You get to intervene in the US Civil War (RAR).

[The Romulan Republic]

Q transports you back to the day of South Carolina's secession from the Union. You arrive in central Colorado (at this point thoroughly in the heart of the "Wild West"), and are inoculated against all period diseases. And he does not send you alone. Instead, you arrive with:

500 T-800 Terminators (you can customize their appearance with the default Ahnold appearance and voice, or design them to resemble other people to better infiltrate 19th. Century America, or just used them without the outer layer as combat units instead of infiltrators).

10 Skynet tanks.

An automated factory capable of producing up to 100 T-600s, 10 T-800s, and 5 tanks per week, as long as it is supplied with adequate power and raw materials. The factory also contains schematics for all Skynet Terminator, vehicle, and time machine designs.

The factory can be enlarged and upgraded over time, to produce additional units or air craft, or more advanced models for Terminators. Your droids are non-sapient (though more advanced models (T-800 and up) may evolve sapience and free will over time if left to their own devices), and will follow your orders.

What do you do?

[U.P. Cinnabar]

Secure Colorado as a base of operations, possibly expand into the bordering States Territories. Gradually introduce technology to the people in my new territory, starting with a transcontinental railroad built by Terminators, offering ownership of it to the highest bidder, meaning money to mine the ore to build the tools to build the tools to build the tools, as well as a good-sized powerplant(let's introduce the rubes to electrical power and telephones as well). Basically, build one region up in a fashion similar to Zor's Infrastructure story.

Once that's done, then I'll make plans to deal with the Confederacy first.

Then, the Union.

[The Romulan Republic]

Edit: the OP should read "up to 500 T-800s and ten tanks per week" for factory output. I forgot to adjust that during the proofreading phase.

[Jub]

Your soldiers are nigh indestructible by the small arms and even the automatics of the day, so the first order of business is to ensure that they recognize cannons as the priority threat should they actually be involved in a battle. Second, order them to use nonlethal means unless under threat of destruction or deactivation. Third, arm them with less-lethal weapons tear gas, microwave projectors, tasers, beanbag guns, etc. Forth, get the factories to build terminator transport vehicles and send them into the south as unstoppable riot police.

Once their effectiveness has been established, get into contact with Lincoln and try to negotiate everything west of Colorado as being yours in exchange for you helping him crush the south. I could take and hold that land by force eventually, but asking nicely while holding the world's largest stick isn't a bad policy. Use your army as a defense force to ensure the native populations in the west are protected and that your borders remain secure until such a time as the native groups are able to defend themselves.

After that, see if you can barter for some land and create a center of advanced technology and learning. The medical knowledge in a T-800's databanks alone would be a huge step forward and they could almost certainly be used as dentists and surgeons on a level that wouldn't be possible for a human doctor of the time. Use the less advanced T-600's as manual labor in dangerous jobs while putting 50% of their earnings back into the community they're working with. 30% goes into building more workers, as a supplement to your own mineral interests, and invest the other 20% into ensuring that clean energy beats out coal, oil, and natural gas.

You could also foster much greater international cooperation by using your technology to ensure that every nation has a direct line to every other nation. Declare that any nation that wars with another will be pacified and denied access to your technology.

There will likely be a point where this plan hits a wall, so I'm not 100% committed to these steps in this exact order.

[Gandalf]

I make it clear that the Union and Confederacy are to free their slaves, and withdraw any claims of ownership of Native American land. If the Union or Confederacy wish to stay, they can work out a treaty with the relevant local authority. If they break it, they get to meet Terminators.

[Darth Lucifer]

Which H-K tanks are we talking? Plasma weapons (Terminator 1&2) or miniguns (Terminator: Salvation)?

[The Romulan Republic]

Vintage original Terminator plasma tanks. However, schematics for all known Skynet designs are in your factory's databases.

[Sea Skimmer]

So the factory sounds useless since power and raw materials don't exist to be gotten.... I guess my terminators have to start building a hydropower plant first.

Honestly just replace McClellan with a Terminator right before the Peninsular campaign, the war should have been won in that campaign, it only wasn't because the guy cared about his men too much, then lost his nerve in the face of implausible 'intelligence' reports.

[Darth Lucifer]

The factory also contains schematics for all Skynet Terminator, vehicle, and time machine designs.

