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| Tweet Topic Started: 29 Mar 2010, 05:20 PM (1,355 Views) | |
| Nentsia | 29 Mar 2010, 05:20 PM Post #1 |
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Admin Zapatista
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Roleplaying What is roleplaying, and how do we play it in Renatia? The following text might look very long and scary, but we are not asking you to read every word of it. Just look up some aspects of roleplaying you are unsure of, and we are sure this guide will help you to become a good roleplayer. The guide explains what makes a good roleplay, it gives examples of godmoding and gives you tips for roleplaying. What is roleplaying? As the word itself says, you are playing a role in story, IC (in character). Here in Renatia, roleplayers take control of their own fictive country. They make stories for their countries in every aspect, economical, political, military and more individual stories based on individuals in that RP nation. The word roleplaying suggests that it is a game, that can be won or lost. This is wrong. Roleplaying is a game, but it has no ending and can therefore not be won or lost. Secondly, this is a game which you play with several people at a time. You don't play this only for yourself, you play this with other people. Give each other a space to have fun, don't try to have fun by taking the RP space of other players by trying to ''win''. With roleplaying it is all about writing good stories together about fictive stuff, in a way that is far too complex for any computer game. With roleplaying, there are actually no borders like a computergame would have. Roleplaying goes on and on, the way you want it. What makes a good roleplay? A good roleplay, is enjoyable to read for the forum members, a good story, where the involved roleplayers do everything they can to put down a realistic and good story about one or more nations, or about individuals. Again, a good roleplay is not about winning or losing. Actually, roleplayers that want to ''win'' all the time are not popular roleplayers. Their nations and character never take responsibility for their acts, such as going to war or oppressing peoples, their armies never lose a war and they do everything to dominate other RP nations. Roleplaying a nation is certainly not a matter of gaining prestige for your RP nation. Don't hesitate to let your won nation lose a war, or have serious troubles with increasing poverty. It will make your roleplays more realistic, and better stories in the end. Having a strong army, an all powerfull dictator and an enourmous amount of territory doesn't make you a good roleplayer. It can be the type of nation you have, but a good roleplayer always plays the consequences of having such a country. An enormous country, will be like a people's prison: a territory where several indigenous groups live. Just like Austria, which existed once of Hungarians, Ukrainians, Czechs, Polish, Slovaks, Serbs, Bosnians, Muslims, orthodox, catholics, protestants, Macedonians, Rumanians and that goes on and on. Or Russia, which has more than 30 indigenous groups in its borders. having different groups in your nation, will lead to ethnic tensions, seperatism, extreme nationalism and stuff like that. Having a big army, is fun. But a good roleplayer, knows that a big army goes at the expense of other important things like healthcare, social welfare, administration, education and law enforcement. Your population won't like this, we don't live in 1900 anymore and the people demand from their government to take care of the people, not only the military. Having extremely large armies, will anger the population. Increasing taxes to finance other things that are meant for the people, will only infuriate them. Good roleplayers let their governments take responsiblity for the government acts. Tax increase causes civil unrest, repressing civil unrest causes even more unrest. Going to war is very impopular in modern day politics. Most governments, including dictatorships, have lost their governing position by going to war. Argentinian Junta leader Videla was toppled after invading the Falklands, Saddam dug his own grave by constant wars against Iran and Kurdish tribes, Milosevic had to resign from office after the Yugoslav war. The American government came under serious pressure for the war in Vietnam and several current governments won't be in office for a second term due to their involvement in Iraq or Afganistan. Since World war II the world has learnt that modern wars have no winners, only losers. A good war roleplay tells a story about the consequences of going to war. Not only about the succes, and the gained territory bla bla. War is devastating for the government budget, it raises many issues under your population whether the war is just or not, and you will suffer casualties. Populations don't like to see their own boys returning from a far away war in a coffin. A good roleplay also needs roleplayers who consult their fellow roleplayers about the next move in the story. Communication is important. I may want to start a war RP with my neighbour, but I could ruin his roleplays by just attacking him without telling him about it. Contact the person you want to roleplay with, tell him of your plans, so that he can refuse it, or come up with a great idea to make the roleplay a succes. This is key especially with war roleplays, but also things like infiltrations, overtrhowing regimes, terrorist roleplays and more of such. Diplomacy and trade at the other hand, become more natural and realistic when players don't know what is going to happen. Will he listen to my offer? Will they back off with these sanctions? How will they respond on the statements of my head of state? It is not necessary for diplomacy and trade to inform the other roleplayers OOC'ly (out of character). To make this short, good roleplayers roleplay their actions realistically, they roleplay their losses, not only their victories. Victories are not even always realistic. Where was the succes of the USA in Vietnam? Where was the succes of WWI? What is the succes of the USA and Russia having more than 50 000 nukes together? Finally, the most essential part of a good roleplay, is fun. All involved should be having fun to take part in it. To allow this, all the involved should take each other into account. You might want to conquer his capital and capture his king, but offer him a chance to defend himself (for example by accepting that you might lose the war). And keep each other informed if you have big plans with an other ones characters or nations. If we all give each other the space to roleplay, by not overpowering ourselves, we can all have a great roleplay. What makes a bad roleplay? There are many, many things to have a bad roleplay. In this section, I will only tell about what makes a ''bad'' roleplay. In the next section, I will tell what ''ruins'' a roleplay. A bad roleplay is most likely to appear in the form of a war. Why? Because wars are the most difficult thing to roleplay. There are so many aspects of life, politics, military and economy involved when it comes to war. In fact, wars are always unpredictable. Having a big army is not a shoe-in for a victory. Besides military aspects, war has many other aspects. each of them contribute to the entire story of a war. Like world war II, war wasn't a military happening with winners and losers. It was a time in history, where millions of individual stories formed what we now call World War II. each individual had his own story. Some were happy, funny, silly. Most were sad, horrible, gruesome, terrifying or just plain wrong. Each war consists of many individual stories. The fact that Hollywood can produce more than 100 movies and more than 500 documentaries about WWII proves how many stories there are during war. Some will always remain untold. In a roleplay, war roleplays can start ''bad'' right from the start. For example, by going to war with a silly reason. Please keep in mind that a war is not a form of diplomacy. If another country doesn't act the way you want, war is not a form to enforce your will upon that country. As modern day war only has losers (and governments know that), war has become the most radical tool of international politics. A leader going to war, will rethink that decision a thousand times before he actually goes into war. there are so many negative consequences of war, war is so unpredictable, that 99.9% of the leaders try to avoid war at all cost. So if you go to war, please make sure you don't make your own government look like amateur morons by going into a war that has more negative consequences, than positive. What also makes