Turn 80 - I’m a Soldier of Freedom in the Army of the Man
Evidently bringing three quarters of a billion people into the Empire whose concept of personal property is, to put it delicately, defective might have an effect on crime rates. Residents of New Port Royal gleefully take advantage of being part of the Empire and cannot seem to comprehend the concept of ‘law’ and ‘order’, especially outside the context of ‘they have a big gun pointed at me’. Needless to say there have been a number of incidents, but the IGMP is on top of the situation.
What is amazing about the entire situation is just how cheerful the ex-slaves are about such things. Shopkeepers on New Castor have found success simply putting up large signs at the door reminding shoppers to please remember to pay for any goods before leaving and, surprisingly, it seems to
work. They aren’t really bad people, just from a rather skewed and dysfunctional cultural matrix. Luckily your education and legal system has experience in this regard, what with the various slave groups you’d liberated over the years. Perhaps not at this scale, but the comparison remains.
One completely unexpected benefit of the situation is that it turns out that the surviving ‘pirates’ are actually pretty damn good shots and once they realize the purpose behind it they take to military discipline and training very well indeed. Instructors report that they are having to explain the purpose behind certain things in much greater detail than they are accustomed to, but that is forcing them to critically examine their own assumptions as well.
The low-level insurrection continues on Okusawa. The latest targets for the fanatics are schools and medical facilities that are being built for the local population in an attempt to dissuade the locals from taking advantage of them. Arrest rates have, however, gone up, success rates on the attacks have gone down, and several more hidden factories and armories have been found and shut down.
The only major attack that succeeded was a mortar strike on a high school graduation ceremony resulting in almost a hundred dead and three times as many injured. The perpetrators were caught by a locally raised militia unit and rather surprisingly survived long enough to be taken into custody by the IGMP, albeit without any teeth and with three shattered limbs, as evidently the locals thought it tacky to cut off their both of their hands so they left the off-hand so they could still wipe their own asses. Thoughtful of them, you guess.
Local authorities are requesting the dispatch of major special forces to the system to coordinate a massive sweep against ISF holdouts. This would be a bit expensive, and your special forces units are not trained for law enforcement duties so the amount of, well, breakage would probably be rather high.
| [] | Send in the 1st Spec Ops Division |
- Cost $5,000,000
- -1% POP growth on Okusawa
- -1% GDP growth on Okusawa
- +1 Econ Rating on Okusawa
- -1 Approval Change
- +2 Politics
- Adds 1d2 counters to ending the Okusawa unrest
- Roll 1d2. On a 1, -5 Approval, on a 2 +5 Approval
|
| [] | Leave it to law enforcement only |
- +1 Approval Change
- -2 Politics
- Adds 1d2-1 counters to ending the Okusawa unrest
- Roll 1d2. On a 1, -5 Approval, on a 2 +5 Approval
|
New Capricorn and New Port Royal are experiencing unexpected, but very welcome, economic booms, but for varying reasons.
On New Capricorn several new factories have opened producing agricultural tractors and tooling optimized for conditions on New Eden. New Eden farmers are purchasing the optimized equipment at an extremely brisk rate as yields nearly double thanks to the new equipment. Food prices throughout the Empire have dropped as the New Eden breadbasket becomes even more productive, with shipping costs now making up almost 90% of the cost of food produced there. As a consequence several new shipping lines exclusively dedicated to the New Eden agricultural trade have opened their doors and will begin revenue operation in the coming years.
New Port Royal, on the other hand, is the newest hot tourist trade destination and, for good or for ill, the latest mecca for the delicately named ‘vice trade’. While they are being quite careful, under the eye of the ICMP at least, to avoid breaking any actual Imperial laws, the local system laws on things like prostitution, drugs, gambling and the like are virtually non-existent outside of requiring consent. It is quite telling that the system capital is called New Vegas, with the tagline ‘Las Vegas was for wimps and prudes’. Considering that the advertising copy from there has been censored in every single jurisdiction in the Empire off of New Port Royal… even considering the generally laid back attitude towards prurience and such… yeah, that’s saying something.
