Victoria Falls: A Post-Collapse American Nation Quest [Down With Victoria!]

[4WheelSword]

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[Taut_Templar]

I mean... considering how often America has overthrown foreign democratically elected governments to install a friendly dictator instead over the past few decades?

I'm going to say yes.

Click to shrink...

So, your assertion is that non-Americans remember the Cold War that strongly? You'd think over two decades of time would make feelings cool. Certainly speaking, at least some of them - like, say, the polish - would have enough experience with the communists that they don't particularly care how dirty the USA got their hands to fight them.

 

[PoptartProdigy]

The Choice Article of Armament

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"Nothing wrong with the 5.56, of course. Perfectly good caliber, adequate for most situations. But I'm not letting Rovers go out there with something that does about as much as mosquito bites to a charging bear again. The trap was pure luck." James Kruger, advocating for the adoption of the AR10 by the Families, May 11th, 2036

Even before committing themselves to the inevitable clash against Victorian forces, the Families faced danger in the form of the native wildlife in Yellowstone, particularly in large animals like bears. Faced with Rovers who were displeased with wandering through woodlands full of creatures against which their munitions were less than effective, the families instead turned to a rifle in their possession, though in smaller numbers, the .308 Winchester firing AR10, and began developing means to reequip their fighting troops.

Of much assistance in this endeavor was the simple fact that many of the individual parts in both rifles were interchangeable, and those that were not, such as the receiver and barrels, were made with the same materials. After two years of work, a workshop producing milled equivalents for those parts that could not be switched over was in full operation.

Over the years since the Collapse, the Families have been able to keep their stock of spare parts at a usable capacity, augmented by recycling of the parts of captured guns from the cadres of would-be warlords and bandit groups drawn to Yellowstone by the Families, whether for their food, their spirits, or simply a fight.

On the occasions that the Families had no means to procure replacements for components such as the polymer stocks and pistol grips, the Families would instead make replacements from hardwood frames sheathed in the same vegetable-tanned boiled leather that they used primarily for belts, straps, holsters and footwear. These AR10's, sometimes affectionately referred to as 'Choice Articles', were something of a status symbol among the Rover Family, having a visible mark of manufacture by the Families.

Of course, a gun without ammunition is not very useful, and even with reloading the shell casings the Families stockpiles would have declined with active use, never mind supplying .308 cartridges to a far larger number of guns than they had arrived with.

While mostly much the same as their original munitions, the Families opted to replace the FMJ lead with steel core bullets, the steel for which they had a more abundant supply of. To mitigate the issue of over-penetration that would result, as well as to satisfy the desire for even more internal damage from a hit, the steel was drilled into at the tip to produce hollow-point rounds.

Even with the success of the conversion process of the Rover Family's armory, a carbine AR15 is still kept in use by Rovers assigned to mortar crews, who greatly appreciate the lighter weight.

Click to shrink...

Hm...how does such a decentralized polity such as the Families manage to hold to this manner of standardization? Particularly when part of their procurement comes from recycling?

Mountain Road Magnates

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"This blacktop's been ours since the real shit went down back in the New Thirties. You know how many relic lawmen, wannabe road warriors and 'militias' we've left in roadside dirt since then? We've long since lost count, and you think your dinky little caravan's gonna be the one to beat odds? No? Then cough up and shut up, 'fore we decide to help ourselves to more than just the extra in your tanks." - The Speed Brother, during a shakedown of Michael Dawes' trading caravan, April 17th, 2071

With the Collapse, came a tide of utter chaos as the breakdown in Federal authority coincided with riots and secessions that left police departments strained to, and in many cases beyond, their breaking. In these circumstances, it is unsurprising that the criminal element would thrive, for a few short months until the societies they preyed upon either completely broke down or descended upon them in bursts of violence. Many of the petty warlords that arose in the early days of post-Collapse America could be traced to such events and associations.

One such association that never truly died beyond in name, was the Speed Brother outlaw motorcycle club. Having been violently driven off by the emerging Cascadian Republic, the half a dozen survivors of their Oregon Chapter regrouped with their compatriots in the state of Idaho, where they had been founded at the city of Boise in 1969. The exact details of what transpired during this meetup are not known, but the end result was the death of eight highway patrol officers, alongside the Speed Brother's Club President, Vice President and all but one of the members of the Oregon Chapter. This last survivor, perhaps scarred by his experiences, abandoned any name he might have had and adopted a sobriquet of 'The Speed Brother'.

What would occur over the next year was a swift restructuring of the outlaw motorcycle club into a truly vicious band of marauders, as they abandoned their hometown of Boise, carrying their worldly wealth on their bikes and in sidecars. For the next seven years, they would wander the Mountain States' roadways, robbing, looting and murdering all who crossed their path, until The Speed Brother was killed in an IJA drone strike near the former Oregon border on June 11th, 2044. The depleted warband, devastated by this attack, beat a hasty retreat into the Idaho interior.

With one of the members deciding to claim the title of The Speed Brother for himself, the outlaws became codified to their modern incarnation as the Magnates MC, with the original name becoming their leader's official title. Recognising that they could not keep up their old standby of pillaging with numbers reduced to approximately 150 members, the Magnates instead turned their eyes on the larger settlements, now with profit in mind instead of plunder.

Making use of their by now extensive knowledge of still usable roads within the Mountain States, they became guides, smugglers and traffickers of prohibited substances to the disparate townships that dotted the surface of Idaho, their old highwayman methods set aside for the most part. The Speed Brother's rank became highly ritualized among the Magnates, with two founding relics passed down to each new leader. A steel motorcycle helmet and facemask, painted to resemble the cap and goggles wearing skull that had been the original club's center patch, and an heirloom 8-inch barrel Mateba Model 6 Unica, with the words 'Speed Brother' engraved with gold on both sides of the barrel's black steel.
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As always, feedback is welcome.

Click to shrink...

Hm. Interesting flavor. With only 150 members, they wouldn't be able to control much, especially not in Idaho -- but then, you have them more as a criminal gang than a proper warlord state. Canon!

A Lost "Hated" Line
When America was slowly dying and before they hated Victoria, they hated a man. A man that lead the world to burn from his own decision for America debt. This man is named Trump who after being "forced" to step down (the Congress was force to issue its way of making a president go bye bye), his family had to distance themselves from him for his actions of turning the world into a "Greater Great Depression" as it was called. That family was hated, hunted (though none of them died prior the Collapse), bullied, and humiliated beyond recognition for their name and lineage just because Trump ruined the world. He promised to make America great but instead he had to ruined it just because he couldn't get his way. When the Collapse happened, the family went into hiding though that was stopped by the CMC lead by Rumford who was just passing by after a raid with some of the remaining forces trying to stop him and his crew. The only survivors were a teen and a kid that barely even remembers it's parents because of that day. They only survive was because the bodyguards sacrifice themselves long enough for them to escape. For weeks they lived on the streets, fight for survival.They were lucky enough to find shelter at an orphanage even more so when a soldier came by and adopted them. That soldier taught them to survive when you needed it. As the years before the Commonwealth began these two kids grew up into grown men, met their wives, and started to have a family. The new family then settled in Chicago a year before the birth of the Commonwealth and before any of ask, yes they change their last names and it call Lincoln after the soldier who adopted and by the way came with them as he too had nowhere else to go after the death of his family by the CMC (his family died before he adopted the kids). When news of Victoria invasion hit the family, they did not hesitate to join in the army for revenge against them for what they did to their family and to redeem themselves for their lineage past mistake. When Victoria surrendered, the family went back home to celebrate and to let the past rest. As of now they wait for the conference to end so they can get ready for the next mission.

Click to shrink...

Non-canon. Nothing particularly wrong with the idea, I'm just not particularly interested in including a narrative about the Trump family finding redemption in post-Collapse America. They want to do it, they can do it far below the level of abstraction.

Fasten your seatbelts, because this one's going to be a doozy.

======================================================================================​

Posted by Strudel_Savant:

ERIE CAMPAIGN PHASE 6​

On the one side, a gently used armored division, and the survivors of a mauled infantry force, determined to make the ones responsible for their losses bleed, their own survival be damned. Morbidly, they are in distinctly better shape on a per-man basis, fewer mouths to feed meaning they can have more than 1/4th rations and fewer hands holding rifles meaning they don't have to be quite so stingy with their bullets. Doctrinal emphasis on travelling light and foraging for supplies may have become hindrance when they were traveling through an environment rendered barren and moonlike by the hand of the foe, but where other men might be demoralized by the thought of scavenging from their own dead, those of Victoria only feel the desire to avenge this indignity, no matter the cost.

On the other side, without hyperbole every single soldier the CCCP could muster, save a single battle-damaged battalion watching over Windsor on the off chance some number of your forces there slipped the net and decided to muster for an attack. Every single soldier, including one extra division forged of the Detroit Militia. The training they had received under Burns between the declaration of war and today was nowhere near enough to bring them to Victoria's standard of quality, even with the extra time bought from the Buffalo Raid, but it was enough to make them assets rather than liabilities. For the militia at least, orders are simple and easy: Go here, look across the river, and shoot everything that moves.

These men were nervous and fearful once, but that was before Hellfire Burns wiped out half the army coming for them, and the forces on the Raisin line delivered a spectacular body-blow to the other half. They know well what Victoria does to its enemies, they have heard the tales of the 42nd, of the other successor states prior to Chicago, of Ashtabula. Now, before their unbelieving eyes, is a chance to stop such a thing from happening again. Not merely to go down swinging out of spite, but to fight the oncoming hurricane, and win. They have their backs to the suburbs of their home. For many, they have their backs to their homes. At least one of them is aiming an assault rifle out through their actual living room window.

In the night, in the south, men move towards distant lights. In the morning, in the north, men tense as the rumble of engines becomes audible.

Then, for but a moment, stillness and silence.

"VICTORIAAAAAAAAAAA!"

"OPEN FIRE!"

*****​

Forlorn Hope: Communists vs. Victoria
Rolled: 6 vs 8. Failure.

The smashed together remnants of the 8th and 10th infantry divisions charge forward like a tidal wave, a significant number focusing on the conspicuously intact bridges across. The heavy machine guns at the ends of said bridges respond with a curtain of lead, spent brass piling up to the ankles of the gunners.

