Shanghaied - 2ACW

[James G]

122 – Holed below the waterline

Christine Matthews had been the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster back in 2024 when the British Government had decided to forcibly suspend the activities of both the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government too. She was a Worcestershire MP for the Conservative Party serving in a role which allowed her to function as a Minister Without Portfolio and the PM had used her to head up the Scotland Task Force to implement his will at first, then later that of the House of Commons, in shutting down the secessionist activities of the Scots. A new super ministry (there were others too) had been created soon afterwards with Matthews named as the Secretary of State for the Union. Her office combined the roles of previous secretaries for Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales, with there being extensive powers available to her. Legal challenges had come when both Labour and the Scottish National Party had failed to get their way in Parliament in opposing what was done yet those, for all of their drama, had failed. Matthews’ authority on behalf of the UK Government, the Commons and the Crown had seen her ministry assume full political control over Scotland end put a de facto end to devolution north of the border. The end had become de jure late in 2028 when, following on from the general election, legislation had been successfully passed to fully get rid of autonomy and self government from Edinburgh four years after the parliament there had been closed down and the then First Minister removed. She ran for a Commons seat in the ‘28 election and won: so too did all of her colleagues who contested every one of the fifty-two Scottish seats in the six hundred seat Commons. None of those SNP-elected Members of Parliament took their seats after refusing to swear an oath of allegiance to King George VII. Matthews had been at the forefront of stern criticism against them and their activities there, comparing them to Sinn Fein, and for refusing to accept the democratic mandate which the government which she served in had gained from British voters.

The ‘Scottish troubles’ had gone on from 2024 all the way into ‘29. What was seen was nothing like what had happened the previous century in Northern Ireland, and especially not anything like events across the North Atlantic with the Years of Lead, yet Scotland had become almost a separate country in every way apart from constitutionally. It was one where the majority of the people wished to break away yet they were held bound to the British state with Matthews even eclipsing the PM as being the face of that. There were regular protests, illegal ones at that, and mass boycotts of businesses with ‘English’ ties. Sit-in protests to disrupt transport and the economy went on and on. Harassment of government officials and the police were widespread: all something that inspired protesters in California and the West of America in late 2028 / early 2029. The king’s lone visit was met with a mass angry gathering where the police had to intervene strongly to stop demonstrators and counter-demonstrators (the latter being royalists & unionists coming up from England) from tearing each other and Aberdeen apart. Other political parties in Scotland were left almost dead. The Scottish Unionists – a split from the UK-wide Conservatives –, Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the Greens and everyone else couldn’t get anywhere when the actions of Matthews gave the SNP everything in terms of representation. Even the 2022-formed Equality & Democracy Party, a left-wing breakaway from Labour which had formed and electoral alliance with the Greens, the Red-Green Union, could make no headway in Scotland despite being firmly in support of the SNP’s claims of utter injustice against the Scottish people. Scottish sports teams participating in international events found themselves banned by governing bodies when the actions of supporters and then later sportspeople themselves broke political impartially rules. Overseas criticism had come aplenty for the British Government. From the EU, President Walsh when he was in office and hostile powers, there had been repeated assertions that the actions of London with regard to Scotland were outrageous and a violation of their national sovereignty. Matthews was usually the one to answer those attack lines when they came from aboard. She would defend what had been done and all that went on. The Scottish Government back in ‘24 had violated the Scotland Act of 1998, the Edinburgh Agreement of 2012 and the Scotland Act of 2016 in their activities ahead of the forced cessation of their activities. With there being no sign that the SNP was in any way willing to engage on the matter, nor were willing to accept responsibly for what had happened, her Department for the Union retained full ministerial control over Scottish domestic affairs. The Scottish Parliament, Matthews would add, was an expensive and unnecessary layer of bureaucracy – just as the independent mayoral posts across Britain had been – while failing to adequately represent the wishes and needs of the British people. London, Manchester and other cities had lost their mayors like Scotland had lost its parliament. There remained assemblies in both Northern Ireland and Wales yet, at the PM’s direction, Matthews had clipped their wings greatly too. Government in the UK was almost fully centralised with devolution claimed by ministers including Matthews prominently to be a failed experiment from the late 1990s.

Nationally yet also in part internationally too, Matthews was regarded as a certain successor to the PM when he finally left office. There was long talk of him stepping down even after his amazing multiple election winning streak had gone on throughout the Twenties. No one else was seriously considered from within his party to replace him should all of the talk about his wish to retire from politics be true. She was known to be loyal to him, fiercely so, and had a lot of support within her party. To voters, Matthews wasn’t exactly likeable but she didn’t put them off either… unless they were north of the border. Fiscally and socially conservative, she was decried by opponents as a zealot hell-bent on power for power’s sake rather than having any clear set of values in her politics. Allies of hers defended Matthews against such claims. Since the start of 2029, she had been trying to broaden her appeal beyond her fellow Conservative MPs and also party members to reach more of the public. She’d done more public appearances, talking to broader audiences. News from out of America dominated the headlines across Britain though. Matthews struggled to cut through all of that to allow the public to see her for all that she was to rubbish the allegations that she was anti-democracy and that ‘zealot’ she was called. She’d brought her family into the public relations effort and that had met with encouraging signs as it made her look more human that opponents often tried to paint her as not.

In the early hours of February 19th, Matthews was at her ministerial flat in Central London. It was a grace-and-favour apartment close to her work which she made much use of. Her lover, a man much younger than her, spent the night before slipping away long before dawn. She was already awake and preparing to go into work when the lead officer of her police protection team – there was a significant presence around her at public events yet also in private – alerted her of a serious incident back in Worcestershire where her personal residence was located in the middle of her constituency. The Home Secretary was soon calling to confirm what news there was. A fire had erupted at the home where her husband and daughter were sleeping in. Both of them had been taken to hospital in critical condition. It was being treated as arson, an act of political terrorism too due to recent serious threats identified by MI-5 against Matthews. She’d been told of them and they appeared to have come to fruition. Soon enough, she was at that hospital out in the West of England where her family had been taken. Dan Matthews had lost his battle to survive but the nineteen year-old Felicity was fighting for her life. As expected, the whole matter was at once national news. Political figures, even from those strongest opponents of Matthews and the government which she was almost at the top of, even from the SNP leadership too, condemned what had happened. Fighting in America was knocked off the news as the media networks covered that lone story exclusively. Images taken from Felicity Matthews’ social media of her, a bright and pretty young woman, were all over the news. Reporters were camped outside the hospital while a news helicopter circled the smouldering ruins of the burnt-down rural home where the Matthews family had lived broadcasting images of the scene of such a shocking attack.

