Modern World STGOD Concept

[Skywalker_T-65]

The individual islands likely would have had slavery during the colonial period (being realistic and all). The Unification, coming a century after losing said colonies, outlawed slavery though.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

I've been reading up on Thai fishing boat slavers recently. We certainly have pirates, what's the status of slavery?
(it's not come up in any past histories yet)

The last time slavery became a feature in the game, we had Shep go nuclear and then we had to all pretend that away....

[Shinn Langley Soryu]

Slavery was introduced to Fuso by the Granadians and was a common practice during the colonial period, though it was abolished during the early years of the First Republic. Debt bondage was also common during the Granadian colonial period and was likewise abolished by the First Republic. Contemporary anti-slavery legislation is similar to that of Rheinland; slavery is punishable by death, any indentured person who reaches Fuso is automatically emancipated, et cetera. The Republic of Fuso Navy and Coast Guard also regularly conduct anti-slavery patrols. Regardless, human trafficking has been a growing problem in recent years.

[Steve]

Cascadians consider slavers to be pirates, and therefore hostis humanis generis (Thans can correct me if I got the term wrong). If Fuso is having problems with them, they can count on Cascadian authorities to help stamp it out.

[Simon_Jester]

Honestly, I doubt any major nation is going to be pro-slave trade; it's totally incompatible with modern economies and the conception of human rights most countries adhere to. Modern countries also usually aspire to a level of universal citizenship that makes kidnapping and enslaving their people tricky.

Umeria runs labor camps that are essentially legalized indentured servitude to the state, but that's within the norms in the real world and probably at least borderline OK here too.

The closest we're going to see to a slave trade is the equivalent of modern human trafficking: a covert, off-the-books operation that relies heavily on tricking people into foreign lands and then forcing them to work there under poor conditions. There won't be big ships carrying lines of slaves shackled in the hold.

Bottom line is, I feel I've put enough limits on my nation by severely limiting its military and physical size that I should not be asked to make even more concessions to what I can and cannot do. If it's expected of me that I won't engage in slippery corporate dodging and weaving I might as well throw in the towel right away. That's an inseparable part of what I want to do, to make it work requires players work with me on it, and that requires a level of OOC trust that cannot be caught in rules or game mechanics.

Here, I'm specifically anticipating an antagonistic relationship with some of the San Doradan megacorps, and I approve and endorse this.

[Siege]

A man is entitled to his life, his liberty and the sweat of his brow. In San Dorado this view developed around the end of the 17th century and by the time the 19th rolled around they were held as a self-evident truth. This development coincided with the move away from mercantilism to classical economics and the evolution of the city-state from a despotic merchant patriciate into the modern oligarchy of industrial statesmen.

The significance of this transformation - or indeed if it was a transformation at all - is likely disputed by historians abroad, but at least it coincided with the abolishment of 'villainous institutions' like the slave trade, probably somewhere in the early 18th century.

[Steve]

I suspect the concerns of being outed as using slave labor would keep any "it's cheaper" impulses in check?

[Eternal_Freedom]

Orion (and the Three Kingdoms) consider slavers to be on a par with pirates and human traffickers: if found, you are free to execute them.

[Force Lord]

Granadia abolished slavery relatively late, during the second half of the 19th century. The current National Populist regime is officially opposed to slavery, though punitive labor camps still exist.

[RogueIce]

For me, it probably happened, but by the time the Seven Cities united probably not as big a thing; their source of slaves would have been from the other Cities and well that wouldn't have worked after they were Unified. If there was some post-unification slavery it probably would have been snatched up Umerians or Hawai'ians or something like that.

Needless to say it is presently outlawed, though of course a certain amount of human trafficking probably goes on because law enforcement isn't perfect. Still, we investigate and prosecute as much as we can.

I doubt anti-slavery patrols would be a thing for the SRN to do. Absent some kind of an above-board slave trade from a nation somewhere that still allows it and another nation willing to sell their people, it's probably a waste of time and resources to have a dedicated anti-slavery patrol. What're we going to do, stop every merchant ship we come across?

Maybe if there's a place where we know is the origin of a lot of human trafficking maybe, but it seems to be something best dealt with via strong customs inspections so they can't sneak them in as easily, and then law enforcement to deal with whoever does get snuck in because no system is perfect.

[Thanas]

Well, our anti-slavery patrols are more directed against human traffickers, especially those operating into Rheinland proper.

