~Message from the Austrian President~

Day 465, 22:16 • Published in Hungary Germany • by Chicco

Dear Hungarian citizens,

I did not initially want to write this article because I felt it unnecessary. However, I have become deeply troubled by the spin given to recent events by the Hungarian media. Therefore, I now ask for your time to let me explain my point of view. Please vote this article up so it is visible to everyone in your country.

1. The question of legitimacy

First off, the RL background of eRep politicians has frequently been invoked as a measure of legitimacy. Therefore, let me say that I lived in Austria for over 5 years, and only recently moved away. My vice-president, Erwin Kroener, is a bona fide Austrian who has lived in Austria his whole life. Therefore, I believe my administration to have a legitimate say over eAustria's affairs.

2. The need for a union

Austria is not a viable country, largely owing to its small population, and the recent political events go a long way to prove my point. Therefore, Austria needs to enter into a union with one of its larger neighbors, but the question is, with which? Germany is the natural choice. Austrian citizens speak either German or English, and Germany makes a strong effort at accommodating both kinds of speakers. Most newspapers, official communication, as well as their forum are either in English or both English and German translations are provided. This is an extremely important point. Common language will allow us Austrians to participate fully in the political and social life of the union. Language is the very foundation of a functional union. Anything else is just occupation.

Having explained all this, I hope you can understand why Hungary cannot be an option for us. Essentially all the articles in your country are written in Hungarian, and English translations are usually not provided. What's worse, the comments posted by readers are almost always in Hungarian. If Austria joined Hungary, how could we play in this union? We could never have a grasp of internal affairs. We might get elected to Congress but we wouldn't understand anything on your forum. Even if unintended, this kind of union would be indistinguishable from occupation.

For these reasons I have long entertained the notion of a German-Austrian union, even before Germany was restored as a sovereign power. Today I was very happy to sign a contract with Isy, the President of Germany, to realize this union.

3. Negotiations with Hungary

Since the contract between Austria and Germany is the object of your anger, let me explain how this agreement was reached. The original plan was for Austria to declare war on Germany. This would have saved us some gold because declarations of war are cheaper for smaller countries. It then turned out that the resulting 'fake war' between Germany and Austria could provide much needed training opportunities for Hungary's young army. Since Hungary signed an MPP with Germany, Hungarian troops could fight alongside Germany in each of these battles. Since there are three parties to this operation (Austria, Germany, and Hungary), we thought it fair to ask Hungary to shoulder a third of the cost of declaring the war (~80 gold). Bear in mind that due to the MPP between Germany and Hungary, a separate declaration of war between Hungary and Austria would not have been necessary.

This deal would have been a win-win situation for everyone involved. However, the trouble was that I did not have control of Congress. In the last Congress elections a group of renegade Hungarians, led by a vigilante called Silent Bob, descended onto Austria and took many of our Congress seats. You have to understand that Austria is so small, there is no competition for Congress seats! Every candidate gets automatically elected into Congress, regardless of voting.

Silent Bob's plan, as you all know, was to annex our high-grain region and fuse it with Hungary. For this reason he refused to agree to the win-win plan I outlined above. The Hungarian government has denied complicity in Silent Bob's coup, and I asked them repeatedly to try to convince him to accept our joint plan. However, the Hungarian government was either unable or unwilling to convince even a single member of Silent Bob's crew to resign his Congress seat or to signal support for our declaration of war. Thus, our plan to provide training opportunities to your army was foiled—not by us but by your own man, Silent Bob.

The Hungarian negotiators tried to convince us to go ahead anyway, and to propose a declaration of war. I rejected this, and here is why: in order to propose a declaration of war, >200 gold need to be transferred from our government bank into Austria's treasury. This is all the gold we have! If the declaration had been rejected, then all this money would have been at Silent Bob's disposal since he commands a majority in Austria's Congress. He could have used this gold as blackmail against us, or else he could have passed a donate law transferring the money into his own account. By transferring the gold into the treasury I would have issued Silent Bob a license to do whatever he wanted with our entire national treasure. It would have been suicide!