Your tanks trundle forward undaunted, mighty cannons cracking open bunkers and smashing apart barricades, creating weaknesses where previously there weren't any. Those among the enemy force issued rocket launchers respond as swiftly as they are able, taking aim at the metal monsters and trusting in their comrades to put enough fire downrange that they don't get sniped while doing so.

Now, it should be noted that the M1 Abrams tank can and indeed has survived direct RPG hits, mostly to the thickest parts of its armor, the front. Designed with the expectation that it would be staring down the Fulda Gap in Germany slinging shells at advancing Soviets and taking fire from them in turn, the reputation it garnered during the conflicts in the middle-east as a hangar queen were at least in part due to a desire to avoid bringing it into situations where enemies would have a clear shot at it's less armored flanks.

Your T34s, having thinner armor made to a lower standard, fail to clear even this bar, taking hits right to the front glacis and going up in fireballs as the shaped charges punch through and detonate the fuel and ammo. Through their sacrifice, however, they inflict in minutes the sort of damage that took hours to inflict upon the Raisin line.

Alas, it comes as too little, too late.

*****​

Ron Burns makes it a habit to tour the scenes of battles he commands. It gives him some perspective on how things happened. Whenever possible, he wants to see the results of his decisions. He hasn't been able to take the time or security to do so just yet, in the battle for Detroit. In fact, he's swiftly coming to realize that it's simply not practical in this kind of war.

But he sometimes can.

The fight at the Huron Line is over in two days, between the Victorians' first assault and the cleanup afterwards. Burns heads down there once the all-clear is given, to see firsthand what he's wrought.
He is silent for a long moment, looking at the droves of bodies from where desperate soldiers charged machine guns across the river. He gazes upon the sooty hulks of blasted-out T34s without a word. The river hasn't turned red -- this is not the Raisin, so much narrower, and filled with dead over a much shorter period of time. But the bodies remain.

American bodies.

His fists clench.

"We're heading back to Detroit," he says, turning around. He says not another word.

*****​

Crew Expendable: Conscripted Merchant Marine vs CCCP Marine Corp
No.

Richard Alderman kneels on the deck of his own vessel, SMG pressing faintly into the back of his skull. Two figures in bulletproof vests and balaclavas drag poor Eric out of the hold by his armpits, the 12-year-old sobbing and mumbling as they bodily throw him to where the section where Rick and the other crew who weren't shot have been herded.

It was only the fact that he was supposed to let them board his ship that he managed to radio in that this had happened, unlike the poor souls on the freighter who's first indication that something was wrong came in the form of dead shipmates.

The woman (the woman!) seemingly in charge holds up her radio. "CWS Audrey Jameson, this is Osprey Actual. Do you read me?"

A response comes, but Rick cannot make it out.

"Scuttling charges in the hold, just like the other ships. This crew tried to fight, but the man with the detonator couldn't do it." Rick's gaze flashes to his pre-teen nephew. "The ship is secure. We have twenty-two survivors to transfer to custody." The woman continues.

More mumbling from the other side of the radio.

"Negative, Jameson," she replies, leaning on the rail. "Easy work over here. Textbook. Nothing we haven't done a dozen times before."

One last exchange, followed by a decisive nod.

The looming Chicagoan Gunboats fearlessly approach the ragtag flotilla.

*****​

All to the line: "Philip Division" vs Mud
Rolled: 6 vs 3
No real opposition, rolled for bad luck/uncooperative terrain. They'll get there, but would they get there on time was the question.

With all needed at the front "Philip" division begins moving out. With the desperation of the situation, there can be no more Toledo Reserve. You demand the warlord give every vehicle he can spare. He agrees with little resistance ,but the pickings are far more meager than you would wish. "Perhaps if you were more generous with your aid I could have done better. But preparing to face the armies of Detroit has left us lean."

In another time, he might have been shot for that, but there is no time for punishing Toledo, and you need to get out. Your last remaining land division departs heading to reinforce the Raisin line. Mercifully, even on foot they do not have the troubles of their brethren. Distracted by your ships and tanks, the Commonwealth cannot afford to harass them.

Still the sight of so many dead and destroyed as they pass through wears at the heart of "Philip" division. Even so, the last of the guardians of the lakes marches forward, determined to make up for their failure in letting the Commonwealth become as powerful as it has.

As the last man of Philip leaves Toledo the city begins to stir…

*****​

Hold the Line: Victoria vs Chicago.
Rolled: 6 vs 7. Failure

It comes at night, turning the darkness to light for brief fractions of a second -- one after the other.

It comes during the assault, picking apart the safest places to stand and fight.

It comes during the counter-assault, sending charging soldiers scattering as they strive not to die from forces utterly beyond them.

It comes... Always, everywhere. Never in quantities sufficient to echo the almost preternatural accuracy of Old World armies, but enough that, to the Victorians, it seems that they're everywhere.

Artillery.

Technicals drop mortar teams a few miles from Victorian positions to fire while infantry units forge ahead to keep your attention, and those mortars rain shells constantly. The possibility of counter-battery fire is acknowledged and subsequently disregarded, the Chicagoans content to assume that their opposite numbers have no realistic method of determining where they are past "north of the river, somewhere", and rather than packing up their mortars after each shot they plant themselves down and focus on dropping as much fire and shrapnel as possible onto the grid squares identified as needing it by their fellows at the front. Tube artillery, completely safe from any attempt at retaliation, fires from behind the lines and joins the effort to methodically pick apart any Victorian attempt to organize.

From offshore, Des Plaines-class gunships rain artillery shells into Monroe, and what should have been the strongest point of Victorian resistance becomes a blasted hell of shrapnel.

In and around this all, Commonwealth teams hurtle around in technicals, while the Victorians can only stare, their own vehicles broken down after weeks of mud and gunfire. With 100 support personnel per 10,000 man division, much of the work keeping the cars and trucks operational had fallen to those who had knowledge and experience of such things prior to joining the military.

Officers ask if they cannot commandeer civilian vehicles. The mechanics gesture to the mud filled craters and ask "What civilian vehicles?"

Officers ask if they cannot run new parts in a machine shop. The mechanics gesture to the bombed-out ruins and ask "What machine shops?!"

Officers ask if they cannot improvise a solution using spare materials. The mechanics gesture to the smoldering remnants of the supply tents and ask "WHAT SPARE MATERIAL?!"

As such, the Commonwealth's soldiers zip up and down the north bank at will, raking the opposite shoreline with .50 caliber machine gun fire.

Your troops try to organize reaction forces to fire back, and at first this works, killing several teams. But then the artillery comes and pounds these concentrations into pulp. They try to cross the river ahead of the Communist attacks in order to cut them off, and find themselves completely unable to keep pace with their motorized foes, all while a constant rain of shells keeps on thinning them out. And finally, they yield to their doctrine, and simply disperse to try and rob the artillery fire of its sting.

In response, the enemy keeps pressing, forcing you to keep responding to ever more aggressive scouting. Whenever your dispersed forces bunch up, artillery continues to rain down. The only difference it makes is that the Communists have that much more time to enjoy local superiority before they fall back. At long last, your exhausted soldiers finally stop responding entirely. And in response to this, their losses begin to drop, while those of the enemy continue for less and less gain.

Thus, the foe plays their last card. The final thing which they believe will force you to respond, like it or not.

Artillery falls on the southern half of Monroe for a full twelve hours, forcing its defenders further and further back. All the guns Chicago could muster point towards that city and turn as much of it as they can into a crater. The Victorians simply yield, dispersing into the countryside without a fight.

And as this rain comes down, an enemy engineer company works, laying down a temporary bridge across the Raisin.

A brigade of communists sallies forth across this bridge into what remains of South Monroe and begins setting up positions, unhindered by the Victorian defenders. It takes a week for them to respond. At least a part of that is incomprehension at the fact that their glorious last stand has turned into the enemy using artillery, of all things, to bombard them so heavily that they allowed significant forces to cross the river without a fight.

But they do respond.

A division of Victorian troops encircles South Monroe and charges into hell. Artillery continues to rain down. Machine guns fire until they click dry. And, supported by more artillery than Victoria has ever envisioned, the enemy soldiers withdraw back across the Raisin before riddling the bridge behind them with explosives and heavy machine gun fire, until parts of it are sinking into the water and others getting swept away with the current. They leave behind mounds of Victorian soldiers dead and wounded. For hours, the city seems to scream with agony.

Following this, Victoria stops fading away. They accept the casualties and post permanent forces on the riverline, while holding the bulk of their forces a few miles back, out of artillery range. They contest everything Chicago does, even under a rain of explosives. It costs them men and materiel, and as time goes on, the exchange is increasingly clearly in the enemy's favor. And after two weeks of skirmishing, the situation is this: battered, exhausted, and minimal Victorian tripwire forces on the river, with the majority of their strength miles away to avoid artillery. Their greatest defensive position at this point bombarded so heavily that not even rats can live there. And the Communists-- albeit with some units mauled from the weeks of skirmishing -- in position and ready to go.

And it is at this point that a marine radar picks up a quartet of fast-moving small boats moving north from Toledo…

*****​

The radio crackles to life in all of the speedboats simultaneously.

"Unknown vessels, this is the CWS Avalon Park. You are in a combat zone, and we are targeting you with 30mm autocannons. Heave to and prepare to be boarded. Failure to comply will result in immediate destruction. I repeat, this is the Avalon Park..."

On the bow of the lead ship, a man stands up with a mirror, turning it over and over to catch the light in a precise pattern.

.-. . --.- ..- . ... - .. -. --. / .--. .- .-. .-.. . -.-- / ... - --- .--. / -.-. .- -. -. --- - / - .-. .- -. ... -- .. - / --- ...- . .-. / .-. .- -.. .. --- / ..-. .-. . --.- ..- . -. -.-. .. . ... / .-- .. - .... --- ..- - / -.-. -- -.-. / .- - - . -. - .. --- -. / ... - --- .--. / ...- . ... ... . .-.. ... / -- ..- ... - / -... . / -.. . ... - .-. --- -.-- . -.. / - --- / -- .- .. -. - .- .. -. / -.-. --- ...- . .-. / ... - --- .--. / -.-. .- -. / ... .-- .. -- / ... - --- .--. / .- -... .- -. -.. --- -. .. -. --. / ... .... .. .--. / -. --- .--

Within a few minutes, all of the ships are headed for the bottom.

