After suffering under French occupation during the Napoleonic Wars, many peoples protested the return of old Kings or Emperors that ruled from far away, and nationalistic refrains echoed in the streets. The Kingdom of Sardinia is famous for fighting the Austrian Empire, and numerous smaller powers, reuniting one of Europe’s most powerful realms for the first time in centuries. Of course, most people do not know that name. You see, Sardinia is now called Italy.
Uplifted animals can carry weapons into battle with us, but that is generally not their primary mission. Most animals at better at some things than we are. Both dogs and cats have spent thousands of years guarding our homes at night, whether by hunting small threats or driving larger threats away. They can see better at night, smell better than us, and generally sense things we never notice. They keep us aware of threats that could kill us.
There was very little fighting in the Core Worlds before The War. Raids and even outright invasions were not uncommon in the Outer Colonies though. Other than a few high profile colonies, they were people who wanted to leave Earth far behind, so most citizens of Earth didn’t worry about them. So there was very little protest of any kind over news of small conflicts out there that took over a year to make it to Earth.
The uplifted cats we recruited for the Wolfenheim Project spent most of the trip prowling around, looking for stowaways. They caught a lot of rats that somehow penetrated all of our screening procedures. We rarely saw the cats, except when they wanted attention or food. It is truly amazing how they can disappear when they don’t want to be bothered, but then be larger than life and impossible to ignore when they decide they want something.
Fearing that another Napoleon could rise and conquer all of Europe, the great powers enacted a series of defensive alliances to maintain the status quo. An attack by any realm would trigger two or three other realms to come to the defender’s aid, and any threat to the monarchies from internal threats would bring aid as well. It was the last, desperate gasp of the great noble families as they tried to maintain their power in a changing world.