Equatorial Ostiecia

Equatorial Ostiecia is a large constituent country of Burgundie located on the northern end of Vallos, at the confluences of the Odoneru Ocean, St. Brendan's Strait, the Taínean Sea, and the Polynesian Sea. In the last 50 years it has come be the cultural and economic center of Burgundie, in essence, creating a foil to the Burgoignesc Metropole.

It is home to over 64 million people and is an economic powerhouse with higher than average GDPPC and standards of living than any other constituent country of Burgundie. Equatorial Ostiecia is predominantly. The country upholds religious freedoms and there is a diversity of religions and other Christian Rites making up 34% of the population. The country is demographically diverse, with 64% of its population being "of Occidental descent" (of which 58% identify as Bergendii), 13% identify as "of Polynesian descent", 8% identify as "of indigenous Cronan descent", 7% identify as "of Oduniyyad descent", 5% identify as "of Alshari descent", and 3% identify as "of other origin" (it is suspected that they are mostly Coscivians). The majority of the people live in urbanized coastal areas, have exceedingly high rates of academic attainment, and work in the services sector.

Economically Equitorial Ostecia is led by its logistics/operations management. It also boasts a large manufacturing sector but this is largely automated so it does not account for a large portion of employment. Retail and the public sector follow manufacturing as economic drivers, they tend to be lower paying but they employ millions of Equitorioise. There is a niche agricultural sector that mostly focuses on cash crops like tea, coffee, sugarcane, cotton, and citrus. There is an even smaller livestock element of the economy with cattle and chickens being the two most commonly raised animals.

Equatorial Ostiecia has been a part of History of Burgundie from at least the early 1600s and after the collapse of the Burgoignesc Colonial Empire in Alshar and Audonia most of the Levantine protestants who made up those Pharisedoms relocated to Equatorial Ostiecia. From that point onward Equatorial Ostiecia has been considered a core part of Burgundie itself.

Etymology
Oustec

Geology
The islands of Equatorial Ostiecia, and the entire XX archipelago, were formed by a as the Cronan plate and Sarepdonian plate intersect. It is a hotbed of volcanic activity.

Initial Levantine intervention
Following the Great Confessional War (1555 - 1575) in southern Levantia, a massive population diaspora occurred. Tens of thousands of Protestant Levantines took to the seas to find new homes free from Catholic persecution, especially with the intensification of the Dragonnades. Many of these refugees were organized under trade companies formed in various principalities the form modern-day Burgundie. But not every trading company was built on the concept of bleeding the fleeing Protestants dry. The Martillien North Levantine Trading Company (MNLC) was chartered in 1579, under the newly ordained Catholic Duchy of Martilles "to control the trading interests of Martillien merchants from the borders north of the upper reaches of the Kingdom of Dericania unto the lands at the zenith of the His terrestrial orb (read Kiravia)". Conspicuously absent were longitudinal limits on the charter.

Following reports of successful settlements in Altaic Sea basin the Martillien North Levantine Trading Company (MNLC) dispatched Jean-Claude Gastineau and a small fleet to establish a Catholic trading post in the area. Arriving in the Alstinian Isles in late 1591, they wintered in the wilderness far from the predominantly Protestant settlements. Cold, disease, and Protestant raids reduced the part from 153 men and 14 ships to 73 men and 6 ships. In the early spring, they made out for mainland Crona to find a suitable and secluded spot to establish a Catholic factory. After 4 months of surveying the coast, a number of suitable locations were noted. Gastineau returned to the Duke of the Martilles and the investors of the Martillien North Levantine Trading Company (MNLC) and presented them with his findings. The Archbishop of Martilles was more interested in the Protestant settlements in the Alstinian Isles and the decision of where to settle a trading post was shelved while Gastineau and his lieutenants drafted a report on military strength, fortifications, indigenous conversion efforts, and infrastructure developments. He became very frustrated with the delay and appealed to leave some lieutenants behind to finalize the report after he had departed to start the return journey. He was denied during each appeal. Ultimately, the report was completed after 6 months of writing and redrafting. After the Archbishop accepted the report, the Duke and the investors met again to pick a settlement spot. They made their selection and outfitted Gastineau with a contingent of 183 men (outfitted with the finest military materiel available in the Duchy), 16 ships, animals, and 5 priests. They arrived in the fall of 1593, establishing the factory of Port-Verde (present-day Gastineau).