*****​

He has been preparing for this for over a decade. Not this fight, specifically, but one like it. His home, under threat. Hostile forces in the area. In preparation for it, he has sacrificed everything. Regional prominence, political freedoms, his home's reputation. All of it, fuel for the fire. Granted, he foresaw a different foe...but he's man enough to admit when he's made a mistake.

Granted, he reflects, this was enough mistakes that I should probably consider retirement.

"You move out in five hours," he says. "They will not have time to respond by then. We must hope that we can complete our tasks before they can. This must not be a failure. The City's future rests on it." He steps up to the woman standing at attention before him, narrowing his eyes at her. "Do you understand, General?"

She doesn't blink or twitch. He approves of that, as he does of her; she has always been reliable. "Perfectly, Warlord," she says.

"Then see to it," he says. "I want them encircled before they ever know that they need to fight."

She nods. "It will be done."

"Dismissed," he says, stepping back.

The General snaps her hand up in a salute and then turns away, leaving the room. The Warlord turns away as well, stepping over to his chair. He is old now, and tired. He has worked for many years for his city's sake, and even though the recent months have shown it all to be a mistake, there is still a chance to salvage things now. His allies have been failing at every turn, and now it falls to him to salvage something from their failures.

He has operated his city on a red line for ten years, pouring everything into the military. If nothing else, he can claim that he has done well there. He will prove it now. The Chicagoans have paid essentially no mind to him and his; they will not expect this.

After this battle, he will retire, his age done. Or perhaps he will be torn down and shot in front of an audience. Either way, this will be his last hurrah.

It will be worth it.

He glares down at the map, and its depiction of the battlefield. "We will not be a footnote," he growls, his fist clenching in his lap.

*****​

Surprise Attack: Toledo vs. Victoria
The Toledan Army has the objective, "Secure Toledo Express Airport."
Toledan Modifiers
Numbers: 7 points.
Troop quality: 2 points.
Surprise attack: 1 point.
Artillery advantage: 1 point.
Extensive pre-planning: 1 point.
Total Modifier: 12 points.

The Victorian Air Force has the objective, "Survive"
Troop quality: 2 points.
The army took the bullets… No, seriously, just ran off with them: -1 point.
Total Modifier: 1 point.
Yeah, nah, Toledo Wins. And before you cry foul, the numbers bonus is based on RELATIVE strength, not absolute. If you have 20 guys and he's got 1, this results in a much greater bonus than if you have 100 and they have 81, despite it being a difference of 19 dudes in both cases. Your air force has how many people?

*****​

The City of Toledo, long a simmering pot of tension, boils over all at once.

Isolated runners darting from building to building become large groups of organized people the second the Victorians' last division in the city leaves. Units of the Toledan Army that had been posted on the city outskirts quietly slip parts of their number into the interior of the city.

And in the morning hours, those units move, charging the fence around Toledo Express Airport in silence.

Victorian sentries drop in a staccato crack of gunfire, and Toledan soldiers sprint to the fence and drop explosives before backing off.

The gunshots got the VAF security staff scrambling. The explosions have them waking their commanders.

It's too late, though. As the bombs go off, the Toledan mortar teams begin firing on pre-sighted positions, wiping out the security teams on duty. Platoons of soldiers trained to the very highest of post-Collapse American standards move swiftly through the airport and secure the runways and the building entryways. Inside of ten minutes, those Victorians who were outside are dead; inside of fifteen, the Toledans bring up loudspeakers.

And in the middle of all of this, as General Thomas Shane of the Victorian Air Force finishes pulling on his clothes, his aide rushes in. "Sir! The Toledans have betrayed us!"

Shane scowls at the younger man with a glare so intense the boy flinches back and blanches. Shane snaps shut the last button on his shirt and storms past the aide. "I'm well aware of that, Lieutenant!" he snaps. "What, did you think I thought the Commonwealth had made it here, somehow?" He jogs through the corridors of TOL to his command center, barging in without a word. "What's going on?!" he demands.

Captain Rogers, head of the ground security company, looks up with a grim expression. "We're blocked in, sir," he says. "The Toledan Army has overrun the airport. We're surrounded." He holds out a slip of paper. "Their commander just asked for our surrender."

The command center goes silent. The CMC Colonel assigned to them sneers. "A woman," he spits. "No wonder the Warlord's nerve breaks now, if this is the caliber of his vaunted armed forces."

Shane quietly takes the paper, reading it as the Colonel speaks.

General,

We have taken control of your base -- retaken control over our property. We now call for you to surrender.

We understand that you may find this difficult to achieve. We have faith in your abilities.

If you are able to successfully surrender, we pledge that you will be treated according to the Geneva Convention guidelines regarding prisoners of war. This offer is void if you make some last-ditch attempt at destroying your aircraft.

You have five minutes to decide.

Shane lowers the note, his throat dry. "We will not be accepting, of course," he says, tearing up the slip.

"Exactly," hisses the CMC Colonel. "We are Victorians. We do not surrender. If they want prisoners, they shall have to beat them unconscious. I for one say that we fight to the death!" He scowls around the room before turning to Shane. "What say you, Gener-"

BANG

Shane lowers his pistol, the barrel smoking, as the Colonel collapses with a hole between his eyes. The men behind him flinch, spitting curses, as brains, bone, and blood spray all over them. Shane safes his pistol and holsters it again. "We will be surrendering," he says, swallowing.

Again, the command center is silent. "...sir?" quavers Rogers, staring at the corpse in the room.

"You heard me," whispers Shane. He clears his throat and continues, louder, "They have promised to treat us according to the Geneva Convention. If they are serious, then we will someday be released, and be able to fight another day for Victoria. Our nation cannot be denied the lessons that we have learned here. If they are not..." He glances at the Christian Marine on the floor. "...we die like God's children ought."

"But sir," says Rogers, gathering himself. "They...the CMC..." He looks again at the Colonel. "...they'll kill us, sir. I'm sorry, but they will."

"Perhaps," murmurs Shane. "But if not them, then the Toledans. I would rather die at home, doing good for our people, than here, dying pointlessly." He clears his throat. "Transfer my acceptance of the General's terms, and order our men to stand down. This fight is done."

As those in the room with him slowly come to grips with the situation, those forces of Toledo not besieging the airport move north at the fastest pace they can manage...

*****​

Remember those first few updates, where we established what happened between the end of the last quest and the start of this one?

Remember how one question among many was about the rising stars of Detroit and Toledo, and how the answer you gave to this was to drive them apart and convince them both that the other was plotting to destroy them?

Remember the second and third paragraphs of this update, where it's established that the " Vast, crime-hardened negro hordes" you warned Toledo of and said could only be held back with Victorian aid, amounted to one single division of infantry that needed Burns to fulminate at for most of a winter before they knew which end of the gun you pointed at the other guy?

Remember when your aid workers slash informants explicitly told you this would be the case, and you decided to go ahead with this narrative anyway, lying to Toledo Joe's face so that you could make him into a pawn for your own schemes?

Pepperidge Farms remembers.

No votes yet. Part 2 to come.

Posted by OrcSlayer: [COMMENT REMOVED BY MODERATOR]

Posted by Burdened Soul: [COMMENT REMOVED BY MODERATOR]

Posted by Lima496: [COMMENT REMOVED BY MODERATOR]

Posted by TokenLib: I… That's...
Words fail me.
EDIT: Now that I'm slightly more coherent, remind me why it was so important for us to prevent Detroit and Toledo from doing anything? And also why Artillery is useless???

Posted by That One Dude: Holy spit I need to familiarize myself with the decision making from just before this battle.

Posted by CPT. Fire: I told you, I told you, I ******* TOLD YOU! But no, why would we need better logistics for marching halfway across the damn country? Why would we need an airforce worth a damn, it's not like the enemy is going to try engaging us out of range or anything, huh, huh? Gee IT LOOKS LIKE I WAS RIGHT!!
MODERATOR: Cool your jets there tiger.

Posted by Spindel'sSavior: I have no words...but to make a point. This tells me just how we've fallen, YOU ALL COULDN'T swallow your pride and keep an updated and skilled doctrine ala the Prussian Military, we failed because we put ideology ahead of practical military thinking...like a communist commissar shame upon all of you shame. At this rate...we should let the resistance kill the rest of our problems instead of letting this mess boil over...This has Civil War written all over it, the myth is gone and now we will reap the whirlwind of our hubris.

Posted by SymbolOfPeace: [COMMENT REMOVED BY MODERATOR]

Posted by Cpt. Fire: The hell we are, I've got some plans for those traitors.

Posted by SedentaryKnave: I have the feeling we need to have a 'word' with our aid workers. I don't recall any warning of the Commonwealth being able to field anything like this.
EDIT: Finally caught up, sorry for lurking thus far.

Posted by Rrwin_Eommel
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure our aid workers were driven out not long after Burns and his band showed up and the radicals seized control. If Stalin could beat the Soviet Union into something capable of going toe-to-toe with the Wehrmacht in just five years, I imagine a smaller polity with the goal of "so how many howitzers CAN we build, anyway?" might be able to pull it off in one. Keep in mind, these are also the people who drove the Nazis out of their backyard. The foundation for a war machine was there, and were it not for these opportunists it would have peacefully given way to civilian interests, like trains.

Posted by Cpt. Fire: Well, Stalin also had the benefit of not killing everyone in his military that ever had a good idea, something that cannot be said for you bunch whenever we rolled up a reformer. Pro tip people, CRITICAL SUCCESSES DO NOT FUCK YOU OVER!!
MODERATOR: Okay, maybe you should take a break from this thread.

Posted by CORN_Fed_Fellow: Pretty sure wehraboo is going to disagree with me on this, but wasn't the reason the Nazis managed to push all the way to Stalingrad partly because Stalin did purge half his military? And what's this talk of rolling up reformers, I thought the plans that didn't win just sort of vanished into the ether...

Posted by SedentaryKnave: He did, then his new army got mangled by the Finnish, and reconsidered his stance on killing just the sceptics to 'his glory'. He started threatening to do it to the stupid ones as well. EDIT: Wow, this feels really meta at the moment...

Posted by Stormrider14: Eugh, sure is Communist in here. New to the quest, but holy moley what just happened? Why didn't we have any artillery to fight theirs off? Who the schnitzel thought flying in a diamond pattern would make SAMs miss? And how exactly did we (and by we I mean you) not realize that foraging is weak to scorched-earth policies, which Communists are famous for employing?

