The Western IslesBoard

So, in response to the whole polls showing that Dormill and Stiura is the best nation in TWI and people would love to at least visit it if not live in it, I've decided to look back over an old question Ostehaar posed to me three years back (page=rmb/postid=20759354) (page=rmb/postid=26891217). I'm going to look at both my original response and the more recent response I did as part of my Collaboration factbook last month and go over what's changed, what stayed the same, what I would like to bring back, and what's going to stay in the past. First off, the original:

Dormill and Stiura wrote:

Since this is suddenly relevant, I'll kill two birds with one stone, with unique names as well :P.

Ain't Reconstruction a b!tch? As a result of the Dormill-Stiuraian Civil War, the United Estates has been trying for a long time to get proper infrastructure to the whole nation. In particular, the Estates of Stiura, Lower Kaelectia (particularly the southern half), and southern New Friesland have fairly piss-poor infrastructure compared to the remainder of the nation. This has the side effect of disconnecting these people from the political giants of New Avillon and Upper Kaelectia, though it is fortune that has prevented a worst case scenario from developing from this.

The Black Sheep of Stiura. Thanks to the United State of Dormill and Stiura being led from Stiura Hall, some Stiuraians are stereotyped as nazi scumbags who find pleasure in violence and secession. Though this has been far from true (and in many cases, Stiuraians have been very patriotic in regards to the United Estates), a 27 year-long war against them has not made well on their image. The government has conceded multiple reparations towards the Stiuraians but several demands in the past were rejected and has politically disenfranchised Stiura as a whole. The recent destruction of the National People's Dormill-Stiuraian Party, whose members were mostly Stiuraian, is seen as a massive blow by New Avillon against a since loyal Estate.

Nothing left to scrape. Again a result of the Civil War (this will be a constant theme), in combination with the previous world wars, the Dormill-Stiuraian population has been cut significantly in the last century and it's only been recently that population growth has been shown. The armed forces are very limited in the manpower they can call on and the economy has less workers to keep it driving in a competitive global economy. The government has done some considerable work to good effect in this field,however, encouraging both immigration from around the region and tax incentives for large families. Eventually, this problem will be alleviated but the United Estates sits in a precarious spot if it has to fight a major conflict against a comparable opponent.

And now for strategic concerns!

Surrounded and Isolated. Due to political considerations over the last few months, the United Estates has failed to find a group of allies it can rely upon, and risks run high as some fear if nothing is done soon, a second civil war might break out in a second attempt to gain new allies. At the moment, the UE has looked at entering the Gael Four, the Cooperative Union, and establishing an alliance with the former long-time rival Veridi to secure interests in the south, but work has been hard and with the Lower Kaelectians disabling the Council in early June, things have bogged down.

Foreign Weapons. The domestic armaments industry has been completely shattered by the Civil War and without it, the United Estates has to wholly rely on foreign arms to build its armed forces. The threat of any current trading partner cutting off arms shipments into the United Estates has put commanders in a spot, and have tried almost endlessly to jump-start a domestic arms industry to supplant foreign arms before that becomes a reality.

Shell-shock doesn't make rocks. All Dormill-Stiuraians have either lived through or have been told of the very recent Civil War, and every member of the armed forces are essentially veterans of that conflict. Those who did fight have been less than cooperative towards other soldiers, growing hostile to those who come from Estates that fought against them during the conflict. Dividing the armed forces based on regional lines is a stupid and ultimately dangerous move so the military has to face with a demoralized force that on some occasions refuse to work together because somebody fought for the New Revolutionary Army and their CO fought for the United Republics.

and now, the new one

So what's changed?