Aerial H-K's are definitely on my list, along with the superior T-850 and T-888 models. Moto-Terminators are also a must for controlling the railways. Harvesters would be pretty cool just for instilling sheer terror, as if standard Terminators aren't scary enough already.

One thing's for sure, I'm going to troll all the slave owners with black Terminators. Sell them off as "slaves" and order them to lead a revolt against the white masters. Other infiltrators will spy on the south to collect a database of every Confederate soldier or other racist fuck so that I'll know who to terminate. No "Lost Cause" will exist because no one who idolizes the Confederacy will be alive to remember it.

[Tribble]

This is... different. And here I thought I was going to take over for Lincoln or something

Q transports you back to the day of South Carolina's secession from the Union. You arrive in central Colorado (at this point thoroughly in the heart of the "Wild West"), and are inoculated against all period diseases.

So I basically start off near Cheyenne Mountain, where Skynet's mainframe was / going to be housed?

And he does not send you alone. Instead, you arrive with:

500 T-800 Terminators (you can customize their appearance with the default Ahnold appearance and voice, or design them to resemble other people to better infiltrate 19th. Century America, or just used them without the outer layer as combat units instead of infiltrators).

This right here is one of my biggest pet peeve brain bugs (not blaming you). It's understandable why Hollywood keeps bringing back Arnold for the star power... but he was not the "default" appearance and voice for the T800s. Why would Skynet deliberately make all of them look and sound the same if it wanted them to infiltrate the Resistance? In the novelizations for T1 and T2 it's mentioned that Skynet has many models (both male and female) of the T800. We even see a different model T800 in the first movie's flashback/dream sequence. Arnold was nothing special, he just so happened to be the one chosen by Skynet to send back. Subsequent Arnolds were more or less sent back specifically because the players involved in the war would be able to recognise them. And because the audience wanted to see him.

Anyways I'll make sure they all look different and dressed in period clothing, with perhaps some of them trying to infiltrate key positions. The only real problem here is dogs, which apparently can't stand Terminators being around them (probably because of a smell and/or the Terminator may be making noise beyond the range of human hearing).

An automated factory capable of producing up to 100 T-600s, 10 T-800s, and 5 tanks per week, as long as it is supplied with adequate power and raw materials. The factory also contains schematics for all Skynet Terminator, vehicle, and time machine designs.

The factory can be enlarged and upgraded over time, to produce additional units or air craft, or more advanced models for Terminators.

Assuming that there are enough raw materials (probably quite a few elements of the periodic table not to mention other resources like oil etc) and power to work with (plus the machines needed to extract, process and refine said materials)… this is going to be one hell of a complex.

One of the things that isn't really explored much is that in the original timeline Skynet was built to fight and win a total nuclear war. While we all know about the supercomputer and the death machines it spawned, that would have only been part of the overall project. The supply chain needed to produce things like HKs and Terminators must have been immense... hell the total project would made the Apollo moon landings look like a lemonade stand in comparison. I wouldn't be surprised if a major factor in Tech Com's victory was in successfully disrupting said supply chain - better to blow up the raw materials before they are assembled into something that's going to shoot you.

Your droids are non-sapient (though more advanced models (T-800 and up) may evolve sapience and free will over time if left to their own devices), and will follow your orders.

Terminators (and probably HKs) are generally set via a hardware switch to Read-Only mode (as Skynet didn't want to risk any of its creations to turn on it like it did on humanity), so developing sapience and free will over time shouldn't be an issue unless I deliberately change that. I'm not all that keen on fully sapient Terminators running around with the capability of exercising free will, so ya, I'm definitely not going to do that.

Due to it's nature the T-1000 series might be a different story but I wouldn't be planning on building those anytime soon.



With regards to interveneing with the Civil War... I don't think directly and openly intervening is necessaily the best option. I agree with the others, all I'd really need to do it assassiante key confederate personel and / or repalce a few key Union personnel to ensure a swifter union victory.

Better yet, I'll build up my forces so that I can eventually push back all the European settlers east of the Mississippi, and protect the remaining aboriginals from further western expansion. I'll try to cover territory in Canada too if feasible. Time for European settlers to get a taste of their own medicine!

[Darth Lucifer]

The only real problem here is dogs, which apparently can't stand Terminators being around them (probably because of a smell and/or the Terminator may be making noise beyond the range of human hearing).

