French Trafalgar, British Waterloo (1882-1911)

The Third American War
The Third American War was considered one of the turning points of North American History: Manifest Destiny, the belief that the Union was destined to control land from the Atlantic to the Pacific was nearly shattered. The, born from the Southern States of the US in 1862, proved that it was strong enough to stanbd up to its more industrialized and populous northern neighbor after three years of bloody conflict that destroyed large swaths of the border lands, and such battles as for Covington and Lexington in the South and Baltimore in the North forged a common sense of pride and nationalism that hadn't really been developed before.

Aftermath of the War
The, the document that ended the war, forever insured that the South was independent from the old United States, and that the Union could never hope to dominate and control the Confederacy, as the people proved they were determined enough after defeat to be able to come back and win. The South also began to induct former black slaves further into the nation since their liberation over 20 years before, going as far as creating all black military units that fought in Mexico. However, no promises for other freedoms were guaranteed, and many rights gained during the war was later lost.

The Confederacy and the Pacific Republic were the biggest winners in the war; they divided the entire Mexican territory of Arizona between them, which provided them with a border to each other, and the ability to build a trans-continental railway, which, before the was built, insured them the ability to transport goods from East coast factories to West coast ports to Asia and the Orient cheaper than shipping through the dangerous Cape Horn passage.

President, due to his handling of the war, as well as the corrupt dealings of several appointed politicians, lead to his impeachment on January 17, 1884, and the ascension of his vice-president, to the remainder of his term, though he would lose the elction to. General, a hero of the war, left the military to become involved in politics: starting as a short-term Governor of his home state of Ohio, then as vice-President on the Nationalist-Democratic ticket in 1888, with President Cleveland. However, Cleveland died of a heart attack barely two years into his second term, and Custer was sworn in as President the next day, and called for the "...rebuilding of the Union into the dominate power of North America."

The, victorious over the US attempts to capture the Oregon Territory, and giving them a Pacific Coast, and their Dominion of , bitter over the creation of the Republic of , managed to annex large portions of the fledging nation, and forcing the shifting of the capital city from Winnipeg to Wascana, in the territory of Saskatchewan, over 600 kilometers from the former capital. Alaska and Assiniboia were also forced to give up lands to the British, which was formed into British Alaska.

Lessons of the War
The lessons of the Third American War were studied through Europe as away to prepare for the next war, but many lessons were ignored, especially the awesome power of the "Gatling Gun", which Britain and saw as unsporting weapons, and so literally banned them from their armies, while other nations, such as  and  especially, sought to acquire this new weapons, with the power to mow down brigades and divisions in minutes, a great boost to long borders and smaller populations. Other teaching, such as the "Confederate Channel" technique, where soldiers would dig themselves into the ground, and ultimately link them together into long, battlefield spanning trenches, which would moderately protect themselves from artillery bombardments and fighting on an open field, and cut down casualties on the Confederate side. Britain, long trained in the technique of fire lines, did not accept this new tactic with open arms, although several British officers did encourage it in the Oregon Territory, with varying degrees of success.

Europe's War Scares
However, Europe was not peaceful during the period before, during and after the Third American War. The bellicose stance of Emperor Louis of France, who was considered a "War Hawk" by many, lead to the majority of the conflicts, though the majority were resolved by diplomacy and compromise. However, the other nations of Europe, especially members of the French lead Grand Alliance, were worried that France would try to push the continent into war before they were ready, and had been able to rebuild their armies from their defeat just over 20 years previously. Incidents in such places as the North Sea, the Tyrrhenian Sea and Tripoli nearly brought the major nations to war on several occasions, and was even considered one of the factors that nearly lead to the assassination of the French Emperor on September 7, 1889, by a deranged gunman who lost his father and older brother in a battle with locals in Mauritania.

No one could claim that Emperor Louis was only focused on Foreign affairs, however. He was considered the force behind the Imperial Welfare and Living Project, which, for the first time ever, gave the workers a set minimum wage, standards for workplace safety, pensions for the elderly and reduced healthcare for the poor. Although conservatives and business owners were opposed, and were preparing to fight over the "Marxist Takeover" of the Empire, the Emperor calmed them down by lowering taxes, and pointing out that the minimum wage would help business, by creating increased demand. However, the Project was never fully implemented, with court cases ascertaining to the legality of provisions of the law, and was ultimately undone by the early 1900's.

Developments in the Middle East
In a surprising move, the Representatives of the ancient Persian Empire decided to try to bring the Emirate of Afghanistan in to the empire in 1883, were they would provide roads and infrastructure to build the poor and warlord controlled region, and, ultimately, make Afghanistan part of the new Persian Empire. Roughly half of the warlords and the Emir, Mohammad Yaqub Khan, agreed and willingly signed the Treaty of Tehran. Several refused, however, and declared "jihad" on the so-called "Greater Persia." The Afghan Uprising lasted for nearly six years, but after the Battle of the Amu River the last of the warlords were dispatched, and Afghanistan became an official part of the Persian Empire.

