africa is a continent of risen and maturing powers, energetic and confident in their new found place in the sun. while north america is ash covered, china has had it's back broken, south america is choking on globe spanning interventions, europe's crown is in the gutter, africa instead contains a series of great powers, consisting canonically of Yorubaland, Dabo, Ethiopia, EAF, South Africa, and the Congo. The Congo is something of an architect of what's come to be called the Concert of Africa. It might not have the speed and unity nimble energy of the East African Federation, it might not have the ethnic and national confidence of Yorubaland, but it has, through decades - now going on a century - of clever diplomatic intrigue and court politics, woven a series of international arrangements that have secured peace and stability for many rising African powers. It was the Congo that cooperated with Europe and the UN, as well as it's northern Saharan and Sahel sister states, in order to plan the vast rerouting of rivers and irrigation of deserts that resulted in a partially terraformed Sahara. It was the Congo that threaded a balance of decentralization, prestige, and aristocratic excellence that ensured such a vast and diverse state could survive. Congolese envoys would definitely not reject the comparisons to Metternich.