Out of the spotlight of media attention, arrests were made. MI-5 pointed counter-terrorism police towards known extremists of a Scottish background who they had their eyes on as a threat to the lives of government ministers and officials. There was no ‘Scottish Liberation Army’ beyond some previous hyperbole in sensationalist sections of the media for them to target. Instead, it was individuals or small groups of like-minded people who either in person or online had said some things. Any of them with any sort of ties to Worcestershire or regarded as possibly highly dangerous were arrested. Later that evening, when the Prime Minister addressed the nation in an unprecedented broadcast, he mentioned those police activities. Politics was left out of his statement, in an overt form anyway. Across Britain, many people looked towards the attack upon the innocent family of someone such as Matthews as being political though and having coming from Scottish secessionists who were seen as trying to ape the actions of those out in America which had been all over the news. MI-5 briefed the PM though that there might be something wider to the whole thing. Almost all of those arrested were likely innocent but one particular individual detained could very possibly have had been behind the firebombing of that family home in Worcestershire. He was not only a Scot but he also had ties to Russia. Fingers were pointed to what had happened the same night as that fire, an incident which the PM had been awake dealing with what news came of that attack on Matthews’ family.

There was a Royal Navy warship which had been holed below the waterline while in the Gulf of Finland.


HMS Glasgow was a Type-26/City-class missile-frigate that had been in the Baltic since the New Year as part of the NATO forward naval presence to assist in the defence of allies there. Run-ins had been had with Russian aircraft and warships ranging out over the Baltic through the sea claimed by Moscow to be ‘historic Russian waters’. Due to recent armed clashes between the Poles and the Russians which had proved deadly, the Glasgow had been moved backwards out from where it had been operating in the middle of that stretch of water off the Estonian coastline and re-positioned near to the western end. Freedom of navigation exercises had taken place and patrols made to assist allies yet the pull back was done less a shot be taken against her while so far forward. Canadian troops in Poland had been targeted in a deliberate Russian missile attack and the fear had been that the Royal Navy might be struck at too as part of the Kremlin’s power games. That concern had been proved correct. A mini-sub, possibly an unmanned one at that, had launched a lone torpedo into the Glasgow while it was in international waters. Deaths and injuries had been reported aboard. The ship wasn’t left in danger of sinking and had began to move under its own power in the direction of Tallinn with a Dutch warship in-close for escort.

The attack on the Glasgow was a deniable strike. If accused of doing so, President Makarov and his spokespeople would play the ‘who, us?’ game and make counter-accusations of their typical wild nature. That was a big deal and something that the PM had been thinking about the public response to when news broke about it. Then the attack on Matthews’ family occurred. She was his number two in government, his strongest cabinet ally. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Home Secretary and the former Communities Secretary all had designs on his job should scandal force him from office if he chose not to retire – election defeat was practically impossible –, but Matthews was different. He had positioned her to succeed him eventually and she rewarded that with her loyalty. Among those at the top of the British Government, it was the Union Secretary who was his closest adviser and the foremost second most-powerful member of the Cabinet. All of a sudden, at a time of extreme crisis for the country with Britain’s strongest ally undergoing civil war while Eastern Europe threatened to explode into World War Three where Britain would have to fight in that, the PM lost Matthews. All of her attention was directed towards her daughter who was clinging onto life while at the same time mourning for her husband too: the PM knew they were close despite private knowledge of her supposedly secret extra-martial affair. Matthews asked for and was granted the position of ‘Minister on Leave’. She remained a part of the government and officially kept her Cabinet job yet the PM had to move someone else into the Department for the Union on a temporary basis. That ministerial status which she took had been used before by others for maternity leave and bereavement as well: it gave them time off for urgent family needs while keeping secure their position.

MI-5’s briefing that the suspect in police custody for the attack in Worcestershire had Russian ties saw the PM authorise the Home Secretary to see even more investigatory effort deployed into what had happened with Matthew’s family. The inquiry of the highest priority already was given additional support to either confirm or deny that connection. Talking with the Home Secretary, the PM suggested that if true, it was a case of the Kremlin not just holing the Glasgow below the waterline but his government too… and causing immense domestic strife as well due to how Scots were going to be blamed by an angry public.

[gillan1220]

May 19, 2021 18:22:51 GMT James G said:

May 19, 2021 2:00:16 GMT gillan1220 said:

I was reading this comic called The Recount where in a terrorist group called The Masses calls for the American public to rise up against the politicians in D.C. It kind off reminds me of Cordis Die from Call of Duty: Black Ops II. If you read the comic, it is an eerie parallel to the Years of Lead.

A lot of people have predicted Years of Lead / Troubles type scenarios. With hope, all of that is just speculation and will never happen outside of fiction such as that and this.

The closest thing to it becoming a reality was summer last year.

[James G]

123 – Hell on Wheels

General Fuller had been building an army for the Democratic American Republic since the beginning of that nation and his appointment as position of the head of its armed forces. He had forcibly crafted an initial defensive force by cajoling, coercing and intimidating US Armed Forces elements spread across the West to defect to the new country formed out of secessionist states. That had been employed to defend the DAR against the first wave of United States attacks where they tried to ‘liberate’ the West. Successes had been had yet failures had been met too. During mid-February, the latter came in abundance when US Army North rushed over the Rio Grande from out of New Mexico and subsequently lanced deep into Arizona. The DAR Army had halted earlier offensives in the north, up into Idaho, and the snow-covered Rockies provided a barrier in the centre yet the forced entry made into Arizona in the south came fast. It was turning into a disaster for Fuller there with significant losses wholescale to elements of his army serving with the Western Command. There never had been the intention though of just using what he had stolen from under the noses of the Pentagon to defend the country which he had such a personal stake in. Right from the get go, Fuller had been building a second force: one created afresh. He had the manpower, the equipment and the supplies to do that from all that had been taken in terms of territory full of those willing to fight for the DAR and also the seized military bases & storage sites. The second components of his army were newly-created. Reservists and volunteers were matted up with tanks and everything else taken from Barstow, Hawthorne & Sierra. Organisation followed directly from how things had been done with the US Army and the US Marines rather than Fuller attempting to significantly change things when time was short and the need so pressing. He built divisions, brigades and battalions in identical fashion with his second forces to copy exactly how things were with those he employed first. Part of that pattern following was the designations given to both the existing and new units for the DAR Army.

