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To Struggle and Strive: The Combined Syndicates of America in 1932. A Kaiserreich Quest

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[] Red Guards units are to choose which form they desire in conjunction with a central body to evaluate their capabilities and the needs of the Revolution.

I feel like this might be the best choice? Different conditions on the ground might require different formations. I would prefer professional volunteers, but we can't reasonably expect everyone to meet that standard.

The other choice I don't know, but I'm pretty sure commissars aren't the answer. Maybe regional officers and the promise of additional support.
 
I'm personally wondering how well the Professional Volunteers option will allow us to leverage our big population/manpower advantage. Like sure, the Red Guards could be the elite core vs the larger numbers of Militia... but doesn't it kinda feel like we already have that in the separation between units like the Blair Brigade and the majority of the Red Guards? And it may be adding another layer of complexity that could make integrating these forces rougher.

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notbirdofprey said:
The Red Guards are not a centralized organization, and they are unlikely to become one without either something massive and unpredictable like a sudden civil war or sustained pressure from the top. That is the first obstacle any attempt at reforming them will face. But according to Butler and some of the more...esoteric military theoreticians he knows, that might also be a strength.
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Oh yeah, and there's this quote that we might want to take into consideration.
 
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I'm coming around to the militia option, because war machines also need an attendant civilian population to sustain them. I think it would be a mistake to just conscript everyone we can equip with a rifle and throw them into the meat grinder - so let's take the option that lets us still call up a lot more troops than I think anyone would expect us to reasonably have and try to give them some level of standardized equipment and training, with a well-manned logistics arm to back them.
 
There also might be something in considering that "professional volunteer force like the US Army with more arrangements made for democracy" is something that might end up being very unpopular because well... the US Army isn't very well liked, maybe even hated and just tolerated as something necessary. Even without the mess that Kaiserreich USA is, I think we're still in the point in time when the general public sees standing armies as an organization that indoctrinates its rank and file to obey.

So "US Army but more democracy" might be the sort of thing that might get the Red Guards to start pushing back against us more heavily.

And well... I'm also kinda interested in what a military where the bulk of our forces not being a professional volunteer army like the core of the US Army is would look like, and the Militias options fascinates me in that it feels like a very Syndicalist organization for a fighting force in a way a more conventional-style army wouldn't be. And we still have something like the model of the Blair Brigade to base the idea that some of our forces will still be based off of for higher quality units.
 
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Parzival95 said:
[] Red Guards units are to choose which form they desire in conjunction with a central body to evaluate their capabilities and the needs of the Revolution.

I feel like this might be the best choice? Different conditions on the ground might require different formations. I would prefer professional volunteers, but we can't reasonably expect everyone to meet that standard.

The other choice I don't know, but I'm pretty sure commissars aren't the answer. Maybe regional officers and the promise of additional support.
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I think allowing for local conditions and strengths with some direction from the center would be the best option. It would give us options in depth I.e. to have large operations and also effectively conduct guerilla warfare

We should also take as many options as possible to get all red guards on board with our directions
 
[X] Red Guards units are to be local militias, drawn from individual unions and organizations, consisting of civilian structures transferred to the battlefield, with alterations for increased functionality going from there.

I feel like purely "choose which form they desire" will be a mess, moreso than things are/always will be. We should have at least a general framework that we want the majority of the Red Guards to follow, especially in our core territory, and maybe add in provisions for the ones on the periphery that we can't keep in regular contact with.

And having the Red Guards be an entirely professional volunteer force starting from the framework of the US Army I'd think would be very unpopular among the SPA, regular people, and the Red Guards themselves, plus may cause us issues when we want to make the greatest use of our manpower advantage over our opponents.

And on a final note, I just feel that this is the most Syndicalist of the options and I'm really interested in seeing where it goes.

Still debating the measures we want to do for Anti-Adventurism, and whether we'll be able to spare the dice for the stuff needed in Plan: Carrots and Sticks.
 