a bad RP, when you don't inform other roleplayers while your plans have strong effects on their nations. War, for example again. If I declare war upon my neighbour without consulting him, he might not want it. In a reaction, he will do anything to defend his nation, causing him to use god-moding. From there on, the roleplay will go from bad to worse until a point that the roleplay minister will have to intervene. Diplomacy and trade roleplays can turn into bad roleplays when nations are being immune to diplomatic sanctions, don't care about diplomatic forms of aggression or simply refuse to be diplomatic while being very involved with international matters. The problem here is, diplomacy doesn't ''really'' affect your nation like a war does. Bad roleplayers tend to ignore the impact of diplomatic aggression. A real nation is very much affected by diplomacy. Diplomacy is responsible for our trade connections, for our international interests and the international position of our nations. Diplomacy is very essential. When a nation closes his borders for you, starts trade embargoes or such things, this will damage your country without a doubt. In a bad rp, you would immediately declare war upon any nation using aggressive diplomacy against you. Highly unrealistic. When a country is using diplomatic aggression against you, it clearly has some complaints about your nation IC'ly. Go back around the table to negotiate with each other, and solve things. Or ignore that nation, and accept your damage with all the necessary consequences in your nation. Also, play diplomacy in a reasonable way. Don't demand everything without giving an inch to your opponent. Don't immediately start a war when things don't work out. It would make diplomacy an unnecessary aspect of the game if we'd roleplay it like that. Godmoding I took the following text from the Jolt forum, as the writer says it better than I could ever do. Definition of Godmoding 1) Saying what happens to other people's stuff. 2) Refusing to take any losses. Or lose. Ever. 3) Having übertech armies that are too large, etc. 4) Having your nation’s geography to your extreme advantage. 1) Example: "Okay, I just blew up 300,000 of your troops!" Why this is Godmoding: Because in freeform role-play, it's up to the person being attacked to determine their own losses. This leads to OOC bickering which in turn, ruin the entire RP. Trust me, it’s happened many times. Don’t let it happen. 2) Example: "Oh, well, my soldiers had personal forcefields so none of them were actually hurt. " Why this is Godmoding: This is probably where godmoding gets its name (from God Mode in Doom, where you were invincible after typing IDDQD). Naturally, if nobody ever takes a hit, the fight degenerates into "I HIT YOU!" "NO YOU DIDN'T!", etc. Remember now, roleplaying isn’t about winning or losing, it’s about telling a story. A nation who is willing to accept defeat gains a lot of respect from others, in turn. Refusing to lose could permanently damage your reputation, making not too many people not want to RP with you. There is no device known or yet to be invented which is perfect. There is no perfect stealth, there is no perfect radar, there is no perfect acoustical protection, there is nothing which cannot be defeated. Therefore you cannot tell someone what their results are in trying to find you! You can tell them how your system works, but you can't off and say "you can't see me nyah!". 3) Example: A 2 day old nation with a population of 6 million posts "My 6 billion man army invades u with NUKES!!!!1" Why this is Godmoding: Okay, little guy nations, I know you're anxious to start throwing your weight around, but let's be honest; you are piddling nothings when you first start out in the world. Note: Nothing stops you registering a group of nations and RPing each as a different but allied entity, or any other reasonable method of levelling the playing field you can come up with. Age should NOT bring with it arbitary RP advantage. 3.5) Example: 'Ok, I'm going after your major cities with cruise missiles.' 'Aha! My EMP defenses short out your missiles and defeat you!' 'But...Don't they destroy every electronic device in your cities, too?' 'No, because they're...Shielded. Yeah.' 'But then why couldn't I just send a spy to buy, say, a calculator or trouser press which would allow me to learn your secrets?' [insert random swearing] Why This is Godmoding: EMP isn’t magic. If you're a nation which has EMP devices and uses them regularly, it'd be ridiculous to think that in all that time nobody would have come up with an effective defense. Same goes for most technology, in fact: you should at least allow for the possibility that a nation which has faced your mighty ubertech on the battlefield has gone off and built something to counter it. 4) Example: “My territory is completely surrounded by mountains, and I have every possible missile defense system that works 100%, so all of your planes will be shoot down, and all of your troops will die trying to get over the mountains!!” Why This is Godmoding: It is possible to have terrain like this, but there are different ways of showing it. You can’t just up and say, after the war already began, that this is your nation. It also goes a little bit into the first example in that you can’t claim other peoples’ losses. Firstly, it is strongly recommended that you make a map of your nation. If you really don’t want to, then adapt the geography of a Real Life nation. Also, if you do want to RP your nation as having such a rough terrain, you need to enforce it within your nations. For example, the soil probably won't be the best in your nation if you have all rugged terrain. Not Quite a Godmode, but... Separate Example of Weaponry “My tanks go 1044054650mph, and they can fire 100 missiles!!! My ships go 235436 knots, and can avoid your attacks no matter what!! Explanation: Ultimately, no weapon is a godmode in and of itself, it may be unrealistic and therefore abuse-worthy if it's creator tries to imply it could really be built, but until you do something technology has no effect on anyone else and therefore does not qualify for the high and supreme definition of Godmode, namely: A Godmode is an arbitary statement of superiority detrimental to good RP. The aforementioned ridicu-tank / ship would make a difference if used as such in a military RP without any related problems RP'd [in fact I personally believe most techno-sillyness isn't that bad as long as you don't start dodging the natural drawbacks of weapon types], but having a character RP party on a million-mile-per-hour ship shouldn't be a problem because the ship's existence and performance confer no advantage to the owner in that scenario. Everything is relative; you can Godmode just as well with a T-72 as with any ridicu-tank design. However, abusing higher tech for arbitary advantage is Godmoding. For example, using FTL cold fusion-powered spaceships with ultrashields against a modern nation would be godmoding if the modern nation did not agree to their existence beforehand; in other words, you can't force a higher tech level on another player. '1. Logistics Also, everybody's happier if you pay attention to logistics. And if you don't know much about Role Playing, there are people willing to teach you. 2. Troops and Godmoding A. Stealth Troops "Stealth" is a cool word, but it doesn't mean "invisible". A stealth bomber is just harder to detect than an ordinary one is on radar - ditto stealth fighters. To my knowledge, there is no such thing as a "stealth tank", "stealth rocket launcher" or anything else like that. B. Invisible Troops The temptation with magic (of any description) is to make people and things invisible. Thus, "my invisible tank has driven into the middle of your city. HA HA." Think about this for a minute. Invisibility only extends to sight - an "invisible tank" would still make noise, especially when it shot you. "Invisible troops" would be even harder to work with, doors would open by themselves and all those orders of the sergeants would be very audible. This doesn't mean you can't have invisible tanks / ships / planes, it just means that not being seen doesn't make you undetectable. C. Very Fast Troops NationStates is a big place. You might have a large army, but if it's all on one side of the world fighting in one war, it can't suddenly appear on the other side of the world fighting in another war. In other words, your battalions can only be in one place at once. Transporting troops takes time, moving ships takes time, setting up bases and moving supplies takes time. As a random note, war threads where troops are being deployed should ideally start with troops being readied for combat rather than departing [or worse, arriving] on the first post. It gives your opponent time to prepare, spy on you, and do all those other things that happen in real-life. D. Military Involvement with Nations NOT Bordering You You cannot directly invade a nation that doesn’t border you. There has to be a way to get there, whether it be with transports, airdrops, or permission to march through another nations’ territory. You cannot just say that your troops arrived at their border and are invading. That, in itself, is a godmode, coinciding with the “Very Fast Troops” explanation. 