| From: | Jeffrey Mach <mach@****.CALTECH.EDU> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Re: Kamchatka?, and some other stuff |
| Date: | Wed, 5 Feb 1997 18:44:12 -0800 |
> DA said:
>
> >>There's a peninsula just north of Japan,
> >
> ><grin> You live in a big place, if nearly a thousand miles is "just
> >north"
>
> D'oh!, I thought it was a lot closer. Better check an atlas and find
> somewhere to which a mage shapechanged into a bird could fly. I'll have
> more silly questions on the topic later.
D'oh! myself. I thought I knew the place you were talking about just
north of Japan, and I did, but it's not named Kamchatka. I should have
checked my handy historical atlas. I was thinking of Sakhalin and the
Kuril islands. For nearly the past century Japan and Russia have been
fighting over them in both hot and cold conflicts (Sino-Russo War, WWII,
etc.). Just north-east of Hokkaido where the water is still warm enough
to sail through year round, they could make a decent base of operations
for your smugglers. The Kulin's are not nearly as inhospitible as
Kamchatka--it does snow in the winter, though--they also have the
advantage of being numerous, so it is possible a pirate group could hide
itself away and pay the rare passing govt. boat just enough to look the
other way.
Now I think that the Russians would wrather go without vodka for a winter
than give up a chunk of land as big as Sakhalin island, but it isn't
outside the realm of possibility that in the worst hour of the Euro Wars,
the Russian Federation might have been willing to sell some of the Kulin's
to Japan, islands that were uninhabited anyway. Else, the islands still
belong to Russia, either way, they may be useful.
--My two yen
Jeff
