What We Should Be

For those of you who don't well me all that well, I am a Communist, and proud of it. I have been writing my manifesto recently, and would like to post what I have so far. Please comment on it in a constructive manner, as these points will likely be addressed because of your comments. This is still a work in progress:

What We Should Be

The human race is the most atrocious species that I have ever seen. Nowhere else in the animal kingdom do beasts kill for the sheer pleasure of witnessing the misfortune of others. It is barbaric and animalistic that the human institutions not only allow for this to occur, but actually support these atrocities. Right now, I am referencing the Capitalist system, the root of all evil in the world. Frequently, there will be documentaries on TV, recounting the struggles of a poor African farmer, but most people will do nothing about it. Only a small percentage, at best, will even send a few spare dollars to some organization that supposedly helps these people. In reality, all that the farmer will get is at best a bottle of water. This will not help him in the slightest. If anything, it only gives him false hope that there are people out there to help him. This is but one of the many examples that I could go into. It is unnecessary to give more, as I assume that you also see the inherent evils within the Capitalistic institutions. What I propose is a new world order, a clear and distinct shift in the way we treat our fellow humans. If we are supposed to be the pinnacle of all heavenly creations, we must bear the burden of this responsibility. We cannot continue down this path of pure evil, as long as we wish to survive for much longer as a species on this great earth.
The main goal of my proposed society is to have a strong central government, able to adjust to the needs of the people. There is to be a representative of the people elected at the beginning of his/her term. In the event that the approval rating of the representative ever falls below 60%, which is determined by a census every other year, the representative shall be replaced in a new election. During the elections, the representative may not imprison or deport anyone in a position of becoming representative, unless there is evidence that proves beyond reasonable doubt, that high treason has been committed. Elections are to be held by a free and independent media. The media, the only institution not under the direct control of the government, and is the responsibility of the people. The media will receive a predetermined percentage of the nation’s resources, and this percentage may never change, unless those in the media are in danger of starvation.
Not everyone is to be equal. There are to be three levels of society: Heavy Laborers, Heavy Workers, and Light workers, levels 3, 2, 1 respectively. Examples of heavy laborers include factory workers, farmers, and doctors, as mental effort is equal to that of physical effort. Examples of a level 2 vocations are technicians, educators, and government officials. All level 1 workers are in general unskilled workers. All essential goods are provided at the end of each day at the company store, which is supplied and regulated by the government. All non-essential purchases can be made using a point system, which is dependent on the level of work, as well as the effort given towards that work, and the duration spent working. Points are awarded given the following equation:

P = l((x/7) + eh)

Where P = Points
= level of work
= experience (in years)
= effort given to work (percentage)
= hours of work
And the cost of a basic article of clothing is about 2 points
Example point totals:
A person that gives 100% effort of a level 1 vocation for 8 hours with 21 years of experience:
P = 11 points
A person that gives 70% effort of a level 3 vocation for 10 hours with 14 years of experience:
P = 27 points