The Civil War is gone
Ah the Dormill-Stiuraian Civil War, twenty-three years of hell centered entirely around Dormill and Stiura in the aftermath of the Second World War (now Imperial War). I don't remember the precise context as to why I decided on a civil war for that segment of my history (and it's even more weird now that I *don't* have it since all of Gael now has a civil war in that timeframe) but I do feel a bit more free in what to do with D&S in that era with the civil war out of my way. While it has been nominally replaced with the conflicts now a part of the wider De Strijd period (including the Dormill-Stiura War, the Ardedan Restoration Conflict, the First Arvannan War), there still a large area of peace that I can operate in. That said, the baggage the Civil War gives D&S, especially in the form of Nothing Left to Scrape and Shell-Shock is something that might be worth touching on in the modern context.

Foreign Weapons is non-applicable
Since a lot of my flaws back then circled back to the Civil War, the lack of it in the last three years allowed me to develop a wholly indigenous arms industry for Dormill and Stiura, something that I both like to have and hate to sit on. Balnik has made this point to me in the past but pushing for a kind of autarky with respect to businesses in general and arms in particular is something that I am uncomfortable with. While I will certainly keep what I've been working on, I'm going to look into ways to restore some of this flaw to D&S, especially post-2011, which I'll cover in the next segment.

All the Republics are now equals
In contrast to the time when Stiura and Kalectia (now Ardeda) were considered to be the redheaded step-children the nation, now they are seen as essential parts of the system, and are relied on as heavily as the remaining Republics (which now number twelve to the original six) to keep the state functioning. While there still remains political tension as is wont for any society, there is no longer a perception that these states and their people are a potential threat to the continued peace.

Now what should I add on?

Political Flaws:

Young and Stupid
I teased this concept overnight on the Discord, but I'll fully elaborate on it here. In a revival of Nothing Left to Scrape, I am going to flip the concept on its head and start operating D&S as if it was a younger nation, much younger than developed nations tend to be. This will come as the result of major efforts made by the De Vires administration during the Post-Imperial Era to increase the national population after the Imperial War, which was translated as major efforts to encourage large families with plenty of children. This has two impacts in the modern day, (1) basically every living generation that lived through this period from 1955 - 1995, grew up with a much stronger communal mindset than I've written before, with a major emphasis given to settling down in the city with large families; and (2) these people break the previously written mold that Doraltics are individualistic as a nation which is going to be particularly interesting because its the last generation of these people, people like Cedar Dyson, that are now reaching the height of their political power. While this does mean that D&S is highly productive with a large, and young workforce, this is poised to start biting it in the butt as the newest generation, the first to grow up post-reunification, start to take back the individualistic part of the Doraltic identity for themselves. I expect more major counterculture movements alike to #OccupyKapolder to be common going forward.

Strategic Flaws:

Global Interdependence
This is my previously mentioned restoration of Foreign Weapons for the modern Dormill and Stiura. Instead of the nation being heavily reliant on imported weapons (that's simply impractical now), the problem now is that a major portion of Dormill and Stiura's key industries are reliant on, partially-, or fully owned by foreign nationals or multinational companies, this goes from agriculture to automotives, to arms manufacturing, to even the modern digital services. While some companies I've written so far (such as White-Liang, East Winds, and the Bank of Kapolder) will remain predominantly independent, the rest have become reliant on foreign investment in the wake of the 2011 collapse of Kapolder Investment Solutions and the subsequent recession. This is going to be the biggest thing that tugs on Dyson for the remainder of his time with us, as his previously expended political clout will now start to turn against him, with foreign interests with hands deep in the economy start to put pressure on him to play nice. This is going to be something I'll be open to everybody in TWI about, so if you want a hand on the strings of my government, let me know and we'll work on something going forward.

An Army for War, Lost in Peace. Doraltic military spending is among the highest in the region and accounts for slightly over 4% of the national GDP, which is on the edge of too high for a nation at peace. This has granted the United Republics a large, modern, and capable military but its expense has created economic, logistical, and political strain within the Doraltic government and society. In general, relatively smaller segments of the military engage in regular expeditionary actions and a large portion of units are functionally ready reserve, requiring several weeks to mobilize in the event of a conflict. Further, military planning is oriented towards threats that were more prominent in the past than in the present, where significant threats are few and far between, causing overconfidence within the Doraltic military that may well be exploited by a committed enemy. This now replaces "A Half-Army" as it was time-limited to a section of 2021 when I originally intended to run Inferno over Gael. Since that has not happened, I felt a need to replace it with a broader issue that does not have a time limit.