What Fuller had stolen, he didn’t rename. For example, the 25th Infantry Division from the US Army, based in Hawaii and sent to fight in Colorado, kept the same name when serving in the Western Command. That was the same with other divisions and smaller units, right down to the lowest level. When it came to new units, Fuller made use of historic designations for ones which he created. Units such as the 2nd Armored & 7th Infantry Divisions had once served in the US Army and they did so too for the DAR Army when they were re-established. Fuller raised many of those new divisions and public announcements were made on that. In something not in any way co-ordinated, rather a case of each side mirroring the other, the DAR Army and the opposing US Army didn’t raise new units with the same name. The Pentagon was standing up their own and found themselves playing catch-up behind Fuller. Minister Rawlings faced a different kind of challenge to the race with the Pentagon when it came to new unit names for the war which the DAR was fighting to survive. Parliamentarians in Las Vegas on the Defence sub-committee argued that using such historic names didn’t sit well with their outlook for their country: why couldn’t a wholly different numbering system, even one of names, be used? She and Fuller both countered that opposition by pointing out the numbers were a simpler system to follow and those personnel returning to uniform had once served in similar named units. They had a sense of history and the morale of those fighting to defend the independence won in the West was important. By the time that ARNORTH stormed into Arizona, taking control of air facilities on the edge of Tucson as they did so, Fuller had built five full-scale combat divisions – out of nine planned – as part of the second wave of the army he created. None of them were fully finished and, outside of them, there wasn’t a complete combat support and service support network to allow for their proper employment. That took far longer than foreseen: it was much easier to create combat units. There was the 5th Marine Division – technically part of the DAR Navy yet in reality an army unit – as well as the 2nd & 3rd Armored Divisions alongside the 7th & 9th Infantry Divisions. The DAR Marines were spread from San Diego to Las Vegas, protecting each against possible US attack coming from the rear, while the 9th Infantry Division (formed at Fort Lewis in Washington state) had begun to move towards the west of Colorado. The 3rd Armored Division was on the Pacific coast of California and moving out of bases from where it had been stood up with the 7th Infantry Division doing the same from out of Oregon. Closest to where the main fighting was occurring was the 2nd Armored Division: a unit with the nickname Hell on Wheels. Fuller had built that unit at Fort Irwin with tanks and armoured vehicles brought down to there from the Sierra Army Depot. Those considered the best, the most capable of service-personnel returning to uniform were sent to man that unit.

Once Davis-Monthan AFB and Tucson International Airport fell to US Army Rangers, who were joined by ARNORTH tanks racing to meet them, Fuller sent the towards them the Hell on Wheels.


Providing external logistics, communications and fire support for the 2nd Armored Division were partially-complete units assigned to the newly-created Arizona Corps. Fuller abolished the New Mexico Corps and took what remained of that once victorious command to add to the Arizona Corps. He appointed an experienced general to command that force whose mission was to defeat the United States’ effort to seize full control of Arizona like they had done with almost all of New Mexico and a good chunk of Colorado too. Over the lower reaches of the Colorado River from out of California the 2nd Armored Division rolled. Fixed bridges there had been attacked by the US Air Force beforehand and so too had replacement temporary crossings. Those attacks had lessened though and there were enough ways across for the hundreds of tanks and armoured vehicles which rolled into Arizona. They moved on their own tracks too, not aboard low-loaders due to the need for the latter to be elsewhere moving more of the reinforcements which Fuller brought into play for the Western Command from newly-built elements of his army. When inside Arizona, the Hell on Wheels joined up with what was left of the 40th Infantry Division – national guardsmen from Arizona, Guam & Hawaii: most of the previous numerous Californians had been lost – as well as the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment. Holding Arizona with just those units wouldn’t be enough though. Both the 3rd Armored & 7th Infantry Divisions were likewise sent to serve with the Arizona Corps too. Moreover, with considerable effort, Fuller transferred what was left of the 25th Infantry Division from out of the southern reaches of Colorado where they had escaped attempted encirclement at the end of January to fall back behind the Front Range of the Rockies. Tactical airlift was used to move them, something that was costly and took time. There was a great need for them though because where ARNORTH was inside Arizona presented those on the offensive with many options as to where to continue their attack towards.

Arizona was large. Of course, California was bigger and none of the (remaining) DAR states with the exception of the tiny Guam & the Marianas were small, yet Arizona was still a big place. Two full corps from the United States Army North, with another pair likely to follow them, had broken into that state in force. They had done so to give them plentiful options as to where to strike out towards. Fuller would have done the same had he been in the position of ARNORTH’s commander, General Lambert, someone he’d once met in person, because of the size of Arizona plus its extensive communications links. It was somewhere well-served by big freeways & connecting main roads without as many geographic challengers that would have been presented as a problem for the attacker elsewhere. Fuller had to expect that ARNORTH would try to continue onwards going deeper into the West via all three options he saw Lambert as having. Striking out on the right was doable with an ultimate destination being Las Vegas itself. The Grand Canyon stood in the way but that wasn’t insurmountable as a barrier to forward movement, not with a multitude of airlift assets. In the middle there were Flagstaff and the massive Phoenix metropolitan area. Proclamations from back in DC were that the United States was liberating the people of the West from oppression by the DAR regime so moving into those two places, plus the wide area around them, would certainly do that. Fuller believed that Lambert would favour more so making the biggest move on the left of ARNORTH though. From Tucson, there was open ground, good tank country, stretching forwards all the way across the tribal lands of the Tohono O’odham Nation, the Sonoran Desert all the way to near Yuma and the Colorado River. Getting into California that way, with one flank ‘protected’ by the Mexican border, would be what Fuller would do, what he was sure that Lambert would prefer. Whether ARNORTH would direct all of his strength there, or just some of it while moving on the right & in the centre, Fuller couldn’t be sure of... yet he knew that an attack had to be made on the left.