This may seem as if it is a large divide, but it is far better than the situation that we have right now, where some make millions of times more than other people. Also, the person with the level 1 occupation can easily achieve 100% effort, while the person with a level 3 occupation struggles to achieve 70% effort.
The way that effort is measured is by a system of supervisors who never know who they are supervising. They look at the raw data and determine if said person could have had a higher output of productivity. If it is essentially impossible to have a higher degree of output, that person is to receive 100% effort for the day. If a person falls into the 50th percentile of productivity, that person shall receive 50% effort, and so on. A system of percentiles like this will create competition in the workforce, a healthy component of any economic system.
Now we shall move on to something more interesting. The representative is to have supreme control over the army. The representative may do as s/he wills, unless 60% or more of his/her advisors officially object to action partaken by the representative. There are to be eight advisors to the representative: Military, State, Economic, Agriculture, Productivity, Foreign Relations, Public Relations, and Educational. These are selected in the same manner as the representative, where elections are held by the media.
Roles of the Advisors:
1) Military:
This person is to advise the representative of possible situations involving the use of the military. This person shall also assume the duties of the representative, in the event that the representative is unable to fulfill his/her duties, until a replacement has been found by means of the electoral process. This person also is to ensure that the military is always prepared to defend the nation in case of foreign and domestic threats.
2) State:
This person is to advise the representative of the day to day operations of the nation. This includes, but is not limited to, infrastructure, and to ensure the effectiveness of the system of advisors.
3) Economic:
This person is to advise the representative of all matters of the economy. This includes necessary adjustments to the income equation to avoid inflation. This person also advises on what kind of businesses should and should not be created.
4) Agriculture:
This person is to advise the representative of that which relates to agriculture. She/he is responsible for ensuring that all people in the country have a caloric diet of at least three thousand calories per day, and all essential nutritional elements. In the event of a food shortage, this person is to advise the representative on how to distribute the food, with level three workers being priority recipients at all times.
5) Productivity:
This person is responsible for ensuring that the country is as productive as possible. This advisor has the ability to create new vocations for the workers of the country, however must receive the representative’s approval for the elimination of jobs. This person is also to assist in the distribution of goods to the company stores of the nation, to ensure that their stocks are never empty.
6) Foreign Relations:
This person is to ensure no foreign governments intend to attack the nation in any manner. She/he is responsible for avoiding armed conflict whenever possible. This person is not permitted to start an armed conflict, unless it is coordinated with the representative and the military advisor.
7) Public Relations:
This person is to ensure that the government does not lose touch with the rest of the nation. S/he also must ensure that the people of the nation have a moderate level of entertainment, provided free of charge to all people, regardless of their work level.
8) Education:
All people of the nation are required to have a minimum of fifteen years of education. This is the equivalent to a level one vocation, and is paid as such. The advisor of education is responsible for providing the proper facilities and resources to educate the public. Education is to start at the age of 5, and end at the age of 20. If one wishes to continue their education, they may do so in a specialized field as long as they pass an acceptance exam. That which is taught in schools must not be biased, and all historical information must be presented from all relative points of view, whenever possible.

In the event that a war erupts, the representative has the ability to reduce pay to the people of the nation by up to 50%. In order for this to be applicable, the nations must be actively fighting each other using conventional warfare. The representative also has the ability of calling upon the people of the nation to defend the homeland. No more than 35% of the population may actively fight as a soldier in the army. Others may aid the army by other means, such as taking level three vocations which produce military supplies.
Researchers for the army have the right to perform any experiments they feel necessary, unless by doing so the entire nation is at risk. This is as research in the sciences is paramount, and should not be restricted by ethical concerns. However, this does not give the research teams of the nation free reign over society. They are to report to the advisor that assigned the team its project. Projects that have an emphasis on increasing productivity shall always have the highest priority, unless a declaration of war has been issued, in which case projects pertaining to the military have the highest priority. In order to join a research team, one may appeal to the research coordinator if there is an available position, or else one must appeal to the advisor who has the ability to create more positions on a research team. At the start of any research project, the advisor must establish the maximum number of people who may work on that assignment.

What is Happiness?

