The Salvation War: Pantheocide. Part Eighty One Up

[xthetenth]

True, but many would support him, just because his idea of ruling Russia was a Russia to be feared, not mocked! A Russia that was strong, and not corrupt.

Yeah. So's Putin's idea of ruling Russia. And Putin is more discriminate about killing people.

And Putin's Russia has the tanks and planes. Really, to get power, one needs to be appealing enough to the first-lifers that they're willing to fork over the shiny hardware. Most of the people who have the cachet with the people to get power are either remarkable enough that they're going to be specially looked out for and have people make sure they don't get power. I very firmly believe that past leaders are only as threatening as the first-lifers give them the military hardware to be, and they're playing it pretty cagey with the support as far as I can tell (From the dealings with Caesar, they seem to have learned from the events of Don't Wake Me When I'm Quiet, and are only handing out the equipment they need to. I would be much more worried about power plays by Earth nations in the immediate aftermath of victory in Heaven. They're going to be ludicrously armed coming out of the fight, and there's a huge amount of resources to be claimed. I also have a sneaking suspicion China's going to be doing very well coming out due to their ammo manufacturing capability, which would let them keep pacifying large chunks of Hell, but that's not something I'm going to bet on because it depends on a lot of other things.

I think this could easily be the fate of many former "great leaders." Many people would consider them dangerous. Their second lives could well be exciting and short.

I tend to agree, especially considering their reputation has given them a perceived threat far greater than their power and consequently than their ability to protect themselves. Especially since many of them screwed more people than they benefited by a huge margin.

[Simon_Jester]

I think this could easily be the fate of many former "great leaders." Many people would consider them dangerous. Their second lives could well be exciting and short.

Well, they fall into four groups:

1) People who will be so unhinged by going to Hell that they are completely unable to function; they're just not the men they used to be. This is more or less what happened to Peter the Great in Don't Wake Me When I'm Quiet.

2) People who managed to effect an escape, or at least got so damn annoying that they actually pissed a demon off into ripping their head off and eating it. So they were dead before the HEA even got there. Alexander the Great might have done this in remote antiquity; a modern candidate would be Winston Churchill.

3) People who are, by and large, remembered as heroes and who retain enough command of their faculties to accomplish something, if not anything all that impressive. People who won't be seen as too much of a threat to leave alive. Robert E. Lee wasn't a national leader, but he falls into this group.

4) People who are not remembered fondly, or have a mixed memory, and whose track record on Earth is such that one might reasonably worry about their intentions. Mao is probably one of the best candidates: officially, China would be thrilled to see him rescued, but unofficially, their government isn't going to want him running around and making trouble.

People in group (4) may be used as rallying points by "their" first life countries, may be killed off, or may be set up in palaces. It depends on national style as much as anything else.

[Edward Yee]

I very firmly believe that past leaders are only as threatening as the first-lifers give them the military hardware to be, and they're playing it pretty cagey with the support as far as I can tell (From the dealings with Caesar, they seem to have learned from the events of Don't Wake Me When I'm Quiet, and are only handing out the equipment they need to.

Caesar also benefited from directly participating in the successes during the Curbstomp War -- specifically, by preventing the overrun of Free Hell, getting a demon army to defect -- and by his putting together a relatively stable state early enough that the US Army didn't mind... back then.

[xthetenth]

I very firmly believe that past leaders are only as threatening as the first-lifers give them the military hardware to be, and they're playing it pretty cagey with the support as far as I can tell (From the dealings with Caesar, they seem to have learned from the events of Don't Wake Me When I'm Quiet, and are only handing out the equipment they need to.

Caesar also benefited from directly participating in the successes during the Curbstomp War -- specifically, by preventing the overrun of Free Hell, getting a demon army to defect -- and by his putting together a relatively stable state early enough that the US Army didn't mind... back then.

Yes. He's the upper bound on the level of support the first lifers are willing to give a fledgling second life state and they're making unprecedented changes to the rules for using weapons of mass destruction in part to deny him support. If they're willing to do that to keep the guy they like under control, what will they do to stop somebody who's a known political threat with a more... aggressive leadership style? The Earth nations are trying very hard to keep their technological advantage, and it is a huge advantage indeed. If there are any problems with rogue leaders in Hell creating threatening states, it is almost assuredly because some state in Earth got out of control to a degree that would likely pose more problematic than a rogue dictator with some modern hardware.