The Arizona Corps’ commander was instructed by Fuller that that was where most of his defensive effort was to be guarded against. The arriving Hell on Wheels turned southeast once inside Arizona and towards that lightly-populated tribal land. Rawlings concurred with that instruction and manoeuvre. However, the Minister for Defence & Security was at that time dealing with those back in Las Vegas focused on the idea of either separate or twin offensives by United States’ forces to move on their capital and also Phoenix. They certainly didn’t want to see either of those things happen. She had to fight political interference on the mission for the 2nd Armored Division and where Fuller directed further arriving units into Arizona to head towards once they moved in. As a compromise measure to stop the complete destruction of the Arizona Corps’ much-needed planned dispositions to avert the loss of that state, Rawlings agreed for the redeployment of the majority of the new 9th Infantry Division. Two of the three combat brigades of mechanised infantry along with a significant number of tanks were redirected away from the Colorado mission and split up while going south instead. They made a turn to the south while going through guerrilla-infected Utah and down to both Las Vegas and Phoenix too. Fuller wasn’t happy with those deployments at all. He understood the extreme political concerns and the need to stop each from being taken yet it wasn’t how he had wanted things done. He was subject to his political masters though and their decisions.

The forward elements of the 3rd Armored Brigade, 9th Infantry Division reached Phoenix after Hell on Wheels units deployed onto tribal land between that city and the Mexican border. Phoenix was the state capital of Arizona with government buildings in that city having been levelled by laser-guided bombs dropped by US Air Force stealth bombers. There had been precious few other strikes made towards the city with only limited actions undertaken against the surrounding airports under military control too due to their closeness of the massive population centre that Phoenix was. Parts of the city looked like a war zone when those troops arrived there to defend it against US liberation efforts though. Arizona was in the midst of political chaos upon their arrival and people had taken to the streets en masse. Governor Harper was dead and the lieutenant-governor had fled towards Tucson seeking the safety of what she believed was the US Government. A lie had been spread by Admiral Miller’s Department of Homeland Security that the attempted snatch of Harper by Delta Force on Pentagon orders was in fact an assassination by the DAR itself ahead of the dead man’s suspected treason. The lieutenant-governor, who had betrayed the United States just as much as he had the previous month in supporting secession, had fallen for that false narrative which Miller hadn’t believed would be as successful as it turned out to be. The secretary of state and attorney general were competing for the blessing of those in Las Vegas to take charge of Arizona and get that coveted leadership position at the top of the DAR. Phoenix’s mayor likewise wanted to take charge of Arizona though had a different outcome in mind: re-defection back to the United States. While all of them manoeuvred to gain power, the vacuum in leadership allowed for an anti-war protest in Phoenix to get out of control when the reaction to it from the police and public safety officials was done at the direction of conflicting orders. Previous gatherings had been peaceful yet the latest one turned a good portion of Phoenix into the scene of a riot first before mass civil unrest had broken out. Looting, arson, murder and general mayhem had commenced. Into the city came those DAR troops sent to stop Phoenix being taken by US forces but who met a population who didn’t welcome them at all.

[Brky2020]

What's daily life like on the homefront, behind the lines in both Americas?

[James G]

May 21, 2021 11:48:47 GMT Brky2020 said:

What's daily life like on the homefront, behind the lines in both Americas?

All sorts of different experiences for those behind the lines.
Overall, there was that Wall Street Crash right ahead of succession and civil war with the background of severe economic disruption, following the short fight with China a few years beforehand which caused global economic insecurity. All sorts of financial issues have thus come about making life hard for many and others on the edge of dropping into economic trouble themselves before any of this conflict. Political polarisation is everywhere yet war has brought about much unity, on each side, when faced with an enemy that they have.
In the United States, there is a war economy underway. It isn't like WW2 but is taking place with jobs and big government spending to support the fight. There are media restrictions and a lot of security but freedoms are generally what they are in peacetime. Shortages happen and there is not much long-distance travel going on. That said, there has been severe civil unrest in urban areas, especially when DAR attacks have knocked out the power, which has been compounded by the absence of police when the national guard and reserves have all been called up. In 'border states' of the Mid-West, there are FEMA camps for the few hundred thousand people who fled the West and those aren't pleasant places to be stuck in.
In once DAR-controlled areas now back in US hands, Colorado has civilian government (returning LG who took the Gov post) while New Mexico and increasing areas of Arizona have military control. There is war damage and internal refugees everywhere. FEMA is trying to provide aid and not doing as well as hoped. Open lawlessness in places has met a military response but away from watching eyes there has been absolute chaos.
In the DAR, there are wartime restrictions and wartime shortages. There is little of the economy left. A UBI scheme to provide a living has blown through most of the cash and is about to crash. The internet is mostly dark while the power is on and off. A huge black market has sprung up to supply smuggled goods, so many of those basis essentials at high prices. Mexicans and Central Americans have crossed the border in large numbers to be exploited. The fighting as the DAR Army retreats is smashing up a lot of those states. There is little fuel for private vehicles and no planes are flying. Abandoned homes have been looted and cities have seen significant unrest. It's pretty bad out West. There is a massive pro-democracy movement underway, one which grows daily in threat to the DAR regime and they are soon to take an iron fist too.

Hope that helps with the picture!
Civil wars are never very civil though at least in this one, neither side is going after civilians in any real way to do them harm. Each has punished service-personnel for even accidentally harming their 'fellow Americans', leading to many bomb runs / arty missions etc called off even when there is great military need at a tactical level.