Posted by SedentaryKnave: Oi, sod off with that 'you' nonsense! Some of us only just got here!
@Rrwin_Eommel Stalin manb that by having a continent-sized landmass to bbbbvork with and starting off on the defensive in his own territory. The Commonwealth has maybe three state's territory at most, most of their neighbours unwilling to trade or give them border access and decades of Retroculture living to try to shake off, for a war on foreign soil. I'm calling bull.

PeterTheHeir: We have let the parasites lull us into a state of blissful ignorance. We have naively believed that the filth would rest after being humbled, misplace benevolence leading us to become filled with weakness. We have become like women, unable to discipline a rebellious child. Now is the time for men to act, to establish stability and cleanse the papist-Marxist abomination that has spawned from the decadence of the Babylon that the old US was mating with the unmasked menace of Bolshevism, no longer bound by the chains of political correctness. It is time for a new Atlanta, a new Shanghai. A reminder to the world of our righteousness that will end with the Stalinist zeal of Burns extinguished, his withered corpse buried in the foundations of the cathedral to the true God built over the ruins of their idols of the false Saints that they dare say we martyred.

Posted by ASquare: Ugh, railroading. I get that at this point the quest would have stopped being interesting if things went logically, but this is a bit far. The reason triumphing over impossible odds is so engaging is because the other guy is an obvious threat; it worked with the US military at the start of last quest, not so much for some rump commies in Chicago. Here us eventually turning this around is just the way things are expected to go. At least we now have a chance to play around with some new division templates; I've seen some of the ideas being thrown around by the wizards in the Army Composition thread, and some of them look pretty great.

Posted by Strudel_Savant: You could have won this. It would have been bloody, and there's no guarantee that you would be able to prevent them from retreating in good order, but you could have forced them out of Detroit. If I had to isolate one thing the battle hinged on, it would be allowing the eastern force to be destroyed, allowing the enemy to pivot their entire force south and squeeze that much more out of those river crossings.
Toledo Joe wouldn't have pulled this stunt if he didn't get a front row seat to the people who would punish him for it getting bodied.

Posted by DerekHaines: [COMMENT REMOVED BY MODERATOR]

Posted by JThom: Makes sense, if this is how things are going to work, then this entire fiasco is actually to our benefit because we've just weeded out all the deadwood and complacent officers from Victoria.
This is good, actually, because we've learned this lesson early on while everything else is still intact. We just need to reorganize, pull the country together again. It seems to me that the main reason that we've done poorly is that both in and out of game people have gotten complacent. And complacency is directly opposite to willpower and duty.
Now that our people know the results of slacking and victory disease we can centralize, pull everyone into a single mailed fist to bring down on the Communists. The Victorian State shall rise from the ashes. Embrace our true traditions and not blind ideology.

Posted by That One Dude:
And this is part 1.
. . .
@Strudel_Savant what does Victoria know about the state of the Tsar (and Russia), or for that matter the wider world in general?

Posted by ScreamingatDarkness: So, given that our army seemed to only understand "charge" and "charge harder", I wonder how much control we actually had over them. This may have been a good thing, long-term. Painful yes, but better we take a hit like this now, while on the offensive, than when an enemy force is landing on our shores and busting into people's houses.

Posted by MechanicalMayhem: We lost this round. A number of stupid, choices lost us this round. The only thing we can do at this point is use what we have to inflict as much damage as we can. Our army is going to die. The best we can hope for is that we kill some of the Communists with them
But before people panic. Let's review. We still have two of the CMC, which leaves us with significant firepower should they attack us. Our militia can bog them down and let the CMC break them piecemeal, if they can even get to us, which given the distance, I'm not sure their machine and therefore logistic dependent armies can even manage.
What we need to do now is hole up. Use our aid workers to keep other powers hostile and Chicago isolated, and do whatever we need to rebuild our army.

Posted by Xenon: So...anyone else wondering if StrudelSavant secretly has it out for us? I'm mainly a roleplayer, not a quester, and I once dealt with a roleplay that was designed as a trap. A deconstruction, meant to show us foolish players the error of our ways. I won't go into it here for fear of disrupting the topic, but it was a shitshow alright. Given the almost cartoonish levels of incompetence we seem to have, especially with our God-given Victorian doctrine and holy adherence to Retroculture, I'm starting to suspect StrudelSavant isn't being entirely honest here. Like they're trying to make us fail, even when we by rights should have won.
Our army is acting like something out of Battlefield: Bad Company, but on a scale hitherto unseen by man (yes, I'm a heretic and play video games. Free country.), the tried-and-true strategies that were encouraged, that pushed us to victory, in the last quest have failed on an unimaginable level, and while it's clear Strudel wants us to adapt, it seems like they want us to throw away our ideology completely in the name of victory.
This quest uses only d3s. Luck has been minimal. Yet we have failed at almost every turn. I'll admit our military conquests would obviously lead to many, many enemies, but I fail to see why they all have such massively inflated stats.
tl;dr: This is bullshit, Strudel. You did this in Lizard Sphere: Before the Beginning, and you're doing it again. Trapping us and making us wriggle in pain because we picked a single bad option at the beginning of the quest, not letting us focus on the build we want. Make the quest fair, or I'm out.

Posted by Cgun150: @Xenon, weren't you banned a while ago for making a sockpuppet?

Posted by Xenon: @Cgun150: I have no idea what you're talking about.

Posted by Strudel_Savant: @Xenon the only things different between this and the previous installment are more stringent requirements for fan-submitted content to be rewarded with a bonus, and a cap on how many bonuses can be applied to one thing. I have never pushed my players to do anything, and have always strived to show the consequences of whatever actions end up getting decided upon.

This is an option that was taken during the first quest. My decision not to offer it in this quest was very deliberate.
Also, I'm very glad somebody finally got around to asking how the rest of the world was doing. A compilation of what you know In Character shall be posted between now and Part 2.

Posted by wehraboo 1939: hey i'm back, again. So what's been going on (reads the absolute annihilation of our army by traitors and incompetence).... You know what? I am okay with this, this is the culmination of every single one of our mess ups: from the obsession with light infantry to the complete refutation of technology and the obsession with the lone farmer most of the (non thread banned) posters had in the last quest. Now instead of adding to the absolute storm of madness above me, how about we think this campaign through, what did we do wrong?

1. We obsessed over light infantry tactics, using the methods of a bunch of asian farmers and middle eastern hillbillies instead of, you know, the tried and true combined arms methods of, say, the 4th Reich?
2. We refused to acknowledge the facts of our enemy: this is not our Poland or France, it is an industrialized communist power, a machine state that cares not for its morals or purity, it is our soviet union. We even failed in a similar manner to Barbarrosa with the overextending of our supply lines and the terrible weather. We expected a pushover, we got a wall of iron and panicked as a result.
3. We chose poor allies. Remind me again why we didn't shoot all the Toledo Orcs the moment they opened the gates? Why did we trust orcs? Seriously tho why. Maybe we could have salvaged something if we just had a more reliable ally or no ally at all, we'd at least have our planes.

I don't have a solution to all those problems, from the reading of the quests description between the end of the last quest and now it seems we lost most of our current allies (besides California we have lost all of them, speaking of which any idea why did we ganked New Jersey? I know the description said they turned full Ork but it was kind of a face heel turn and i'm hoping Strudel will explain that) and have also lost most of our possible allies (the Illinois Nazi's are a big one) maybe look for foreign allies in europe?
But I do have solutions for the other two. To deal with the machine state, we must become iron, we must use tried and true combined arms tactics, we must become a new Germany. Bide our time, industrialize like i WANTED TO FROM THE VERY BEGINNING OF THE ORIGINAL QUEST and construct a new army. Throw away Retrocultialism for the moment and return to the tried and true Fascism.
But there is one thing we must do, one thing that will grind Burns and his Abrahms into dust, a way we can thoroughly win the next war: ladies and gentlemen, we need our Wunderwaffen. First, we shall create a new Maus that will shatter their Abrahms, then a Schwerer Gustav to shatter their tranches, and then our vengeance weapon that will kill millions for those lost in the muddy fields of Detroit, a Nuclear warhead V3. (looks back up at thread) or we could rage and panic, that works too.


Posted by WhiteKnightofLight:
We would have won if it wasn't for Burns and his loathsome imps. He coaxed the coddled whelps into battle by not having them fight like real warriors, by giving them weapons that didn't require fighting the enemy and letting them retreat at the first sight of real conflict. His insistence on hidebound tactics that have no place in any proper war only worked because of the fiendish engines infused with the power of the Devil. Once his infernal legion was rejuvenated by the wanton slaughter of souls, stolen from valiant martyrs laying down their lives for a cause most holy was there enough sacrifice to reanimate beasts that should have long been dead. How is the sinner and his possessions not burning in the depths? What contract with the Devil has he penned in the blood of the innocent? It's plain to see now. He might have been pure of soul at one point, but the only reason the tainted artifice of an unholy era still yet lives is because of witchcraft. Are the lemmings under him tainted too? I thought the woman was just someone he kept because he could unload his stress upon her, but now I am rethinking how deep the blasphemy runs. Is she a succubus, sent to ensure Burns fulfills his end of the pact? I was dismissive of her initially; after all, women don't tie together righteous anger and decisive action like men do. But if she is a handpicked agent of Satan himself, that changes everything.

Burns was never an idiot, but in Azania he didn't have the skill to beat us. Something changed, and that something is the Devil playing his hand. That she-devil is propping Burns up like the withered octogenarian he is while she runs the show. Burns would never have claimed Chicago without a fight and then making an example out of the survivors. He never would have stayed long enough to even try to better the lot of those he would pillage from. The transformation of the squalid hovels they called civilization into a dumpster-diving CCCP could only have been possible through her hand. I shudder to think of the rituals she must have propagated in order to prepare for a war in which they were severely outmatched. And the way the devil worshipers waged it? When it comes down to it, Burns is a coward at heart who never changed his ways, even when he was facing Rumford. Always hiding, always skittering away, always never suffering so much as a risk, always camping under his bed because he doesn't have the stomach for getting his precious children and their toys scuffed. Some of the conflict he had a hand in, the hidey-holes, the retreats, the fleeing of undisciplined swine as fast as wheels would take them. But for other parts, she must be responsible. Burns never had what it took for a high-risk commando raid, and never possessed the skills needed to pull one off. And the tanks, the garage queens, made of technology men were too blind to see the folly of? The only reason his misbegotten existence is even relevant? That he must have sacrificed his soul to keep running? Burns didn't target the strongest formation on the field, the Savior Division, who posed the greatest threat to his mamby-pamby behind. No, the thirty pieces of silver were spent on the CMC, the most faithful formation present. Holy men who would go the extra mile were killed solely because they had the strongest faith in God that day.

