The guy above you literally calls Reed a son of a bitch.
And then he goes on to lay out the strategic reasoning behind his decision. This just kind of feels like you're reading what you want to read, here.
Of course I'm self aware, I'm very much not on the side of the United States in this quest, this is both obvious and I've made no claims otherwise.
But there's more than two factions on the board. And given that this quest doesn't follow the Kaiserreich plot to the letter, you'd think people would be more hesitant to just let the South be when they're more.... everything than the Socialists at the moment.
Red areas already have lots of internal dissent. They're hardly unified and they don't even seem to have momentum on their side. They're already meeting resistance from local national guards and what have you, but somehow a few communes are a greater threat than a regional bloc? No, and it's ridiculous to equivocate them.
Reed is one man, and if it's made clear that the administration doesn't want to shoot workers in the streets of Chicago, the Socialist Party will have all the more harder time gathering support, unifying its base.
When you hit a target, you make it harder. If you leave the situation ambiguous, people will squabble, get cold feet.
It's not a given that the revolution will snowball, unless you go out of your way to make it snowball. Which is what the players have chosen.
The Olson administration has shown itself to be a friend to labor in all the ways that would matter to the average person. There is good will there.
That all goes up in flames the moment the Federal Army has to take American cities, subjecting their people to sieges and urban warfare. Shellings, mass arrests, summary executions, it's all going to turn these people against the government.
Edit: If you want a revolution to fail, you make the revolutionaries look unreasonable, you make them isolated, you make them look insane for rebelling against a "reasonable authority". But when you're talking about "Going Sherman on some Reds" then all that goes out the window.
Because then the revolutionaries are right. They have been singled out, the government is not on the side of the people and the revolution is not only justified but it's also the only option left to anyone in "Red" territory if they don't want their homes destroyed if not their lives.
Either you support the militia and live another day, or you make a gamble that Eisenhower isn't going to shell your house, that you won't get caught in the crossfire, etc. etc.
You don't know what you're doing if your response to an uprising is just to smash it.
If you want to make a revolution fizzle out, turn it into a farce not a tragedy.
You probably would've encountered less pushback if you'd made these arguments before, or instead of, throwing out blanket accusations of political bias towards the thread. I'm also disinclined to take strategic advice from somebody who has come out and said that they're not on our side and want us to lose. You're making good points and I'm glad they're in the discussion, but I also just don't trust them. I won't try and reject them just on the basis of that though, because that's basically an ad hominem.
With that in mind, your plan seems to me to hinge on the idea that Reed is safe to ignore and turning military attention to them is what will make them consolidate, not giving them time and breathing room, because by not attacking we might be able to defuse them. I'm not really sure what to think of that. They're currently on the offensive and mobilising because police and corporate mercenaries are attacking strikes all across the country. The revolution has all the attempts to smash it that it needs to keep going, by your guidelines.
I'm also skeptical of "You don't know what you're doing if your response to an uprising is just to smash it". That's for a civil uprising of some kind. This is paramilitaries and military deserters rallying together under the stated goal of making the red flag fly across America, it's an outright civil war. Or if not, why not ignore Long? That's an uprising too. Surely he shouldn't be smashed either. The logic doesn't seem to hold up. Both parties want to overthrow us and enshrine their own set of values, the South is just further along the path than the CSA.
I do believe it is possible that Reed could lose steam if we ignore him. I just don't think it's anything near likely. The fire has already been lit, from what I can tell. Their war goal is to bring the Red Flag across America, and we no longer have much ability to put out messaging in those areas, so the CSA has no real opposition to its own messaging. And as much as we've proven ourselves a friend of the common worker, the CSA's whole identity is being friends of the common workers. Maybe they'll lash together if we strike. That's possible too. But I think it's more likely that leaving them be will allow them to consolidate than that attacking them will consolidate them. And the former is a much bigger problem if it happens than the latter.
Also just going to throw out that the "going Sherman on the Steel Belt" comment was isolated and not indicative of the mainstream voter opinion or the reality of what thee QM intends by presenting that option. I heavily doubt a vote to burn down all the valuable industrial capacity in the Rust Belt, the main reason we're so concerned with the CSA, would accrue all that many votes.
Red areas already have lots of internal dissent. They're hardly unified and they don't even seem to have momentum on their side. They're already meeting resistance from local national guards and what have you, but somehow a few communes are a greater threat than a regional bloc? No, and it's ridiculous to equivocate them.
To correct some mistakes in this paragraph in particular, the CSA leadership has some internal dissent. From what I recall, we saw a hint of it in some CSA members voting out of party line for cloture, and there's the recent mention that Norman Thomas "caved to the pressure of his allies" before making the NYC commune. I don't know how much the Red areas themselves have lots of internal dissent, however. I don't recall mentions of that off the top of my head, though that could just be me having a poor memory.
Also, they're not meeting resistance from local national guards. As the QM recently conveyed from Discord, the Rust Belt National Guards have had most of their members defect to the CSA. The police and corporate mercenaries attacking strikers all across the country is... well, it's basically already the reason for them to fight back and mobilise. Like I said, that's why they're doing it. Meanwhile, neither of those aggressors are really up for an actual battle with the Red Guard and the National Guard defectors.
We are up for a battle with them though, and arguably they're not up for a battle with us. Their military structure is currently not all that formed, because they're a new state that's cobbling together their leadership and military more or less as it comes. Eisenhower also managed to evacuate lots of federal armouries, so they don't have as many weapons as they could otherwise. They're sitting on the industry to correct that if we give them time, and they can solidify their military structure too.
And that's the final thing I believe you're misunderstanding here. I don't think any of the voters voting to strike the CSA is voting it because they think the CSA is currently the biggest threat. We all seem to be on the same page that right now, the CSA is not particularly potent. That's why we're trying to sweep as much of it off the board as fast as possible, while they're still weak and before they get to build up and consolidate into a threat in the future.