[James G]

124 – Lashing out

Admiral Miller at the Department of Homeland Security had fed the lie to those out in Las Vegas with the leadership of the Democratic American Republic that the death of Governor Harper was an assassination rather than an accidental death during a botched defection. His organisation's intelligence efforts had been reined-in significantly by Director of National Intelligence Ellis yet there was still some reach out West that he had to get a message to the Council of Twelve. The CIA had killed Arizona’ governor, Miller had them believe, after previously killing Minister for Public Safety Quiroz in another targeted strike: the rest of them were prime targets for further similar strikes. That was done to cause a reaction from the others, to get them to do something foolish. Miller believed that whatever they did would help bring about their downfall, even if it was temporarily disadvantageous to the United States. Ellis, the members of the National Security Council and President Mitchell wouldn’t have agreed with that line of thinking so Miller kept everything he did with that quiet. It was a wise decision. The Council of Twelve lashed out quite strongly and did some real damage in response to that ‘assassination’.

The DAR Air Force flew its B-21A Raider stealth bombers most nights with one, two or even three of them airborne at once on long-range strike missions. It was hard going for the aircrews, the ground personnel and the aircraft themselves. The missions were either bomb runs or the launching of missiles with a mix of strategic and semi-strategic targets. The B-21s had gone all the way to the East Coast though the majority of their strikes had taken place west of the Mississippi & Missouri Rivers. It was military targets in the main which they hit though there had been those missions to knock out the civilian power grid and also strike at oil refineries along the Gulf Coast too. The US Air Force had tried everything to get at them in-flight but to no avail. Those aircraft were just too well built to be detected and tracked while flying. Getting at them on the ground had been tried as well yet they were dispersed and moved about as well as being subject to quite the extraordinary level of camouflage when on the ground. A special mission unit, Task Force Dustland with intelligence specialists from many fields & organisations, were trying to achieve a knockout yet until then, the trio of stealth bombers were left free to spread chaos with what they could achieve when on the attack. It was the B-21s which the Council of Twelve used to avenge the death of Harper. Minister for Defence & Security Rawlings, along with Governor Pierce from California who was increasingly dominating war-related discussions in Las Vegas among the leadership, pushed for a series of attacks unlike no other using those bombers. Agreement came for what the two of them wanted to see done happen from a vengeful DAR leadership.

All three bombers were sent out together during the early hours of February 20th. They were needed more so to help turn the tide of war as the United States Army North pushed deeper into Arizona rather than where they went but the political leadership wanted to do more than just disrupt that offensive on an operational level. They used their bombers strategically, as they were designed to be employed. One of the B-21s flew north-south down the course of the Mississippi starting near St. Louis. Using laser-guided bombs, bridges over that mighty river were dropped all the way down to past Baton Rouge. The road and railroad crossings which carried military traffic, supplies mostly, over them were targeted to put them into the water below. The Merchants Bridge between Illinois and Missouri went down first, putting a halt to freight rail traffic running in both directions. Two more bridges in the St Louis area carrying interstate links went down before southwards the bomber flew to keep unloading bombs atop those fixed crossings. In bombing the Hernando de Soto Brigade – carrying Interstate-40 from Arkansas to Tennessee – the attack failed to do the job. However, there were successes with more strikes including the Charles W. Dean Bridge and the Vicksburg Bridge too. The last target was the Hale Boggs Memorial Bridge in Louisiana. Of the sixteen structures targeted in total, fourteen were knocked out of action: the Cairo I-57 Bridge connecting Illinois to Missouri stayed up like the Hernando de Soto crossing. None of the bombs which fell from the attacking bomber hit the surface of the bridges, where the spans ran high over the river below, but instead the supporting infrastructure of those engineering marvels. Three more of the targets wouldn’t be brought crashing down and would survive – the Memphis & Arkansas Bridge within sight of the citizens of the city of Memphis was one of them – yet the damage done to them was almost as significant as was the case when the other bridges came down. On the Harahan Bridge which carried the Union Pacific Railroad atop it, a freight train laden with munitions going west went into the Mississippi below. A convoy of military trucks also carrying munitions, but also other war supplies too, was halted just in time before it went across the smashed up Huey P. Long Bridge outside of Baton Rogue: if the trucks had gone over, there was a good chance they could have brought the bridge down. There were casualties from those strikes yet no more than fifty in total. It wasn’t as if those bridges were full of civilian road traffic or trains carrying passengers when they were hit. Still, they were civilian targets blasted to ruin. No longer could the US Armed Forces use them though and that was what was important. Traffic would have to be re-routed over crossings which weren’t anywhere near as effective as those downed and smashed up ones were. There was too the psychological blow delivered by those attacks: the Council of Twelve wanted everyone to know what they were capable of with a complicated strike mission like that with such far-reaching outcomes.

The other two bombers flew direct towards DC. Right ahead of their firing of missiles towards multiple targets, ones launched en masse from less than a hundred miles out, a phone call was placed on a direct line to the commander of US Strategic Command at his headquarters below Offutt AFB. The line was hi-jacked with the incoming call coming from an outside source who shouldn’t have had access. General Fuller spoke to a surprised, and angry, General Juan Ibañez Rico there in Nebraska. The DAR’s military chief told him that a missile attack was inbound upon DC yet it wasn’t a nuclear one nor targeting the US political leadership. Ibañez started to give Fuller a tongue lashing about treason and a warning about the dire consequences of doing that yet the connection was cut by the latter without him having to hear the majority of what a former Pentagon colleague wanted to say. Making such a call to Offutt had been discussed ahead of the last time the DAR sent bombers towards DC and had been dismissed then but Fuller had convinced Rawlings that it necessary when missiles were going to be used. A real crazy reaction might happen otherwise… Connecting directly to the personal line of Ibañez would also be of benefit in getting the US Air Force to go on a mad hunt to find out who had helped make that happen leading to all sorts of unrest.