It's clear whatever control Burns had has been relinquished or taken from him. He's nothing but a slave to evil now, and the spawn of Satan walks the Earth. But fret not, our steadfast character and our faith in God will see us through. God will make his wrath known and will punish the hubris of Burns and the wickedness of the Devil. In the face of such a dire threat to our way of life we can only pray for Deliverance. Pray, and a savior will rise to guide us to victory. Pray, and we will be delivered from the evils that hunt God's children. If nothing else, take heart in this; Fortune favors the bold, but Fate favors the righteous.
Posted by That Random Dude:
@wehraboo1939 bruh. The wunderwaffen were kinda useless. Remember how the Maus move at jogging pace and broke the stuff around it (including roads). Also I don't really see nukes not attracting real heat.
@whiteknightoflight WTF

Posted by WhiteKnightofLight
@That Random Dude If you pinged me just to complain then begone, I only have room for positivity in my life.

Posted by Niðavellir:
Against the teeth of the infernal machine, the courage of men availed not.
As expected.
Courage alone cannot lead us to triumph against a foe that has embraced the legacy of the Enemy. Not alone, and certainly not when that courage has been marred by foolish pride. Pride, which assumed that we would crush Chicago and Burns without much effort, which let us hand them Detroit to "teach them a lesson."
Where is that pride now? Lost in a tale of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
Detroit is lost. Toledo is lost. Our mighty Host is lost - or might as well be, whatever the butcher's bill it extracts from Hellfire's Hordes.
And the worst is yet to come.
Flesh we have lost. Pride we have lost. Power and prestige.
Yet when measured against eternity, these are inconsequential things.
Mark my words. Before this is over, Victoria will find itself in a battle for its very soul.

Posted by Lindbergh
*sigh*
See, this is what happens when you rely on (((allies))) and their kept women to secure your forward operating base out in Indian country. Shoulda just gassed the place while we had the chance; would have left us with more supplies, too.
Settling accounts will have to come later I guess. Assuming Burns doesn't do it for us.
Anyone know how much of our trained pilot corps Toledo just sold out? We're going to have to pay through the nose to ransom those boys back; planes we can buy from Cali or Russia, or even the Japs, but pilots take years to train in order to get anyone competent enough to fly a bird in combat without planting it in a lawn somewhere. And we're going to need that money to rearm.
Maybe we can raid Toronto to pay for it. We still have 2 CMC divisions, after all, and control of their electric power supply, even after this fiasco.
@wehraboo1939
Kek. Let me get this straight. You want to go from equipping our grunts with one set of 1940s gear to another set of 1940s gear right after we got knocked the fuck out with leftover miltech from the 1980s? Topkek.

Posted by MyOtherCarIsAnEvangelion
*delurking*
Well, no one can certainly question the [REDACTED] courage of the Victorian man. Only everything else, starting with the leadership. I mean, the brass most certainly fucked up bigtime. Whether it was incompetence or betrayal is going to require an inquiry, but command failure of this level should be a capital crime. I know I shouldn't get worked up, but a lot of fine divisions out there getting turned into fertilizer by the negros and gangsters of Chiraq. A lot of history bleeding out there on the soils of Michigan.
Is there literally no other way to turn this around, even now? Using a small team to kill Burns? Blowing up their ammo depots? I dunno, something.

Posted by CrusaderApostle
*Steeples fingers, takes a deep breath*
Well that was a shitshow. Been said before. We still fought well in most places. I do wonder if this shows some...cracks...in our hardline usage of CMC officers in non-CMC divisions, though? It seems like perhaps our Air Force personnel would have been willing to fight to the last and deny assets to the Toledoan forces if we'd had some carrot to go with the stick. A Morale Officer shouldn't be there only to punish bad behavior, but reward good. We need to seriously consider adjusting our policies, and working toward ensuring that our blessed Christian Marines serve as true Shepherds, and not simply Sheep Dogs. A shepherd breaks the legs of a stray lamb, it's true, but only so that they can help the lamb understand the correct way. A good shepherd doesn't kill every sheep that wanders. They apply the goad and the gentle hand in equal measure.
Furthermore, while I would love to see nothing but our faith prevail, I would agree that, at minimum, we need to reexamine how we handle our logistics. Certainly we need to ensure our brave men holding the line against this, this….godless communism….have sufficient arms to drive back the mis-managed and tech-obsessed hordes. But does not Christ himself say we are to be as wise as serpents? Let us not rely too much on simply "being faithful". Does not the book of James call our works to match our faith? He who has ears, let him hear.

Posted by Strudel_Savant: Mods, I know you have a lot of work cleaning up these posts, so to make things easier on you I think I'm going to relax my position on swearing. Temporarily.

=====================================================================​

I was blown away by the community participation in this one. You are all amazing people and I am very glad I've gotten the chance to work together with you.

Click to shrink...

Welcome to the negaverse!

​

Name: Landry Corporation, "The Company" colloquially among its inhabitants
Government Type: Officially a Stateless Society, Semi-Officially an Objectivist Corporate State, Unofficially a Flawed-Democracy/Oligarchy with Democratic Elements
Capital: Amarillo, Texas
Territory: See Map
Leadership: Todd Savage- CEO of the Landry Corporation (de facto Head of State), Kailynn Mcknight- Executive Vice President for Public Relations (de facto Foreign Minister), Kerry Tyler- Executive Vice President for Company Security (de facto Defense Minister), Rodney Pope- Chair of the Board of Directors, Dominic Ochoa- President of the Landry Employees Union
State of relations with the Commonwealth: Barely aware of the CFC's existence- they've heard that there's a large Revivalist state based in Chicago that beat Victoria, and they know that the CFC includes General Burns in its leadership. Landry Corp approves of beating Victoria as most of the population of Amarillo has yet to forget or forgive Victoria for their city's treatment at the hands of Victorian mercenaries... but it's also not a big fan of Hellfire Burns personally. During the period when Burns was leading Devil Brigade through its nomadic existence across the country, necessity periodically forced him to requistion supplies from local communities to keep the brigade operational, and Amarillo was one of those places. The Company was a lot weaker then (it was just a couple of years after the end of the Pacific War) and viewed his involuntary requisition of food, fuel, parts, vehicles, and ammunition as criminal extortion. They do still have the Material Receipt he wrote up, issued in the name of the United States Department of Defense and promising to reimburse them for the cost of requisitioned supplies from the United States Treasury at the conclusion of the war. Any friendly relations between Landry Corp and the CFC would be contingent on getting that receipt honored.
Broad, short-term objectives: Secure more oil and gas sources in their areas, develop local infrastructure, defeat a couple of asshole warlords in their area, generally continue to survive
Summary:

Spoiler: Wow that's more text than I intended

Amarillo got screwed with its clothes on during and after the collapse of the old USA.

First the global pandemic hit the Yellow Rose of Texas hard. Then it got caught up in the New American Confederation and the fighting between the "Old South" and the "New South". Then the Victorians- or rather mercenaries/gangs who had been hired by the Victorians- mulched the city while going through to destroy the Pantex facility, and the Bell Textron plant. Then a purely opportunistic warlord took advantage of the chaos that Victoria's stooges left in their wake to roll though and sack Amarillo. The result of this was a near total power vacuum in the city of 100,000~ people that was filled by Diego Landry.

Landry was the regional manager for Tyson Foods, a major beef-processing company that ran a substantial meat-packing facility in Amarillo and employed a large number of local citizens. While Tyson's high-level corporate management had disintegrated with the breakdown of public order, the local organizational structure was still functioning and this gave the regional manager access to a sizeable stockpile of beef (an invaluable resource in the apocalypse), plus armed company security guards (beefed up during the growing instability before the Collapse), and any kind of functioning organization at all. Landry used these resources as a foundation to restore order in Amarillo, transforming the local branch of Tyson Foods into the "Landry Corporation". He formed alliances with other important groups- local farmers, a nearby copper refinery, some dude with a machine shop, a natural leader who was putting together a militia- integrating them into Landry Corp in exchange for shares of his new company. As a life-long Objectivist, Diego Landry believed that society functioned best without artificial constructs like government, and that most human beings were naturally good.

In addition to (or perhaps "despite") being an Objectivist, Landry was a capable, competent, and generally well-meaning person. He understood the need to make ideological compromises during a genuine emergency and he organized rationing, fed people who were starving, housed those who had lost their homes, and co-operated with others in the name of Rational Self-Interest. True, he favored people with useful skills, and he was ruthless towards his enemies, but this was hardly unusual behavior during the Collapse. He permitted his company to assume most of the roles and responsibilities usually held by governments, and when- to Landry's chagrin- his employees began to organize he first tried to talk them out of it, and then grudgingly agreed to negotiate with the Landry Employees Union after a three-day strike (it may have helped that many of those striking were also members of Company Security, so breaking it with force wasn't an option). Still a fairly popular figure, Landry Corp's first CEO remained in power until 2049 when he retired and a new CEO was elected to replace him by the Board of the Directors.

Landry Corporation continues to function as a "Stateless Society" with no official government. It's a fact that corporations think in the short-term- a corporation that thinks long-term will go out of business in the short-term- while governments think in the long-term- a government that thinks in the short-term will be defeated in the long-term, and the pressures of operating as a post-apocalyptic faction have forced Landry Corp to adopt the kind of long-term thinking and social functions associated with traditional governments. For instance it operates free, mandatory schools for the children of employees because skilled workers are essential for business, it provides (very basic- this is the apocalypse) free health care because healthy workers are more productive, and it does what it can to maintain public infrastructure for reasons of Rational Self-Interest. The Landry Employees Union has managed to insist on a closed shop so that all employees are unionized, and because about 90% of the workforce within Company territory are employed by the Company, an LEU strike can effectively shut down everything. Because the union needs a 2/3rds majority vote of the membership to strike, and because it embraces so many disparate interests, it's rare for the LEU to actually strike over something however, and because the management aren't stupid they're generally willing make concessions when it looks like a strike might actually happen, because having your army, bureaucracy, and agricultural and industrial workforce go on strike simultaneously when you're a pseudo-state with warlord neighbors is bad. (The union isn't dumb enough to strike at a time that would actually endanger Landry's survival, but it's still not something you want to risk). The longest ever strike the LEU conducted lasted for 10 days when a new CEO who was a lot more devoted to ideologically pure Objectivism than Mr. Landry attempted to actually break the union and do without a contract at all. The strike came to an end when an emergency meeting of the Board fired him and appointed a CEO with a much more conciliatory approach. The LEU has thus successfully secured a number of important concessions- there is an independent Company "Safety Department" responsible for law-enforcement whose director and mediators (judges) are chosen by a popular vote of the union membership biannually, school curriculum and education policy is set during regular contract negotiations, and use of company-maintained infrastructure (muh roads, muh sewer system) is free for all employees and their families.