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[X] Red Guards units are to choose which form they desire in conjunction with a central body to evaluate their capabilities and the needs of the Revolution.
 
Yeah, thinking about it some more, I really don't like "allow Red Guard units to choose the form they desire", even if it is in conjunction with a central body. I feel like going for it is going to make/keep the Red Guards a mess in terms of organization.

notbirdofprey said:
Honor of the Regiment: One way to encourage good behavior of the Red Guards is to have that behavior reflect on something larger than themselves but more digestible than the syndicalist cause: their unit. Encouraging pride in the larger Red Guards groupings, the creation of distinct uniforms, and the utilization of unique symbology will hopefully create a spirit of socialist brotherhood between the members of the Red Guards groupings, and this spirit can be used through propaganda to make some of the more volatile individuals think twice. Cost: 1 Resource. Time: 3 months. DC: 25/50/75. Result: Create larger Red Guards units with a greater sense of esprit de corps.
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Like, for example, we want to take this action relatively soon. And that might become quite a bit harder if the Red Guards have already chosen their organization format and we have to try and mix or move around different Red Guard units that have taken different styles.
 
Chimeraguard said:
Yeah, thinking about it some more, I really don't like "allow Red Guard units to choose the form they desire", even if it is in conjunction with a central body. I feel like going for it is going to make/keep the Red Guards a mess in terms of organization.


Like, for example, we want to take this action relatively soon. And that might become quite a bit harder if the Red Guards have already chosen their organization format and we have to try and mix or move around different Red Guard units that have taken different styles.
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It wouldn't be a mess so much as play to strengths. If we continue to support the structure. You could argue that, just miltia would dilute the effectiveness of red guards and limit the ability to make local decisions to address local conditions.
 
Even with that thought, I feel like if we're going for flexibility, we should first start off with an overall method of Chain of Command for the Red Guards, then allow flexibility for more distant units according to the local conditions, not start out with allowing this variety of choice to individual Red Guard units that we'll then have to wrangle together later.

The Red Guards we're creating here aren't the local paramilitary fighters whose job is to work with local conditions, they'll be the core and bulk of our army when the Civil War comes. This is specifically the format we want for our army.
notbirdofprey said:
Regardless, if a better, more democratic chain of command is to be created, the first thing that needs to be discussed is what the expected pattern of the army is. Are they a professional volunteer source? A levee en masse in the French style? A citizen's self-defense militia? All of the above? Whatever choice you make will have severe and unpredictable repercussions...
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And "unpredictable repercussions" combined with a large variety in the way the Chain of Command forms seems like a recipe for a disaster.
 
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The same principles would apply, you are exactly right, however our Red Guards will fight first in local conditions and then in further. Diversity will be a strength as you can use different groups for different purposes.

I could be convinced we should create an amey on mass or some sort of proffesioanl core with well trained Red miltia.

What did the soviets do OTL? In the Civil War. They were ultimately very successful and could be a good model for us to work off and understand possible difficulties.

Also, great update @notbirdofprey. Your writing is really enjoyable and I really look forward to them!
 
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Justinian said:
What did the soviets do OTL? In the Civil War. They were ultimately very successful and could be a good model for us to work off and understand possible difficulties also
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The Soviets IIRC became increasingly professionalized with traditional army hierarchies and mass recruitment of former Russian Empire officers. This is... unworkable for us for many reasons. We don't have a surplus of officers, traditional army hierarchies are unacceptable to us (even the format of the US Army says we'll be modifying the structure to increase democracy), and I feel like given the overall attitude of Americans to standing professional armies at this point in time (at best, barely tolerated, at worst, outright hatred), trying to do something similar for the whole of the Red Guards will result in massive backlash.

Plus, the Soviets lost TTL, so people probably won't take "The Bolsheviks did it" as a good answer.