Six and a half minutes later, the JSOW missiles fired by the B-21s already on their way home started hitting their targets in and around DC. Fort Belvoir, Fort McNair, the Marine Barracks inside DC itself and US Marines facilities at Quantico were blasted: Andrews AFB was left alone though. The CIA headquarters at Langley received a barrage of missiles and so too did both the major airports of Dulles International and Reagan National. The Pentagon was struck as well. Nine JSOWs smashed into that five-sided iconic building. It was somewhere almost left off the list due to the historical connotations of striking there but Pierce, as well as the governors of Colorado & New Mexico who had so much of their states overrun by US forces, successfully argued for its inclusion at the top of the strike list. Massive damage was done to the building and casualties, even with the attack taking place at night, were immense. The Secretary of Defence and the Joint Chiefs had weeks beforehand moved their operations to the Raven Rock nuclear facility but the Pentagon was still a hive of high-level activity. Once it was struck like that though, it wasn’t any more. The White House and Congress weren’t touched. Just as Andrews was left alone, they weren’t on the receiving end of the missile strike despite some desires back in Las Vegas to see them hit by more missiles. The attack came when Mitchell wasn’t in DC as well, something that the Council of Twelve knew was the case when they authorised the strike to take place when it did. Nonetheless, the capital of the United States where it’s president and government resided had been so targeted like it was inside and out with a wide range of sites blown up.

Arguably, that attack was the indirect work of Miller. The Homeland Security Secretary didn’t send those bombers and their missiles towards DC, nor had he started the secession of the West and subsequent civil war. Nonetheless, he had a hand in what happened with his web of lies spread to those in Las Vegas to make them react as they did. When the sh*t hit the fan afterwards, he wisely kept his mouth shut on speculation as to what might have been the motive for it beyond the DAR wishing to retain its illegal independence. His interest was in seeing what would happen to follow the strike where he wanted to see the DAR brought down and its leaders brought to trial for treason.

[gillan1220]

May 21, 2021 18:19:18 GMT James G said:

May 21, 2021 11:48:47 GMT Brky2020 said:

What's daily life like on the homefront, behind the lines in both Americas?

All sorts of different experiences for those behind the lines.
Overall, there was that Wall Street Crash right ahead of succession and civil war with the background of severe economic disruption, following the short fight with China a few years beforehand which caused global economic insecurity. All sorts of financial issues have thus come about making life hard for many and others on the edge of dropping into economic trouble themselves before any of this conflict. Political polarisation is everywhere yet war has brought about much unity, on each side, when faced with an enemy that they have.
In the United States, there is a war economy underway. It isn't like WW2 but is taking place with jobs and big government spending to support the fight. There are media restrictions and a lot of security but freedoms are generally what they are in peacetime. Shortages happen and there is not much long-distance travel going on. That said, there has been severe civil unrest in urban areas, especially when DAR attacks have knocked out the power, which has been compounded by the absence of police when the national guard and reserves have all been called up. In 'border states' of the Mid-West, there are FEMA camps for the few hundred thousand people who fled the West and those aren't pleasant places to be stuck in.
In once DAR-controlled areas now back in US hands, Colorado has civilian government (returning LG who took the Gov post) while New Mexico and increasing areas of Arizona have military control. There is war damage and internal refugees everywhere. FEMA is trying to provide aid and not doing as well as hoped. Open lawlessness in places has met a military response but away from watching eyes there has been absolute chaos.
In the DAR, there are wartime restrictions and wartime shortages. There is little of the economy left. A UBI scheme to provide a living has blown through most of the cash and is about to crash. The internet is mostly dark while the power is on and off. A huge black market has sprung up to supply smuggled goods, so many of those basis essentials at high prices. Mexicans and Central Americans have crossed the border in large numbers to be exploited. The fighting as the DAR Army retreats is smashing up a lot of those states. There is little fuel for private vehicles and no planes are flying. Abandoned homes have been looted and cities have seen significant unrest. It's pretty bad out West. There is a massive pro-democracy movement underway, one which grows daily in threat to the DAR regime and they are soon to take an iron fist too.

Hope that helps with the picture!
Civil wars are never very civil though at least in this one, neither side is going after civilians in any real way to do them harm. Each has punished service-personnel for even accidentally harming their 'fellow Americans', leading to many bomb runs / arty missions etc called off even when there is great military need at a tactical level.

I have female online friend in California and she's a Republican in a blue state. She lives in Santa Clarita and no doubt would have protested the DAR's independence. But it appears she would be stuck there for the time being.

I also have some Filipino-American friends serving in the Armed Forces: one aboard the USS Ronald Reagan, one as a U.S. Army paratrooper in Alaska, and one missile controller at Minot, AFB, North Dakota. The one serving on the Reagan would probably be in the DAR. The paratrooper in Alaska would likely remain part of the USA. The missile controller on the other hand would be in a precarious situation. His family is in California as he group in the Golden State but his assignment is a nuclear missile silo in the Midwest.

[sandyman]

Some great updates James. I am glad to see the UK appearing in the story poor old Scotland I am sure they will get over it one small question who is the King is it Charles or William.

[Brky2020]

And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.
--Thomas Hobbes

After a bloody and contentious civil war in a time far advanced from that of Hobbes', life for the average American probably won't be that awful...but it won't be pleasant, either.

One thing is for certain: there is no going back to normal once all of this is done.

[James G]

May 22, 2021 1:17:56 GMT gillan1220 said:

May 21, 2021 18:19:18 GMT James G said:

All sorts of different experiences for those behind the lines.
Overall, there was that Wall Street Crash right ahead of succession and civil war with the background of severe economic disruption, following the short fight with China a few years beforehand which caused global economic insecurity. All sorts of financial issues have thus come about making life hard for many and others on the edge of dropping into economic trouble themselves before any of this conflict. Political polarisation is everywhere yet war has brought about much unity, on each side, when faced with an enemy that they have.
In the United States, there is a war economy underway. It isn't like WW2 but is taking place with jobs and big government spending to support the fight. There are media restrictions and a lot of security but freedoms are generally what they are in peacetime. Shortages happen and there is not much long-distance travel going on. That said, there has been severe civil unrest in urban areas, especially when DAR attacks have knocked out the power, which has been compounded by the absence of police when the national guard and reserves have all been called up. In 'border states' of the Mid-West, there are FEMA camps for the few hundred thousand people who fled the West and those aren't pleasant places to be stuck in.
In once DAR-controlled areas now back in US hands, Colorado has civilian government (returning LG who took the Gov post) while New Mexico and increasing areas of Arizona have military control. There is war damage and internal refugees everywhere. FEMA is trying to provide aid and not doing as well as hoped. Open lawlessness in places has met a military response but away from watching eyes there has been absolute chaos.
In the DAR, there are wartime restrictions and wartime shortages. There is little of the economy left. A UBI scheme to provide a living has blown through most of the cash and is about to crash. The internet is mostly dark while the power is on and off. A huge black market has sprung up to supply smuggled goods, so many of those basis essentials at high prices. Mexicans and Central Americans have crossed the border in large numbers to be exploited. The fighting as the DAR Army retreats is smashing up a lot of those states. There is little fuel for private vehicles and no planes are flying. Abandoned homes have been looted and cities have seen significant unrest. It's pretty bad out West. There is a massive pro-democracy movement underway, one which grows daily in threat to the DAR regime and they are soon to take an iron fist too.

