2023年2月22日星期三

A Brief History of Komland

As we turn to the history of Komland, we find that the principal inhabitants belong to the Bach Viet people, whose arrival is believed to be part of the larger Austronesian-Polynesian migration. Approximately thirty thousand years ago, these intrepid travelers set out in their canoes, gliding over the Pacific waters until they reached Southeast Asia, where they continued their journey by both land and sea. Thus, they eventually made their way through Cantonia and up into the region now known as Komland, where clans of these migrants settled around the land of North Water and Three Mountains, establishing the Komviet kingdoms, which became known as the first civilization to domesticate rice.


Five thousand years ago, as the Eastern permeation of the Mesopotamian civilization unfolded along the middle route of the Inner Asian Pathway, the influence of this Bronze Age culture brought with it advances in not only metallurgy but also new forms of urban organization: the city-state; Namely, in the sequence of Sumer (in Mesopotamia) - Elam (in Iran) - Harappa (in North India) - Sanxingdui (in Basuria) - Yangtze River (in Xingan, Komland). It was this very movement that is said to have propelled the Golden Age of the Komviet people. Although the relics of the Komviet civilization are younger than those of the Sanxingdui culture, they predate that of China. The Komviet's metallurgical techniques, especially in weaponry, were deemed the most refined of the Yangtze River Valleys at that time.


In the Golden Age of the Komviet people, their influence extended to the Jingchu region, where they confronted the rising power of the first generation of Chinese people, the Shang Dynasty, which evolved from the degenerating Inner Asian chariot civilization. The tug-of-war between Ruijiang Copper Ridge (Komviet) and Panlong City (Shang) lasted for a thousand years until the emergence of the Chu and Wu aristocracy, also Inner Asian influenced. The Komviet finally chose to ally themselves with the victorious Chu and Wu in their struggle for dominance, exchanging their metallurgical technology for the latest warfare tactics and inspiration of societal reform from Inner Asia.


The Inner Asian culture's advantage in mobilization, combined with China's unique centralized dictatorship, cast the terror of total war on East Asia. During this process, the city-state civilization of the Mid Kom and West Kom regions gradually collapsed, giving way to the aristocratic structure of the Churian state, which declined after the Great Chu fell. The mountain tribes that renounced the temptation of war gathered in the East Kom Lake area, preserving their vitality. After Qin dominated the six states, the first anti-Qin warlord, Wu Rui, the King of Poyang, came from this area.


As the real Chinese people, the Qin cut themselves off from Inner Asian civilization and invaded the Kom River in order to open up the Southeast Asia corridor and conquer the various Viet tribes. It was then when the plain dwellers of the former Komviet civilization went through a process of formalization, experiencing social descent due to the war at the end of the Qin dynasty, and the majority returned to the mountains with the Lake people of West Kom, regaining their autonomy. By the end of the Han Dynasty, Chinese officials paid no attention to the people of Kom, expecting no other than building trade posts along the Kom River to exchange gold and rice, and dared not take a single step across.


During the transition from the Han bureaucrats gradually to the military nobility, from Sun Quan to Xiao Liang, a series of invasions were launched against the Komviet to plunder for rations and enslave troops. The cruelty and evilness of the Chinese in the later period were slightly inferior to the Qin, which still incited repeated revolts from the Komviet chieftains. Amid the long war, the chieftains sought ideological means of resistance beyond military force. At this time, the Celestial Masters' Taoism, which at its core was localized Zoroastrianism, was introduced along the same bronze route, and the chieftains combined it with the ancient Komviet belief in WuNuo (witchcraft). From these emerged a class known as the Nam-Cuon Heroes.


The Nam-Cuon Heroes were leaders and priests, but with the introduction of a stable inheritance law of the Zoroastrian order, they ensured the stability of their grand strategy. The wave-like wars of the chieftain of various Komviet tribes decisively overthrew the control of Xiao Liang, winning the long-lost freedom under the rule of Emperor Chen Baxian. On the other hand, the overflowing resource of "law and order" stemmed from a stable tribal structure and also stimulated the class of professional priests to break away from the tribe and unite them on a larger scale. Their main mission was to serve as the religious core of local communities, provide channels of communication for nearby chieftains, and craft literary works and lectures in their leisure time. This was the truth behind the rise of Taoism and Buddhism in Komland. Those two veins, one of the tribe and one of the priests, have thrived to this day.