Why doesn't the union just get rid of management and run things themselves if they're so powerful?

Well...

1. Surviving the apocalypse together is the ultimate corporate team-building exercise and there's a lot of very genuine company loyalty among the workers
2. The Texas Panhandle is a very conservative are, having unions run things would be socialism, and every red-blooded American knows that socialism is evil
3. Holy shit, have you ever tried to get 2/3rds of a given population to support anything? The LEU wields a de facto veto over corporate policy, but convincing enough people that they actually need to use that veto is a nightmare.

Anyway, Landry Corp is still run by a Board of Directors elected by the shareholders, and the Board still appoints CEOs to what are usually 4 to 8-year chunks of time since Diego Landry's retirement. Shares can bought and sold of course. While profit remains a driving motive for the Company; survival > money (they issue their own) during the apocalypse and the shareholders, directors, and corporate executives largely live in the same community that their workers do and are emotionally invested in its welfare. The CEO's kids and the janitor's kids go to the same school, if simply because there are only, like, 3 high schools and 1 college in Amarillo, and they're all corporate-run. Because almost all of the economy is controlled by a single corporation, company fiscal policy tends to more closely resemble central-planning than laissez faire, which works (and might be partly necessary) in a post-apocalyptic failed state, but in the long run the lack of a true free market may end up being a problem. Company policy prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation- Landry believed that you succeed in business by hiring and promoting people based purely on competence and merit- and this policy has been adhered to about as well as similar policies have ever been historically (it's mixed). Landry Corp does promote religion however, Christian chaplains are present part-time at company worksites and prayer books are available for employees to use during mealtime, although none of that is strictly mandatory. Since most company employees are themselves Christians of various denominations, these practices face little opposition from the LEU. The current CEO, Todd Savage, is well-like, a mustachioed former Executive Vice President for Company Security who lost his left eye and picked up a large facial scar while fighting gangs as an ordinary security guard in the early days of his career.

Victoria was always aware of Landry Corp of course, they had "aid workers" stationed there, but a strongly anti-socialist/anti-communist Corporate State that actively encourages Christianity among its workers located two thousand miles away was never going to be real concern for Augusta.

It's not an ideal system, and it has some significant flaws (i.e. if you don't work for the Company you can't join the LEU, and so you don't have free access to the school system, the healthcare system, or basic infrastructure), but the Company functions and here are worse places in America to live.

TL/DR: I was reading one of @PoptartProdigy's other quests and a presumably sociopathic Corporate State made a brief appearance. This got me thinking; is it possible to create a Corporate State that isn't mustache-twirlingly evil? Hence the Landry Corporation, an Objectivist Corporate State that by virtue of being run by people who aren't stupidly self-destructive is a flawed but functioning political entity.

Click to shrink...

Ooh, this one has some nice flavor! Canon!

@PoptartProdigy, here's that China omake I was talking about earlier!

Found at FreeOpenSourceInfo.org:

The Sun Rises: Politics of the Republic of China​

Before discussing the current political dynamics of the Second Republic of China, it is vital to give some background as to politics in the late-PRC period and Second Warlord Period. During The Collapse, an expansionist faction of the CPC grew to dominate the party, implementing an aggressive foreign policy designed to offset the party's collapsing legitimacy in the wake of the economic crisis that formed a major part of the Collapse.

At the time of the Shanghai Crisis, there were two other major factions within the CPC, the Reformists and the Conservative-Maoists. The Reformists sought to increase the popularity of the CPC by granting increased freedoms to the populace and slowly democratizing under the control of the Communist Party, their largest supporters being students, urban academics, and industrialists. In contrast the Conservative Maoists argued that the collapse of the CPC's legitimacy and China's economy was due to economic and cultural liberalization, their chosen solution was to return to a stricter form of Maoism, albeit one with a tinge of social conservatism. Their base was mostly rural, but also included some of those who lost their livelihoods in the collapse.

In 2042, the Expansionists faced an immense crisis. The Cascadian Republic, a social-democratic republic which had been supported by the PRC since its secession from the disintegrating remnants of the United States and Canada, came under protracted military assault from both a resurgent Imperial Japan and Victoria. Both of which were aided not-so-secretly by the Russian Empire. Chinese leadership reacted quickly, ordering the deployment of a brigade of the PLAAF Airborne Corps, and dispatched a relief force as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, the PLAN, pressed into a mission quite different than it was intended for, proved unable to pierce the IJN blockade despite several attempts and a large but inconclusive naval battle, and as a result the PRC's leadership could only watch helplessly as the Japanese and their Victorian auxiliaries crushed the Cascadian forces and scattered the 7th Airborne Brigade. Then, at the apex of the crisis, a boat filled with high explosives detonated in Shanghai, with all evidence pointing to a Japanese intelligence operation. The Chinese government, absolutely furious at the blatant provocations of the Japanese government, mobilized forces to attack Japan, beginning with nuclear strikes on key military targets, only for Russia to threaten the deployment of nuclear weapons against China if they made a move against Japan. Ultimately unwilling to risk annihilation for the sake of Cascadia and their pride, the Expansionists backed down.

To say that this decision was politically disastrous would be an understatement, simply put, the Expansionist faction's support evaporated overnight, leaving a gaping power vacuum and a furious public, who began to launch protests demanding resignation of the government. Amidst the chaos, a clique of Conservative-Maoists took the opportunity to seize control of the apparatus of state, only for loyalist military officers to stage a counter-coup, plunging the capitol into open warfare between different units of the PLA and competing militias. Yet even as they engaged in open warfare, both Expansionists and Conservative-Maoists launched mass purges of Reformists and Reformist sympathizers, who fled en masse from the fratricidal violence consuming North China alongside a slew of less politically motivated refugees. Central governmental authority had soon collapsed entirely, and local provincial leaders took the chance to consolidate power and create their own personal fiefdoms, ushering in a new era of warlordism.

Guangdong's provincial governor had previously gained a reputation for tolerance and, as the country disintegrated, desperate Reformists and their allies in the Chinese political scene flocked to Guangdong, accumulating in large numbers. As the chaos dragged on and the governor did nothing to intervene, content to rule Guangdong while China burned around him, popular unrest began to simmer, heavily bolstered by the Reformist refugees, and especially prominent in patriotic sailors of the PLAN's South Sea Fleet. Reformist politicians formed the United People's Party of China (UPPC), and in 2045 the UPPC managed to overthrow the provincial government with the backing of most of Guangdong's military and declared the creation of the Provisional Revolutionary National Government of China (PRNGC).

Upon assessing the situation, the PRNGC quickly came to the conclusion that the forces under their command were wholly insufficient to reunify China on their own, and the vast majority of warlords were hostile or too far away to matter. As such, the UPPC leadership reached out to the KMT-led government of the Republic of China, otherwise known as Taiwan. This was a calculated gamble, but it paid off in spades. Although talks led to numerous concessions to Taiwanese autonomy and self-government, KMT officials were ultimately optimistic that their time to return to the mainland had finally come, even if the KMT would not be at the head of this effort, and so Taiwanese military and economic aid began to flow into Guangdong. The ROCA, although miniscule compared to the might of the PLA and equipped with outdated equipment, was well trained, and numerous enough to pose a major threat to any warlord state. One year after overthrowing the Guangdong government, the PRNGC officially launched the Second Northern Expedition, beginning a decade long military and diplomatic campaign to reunite China.

As much as the UPPC leadership would have liked to avoid making concessions to warlords and anti-democratic states, the reality of trying to unite China forced the UPPC to reach out to groups like the Beijing Government and offer political concessions to entice them to comply with unification. This has directly led to the existence of the CPC(M) as a prominent player in present day Chinese politics, as well as other much less prominent CPC splinter groups.

Finally, in 2058, a mere 16 years after the collapse of central governance of China, the second Republic of China was declared, and nation-wide elections were held for a constitutional convention. Almost as soon as the convention began, the UPPC, bound together mostly by a shared dream of a unified and democratic China, shattered into pieces, and even as delegates were hammering out a constitution that worked for everyone, new political parties and alliances were rapidly forming and just as quickly disintegrating. These years of frenetic political maneuvering, continuing even after the 2059 ratification of the constitution and subsequent election, would eventually be called the Thousand Party Period by ROC textbooks, during which the National Assembly was largely unable to pass legislation, though a UPPC-remnant compromise cabinet was able to continue promulgating foreign policy. 2063 put an end to this state of affairs, and Chinese politics assumed the character which persists to this day.

As the Republic of China is a parliamentary democracy, Chinese politics is dominated by the National Assembly. The legislature is elected on the basis of proportional representation (mixed-member proportional representation in the case of Taiwan and Hong Kong) in elections held every four years. The National Assembly is at present dominated by four major parties:

• The Progressive Party of China:
  • A center-left party that formed out of the center of the UPPC, they uphold the principles of dirigisme and social welfare which dominate the Republic's economic consensus, but also argue for social progressivism and a foreign policy involving the aggressive promotion of democracy in Asia and beyond. The Progressives currently dominate the National Assembly in the Pink-Green Coalition with the Socialist Party of China, and are the largest single party in the entire National Assembly.
• The Socialist Party of China:
  • The junior partner in the ruling coalition, the Socialists formed from the defunct left-wing of the UPPC. They occupy the space from left to far left, promoting expansion of the welfare state to include guaranteed housing and food, the implementation of a mechanism by which failing companies can be sold to their workers, increased environmental protections, and aggressive social progressivism. Their foreign policy stance is anti-fascist in nature, arguing for China to aid movements with everything from diplomatic support to direct military aid.
• The Kuomintang:
  • The largest opposition party, the Kuomintang's hundreds of years of history make it by far the oldest party in China. It occupies the center-right of Chinese politics, supports highly interventionist economic policies as well as social conservatism. Yet it is relatively dovish on foreign policy for Chinese politics, seeking to avoid direct confrontation with Russia, Japan, and India while encouraging diplomatic ties with friendly countries.
• The Communist Party of China (Maoist)
  • Paradoxically for a self-proclaimed communist party, the CPC(M) occupies the far-right of Chinese politics, for they are fundamentally reactionary in character. Formed from disgruntled remnants of the Conservative-Maoist faction of the CPC, they seek to re-institute the dictatorship, launch campaigns against "degeneracy", return to a planned economy, and institute total self-reliance. All other political parties oppose them, and their share in elections has been slowly declining since 2063, but the nature of the political concessions needed to unify China have ensured that it will still be a decade more before they cease to be a major force in Chinese politics.