Hope that helps with the picture!
Civil wars are never very civil though at least in this one, neither side is going after civilians in any real way to do them harm. Each has punished service-personnel for even accidentally harming their 'fellow Americans', leading to many bomb runs / arty missions etc called off even when there is great military need at a tactical level.

I have female online friend in California and she's a Republican in a blue state. She lives in Santa Clarita and no doubt would have protested the DAR's independence. But it appears she would be stuck there for the time being.

I also have some Filipino-American friends serving in the Armed Forces: one aboard the USS Ronald Reagan, one as a U.S. Army paratrooper in Alaska, and one missile controller at Minot, AFB, North Dakota. The one serving on the Reagan would probably be in the DAR. The paratrooper in Alaska would likely remain part of the USA. The missile controller on the other hand would be in a precarious situation. His family is in California as he group in the Golden State but his assignment is a nuclear missile silo in the Midwest.

There would be all sorts of loyalty issues like that.
Family, politics and where you are from/live would come into it. There there would be a decision on what is right and wrong. Each side lost a lot of people, though many later did return to uniform, over such splits of conscience.

May 23, 2021 8:09:53 GMT sandyman said:

Some great updates James. I am glad to see the UK appearing in the story poor old Scotland I am sure they will get over it one small question who is the King is it Charles or William.

Thank you.
Scotland is a right mess and the UK doesn't have a nice Gov. in power.
I am not sure. Let's go with Charles if it is 'George'.

May 23, 2021 15:05:53 GMT Brky2020 said:

And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.
--Thomas Hobbes

After a bloody and contentious civil war in a time far advanced from that of Hobbes', life for the average American probably won't be that awful...but it won't be pleasant, either.

One thing is for certain: there is no going back to normal once all of this is done.

It'll never be the same again! Not after the slow but sure slid past what's maybe reasonable into what it is becoming.

[James G]

125 – Crackdown

The targeted killing of Lauren Quiroz had pushed her deputy upwards to take over her role as Minister for Public Safety. Desmond Thompson had been an early convert to the idea of a West America / New America and had spoken out significantly in support of secession of the West ahead of the Unilateral Declaration of Independence which created the Democratic American Republic. At that time, he was a Deputy US Attorney up in Washington state certain to lose his job when the new administration in DC took power. Fired by the Walsh Administration ahead of then for such public remarks, he’d been one of those sought for arrest by the federal government when the then president had tried to put down the civil unrest across the West. Thompson had left his home and gone on the run… sort of anyway. There wasn’t any real story of dashing bravery that could come from his hiding from FBI agents: he’d been at his parents house and hidden on that property when a cursory search was made for him there. When Governor Quinn first took power in Washington and then took the state out of the United States and into the DAR, Thompson had emerged from hiding and talked himself into prominence. He was a great communicator with a friendly media ready to listen, something he had only discovered right at the beginning of 2029 rather than any time previously in his career. There were ideas in him to use his public profile where he was such a strong supporter of the new country to make a run for political office in the parliament being established. Thompson was too late though: quicker than he and others with an eye on doing that imagined, there were others faster than them who made that jump into the (initially) only one hundred seats up for appointment. He didn’t have the political connections that those real politicians had. Quinn had taken notice of him when he had been such a media star in support of what she had done to take the statehouse in Olympia yet she didn’t trust him. He had jumped aboard late in the day as far as she was concerned and not really committed to the cause: he was an opportunist seeking to stay in employment. There were positions which she wanted to fill in her state in the legal field but Thompson wasn’t appointed to any of them despite his long experience and a willingness to serve. Someone else had believed that Thompson would be useful though and that had been the newly-appointed Minister for Public Safety.

Quiroz had met him when she had come to Seattle while on the search for a deputy and selected him to serve underneath her. It was a choice that raised many questions when there were clearly many far better candidates. The matter had gone to the – as it was then – Council of Thirteen with Quinn opposing the choice of Thompson at such an important post within the DAR Government. A strong majority of votes had come for Thompson though when other governors had been lobbied by Quiroz’s backers to accept her choice. Quiroz had kept Thompson out of the media limelight and had his doing important work to assist her in ensuring the safety of the public. He oversaw the preparations for prosecutions of internal political opponents of the DAR who were charged with treasonous activities. That was something he did far better than others had expected but not Quiroz: she’d seen that talent, and his zeal, and put him to use. Thompson was working on prosecutions through the Oregon and Washington state courts against those who continued to argue that the country was an illegal entity when Quiroz was killed by the US drone strike. The Council of Twelve were split on whether to appoint him as her successor or chose someone else. He was ready to step up and briefed on all of the issues facing the DAR though. The consideration was made that there wasn’t any time to mess around, something highlighted by Governor Isaac from Oregon when his state was engulfed by opponents to the DAR Government and Thompson was doing well going after them. The leadership gave him the job despite the uneasiness of many to that. Thompson repaid that support. He doubled down, he really went for those opposed to the regime down in Las Vegas as he displayed the abilities which Quiroz had seen in him from the start.