[GrayAnderson]

I think this could easily be the fate of many former "great leaders." Many people would consider them dangerous. Their second lives could well be exciting and short.

Well, they fall into four groups:

1) People who will be so unhinged by going to Hell that they are completely unable to function; they're just not the men they used to be. This is more or less what happened to Peter the Great in Don't Wake Me When I'm Quiet.

2) People who managed to effect an escape, or at least got so damn annoying that they actually pissed a demon off into ripping their head off and eating it. So they were dead before the HEA even got there. Alexander the Great might have done this in remote antiquity; a modern candidate would be Winston Churchill.

3) People who are, by and large, remembered as heroes and who retain enough command of their faculties to accomplish something, if not anything all that impressive. People who won't be seen as too much of a threat to leave alive. Robert E. Lee wasn't a national leader, but he falls into this group.

4) People who are not remembered fondly, or have a mixed memory, and whose track record on Earth is such that one might reasonably worry about their intentions. Mao is probably one of the best candidates: officially, China would be thrilled to see him rescued, but unofficially, their government isn't going to want him running around and making trouble.

People in group (4) may be used as rallying points by "their" first life countries, may be killed off, or may be set up in palaces. It depends on national style as much as anything else.

And then you'll get fun 1/4 hybrids: People who're not functional, but who have enough of a mob out to get them that it doesn't matter.

Honestly, there are probably going to be a lot of former "greats" who've been through enough that while entirely in command of themselves, they're content to either sit back and do the speaking circuit and write their memoirs or to otherwise pass time in (relative) obscurity, maybe teaching period history courses at Hell U. Herbert Hoover would probably be in this category (he did a wonderful job of it IRL), as would a couple of the more reluctant Roman Emperors (I know at least one or two of them had to be begged to take up the throne).

[Simon_Jester]

Heebie Hoover would make a pretty good organizer too, but he'd probably be quite burned out just from his First Life experiences, let alone from burning in Hell for forty-five years.

So it's hard to say what he'd do. Doubt he'd run for office... but on the other hand, I doubt there are that many people who hate him enough to want to kill him again. Anyone living has forgiven him, anyone dead who remembers vividly will have much more pressing matters (like revenge on demons who raped and tortured them).

[GrayAnderson]

Heebie Hoover would make a pretty good organizer too, but he'd probably be quite burned out just from his First Life experiences, let alone from burning in Hell for forty-five years.

So it's hard to say what he'd do. Doubt he'd run for office... but on the other hand, I doubt there are that many people who hate him enough to want to kill him again. Anyone living has forgiven him, anyone dead who remembers vividly will have much more pressing matters (like revenge on demons who raped and tortured them).

Well, let us assume for the sake of argument that Hoover recovered quickly. His rough run at the Presidency was followed by a pretty decent thirty-year retirement (left office in '32, died in '64 IIRC), after all, and though there were attempts to draft him to run for office within the party, after the early 40s he declined opportunities to serve in Congress (Truman did get him on an expenditure reform commission, and Ike kept him there). Hoover's a wonderful example of someone who's "been there, done that, got the t-shirt, and doesn't particularly want to go again".

I bring him up as an example of someone who though powerful in their first life probably wouldn't want to make a run at power. I suspect that especially as you get into the ballpark of hereditary rulers, you'll run into a lot of people who were king/queen/duke/etc., and might have even been good at it, they didn't necessarily want it and/or wouldn't seek it out again. Louis XV leaps to mind.

There's another subset that I'll offer up as the "contented backbencher" type: They'd like to be in a position to influence policy, but are quite happy to stick around in the second tier of politics. One of the members of my state legislature for about 30 years is a shining example of this: He never tried to chair a committee, and spent more time acting as a bit of comic relief in the body.

There's another type I'm trying to sort out what to call, that John Quincy Adams typifies: He's about the only President to have a substantial post-Presidential career, as a high-profile backbench member of the House. Ted Heath over in Britain is a similar type (sitting on the backbenches for 26 years after being pushed out of the party leadership rather than just going to the Lords and fading away)...individuals who were content to go back to what they were doing before they wound up high in power rather than trying to force their way up the ladder constantly.

[Mayabird]

The Group 5 of former greats who have no interest in going back at it would probably include a lot of them at least at the beginning, because a lot of them would be more interested in reuniting with their dead loved ones and making sure they were fine. A lot of people are still being dug out, and with the ones who have been dug out, there's no organized system yet capable of sorting out all those tens of billions. Probably a bit easier to reunite a king with his queen than to figure through the Mohammed son of Mohammeds and the like.