[Siege]

I suspect the concerns of being outed as using slave labor would keep any "it's cheaper" impulses in check?

No, this is an aspect of morality the elites genuinely believe in. Slavery, treating people as property to be bought and sold and forced to labour without compensation, is anathema to San Dorado's libertarian underpinnings.

A major element of the city's mindset and draw is that anyone can come to San Dorado to be free and make something of their life. Corporations will happily pay terrible wages for long hours in awful conditions, but employees always have the option to quit and they will always be compensated for their work, however measly that compensation may be.

It helps of course that there's plenty cheap labour available, and there's probably shady outfits in the Sprawl or even just across the border in Omnia who are forcing new immigrants into slavelike conditions: sweatshops, prostitution rings, you name it. Officially though this is very much frowned upon and the people spearheading such rackets are in for a one-way trip to the mayor's gas chamber if they get caught.

When the Rampart Group, the city's biggest criminal cartel, catches them they'll do even worse things. Rumor has it because Jackie the Saint, the boss of bosses, has personal history involving slavery, but that's a subject best not brought up in her company if one values one's life.

[The Romulan Republic]

Do the NPCs near Corona still need to be sorted out?

Here are some suggestions:

Country number 8 is a democracy but it has authoritarian tendencies. However, its pretty peaceful/stable for now.

Country number 9 is a Christian theocracy. Its a source of refugees fleeing to nearby countries including Corona and theocratic supporters of secession in Corona. Corona hates it and is supporting reformers their but doesn't want to go to war. It has a less competent but larger military.

Number 31 is a monarchy. Its like Corona without democracy. Its also tiny (basically a city state). Corona has supported it in the past because it was between them and Omnia, but lately Corona has made it clear that support depends on reform.

Is this acceptable?

[Thanas]

Beowulf, why do you have the relations to Rheinland set to frosty? were you involved in the eighty years war or something?

Also, what percentage of GDP are you using for your military?

[Steve]

That's because he's ornery.

[Thanas]

That's because he's ornery.

Lol. Yeah, but Rheinland is the only one where it is "frosty", whereas even Cascadia and Klavostan have better relations with him ("rocky"). So I am wondering why....

[Simon_Jester]

Where did he say frosty is worse than rocky?

[Thanas]

He didn't, that is my interpretation. Maybe it is wrong.

[Steve]

I still have to figure out an OrBat, but I'll be operating under these principles:

A) The need for a strong army to watch the Klavo border. Considering at least eight, possibly ten or fourteen active divisions, with another four to eight divisions of reservists, for the national army in total. Selective Service has replaced Conscription in the last few decades. The scale of the army will be determined by what Klavo and I determine for our relations in the last decade or so.

B) The need for a first rate air force, although quality would be preferred to quantity. Cascadia will have Boeing and North-Lockheed as its primary aircraft companies, and will be capable of fielding 5th Gen fighters. The Air Force will be focused on the missions of defending the skies of the country, potential deployment to assist friendly countries with aerial missions, and strategic airlift for that second role plus moving troops across our territory quickly. There will be a bomber force, but disposition of tactical versus strategic roles will await talks with Klavo.

C) A Navy that can project power into South America and the western Pacific. I've yet to decide on whether I'll have full Nimitz-style CVNs or if my budget and desired fleet size requires something smaller/cheaper. I do intend to bring back a number of designs from SDNW2, including my 16,000T cruisers. To save on escorts I will probably also go back to the SDNW2 practice of Joint Carrier Operations Groups, that is, my carrier groups will have both a carrier and an LHD (with supporting LPDs) with shared escorts. It reduces flexibility in deployment but lets me field both capacities on a smaller escort fleet.

D) A well-developed air defense network for all of my territories, including the use of dedicated interceptor aircraft.

The main issue I'm facing is how much of these three goals I can feasibly achieve on a defense budget in the range of $320-$400 billion (4-5% GDP range). Depending on Klavo's level of milittarization (and looking at Beo's), I may even consider a defense budget over $400 billion, but I don't want to hit half a trillion before in-game stuff commences.

[Siege]

Do the NPCs near Corona still need to be sorted out?

Here are some suggestions:

Country number 8 is a democracy but it has authoritarian tendencies. However, its pretty peaceful/stable for now.

Country number 9 is a Christian theocracy. Its a source of refugees fleeing to nearby countries including Corona and theocratic supporters of secession in Corona. Corona hates it and is supporting reformers their but doesn't want to go to war. It has a less competent but larger military.

