Re: Blood and Iron

The British Empire, Fourth French Republic, and the United States of America were all watching keenly on what was transpiring in the east.

It had been two weeks since the Imperial Japanese Navy opened fire on a German Destroyer, patrolling through the Bismarck Sea, and in doing so had provoked an outright war after sinking it.

The Germans had opted for a largely defensive war. Holding the line with Colonial Forces, while forcing the Imperial Japanese military into a meat grinder to bleed them dry.

Making use of their naval aerial assets in the region to rapidly resupply or reinforce any island or territory that might come under assault.

All the while, straits were lined with mines, and German U-Boats prowled beneath the ocean’s surface in Wolfpack formations, hunting Japanese vessels, whether military or civilian like a pack of great white sharks who had just caught the smell of blood.

Meanwhile, on the Korean Peninsula, the Imperial Japanese Army was forced further and further back, trying to hold the line just north of Pyongyang, while the Russians came at them like an avalanche of steel, lead, and explosives.

No doubt, this had put the other great powers of the world on edge. Japan ranked third among them all, and was being spit roasted by the number 1 and 2 of the world. Which frankly, nobody really knew which was which anymore.

King George V could not help but call the President of the United States, Herbert Hoover, as the two of them discussed the ongoing war in the Pacific in greater detail.

“I think it would be wise if you began shifting forces to the Philippines. At the current rate, the Japanese might get desperate and try to invade it if they believe your defenses to be weak there.

If that is the case, then you will be dragged into the war on Germany’s side, and that would complicate matters in the future….”

President Hoover had his own crisis going on. And the war in the Pacific was only aw minor concern for him. Just a few days ago, the stock market in the United States crashed.

And he was currently 48 hours without sleep as his administration scrambled to find a solution before this created an economic depression so great it might just destroy the country altogether.

Because of this, his voice was stern, and almost agitated as he made a statement that would have severe diplomatic consequences in the future.

“I don’t give a rat’s ass about the current state of the Pacific! The Philippines is the least of my problems, and frankly I’m going to have to sit this one out! Lest there won’t be any continued cooperation between our two nations if I can’t find a fix to this fucking problem!”

The silence that followed this outburst was symbolic of just how offended King George had been by it. But Hoover’s following statement was truly the straw that broke the camel’s back.

“So the next time you call me, you limey fucking bastard, it damn well better be with a fucking emergency! Because if not? Blow it out your ass!”

Sleep deprivation was a hell of a drug… And it could make one prone to violent or aggressive behavior without them even realizing it.

And thus when Herbert Hoover hung up, he had not even understood that the words he said were severely damaging to the alliance he had fought so hard to negotiate the year before.

And had he known that Bruno was the catalyst for the Black Tuesday in this life. He probably would have called King George back immediately to apologize in the most submissive manner possible.

—

Unbeknownst to President Hoover, while he barked threats at Britain over long-distance telephone lines, the true architect of his crisis was seated calmly in a private chamber beneath the Reichsbank in Berlin.

One hand swirling a glass of Riesling, the other leafing through a dossier marked Confidential: NYSE Acquisitions Phase II.

Bruno von Zehntner, the Grand Prince of Tyrol, Marshal of the German Reich, and de facto master of the German economy; had been preparing for this moment since 1903.

It began subtly. Over the years, Bruno had quietly purchased minority shares in key American industrials: railroads, steel, chemicals, communications, shipping.

His war-time maneuvering had destroyed rival banking houses across Europe, including the Rothschilds, Bleichröders, and even remnants of British and Belgian syndicates clinging to the old order.

By 1929, the man was more than just rich; he was capital incarnate. A global shadow behind the balance sheets of a thousand companies. His reach was long, quiet, and utterly disinterested in public acclaim.

When the New York Stock Exchange plummeted on Black Tuesday, Bruno did not panic.

He smiled.

The crash was not a catastrophe to him; it was a sale.

With Germany’s new imperial treasury flush from a decade of postwar expansion and colonial resource extraction, Bruno launched a series of targeted buyouts through neutral intermediaries: Panamanian shell companies, Swiss front banks, and Argentine holding firms.

American icons fell one by one into his grasp: General Electric, DuPont, Union Pacific, Standard Oil of Indiana, Bethlehem Steel, RCA, and eventually even parts of Ford, whose cash-starved leadership was desperate to stay afloat.

Shares, once deemed untouchable were now bought in bulk for pennies on the dollar.

By 1932, a quarter of the U.S. industrial economy answered not to Washington, nor Wall Street; but to Berlin.

But Bruno did not stop with America. Britain’s own banking sector, already strained by French instability and the collapse of colonial revenues, began to buckle.

German capital offered “assistance” in the form of buy-ins, mergers, and refinancing. The pound sterling teetered on the edge. The Bank of England flirted with insolvency.

And through it all, Bruno kept silent. Not a speech. Not a press release. No grand declarations.

Because true power, he believed, did not speak.

It bought.

Bruno had never forged this wealth to build palaces of marble or indulge in luxuries so obscene even Plutarch might blush. No; money, like every other tool in his life, existed for one purpose alone.

To be wielded.

Because to Bruno, all the investments he had ever made in this life, every fortune gained; it was never about the money. But the power that it bought him.

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