3. Acts of God The cheapest godmode tactic of them all -- invoking God. Surely there is nothing more repugnant than that, especially to those of us who -are- religious. This is a game. God has better things to do with His time than intercede in someone's RPing. This doesn't mean you can't have characters who are minor or even major Gods, it means you cannot simply say 'God smites you because he's on our side!' as a response to an attack. 'S cheesy beyond mortal comprehension. The Space-Time Continuum and God-Moding Just because your country zips around in flying saucers and comes from another planet doesn't mean it's invincible. Despite the fact that there are multiple techs, it is still possible to have a war between such nations. It’s going to be a lot harder than having a war with someone within your tech range, but if you can pull it off, it’ll look great. Future-tech vs. Present-tech What's to stop an M-16, well-aimed, from knocking out all sorts of important bits of androids? Future-tech vs Past-tech Even a catapult could do some sort of damage. Ditto a crossbow bolt - they're still effective murder weapons today. Present-tech vs Past-tech If your castle's being shelled by tanks, try to tip some boiling oil over them. Crude, and only successful if the tank is charging your castle, but hey, you gotta do what you gotta do. Again, bow and arrows on the castle walls is very effective, although, the armor that present-tech may have could probably stop majority of the shots. Just aim for the head *wink*. It’s still very possible though, especially when it comes to close combat. The Effects of War Wars on your soil damage your infrastructure and economy in ways not quantified by the game in NS1. Wars abroad typically cost lots of money. Keep that in mind, for those of you who are frequent warmongers. Mobilizing troops, tanks, artillery, planes, etc, takes a surprising amount of money each time you do it. Be careful about how you do it as well, especially for you younger nations out there. Your first action being a mobilization, is definitely not recommended. Other things that’ll cost you money is keeping your mechanized military up-to-date, and refurbished. You can’t just let it sit in the shop, its gotta be checked every now and then for problems, and tested out. Don’t forget the amount of supplies each soldier will need too. They’ll obviously need food, water, and for those of you out there who take things safe, gas masks, and things like that [do not mistake this for needing to KNOW the exact amounts]. Weapons in Your Nation When selling/inventing weapons... keep the specs reasonable, as well as the cost. Example: If you claim you can sell a fighter jet for around $1M USD at any sort of profit, it obviously can't be a topline modern fighter... small old fighters like the F-5 Eagle come to mind. If your equipment is 'cutting edge' - ie it's at the very top of whatever tech bracket you place yourself in - then you need to boost how much it costs you. Also note that how much the contracting costs your government will vary according to the cost of labor in your country; the rate at which you can build new weapons will vary according to how much industry your country has. For some countries, particularly a number that have no close real world equivalent and few factories, manufacturing may be largely done by humans, or sometimes even individual craftsmen; in others, it is entirely mechanized. The most efficient method varies wildly from state to state. When buying weapons... remember the above, and additionally remember that the manufacturer may be over-reporting the specs slightly. That top speed of 700mph for your new bomber may have been clocked relative to the ground with a hurricane strength tail wind, and only the pilot and a quarter tank of fuel on board - no cargo, no payload, no copilot, no guns, etc. In other words, feel free to scale down other people's ludicrous specs when you buy their equipment if you're not happy using it 'as-is.' When selling supplies try to keep in mind real world prices. You may be able to undersell this by a significant amount, or oversell to gullible or desperate countries, but it's a good marker to look at. Even if they gave it to you... it still costs money to maintain. It may be dirt cheap to man it if you're a communist state, and easy to find skilled operators if you're well educated, but the nuclear subs won't work if you don't have a source of uranium, which is expensive. So is new ordinance to replace the stuff you fired off during the last war on Tuesday. Stealth matters: the F-22 is much less visible to other aircraft, BUT IT IS STILL VISIBLE ON RADAR, much like the way the B-52 Stratofortress is very visible but a B-1 Lancer is LESS visible. The F-117A is slow (sub-Mach 1), carries no gun, has no radar (it can only pick up fighters with IR sensors maybe 5 miles away), and carries maybe two reasonable-sized laser-guided bombs. The F-22 is nowhere near as stealthy. For one, it has that massive heat signatures from the engines- the F-117A has cooling jets to reduce the signature. It has a radar and gives off a big electromagnetic signature, and enemies can know there's an F-22 around from the radar signature. The shape, while stealthy, is not perfect at all and is only moderately stealthy to radar. And it carries just 8 missiles. Economy vs. Military Sometimes, a lousy economy is entirely due to too much military spending. When in doubt, refer to (if possible) a nation's per capita military spending ranking. Poorer nations often have armies that are more effective for their money, but typically less potent in absolute terms. This means you cannot simply say 'I have a bigger economy, so my army should be bigger than yours.' As an extreme example, an entire population could have cheap assault rifles, have no permanent home, and exist as nomadic raiders. In which case, you don't have much of an infrastructure to manufacture stuff with. Try to stay in line with your government type. A democracy would be allowed to do a war every week, but don't expect that candidate to be elected when the next elections come. A oppressive psychotic dictatorship would not have its citizens willingly marching into someone else's country with AK-47's just because the Grand Poobah said so. An anarchist government would not even have an organized military, seeing as there isn't anyone to oversee it. It would be composed of militias, created by the people themselves. Government Ideals Democracy- Form of government in which government officials are elected by the people. PROS: Tends to have high evils of political freedoms, good but privately owned infrastructure, moderate sized volunteer armies. CONS: The people can remove people they don't like from office. People tend to be leery of war and grow ever more dissenting the longer the country is in a state of war. EX: United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia, Japan, ect. Theocracy- Government by the religious institutions of the country. PRO: Populace tend to have fanatical dedication to the government, large military force. CONS: Tend to be monarchies or puppet democracies. Secular governemnts tend to frown upon them as terrorist or irresponsible states.. EX: Israel, Saudi Arabia, Syrian Arab Republic, Kuwait, Iraq, ect... Dictatorship: The people are ruled by a single person or group of persons. Is often the most versatile form of government as it can include elements from any other forms of government. Can have elected dictators ((think of Naboo from SW:TPM)) or a dictator which appoints a council to aide him, ect. PROS: Can have high levels of population support [unlikely for non-benevolent dictatorships], low to no unemployment, Huge militaries (you're a dictator, the people do what you say or else.. mwhaha.. anyway percents vary here depending on the size of your country, economic and infrastructure base, and amount of populace in the acceptable age range. CONS: Can have low levels of population support. Can have bad infrastructure and high crime ((depending on how well the populace like you)). Of course that is simplified but most of the