This book should be available now so this is the last snippet.
1636 The Kremlin Games – Snippet 48
Chapter 40
On the road to the Swedish Border
November, 1633
Bernie shivered. Theatrically, Natasha thought. She exchanged an amused glance with Anya. Anya rolled her eyes and Natasha had to struggle not to giggle.
Oblivious to the byplay, Bernie went on, “Well, at least it’s not a horse. It may be colder than a witch’s . . . ah, never mind. It may be really cold, but at least we aren’t riding horses.”
“Indeed, we aren’t.” Natasha smiled. “And you must admit that it’s a very nice sleigh, Bernie, very nice.”
And it was, in fact, a very nice sleigh. It had special springs for the skis. Outside it was bitterly cold and the snow was still pretty deep, but the streamlined sleigh had double-walled construction and a lacquer polish job that acted as sealant, as well as making the whole thing shiny. It was relatively warm inside, even if it did look a bit peculiar. The sleigh needed high road clearance because even the improved roads weren’t exactly highways in the up-timer sense of the word. They were reasonably well-graded dirt roads with a bit of crushed rock spread over them. Plus, at the moment, a layer of snow.
Only a relatively small part of the design for the coach was from up-timer information. More of it came from a Russian coach maker who had joined the team after the czar had seen some up-time car magazines. Czar Mikhail had liked the idea of cars and smooth rides. He’d decided that if he couldn’t have an engine, he at least wanted a streamlined design and shock absorbers.
The coach maker, Ivan Egorovich Shirshov, had taken note of that desire. The czar had seen to that. Ivan Egorovich had arrived at the dacha with a medium-sized chip on his shoulder over the whole mess. Then he talked to Bernie and found that Bernie agreed with him. But it was no more up to Bernie than it was to him. They had gone over Bernie’s car magazines, then over sleigh designs and coach designs, trying to figure out what they could do. Ivan Egorovich now had a permanent dent in his forehead from pounding it against the wall in frustration. And Czar Mikhail had a new coach. So did Bernie.
Bernie grabbed the edge of the seat. “Hang on. We’re about to hit another rutted bit. And I still can’t figure out why you wanted to come on this trip, ladies. You’re probably going to get frostbite on your noses.”
“The ‘advance team’ as you call it has made arrangements, Bernie. We will be comfortable. And I like traveling. Vladimir and I did quite a bit of it, you know, back when our father was alive.”
Aunt Sofia grinned widely. “The weather, it is not so bad.”
Bernie shuddered. If it hadn’t been for the long johns, he’d have had frozen b . . . ah . . . parts by now.
The trip to the Swedish border had several purposes. One was to investigate the road work. Road work had been continuing apace since a few months or so after Bernie’s arrival. Since he had worked on the road gangs around Grantville and had a mechanical turn of mind, he had a good knowledge of the horse-drawn grader and other horse-drawn road improvement equipment. The equipment he had helped design for Russia had been used extensively for more than a year now and was showing real effect. The czar’s highways mostly went south and east, roughly toward China. One, however, went north and west toward the coast of the Baltic Sea.
That was the highway they were traveling. It was a fairly slow trip. They stopped occasionally to examine the road work. Most important to Bernie, though, was that the trip’s second purpose was to pick up his car. It had been shipped from Grantville by way of the Baltic Sea to the Swedish-owned coast.
Russia had lost this particular bit of land to Sweden a couple of decades before. Thankfully, relations between the two nations had greatly improved in the ensuing years. This was mostly because both Sweden and Russia disliked Poland more than they disliked each other. But, also, Czar Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov was honestly impressed with the charismatic Swedish monarch.
Natasha had decided to join the party and she brought Sofia and Anya, so there were more women than Bernie thought there’d be. The amount of advanced planning needed to travel just a couple of days was mind boggling to Bernie. And this trip would take at least a month, new coach or not.
****
“I can’t believe it.” Bernie knew his voice was harsh and his nose bright red from chapping. He was also angry. “I can’t believe it took five freaking weeks to get here and the ship still hasn’t made it.” Which wasn’t what he’d started to say but was more politic. He stomped around the room for a bit, working off some excess energy and tying not to say what he wanted to say.