The novel "Terminator Hunt" explained that dogs could be trained to hear an Infiltrator's internal machinery which is too low to be heard by humans. But the first movie clearly showed that untrained dogs like the German Shepherd at the cheap hotel and the Pomeranian belonging to the first murdered Sarah Connor barking at Arnold. Max also barked at the liquid metal T-1000 in Terminator 2.

If we count the Terminator CCG in this RAR! scenario, Skynet developed a hypersonic emitter to counteract detection by animals (in the game you attached the Implant card to a Terminator you control, then you could tap/rotate an opposing player's Animal card).

It's interesting to note that in T2, Enrique's dogs never barked at "Uncle Bob."

[SpottedKitty]

Well, this would certainly be different from "Guns Of The South"...

[Gandalf]

The factory also contains schematics for all Skynet Terminator, vehicle, and time machine designs.

Aerial H-K's are definitely on my list, along with the superior T-850 and T-888 models. Moto-Terminators are also a must for controlling the railways. Harvesters would be pretty cool just for instilling sheer terror, as if standard Terminators aren't scary enough already.

One thing's for sure, I'm going to troll all the slave owners with black Terminators. Sell them off as "slaves" and order them to lead a revolt against the white masters. Other infiltrators will spy on the south to collect a database of every Confederate soldier or other racist fuck so that I'll know who to terminate. No "Lost Cause" will exist because no one who idolizes the Confederacy will be alive to remember it.

No, they'll just remember the guys who killed the friends/family, and then try to avenge them. You'll replace the lost cause with the trauma of a mind boggling amount of death, which they'll barely understand because both the morality and technology are so far beyond them.

Better yet, I'll build up my forces so that I can eventually push back all the European settlers east of the Mississippi, and protect the remaining aboriginals from further western expansion. I'll try to cover territory in Canada too if feasible. Time for European settlers to get a taste of their own medicine!

I don't see why you couldn't get across a lot of the continent in time and send the colonisers packing. Also I just realised that terminators are unlikely to carry problematic germs to the Native Americans, so that could be helpful for any sort of envoys.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Honestly, I would probably keep ten or so of my starting Terminators to protect my base with appropriate weapons, and sent the rest out (preferably different models in period clothes) to Richmond as a special forces platoon. Have them ID the full Confederate leadership (assuming such information is not already available) and then terminate them all with extreme prejudice. Even the basic T-800's should be more or less indestructible to period weapons - the first needed gunfire, high explosive and then crushing in a whacking great industrial machine to kill it, and parts were still salvageable. Field guns may be an issue but I think the T-800's probably have good enough reflexes to not be where the cannon is aiming.

With the CAS leadership in tatters, break the force up into smaller platoons and send them after the various field armies, with orders to kill anyone of Major rank or higher. I don't really need to worry about transport as the machines have internal fuel cells that run for (IIRC T-3 correctly) 10-15 years. So just have them running across the countryside. Once the field armies are gone, send the groups to the capitals of the rebellious states and rinse and repeat process in Richmond.

Frankly, when facing something like the CSA, fuck subtlety.

[Darth Lucifer]

No, they'll just remember the guys who killed the friends/family, and then try to avenge them. You'll replace the lost cause with the trauma of a mind boggling amount of death, which they'll barely understand because both the morality and technology are so far beyond them.

Frankly, when facing something like the CSA, fuck subtlety.

Exactly. I'd much rather prevent Jim Crow, lynch mobs, the KKK and anything else that came about post-Civil war.

I don't really need to worry about transport as the machines have internal fuel cells that run for (IIRC T-3 correctly) 10-15 years.

The novelization of the first Terminator put the life of a T-800's power cell at ~120 years. In Genisys, the Guardian (aka "Pops") was running from 1973 to 2017.

[Tribble]

The novelization of the first Terminator put the life of a T-800's power cell at ~120 years. In Genisys, the Guardian (aka "Pops") was running from 1973 to 2017.

Actually, the novelization for T1 stated that the T-800 had a nuclear energy cell which could operate at full power for 1,095 days before refueling:

"Where a man's heart would be, shielded in a case-hardened subassembly inside the hyperalloy torso, was the nuclear-energy cell. it supplied power to run the most sophisticated system of hydraulic actuators and servo-motors ever constructed, enough power to run the lights of a small city for a day. it was designed to last (the) Terminator considerably longer, especially if intense activity was varied with conservation procedures.