governments ((except anarchy)) are some form of those three or a combination of them. Notes on why I gave the percents for fighting force: Democracy: Military is volunteer based and populace grows disconcerted at huge numbers of military. Although, if the large force still consists of all volunteer forces, it isn't likely that the populace will get upset. It's when a draft is instated, that the people get uneasy. Theocracy: military is both volunteer AND forced, people however are fanatically devoted to cause and are often willing to declare holy war against their enemies. However, the belief in holy blessing for their cause may lead to poor tactics in combat, since their Generals may believe they will win regardless of what they do or that their enemy are weak from corruption and will fall easily. Dictatorship: Military is forced or selected so it's at will, populace can either be fanatically devoted or not or somewhere in between. What really counts here is how much importance you place in other areas and you could put the leftovers into military ((note the term military THROUGHOUT this post is defined as: combat troops, offices, pilots, naval officers/crew, support personnel, relevant government officials, anyone employed in the sole manufacture, storage, or transport of military goods, an anyone working for the military as defined.)) and then use real word statistics to figure out the individual areas so overall combat troops might only be like 4-9% depending. Again, the key to not godmoding is to be consistent, think about your form of government AND use your country (give it a history where it came from ect..). Your country is an advantage. If you mix fantasy with role-playing and say your populace JRR Tolkiens' Elves then your military numbers could get a boost (Tolkiens; elves can't die or be affected by disease or old age) and effectiveness increases because of their natural abilities. Just remember to be consistent and within the bounds of the RW or the world you set your nation in. Some people will ignore anything out of the ordinary, but that's something you'll have to live with. Deploying huge fleets at a moment's notice is one of the more bizarre feats of wankery a player can do, because it involves assuming that your fleet is at DEFCON 1 at all times. Care to say how long the economy of a developed nation could stand up to that? The Indefatigable Army. Ok, so you've just conscripted your huge (but not too huge) army from your reservists. You've sent them to fight, they arrive in reasonable time, and then you go and screw it up by having them all act like Space Marines. Think about it: how much of your army is career soldiers and how much is petrified civil servants who just want to go home? Your army will start to lose hope if they're being absolutely hammered in some foreign land for reasons they can barely remember. Writing from their perspective makes RP more interesting to read. Completely Discounting an Opponent 'I attack you. You're small, I'm big. I win.' 'That was fun...' Ok, with superior numbers and weaponry you'll probably have a fairly one-sided fight, but you shouldn't just assume your enemy will be a walkover. Remember, you're on your enemy's home turf and they're fighting for their homes and families. They won't roll over and die just like that. SPR is not real and you can't beat an enemy by throwing troops at his machine gun nests in the hope he'll eventually run out of ammunition. Anything can happen really, when it comes to role playing. A smaller nation can drive out a larger nation through superior tactics, and overall superior role playing. It's difficult and horribly costly, but it can be done. Nothing is Perfect That goes for your tanks that never break down, your troops that never give up, your NMD that never misses. Adding in things like this during a battle/war would make it much more realistic. Not Looking Before You Leap Ex: 'I send a fleet to your nation.' 'Err...The only port we have comes in bottles...' ASK. If you're going to war with someone, ask for a basic breakdown of their nation's appearance, size and military strength. It is understandable for a nation to have classified information when it comes to military, but all of it shouldn't be. One thing that needs to be stressed is the fact that in order to set up an aggressive war with someone, both nations need to know the other nations’ terrain [or the area of operations if the war isn't fought on either country's home soil]. Without that, then how will you know where to invade? Untraceable (Terrorist Nation/Group) It’s one thing to make your nation into an organized terrorist organization, and have cells around the world that are hard to detect [assuming that the nations the cells are in agree to the presence of your terror cells beforehand], but when it’s a nation itself that is hosting this terror org, it’s not impossible to see. |
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| Nentsia | 14 Apr 2010, 05:28 PM Post #2 |
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Admin Zapatista
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Extended Roleplaying guide update: ECONOMICS GUIDE The following text is an extension/update for the Roleplay guide. Economy, statistics and numbers On the 3rd of April, the House of Law Lords passed the ''war statistics act'' in an attempt to make wars more realistic.
The vital parts of this act are to enforce war-makers to use realistic economic and logistic numbers in order to ''explain'' why their army has that size and that strength. As said earlier in this guide, war costs money. Soldiers cost money. Weapons production costs money. Finances is a major, I repeat MAJOR, factor in the outcomes of war. This law will ensure that a realistic economy, will able to finance a suitable military. As I checked some databases of other nations, randomly, I noticed that people have difficulties in making a realistic economy for their nation. Many nations for example, use real nations as reference. I have no objection to that, IF your population and the population of the reference are equal. Yet most of the time, this is not the case.The result is that nations have economic numbers such as GDP per Capita that don't match with their own population. I will use this update to tell you step by step how to make a realistic economic model of your nation, without the need of real nations. Don't be scared of the words ''economy'', ''numbers'' and ''Tax rate'', the model is really easy. I was horrible with maths at school, and my economy grades sucked as well. Even I can make up my economy with this model. If I can do it, everybody can do it. Step 1: what is your economic system? This question might allready sound difficult. With economic system, don't ask you to calculate production, income, trade and all that stuff. All I ask is: How is your economy run? Do you have a planned economy, like in the Soviet Union, China, North Korea and Cuba? An economy where unemployment doesn't exist, where the government makes production plans for a certain amount of time and where all production is state owned. In a planned economy there is little to no private ownership. All factories, services, estates and farmlands are owned and controlled by the state or the collective. Maybe some local shops have private owners, but that's about it. The good thing about the system is that there is no such thing as unemployment, economic crises or exploitation by greedy corporations. The negative thing about the planned economic system is that it doesn't give much space for economic growth. The people get what they need, basically for free. There is no such thing as competition and eventually the planned economy will not grow anymore. The planned economy is really good at distributing wealth equally, but it has no means to actually stimulate the economy to grow. The other well known economic system is capitalism or market economy. The state is supposed to keep it's nose literally out of your business. Everybody is free to become very rich, or very poor. Work hard, get a lot. Those who work hard will be rewarded for that by the market economy. Supply and demand will create both work, production and thus an income. If everything goes according to this plan, the market economy will have periods of a slow growth, and a high growth: the economy will always grow. In order to keep this system effective, unemployment is a necessary evil. It causes competition in the labour markets, that will cause employers to start employ more workers again. That will in its turn increase the production, and the income. The good thing about the market economy is that it will stimulate the economy to grow, it will stimulate the