Number 31 is a monarchy. Its like Corona without democracy. Its also tiny (basically a city state). Corona has supported it in the past because it was between them and Omnia, but lately Corona has made it clear that support depends on reform.

Is this acceptable?

Sounds good to me, bit sparse but that can always be developed later. Do you have any names in mind? I imagine that since Corona is next door they'd have a reasonably similar sort of culture, so what names would make sense for them?

[Beowulf]

He didn't, that is my interpretation. Maybe it is wrong.

Rocky and frosty both imply negative relations. The difference is the activeness of the relations. Komradistan actively dislikes non-commies, even if they did help in overthrowing the prior government. Tianguo helped overthrow a Cascadian allied government, in order to prevent a perceived potential hegemony of the continent. And Dreisgrond had Tianguo meddling in their civil war.

Tianguo is merely passively unhappy about the outcome of the 80 years war, in specific, the annexation of two countries. However, it very pointedly did not participate in the Great War II, prefering instead to remain actively non-belligerent.

I haven't decided on the exact percent of GDP being used by the military. That's why I don't have numbers in my wiki for ships or aircraft.

[Simon_Jester]

With some assistance from Timothy I've worked out most of what my navy and air force have. I don't think I can do realistic force numbers myself; it'd be an interesting exercise given that Umeria's economy has been growing pretty rapidly for the past 20-30 years, and at a pretty good clip before that... but that if you go back to the 1955-1980 timeframe, the country was very avidly building up modern military capabilities.

So you'd see a Soviet-like bulge of equipment dating back to the '50s and '60s. Some time in the late '60s or early '70s the leadership went "all this illustrious high capability foreign stuff... if we don't learn to build it ourselves we're going to be unable to defend ourselves without foreign support." So they retrenched and started trying to design their own weapon systems.

A few years after that they realized they'd been neglecting the civilian economy a bit in order to give Umeria some big nasty teeth for the first time in a century or two, adjusted priorities... and that's pretty much the pattern up to today.

Their native design establishment is limited in scope (they can basically work on one advanced aircraft, one large warship design, and one submarine at a time), but has gotten fairly competent. They have some genuinely first rate surface warships (Umeria ain't Umeria without atomic rocket cruisers, and they're built to battleship scale) and were able to roll out their own fifth generation fighter (with teething difficulties) during the first decade of the 21st century. Their latest pride and joy is a high-performance bomber, but they only have like four of the things and probably won't break single digits for another year or two.

Their army is well organized but kind of primitive, still relying heavily on attempts to modernize that 50s and 60s-vintage hardware. The artillery is quite effective and modern, though.
_______________________

By the way, Beo, when would the J-10 have become available for purchase? What about license-building? And was there ever a 'super J-10' modernization program to bring the avionics up to date and create some viable modern airframes for the beast that aren't falling apart?

[Beowulf]

By the way, Beo, when would the J-10 have become available for purchase? What about license-building? And was there ever a 'super J-10' modernization program to bring the avionics up to date and create some viable modern airframes for the beast that aren't falling apart?

The J-10 has received multiple improvements over the years, from it's first flight in 1961. It reached service in 1964. The first major upgrade program occured in 1974, upgrading the radar to the same as that on the F-14 seen in service in Shinra and Hawai'i. The second upgrade was in 1985, adding the ability to take conformal fuel and sensor packs, amongst other upgrades. The third major upgrade was in 1991, which further improved the radar with a digital backend, and a "glass" cockpit, and the capability to take the new small diameter long range AA missile. By the early 2000's, it's successor was entering service. Foreign sales of the J-10 occured after the majority of deliveries to the Navy completed for each production batch. This was approximately 1970 for the first variant.

Assume each upgrade had a new production batch, lasting for several years. As such, the youngest J-10 could be only 15 years old or so. Possibly younger, is someone wants a J-10 with more advanced avionics, like AESA radar. Tianguo would instead be buying the new J-12 aircraft, however.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Ok, I'll be working on my OrBat in the next few days. Which is/are the country/countries that are building F-15E, F/A-18, F-22 and Eurofighter Typhoons? And of those, which woudl be amenable to a license-building arrangement with Orion? (For reference, I'm using "license-building" in the way that Japan has their F-15J's).

Also is anyone still building/built relatively recently A-10's, AC-130's and Apache helicopters? I think my Air Force needs some of those

[Skywalker_T-65]

Rheinland, I think.

If I'm not misremembering Thanas' OrBat.