The Empire in Asia

> "*I shall be honest. This is not a task to be rushed. I am not ashamed to admit that I am no Athdus; indeed, we may never see his like again. Push too fast and we will enrage these people and over-extend ourselves. Let not a desire for a quick and glorious victory destroy our grand project in the world beyond. In emulation of our forefathers, let us think of our descendants - not just our children, or our grandchildren, but those who may live centuries from now. They will thank us for our prudence.*"
> ― Empress Isana (1444-1498), about the conquest of Asia
>
>

From the late 14th century to 1946, the Nesarian Empire has ruled territory beyond the boundary of Inecuria in Southeast Asia, interrupted only by a gap between 1919 and 1931 following the Treaty of Haguun. Relations between the Empire and its ex-subjects are largely positive, with all but Thailand allied together in the League of Free Peoples.

The slow and measured Imperial expansion across Southeast Asia was accomplished through a combination of military and diplomatic conquests. Where possible, the Imperial state preferred to peacefully incorporate existing realms into the structure of the Empire, enticing Asian kings into the Imperial sphere of influence with offers of protection, investment and trading access to the gargantuan Inecurian market; over time, these bonds could be strengthened and eventual full annexation was made possible. However, large swathes of Asia were also incorporated through open war, most notoriously Thailand, which took several long wars to fully conquer.

Even in cases of military conquest, though, the Empire continued the tradition started by Athdus the Great and allowed the local rulers to continue ruling under the Imperial flag. This policy was on both ideological and pragmatic grounds. Ever since Emperor Athdus, the Imperial tradition had been one of autonomous self-rule and avoiding the imposition of foreign customs and power structures, and the aristocracy had come to attach moral value to a hands-off model of governance. However, arguably more importantly, the Empire had never truly possessed the capacity to create a centralised state that could unite its territories more strongly. Integrating the systems and traditions of conquered peoples rather than replacing or overriding them had always been critically necessary to maintaining the unity of an Empire that was far less in control than it appeared on the surface.

## Modern Asia

   Every aspect of Southeast Asian society has been greatly shaped by Imperial rule; economies, cultures, political traditions and national borders all show strong streaks of the Imperial legacy. Nesarian remains a widely spoken language and is typically used as a lingua franca between the diverse peoples of the region - some cosmopolitan cities, most notably Singapura, have Nesarian so entrenched into their society that it is the most widely spoken first language.

The modern borders of Southeast Asia are shaped by the old borders of the Imperial Countries, though some have been altered by the period of European rule from 1847 to the 1950s. The European empires also left their mark on the region after approximately a century of rule, but to a much lesser extent than the Nesarian Empire. The reasoning for this is twofold; not only were the European empires content to not upset the boat and inherit old Imperial institutions when they took over, but the general hostility the natives felt towards the Europeans made them resistant to change and spurred many of them to reverse European influence once they gained independence.

The status of development across Southeast Asia mirrors that of Inecuria, to some extent. It is largely characterised by the prominence of a few large and wealthy cities, with the rest of the land being rural and sparsely developed in nature. While the cities of Southeast Asia are easily rivals to any Inecurian city and are amongst the wealthiest in the world, the rural countryside is generally far less developed than the countryside of Inecuria. The exceptions to this rule are found in Papua - which has numerous medium-sized cities rather than a few large ones - and Mainland Southeast Asia (or Indochina) - which has a more even but generally lower level of development.

The largest city of the region by population - and one of the largest cities in the world - is Jakarta, the capital city of Majapahit. The wealthiest city is Singapura on the southern tip of Malaya, which has approximately half the population of Jakarta, but is the most populous city of Malaya - over thrice as populous as Malaya's capital of Melaka. Because of Singapura's economic and political significance and its demographic differences with the rest of Malaya (namely that most of the population is ethnically Chinese and natively speaks Nesarian), it has a high degree of autonomy, and almost exists as a vassal state of Malaya rather than an integral part of it.

## Administrative Divisions

Just as Inecuria is divided into numerous Imperial Countries, so too were the Asian territories divided into Imperial Countries which enjoyed the same status and rights as the countries of Inecuria. They are listed below in alphabetical order, with their Nesarian name followed by their indigenous name (if the two are not identical).