people to work hard and so on. The bad side of this, is that the market economy is really sensitive to economic crises, it needs the presence of unemployment and it offers greedy monopolies an opportunity to exploit people and the environment. There is also mixed economy, which is basically a market economy with more government intervention. This is very common in European nations. Germany, Sweden, France and Italy are good examples of a mixed economy. Enough of this and lets continue with the real work. Step 2: What kind of economy do you want for your nation? The great thing about this forum is, we can make our countries the way we want it. Otherwise we would have roleplayed with real life nations. In order to make up your economy, it is important to ask yourself the question ''what kind of economic situation is my nation currently in?'' Is your nation a developing country like Nigeria? Or are your people living in wealth, with a booming economic powerhouse like in Norway and switzerland? Perhaps your economy is well developed, but not really growing and stuck in time, like the Russian and Cuban economy. Or your economy is not yet fully developed, but growing faster than people can blink with their eyes like in China and Singapore? Is their much economic inequality in your country, like in Russia, China and South America? or is the entire population poor (Zimbabwe)/or rich (Switzerland)? Is your economy currently growing? or is it going down? If another person takes a look in your nation, would he see good infrastructure, new cars, proper roadsigns and well maintained buildings? Or would he see older cars, crappy roadsings, the infrastructure in decay and a homeless here and there? Or worse? Would he see any infrastructure at all? Are the buildings on the edge of collapse, are there any cars? Would he see beggars and homeless at every corner? Those questions all help you to imagine what your economy is like. As you might have noticed, your economy plays a big role in the situation of your country, it helps you to imagine what your country is like. For example, your nation is a remote banana republic where violent power takeovers are occurring every month. These type of nations usually have a weak economy, with a crappy infrastructure, a lot of unemployment, homeless and shabby buildings. Countries with a very powerful economy, have less social/economic/political tensions, causing them to have stable, not corrupt governments. Except for the British, their government is corrupt while having a strong economy. Step 3: Making up your economic statistics. Now you know what kind of economy your nation has, and all we have to do is to fill in suitable statistics for that. In order to keep the economic model simple, we leave out foreign relationships such as exports and imports. You might think that you need to decide your GDP (gross domestic product) first. This is not wrong, but not very useful too. Making up just a GDP is very hard, as it is the sum of the entire domestic product of your nation. If you are good at estimating those numbers, then go ahead. But this is for people who have difficulties with making up their GDP, so I will tell you a little trick. We just decided what your economy is like. To determine your GDP you have to make up your GDP per Capita. The GDP per Capita tells what the income is of an average person in your nation. When you multiply the GDP per Capita with your population number, you get your GDP. Voila. But, what does an average person make in a rich country? For that, my friend, I have a list for reference here: GDP per Capita (based on CIA factbook): United States of America (rich): $46 400 United Kingdom (rich, less economic power): $36 000 China: $3600 (the economy grows fast there, but hundreds of millions live in extreme poverty) Russia: $9000 (not really poor country, but certainly not rich) Qatar: $111 100 (guess where that comes from?) South Africa: $5700 (one of the richest in Africa) Sierra Leone: $400 (one of the poorest in Africa) Guatemala: $2700 (your average banana republic) Brazil: $7500 Mexico: $7800 Norway: $79 200 Switzerland: $63 700 Czech Republic: $18 600 Romania: $7200 Vietnam: $1000 Indonesia: $2100 India: $1100 Japan: $39 700 Iraq: $2400 Iran: $5000 Turkey: $7700 Egypt: $2400 Canada: $39 400 Italy: $36 000 Greece: $31 500 Now we can easily categorize the economies. Economic powerhouse GDP/capita: $45 000 - 100 000> Strong economy GDP/capita: $35 000 - 45 000 Average economy GDP/capita: $15 000 - 35 000 Weak economy GDP/capita: $4000 - 15 000 Bad economy GDP/capita: $1000 - 4000 Worthless economy GDP/capita: <$1000 Allright. Now this is set, all you have to do is to pick out the category you want your nation to be in. For example, my own nation ''Nentsia''. I based my nation on Russia when I created it. We all know Russia. If they ever want to attack western Europe, their tanks won't even be in Poland before the wheels come off and the fuel is out. This basically symbolizes the Russian economy. Their economy is pretty good...if we were living in 1975. Now, the Russian economy is not that bad, but it's certainly not good either. Healthcare is of low quality, the people are not rich and often unemployed and even homeless. The military is something the Russians are proud of, but the quality of it is in serious decay due to the lack of money. Buildings are cheap concrete structures and schools are in serious need of money. I wanted my Nentsian economy to be just like that, putting the Nentsian economy in the ''Weak economy'' category. I am looking for a GDP/capita between roughly $4000 and $15 000. I chose for about $16 010. This officially puts me in the ''Average'' category, but that doesn't really matter. The Russian GDP/capita is $9000. The average Nentsian persoon is about twice as rich as the Russian person. Nentsia has roughly 100 000 000 living in their borders. If we multiply this number with the GDP/Capita (16010) we get the GDP of Nentsia: $1.473 trillion. Step 4: GDP and GDP per Capita...and then? With these two numbers, you can determine your annual government budget and thus your annual military budget. Nentsia has a flat tax rate of 44%. 44% of the GDP goes to the state, which will be the government budget. Most countries maintain a tax rate of about 20% to 30%, some are higher and some are lower. The Nentsian tax rate multiplied with the GDP will give the government budget. In this case: 0.44 × GDP (1.473 trillion) = $648.9 billion (government budget) My Nentsian government spends $645 billion of the 648.9, in order to save some money for later. (you don't have to do this, you may even exceed your budget if you want). Now I am going to make up how much my government spends on several things in the country. Administration: 6% Social Welfare: 11% Healthcare: 11% Education: 9% Religion & Spirituality: 5% Defence: 19% Law & Order: 11% Commerce: 4% Public Transport: 4% Environment: 1% Social Equality: 7% Development aid: 2% Science & technology: 10% You can see that I spend 19% of $645 billion on defence, the military. This makes my annual military budget: $122.6 billion. If I spread out this budget over my entire army (1.4 million men), I can calculate how much I spend per soldier. $122.6 billion (military budget) ÷ 1 400 050 (number of men serving armed forces) = Spending p/Soldier: $79 094.22 Why is the ''spending per soldier'' important? This way, we can easily compare armies with each other. An army with a spending per soldier of $20 000 will most likely not have a very advanced army. (note: some countries have lower wages and production costs such as China, the number therefore does not say everything about the quality of an army) If you want a high quality army, you now might think you should just spend 50% of your government budget on the military. Well I hope you know what you are doing then, because it will be at the expense of your population. Step 5: completing your economic model The most important things are done. We know the GDP per capita, the GDP, the tax rates, the government budget and spendings, all that we now have to do is to fill in the last numbers. GDP - composition by sector: Agriculture (large in undeveloped nations and poorer nations), Industry (large in industrialized nations such as China, Russia and Mexico), Services (large in rich nations, but also in nations that rely on tourism such as Thailand) Unemployment rate: (very low in communist states, higher in capitalist nations) Population below poverty line: (higher in poorer countries, also higher in countries with great inequality) Main industries: (fill in the industries that fit your resources) Currency: (whatever you like) Edited by Nentsia, 1 Jul 2010, 07:20 PM.
