Nice preview livestream. This seems like a good place to post a couple of comments on really minor stuff.
West Mid West: You could really punch up these events with more evocative names. In the Depression, another name for it was the Dust Bowl, and that might be a good bit of flavor if they’re rebelling because everything’s terrible and they’re fed up. Better known as the Great Plains.
A movement like the in-game Constitutionalists (I really like that name) might call the states from Ohio to Minnesota the Old Northwest. It calls back to the right period of history for them (and both Northwest and Northwest Territory referred to other pieces of land by then). Or the Great Lakes. If the Syndies—excuse me, Commies—make that their powerbase, maybe they call it the Steel Belt. It’s ahistorical, but has resonance for Americans today who know it as the Rust Belt.
You might also call the region that stayed with the Loyalists in the livestream the Rockies or, more poetically, the Big Sky.
MacArthur offers to take over: Again, a small nit about writing style, but it’s out of character for this game to be this naïve. A military junta doesn’t “offer” to take over the government, then go back to their jobs as if nothing had happened.
The way this would most plausibly happen is that the President invokes the Insurrection Act, sends in the Army to put down the “insurrection, domestic violence, unlawful combination, or conspiracy,” and possibly also declares a national emergency as FDR historically did in 1939 and 1941. Then there is an order similar to FDR’s Executive Order 9340, in which he sent in the army to break strikes and seize the coal mines. (“I should use all the power vested in me as President and Commander in Chief to protect the national interest and to prevent further interference with the successful prosecution of the war.”) The government in the new timeline could use similar language, but go further, either because it’s more sinister or because there are more strikes and lockouts.
At that point, Douglas MacArthur (who historically was called in to break up a protest in DC between the wars, and might still be Army Chief of Staff) gets promoted to General of the Armies and is granted so much power that the elected President becomes a figurehead. Or, the President manages to retain civilian control over the military but doesn’t fire him.
Contemporaries wouldn’t describe this as MacArthur “offering to take over the government.” They might say that the War Department is losing confidence in the President, or make it a question: “Is MacArthur the Man America Needs?”
Armored Cars: Historically, armies attempted to use these for recon. Another in-game use would be military police. In-game, they might be an upgrade to cavalry that’s better in flat terrain? It’s an oversimplifcation, yes, but it makes sense that the US troops occupying captured territory or rushing in to push naval invasions back into the sea would be riding armored cars and jeeps, not horses or light tanks.
West Mid West: You could really punch up these events with more evocative names. In the Depression, another name for it was the Dust Bowl, and that might be a good bit of flavor if they’re rebelling because everything’s terrible and they’re fed up. Better known as the Great Plains.
A movement like the in-game Constitutionalists (I really like that name) might call the states from Ohio to Minnesota the Old Northwest. It calls back to the right period of history for them (and both Northwest and Northwest Territory referred to other pieces of land by then). Or the Great Lakes. If the Syndies—excuse me, Commies—make that their powerbase, maybe they call it the Steel Belt. It’s ahistorical, but has resonance for Americans today who know it as the Rust Belt.
You might also call the region that stayed with the Loyalists in the livestream the Rockies or, more poetically, the Big Sky.
MacArthur offers to take over: Again, a small nit about writing style, but it’s out of character for this game to be this naïve. A military junta doesn’t “offer” to take over the government, then go back to their jobs as if nothing had happened.
The way this would most plausibly happen is that the President invokes the Insurrection Act, sends in the Army to put down the “insurrection, domestic violence, unlawful combination, or conspiracy,” and possibly also declares a national emergency as FDR historically did in 1939 and 1941. Then there is an order similar to FDR’s Executive Order 9340, in which he sent in the army to break strikes and seize the coal mines. (“I should use all the power vested in me as President and Commander in Chief to protect the national interest and to prevent further interference with the successful prosecution of the war.”) The government in the new timeline could use similar language, but go further, either because it’s more sinister or because there are more strikes and lockouts.
At that point, Douglas MacArthur (who historically was called in to break up a protest in DC between the wars, and might still be Army Chief of Staff) gets promoted to General of the Armies and is granted so much power that the elected President becomes a figurehead. Or, the President manages to retain civilian control over the military but doesn’t fire him.
Contemporaries wouldn’t describe this as MacArthur “offering to take over the government.” They might say that the War Department is losing confidence in the President, or make it a question: “Is MacArthur the Man America Needs?”
Armored Cars: Historically, armies attempted to use these for recon. Another in-game use would be military police. In-game, they might be an upgrade to cavalry that’s better in flat terrain? It’s an oversimplifcation, yes, but it makes sense that the US troops occupying captured territory or rushing in to push naval invasions back into the sea would be riding armored cars and jeeps, not horses or light tanks.
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