### Pacific Islands

* Delumére ("New Islands")
* Papumére ("Papua[n] Islands")
* Picumére ("Little Islands")

### Southeast Asia

* Burenai / Brunei
* Calimanta / Kalimantan
* Java / Jawa (originally named Magapita / Majapahit until 1611)
* Madia / Madya-as
* Maluca / Maluku
* Papua
* Suluesa / Sulawesi
* Sumatra
* Tanamela / Tanah Melayu
* Temuria / Kepulauan Timur

### Indochina

* Ainan / Hainan
* Campa / Champa
* Campucia / Kampuchea
* Daivetta / Dai Viet
* Lansa / Lan Xang Hom Khao (also known colloquially as Muang Lao)
* Taira / Krung Tai

## Colony in Deluana

Imperial rule in Southeast Asia began with the colonisation of Deluana (from *Delu Dana*, "New Land"), which officially began in 1389 when the Imperial flag was raised there for the first time. Large swathes of Southeast Asia had already been discovered by explorers at this time, and the colonisation of Deluana was expressly intended to be the first stepping stone to the conquest of Asia.

The colonists who went to Deluana were all Nesarian in origin, and were chiefly from Zathola. They settled the city of Nerules ("City of Nerusan") on the south-western coast, and sought peaceful relations with the native Kanak people. For roughly the first twenty years, the colonists and the natives enriched each other by sharing knowledge and goods, but the Kanaks soon began to catastrophically suffer from diseases the colonists had unknowingly brought with them, chiefly smallpox and measles. The Kanaks came up with several theories as to why this was happening; some thought the colonists had deliberately spread the diseases, some thought the colonists were inherently unclean, and others thought the disease was a supernatural judgement for welcoming outsiders. Whatever the case, the majority of the Kanaks came to believe they could no longer peacefully coexist with the colonists, and sought to eject them from the island.

Nerules came under attack in 1411, and they sent for help from the continent - but reinforcements could take months to arrive, so they had to quickly act on their own initiative. The Kanaks outnumbered the colonists and certainly did not lack courage, but their relatively primitive weapons were simply no match for the sophisticated arms and armour of the colonists, who repelled two assaults on Nerules and then began making assaults of their own. The Kanaks became more desperate as their population was cut down in droves by disease, and this desperation caused them to become careless with their strategies, leading to many catastrophic defeats. Both sides became increasingly vicious towards one another, taking no prisoners and making a habit of killing civilians. In 1414, Governor Rexon Miziaga infamously declared that there could be no peace on Deluana so long as Inecurians and Kanaks shared the island, and began a program of what essentially amounted to systematic extermination. All military-aged native men were to be put to death, and the women, children and elderly were interned in camps, most of whom perished from disease.

Governor Rexon withheld correspondence between the colony and the mainland, knowing that the Imperial state would object to his actions, but his plan to keep things secret was foiled in 1417 when Emperor Degos himself visited the island, as part of the traditional process of touring his domain after his coronation the year before. Upon learning the truth, Degos sentenced Rexon to death and ordered that all the interned natives be set free. Though some historians express doubt about the truthfulness of the event given that it appears in only a single source, the official history of the event states that Rexon accused Degos of cowardice and challenged him to swing the executioner's sword himself - and the Emperor took the sword without hesitation and hacked off Rexon's head in two strikes.

With Emperor Degos's direct involvement, a peace treaty was eventually reached between the Empire and the Kanaks in late 1418. The island of Deluana was split roughly into thirds, with the southernmost third going to the Empire and the other two being left to the Kanaks "in perpetuity". No individual was permitted to cross the boundary without explicit permission, a policy which Degos hoped would both ease tensions and reduce the spread of disease. However, disease was already irreversibly entrenched into the native population. The decimated populace was forced to abandon most of the territory they were entitled to live in according to the treaty, and in 1427 the colony openly breached the rules of the treaty and began settling in the area granted to the Kanaks, arguing that the land was empty and it was wasteful to deny it to those who could use it. Though the Kanaks strongly objected, they knew they were in no position to fight back, and expected that another war would only end in the total annihilation of their people.

The Kanak population kept declining and the colonial population kept growing, and it is estimated that by 1440 the colonists outnumbered the natives on the island. It is estimated that the Kanak population only stopped declining in 1470 or 1480, and by this point the Kanak population was approximately only 20-30% of its pre-colonial level. In modern times, Kanaks are a small minority compared to the natives, and they only make up the majority in the far north. The rest of the country is overwhelmingly inhabited by the descendants of the Nesarian colonists, as well as other Inecurians who migrated over the centuries.

## Decolonisation

In the wake of the Second World War, the exhausted European empires - especially the British - sought to shed as much weight as possible in an effort to recover, and began dismantling their overseas empires, leaving governments favourable to them in their wake. However, in Southeast Asia this process was significantly complicated by the fact that the war was still going on in Inecuria, and would continue until 1960. The British were therefore not content to relinquish all of their Southeast Asian possessions, and both they and the Dutch were pressured by the Americans to retain their territory in the region to support military operations.