In the following years trading between Port-Verde and Martilles increased and immigrants started to arrive in greater numbers as the vast "untapped" wealth of Crona became legendary in the coastal states of the Kingdom of Dericania. However, the piracy that plagued St. Brendan's Strait threatened to terminate the potential of the colonial endeavor. Something had to be done and the Duchy of Bourgondii sought to exploit the situation and force Martilles to pay them protection. The Bourgondii Royal Trading Company was commissioned to establish a port in the islands of Vallos and with a fleet built by the Duke of Bourgonii (subsidized by both the Holy Levantine Empire and the Papacy), their remit was to charge a convoying fee and clear the path for Occidental traders making their way to Crona. They were further authorized to make settlements as they saw fit in Vallos. The lands of the northern archipelago and northern third were targeted, beginning centuries of conflict between the Bergendii and the Kingdom of Oustec. The fleet of 12 older carracks, 3 fluytes, and 5 of the newly designed and faster frigates set out in 1597. These ships reached Catavis in early 1598 and established a small outpost. In the summer they had refitted and set out in search of pirates. The fleet met mixed results that summer, capturing three Oustec pirate galleys but losing two carracks. The men they had brought were sailors, not rowers so the galleys were not immediately usable. That winter they brought 500 slaves from the Bourgondii Royal Trading Company's Istroya Oriental colony to serve as galley slaves, a further 215 slaves to work iron mines to establish a cannon foundry that would be led by a cannon manufacturer from the days of the Oduniyyad Caliphate. They also brought 184 colonists who established Portilles a small port town on Catavis.

In the spring and summer of 1599 they were much more successful and carried 17 convoys safely through the St. Brendan's Strait. Portilles was becoming a more important town as it was where Occidental sailors would have to stop to hire the Bourgondii Royal Trading Company. Its port facilities started to expand as a result and its population grew as some colonists and traders decided to stay. As the Burgoignesc fleet prepared to winter in November they were attacked by a coalition of the pirate kings and Portilles was razed. Many of the ships of the Company were destroyed or captured. In 1600 the Bergendii returned with an army of 7,000, a colonial force of 450, 3,500 Audonian slaves, and a fleet of 100 ships. Portilles was rebuilt, and the first order of business was to change the composition of the fleet. A group of 24 shipwrights were set to survey the forests for usable wood and to construct from it a specific ship to combat the Oustec pirates. The cumbersome fleet survived 1601 while the shipwrights set about their task. In 1602 they decided a. Another 240 colonists were brought in to work on the ships along with the slaves. Some of the older carracks were disassembled and tropical timbers were harvested and a fleet of 18 were completed for the summer of 1602. These swift, shallow draft boats were able to chase the pirates anywhere and maneuver as deftly between the islands. By 1613, the Bergendii were becoming masters of the St. Brendan's Strait, giving them a sizable base to interdict against Oustec piracy. They began colonizing the islands and taking the fight to the landed nobles of northern Vallos, capturing Port de Vanse in its entirety from the Oustec by 1621. Despite these early successes, the Oustec remained formidable and resisted an effort to invade modern Pescanice in 1629, and after this successful defense Oustec began to rapidly adapt to Occidental military technologies and tactics, remaining competitive for the next century.

Late modern period
As the Burgoignesc Colonial Empire collapsed in the early 1800s a massive influx of Bergendii colonists from Alshar and Audonia sought refuge. As they had been dismissed from Levantine for being Protestant in the first place, they were not welcomed back to the Burgoignesc Metropole.

They were rerouted, en masse to Equatorial Ostiecia were the population exploded from about 27,000 Occidentals in 1800 to about 450,000 by the 1850s. The colony saw an explosive period of urbanization and industrialization of farming to accommodate the seemingly endless tidal wave of people.

