Chapter 8 - Jun 1941: The Autumn Riots
This war is a mess.
- General TBC, Commanding Officer, 3rd Army
The fighting in Peru can be described only as hellish. Thick jungle and snow peaked mountains make any form of vehicle useless, and ambushes are a daily occurrence for those units unfortunate enough to be leading the armies. The quick progress against Colombia and Venezuela is nowhere to be found in Peru, where every shadow hides another enemy ready to throw himself to his doom, bringing as many Americans with him as he can.
Far from South America, the north of Picardy is nearly a wasteland. After months of endless fighting, the towns and villages are abandoned, the cities destroyed, and the landscape stained with artillery craters. While the line has stood strong in the last month, it is breaking now. A seemingly unending supply of Lotharingian fighting men has battered the weary Picardian and British troops, and now they are beginning to falter.
Operation Rising Eagle stalled completely in May, and the next phase is delayed indefinitely. 'Hold the line' is the only order given now.
As they lose ground on land, the sea and air battle exceed all expectations. The Battle for the Channel is now entirely in Anglo favor. Lotharingia's navy is no more, as are most of the navies of the other Covenant countries. Thousands of enemy planes still attempt to seize air supremacy over the waters, but they are beaten back by the more skilled Anglo fighters. At the beginning of the war, Lotharingia had well over 6 thousand planes. Now, they field 2 thousand.
Within a month, the northern line has collapsed, and the Covenant pushes deep into British territory and along the coast.
On July 22nd, Kanem Bornu, the insignificant African nation, declares war on Funj to take their western state.
Swahili, also known as the Republic of Kenya, joins the Stali Pact at the end of July. They are a nation which covers most of the east coast of Africa. While they are not militarily powerful, their control of the coast affords them great power over trade.
The rest of the line in Picardy collapses in August, and now Covenant troops near the west coast once again. The southern lines mostly hold against the onslaught, but even they lose some ground.
In South America, Operation Mountain Storm begins. This operation is simply a push into Peruvian territory. Instead of trying to encircle and capture enemy troops, as was the policy in Peru since 1940, General Khaine, in charge of all US forces in South America, believes that Peru will collapse if its capital is taken.
Another war begins in Europe, as Poland, with the backing of the Stali Pact, invades the NGF. As Lotharingia has always had its eye on the NGF, there is no telling how this will affect Covenant-Stali relations.
The Covenant reaches the coast in September, and it seems likely the Brits and Picardians will be pushed out of Europe. The southern lines still hold, but they undergo ruthless battering.
Good news reaches America, as Barcelona, lost nearly a year before, is retaken. It is the first progress in Iberia in many, many months.
More good news arrives hours later. Even though the Peruvian capital's fall did not mean the fall of Peru, as was predicted, 10 divisions of the enemy, nearly a hundred thousand, are trapped behind our lines. Their capture would be an enormous step towards victory in South America.
The enemy troops surrender a week later, and the Peruvian Army is down another hundred thousand troops. The US continues its grueling march through Peru.
When the war first began, Americans were willing to go to war with the evil fascists of Europe and South America. With over a year of no progress in Europe, and slow and bloody steps in South America, support for the war in many US towns and cities has dropped. More and more industries are converted to military use, and more and more products become hard to come by. The American people are unhappy.
The first strike begins in Detroit, as thousands of factory workers take to the streets to protest the war. And it doesn't end there. The next day, Chicago joins Detroit in protest, and soon after so does New York. Pretty soon, towns and cities all over the country see thousands of workers refusing to continue working until their conditions have improved, or the war stopped.
All factory production is reduced by 20% from the strikes, and, if things don't change, it will only get worse. Dunaden mulls over his choices. His military advisers, scared at the prospect of a huge lack of supplies, advises an immediate show of military force to quell the strikes. The President disagrees and goes with the much more measured approach. A propaganda campaign, showing those workers who continue to work as heroes, begins. Perhaps this will end the nonsense.
To everyone's surprise, Persia does not fall to Turkestan. On the contrary, they have completely annexed the invading nation, and Persia has doubled in size.
Picardy falls in late September. Britain struggles to hold on to its last mainland territory, but it looks hopeless. Already American media is reporting that the end of the war in Europe is months away.
Even as one of the Anglo Alliance members falls, the Covenant loses one as well. Peru capitulates on the 12th of October, and their troops throw down their arms and surrender. Several thousand Lotharingian troops fight on from Peru's defacto capital, Forte do Principe, but they do not last long. A few divisions remain to clean up the mess. The rest, so tired from a year of horrific fighting, are sent to Iberia. The invasion of Arabia must be planned.
Production of all plane models halts in November. Soon after, dockyards across all the states close as their workers join the strikes. As production halts, trade dwindles to the point where there is a lack of nearly every material. The protests turn into riots in Detroit and Chicago, and several dozen die in clashes.
Perpignan is retaken after over a year of enemy occupation. It took weeks of combat to finally oust the Covenant forces, and the city is in shambles because of it. The rest of the occupied land will not be easier. The strikes at home have caused a shortage of light tanks, and the tank brigades in Europe and South America are down 3.3 thousand tanks. In addition, the infantry divisions have a small shortage of artillery, and the shortage will grow alarmingly fast if the strikes do not stop.
Dunaden signs the National Workers' Act on December 20th, 1941, as the strikes reach an alarming level. This act would provide several new rights and laws for workers, including a shorter work day, guaranteed vacation and sick days, and safer working conditions. In addition, a small percentage of converted factories are converted back to commercial use.
The new Act combined with the propaganda campaign do the trick, and the majority of the striking workers are quite satisfied with the changes. The strikes almost completely dissolve less than a week after the introduction of the act, and production returns mostly to normal. A few protests continue against the war, but their significance is minimal.
Had the strike continued for much longer, the war in Europe would have been lost. Still, there are severe shortages of tanks, artillery, and planes after months of halted production. It will take months to repair the damage done to the war effort.