Despite their numerous differences, these parties are united in one thing: the conviction that the Republic shall not allow any more submission or humiliations to either Japan or Russia, to the point where even suggesting the opening of trade to Japan will draw the ire of the Big Four and their supporters down upon you.

There are another three minor parties within the National Assembly which have some trait which merits mentioning:

• The Party for Chinese Democracy:
  • Formed from the right-wing of the UPPC, they go against the consensus in arguing for policies economic liberalism and cuts to welfare, as well as limited social progressivism and increased federalism. Their main voterbase are well-off and educated urban voters.
• The Democratic Progressive Party:
  • This Taiwanese Nationalist party spent nearly 20 years in opposition, as the KMT racked up electoral success after electoral success, but has achieved a majority in the most recent Legislative Yuan elections in Taiwan, and is now seeking to hold a Taiwanese independence referendum. They are otherwise quite similar to the Progressive Party, except for a more liberal economic stance.
• The Tibetan Independence Front
  • Tibetan nationalist party currently in negotiations with the government over Tibet's status, they are a broad tent-party with little in common aside from a desire for Tibetan independence. Their seats in the National Assembly are currently vacant, as they refuse to sit in the Assembly.

As the Bear's grip over the world loosens, the Dragon continues to rise once more from its slumber. Yet China is surrounded by enemies and lacking in friends, for Europe continues to shun them out of fear of Russia and perhaps a bit of fear of what a resurgent China could mean. To make matters worse, Chinese intelligence has brought word of a disturbance in the shattered remnants of the United States, and the leadership of the Republic has suddenly been made acutely aware of how little they know about America beyond the West Coast. If some warlord has finally managed to begin consolidating power and seeking to restore the American Empire, if Japan seeks to once more crush the possibility of Chinese hegemony, if India decides that now is the time to settle the score, then China must be ready for them.

A/N: If someone more knowledgeable about present-day China wants to critique this, then by all means go ahead, I am definitely no expert.

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As critiques are ongoing, I'll refrain from making a ruling at this precise moment.

There is no real support for an independent Manchuria among the peoples of the Northeast. The concept of independent Manchuria is generally considered tainted and almost wholly linked with Japanese imperialism nowadays. It is not implausible that a powerful effectively independent remnant state could form in the industrialized Northeast China if the central Chinese government collapsed but such a state would regard itself as Chinese or even claim to be the rightful Chinese government if it wanted to maintain any legitimacy particularly if Japan invaded again. In fact, the Northeast is generally considered very pro-PRC and the "eldest son" of the PRC in Mao's words. So I imagine if the Northeast caused any problem for the new republic, it would be pro-CPC and pro-PRC sentiment rather than regionalist sentiments.

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I mean, I'm pretty agnostic on Manchuria itself being one of the splinter states to result of China's various elites seizing whatever combination of materiel and soil they could. The important thing is that Japan thought of Manchuria as a realistically discrete piece of China and went for it, which wound up being a meat grinder as the result of whoever wound up grabbing onto that part of China having the good fortune to inherit lots of materiel and manpower from the PLA.

If Manchuria itself is so sufficiently opposed to the idea of being an independent state that they would rise up and reject a warlord swanning in with enough of the PLA to make the region infeasible for a resurgent Japan to conquer, who then do you see as controlling the region?

 

[Lightwhispers]

So, your assertion is that non-Americans remember the Cold War that strongly? You'd think over two decades of time would make feelings cool. Certainly speaking, at least some of them - like, say, the polish - would have enough experience with the communists that they don't particularly care how dirty the USA got their hands to fight them.

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This seems to be discussion of current politics, only tangentially related to the quest. Please stop.

 

[Sir_Travelsalot]

Hm...how does such a decentralized polity such as the Families manage to hold to this manner of standardization? Particularly when part of their procurement comes from recycling?

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Because it's only the Rover Family, the smallest of them, that has a standardized armory. The fact that the AR10 and AR15 have a great deal of parts and materials interchangeability has been nothing short of a godsend to them.

Hm. Interesting flavor. With only 150 members, they wouldn't be able to control much, especially not in Idaho -- but then, you have them more as a criminal gang than a proper warlord state. Canon!

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In fairness, they never had permanent holdings. Even when they had membership in the ballpark of 600, they were a marauding warband through and through until they got slapped down with the drone strike.

 

[AKuz]

So, your assertion is that non-Americans remember the Cold War that strongly? You'd think over two decades of time would make feelings cool. Certainly speaking, at least some of them - like, say, the polish - would have enough experience with the communists that they don't particularly care how dirty the USA got their hands to fight them.

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The United States has, at one time or another, tried to conquer every single one of it's neighbours And usually succeeded after breaking treaties in outright wars of conquest and genocide.

There are places that are still mad about shit that happened when Rome was still a going concern.

America itself is still pissy about the time that some Iranians occupied the American embassy over 40 years ago. "The time the US conquered and murdered us," and "the time that the US overthrew our government and put fascists in charge." Is part of a longstanding pattern of behavior that people have yet to forget, and have not forgiven because America has never stopped acting that way.

Many Americans have this bizzare conviction that everyone else loves America the same way they love America.

 

[Oshha]

I personally think that the world is a large enough and diverse enough place that trying to boil down the opinion of America to a single one isn't going to work because different people are going to have different opinions. Frankly, I also think that trying to treat people in a country as a monolithic group when comes to their opinion is foolish because you are always going to get a variety of different opinions in a group that large.

Some people will like America, some people will hate America, others will dislike it, more will love it and other people will be indifferent or don't care. Many will probably have a complex opinion and might like some aspects of America whilst being against other aspects of the country.

Edit: I am also not sure what we are talking about now. Are we still discussing Poptart's prompt from yesterday about what we would do if America became a global power again?

 

[Taut_Templar]

The United States has, at one time or another, tried to conquer every single one of it's neighbours

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A rather dramatic statement, considering the fact that there are two of them. The number of nations the British haven't tried to invade can be counted on two hands, yet they aren't an international pariah.

There are places that are still mad about shit that happened when Rome was still a going concern.

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... such as? I'm legitimately curious as to what you're referring to here, although the point about nationalist grudges lasting generations is taken.

America itself is still pissy about the time that some Iranians occupied the American embassy over 40 years ago.

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... leaving aside the downplaying of the Iranian hostage crisis, the antipathy between the two nations is a bit more complex than a single incident that happened nearly half a century ago.

"The time the US conquered and murdered us," and "the time that the US overthrew our government and put fascists in charge." Is part of a longstanding pattern of behavior that people have yet to forget, and have not forgiven because America has never stopped acting that way.

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When is the last time the US has done either of those things? For that matter, how many nations can actually claim to have been "invaded and murdered" or had a blood-thirsty psychopath placed in charge of their nation by the US? The relationship between America and its southern neighbors is unequal and abusive, that few can deny, but cherry-picking the worst excesses of US foreign policy and trying to claim that's what everyone has experienced/remembers is deeply disingenuous.

Many Americans have this bizzare conviction that everyone else loves America the same way they love America.

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Personally speaking, I suspect it's more some people struggle to understand that their opinion that's validated by various online echo-chambers isn't actually commonly held or accepted. Whether that be 'evil Trump-loving righties' with their toxic nationalism, or something else entirely.

 

[Thebigpieman]

A rather dramatic statement, considering the fact that there are two of them.

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I mean if you consider all three centuries that America has existed for, you have a grand majority of First Nation civilizations that inhabited the North American continent.

 

[Sir_Travelsalot]

Whether that be evil Trump-loving righties with their toxic nationalism

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Thread policy's still a thing. And even if it wasn't, this sort of blanket statement is in genuinely poor taste, so kindly cease.

 

[BoredStudent1414]

I mean, I'm pretty agnostic on Manchuria itself being one of the splinter states to result of China's various elites seizing whatever combination of materiel and soil they could. The important thing is that Japan thought of Manchuria as a realistically discrete piece of China and went for it, which wound up being a meat grinder as the result of whoever wound up grabbing onto that part of China having the good fortune to inherits lots of materiel and manpower from the PLA.

If Manchuria itself is so sufficiently opposed to the idea of being an independent state that they would rise up and reject a warlord swanning in with enough of the PLA to make the region infeasible for a resurgent Japan to conquer, who then do you see as controlling the region?

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I guess a former PLA warlord could control the Northeast and resist Japan by branding his or her effectively independent forces as the "Northeastern Army" or "Northeastern Government" in service of a non-existent central Chinese government and invoke anti-Japanese sentiment and the legacy of Zhang Xueliang the former warlord of Manchuria before WW2 who is regarded as a patriotic hero on China for resisting Japan and his role in the creation of the Second United Front. Additionally in real life after the initial invasion of Manchuria, large Chinese volunteer armies such as the Northeast Anti-Japanese United Army sprung up in the region and fought in a guerilla war against Japan which caused trouble. There would no need to invoke Manchurian nationalism to organize a state in the Northeast to resist another invasion by Japan. It would be very counterproductive to do so. Chinese nationalism and widespread anti-Japanese sentiment would probably be enough to provoke painful amounts of resistance against the New Japanese Empire.

 

[PoptartProdigy]

All right, ease off of the real-life shit, folks, we have a policy.

