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Horatio Nelson
Name: Aston Lewisson Cromwell
Faction: Fylkirid (Originalist)
Date of Birth & Age at Appointment: 14 May 1732 (51 years old)
Personality: What can one say of Aston Cromwell, Bryten’s newest Heahcarl? A man with intense dark eyes, he is known as someone who
bears a grudge, even if he is very keen to
conceal his feelings. He is
generous to his own, but
merciless to his enemies. This is no bombastic military general, but a
cold and calculating strategist who sees the entire struggle for influence in the military as one of strategy, and he believes that by Cnut Aldraic-Kane’s utter failure, he has won the struggle.
Origins: Even the bald simple fact that Cromwell is Heahcarl shows that a lot of things have gone wrong for the huscarl caste. A man who came from basically nowhere – the earliest army records already have him as a
fenrik – his huscarl status is
assumed, rather than taken as fact. A keen
politician as well as an experienced military man, he successfully played the ‘game’ so to speak, and climbed up the greasy pole to become an
overst by the time ‘that idiot from Iceland’ took over. A protege in a sense of Wyndham, Cromwell realised that what the Totalists planned would lead to disaster, and made sure to distance himself from any real involvement in the matter.
Declining to support the disgraced traditionalists nor the ascendant Totalists, Cromwell sought to cultivate the ‘originalist’ idea, that of the heahcarl and huscarls as people’s champions as the true ‘original’ purpose of the Stratocracy and the reforms implemented as distancing the huscarls from their true purpose. While this politically isolated him during the Totalist years (even as he served the military faithfully in the war in Avalon), it benefited him massively once Bryten started to burn.
The War Council turned to lots of other potential heahcarls after throwing out the Marshal-Executor, but one by one they all declined, eager to not be in the firing line, or quietly fleeing to Norway. Cromwell knows he is the thirteenth choice, and the one
forced on the Council due to Lind's intransigence. But that the War Council is desperate for a path, any path, out of the current crisis. Cromwell promises ‘victory and justice’. But for
who?
Style of Rule and Politics: Cromwell is a cagey man who trusts very few. Thus his cabinet will be solely those that have been with him during his wilderness years as well as sufficient sops to the established factions (not the totalists, he hates them) up until he deals with them for good. He will seek to
use his civilian equivalent and his faction to shore up his numbers as much as possible of course, the two have an
understanding.
Cromwell’s politics can be summed up quite simply as
‘originalist’. A radical vision of the Stratocracy as far more than just a caste interest, and more of a System. He believes that only Wyndham of all his predecessors truly understood the Stratocracy, and that all others merely saw it as crass benefit, or in the Totalist case a path to dictatorship. No. None of that is for Cromwell.
He will be the ‘Folkscarl’ – the People’s Leader – and seek to utilise their anger effectively to boost his and the Executor’s radically meritocratic policies. If the masses lynch a traditionalist huscarl, a totalist one, or even a die-hard Teague who opposes their policies, ah well, seems as they caught them way too late. What a shame. Perhaps that’ll scare some of the more stubborn survivors right back in line. We don’t want the great Brytisk Folk to mete out their justice again, right?
The Stratocracy, as a System in where the military has insane amounts of power, will survive. The caste that created it, Cromwell has little sympathy for. He well remembers his true origin, and what genuinely motivates him in the end. The Stratocracy made him who he is, and he has nothing but utter loyalty to it. The caste that it made bloated? No, no. This
freeman will deal with them…
Short Term Goals:
1) The New System
Even though Lind is a confederate in promoting meritocracy, he is still one that is against the Stratocracy as an idea. Thus Cromwell will work with him, shake his hand, while quietly working to undermine any overtly anti-stratocratic (
not anti-huscarl, he will do nothing to stop Lind from undermining those bloated folksmen who backed the traditionalists and the Totalists in turn) policies. The Heahcarl must maintain power in this new world.
Cromwell’s ‘New System’ will be the below, if he gets his way.
- The end of any ‘caste laws’. As someone who
technically shouldn’t be as high as he is, he despises those laws, and will support any move by Lind (or even move himself if Lind
forgets) to demolish them. Position and place should entirely be on merit, not on one’s caste.
- The War Council to remain powerful and with a controlling interest on foreign policy. Once all the non-Originalists on the Council are
done away with, he will turn it into a formalised committee with clear portfolios, both for ‘Home’ and ‘Away’ matters. Order at home and interest abroad are crucial. Judging it necessary to appease the Folk and their righteous anger against his predecessors, he will rebrand it to something less tainted, probably ‘Union Council’. Yes, that sounds nice.
- The Heahcarl to
remain appointed by the Union Council, with the only other way to replace him being of course the King-Emperor. The Heahcarl remains the undisputed foreign policy authority, with not even the Executor able to override him.
- There will be a clear definition of ‘dual spheres’, with the Executor, Cabinet and Thing having clear authority on domestic matters, and Heahcarl, Council and Military having undisputed authority on foreign and military matters. If he gets his way, he and Lind will agree to this dual spheres and the maintaining of the
true nature of the Stratocracy, purified of its impurities, will be successful.
- Apart from all that, he supports Lind’s meritocratic reforms to the hind of course.
2) The Great Purge
Cromwell is not naive. He knows the fractious nature of the huscarl caste. He knows how greatly privileged it has become. He knows that they were eager to back the so-called traditionalists (actually kleptocrats) and then the insane Totalists in turn, with his originalists being the smallest of the three main Fylkirid ideologies. Well. What a good thing he has plenty of willing executioners.
He will deliberately and slowly open up avenues for the masses to ‘express their anger’ on his rivals, with more and more huscarls being cut out of the protection of the military and exposed to the folk’s murderous rage. The originalists will be saved in his plan, but everyone else, especially those more opposed to his and Lind’s radical reforms? Well, well, what a pity. What a mess. Ah well. Such are the times.