Sui and Tang pushed the once-onstage Nam-Cuon Heroes back underground, and the upper class of the colonizers from Inner Asia was introduced. The Pavilion of Prince Teng was the "Production and Construction Corps dance hall" of the Inner Asia troops, but their colonization still did not cross the Kom River. What was truly important was that the Inner Asia inflow of enlightenment reopened by the "Five Barbarians' invasion" broke through the barrier of the Southern Dynasties and merged with the maritime order from Southeast Asia, which had gone northward from Cantonia. With the merger came Persian merchants, who introduced the model of the corporation to Komland, that is, if the previous Zoroastrian order did not already serve as merchant guilds. The establishment of Hongzhou was actually in the Tang dynasty, with its true owner being the Persians. Although the Chinese trading posts along the Kom River were called the founders of the cities in propaganda, the relationship between Guanying settlement and Hongzhou precisely mirrored the relationship between Weiwen's Yizhou and Japan's Formosa.


The maturation of the Celestial Masters' Orders, the Zen Orders, and tribal trade associations since the end of the Han had transformed the sparse forest into a tropical rainforest in terms of societal resources, resurfacing again in the Sui and Tang dynasties. The evolution of inheritance law and arbitration law enabled the tribes to settle steely common laws, allowing them to progressively occupy all cultivable plains in Komland and form the enduring ethnic boundaries that exist to this day. In the late Tang, the one and only in the history of Komland, Zung Cuon, relying on his clan soldiers, defeated the professional army of China and once again won a precious forty years of independence before modern times. With the wisdom and generosity of Saint Louis, he was widely revered by the tribes, religious orders, and merchants alike.


The Southern Tang obliterated the best opportunity for feudalization for the Komlish people yet liberated the budding Confucian scholars. The advocates of literary governance played the trick of obscuring the importance of daily experience through text records, distorting the sense of proportion in Komland politics, and leading later generations and outsiders to mistakenly believe that Confucianism became mainstream in Komland since then. In Song, the shackles of the Komlish Confucian scholars were further released. They imitated the teaching of the Buddha and Taoist sages, founded academies, and initialed their own educational tradition, competing with their Goetian counterparts for China's imperial heritage at their peak. However, as the Chinese of the Song empire migrated southward, the tribes of Qianzhou first rebelled against the Song, which subsequently developed into a major rebellion of all the tribes of Komland. At the same time, the common law of the Komviet tribes clashed with the "household registration and equalization system," resulting in the reputation of "a Komlish favor for lawsuit" for the next millennium. The Komlish Confucian scholars realized that they were just floating on the ocean rootlessly, and their ambition to control China was ultimately extinguished when they failed in their struggle against the Goetian scholars after the relocation of the capital of China to Goetland.


As the Sinicization curve of the Komlish Confucian scholars reached its peak, the Mongols' invasion gave them a brilliant and deserved farewell: they persuaded the Komviet chiefs to form a coalition to defend their territories and, in the years that followed, interpreted their military achievements as the legitimacy of ruling Komland. Nonetheless, the Mongols also annihilated the Imperial Examination, blocking the channel for the final Sinicization for them, inevitably leading to their decline. The Mongol order was the dying light of the Inner Asian civilization. They governed by custom, only sending feudal lords to rule indirectly. After the people of Mesopotamia and Persia, they were the last to bring Inner Asian genes into Komland.


