Space Race (Napoleon's World)

While considered a major part of Cold War relations, the Space Race - the competition to gain economic and military supremacy over outer space - is just as much a scientific venture. While it began as a heated and sometimes volatile faceoff between the United States and French Empire, it has recently turned into a multinational affair, often with different countries working together in unusual harmony to reach for the stars.

French Investigation
In 1952, Emperor Sebastien Bonaparte called for a massive summit of the Empire's leading scientific leaders at that time - among them, German rocket scientist Werner von Braun, famed Jewish physicist Albert Einstein, and Russian chemist Sergei Dmitrov. The Scientific Conference of 1952 in Paris was marketed to the world as an exposition of modern science, medicine and technology - but, like most Sebastienite "conferences" that he championed to the world, there were significant backroom meetings held in secrecy by the Emperor and his inner council.

Sebastien had four main points to bring up at the conference. First, he wanted to develop a powerful and portable data processing machine - an improvement over the early, cumbersome computer. Secondly, he wanted to develop a nation-wide color TV broadcasting service, to be fully operational by 1972. Third, he wanted to develop a powerful explosive using the proposed theory of atomic fission - in 1959, this dream would be realized in the form of the atomic bomb. Finally, he wanted to pioneer rocket technology to deliver weapons and personnel through the upper atmosphere - in other words, a space program.

It came down to von Braun to take charge on the space program. He formed the Departemente Extraterre, an agency that would develop the means to deliver payloads from one side of the Empire to the other via atmospheric rockets. While this was in some form a precursor to ICBM missile technology that would be developed in the 1970's, von Braun envisioned firing rockets through the sky from Moscow to Paris, carrying passengers from one city to another in mere minutes.

Long-distance atmospheric rocket tests proved futile throughout the early 1950's; not only that, it sparked the interest of the Americans and the Chinese, who feared that the French were building missiles aimed directly at targets in their countries and could deliver long-distance explosives.