“Now, Bernie.” Vladislav Vasl’yevich Vinnikov, Natasha’s captain of guards, tried to soothe him. “It was a long way, a hard trip at this time of year. I would imagine that it was even worse on the sea. Your friend will be here. You must just be patient.”
“Why can’t we just go to the coast to meet him?” Bernie asked, in spite of his better judgment. The truth was Bernie was pretty sure he knew why. He wasn’t going to be allowed to leave Russia. Not for the foreseeable future, anyway. They had their up-timer and weren’t going to chance losing him. That had become obvious once they got to the Russian/Swedish border and stopped. He threw his hands in the air.
Bernie knew Vladislav Vasl’yevich wasn’t about to answer his question directly. It wouldn’t be the correct thing to do.
“The villages in the area, Bernie. We should look at the villages. The soil is a bit different, perhaps. You could take notes; it would help with the development of the plows and reapers, I’m sure.”
Bernie brightened a bit, not much. “Well, it’s something to do anyway. Sure, we’ll go take a look.”
Natasha, who had been quiet for a few moments, added, “As well, Pavel Andreyevich would like you to design your plumbing for his home. He is most interested in it. And you are invited to utilize his sauna, if you wish.”
Bernie grinned. The word Natasha had used was banya. The Russian sauna was certainly a way to get warm. Overly warm, if the truth were known. Bernie hadn’t quite been able to make it to the third level back at the Dacha, not yet. Nor had he quite had the guts to roll around in the snow afterwards, although he had progressed to dumping buckets of not-quite-cold water on himself. They also involved a massage with leafy twigs which was called venek, that had been sort of a revelation. Bernie didn’t know of the reports up-time that venek worked better than Viagra, but if he had he would have agreed with them.
“Sounds like a plan.” Bernie sniffed. Cold always made his nose run. “After four hundred miles in this kind of freaking cold, a sauna sounds really good.” And as pissed and, tell the truth, Bernie, he thought, scared as you are. Now is not the time to make an issue of it.
****
Natasha smiled as Bernie left the room. “That might have been more difficult.”
Vladislav Vasl’yevich shook his head. “He knows. He just doesn’t want the confrontation any more than we do. I wonder what delayed the ship.”
They had planned not to reach the border till after the car was already there, but didn’t want it waiting too long. Natasha had spent a worried week thinking up things to keep Bernie occupied. As yet, Russia had been able to recruit a total of one up-timer. That up-timer was Bernie Zeppi. Cass Lowry was a temporary hire.
Czar Mikhail and Patriarch Filaret were quite insistent that Bernie not leave Russian territory. At the same time, Mikhail Romanov expressed a personal desire that Bernie not be made to feel abused or trapped. Natasha was stuck with the job of keeping Bernie from leaving Russia while keeping him from realizing that he couldn’t. A task which, if Vladislav was correct, she had already failed at.
It was important that Bernie remain willing to stay in Russia. Bernie was in regular correspondence with Brandy Bates and his own family in Grantville. A sudden end to those letters would be reported to the government of the USE, most likely. Russia, decidedly, didn’t want to annoy the USE at the moment.
This last snippet sure does whet my appetite for the rest of the book, which should be arriving soon from Amazon. So, Drak, when do the snippets from 35PS start? and BTW, are the Papal Steaks cut from a Papal Bull?
I have the book now, and have read most of the unsnippeted part. I still think it is impossible that Russia could have made as much technical progress between 1632 and 1636 as the book portrays. This is not a book of alternate history, it’s a fantasy. I remember bad 1950’s SF where totally new technologies were adapted overnight. This doesn’t and can’t happen.
@2 “I remember bad 1950′s SF where totally new technologies were adapted overnight. This doesn’t and can’t happen.”
You don’t have to have 1950s SF for that, modern SF does it all the time (like ID4, all those Area 51 movies, many alien invasion stuff…
@2 dave o:
Having also read the book;
IMO the technology/technical progress you are having problems with IS plausible due to:
working from proven uptime/downtime copied technologies with minimal at best reverse engineering required;
starting at first principles and IGNORING safety considerations;
a severe top-down autocratic structure (if ordered it WILL be done);
a start-from-scratch baseline (competing structures near-nonexistent);
minimal economic neccessities (the Dacha is STILL far in the red);
the minimized complexities (spark-gap transmitters; crystal recievers; overscrewed/replaceable breeches; low pressure steam; etc.);
and due to the minimal infrastructure and general illiteracy the V-E-R-Y S-L-O-W spread of the improvements (even by the end the Dacha and a very few palaces have plumbing; Sanitation practices are still half-assed; very little of the farm equipment/weaponry has been dispersed (and much of what WAS produced went black market or to the Ottomans; medical knowledge-crossover is spotty; etc.) has been SEVERELY hampered (NTM the results/fallout from the events in the book).