[Simon_Jester]

Though I bet that the system will be in place long before the physical task of harrowing Hell is finished. We've got rivers of fire to divert, large areas to liberate... it's not something we can snap our fingers and finish over a long weekend.

By comparison, creating a cross-indexed database capable of tracking a hundred billion people and figuring out who's married to who and such is... well, I won't say it's going to be easy, but I will say we can probably do it faster if we throw enough computer hardware at the job.

[Night_stalker]

Now, I wonder if the wedding vows still apply to a person in hell. I mean, "Til death do us part" doesn't cover this entirely.

[Ruadhan2300]

conceivably there'll be a lot of second-lifer divorces once some of these people realise such things are relatively common now. there were a lot of unhappy marriage-of-convienience's which are likely no longer convienient.

[Stuart]

Though I bet that the system will be in place long before the physical task of harrowing Hell is finished. We've got rivers of fire to divert, large areas to liberate... it's not something we can snap our fingers and finish over a long weekend. By comparison, creating a cross-indexed database capable of tracking a hundred billion people and figuring out who's married to who and such is... well, I won't say it's going to be easy, but I will say we can probably do it faster if we throw enough computer hardware at the job.

I calculated it would take around 400 years to cleanse the Hell Pit of tormented souls. That's multiple teams working day and night extracting the bodies and shipping them to a rehabilitation center.

[Stuart]

I think this could easily be the fate of many former "great leaders." Many people would consider them dangerous. Their second lives could well be exciting and short.

I suspect for that very reason, a lot of said leaders will keep very quiet about who they are. "Me? I'm Anh Kang, a buffalo chip gatherer. Not Pol Pot, no no, never, quite imposible."

Then, of course, there's the problem of multiple claimants. "Will all the Napoleons please gather on the left."

[JN1]

I suspect the likes of Pol Pot would also keep quiet because they may now face the war crimes trials they escaped in the First Lives. I can imagine that multiple countries would like to get their hands on Adolf Hitler - Israel, Russia and Germany herself spring to mind.

[UnderAGreySky]

I calculated it would take around 400 years to cleanse the Hell Pit of tormented souls. That's multiple teams working day and night extracting the bodies and shipping them to a rehabilitation center.

Did you include the liberate souls pitching in to liberate more after rehab? Especially those with shorter rehab times like Ori and the Spartan guy who sort of dealt with it better?

[Baughn]

Four hundred years?

Well, it won't be that long, even if AIs have to get involved.

And don't look at me like that. There is absolutely no way it'll take that long to make one. Sure, we haven't made all that much progress yet, but four hundred years. Consider where our science was that long ago.

[GrayAnderson]

conceivably there'll be a lot of second-lifer divorces once some of these people realise such things are relatively common now. there were a lot of unhappy marriage-of-convienience's which are likely no longer convienient.

So...

If a man die having no son, his brother shall marry his wife, and raise up issue to his brother. Now there were with us seven brethren: and the first having married a wife, died; and not having issue, left his wife to his brother. In like manner the second, and the third, and so on to the seventh. And last of all the woman died also.

...then who is he married to?

I think this could easily be the fate of many former "great leaders." Many people would consider them dangerous. Their second lives could well be exciting and short.

I suspect for that very reason, a lot of said leaders will keep very quiet about who they are. "Me? I'm Anh Kang, a buffalo chip gatherer. Not Pol Pot, no no, never, quite imposible."

Then, of course, there's the problem of multiple claimants. "Will all the Napoleons please gather on the left."

I'm wondering where Norton I will be lining up...

[GrayAnderson]

Though I bet that the system will be in place long before the physical task of harrowing Hell is finished. We've got rivers of fire to divert, large areas to liberate... it's not something we can snap our fingers and finish over a long weekend.

By comparison, creating a cross-indexed database capable of tracking a hundred billion people and figuring out who's married to who and such is... well, I won't say it's going to be easy, but I will say we can probably do it faster if we throw enough computer hardware at the job.

In a lot of cases, we've got fallback records stored by groups like the LDS (not to mention a number of Catholic churches in Europe) that will cover us for the last few centuries, at least in the West. Getting the right names connected to the right people is going to be the hard part. Sorting out the billions of people for whom no records exist, on the other hand...