Not long into his new position, Thompson began a crackdown. It was quite something and much more than anyone had expected considering he wasn’t thought of a zealot to the cause but instead just an out-rider who had jumped onto the bandwagon. A trio of inciting incidents set off the nationwide crackdown. First, there was the Portland Riot. That Oregon city had been the scene of plentiful unrest before the DAR came into being and then again after the country’s formation. In mid-February, it was Marxist Vanguardists who unleashed chaos upon that city. They protested against the ‘capitalist war’ underway, supporting neither side in the conflict between the DAR and the US. Terror activities by them had been ongoing in the Pacific North-West despite the change of government and they moved to hi-jack an anti-war rally – organised by those against the fighting, not sharing the aims of the Vanguardists – with success to trash Portland. Down in Los Angeles, at another anti-war rally on the streets of California’s biggest city, yet again Mayor Antonio Vivanco Nández appeared at the head of a massive gathering of people there demanding not just an end to the fighting but a cessation of media restrictions imposed throughout the DAR. Phoenix was the third incident where the rioting there ahead of the movement of the front-lines of war towards that Arizona city brought out the public to protest against the DAR itself. Soldiers moving in to protect the city from United States attempts at liberation were attacked during that while the city’s mayor was regarded to have actively encouraged rebellion as part of his attempt to see Phoenix back with the United States. With permission from the Council of Twelve, Thompson went after more than just the ‘usual suspects’ for arrest. He was given permission to launch a widespread crackdown against open political dissent within the DAR which threatened its existence just as much as the advance of the United States Army North. He was allowed to go even further than Quiroz had ever dreamed of in detaining so many of those whose political views had previously been tolerated. It was ‘counter-revolutionaries’ he was taking on, so claimed the new Minister for Public Safety.


Arrests were made across the West. In California, the Pacific North-West, into Arizona & Nevada and up into both Idaho & Utah, so-called counter-revolutionaries were taken into custody either at their homes or their places of work. The highest profile arrest was that made of Mayor Vivanco. He didn’t go into custody easy and there was first a scuffle before shots were then fired. His wife had the gun and killed a California Highway Patrol officer assigned to the arrest team. Shots were returned and she was killed too while her husband was gravely wounded. The detention of Phoenix’s mayor was far less dramatic and without any violence. Soldiers were on-hand in case things went wrong there, just in case. Minister Thompson had a list which his office had compiled of those to be arrested. It was a long list at that. Dozens of those names were the same ones which had been on arrest lists which the Walsh Administration had instructed federal agents to use during the failed Operation Restore Order taking place before the formation of the DAR. Thompson himself had been one of those and he had avoided arrest them just like many figures from groups such as Revolución. That political organisation who had supported Maria Arreola Rodriquez, yet which she had never been in control of, had moved to oppose the war being fought. Quiroz first and then Thompson had been critical of Revolución yet their nation’s president had stood by them as they had stood by her. Alas, when the anti-war voices within took control and used the organisation for not its initial purpose, as had been seen out in Hawaii beforehand, Revolución was thrown to the wolves. Thompson had free rein to go after its top people. In addition, two members of the DAR Parliament, both former Members of the US Congress, had left that latter body just like they had resigned from the former. They had been active in the people protest movements against the ongoing fighting and made no secret of their wishes to see not just an end to the war but the DAR themselves. They had turned against their new country strongly and were arrested for doing that when it was against the law to do so.

Lower down, there were a good number of arrests made of relatively anonymous figures who stood in opposition to the DAR and what it was doing. Thompson had long wanted to see them brought to heel but they hadn’t crossed over the line into breaking the DAR’s laws – approved by the rubber-stamp parliament in Las Vegas – with regard to opposition to the country. He had approval to cut the heart out of the anti-war protest movement and that included those who hadn’t grabbed so much of the spotlight for themselves. The charges which were brought against them by the Minister for Public Safety were thin and wouldn’t have held up to ‘regular scrutiny’. However, where Governor Clarke in Utah had been doing his own thing with his own fiefdom out there in making similar arrests on such dubious grounds, Thompson followed that elsewhere across the DAR. Getting those people into custody was the priority rather than ensuring that there was enough evidence for a successful prosecution. Doing so went against everything that Thompson had ever done as a prosecutor himself yet he had moved into the political field and worried far less about such trivial matters. All told, from the highest profile figures such as Mayor Vivanco down to catering union officials in Las Vegas to community organisers in Seattle, there were one hundred and seventy-one arrests made: a further forty-seven of those sought evaded detention. There crackdown wasn’t going to stop there though.

None of what happened was something that was done in the public eye. The extensive media restrictions across the DAR, what people such as Los Angeles’ mayor had been angered enough about to start his break with Governor Pierce up in Sacramento over, meant that the vast majority of the public had no idea what was going on. Most parliamentarians out in Las Vegas nor state officials across the DAR weren’t told what happened with Thompson starting to detain as many people as he did either. The news was shut down. The Council of Twelve would never had approved the crackdown if that hadn’t been the case, if there was free reporting on what had gone on taking place. Walsh’s ‘Restore Order’ had in so many ways put them where they were and they had watched what had gone on in Hawaii with fright when people power swung back against them. Yet, the people were no longer aware of all that happened. Silence descended over their country. There was silence from opposition politicians, from the media and from any form of criticism. Those who had been unsure about Thompson weren’t afterwards. He had done what was asked of him and appeared to have cut their heart out of the growing people power counter-revolution against them.

[Brky2020]

So the DAR is slowly turning into the thing they would say they are not.

[gillan1220]

May 23, 2021 22:27:27 GMT Brky2020 said:

So the DAR is slowly turning into the thing they would say they are not.

Yeah. It reminds me of those CHAZ/CHOP or California secession movements that don't have a clear plan what to do next.

[gillan1220]

Hopefully, this does not happen just like your story.
Could the US Lose a War Over Taiwan?

[James G]

May 23, 2021 22:27:27 GMT Brky2020 said:

So the DAR is slowly turning into the thing they would say they are not.

Yep. They escaped from a 'fascist state' only to slowly create one of their own.

May 24, 2021 1:04:51 GMT gillan1220 said:

Yeah. It reminds me of those CHAZ/CHOP or California secession movements that don't have a clear plan what to do next.

They had a plan but the US, and the rest of the world, refused to co-operate. Oh, and the people too, those ungrateful sods!