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| Nentsia | 15 Jun 2010, 06:44 PM Post #3 |
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Admin Zapatista
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This guide update will consist of a reference guide to show people what real militaries are made up like, to show you how many men you need to keep at least one fighter plane in the sky of your air force and more of such. The other part, is a damage guide. Mostly dedicated to what damage bullets do and nuclear weapons. Some of it may sound obvious, but I bet there are things you didn't know or think about. Maybe, I'll add EMP damage and grenade damage to this later. Damage guide Bite the bullet (bullets damage) Okay, so here is the thing: we are in the middle of a hostage situation, 15 terrorists have taken the streets of your capital, and you are fighting fire with fire. You have a SWAT team, equipped with Kevlar body armor, 9mm MP5 sub machine guns, a sniper with a .50 Barrett on a rooftop and an armoured truck. My terrorists are based on the High Incident bandits, who were a bunch of bankrobbers in 1997? 1998? who engaged into combat with the North Hollywood Police in LA. The terrorists both had an AK-47, with round drum magazins (100 round mag) and the bullets were imported from Eastern Europe, as they were strictly illegal rounds. The bullets had a full metal jacket. My terrorists are also wearing self-made plate armor, from neck til toe, just like it was back then. Let's say, one of the terrorists hits somebody in the upper leg. Doesn't sound too lethal? does it? Wrong. The 7.62 mm round with metal jacket shattered 7 inches of bone, leaving a very deep wound in the leg. This kind of injury, will cause serious bleeding. Taking a hit like this, and you are lucky if you survive for 30 minutes without help. In the real gunfight, a cop was hit like that. He almost bleeded to death, and doctors needed a surgery of 6 hours before the cop's life was saved. Does every gunshot cause that much damage? No. The situation above, contains a 7.62 mm round with a full metal jacket. The reason why the bullet is so big, is because the shell contains a large amount of gunpowder for a longer ranger and a deeper impact. The size of the bullet also increases the damage it does to the body, when it ripps through organs and bones with a speed of 800 meters per second. A gun firing 7.62 ammunition, is also classified as a high velocity assault rifle. It combines large bullets, with long range and a high travelling speed of the bullets. There is no body armor at the moment that is capable of stopping a bullet coming from a high velocity assault rifle. High velocity assault rifles include: FN Scar Tar-21 AK- 47, 74, 103, 101, 107 FN FAL M16 HK G36 etc etc etc. What does body armor do then? Well, it is a myth to believe it will stop the bullets for you. If that was true, soldiers wouldn't have to worry anymore going into combat. In fact, if you are firing with a larger gun than a 9mm Beretta handgun, the ''bulletproof'' vest won't even make much of a difference. From distance, a standard handgun won't penetrate a Kevlar vest. The kevlar will absorb the power, and be able to prevent the bullet from entering the body. But the bullet will definetely cause bruisings, and very painful spots on your body. You could break your collar bone, shoulder, rib or something like that from a bullet that is stopped by the vest. It saves your life there, but it is painful. Take anything bigger, for example the Desert Eagle or a .44 Magnum, and you can just take off the vest as it won't save your life anyway. The vest could reduce the impact of the bullet, but if it is placed at the heart or liver, you are dead for sure. Go to anything bigger e.g an MP5N, M16, AK-47 or UMP-45 - the vest will not save you. Bullets easily penetrate through your entire body, reaching lungs, kidneys (kidneys are your least problem then), the heart, nerve systems (very vulnerable, liver (when this one is ruined, your life is ruined. You can't live with even a damaged one), aorta (matter of seconds before you bleed to death), windpipe (consider yourself dead when you are shot there), stomach (you will burn yourself with acid from the inside, consider yourself as good as dead), pancreas (your doomed). You could survive hits in the intestines, spleen, the lung, kidneys and shoulders. And tanks and armoured vehicles? Can they stop shots from guns bigger than a handgun? Definetely. That's what they are designed for. But, as it is always with military technology: countertechnology. For tanks and such, man has invented anti-tank rifles. Many sniper rifles for example, were designed as anti-tank weapons. Long rifles, with extremely large rounds (for maximum muzzle velocity) and range and the rounds are of course with a full metal jacket. The full metal jacket provides an extremely hard bullet tip, that concentrates all its force on a very small surface, usually smaller than normal bullets. The Barrett .50 Caliber, was such an anti-tank weapon. The bullet has a diameter of .50 inches, or 13 mm. The round is also 138 mm long. The shell is filled with gunpowder, and you can imagine the power this bullet has when fired. With ease, this round will travel for 2000 meters through the air looking for its target. (it would take the bullet about 2.5 seconds to cover such distance) When it finds a head, the head will be blown literally off the body. When the bullet needs to hit someone standing behind a concrete wall, don't worry. The head will be shattered into dozens of pieces of skull and brain. A concrete wall is no problem for this bullet. A tank? Unsure. I don't know if the 13mm round, or .50 cal, can penetrate through the armor of a tank at a distance of 2000 meters. I don't know if that is ever tested before, and even if it did, I don't know the results. But I suppose it can penetrate a tank at 2 km distance. The ''effective range'' of the Barrett .50 Cal is up to 2000 m, so one would expect it can do its job at that distance: crushing armor. We have bigger ammunition, which has a bullet diameter of about 30 mm, but the type of gun firing such rounds is too heavy for a human being to carry around (Gatlin guns). We install those guns to bunkers, or hang them under a chopper or F-22 Raptor. When you get hit by this monstrous bullet, arms, legs and heads are blown off. One bullet of this size is enough to rip you in pieces. No toys. At what distances are handguns, high velocity rifles and sniper rifles effective? This always depends on the situation. For a police officer, who is less experienced, the handgun effective range is about 30 meters. The officer is not trained and experienced enough to fire a handgun accurately at a greater distance. But the bullet of a standard 9mm Beretta can travel for about 100 meters. In trained hands, the hands of a commando, the Beretta can be effective up to a range of 60 meters. But don't expect to kill someone at that distance when he is wearing body armor. A Desert Eagle, which fires a much larger round (and thus more power in the bullet for more range and impact) can reach up to 200 meters. But it is not accurate at that distance anymore, simply because human eyes are not good enough and human hands are too shaky. Lets get to the bigger guns. The MP5N, standard law enforcement counter terrorist machine gun, is effective up to 200 meters. But it is really inaccurate at that distance. The MP5 uses 9mm rounds, which are pretty thick but also short. The rounds therefore do not have much power to travel far. Therefore, even this submachine gun does not have such a long range. That's why it is sometimes called a ''machine pistol''. It combines the firepower of a pistol with the fire rate of a machine gun. Assault rifles, use different rounds. 5.56mm, and 7.62mm are the most common rounds. The 7.62mm is a brutal bullet. A monster and a nightmare to every soldier. Nothing will stop this bullet, unless your in a tank or something. It combines muzzle velocity and range to create a devastating impact on human tissue and body armor. The gun that is famous for using this bullet, is the AK-47. The AK-47 has a range of 400 meters, but that is only when you fire it semi-automatic. Now that's a long range. For some reason (and I don't know why), the 5.56mm round has more range. It has less power, the impact is smaller, but the range is bigger. The weapon that is famous for using this round is the M16, and basically every NATO designed round. So, the assault rifles manufractured in the west use this round. The m16, handled by a skilled shooter (you may call this dude a marksman), the M16 rifle can be effective at a range of 600 to 700 meters. (The person who can shoot somebody at that range with an M16, without optics must be some kind of god or something). Sniper rifles nowadays use rounds ranging between 7.62mm and 13mm. The Barrett uses the 13mm, most other sniper rifles use a bullet of about 10mm. But, the sniper rifles all have something in common: they are awesome, and effective up to 2700 meters. A skilled sniper will need to calculate windspeed, count his heartbeat, hold his breath, and bear in mind the air pressure differences before he can actually fire at a target at 2500 meters. The temperature differences between the rifle and 2500 meters away can decide the fate of a target. The direction of a bullet that has to travel 2500 meters is extremely sensitive to wind, temperature, gravity differences and your own heartbeat. The target is so far away at 2500 meters, that bullet will just not hit it because the telescopic sight is not precise enough. Or the heartbeat of the shooter himself causes the bullet to miss the target by 20 inches. Nuclear bomb First of all, the nukes thrown at Japan were small ones. The nukes that currently exist, are about 20 times stronger. (Still under construction) Edited by Nentsia, 16 Jun 2010, 09:10 PM.