Because this was occurring during the industrial revolution there was period during the First Fratricide where Equatorial Ostiecia was more advanced than the Burgoignesc Metropole. Because the colony wants bound up in medieval infrastructure and political baggage it was able to adopt new ideas and technologies immediately.

This is also the period when the primacy of property rights, self-reliance, embracing innovation, and a frontier mentality took hold in Equatorial Ostiecia that still permeates it's culture today. The concepts of and  were born of this period.

Operation Kipling
The wars of Operation Kipling formed the modern Equatorial Ostiecia. It was used as a forward operating base for the various general staffs and as a forward manufacturing and logistical hub. The logistical infrastructure that criss-crosses the country were laid down or expanded during the course of the wars in Alshar and Audonia. It is also why most of the infrastructure favors the western sides of the islands. The raw materials coming from the Burgoignesc Metropole were smaller and easier to disembark in the older ports and rail hubs in the eastern shores of Equatorial Ostiecia. As the products were assembled they became larger and more complex and by the time they were completed and ready to send to the war zones they required larger and more complex logistical chains. This has led to more rail and shipyards in the western portions of the country and more airfields as well.

1980s through today
After the conclusion of Operation Kipling the Security Services of Burgundie sold off much of the manufacturing and logistical assets it had built/subsidized to private firms who were immediately take ownership and turn a profit. This lead to a huge economic boom that lasted from about 1987-1995. It waned with the advent of the global adaptation of the internet but a few companies were forward thinking and invested heavily in the adoption of the new technology. The shipping company wars of the mid 90s ravaged large swathes of the economy to the point were the national government of Burgundie stepped in and mediated a peace and what had once been a patchwork of 100s of smaller owner/operator logistical concerns was reduced down to three large logistical companies to provide stability, maintain competition, and standardize the infrastructure to international standards.

This infrastructure standardization led to a construction and network system development boom that led the economy for approximately 15 years from 1998-2013. While construction and infrastructure maintenance is still a strong aspect of the economy, it is a mere shadow of itself in the early 2000s. Bringing all of the micro systems online or into a centralized corporate database meant that an entire sector needed to be stood up overnight. This also means that government-owned internet infrastructure was pervasive across all of Equatorial Ostiecia with fiber optic internet being standard and 4 and 5G towers covering 97% of the countries population.

Equatorial Ostiecia also was the first Levantia and Odoneru Treaty Association (LOTA) constituent to thaw relations with Caphiria and as such had virtually zero competition in the trade to and from Caphirian markets to consumers in LOTA countries. It also saw a rapid growth in the tourism sector as Caphirian tourists and tourists from LOTA nations would come and gawk at each other on "neutral" ground. Tourism has since subsided but it is still a popular destination for Yonderrians who want to get a sun burn without having to learn another language.

Companies in Equatorial Ostiecia used this revenue to expand their markets to nations on all continents and to diversify their internal economy as well.

Flordeterra
The "mainland" province of Equatorial Ostiecia and its immediate surrounding islands is Flordeterra, its capital is Vilalbanes. It is the capital province of the country, with the federal government capitaled at Fort Monteneri.

Pescanice
The largest island province is called Pescanice, its capital is Port de Vent.

Ile Plaiteaux
Ile Plaiteaux is the island province due north of Flordeterra, its capital is Portinhes.

Port de Vanse
Port de Vanse is a cluster of islands northeast of Pescanice, its capital is Aprolpheia.

Catavis
The smallest province to the extreme north east is Catavis, its capital is Portilles.

Military installations
Equatorial Ostiecia is home to many military bases, Fort LaRemie, operated by and headquarters to the Foreign Legion, is the largest and most prominent.

Fort LaRemie
The military installation now know as Fort LaRemie was first established as a militia training camp in the 1600s under orders of the Bourgondii Royal Trading Company and used as a mustering ground for over 150 years. It was also a town common for grazing animals when not serving its military purpose. In the 1780s its militia use was discontinued. The grounds were eventually sold to a private land owner.