Vilvo Orbraggar
Vilvo Orbraggar | |
|---|---|
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| Mervoret of Drevstran | |
| In office 1916–1941 | |
| Preceded by | Creation of the position |
| Succeeded by | Vernesto Skolad |
| Leader of Yednosc! | |
| In office 1916–1943 | |
| Preceded by | Creation of the position |
| Succeeded by | Vernesto Skolad |
| Personal details | |
| Political party | Yednosc! |
| Children | 2 |
| Profession | Military General |
Vilvo Orbraggar was a Drevstranese military leader, nationalist politician, and revolutionary who served first as a Warlord during the Drevstranese Civil War and then as the foundator and leader of the First Mervoshia until his resignation in 1941.
Born in the Mrengrave, in western Drevstran, Orbraggar was a Major-General of the Triple Crown's Army when Hortankh Bolsar launched his coup and deposed the monarchy. Despite the two men cordial relations before the civil war, Orbraggar would remain unaffiliated to the Bolsarist faction and instead became a Warlord, gaining control over most of the Furodomark. At first considering the option, he ended up refusing to support Ansmar II ill-fated attempt to return to the throne, instead becoming a staunch supporter of the country's provincial parliaments as the sole holders of public legitimacy. After his victory in the civil war, Orbraggar and the parliaments established the modern republic of Drevstran, with Orbraggar as its first leader under the title of "Mayor of the Palace".
As leader of Drevstran, Orbraggar was the instigator of profound political and economic reforms, developing the industrialisation of the country and its attractivity for foreign investors. He also introduced the foundations for a democratic regime, even if it wouldn't go further because of his and his successor's grasp on the system until the Black Streets Days.
He served three mandates of seven years as Mervoret given that his party, Yednosc! had completely taken over the electoral process. But in 1941, he decided against presenting himself for a new mandate and decided to retire from politics at the age of 86 because of health concerns. He would die two years later of an aneurysm.
Early life
Vilvo Orbraggar was born in the village of Tsaro, in the region of the Mrengrave in Western Drevstran, in 1864. At the time, Tsaro was a small village predominantly a Lushyod and Docetic settlement, with a small Jewish community. His father, Edmond Orbraggar, was the Yätzelember (head of law enforcement) in the village and a small time career policeman from a local family of small landowners. His mother, Jadott Orbraggar, born Misremond, was the third daughter of a Miller-born Hotelier who owned an Inn in the Furodomark. Vilvo himself was the couple's third son. As a career civil servant with bloodties within his commune and married to a woman doubly tied to professions of ill repute, milling and innkeeping which were both always suspected of thievery and banditry, the reputation of Edmond Orbraggar was sulfurous even though no proof of specific wrongdoing ever came up to tarnish his name, even after his death.
The young Vilvo Orbraggar, free from farmwork unlike most Tsaroists children of his generation, could attend school fulltime and was loaded for his diligence and dedication by his teachers. Once he became a teenager, he was sent to the Docetic highschool in the nearby city of Kiröt, where he maintained his good reputation. Just like his father, he was promised to a career as a civil servant. At first in law enforcement but after his military service in 1882 it was instead agreed he would go to the Military academy of Mrenatjaros, with the help of a scholarship from the Docetic Faculty of Kiröt and a loan from his maternal grandfather. In 1883 he entered a joint program between the Triple Monarchy and Garima and was sent to the latter country to pursue his studies. He returned to the Lushyodorstag in 1885 and entered the military with the rank of lieutenant. He was then affected to the Sixth Army where he would befriend another military officer, the then capitain Hortankh Bolsar. They would seemingly part ways a few years later as they were promoted to different units, but they would, for better or worse, remain in close contact.
Kopony Clique
When Hortankh Bolsar created the Kopony Clique, he naturally invited the friends he judged trustworthy into it. Among them was Orbraggar who, despite his relative low-rank compared to the other members, was still considered an equal during the Clique' discussions, debates, and reunions as per Bolsar' oral rules for the society. In 1901, Orbraggar was nominated as the Military attaché to the embassy in Garima. His mission ended 4 years later, and he was then recalled to Angrast where he was promoted to the rank of Major general and placed at the head of the Military intelligence service. It's there that he would first meet Vernesto Skolad who would become thorough the years his right-hand man.
His new position allowed him to become more active in the Kopony Clique' discussions. Although just like every other members he agreed to the necessity of reforms without falling to populism, as most socialist movements were caracterized in their eyes, Orbraggar defended a Unitarist, anti-nationalist vision alongside Hortankh Bolsar and the majority of the Clique' members, in opposition to a minority who wished to keep the federal system of the Triple-Monarchy, or even to divide it further along ethnic lines. What Orbraggar and Bolsar disagreed on however, was the necessity for violence and the role of the Monarchy in the future state. When Bolsar became the Royal Enforce in 1911, they both began to believe that top-down reforms through the monarchy could be possible through this new position, but King Ansmar II' passivity and political manoeuverings made the plan an illusory dream and a dead-end. It's then that Bolsar, now his life at the mercy of any apparent change of opinion from the king, decided that a coup was the only option left. Orbraggar disagreed and refused to participate, leaving Angrast momentarily for the countryside as a sign of protest and neutrality.