/Rob
@2 How is about 4 years “overnight?” Given the right developmental impetus , a lot can change in 4 years(compare planes at the start of WWI to what they were fielding at the end). Rates of stagnation or development don’t remain fixed, and there’s a definite reason here for development–not falling behind neighbors that already are or could become your enemies.
It’s not like the developments here are all that “advanced,” comparatively speaking, and the new technologies aren’t quite up to realiable mass production standards.
Example: Breech-loading cannon with an interupted screw breech. I suppose it is possible to make an interupted screw, or the male half anyway with files. In a year or so. The female half is difficult to impossible. So the things were made with a metal working lathe. Metal, as opposed to woodworking, lathes require a cast iron bed. Freshly cast iron warps, due to stresses from uneven cooling. Before it finished, it is left for a period of years (at least 2 or 3) for the cast-in stresses to equalize. Then it is machined to be flat and level. Note that this is only the final stage of a production process. Every preceding step also takes time. Lots of time. Knowing what you want to do is only the beginning. Learning how to do, mostly by trial and error comes next.
No matter how many low tech or alternate tech solutions are proposed, a good many things in the book are not simply difficult: they are impossible. The Tsar, or more likely Sheremetev, can order things done, and can punish the people who can’t and don’t. But impossible doesn’t care.
Actually, you can make the female part of the breech by tapping the thread then cutting (with files) the interruption.
You apparently missed the fact that they’re not using “modern” steel for the cannon or breech. Even if they weren’t the claim of a year to cut the thread is hyperbolic at best. Slow and tedious, yes, but not to that level.
@6 Dave: “The Tsar, or more likely Sheremetev, can order things done, and can punish the people who can’t and don’t. But impossible doesn’t care.”
How right you are! Already, in one of the last snippets, Vladimir Gorchakov was complaining to Brandy that they were demanding the impossible of him.
The US entered WW1 in 1916. Despite an intensive development effort, it was not able to produce either field or heavy artillery for it’s troops before the war ended in 1918. The US was a (mostly) literate, technically advanced country. Russia in an almost completely illiterate technically backward country. Does this suggest why I find much of Kremlin Games completely implausible.
dave o @9,
a) We entered in 1917, not 1916.
b) The issue was not manufacturing capability. See the M1916 75mm. See also the M1917 155mm (more properly the Canon de 155mm GPF), which US manufacturers built (though it was a French design). These weapons were produced during WWI. They were not, however, deployed in great numbers. Well, the heavy wasn’t. There were several M1916s sent over.
addendum – I should also point out that we took breechloading guns to Cuba and the Philippines in the Spanish American war. They just weren’t as good as the Krupp designs they faced.
@11, agreed, we also built and used breachloading artillery for the American Civil War! Claiming we couldn’t do so in 1918 is nonsensical.
If all you want is a breachloader it could be done in the 14th century and was being done then, it’s getting it to work WELL that’s tough.
#7 Kirk: Taps are made of high carbon tool steel.
#10 Kirk: Several is not nearly enough to supply the troops we had in France. And I did not claim that the ONLY issue was manufacturing capability. Design and testing take time too.
#12 Doug: If it’s so nonsensical, why did American troops rely almost entirely on French field artillery and British heavy artillery during the war.
You people ought to read Churchill’s history of WW2, with particular attention to the parts where he discussed weapon production delays and difficulties. Or for that matter, how long it takes the US to develop, build, and deploy new weapon systems.
@13 dave o,
Actually, you need to read history. Taps today are made of high carbon steel. Taps in the 18th century were not. They were made of mild steel which was then hardened. Yes, I said 18th century.
Responding to both your other points, a really short history. We were producing breech loading artillery in the 1800s. As I said in the previous comment, when we invaded Cuba and the Philippines, we discovered that while our breech loading weaponry was good, it paled to the Krupp designed systems the Spanish were using. The Ordnance department made a serious effort to improve our entire inventory, to include our artillery systems.