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| Nentsia | 2 Jul 2010, 12:18 AM Post #4 |
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Admin Zapatista
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Diplomacy and International politics guide Why we use diplomacy, what can be build...and even destroyed without the use of weapons. All war represents a failure of diplomacy. - Tony Benn, British politician Diplomacy: the art of restraining power. - Henry A. Kissinger, American statesman and diplomat Diplomacy is more than saying or doing the right things at the right time, it is avoiding saying or doing the wrong things at any time. In this globalized world, diplomacy has become more important than ever. Sadly enough, not in Renatia. In Renatia there are actually more wars going on than there is diplomacy. And that is the result of numerous problems. We don't roleplay the human side of war, the prestige drop you get by going to war and wars of aggression are not punished by the international community. It all comes down to one problem: Roleplay nations simply do not take the responsiblity for acts of war, they do not roleplay the consequences enough. Because if we would roleplay the devastation and loss that war causes, then war would be far less optional in Renatia. The most successful war seldom pays for its losses. War is an instrument entirely inefficient toward redressing wrong; and multiplies, instead of indemnifying losses. - Thomas Jefferson, American president Another part of the problem, is diplomacy. The value of diplomacy is not appreciated in Renatia. There is a certain atmosphere here which is like ''The only way to get things done in Renatia is through war''. With this guide, I would like to change that into ''when all else failed, we will go to war''. War is failure of diplomacy. - John Dingell, American politician. War as your last option History teaches that war begins when governments believe the price of aggression is cheap. - Ronald Reagan, American actor and president. Economic War is devastating for your economy. The government has to pay for all the costs of the deployed soldiers, the government must pay for different types of clothes, for food, drinking water, shelter and all the articles normal human beings need to have some sort of a life. The the government has enormous upkeep costs for material, many vehicles and rifles need to be replaced once in a while, military camps have to be constructed, bullets have to be purchased, lots of fuel, gigantic transport costs and of course, the high tech gadgets used by military intelligence organizations, the navy and the air force are incredibly expensive. For example, a single F22-raptor aircraft will cost your ministry of defence about $140 million(!) And then I haven't mentioned the upkeep costs, fuel costs, and crew personnel costs and even the training costs that the crew requires. You can imagine, that every loss of such an aircraft is a serious economic blow for the government. Buying a new one is for most nations in the world simply not possible, as the price is higher than the Defence budget of most nations. The US government under Bush' administration, started 2 wars in just one term in office. This caused the US government budget debt to rise with 4 trillion US dollars. This is the reason why the US tries to get more NATO nations to help in Afghanistan, and this is why the US looked for support in the war against Iraq so desperately. The US cannot conduct war in these nations on its own, not because its military is too weak or small, but because the US could not afford it. Not only is war expensive, it requires soldiers. And soldiers, seen through the eyes of economists, are workforce. Workforce that isn't being used, workforce that isn't producing anything. Workforce that is sitting in a military camp in a far away country for years. If you send hundreds of thousands or even millions to the front, the labour market will have less suppliers of labour services (workers), and therefore the workers can start demanding higher wages. As a result, production costs get higher and inflation becomes inevitable. The inflation could cause a serious recession or even a depression. To come to a conclusion: War is very very expensive for governments, and it could lead to disturbances in national economies of the participating nations. There is no government in the universe which would prefer war above diplomacy if these are the economic consequences of war. Governments of the world, think! (if you want to keep your popular support) That also counts for all the psychotic dictatorships in Renatia. Not only democratic regimes need popular support, dictators need too. After all, the dictators rely on the people. They rely on the people to obey them, they rely on the people to work for them and they rely on the people to fight for them. The masses are in reality their own leaders, dialectically creating their own development process. - Rosa Luxemburg When the dictator becomes evil in the eyes of his people, they will resist against him. Revolts, rebellions, strikes and insurgencies break out. The dictator can keep himself in power through state terror, but in the end, he will lose. In the end a revolution will take place, a coup d'etat or the dictator simply steps down to save his ass. You can look it up, cruel dictators don't last for long. No matter how tight their grip on the nation is. When they turn cruel, their days are numbered. Even Joseph Stalin became a victim of his own cruelty. The Ukrainians, Cossacks and Finnish all revolted against the Soviet Union during WWII. Eventually, Stalin had a stroke on a morning in 1953. His ministers, deliberately let him die. Some say Stalin begged for his life in his last minutes alive. Political First of all, politics is all about having power and to keep it like that. That is the only agenda of politicians, presidents, dictators, chancellors and even monarchs. To remain in power for as long as possible. One way to stay in power is to avoid war. In the previous chapter, I accidentally told you allready that a national leader needs some form of popular support. For democracies, you need the support of the majority of the people to win another term in office. For dictators you need a different form of popular support. The popular support that a dictator needs, should rather be called ''popular tolerance''. He needs the tolerance of his own people, so that they won't start demand a regime change, a revolution or free elections. War is destructive to both forms of popular support. Not only do governments have to economic consequences of war into account, they also need to think of their own career. Why else do you think nations always try to justify their wars? They need popular support for the war so the war won't cost them their careers, and they need recrutes for the army. Since 9/11, many countries justify violent military action against their population in the name of ''the war against terror''. Where man called war ''war'' or ''invasion'' in the old times, we now call war and invasions ''military intervention'', ''liberation missions'' etc etc. What was once called ''battlefield'' is nowadays called ''conflict zone'', ''combat zone'', ''red zone'' etc etc. Internationally, warmongering nations will see a drop in their prestige. Since WWII, the USA started many wars. Whether the wars were right or wrong, it caused a huge decrease of US popularity in the world. Before 1945, the US were seen as a sleeping military giant, always fighting against colonialism and they were seen as the great liberators of Europe and Asia. But due to their tremendous amount of wars, this world view changed. Now, the USA was blamed of imperialism. The USA has become the big agressor, and the USA has committed war crimes. True or not, the US wars have led to the rise of anti-american and anti-western movements such as Ghadaffi from Libya, Chavez from Venezuela, Castro&Guevara from Cuba, Morales from Bolivia, Al-Quaida, Taliban, Irak, Iran, Syria, various Asian movements, several African presidents and even European citizens. During the 1960's and '70's, millions of people throughout the world demonstrated against the Vietnam war. Not only that, war could also lead to serious diplomatic sanctions taken by other nations against your nation. Embargoes, blockades, isolation etc etc. Again, this will upset your own population, which