The resurgence of Persian Power made Ottoman Turkey nervous, as this directly threatened Constantinople's influence over Mesopotamia and Arabia, because the strongly Islamic areas would have been more sympathetic to an Islamic government closer to home. Abdülhamid II, the new sultan of the Empire, decided that it may be best to try to limit Persian influence in the area, but heavy handed actions in order to suppress dissent and "groups loyal to Foreign states" provoked outrage, especially actions in heavily Christan Armenia, and the "Trabzon Massacres," (1887-1891) named after the first province to feature these mass murders, especially angered Europe and North America.

The Second Industrial Revolution
By 1885, the majority of the world was now claimed, controlled or conquered. Empires stretched across continents, while smaller nations struggled to find their place in the world. Factories in the major cities belched smoke and produced products that were sold around the world. The telegraph, the steam ship and the railroads, all created and established at least two generations before, now links the world, and such projects as the Confederate-Pacific Railroad, the Colombian Canal and the Trans-Atlantic Telegraph cable now allows people, goods, ideas and wealth flow from on area to another with ease never before seen.

But this time also say the beginning of the free-market laissez-faire economics: the belief that industry and consumer demand would control the economy, and little to no government intervention would be needed. However, this resulted in a constant cycle, where factories would produce ever increasing amounts of goods and hire many more people, resulting in an economic boom, until overproduction and the loss of trust in the free-spending banks and governments result in bust, so that after 1880, and before 1910, the world experienced four of these economic cycles, nicknamed the Boom-Bust Dance.

The British and French Empire's was also beginning to reform themselves. The successful creation of the Dominion of Canada lead to and  to be created as Dominions as well, in 1892 and 1899 respectively. Immigration to different parts of the Empire, and various groups of Russian, Chinese, Japanese and Arabian peoples to North America, Australia and the Colonial African territories increased the prosperity in their new lands, though mild racism, discrimination and prejudice still existed. French territories, especially Algeria and Indochina, were given some form of Home Rule, but Governors appointed by the Emperor still held executive power in these regions.

Reforming the System
Into the 1890's, the major governments of the world still promoted some form of democracy, either with a constitutional monarchy, like in the UK, or a full fledged Republican system, such as in the United States. But voting rights in almost every nation were restricted, usually only to land holding males. But women and those not of the Caucasian race struggled to try to get their voices heard. The Women's Suffrage Movement, founded in the US and Russia almost simultaneously, fought hard to try to get their voices heard. Leaders such as Nellie McClung in Assiniboia, Kate Sheppard in Australia, Miina Sillanpää in, Emmeline Pankhurst in Great Britain and Lucie Hadamard, the wife of well known politician Alfred Dreyfus, in France, ultimately proved successful, with women gaining the vote in almost every country. The Confederacy, Spain and several South American nations, however, did not approve of the vote, and the last country to do so, the Confederacy, wouldn't until 1933.

Other movements focused on trying to give the vote to the disenfranchised, as well as more democracy to the people. The biggest movement was in America, where, although free for over thirty years, the African-American men and women who were formerly slaves fought to try to get their voices heard. The Confederate Government in Savannah, Georgia, bitterly opposed giving their former servants and indentured field hands any voice in governments, and organizations such as the African American People's Liberation Movement (the AAPLM) were quickly suppressed by the Army in several major raids in the Spring of 1895. In the Union, the black people earned their right to vote in the 1870's, mostly because the number of blacks in the north was immensely smaller than the south, so it wouldn't have affected the political system as greatly. However, the large number of immigrants, many of whom where from Europe and Asia, were causing massive dislocations in the system. Laws to restrict voting from Chinese and those from Southern and Eastern Europe were the major issues in the United States, and due to low work wages, deplorable safety conditions, and the high prices for products. The political struggle between the Socialist Party, the successor to the Liberal Party, and the Nationalist Party, with two different view points: The "Red's" which called for government regulation and a strong stand against the CSA; and the "Blue's" which campaigned for free market enterprise with no government intervention and a moderate stand against the South and a development of the nation.

The "Era of Luxury"
The 1890's and early 1900's became known for the absolute wealth and prosperity that the rapidly industrilizng world gave to those who owned the massive companies that spread across nations. Krupp and Farben in ; Carnegie, Rockefeller, Morgan and Vanderbilt in the US; Simon, Perroit and Gambetta in France; Whitney and Smithson in the South; Tesla in Austria-Hungary; and Rostovtsev and Lenin in Russia became house hold names, for managing to build business that made their homeland's more powerful, and bringing massive wealth to their owners and the nation.