By the time the Folk are finished meting out justice, he hopes that the huscarl caste are either dead or utterly broken and willing to surrender to whatever he decides is best for the country. It is originalism, or it is your certain death, is the implicit threat that will emerge after deaths upon deaths. After the caste laws are repealed, he will be very clear that there is just simply
no ‘huscarl’ caste. Merely ‘military men’ and their families. Caste is a threat to Bryten. It will never be a thing again.
The Totalists will be targeted quite firmly for this, with those madcap people with paramilitaries portrayed as the worst of the worst, with leaflets going around portraying them as rapists and murderers to stir up the masses’ fury. Then of course he and the new army comes in and defeat them (if the masses didn’t kill them first), a clear redefining of the army as a protector of the Folk.
He will seek to ensure that promising huscarl talent are reserved and even saved, of course. The Purge is like a forest fire, it can easily be managed with careful moves, and if there’s careful altering of records to say that one wasn't
actually huscarl all along, ah well. Papers! What can you do, sheesh?
3) The New Model Force
The Heahcarl knows that if he goes ahead with the Purge, that’s a good deal of people at the top just gone. In those times, that’s not a good move if there’s not sufficient replacement. Therefore when the caste laws are repealed, he will move to promote ‘New Model Men’ for his ‘New Model Force’. Men from the lower classes and serve in positions now capped by their caste will suddenly be given new roles by the Heahcarl. The emphasis is on a
folkshaer, a military of the people. The first test of the New Model Force will be dealing with the renegade Totalists. Once they are defeated, the Force will be able to sell itself more as the
folkshaer far more easier.
Long Term Goals:
1) The ‘National Interest’
Bitter at how Brytisk foreign policy has been incoherent and destructive, Cromwell will seek to create a clear foreign policy perspective. After all, if he gets his way on the New System, diplomacy is within the Union Council (see why it was renamed?). So he will seek to expand the diplomatic system originally started by Queen Tyffa I and expanded (but eventually neglected) by successive monarchs and heahcarls. The Heahcarl is the one exclusively responsible for foreign policy, right? So that includes diplomacy.
The diplomatic service will be revamped, with diplomatic staff apart from the ambassadors and envoys now being supplied by the Department of State, and thus of the ‘civil service’ so to speak. If peerages are being handed out like candy by the Emperor to Lind for his sort, well, Cromwell wants some of that for his people too especially if the aristocrats abroad won’t take to diplomats from the ‘new’ men.
The
National Interest will be emphasised in diplomacy. A rejection of the old ‘Scandinavianism’ (indeed, Cromwell has
choice words for how Bryten sacrificed troops again and again for Norway), it casts a sceptical eye on any idea of Bryten having ‘permanent entanglements’. In Cromwell’s words –
“Bryten has no eternal allies nor perpetual enemies. Its interest is both eternal and perpetual, and that is its lodestar that we, as its state, should follow.”
Always sceptical of Germany, but hesitant at tying Bryten so
permanently to the mainland, he will seek to improve
diplomatic connections to the Ententa, even if refraining from permanent alliance. International trade is under the Heahcarl’s authority (if the New System succeeds…), and this is something Cromwell senses opportunity in using. Perhaps advantageous trade deals with them.
[think OTL 19th century fopo, a sort of feckless
realpolitik motivated by imperialism, as well as using trade deals to acquire economic leverage].
2) The People’s Force
If successful with his short-term aims, he will focus on his aim to ‘folkise’ the Military. The
Haer and
Sciphaer will be the
Folkhaer if he can’t help it.
The ‘Cromwell Reforms’ to create a New Model Force (and not the rudimentary one he implemented to ward off reactionary influence) will include
- A policy so that the longer a soldier serves in the Force, their wage increases. This is intended to encourage a culture of loyalty, not to a certain caste, but to the Force and the System.
- More promotions from the ‘lower’ classes via seeking of talent no matter where it comes from.
- An aggressive push to spread the idea that the
Folkhaer, not the old military nor the old huscarls, represent the Folk and their interests, and that in the Force, one can through service advance oneself greatly. A partnership with the Church will be useful here.
- A united chain of command with the
Haer and
Sciphaer now clearly unified under the Union Council and seen as firmly two branches of one greater Force (it is a pity
Haer is reserved for the Army, so we will have to use
Folkhaer, but you know, if it’s possible to rename
Haer to
Landhaer…).
3) The Lifeblood of a Nation
It is not often one associated with a Heahcarl, but Cromwell has staked a commanding interest on trade policy as part of his New System. He knows the Executor has
ideas, weird ones,
strange ones. Cromwell is not a man to bend or break, but he knows Lind’s cooperation is
particularly important. Cromwell has no concrete theories himself on the dismal science, apart from the clear belief that Totalism failed the country utterly.
So while the
Sciphaer seek to regulate Brytisk trade on the high seas, and seek to expand its economic interests in the colonies (what of them we have left) such as the Osbaldines (a sure money-maker that will make up for the Great Disaster, some of his advisors on the Union Council say), the
Haer will seek to ensure that trading at home is done as
smoothly and as
efficient as possible. Any disturbances in critical trade ports will be dealt with. Not with the knout though, that’s the old way. Order, but not through savagery. It’s a fine balance.
The Diplomatic Service will continue, with trade deals being done with the
Ententa and other
civilised countries. Lind’s wish for free trade is tiresome, but Cromwell is sure he can entertain the idea by widening Bryten’s ‘economic sphere’ further and further with trade deals upon trade deals while giving the wider Empire liberty to trade with whichever makes it profit.
TLDR: Slow implementation of free trade via trade deals removing barriers, while the Force becomes a guarantor of trade (if it wasn’t one already)