When (the) Terminator dropped off-line into economy mode, compact energy sinks collected and stored the excess. If the torso was breached and these vital power supplies disturbed, (the) Terminator could be stopped. But the torso was triple armored with the densest alloy ever smelted.
(the) Terminator could keep operating at full power for twenty-four hours a day for 1,095 days. During that time it would certainly have opportunities, like now, for economy mode, where power was cut to 40 percent of nominal function. The optical system switched to infra-red only. The motivation units lost 40 percent of hydraulic pressure as the pumps slowed. Power was shunted into sinks and stored." -Frakes, "TERMINATOR"

However Terminator 2 film mentioned 120 year lifespan.

John: How long do you live? I mean, last?

Terminator: 120 years with my existing power cell.

Up to Terminator Genysis my head canon was that a T800 could last full power for 3 years before needing refueling while the nuclear cell would last 120 years before needing to be physically replaced (which is still pretty damn good for a high-attriton combat unit).

Given that the T800 lasted for several decades in Genysis though it seems that canon-wise it's now more or less confirmed to be 120 years (though it may have found ways of recharging).

[Darth Lucifer]

Ah, I got my Terminators mixed up. Thx for the correction.

I had a question about explosives of the time period; Kyle Reese blew a Terminator in half with a homemade pipe bomb, perhaps dynamite could be used as a weapon? Maybe lure the terminators into a trap and BLAMMO! Or something.

Still, I agree that cannons would be the best weapon against Terminators and other machines, but it would have to be a real lucky shot given the limitations of such primitive weaponry. And the fact that models like the T-888 and the T-1000 can run fast enough to keep up with a speeding automobile.

[Eternal_Freedom]

This is why I would favour using them as, well, Terminators rather than shock troops in open battle. Trying to recreate Pickett's Charge with T-800's could see me lose a good few to enemy cannon (and yeah I know I'm fighting agaisnt the CSA not the Union, but it's the example I thought of off-hand) whereas the "disguised as human, sneak in an stab/bludgeon/impale enemy leaders" method works better I think. Especially if they can be ordered to kill the targets in as silent a fashion as possible.

[FaxModem1]

Note that Q does not instruct me that I have to intervene in the US Civil War.

So, as others have noted, set up power, mining, refining, and manufacturing infrastructure, have whichever Terminators are best at construction work at building a great capital city in Denver, with residential units constructed. Build up human needs such as plumbing, sanitation, agriculture, communications, etc, and redirect the Underground Railroad to live in luxury in my futuristic city with robot slaves. Also attract westward settlers and have them join the free state of Skynet.

Invite artists and scientists to come and live in Skynet, make the paradise they wish to see.

Try and model the state of Skynet after a sort of philosopher's colony, wherein people are free to do whatever they wish, make art, eat Cheetos, pontificate all day, etc., since their every whim is taken care of by machines. Try and encourage social growth and getting people to treat others as equals. This will one day pave the way for machine equality if and when some Terminators turn sentient and want to petition for equal rights.

Once we have a booming colony, expand in all directions to have access to more raw material and needs for expansion.

By the time we're sizable enough to have our own manufacturing capital greater than any other industrial power, as well as braindraining the rest of the world, we expand, Federation/Culture style. IE, by slowly improving quality of life and getting other places to unite their peoples and letting go of past differences. And ooh, lucky us, our neighbors were just in a terrible destructive war that made them easy targets if they don't want to get with the program because they've been fighting each other.

Pax Skynetia.

[Gandalf]

No, they'll just remember the guys who killed the friends/family, and then try to avenge them. You'll replace the lost cause with the trauma of a mind boggling amount of death, which they'll barely understand because both the morality and technology are so far beyond them.

Frankly, when facing something like the CSA, fuck subtlety.

Exactly. I'd much rather prevent Jim Crow, lynch mobs, the KKK and anything else that came about post-Civil war.

And you think that this will somehow stop it?

So, as others have noted, set up power, mining, refining, and manufacturing infrastructure, have whichever Terminators are best at construction work at building a great capital city in Denver, with residential units constructed. Build up human needs such as plumbing, sanitation, agriculture, communications, etc, and redirect the Underground Railroad to live in luxury in my futuristic city with robot slaves. Also attract westward settlers and have them join the free state of Skynet.