[Night_stalker]

Yeah, taht will be a problem. Incidentally, what about all the dead musicians and the like, do they still get their licensing fees?

[JN1]

Copyright will probably have run out for most of them and the rights to their music will have been sold to someone else. They can try to buy the rights back, but unless copyright law is changed they wouldn't have a legal leg to stand on.

[Edward Yee]

conceivably there'll be a lot of second-lifer divorces once some of these people realise such things are relatively common now. there were a lot of unhappy marriage-of-convienience's which are likely no longer convienient.

And as suggested by Anderson, there'll be cases of unintentional polyamory... some of the former spouses may be okay with this, some not so much...

... GUILLAUME! GUILLAUME! GUILLAUME!

[Buritot]

Four hundred years?

Well, it won't be that long, even if AIs have to get involved.

And don't look at me like that. There is absolutely no way it'll take that long to make one. Sure, we haven't made all that much progress yet, but four hundred years. Consider where our science was that long ago.

Agreed. We can liken the effort to liberate the tormented to settling Hell since I assume no-one wants to be woken in his sweet home by the cries of the (previously) damned on the porch over the street.

I know we're talking about the land mass of approximately two third of Earth's surface but still, that's not as much as you'd think it would be. Okay, a quick check makes that 360 million square kilometres. But keep in mind Hell got a population of around 80 billion (8x10^10) humans, that comes down to a population density of 220 humans per square kilometre. How long would it take to fill that up? I'm hesitant in comparing it to the Wild West expansion of the US since we have nowadays far more resources at our hand, but there are dangers I think.

Or put it differently, what would be the rescue effort per day if you'd take 100 years to save 80 billion. That's 800 million per year, or roughly 2.2 million per day. Okay, put that way it is a lot to muster, especially if you consider a rescue team of 4 per person and logistics behind those of 10. 14 skilled workers to safe one person. Lets say, one second-lifer per hour. That's 8 per day per team of roughly 14 people. Three teams to cover a 24 hour day. 24 saved with the work efforts of 42 people. So to save the 2.2 million per day as required we'll need circa 5 million workers.

I'm not used to these numbers but I gather fielding such numbers after a few years is entirely doable. I daresay we can increase even the effort after a decade or two.

I'm worrying about other environments, though. Was breathing required for second lifers? If not, I wouldn't be surprised if the demons just had thrown humans over board with stones attached, just for the evulz.

[Simon_Jester]

What would be tricky is getting someone to pay for it all. The historical record isn't promising when it comes to the long term survivability of humanitarian operations. So while we could do it, assuming your manpower figures are on the mark, I doubt manpower above the level of ~5 million workers on the job is going to be available any time soon. If that much.

[Nematocyst]

Four hundred years?

Well, it won't be that long, even if AIs have to get involved.

And don't look at me like that. There is absolutely no way it'll take that long to make one. Sure, we haven't made all that much progress yet, but four hundred years. Consider where our science was that long ago.

Of course we could, but the people still in the Pit would be less thankful of the robots pulling them out, for psychological reasons.
Imagine you've been in hell for 700 years. You don't even know the word 'robot', let alone what it represents, then suddenly one pulls you out of your torment. There you have it, a thing as unlike you as the demons that put you in there is before you: how do you feel?

keep in mind Hell got a population of around 80 billion (8x10^10) humans, that comes down to a population density of 220 humans per square kilometre. How long would it take to fill that up?

When we're done with Heaven, we could send some humans from Hell to there if overpopulation really becomes a problem. If we're ever done with Heaven, that is...
And then there are the other Bubbles. I doubt they are more terrible than we already have, and with any luck, some of them will be empty.

[GrayAnderson]

<Snip lots of numbers>

I'm not used to these numbers but I gather fielding such numbers after a few years is entirely doable. I daresay we can increase even the effort after a decade or two.

I'm worrying about other environments, though. Was breathing required for second lifers? If not, I wouldn't be surprised if the demons just had thrown humans over board with stones attached, just for the evulz.

I tend to agree on being able to "up" the effort over time; I'm still thinking there's likely to be 100-200 years involved, if just because of the scale of things (not to mention access issues). I'm suspecting some engineering difficulties.

As to the second point, I think I can answer pretty strongly in the negative based on some of the text at the end of the first novel (if you're pulling someone out of a river of fire, then that pretty much excludes them having had to breathe in the interim). Also, in most cases, demons were aiming to torture as opposed to kill.