could lead to the downfall of the government. Also on this point, the government has to realize the negative effects of going to war. Humanitarian In war, people die. No matter how large the numbers are, they remain numbers. But war itself is brutal. It is always older men who send young men to the front. These young men have to abandon their friends and families, leaving them behind in uncertainty. The soldiers are scared. They are, especially in modern wars, fighting against an enemy whose face they will probably never even get to see. Although we do not fight with swords and sticks anymore, we have found a way to fight an even more brutal war against each other: firing projectiles at each other. Bullets of today cause horrible injuries. About 25% of the troops stationed in warzones suffer ''life-changing injuries''. Soldiers who lost arms and legs. Others get shot. When hit, their comrades need put their organs back on their place. The soldiers literally scream for their mothers, crying like a kid. This is the side of war, the media never show us. Simply because it is too crude, too horrible. I once watched a National Geographic documentary in which journalists followed a US spec ops unit in Afghanistan. The soldiers seemed friendly men, they were a good team together. One of the men was also a translator, who translated the words of Afghans. He also translated the Taliban communication which they intercepted. Every time the Americans talked to Afghan people, the Taliban were always watching - that could be concluded from what was intercepted on the radio. At one night, the team was driving through the desert. They found an IED. They demolished it. Then they found another IED. It was demolished. Military intel told there was an ambush prepared by Taliban. Air support was called in. The team found more IED's hidden, just meters away from their vehicles. After five(?) hours, the team had demolished all the IED's in the area. The first vehicle moved on. The cameraman filmed the other humvee behind them. All of a sudden, a bang could be heared, the camera blacked out for a few seconds. The humvee behind them was on fire. The men started to scream. Some of the passengers died instantly. The translator had burned for about 90% of his skin. The camera crew was wounded too. It would become the biggest loss for this spec ops unit in the Afghan war. The documentary was never finished. The translator died in a medical specialist centre in Hamburg, Germany. He left behind a wive and a recently born child. The other victims also had wives and children. That year, a dozen more people of the same regiment died in Afghanistan. War settles nothing, said Dwight Eisenhower once. It only kills the sons of mothers, friends, fathers and brothers. In every war, innocent people form the largest part of all the casualties. Generally, only 25% of all casualties in a war are actual combatands. The rest is civillian. Governments do not like to see coffins coming back from a foreign war. Because every dead soldier that returns to his nation of birth, will upset the population. Each time the people here of another casualty in the war, their support will significantly decrease. Diplomacy The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting. - Sun Tzu, ancient Chinese military general, strategist and philosopher. Diplomacy is not just being friendly to other governments. It is a form of art. It is in my opinion. The aim of diplomacy is to achieve things through words. To expand your power and influence without having all those negative sides of war, that could cost you your career and even life. Be frugal with your compliments to other nations, make them work for your compliments. Stay calm when one nation tries to provoke you, and be provocative when you know that you are in a very good position. Be also frugal with your warthreads, as they might become meaningless when you use them too often. Don't condemn every nation you don't like, as you condemnations eventually lose their symbolical strength when you use them too often. But diplomacy is not only through the word. Diplomacy is also taking and giving. When you appreciate the recent actions of another government, or you want to offer them something in exchange, then give them something. But, be frugal. Make them work for it. You could offer them trade. If you already trade with them, offer them lower your import tariffs on their products, or offer them free access to your markets. Offer them investments in their country, or buy their government bonds. (like China does with the US). Offer them military acces through your nation, guarantee their independence, open up a new embassy for them in your nation, make special prices for them on your exports, offer them technology (such as agrarian technology, weapons technology, education etc.) or even aid them in a war. Even by showing your friendship to the world as national leaders you do each other a great favor: this makes your nations attractive for businessmen and foreign investors. Diplomacy can build many things, but it can also destroy. For example, diplomatic recognition is needed for new states to become legitimate and independent. This diplomatic tool has been used as a diplomatic weapon by many nations. During the 1990's, the FYR of Macedonia recognized the independence of Taiwan. The Chinese were offended, and vetoed a new UN mission in Macedonia after the Yugoslav war. Nations can also reduce or remove diplomatic ties when an other nation is provoking them. The closure of an embassy, blocking communication, etc etc. Those are more symbolical actions, but they can be very effective. In this modern world where trade and cooperation between nations is a must, breaking off diplomatic ties is a severe punishment. Imagine you live with a group of 5 people in one house. One of them insulted you. You decide not to speak to that person anymore. At first, that person might say he doesn't care. But he does. After all, you have to live with each other. The only way to make things work out is by good communication. When you block this communication, the other person might offer his apology for the sake of cooperation. Other diplomatic sanctions include embargoes and even trade blockades. These are very heavy diplomatic tools, as they also damage your own nation. Disinvestment, sometimes referred to as divestment, refers to the use of a concerted economic boycott, with specific emphasis on liquidating stock, to pressure a government, industry, or company towards a change in policy, or in the case of governments, even regime change. If you are with many nations against one other, you can even try to isolate that nation, causing extreme poverty to that nation. One could also set up a ''visa-embargo'' against a nation. This basically means that citizens from that nation may not enter your nation. Not only damages this both economies (no exhcange of business people), there is also a ne barrier for communication then as diplomats and leaders may not enter your country. This may be very painful. For example, the U.S. denied a visa to Iran's United Nations ambassador who was scheduled to participate in UN General Assembly meeting in New York. This could also happen with sports events. Diplomacy is the war without weapons. Nations try to expand their influence at the expense of their rivals and enemies by undertaking action the limits the influence of their opponents. The art is to keep weapons out of the conflict. When weapons do come into play, both nations have already lost the war. Diplomacy really is a dirty game. You have to outsmart your rivals, humiliate your enemies and perform actions to restrain their influence, in your favor. At the same time, please ones you need to help you out in your diplomatic war against your rivals. That is what most modern day alliances are for. Not really military protection anymore, but rather to form a strong diplomatic bloc against rival nations. Are you ready to win the war of diplomacy? Can you negotiate at the edge of war and peace? Do you dare to challenge your rival diplomats? And do you know exactly what your interests are? The world is waiting, waiting to hear what you have to say in the name of your nation. NOTE: Diplomats are always immune! Attacking or arresting a diplomat is a serious crime and an act of war. Edited by Nentsia, 2 Jul 2010, 06:56 PM.
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