This is one of the most perplexing questions that I have ever faced in my entire life. I am sure that you can think of things that make you happy, and you are likely thinking of them right now as you read this. But what is the true meaning of happiness? You can look in any dictionary to find a vague, meaningless answer that tells you absolutely nothing. I could easily just say some cheesy chiché, saying that in order to find out what it is, you need to "look inside of yourself". That, yet again, is entirely meaningless. I give a very simple definition to the word happiness: an illusion. The feeling of happiness is but a temporary hallucinogen from the sobering reality of humanitys existence. It is the goal of all of mankind, yet it is impossible to grasp. If a person claims that they are happy, they are liers. In order to truly be happy, you must be the most ignorant person on the face of the earth. You would have to ignore all of the problems that plague not only yourself, but the rest of us. Why is it that children die of cancer at the age of 7, yet Stalin lived to be 74? I sometimes use the phrase "[insert noun here] should be taken out back and shot" (as a joke). The only noun it truly applies to is Stalin himself. The world is incredibly unjust, and the fact that we just watch is appaling. I like to think that every person has some good inside of them, but I simply cannot believe the fact that collectively, people can be good, at least not right now. For the past 300 years we have been faced with extreme hardship in the wake of the industrial revolution. Sometimes, I try to think what the mentality of the factory workers were. All it usually comes to is me imigining them saying to a worker of theirs "I'd trade your arm for a good cup of tea anyday!". You can see why I feel the way I do. My personality is simple, and somewhat Vulcan-like. I see a problem, I analyze the problem, and I do what I can to fix the problem. I do what is logical, and I see things from a logical perspective. I want to do some good in the world before I die, and how much better can I do than trying to fix the worst part of humanity: greed. Many people throughour the course of history have tried to change this, Marx, Lenin, Engels, and yet their names are now sinonimus with evil! While yes, they did have some bad traits about them, everyone does! The Capitalist pigs have even worse traits, yet they rule the world! Of course we do not learn to love Lenin in American schools, as Capitalists write the history textbooks that we read. Sometimes I think to myself, what the point of trying to help the world if it doesn't want my help? I'm sure some people would find it convienent if I were to "dissappear", but I haven't figured out that magic trick yet, sorry.
My views are controversial, yes, but I believe them because the goal is collective happiness, not happiness at the expense of others. But again, how can you have collective happiness if you do not know what happiness looks like? Illusions are a mysterious things indeed, and I have never found a more prime example.
Of course, I have had moments where I have experienced happiness, yet I have never actually been happy. Is it even possible to be happy? Appearently not, if you believe the above. Then why bother trying? If you know that you can never be happy, why waste your time? The answer is simple: we need to be trying because otherwise, we may as well all commit mass suicide. It is the stuggle that keeps us going, the struggle for happiness. Without it, life is meaningless, even more so than the definition you were tempted to look up in the beginning of the post.
I've never really tried to be happy before. I would always convince myself, "you'll be happy later on in life, don't worry about it right now, just focus on what I need to do to get to that point". It was not until last night that I asked myself, "why?". Why will I be happy later, and why should I wait? Do I gain anything by waiting? Perhaps I do, but most likely I won't. Why would I continue to pursue such an abstract concept if I don't even know what it is, if I have never experienced it? That is why I do need to try to be happy. That doesn't mean to force a smile on my face when I feel down, but to go after which naturally puts a smile on me, to go after which forces a smile on me, to the point that I cannot resist an ear to ear grin. Is this only achieveable for me if I see the death of Capitalism? I doubt it. Many things can make me smile, but I have yet to encounter something that makes me happy, so much as to force a smile upon me. Should I try? I don't know. I find it interesting that this post has turned into a self reflection, but it needed to come out. I doubt anyone has actually made it to this point in my ramblings, but if you have, you rock! Last night I tried to convince myself to try from now on to chase happiness, as far as I had to, and until death stopped me. I know myself well enough by now that it wasn't going to happen. I preach productivity, yet when it comes to chasing happiness, I am the laziest person I know.
I put alot of reflection in this post, so if you can make it past the brief rant on Capitalism, you'd really make my day.
09edwarc

Räznovia Unbound

I figured that some people that read my blog would want to see what I have been talking about so often, so here it is. It is still a rough draft, but the main points are there:





Räznovia Unbound



By,
09edwarc



















Part One:

The year is late 2012, and Russia has fallen to the Räznovian revolution. In one of the largest coups on Earth, Communism was making one last gasp for eternal power. But this was no ordinary Communism; it had somehow combined the Capitalism of the west with it, which was a feat in itself. There was an even distribution of wealth, which included President Peter Vostov himself, along with all of his officials.
Everything was provided by the state: housing, food, clothes, everything essential to life. However, as an incentive to work harder, luxury items were rewarded in a point system to those who worked the hardest. Suddenly, those who had desk jobs were not nearly as well off as those who were farmers or factory workers. With that in mind, people for the first time actually wanted to do hard labor. The people of Räznovia respected this system, as a true leader had rose to power, not a corrupt man like too many times before.
It was proclaimed just after the revolution that the borders would be closed off for fifteen years, in order for the country to become a “self-sufficient country” before becoming dependent upon trade. Nobody knew that in this time, Räznovia was building up its industrial power beyond what any country had seen before. Not the best satellites, nor the best spies, could see what was happening beneath the mountains of Räznovia. Nobody could see the stockpiled weapons in the thousands upon thousands of mines located throughout Räznovia, at least not until a severe thunderstorm caused a collapse of one of the mines near the Chinese border. Chinese border men could see hundreds of Räznovians digging frantically in a supposedly deserted area. In total, 137 nuclear warheads were seen by the outside world, and in defiance of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty signed by all nations, outlawing nuclear weapons; Räznovia had broken that treaty. If the border guard were to be killed, the Chinese would launch an investigation, which may have revealed the radiation leak from one of the warheads. The Räznovians knew that China had to be silenced, or an all out war with every single capable country would break loose; for the first time in 15 years, several men left the confines of Räznovia and headed to negotiate with the Chinese border men. They refused to immigrate to Räznovia, which was the first choice presented, and they even refused an enormously large bribe, which led to the events that would follow. 137 Räznovian suicide terrorists covertly made their way into China 48 hours after the diplomatic attempts, and 137 nuclear warheads detonated on Chinese soil. Räznovia quickly claimed responsibility, which was followed by an invasion. Fifteen minutes later, China surrendered. One hour after that, NATO unanimously declared unrestricted war on Räznovia, along with the cancellation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty.