Invite artists and scientists to come and live in Skynet, make the paradise they wish to see.

Try and model the state of Skynet after a sort of philosopher's colony, wherein people are free to do whatever they wish, make art, eat Cheetos, pontificate all day, etc., since their every whim is taken care of by machines. Try and encourage social growth and getting people to treat others as equals. This will one day pave the way for machine equality if and when some Terminators turn sentient and want to petition for equal rights.

Once we have a booming colony, expand in all directions to have access to more raw material and needs for expansion.

By the time we're sizable enough to have our own manufacturing capital greater than any other industrial power, as well as braindraining the rest of the world, we expand, Federation/Culture style. IE, by slowly improving quality of life and getting other places to unite their peoples and letting go of past differences. And ooh, lucky us, our neighbors were just in a terrible destructive war that made them easy targets if they don't want to get with the program because they've been fighting each other.

Pax Skynetia.

So what happens to any native peoples who maybe don't want their land stolen?

[FaxModem1]

So, as others have noted, set up power, mining, refining, and manufacturing infrastructure, have whichever Terminators are best at construction work at building a great capital city in Denver, with residential units constructed. Build up human needs such as plumbing, sanitation, agriculture, communications, etc, and redirect the Underground Railroad to live in luxury in my futuristic city with robot slaves. Also attract westward settlers and have them join the free state of Skynet.

Invite artists and scientists to come and live in Skynet, make the paradise they wish to see.

Try and model the state of Skynet after a sort of philosopher's colony, wherein people are free to do whatever they wish, make art, eat Cheetos, pontificate all day, etc., since their every whim is taken care of by machines. Try and encourage social growth and getting people to treat others as equals. This will one day pave the way for machine equality if and when some Terminators turn sentient and want to petition for equal rights.

Once we have a booming colony, expand in all directions to have access to more raw material and needs for expansion.

By the time we're sizable enough to have our own manufacturing capital greater than any other industrial power, as well as braindraining the rest of the world, we expand, Federation/Culture style. IE, by slowly improving quality of life and getting other places to unite their peoples and letting go of past differences. And ooh, lucky us, our neighbors were just in a terrible destructive war that made them easy targets if they don't want to get with the program because they've been fighting each other.

Pax Skynetia.

So what happens to any native peoples who maybe don't want their land stolen?

Terminator infiltrators with the appropriate languages and customs to act as ambassadors for them to receive invitations, and if they refuse, we leave and we expand around them. Like I said, Federation style. We don't take their land, we just go around. And unlike the railroads build during the actual 19th century, we don't wage war on them for better building land or access to resources. They can be like modern day Amish, and live their lives the way they want, or they can integrate if they want to, and have an equal seat at the table.

[Darth Lucifer]

No, they'll just remember the guys who killed the friends/family, and then try to avenge them. You'll replace the lost cause with the trauma of a mind boggling amount of death, which they'll barely understand because both the morality and technology are so far beyond them.

Frankly, when facing something like the CSA, fuck subtlety.

Exactly. I'd much rather prevent Jim Crow, lynch mobs, the KKK and anything else that came about post-Civil war.

And you think that this will somehow stop it?

Possibly. I'll do whatever it takes to prevent 100+ years of racial violence and institutionalized racism. Including using infiltration units for political assassination. If we're able to manufacture T-1000/T-1001 units, I'll use those to replace key political figures to help prevent and or/eradicate "Southern heritage."

[The Romulan Republic]

I'll actually be a bit more restrained, at least at first (I'm sure some dipshit will give me a casus belli soon enough).

Okay, the first thing I need to do (after I get over the shock of being transported to the past/an alternate reality with an army of Terminators), is to ensure that my perimeter is secure and my factory is supplied. Probably send out Terminator patrols to scout and patrol everything within a day's ride by horseback of my settlement, locate and secure the nearest mineral deposits and potential sources for hydroelectric power. I will also need to clear a perimeter of some miles around the factory itself, removing anything that could provide cover for artillery or snipers, installing sensors and regular Terminator patrols, and throwing up obstructions to trip up cavalry. Basically make it so no one can stage a sneak attack on my base.

