I'm not going to put words in the GM's mouth but why would the Crusaders attack us instead of the loyalists? Their goal is to take over the government, not to 'win the war' against the heretics and then lose to the loyalists. Unless the GM is going to do a writer's fiat, almost every rebel force that is decently-led will do the logical option..
The Crusaders are extra double plus super fanatics, though. Remember that these are the guys whose fanaticism gives them a
+2 to combat rolls; it is kind of fucking ridiculous.
I can totally imagine them deciding that crushing a small, badly overextended force of heretic Communist invaders into the mud on Victorian soil would be a great way to secure their legitimacy, wipe out the stain of the destruction of the (old) Moses Division, and
not coincidentally seize more territory around Buffalo and get their hands on the Welland Canal, giving them significant leverage over any maritime activity trying to cross from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario or vice versa.
As for the resources needed to keep a war footing, its presumably vastly cheaper to keep at it now rather than to have to fight round two with a strengthened Victoria who have crushed the rebels.
I don't think this is an either-or decision. The civil war won't last forever; we can't
make it last forever realistically. Whoever wins
will consolidate; we ourselves cannot plausibly bulk up enough to literally conquer Victoria in the time available before the civil war ends.
And whenever the stalemate between them is broken, we'll supply arms to the other side. Keep them fighting, keep them weak.
Supplying arms to
any Victorian faction will cause a political scandal in the Commonwealth, because the Commonwealth is united in hating Victorians and wanting them to fail. Arming any group of Vicks, even to fight other Vicks, is going to be very unpopular.
Well then. The war is looking to be even more physically destructive than we had hoped.
How long before Alexei throws up his hands in disgust and physically intervenes by airlifting a regiment or two of VDV into Boston along with a couple squadrons of Su-25s and Su-34s and calling a time out?
I doubt it.
I think Alexander doesn't really care about who runs Victoria as long as they're militarily competent. If Blackwell wins, it confirms what the Czar probably suspected all along- that he can run the place. If he
fails with all his advantages, he was never going to make a worthwhile proxy anyway, and it'd be better to just work with the Crusaders who are already most closely accustomed to using his equipment.
On the other hand, I presume the pilots of the VAF are very quietly grateful that we are keeping them out of this fratricidal conflict.
That kind of choice is agonizing.
I think in this case, given that the VAF is chronically under suspicion as the ultimate 'nerds' of the Victorian military, while the Crusaders are its most ideologically fanatical 'jocks,' that the VAF pilots would not find this hard at all and would merrily bomb the shit out of the Crusaders, at least until their planes fell out of the sky or were casually shot down by whatever air defense weaponry the Crusaders possess.
Point of order:
The Welland Canal is currently held by Loyalists. Blackwell's people.
The Crusaders have not been able to spare the force to dislodge them. They would not be likely to turn to save a bunch of Blackwell loyalists with Blackwell's forces behind them.
Doesn't necessarily meant that an operation to capture the Welland Canal is a good idea on the strategic scale, mind.
Just saying that operationally, the risk of getting jumped by the Crusaders while we are kicking the shit out of a Loyalist holding is not very likely.
I mean. The Crusaders might very well decide that "the heretics and the communists are fighting among themselves" is the
PERFECT time for the faithful to jump upon both of them and chop them up piecemeal. Or they might (given that they have two divisions of heavily armed mechanized troops) decide to wait until we've finished fighting Blackwell's men (big blobs of citizen militias) and are spread out over a bunch of ground, then hit us really hard and rupture our position, while Blackwell sits back and laughs as his enemies pound on each other.
Remember that the only asset we have that can handle a CMC mechanized division on the open battlefield is the Devil Brigade, and the only way to reliably beat one is to expend some of the remaining Old World Equipment. Last time the CMC was obliging enough to charge into the Devil Brigade's guns and get slaughtered, but there is no guarantee we'll be able to deal with them as cleanly this time. If nothing else because now they have two such divisions, and the Devil Brigade can only be in one place at a time, and needs some refit time between expenditures of Old World Equipment.