This also lead to the rise of the middle class: the proffessionals who worked in the businesses and factories as managers and designers, and achieved a level of prosperity never seen by the masses of people: they could afford some of the things that the were before only for the rich, such as the first automobiles (and the mass produced cars by Ford, which were reduced in price by the introduction of the assembly line in 1899) and phonographs. The first movies, made in the US and France, were mostly silent, black and white films, began in the later 1890's.

Unionizing the Workers
But the lower classes were only seeing marginal improvements in their lives: the first minimum wage laws in France and later the US and Russia didn't cover the majority of the expenses that they were faced such as high food prices and rents. And as more and more steam powered machines were being used in the factories, doing the jobs of dozens of men, more and more were laid off. Many of these same men were drafted into the army, as some form of cronsciption was in place in almost every country in the world in order to protect their intrests and safeguard their borders. The cultimation of these factors lead to vicious riots in Montreal, New York, Manchester and Volgograd in the summer of 1901, the majority of which were surpressed by the army, killing hundreds. A massive strike in Pitsburg was broken up by private security company's hired for the event, such as the Pinkerton National Detective Agency, which resulted in the so called "Battle of Carnegie" after the owner of the steel mill, whihc resulted in almost 289 dead and over 500 wounded, as well as 1,750 arrested after the state milita responded.

This represented a major setback for the fledging labor movement, as the violence reinforced the big owner's hold on power over the factories, while crushing the rights of the workers to try to unionize. Despite some gains, the American Steel Workers Association collapsed as a major power, and the major steel mills of the US remained un-unionized until 1914, when unions were given protection to organize.

The "Melting Pot"
The world in the late 1890's and early 1900's was seen as a "melting pot" by journalist Winston Churchill in 1907, and he had every reason to believe so. Nationalism and Imperialism wer sweeping across the continent, turning former allies against each other in the race to bring all the peoples of one nation under the control of one state and for the colonies offered in Africa.

The balance of power since the end of the, were their were two major alliances - France and its allies and "associates", and Britian and Prussia and their allies had been undermined and shifted continously since the 1860's. But by now, the major alliances, the and the , were constantly at each others throats, trying to find get an upperhand over the other. The Naval and Army Arms Races, where each nation tried to get their hands on the most up to date weapons to equip their armies with had nearly bankrupted many smaller nations, but loans and grants from their larger allies had prevented them from collapsing all together.

The War in Burma
The fragile partnership of France and the United Kingdom, created after Germany and Britain suffered a falling out after the, was nearly destroyed by the situation in the Far Eastern territory of Burma in the spring and summer of 1897. The two powers saw Burma as the perfect way to expand their colonial powers: The British from India and the French from Indochina. Separate expeditions launched by both nations without the others knowledge clashed in the jungles south of Mandalay, resulting in both forces withdrawing, and a bitter exchange in Europe. France called for Burma to be theirs, as they have traded with the ares for decades, though British influence was growing ever stronger with India. When French Prime Minister Félix Faure was asked about it, he claimed that Burma should be French because of the taking over of France's Indian territory's over forty years before, which sparked outrage in Britain. Both sides continued to bicker, but when the British caught wind of France preparing the Atlantic Fleet from Cherbourg, they claimed that the French were preparing a landing, and in return, started to mobilize the Home Fleet, which nearly lead to the calling of General Mobilization in France.

Both sides continued to fight until Russia called both of the governments to agree to a conference, which Italy offered to hold. Germany, Ottoman Turkey, the US, the Confederacy, Japan, China and Austria-Hungary all pushed for the fighting powers to do so, as they all knew that if a European war were to break out, it would very quickly spread around the world. Emperor Victor ordered Faure to agree, but instead resigned, to be replaced by Alfred Dreyfus, who followed the emperor's instruction. Great Britain also agreed, under Arthur Balfour, and the was held. The negotiations nearly faltered several times, mostly because France and Britain could not agree. The Conference was only held together by the other nations, who bluntly stated that they will not support either nation if they did not agree to some form of compromise. But the other nations could not agree on what the compromise should be, making US President Custer famously remark: "To be honest, we cannot agree on anything, except that we can't agree on nothing!" A compromise was eventually reached when France was given most of Burma, but Britain received some land, and trading privileges for forty years in the French Colonial Empire, which, by mutual agreement, was extended to the British colonies in 1903.

The Passing of "Europe's Queen"
The death of Queen Victoria in 1901 brought to a head the various tensions each nation had. The Funeral itself was attended by every Head of State in Europe, as they were all, some how, related to her, including the Bonaparte's in France, the Hohenzollern's in Germany and the Romanov's in Russia. But without the sturdy influence of Victoria, and the gallivanting of her son, King George V, lead to a further isolating of the major powers.