You are not going to allow any of your grandkids anywhere near the planet. Your grandfather might have agreed with you, and Tyler was… Tyler. You still have the lifetime subscriptions he gifted you with on your 16th birthday, although you swear you still get them for the articles.
You’ve installed your new advisors. General Jenkins and Grace have initiated a thorough review of the circumstances leading to the tragedy at the Kraken-T demonstration test. So far nothing firm has been established, although there are no signs of foul play, the test protocols were fully in line with best practices, and investigation of personnel involved show absolutely no issues whatsoever. The report you read noted in a sidebar that at this point the only ‘theory’ that had not been categorically ruled out was Calliope IV squirrels causing a cascade failure like what happened several years ago to the LAM factory. With the caveat that nobody has been able to figure out any plausible means for Calliope IV squirrels to get to the station in the first place.
Dark humor, perhaps, but you are a career soldier, you appreciate dark humor at times.
You did spend several enjoyable hours chasing General Jenkins around the palace with fell intent of defenestration after he issued a memo reminding you that as Emperor you are required to wear the Emperor uniform, complete with ridiculously oversized shoulder ornamental ‘spike’, or a Princess dress when ‘on-duty’. That he thoughtfully sent over an oversized foam rubber mallet with the memo was quite intelligent of him, but alas he’s twenty years younger than you and in somewhat better shape, so the little shit manages to avoid being hammered as he deserved.
That does, however, serve to remind you to finally settle the uniform issue for good. The old Griffon uniforms are getting dated and provide little differentiation between the three major service branches. You have polled the branch leaders for their opinions.
The Imperial Griffon Army has rallied behind a proposal from some historically minded folks who desire to resurrect the ancient ‘pinks and greens’ uniform from the old United States Army as the service dress uniform, with the undersuits for the power armor worn by the infantry, vehicle crews, and mechwarriors serving as the field uniform. You do think they are rather nice looking and wouldn’t have minded wearing them when you were in. Plus, quite bluntly, they look far more comfortable than the current getup.
No spiky bits, for one thing.
The Imperial Griffon Aerospace Force is holding out for these sleek blue and red jumpsuits that look like they were inspired by some cartoon, being all blocks of color and straight lines. Either that or these ridiculously over the top fancy uniforms that look like they sprang from the imagination of some Old Earth dictator, considering how much bling and sparkle they have. General Romanov has privately informed you that both proposals were evidently pushed by various pranksters within the branch and that she’s inclined to hoist them by their own petards by approving both on an interim basis. The actual uniform she’s approving is the same cut as the Army uniform, but in dark blue with red highlights at the seams.
The Imperial Griffon Navy is being quite sensible with the whole thing, styling the shipboard uniforms with an eye to pure function, making them skin suits with easy attachments for pressure gloves and helmet using different colored sleeves to indicate duty station, and the formal uniforms being another variation of the Army uniform, this time in black with actual shoulder boards and gold trim.
You are quite pleased to see that all the proposals incorporate strict limits on decorations worn on the uniform itself. Apart from the name badge, the branch badge, rank insignia, and the Imperial Griffon shoulder flash, the only things to be worn are a single qualification badge and the highest earned medal for valor. All other medals and badges are to be attached to an ‘I Love Me’ board to be mounted on the inside of their assigned lockers.
You approve of that.
There’s a brief scare at Sukaishi when a very shiny new
Luxor class cruiser jumps in, but the IFF is that of the Crimson Storm and they immediately identify themselves as such. Your little sister and her husband are on board, but your parents have chosen to remain behind with the various Crimson Storm kids playing doting parents to them all.
The captain of the
Luxor is horrified to hear about the Black Steel attack. They’d been dealing with scattered Black Steel raids on their end, but nothing serious. The captain promises to carry a message back home for you. They’ve also been authorized to give you samples of some of their cybernetic augmentation kits, which will be very useful for any R&D projects you perform on cybernetic augmentations.
