Black Chamber is set in a timeline where William Howard Taft, then President of the United States, dies of a heart attack before he could be nominated again as the Republican presidential candidate in the 1912 election. With Taft gone, the Republicans have no choice but to nominate Theodore Roosevelt, former American president who in our timeline ran under the Progressive Party in 1912 after he failed to secure the Republican nomination. In this timeline, however, Roosevelt gets the nomination, defeats Woodrow Wilson, changes the name of the Republicans to the Progressive Republicans and sets about driving America out of its 19th century attitudes as soon as possible.
Fast forward to 1916 and President Roosevelt's reforms have revolutionized the country. New possibilities have been opened for women and POCs, while industrial and technological development is encouraged by the federal government, which sits on any robber barons or traditionalists who might try to stymie change. Mexico has also been invaded in response to a raid by Pancho Villa and is now a protectorate of the United States, which has to deal with an insurgency against their rule there. Meanwhile, the Great War rages in Europe, but Germany is doing a tad better than they did in our timeline, having managed to capture Verdun. Nevertheless, their unrestricted submarine warfare has angered President Roosevelt and it is only a matter of when America will enter the war on the side of the Entente.
As preparation for this, our hero, Luz O'Malley Aróstegui, is tasked with a secret mission that will take her to the heart of Germany. Posing as a Mexican insurgent willing to help the Germans fight America, she meets with a German agent who takes her to the middle of Saxony where she witnesses a weapons test that can finally break the stalemate on the Western Front...and make America think twice before challenging the coming Pax Germanica.
Black Chamber was an enjoyable read...but it had issues. Admittedly I found the setting to be fascinating. Theodore Roosevelt ranks in my top 5 favorite American presidents and seeing what he might have done had he won his third term made for an interesting thought experiment. I especially liked how Roosevelt worked hard to chip away at the laws that kept women and POCs down, which is an optimistic take on the early 20th century that was refreshing to read. Furthermore, I never felt bored during the less action packed scenes of the novel, which is a plus when it comes to the spy genre and me.
That said, a lot of Stirling
Also I found the idea that Mexico could be subjugated so easily in just a couple of years to be a little hard to believe. The insurgency is described as almost dead by the start of Black Chamber, which is surprising considering the Philippines put up more of a fight in our timeline when the United States tried to incorporate them.
That all being said, Black Chamber is still a good book in my opinion and I am interested in seeing where Stirling is taking the story. Not to spoil anything, but Stirling seems to be trying to take the geopolitical situation of 1940s Europe and transplant it a couple decades ahead of schedule. Granted the Kaiser's Germany is not Nazi Germany, but there are a lot of hints through the book that we are going to see World War II fought with the personalities and weapons of an earlier generation...and that could be cool to read about.
In order to go to the Philippines the US military had to project force across the largest ocean in the world. Mexico is right next door. It is multiple orders of magnitude easier, especially in those days, to invade a country when you don;t have to ship forces by boat. Add to that The US population in 1900 was approximately 76M and only 14M for Mexico and it doesn't sound so far fetched after all.
ReplyDeleteThe Philippine Insurrection lasted about 3 years, which is the same time-frame. Most of that was mopping-up as the last serious holdout leaders were hunted down and captured or killed.
ReplyDelete(The later fight against the Moros in Mindanao and adjacent islands was a separate matter, and the Moros had never been controlled by any government based in Manilla in any case.)
And as Mr. Gallagher points out Mexico is much closer, and the US controlled all access to it by land and sea.
It was also much less backward and had a better communications network than the Philippines, and the US had much more in the way of contacts and institutional knowledge there; tens of thousands of American citizens lived in Mexico, the US was Mexico's most important trading partner and source of investment, and there had always been much movement back and forth across the border.
In that era, attempted insurrectionary resistance to foreign/imperial conquest by a Great Power usually failed, and failed fairly quickly. The Boer War, the second phase of which was the most successful guerilla action during the period, also lasted less than 3 years.
Guerillas and partisans were considered inherently illegitimate, outlaws beyond all conventions, and they and their supporters could be subjected to the most ruthless measures of reprisal. As the old saying goes, repression works -- but not in moderation.
Fair enough.
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