That's another reason I like the Militia option. It makes use of pre-existing civilian structures modified for battlefield use to provide cohesion, and doesn't require a mass of professional officers we don't have. Professional armies require a lot of organizational infrastructure behind them, and that's an infrastructure I think we're sorely lacking in and can't really provide in a timely manner.
 
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Chimeraguard said:
The Soviets IIRC became increasingly professionalized with traditional army hierarchies and mass recruitment of former Russian Empire officers. This is... unworkable for us for many reasons. We don't have a surplus of officers, traditional army hierarchies are unacceptable to us (even the format of the US Army says we'll be modifying the structure to increase democracy), and I feel like given the overall attitude of Americans to standing professional armies at this point in time (at best, barely tolerated, at worst, outright hatred), trying to do something similar for the whole of the Red Guards will result in massive backlash.

Plus, the Soviets lost TTL, so people probably won't take "The Bolsheviks did it" as a good answer.

That's another reason I like the Militia option. It makes use of pre-existing civilian structures modified for battlefield use to provide cohesion, and doesn't require a mass of professional officers we don't have. Professional armies require a lot of organizational infrastructure behind them, and that's an infrastructure I think we're sorely lacking in and can't really provide in a timely manner.
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Here's my worry... what about the organizations that are already basically professional? Are we going to outlaw ones that are more like an actual army unit? Because does the Blair Brigade really draw directly from local civilian organizations? Etc, etc?
 
The Laurent said:
Here's my worry... what about the organizations that are already basically professional? Are we going to outlaw ones that are more like an actual army unit? Because does the Blair Brigade really draw directly from local civilian organizations? Etc, etc?
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I think there's room for both. Think of these militias like a left-wing version of the modern National Guard - they're volunteers who still maintain a distinct civilian identity to prevent a toxic warrior culture from taking root, but still get the same basic training and equipment as their full-time counterparts. Meanwhile, the most promising members of these militias can be sent to the training camps and be organized into more dedicated brigades of elite troops, or sent back to their militias to serve as leadership.
 
Just to note, if we take Plan Carrots and Sticks and the latter write-in option, we'll have to take Honor of the Regiment next turn. Which isn't a bad option, but people should just be aware of that.
 
[X] Red Guards units are to be either highly-professionalized forces or local militias, with the decision being chosen by the Red Guard units themselves in conjunction with a central body to evaluate their capabilities and the needs of the Revolution.
[X] Plan: Carrots and Sticks

So, here's a thought. I'm not a fan of Levee en Masse for the Red Guards, and I feel like having the Red Guards choose between two different styles is liable to be less messy/confusing than three or more. But while I want the majority of our force to be Union-sourced militia to better let us leverage the industry and manpower edge of the Red Belt, we also want to ensure there's a spot for more full-time professional units like the Blair Brigade.

Hence choosing between the top two while leaving out the conscript option. And yes, @notbirdofprey okay'd this Write-In as a valid one to vote for.

I'm still leery about "The Red Guard units themselves decide" to a degree, but I'm hoping that this is giving us the better instead of the worst of both worlds.
 
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[X] Red Guards units are to be either highly-professionalized forces or local militias, with the decision being chosen by the Red Guard units themselves in conjunction with a central body to evaluate their capabilities and the needs of the Revolution.
 
[X] Red Guards units are to be either highly-professionalized forces or local militias, with the decision being chosen by the Red Guard units themselves in conjunction with a central body to evaluate their capabilities and the needs of the Revolution.
[X] Plan: Carrots and Sticks
 
[X] Red Guards units are to choose which form they desire in conjunction with a central body to evaluate their capabilities and the needs of the Revolution.
[X] Plan: Carrots and Sticks
 
[X] Red Guards units are to choose which form they desire in conjunction with a central body to evaluate their capabilities and the needs of the Revolution.
[X] Plan: Carrots and Sticks
 
[X] Red Guards units are to choose which form they desire in conjunction with a central body to evaluate their capabilities and the needs of the Revolution.
[X] Plan: Carrots and Sticks
 
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