The Portuguese were highly reluctant to let go of their possessions, since the ruling Estado Novo regime opposed decolonisation. However, they were content to allow the Temuria to transition from an integral Portuguese territory to a vassal state in 1953, allowing the King of Temuria to reclaim control of the local institutions as long as he swore perpetual fealty to Portugal. The other Portuguese holding in Southeast Asia, the western half of Papua, was lost in the West Papuan Civil War, when the communist Papuan People's Army overthrew the local government, established the People's Republic of Papua, and successfully resisted a Portuguese attempt to retake the land in 1955-56. Papua was eventually united in the Papuan War, when the combined forces of the Kingdom of Papua (the ex-British portion) and the Nesarian Empire defeated the People's Republic of Papua.

Depending on the definition of independence, the last Southeast Asian state to become independent could either be defined as the countries of French Indochina (1974) or Temuria (1975). The four constituent nations of French Indochina were granted independence in 1974 in the wake of the Viet War, as France ultimately preferred a peaceful transition of power to the expansion of communism. These were the last countries of Southeast Asia to become sovereign states, though many analysts define the last country to become independent as Temuria; though it had become its own semi-sovereign state in 1953, it was not released from its oath of fealty to Portugal until 1975.

### Decolonisation Timeline

* 1946: The Viet Minh proclaimed the **Democratic Viet Republic** in the wake of the Haiphong Incident, beginning the first phase of the Viet War
* 1947: The **Kingdom of Sumatra** became independent from Britain, but was required to assist the ongoing war effort in Inecuria
* 1948: The **Sultanate of Brunei** became independent from Britain, was not required to assist in the war in Inecuria
* 1949: The **Kingdom of Majapahit** became independent from Britain, was required to assist in the war in Inecuria
* 1949: French forces completely retreated from the borders of the **Democratic Viet Republic**, shifting the Viet War into its second phase - or the "quiet phase"
* 1950: The **Kingdom of Malaya** became independent from Britain, was required to assist in the war in Inecuria but refused to cooperate with Allied forces
* 1951: British Papua became independent as the **Kingdom of Papua**, was required to assist in the war in Inecuria but refused to cooperate with Allied forces
* 1953: The **Kingdom of Temuria** became semi-sovereign, recognised as its own state but required to maintain fealty to Portugal
* 1955: Portuguese Papua became independent as the **People's Republic of Papua** through rebellion
* 1958: The **Kingdom of Kalimantan** became independent from the Netherlands after the King seized all Dutch institutions and demanded independence, the Dutch government initially vowed retaliation but was forced by public pressure to accept Kalimantese independence
* 1967: All of Papua was united under the **Kingdom of Papua**, after the People's Republic of Papua was defeated and absorbed
* 1969: The **Kingdom of Madia** became independent from the USA, one of President Nixon's first major acts in office
* 1970: As part of a deal with the Nesarian Empire, the **Republic of Deluana** became independent from France, and Imperial forces moved to assist French forces in Indochina, shifting the Viet War into its third phase
* 1970: The **Kingdom of Maluku** illegally held a referendum for independence from the Netherlands, with 89% of voters in favour of independence. Though the Dutch government initially condemned the referendum, they were pressured by the USA and Nesarian Empire into accepting it
* Early 1971: Inspired by events in Maluku, the **Republic of Sulawesi** is proclaimed by liberal revolutionaries after the King of Sulawesi declined a petition to demand independence from the Dutch, beginning the Sulawesi Civil War
* Late 1971: The King of Sulawesi declared independence from the Dutch in order to try and pacify the rebels; the liberal revolutionaries lost some momentum, but the civil war continued. The Nesarian Empire began supporting the monarchists with an expeditionary force
* 1973: The United Kingdom held independence referendums in all five remaining British territories in the region; **Nagela**, **Vanuatu** and **Fiji** became independent as democratic republics, whereas Samoa and Palau narrowly voted to remain under British rule, largely because of the presence of British colonists
* 1973: Frustrated with the King of Sulawesi, the Nesarian Empire made an agreement with the republicans and turned on the monarchists. In the face of this betrayal, the King surrendered his throne to the Republic, ending the Civil War
* 1974: After the Viet War was finally ended, France released the Kingdoms of **Dai Viet**, **Champa**, **Lan Xang** and **Kampuchea** as independent states, being pressured to do so by both the USA and Nesarian Empire
* 1975: The **Kingdom of Temuria** was released from its oath to Portugal by the new Portuguese Republic, which had overthrown the Estado Novo the year before