Under Mongol rule, Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism compete for the conversion of grassroots tribal chiefs. Yet, the elitist strategy of the Celestial Masters' Order and Komlish Confucianism resulted in a loss of good relations with the tribal lords. At this time, the tribal lords who had no other choice picked up the long-forgotten literati religious sect, Pure Land Buddhism, and created the "Lotus Sect." The longstanding narrative of good versus evil, along with the succession law of religious leaders and clan chiefs, were transplanted from the Celestial Masters' Order to the belief in Maitreya Buddhism. Towards the end of the Yuan Dynasty, the Lotus Sect naturally took the lead in Komland, but the inappropriate Warring States era stirred the Lotus-Confucian civil war, allowing the Chinese to take advantage to invade when Komland was at its weakest.


Ming's Assyrian exile destroyed the rising elites of the Lotus Sect, proving that the similarity in ideological beliefs on paper could not hide the ethnic conflict between the Komlish and the Chinese. Their rebellion spanned the entire Ming Dynasty, but continuous uproots in their communities caused them to lose power bit by bit. The attacks on the Komlish Confucianism were less severe, but they could only serve as a tool for Ming's aggression against the Goetian gentry, not realizing the ambition of their predecessors from Song. After the appearance of the Manila Galleon, they were surpassed both internally and externally by the Wanshou Palace community and the Geotian gentry, leading to the ultimate downfall.


The Pure Brightness Sect, the faith of the Wanshou Palace community, was a branch of the Celestial Masters' Order and another resolution made by the deeply rooted Komviet tribes. They caught up with the economic prosperity conveyed by the maritime order and took the Upper Yangtze as their own Seven Seas, sending caravans to shuttle through the mountains of the Upper Yangtze and bringing Komlish culture into various countries along the river, even to this day. In fact, The Pure Brightness Sect integrated the narrative of the legitimacy of Komlish Confucianism and the military heritage of the Lotus Sect. The tribal alliance took the Wanshou Palace as its center for governing, coordinating local affairs within, and arbitrating disputes among business groups outside, which was the true origin of the modern community of the Komlish people, the clan. During the three hundred years of the Maritime era, the clans steadily recovered from the blow of the early Ming, and the general consensus at the time was to spread the Wanshou Palace and the belief in the "True Lord." The emergence of "Komland's Lord of Fortune" marked the dawn of modern national consciousness in Komland.


The people of Komland's admirable bravery in their resistance against the Manchu invasion freed them from the oppressive taxation of the turbulent times. The tyranny of the Ming was replaced by the lenient rule of the Manchu dynasty, which was the result of a war of attrition between the Manchu and Komland. In the Taiping Rebellion, the Wanshou Palace community, which had monopolized the grassroots political spectrum, emerged for the first time and regained the most advanced European warfare tactics, providing them with a ticket to independence. They later formed an alliance with the people of Fuhsiangria to expel invaders and win their de-facto independence.


In the 19th century, the gentry of Komland discovered the utopia of clan freedom in the motherland of maritime order, Great Britain, in the era of China's disintegration. After the various independent wars of the 20th century, they formed multi-level bourgeoisie councils from the village to the nationwide. There, the radicals of Pan-Asianism and the conservatives of Nativism cooperated to bring ultimate independence to Komland with minimal bloodshed and turbulence, an exceedingly rare achievement in East Asia and even the post-19th century world.


The solidarity of Komland's elites, who were feared by Chinese nationalists like Yuan Shikai, prompted him to order Chinese troops to invade Komland, disrupting its legal system. For more than a decade thereafter, the local politics of Komland continued to be suppressed. The conservative factions and the old radicals could not reach any consensus except advocating for the expulsion of the northerners. The new radicals followed Sun Yat-sen and shifted from Pan-Asianism to socialism, introducing the Chinese Nationalist Party and Communist Party of China into Komland. For the first time, the Chinese came from the south and ended the decades of incredibly tenacious legitimacy of the Komland council.


The Communist Party of China's ambitions were prematurely exposed, and it became embroiled in internal strife with the Kuomintang. The following decade of its occupying South Komland brought about the first catastrophe caused by communism in Komland's history. The Kuomintang, unwilling to loosen its grip on Komland, cooperated tacitly with the theoretically hostile Communist Party to strike against the local parties of the Dangyan Society and Hequn Society. At the same time, it cunningly manipulated the native Komlish Kuomintang forces, leaving the local elites, despite having military might, powerless to eradicate the universally reviled Communist Party. Only after the Kuomintang's attention was diverted by Japan were they forced to partially relinquish their power to the people of Komland. The latter took over the mission of suppressing the communist bandits in the region and, within only three years, completely expelled the communists from Komland.


