erivan vs Murmansk: Erivan wins the final match of the fourth edition of the Russian Soccer League 1-0, taking the Russian Soccer League to the Caucasus for the first time.

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[International]

On October 1 in Berlin, the German Empire opens its own Internationale Kolonial- und Exportausstellung (International Colonial and Export Exhibition) for the first time, which presents products and animals (including humans ...) of the German colonial empire and allows other nations have their own flags.

From Deutsche Südostasien (capital: Brennhol, or Sài Gòn for Vietnamese locals) there are various materials drawn from the region, some native Papuans from Deutsch-Neuguinea, etc.

The exhibition has a 1,000,000 visitors at its completion.

On October 15, the United States Supreme Court declared the Civil Rights Act of 1875 unconstitutional, allowing the government (or administration) and private companies to discriminate based on race (segregation, in other words).

On October 20, the South American states of Peru and Chile sign the Ancón treaty, ending Peruvian participation in the War of the Pacific, leaving only one Bolivia vs Chile.

October 22, Russians and Austrians begin construction of Vienna's first electric tram after completing the first Austro-Hungarian power plant.

At the end of the month (October 30), the group Clan na Gael, "family of the Gaels", an Irish republican organization based in the United States and successor to the Fenian brotherhood, places two dynamite bombs in the London Underground.

Killing several people due to this action, 300 guards are posted the next day to prevent something like this from happening again.

In mid-December (16), the Vietnamese citadel of Sơn Tây falls into German hands, the German campaign in northern Vietnam is not over, but its quick victory with Dutch support is alarming.

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* [Russian Marxism]

At some point exactly unknown, but known to have occurred between October and December, the first Russian Marxist organization was formed in the city of Geneva, Switzerland.

This is the organization Emancipation of Labor (Освобождение труда, svobozhdeniye truda), formed by Pavel Borisovich Axelrod, Lev Grigorievich Deutsch, Vera Ivanovna Zasulich, Vasily Nikolaevich Ignatov and Georgy Valentinovich Plekhanov.

The group was founded by Plekhanov, but Axelrod would end up being the main ideologist of the group, which would never exceed more than 5 people (Deutsch would leave the following year, Ignatov would die, only one more person would join, Sergei Mikhailovich Ingerman, but would also leave in 1891 ).

Svobozhdeniye Truda would arise due to the defeat of the Russian populist movement, now the revolutionaries were looking for a new theoretical material. Plekhanov and associates would become especially acquainted with the Western European labor movement.

So Plekhanov when founding the group had the following goals:

1-Translate the books of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels into Russian for the proliferation of scientific socialism.

1.b-Translate the works of followers of Marxist socialism into Russian.

2-Criticism not only of Tsarism, but also of Russian populism to face the problems of Russian social life from Marxism.

Plekhanov's first book published within the group would be "Socialism and Political Struggle" (Социализм и политическая борьба, Sotsializm i politicheskaya bor'ba). Where he studied Marxist ideas and their application in the Russian Empire.

Plekhanov would be the father of the Russian Social Democrats in the 1880s, when in 1885 he would present the Russian Marxist program:

1-Democratic transformation of the Russian state.

2-Measures within the interest and welfare of the workers.

3-Measures within the interest and well-being of the peasants.

Axelrod had his own ideas, being the author of "The Labor Movement and Social Democracy" (Рабочее движение и социал-демократия, Rabocheye dvizheniye i sotsial-demokratiya) in 1884, a voluminous series of books and pamphlets.

1-The revolution would be an inevitably violent and bloody process, for the working class to take true political power.

2-However, before the revolution, the workers' party needs experience. Among which is (but not only) working within a government system, preferably parliamentary.

... It is curious that Axelrod in the mid-1880s formed his own company producing kefir (a fermented milk-based drink) to support his family (wife and children), but also to support other socialists.