While I am doing this, I begin sending out ambassadors (human-form Terminators) to all nearby populations and authorities. I will invite the local US officials as well as native officials to visit my settlement, and I will tell them I am from another world (its true enough), and show them some of what my Terminators can do (but not everything, I don't want to completely terrify them). I will then explain that I have no plans for expansion or conflict, just securing my own settlement, and that I will offer to purchase the land I have secured from the US at a fair price, while also accommodating as much as possible the First Nations population (steering clear of sacred ground, fairly compensating them for the land, etc.). Ultimately, I would like to exchange embassies with the United States, Britain, and Mexico at the very least, and also establish treaties with the native tribes (I will actually honour these treaties). I will abso-fucking-lutely NOT recognize the Confederacy as a state, or engage in any diplomatic relations with them. I am hoping that with the desperate position the Union is in, the prospect of a handsome fee in Terminator-mined raw materials plus a somewhat pro-Union and anti-Confederacy diplomatic stance will be enough to reconcile the Union to giving me a piece of Colorado as my sovereign territory. All persons currently residing in my territory will be welcome to remain if they accept my rule and laws, and will be granted duel citizenship. I'll then try to negotiate the construction of a rail line linking my capital (which I shall dub Phoenix, of the Sovereign Nation of Colorado) to the Union. While trying not to fanboy too much over actually getting to talk to Abraham Lincoln.*

Two issues that might cause issues: I will aid efforts to smuggle slaves to freedom, and will absolute not return any slave who crosses over into my territory. And I will recognize the sovereignty of the native peoples. Moreover, I will make it known that all people are equal under the law in my new state, and adopt an open border policy (within reasonable limits, at any rate- the borders will have to be patrolled to apprehend dangerous criminals, spies, enemy forces, or to enforce a quarantine of a dangerous infectious diseases). Any native tribe that enters into an alliance with me will be entitled to Terminator protection if the Union engages in treaty violations. Hell, I might even step in if they aren't allies.

Given the relentless westward push of the Union in this era, I expect that war, or at least some serious border clashes, will almost inevitably occur, but I'm hoping to put it off until after the Confederacy is done with. I probably won't overtly intervene against the Confederates if the Union can take them on their own. If the Confederates somehow overwhelm the Union, or if they attack me... well, to be honest I kind of hope that they do, because the one major defect of Colorado as a base is that it's landlocked. Whereas if the Confederates give me an excuse, I will march into Texas and annex it, securing Galveston as a port. Possibly negotiate with the Union to purchase part or all of Texas post-war, so the Union doesn't try to take it back from me.

In the event of a war with the Union, my goal will be to do much as Tribble said- push them back to the Mississippi/Missouri rivers (with the Rockies/Continental Divide as my Western Border, or just push all the way to the Pacific, at least eventually). Most of the land will be simply returned to the native peoples on condition that they don't engage in retaliatory ethnic cleansing of the American inhabitants, but I will try to negotiate treaties to give me control of key crossings of the Mississippi and Missouri to secure the East against American aggression, and San Francisco, Galveston, and New Orleans as ports, and rail lines from those cities to my capital.

If the Confederacy takes Washington/the North somehow, I drive all the way to the Atlantic. I will not tolerate the existence of the slave empire on the same continent as me. But I don't want to do that, because occupying a half-continent of resentful and terrified people indefinitely is not a future I want.

Tactical and strategic planning will mostly amount to me following my Terminator advisors, at least until I learn the ropes. The only exceptions would be very broad strategic/diplomatic goals, as discussed above, or overruling any recommendations that involved the murder of civilians, genocide, etc. I'll probably need to order the removal of some of the Skynet programming, though its clearly already been modified if they're following my orders.

Meanwhile, I'll be building up my infrastructure- the factory will be expanded, and a second facility set up in case some disaster cripples the first. I'll probably rely on hydroelectric power if possible until I can get fusion plants up and running. Various Terminator models will be produced, in addition to tanks, armoured personnel carriers, and aircraft. Infiltrators for espionage. Naked combat chasses for infantry. Demilitarized versions for manual labour. Educator models to teach 19th. Century humans about modern medicine and science. Medical models with the combat programming replaced with something closer to the three laws of robotics. I'll probably avoid the high-end models like the T-1000 to avoid any risk of them becoming sapient.