Consequently, I asked the Hungarian side to insure us against this possibility. I asked them to include a clause in the contract awarding us 200 gold in damages should the declaration of war be rejected by Silent Bob. In exchange, the Hungarian government would have received ownership over the gold in our treasury. This would have forced Silent Bob to duke it out with his own government rather than with us.

Well, I don't know about you, but I find all these conditions very reasonable. However, the Hungarian government refused to incorporate this insurance clause. As a result I abandoned the negotiations. And this is the point which has been so utterly misinterpreted in the media. It is not that we didn't want to afford you training opportunities. We would love to! But we cannot do so if it means gambling away our entire national treasure!

4. The issue of Lower Austria

Now, let me talk about the high-grain region. I was initially not opposed to the idea of lending you the region. In fact, I was the first to bring up the possibility, and Quicksilver can testify to this. As before, I saw this as a win-win situation: you have gold but need grain, whereas we have grain but need gold. However, there were two problems. First, lending the region was not enough to placate Silent Bob. Even under these conditions he was unwilling to support an Austrian declaration of war. Apparently, he demanded the regions be permanently merged into Hungary, and without any financial compensation whatsoever for the rest of Austria.

The second problem is that I was having second thoughts about 'giving away' Lower Austria. You might not know this but Lower Austria is home to our capital, Vienna. I don't want to bore you with the importance of Vienna to Austrian national identity, suffice it to say that Austria without Vienna just isn't Austria. These are not simply my personal concerns. I believe the majority of Austrian citizens supports our union with Germany. At the same time, I do not believe the majority of Austrian citizens would support our venture if it meant 'giving away' our capital city of Vienna. Therefore, I decided to take the option of lending out Vienna off the table. As a nation that has lost much of her territory, I am sure you can appreciate the emotional attachment to certain territories. At least I would be surprised and disappointed if you didn't. So, in this light, I kindly ask you to respect our right to national self-determination.

Finally, many Hungarians have voiced their opinion that a high-grain region is essential to Hungary's survival. But we all know that you can import grain, as all of us import other raw materials like iron, wood, and diamonds. In fact, it can be more profitable to import grain and employ your workforce in food companies instead. Exporting food provides gold, and some of this gold can be used to import grain. On the other hand, if your workforce is tied up in grain production, you have fewer workers to produce food for export to other countries. Just do the math. It is a zero sum game. There is no inherent economic advantage to having high-Q raw materials regions.

Moreover, the German-Austrian government shall be happy to sign long-term contracts with Hungary guaranteeing the supply of grain. In exchange, you can export food to Germany. This is why people trade in the first place: everybody specializes in goods they can produce most efficiently, and trade allows these goods to be exchanged between people. Do you need to be a construction worker, plumber, electrician, and farmer all at the same time? No. You become a farmer, and when you need a plumber you hire one. Sorry for these kindergarten analogies, but reading some of the commentary in Hungarian newspapers, I'm not sure everybody appreciates this.

5. Political fallout and future prospects

Finally, given Silent Bob's blockade of our Congress, and given the Hungarian government's unwillingness to include an insurance clause, we went ahead and signed a contract whereby Germany issues the declaration of war. What were we supposed to do? Wait until Silent Bob throws in the towel? This might happen tomorrow, but it might just as well happen next year. I find it impossible to talk to him, and so seems everyone else. It is unfortunate that the current contract does not provide trainings opportunities to Hungary, but unless Silent Bob supports an Austrian declaration of war, my hands are tied.

To make matters worse, Silent Bob launched impeachment proceedings against me. Although his proposal was narrowly defeated, you can imagine that this act was not exactly conducive to our negotiations and completely poisoned the political atmosphere.

Last but not least, let me remind you of the friendly relations our two countries have enjoyed in the past. Although it is a long time ago, Austrian solders did shed blood on Hungarian battlefields. I may have only eight fights on my C.V., but those were racked up in the Hungarian war against Romania. Moreover, our countries are officially allied through PEACE. Let us not gamble away this history of friendship and cooperation on account of one man's stubbornness.

I sincerely hope that our relations can be restored to what they once were.

With best wishes,

~Chicco
President of Austria~