Thus, in this 2023 Update, the major flaws of Dormill and Stiura are:

Political Flaws

Slow? Where Capitalism goes we don't do slow.
As a Capitalist nation, Dormill and Stiura relies closely on the continued growth of private enterprises to keep the national economy afloat. While this may not be a concern most of the time, a major problem arises whenever the system suffers a major slow-down, which has happened twice since the United Republics reunified in 1995, first in the lead up and aftermath of Baetylus, and second in the wake of a short squeeze killing the nation's largest investment bank in 2011. Recovery since then has been a patchwork job and has exposed several core inequalities about the United Republics that is slowly eating away at the national fabric.

Young, Stupid, and Powerful.
Related to the above 2011 Recession, Dormill and Stiura is also undergoing a major shift in the political dynamics of the nation, new and younger Dormill-Stiuraians who grew up with the new Union have had a unique perspective on how things should be run. Thanks to a abnormally young political ruling class compared to its neighbors driven by Viresian population growth policies of the 1950s-70s, Doraltic policy is becoming increasingly directed by people wishing to take the next big step in the path of Doraltic unification, splitting between a side that wishes to reform the federal system, and those that want to dismantle the federal system in favor of a true democracy. All the while, the old political ruling class is still contending with their loss of power, and will certainly try to take it back over the next several elections.

Forwards; but to where?
Although popular among the common people both within Dormill and Stiura and abroad, Cedar Dyson is not your average politician. He did not know how to play the political game when he sought office six years ago, and he's still learning how to handle each new situation like a first-year Political Science major. Dyson has expended a significant amount of his political capital early on with several foreign invasions and attempts at diplomatic flexing. While some have been successful, others haven't, and this has caused problems for him among those people who know how the game is played and how to manipulate Dyson's fears of being unable to handle the Presidency against him. He can be caught up in schemes beyond his understanding but don't mistake him for gullible or naïve, this Presidency has taught him much, regardless of how much more he has to learn.

Strategic Flaws

Eastern Myopia.
For as long as Dormill and Stiura has existed as a nation, so too has its utter lack of care for trans-Argus affairs or nations. Dormill and Stiura's core strategic concerns are always vested in Gael and the near South, always around securing Dormill and Stiura's economic interests by creating blocs aligned to Dormill and Stiura's interests. This means that the nations of Raedlon and the Mesder are considered irrelevant in almost every aspect. One day though, this line of thinking will come to bite Dormill and Stiura, whether or not its leaders know it.

Southern Menace.
Balnik is considered by Dormill and Stiura to be the most significant threat to stability in all of Gael. A relatively large nation built from the ground-up of a devastating civil war into the perfect fascist war machine, it's almost a shock that the two nations haven't gone to war in the last 30 or so years. That's not to say there haven't been close calls on both sides, but it does not change the fact that Balnik may well be the one true existential threat to the United Republics out of anything that presently exists in the Isles. As a result, the United Republics' military concerns are focused mostly at countering Balniki threats, leaving a disproportionate amount of forces orientated against the southwestern border, ready for a war that is the dread of such a large part of the nation.

An Army for War, Lost in Peace.
Doraltic military spending is among the highest in the region and accounts for slightly over 4% of the national GDP, which is on the edge of too high for a nation at peace. This has granted the United Republics a large, modern, and capable military but its expense has created economic, logistical, and political strain within the Doraltic government and society. In general, relatively smaller segments of the military engage in regular expeditionary actions and a large portion of units are functionally ready reserve, requiring several weeks to mobilize in the event of a conflict. Further, military planning is oriented towards threats that were more prominent in the past than in the present, where significant threats are few and far between, causing overconfidence within the Doraltic military that may well be exploited by a committed enemy.