There were several very good systems developed. The M1902, for example, was good enough there are still a few around (to include one used by the Corps at Texas A&M). The problem was that Congress was keeping the military on a very short budget, and so there wasn’t the ability to purchase weaponry in the numbers needed. What money was available was more frequently spent on infantry materiel such as the M1903 (another ordnance development). The floodgates were opened in early 1917. A year and a half later major production was rolling – but the war was ending. Thus the US only went to war with a few dozen pieces instead of hundreds and thousands.
Oh, an aside as to why we used French artillery so much. It was because we initially subordinated our forces to the French. Politics and Logistics are major issues.
Finally, the comment on how long it takes to develop, build, and deploy new weapon systems shows you’re trying to paste the present on the past instead of looking at history. Instead you should look at how long it took to develop, build, and deploy systems in earlier periods, with the 1800s being a good baseline. The greatest resistance to such is always political, and if the political is behind the item its time from origin to deployment is astonishingly rapid.
Drak! Since I have the hardback version now, if I pick up the story at point where the snippets end, do I miss any text from earlier in the book?
Vikingted, you should be OK but there may have been changes from what I posted. I posted from the EARC (Electronic Advanced Reader Copy) and there may have been changes made prior to publication.
The main nit I still have with the dead-tree version is we didn’t catch/bring-up the many map discrepancies prior to it being locked in with the printer/publisher.
I thought it was a GREAT read and I personally prefer it to “Butterflies in the Kremlin”!
Thanks again Drak for all your work posting these snippets here and on the Bar!!!!!
Kudos and Bravo Zulu!!!!!!
/Rob
@14, in both WWI and WWII the sealift capability to provide sufficient artillery pieces and shells to the ETO was lacking. During WWI, since the French defense industry was (nearly) intact it was feasible to substitute French artillery pieces and ammunition for the US stuff which would have had to be shipped across the Atlantic. In WWII, that option wasn’t available and as a result US forces in Europe, despite being “overequipped” by European standards, were generally short 2-3 medium and 3 heavy artillery batteries per corps, because we couldn’t send enough shells to keep the extra batteries properly supplied.
Similarly, US forces in France during WWI had their Thomplson SMGs taken away and replaced by French-made Chauchet automatic rifles in an attempt to reduce the number of different calibers of ammunition the rear-area supply services had to handle. That turned out to be a mistake since the Chauchet was highly unreliable and prone to jamming.
#14 Kirk: I assume you mean case-hardened taps. This is ok for relatively small taps. I have no idea whether it would work for tap large enough to use to make cannon.
Yes, breech-loading cannon were used in the 19th century. By that time, ‘modern’ metal-working machinery had been developed, especially by the Spanish-American war. And steel was widely and cheaply available. The Kremlin Games is set two centuries earlier, and in the most backward country in Europe.
Prior to early mid 19th century, there had been practically no such thing as weapon development since the French introduced the fusil under Louis XIV. The basic reason for this was the lack of machine tools and skilled labor to use them. While even Russia could create them back in the 1630’s, with enough help from Grantville, they couldn’t do it quickly. There isn’t enough detail in the book to give exact or even approximate time lines. But even if they had from 1631 to 1636, I don’t think that’s long enough. You can believe whatever you like.
@19 dave o: Willingness and ability to spend the money for development could have made the crucial difference in Russia in 1631-6, but OTOH, as Kirk so aptly put it, “The greatest resistance to such is always political,” and there was political opposition, which Filaret & son may (or may not) have been able to overcome. (cf. our delayed entry into space because ‘Engine Charlie’ insisted the space vehicle had to be by General Motors)
In any case, I’m not going to be too critical, because I fully agree with Rob (@17) that “it was a GREAT read,” and thanks to EF. And thanks to Rob for reminding me that we all owe a great deal of thanks to Drak. Thank you very much, Drak.
I want to thank all you for many interesting comments during this string of Snippets. I realize some of my objections to radio transmission is due to thinking to modern. Spark gap transmission would be doable where voice would be problably beyond the event horizon of the dacha brain trust.
Thanks Drak, as always you are responsive to my questions on the snippets.