I guess a former PLA warlord could control the Northeast and resist Japan by branding his or her effectively independent forces as the "Northeastern Army" or "Northeastern Government" in service of a non-existent central Chinese government and invoke anti-Japanese sentiment and the legacy of Zhang Xueliang the former warlord of Manchuria before WW2 who is regarded as a patriotic hero on China for resisting Japan and his role in the creation of the Second United Front. Additionally in real life after the initial invasion of Manchuria, large Chinese volunteer armies such as the Northeast Anti-Japanese United Army sprung up in the region and fought in a guerilla war against Japan which caused trouble. There would no need to invoke Manchurian nationalism to organize a state in the Northeast to resist another invasion by Japan. It would be very counterproductive to do so. Chinese nationalism and widespread anti-Japanese sentiment would probably be enough to provoke painful amounts of resistance against the New Japanese Empire.

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So, if I understand you correctly, it is not impossible that there could be a state comprising only Manchuria, and it in fact would be eminently possible for one to form, and there is actually past history of states existing in that region and comprising that territory in a situation where the central government no longer wields meaningful authority or has in fact collapsed. The real problem is the use of the word, "Manchuria," which up until this very moment I did not realize was discouraged within China itself.

 

[Taut_Templar]

All right, ease off of the real-life shit, folks, we have a policy.

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My bad, I was just legitimately curious as to what people thought of the United States. When you spend a lot of time on sites like this, it kinda warps your perspective.

 

[SneakyWalrus]

snip

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This is like a calming balm to my soul. I savour it so, so much.

 

[Simon_Jester]

Fasten your seatbelts, because this one's going to be a doozy...

I was blown away by the community participation in this one. You are all amazing people and I am very glad I've gotten the chance to work together with you.

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My only regret is that I missed this because I wasn't paying attention at the time.

Yeah, that. Black powder, also called gunpowder.

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Probably not, for the same reasons no one uses it in the Third World today. It's not significantly easier to get the materials for, since neither saltpeter nor sulfur is especially easy to find in pure form. It's just that it requires very little knowledge of scientific chemistry to discover and prepare if you have the materials. So even in the most remote parts of the country, almost everyone is probably just using 20th century style rifles firing smokeless powder, because the rifle ammunition isn't that hard to carry around- one guy with a knapsack can carry hundreds and hundreds of rounds of ammunition.

People in the most regressed and economically decayed regions are just careful with their ammunition, because it's expensive... but blackpowder ammunition would be even more expensive since it would probably require long distance trade to source the needed materials.

I love this because it feels like a real historical grievance.

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It seems pretty valid, too.

The "anti-government free-market state is really an economic monopoly" trope has been a little overdone IMO, I though I would try "anti-government free market state is actually a somewhat corrupt command economy".

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I mean, almost every corporation is a command economy internally. Within the corporation, resources are distributed at the will of executives, not by different branches of the company buying and selling services to one another, at least not normally.

From the perspective of people inside the borders of corporate-controlled territory, the corporation will start to look exactly like a, well... "somewhat corrupt command economy." With the corruption provided by standard-issue nepotism and selective butt-kissing behavior by those at the bottom of the pyramid.

Thanks, I'm contemplating scattering a half-a-dozen similar receipts to small generic factions because there's no way that Amarillo was the first or last time that Burns had to requisition like that.

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Oh yeah. As we expand onto the Great Plains it's entirely possible that we'll have to take a Pay Reparations for the Stuff Burns Stole action.

I bet there's an interesting story about Burns being contacted by Blue Army recruiters around the time of the Cascadian Rainbow Uprising of 2062, but for various reasons they were unable to participate.

Possibly just too far away, possibly were slowly making their way over for the planned launch date but things ended up kicking off too soon.

Or maybe they didn't know anything until they started getting radio reports and we're like "Hey, that's pretty cool, maybe we should-" *August Mutinies Break Out* "oh no, not again"

Or hell, maybe this was yet *another* place where Burns wound up and they escaped when the Blues decided to wind down their campaign and do force preservation instead of fighting to the bitter end.

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I'm pretty sure that if Burns had made it into contact to fight the Japanese, then pretty soon they would have realized "HOLY SHIT there's a short mechanized reigment kicking around out there what the hell I HAVE SO MANY QUESTIONS!" This would have been followed by an unusually vigorous effort to bomb and hunt the Devil Brigade into nothing, making it difficult to explain how they preserved their ammunition stockpile.

 

[hYGP]

I'm pretty sure that if Burns had made it into contact to fight the Japanese, then pretty soon they would have realized "HOLY SHIT there's a short mechanized reigment kicking around out there what the hell I HAVE SO MANY QUESTIONS!" This would have been followed by an unusually vigorous effort to bomb and hunt the Devil Brigade into nothing, making it difficult to explain how they preserved their ammunition stockpile.

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Depends on when Burns decided to join in, if at all. Remember, the Rainbow Uprising very nearly threw the Japanese entirely off of Cascadia, which probably implies a level of force well beyond "a spare OWE short mechanized regiment" - enough force that Burns probably wouldn't've been that remarkable.

 

[BoredStudent1414]

So, if I understand you correctly, it is not impossible that there could be a state comprising only Manchuria, and it in fact would be eminently possible for one to form, and there is actually past history of states existing in that region and comprising that territory in a situation where the central government no longer wields meaningful authority or has in fact collapsed. The real problem is the use of the word, "Manchuria," which up until this very moment I did not realize was discouraged within China itself.

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That is correct. The people of Northeast China despise the concept of an independent Manchuria or Manchukuo which they regard as an illegitimate creation of and reminder of Japanese imperialism. The people of the Three Northeast Provinces, both the Han and the native Manchu, consider themselves proudly Chinese. Even the term Manchuria or Manchukuo is Japanese in origin and a real sore point among the people there. The Chinese often still preface Manchukuo's name with the word wěi (false, pseudo, or so-called) when speaking about it. It is a real irony of history that the people of the region that Sun Yat-sen once dismissed as not a part of the real China are so patriotically Chinese that they would stubbornly resist being detached from the rest of China.

Any post-Collapse Chinese warlord that would try to invoke Manchurian nationalism would tank their own legitimacy before the people and be accused of collaboration with Japan so associated Manchurian nationalism is with Japanese imperialism nowadays. Any post-Collapse warlord state in Northeast China would probably stylized themselves as the "Northeastern Army" or "Northeastern Government" even if they are effectively independent of any central Chinese government or if there is no central Chinese government for legitimacy purposes. The resistance movements against the New Japanese Empire would invoke Chinese nationalism, widespread anti-Japanese sentiment, memories of the previous invasion, and the legacy of patriotic heroes of the past to rally support of the people of Northeast China. That would be probably enough to cause a quagmire for Japan.

It might seem strange that a people of a region would be so stubbornly resistant and hostile to the idea of their region becoming its own country but that is how it is in Northeast China.

 

[Taut_Templar]

That is correct. The people of Northeast China despise the concept of an independent Manchuria or Manchukuo which they regard as an illegitimate creation of and reminder of Japanese imperialism. The people of the Three Northeast Provinces, both the Han and the native Manchu, consider themselves proudly Chinese. Even the term Manchuria or Manchukuo is Japanese in origin and a real sore point among the people there. The Chinese often still preface Manchukuo's name with the word wěi (false, pseudo, or so-called) when speaking about it. It is a real irony of history that the people of the region that Sun Yat-sen once dismissed as not a part of the real China are so patriotically Chinese that they would stubbornly resist being detached from the rest of China.

Any post-Collapse Chinese warlord that would try to invoke Manchurian nationalism would tank their own legitimacy before the people and be accused of collaboration with Japan so associated Manchurian nationalism is with Japanese imperialism nowadays. Any post-Collapse warlord state in Northeast China would probably stylized themselves as the "Northeastern Army" or "Northeastern Government" even if they are effectively independent of any central Chinese government or if there is no central Chinese government for legitimacy purposes. The resistance movements against the New Japanese Empire would invoke Chinese nationalism, widespread anti-Japanese sentiment, memories of the previous invasion, and the legacy of patriotic heroes of the past to rally support of the people of Northeast China. That would be probably enough to cause a quagmire for Japan.

It might seem strange that a people of a region would be so stubbornly resistant and hostile to the idea of their region becoming its own country but that is how it is in Northeast China.

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From my understanding of the situation, it's practically the opposite in southern China, where the terrain has enabled the survival of numerous different cultures and "dialects" from Han supremacy.

 

[Simon_Jester]

So, it sounds like we need to set a policy recognizing economic warfare as equivalent to physical warfare, and that a legal system which supports such is not legitimate. Or, from another viewpoint, equating debt-holding with extradition, and demanding similar standards.

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I mean, it's one thing if it's debt the Commonwealth itself incurred, on terms the Commonwealth agreed to.

It's another thing (as I think we all agree) if we're talking about debt that was incurred by a nation far more capable of paying it, as a result of governmental decisions made by people who are long dead.

Depends on when Burns decided to join in, if at all. Remember, the Rainbow Uprising very nearly threw the Japanese entirely off of Cascadia, which probably implies a level of force well beyond "a spare OWE short mechanized regiment" - enough force that Burns probably wouldn't've been that remarkable.

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Yes, but when the rebels are fielding 70-ton main battle tanks, the question of how the fuck they sourced that isn't going to go away. Yoinked from a New California Republic arms cache? Time for the Russians to spank California for letting their weapons falling into rebel hands. Looted from an old Star League federal facility? Clearly someone missed a spot. Any such units that actually formed, armed up to that level, and got away would be prime targets for Russian and Japanese aerial smiting. I'm not saying it's literally impossible but it bears consideration.

 

[EBR]

Can we leave this topic alone, please?

 

[Flectarn]

When is the last time the US has done either of those things?

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October?

 

[Thors_Alumni]

The GM had asked us to stop with the subject. So drop it already.

 

[armentho]

The GM had asked us to stop with the subject. So drop it already.

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ok,i drop it

 

[armentho]

[thinks about it...]

May I ask an only semi-related question of out pure linguistic curiosity:

Is "Suramerican," possibly with appropriate accent mark, a common single-word adjective or noun in Latin American Spanish?

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is more of adjective,you are describing a propertie of coming/belonging from/to a place

 

[EBR]

The GM had asked us to stop with the subject. So drop it already.

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This.

 

[PoptartProdigy]

The next time y'all start a topic I asked closed because you were spiraling on it -- not on this topic, the next time on any topic -- I'm not calling for you to knock it off, I'm jumping straight to reports. Addressing nobody in particular: Don't restart dead topics. Don't treat your opponents like an intellectual dead space. Again, I will not ask, next time.