My alarm clock rang; it was time to get up.
“Turn that thing off Alec,” moaned my wife Julie, “I need to get some sleep before the Kuiter trial.”
“But that’s not until Jan…”
“I know I know, but I need to make sure I get him, we can’t let a person like him walk free”
“You still pushing for the death penalty?”
“Yes, now can I go back to sleep?”
I got out of bed and put on my slippers. Before I took my shower, I looked in the mirror as I sometimes do in the morning. How I loath my body. I used to be the quarterback on the football team in high school, now I’m balding, overweight, uhh what a mess. I took my shower, got dressed, and went down to the kitchen to make my morning cup of coffee, barely able to keep my eyes open.
“Good morning Houston,” said the man on the radio, “Today is Thursday, December 23, 2027.”
I turned the coffee pot on, and continued to listen.
“Today’s weather is going to be cloudy with a chance of rain, high 65, and a low of 53”
I went and got a mug from the cabinet, and sat down.
“Tomorrow: sunny and turning cold overnight, high 62, with a low of 44”
The coffee ready light turned on, so I got up to pour myself a cupful.
“For your extended outlook, Christmas day will be cold and sunny with highs is the 50’s, the 26th will start to warm up with highs in the…”
I turned off the radio just as I sat down in the kitchen, listening to the world go by. In that one moment of peace and solitude, I heard Chops outside, honking his horn like mad. Just then, I got a call on my cell. I look to see who it was, and predictably enough, it was Chops. I rushed outside to the car, and got in the front seat of his old station wagon.
“That took you long enough,” said Chops.
“I’m always ready at this time, what’s wrong with today?”
“Remember, we have that new guy to pick up”
“He’s riding with us?”
“Yeah, don’t you remember?
“No”
“Well, maybe I didn’t tell you, but he’s more or less on our way to the base, so I offered to let him ride”
Chops started to drive down the road.
“You were only planning on telling me this now?” I said
“I thought I already told you, actually, I did, I remember now, it was at that party a couple nights ago”
“There was a party?” I said sarcastically
I started to chuckle as all that I could remember about that night was that I may have had a little too much egg nog to drink, and the rest is a blur. I normally didn’t drink though, as I never wanted to be like my father.
“Ok, we’re here”
I got out of the car, walked up to the door, and rang the bell. I could hear voices inside, but I couldn’t make any of it out, and finally, the door opened.
“Take care now”, the man said to the woman standing by the door.
We walked to the car, and got in.
“Hello there. I’m Alec, Commander of the tank battalion, tell me about yourself,” I said to the new guy.
“Well, my name is Mathew Jacobson, and I am going to be the commander of the new SAM battalion here in Houston. I used to live out in California, but I was reassigned here.”
“Ok, we can find out more about you during our break, we’re almost there”
“Hey Alec”, said Chops as he pulled into his parking spot, “what are you doing for lunch today?”
“I’ve got a ton of paperwork I need to do, so I’ll probably just go to the break room or something like that”
“That’s fine, I’ll meet you there”
I got out of the car, and started to walk towards my office building. Just then, I got a call on my cell. I pulled it out of my pocket, and checked to see who it was. The screen said that it was General Reeves, the old guy in charge of the base.
“This is Alexander Bradley,” I say as I answered my phone.
“Bradley, this is General Reeves, there has been a change in the schedule for today. I need you to closely watch our satellite images over Räznovia, it’s the fifteen year anniversary and we’ve gotten some reports from the Chinese that there has been some activity”
“I’ll get right on it General”
I hung up the phone and started to head to the satellite imagery room.
“I’ll do anything to get out of doing paperwork,” I thought to myself as I opened the door. I walked up the steps to the third floor, and went into the main room.
“Ok, so what do we got here?” I asked to the soldier standing in front of the large screen mounted on the wall.
“Well, I have been looking at the Räznovian eastern borders as I thought that there had been some movement there, but I don’t see anything there now. I’ve watched this particular part over and over again, take a look”
The man showed me the video and it did look as if there had been some sort of activity on the mountainside near the Chinese border, but just as soon as it started, it disappeared.
“I don’t know what they could be doing” he continued.
“You sure it’s not just a glitch or something?”
“I’m certain, I mean look at this,” he said as he zoomed the picture in to as far as it could go, “It definitely looks like people down there, and unless somebody has hacked our system, something’s going on over there”
I knew what he was saying was correct, as the images certainly looked human. The man printed out a copy of the picture from the screen and gave it to me.
“Well,” I started, “I’ll take this to the General, and we’ll go from there. You have a good eye to see that. And, why would you think to look there anyway? I mean, that place is practically deserted…”
“Don’t tell the General this, but I have a friend in China. He said that there was a real bad storm a few days ago, and I wanted to check out what happened”
“Well, it seems your personal use of government computers has provided us with some potentially useful information, so in that case, I’ll disregard what you just said and just take this to the General.”
“Thanks, I appreciate it.”
It was almost time for lunch at this point, so I thought that I might as well take my lunch early. I headed over to the break room to find Chops already there, eating a sandwich.
“What, you couldn’t wait for me?” I said
“Well, you weren’t showing up, I thought maybe something came up. But I did spare your lunch.”
He handed me another sandwich, still in its plastic wrap. As I started to unwrap it, I heard something outside.
“Do you hear that?” I asked
“Hear what?”
It was quiet, but it sounded like screaming almost. Then, an alarm rang.
“Warning! Warning!” said the person on the intercom frantically, “Proceed to battle stations immediately! This is not a drill! Repeat: Proceed to battle stations, this is not a drill!”