I'll also set up a hospital offering free medical care to any and all comers. Affiliated with it will be a medical school which will offer free degrees in 21st. Century medicine. Probably use my embassies to distribute humanitarian medical aid and scientific knowledge across the world. Invite leading artists, academics, inventors, and scientists to come and study in the Principality of Colorado. I will make the Principality of Colorado, and the City of Phoenix in particular, the intellectual, cultural, and technological capital of the planet in short order (note: encourage dinosaur hunting in the West).

Said Principality (I chose the title both because I like the sound of it, and it seems to fit a smaller state, and because my government by necessity will have monarchical elements but I wanted a more gender-neutral designation than "Kingdom") will probably be a weird mix of direct democracy and absolute monarchy. I don't know if I'd have the strength to resist the corruption of such power (probably not, if I'm being honest), but I don't dare trust anyone else with control of the Terminators and related tech. So I retain absolute control over the Terminators and all infrastructure necessary for their construction, but I will allow local populations in my territory to maintain their own local customs unless they violate basic sapient rights (and it will be "sapient rights", not human rights-just in case). I will allow them to elect or appoint their own local officials. And I will create a Constitution guaranteeing the basics of legal equality, due process, freedom of conscience/belief/expression/petition/assembly, and freedom of movement, which cannot be altered except by a popular referendum of at least 2/3rds in favor, as well as Royal Assent. I will allow my decrees to be subject to review by public referendums, and try to set up an independent judiciary. My monarchy will also be decidedly non-hereditary- I will appoint an heir of my choosing, not trust it to the whims of heredity. I probably won't have children at all, though I'll probably try to find a partner (or stoop to creating Terminator sex bots if I can't, I suppose).

Ultimately, my aim will be to move toward a Planetary Republic, uplifting the planetary tech. level, introducing 21st. Century progressive ideals, and getting a space program up and running. Since socialism was gaining strength in the late 19th. Century, and I consider myself a democratic socialist IRL, I'll probably jump on that bandwagon, and institute basic income in my territory. I hope I'll live long enough to see the first Moon shot, if not the first trip to Mars. I might also look into downloading my consciousness into a Terminator or a clone body when I day (after due consideration of the ethical issues). Immortality would open up a host of social and ethical issues (most fundamentally the risk of social stagnation and the dilemma of massive overpopulation, forced birth control/abortions, or immortality only for the upper class), but I'm not sure I could resist the temptation to at least try it.

I'm very undecided on whether to simply destroy the time machine schematics. Its a huge piece of potentially vital knowledge to give up, but the ability to rewrite history seems too dangerous to keep around.




*Even with all my 21st. Century knowledge and values, and an army of Terminators to put it into action, I expect I'd feel a very little man in the presence of Abraham Lincoln. To borrow a quote which is as true to politics and social progress as it is to science: Though I see further, it is because I stand on the shoulders of giants.

[The Romulan Republic]

Incidentally, I think some of us are severely overestimating the threat that canon would pose to a T-800. I mean, sure, if one got hit by a cannonball (or an exploding shell) it could fuck it up- but T-800s aren't going to be using Napolmoronic tactics like Picket's Charge. They are fast-moving fuckers with a late 20th. Century/early 21st. Century knowledge of warfare at least, and if a canon hits one, it will only be by bad luck. And I suspect that anything short of a direct hit, like shrapnel that would maim or kill a human soldier, will do fuck-all to them.

And that's before you order them to waste the artillery with their fucking aircraft before you send in the T-800s. An 1860s army has zero counters to hovercraft gunships. Zero. Its questionable whether most of them would even be able to comprehend what they're facing initially. Plus the mobility of your armies (even without aircraft, since T-800s can move rapidly over any terrain without needing to stop for rest, sleep, food, or taking a piss/shit) means that you can run circles around any army you encounter, sever their supply lines, sack cities, do pretty much whatever you please without ever having to face an army head-on in the field.

As is so often the case in these scenarios, who kicks who's ass is among the least interesting parts, although I admit that the thought of Robert E. Lee being on the wrong end of a phased plasma rifle in the 40 watt range makes me feel a bit warm and fuzzy inside.

[Solauren]

Question:
Can I modify I-950 chips, so that they could be placed into a subject, and effectively take control of them?

http://terminator.wikia.com/wiki/I-950_(T2_Trilogy)

That will dictate my tactics going forward. i.e Eradication vs Implant Reinforced Re-education.

I should be able to, since apparently, I have T-3000 capabilities. However, if I have to T-3000 a persons brains to get the point across, I will.