Scottish resident SF/F author (he/him/they/them). Three times Hugo Award winner. Does not play well with Nazis. Abolish the monarchy!
@cstross.bsky.social on Bluesky
blog at: https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/
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@YouKnowWhoTheFuckIAM It goes back to the mid 19th century. In an era where battlefields were controlled by massed infantry with rifles, railways revolutionised the process of mobilizing for war—they who ran the tightest timetables got to the battlefields first. But as a result, frontiers moved around and the networks fractured. And shit like the Russian Empire deliberately choosing a different track gauge to stop German and Austrian troop trains running on their tracks during an invasion.