Under the control of the native Kuomintang, the policy of persecuting the old Komlish Council landlords was inherited. However, the principle of "Komlish governs Komland" left the elites a loophole, enabling them to retake control of local authority by organizing Sanqingtuan or cadre schools as an excuse. Nevertheless, the destruction of the local councils dealt a severe blow to the tradition of coordination of the elites, and the bureaucratism and rigidity of the local party system of Kuomintang were the main reasons why the Komlish people were unable to counterattack with all their might in the anti-communists warfare.


In the 1950s, the Kuomintang committed its greatest mistake by forcibly seizing Manchuria and was subsequently outmaneuvered by the Communist Party. Recognizing its own weakness, the native Kuomintang adopted a cowardly attitude with hope in desperation, recruiting over 100,000 youngsters from Komland only to take them to Taiwan. In Kinmen, the blood of these youthful Komlish drew the frontline at the Taiwan Strait in the East Asian Cold War. Meanwhile, the elites of Komland organized anti-communist armies throughout the country, attempting to annihilate the hordes of Chinese locusts as they did twenty years earlier. Yet this time, due to Soviet intervention, the Komlish landlords failed valiantly. They persisted in resisting until the 1960s, leaving behind their deeds and legends as the most precious heritage of Komland's revival.


After the war against communists was lost, the land reform in Komland was swift and ruthless, with clans massacred and disbanded, religious groups eliminated, and the property of merchant guilds confiscated. The once proud and wealthy people of Komland are now impoverished and isolated. Nevertheless, the spirit of the clans has never been extinguished. Even in the darkest moments when the proletariat controls rural politics, the simple truth that "clans last for millenniums, while governments never" is still believed by all the people of Komland. In the 1970s, when China turned to the United States for partnership after being depleted of resources and forced to open its coasts and abandon its villages, the clans stumbled back to their feet. In less than twenty years, they had already demonstrated the capability to launch armed uprisings and execute local Communist officials.


The Communist Party, clinging to life, has resorted to its old scheme and tested the limits of the West's bottom line after the collapse of the Soviet Union, attempting to change the world order. At the brink of destruction due to sanctions, it unexpectedly survived because the United States and NATO shifted their strategic focus to the Middle East after the 9/11 attacks. The Chinese people learned from their mistakes, biding their time and enslaving the labor force of Southeast Asia, including the Komlish people, exchanging the fruits of their slave factories for the capital to suppress the clans and prepare for the next rise to power. In these twenty years, the clans of Komland have suffered persecution in their own countryside and have to flock to the Bach Viet coasts, where the merchant guilds of Komlish people have also been revived. In contrast, however, in areas where the clans could not survive Communist persecution, the same unorganized labor force that fled has caused rural hollowing.


Today, the Communist Party believes that it has been dormant long enough and has chosen to "rise" again, only to be quickly sanctioned and returned to the brink of collapse once again after twenty years. The clans of Komland are still strong, fighting tooth and nail with the infiltrating Chinese; their merchant guilds have taken their places in the Bach Viet coastal region where information and resource flows are most convenient. But the ethnic consciousness of the Komlish people has not yet awakened, and they can only interpret their successive armed resistance as similar events to when Chinese people kneeled and begged for mercy. The blood of the martyrs will not be shed in vain, of course, and the cycle of history has given birth to Komland nationalists. Starting in 2017, they have called on the people of Komland to reclaim their long-lost hometown, permanently expel the scourge of mankind—the Chinese invaders—and regain independence for the Komlish people. In the interim period of China's deluge to come, the Communist Party and Chinese refugees will threaten the lives and property of the clans who hope to defend their motherland together. In need of an ideology, of a voice of their own, the moment has arrived for the Komland people to break free.