I looked at Chops with my eyes wide open. I could see that within him there was confusion, but he was also scared. We jumped out of our chairs and ran out of the building. There was a jeep waiting for both of us just outside, and the driver urged us both in. It must have reached at least 75 on the narrow roads of the base; we were both hanging on for our lives.
“What the h--- is going on?!” I asked the driver.
“I don’t know, but early reports are that China has just been attacked” he responded
“By who?!” asked Chops.
“I don’t know.”
The jeep stopped right in front of headquarters, which is not where we are normally told to go the event of an emergency. I saw General Reeves standing just outside, awaiting our arrival.
“Can you tell us what’s going on?!” I asked as I got out of the jeep
“Come inside, there’s going to be a debriefing.”
The three of us jogged inside to find a roomful of people, fellow commanders, waiting for the briefing. Reeves ran up to the front of the room, went up to the podium, and started to speak.
“Ok everybody, sit down. We don’t have much time, so listen carefully. China has just been attacked by the forces of Räznovia. Just a few minutes ago, about 150 nuclear warheads detonated on Chinese soil.”
The crowd gasped.
“Chinese officials say that this act was unprovoked, and they are requesting immediate aid. We are currently preparing for an assault of the Räznovian eastern border in response. Currently, NATO is deciding what actions to take, but predictions are that this will lead to an all out war. There will be several C-47’s to take us to the western border of Alaska to prepare for the attack. All men are to leave immediately. That is all for now.”
We were all in shock. There were no words to describe our emotions, but we knew that the world we had lived in was gone, and would likely never return. We left the room and headed towards the airfield. There were dozens of planes that seemed to just come out from nowhere.
“I didn’t know we even had this many planes at the base!” I said to Chops
There must have been at least five hundred planes on the tarmac; they could barely all fit. There were signs posted all over the place on where specific units were to go.
“Standard Infantry, runway A1-A15...”
We looked for our positions on the signs.
“Commanders, runway C16…”
We got in the plane to find Matty already in there, so we sat next to him.
“I take it you’ve already heard what happened,” he said.
“Yeah, we heard,” I said, “And I mean of all days, it’s the 15 year anniversary of the revolution isn’t it?”
“It sure is,” said Chops.
The engines started to throttle up and a person closed the doors.
“You don’t think they’ve been planning this from the beginning don’t you?” he continued.
“Oh God I hope not,” I said.
The plane started to move forward. It went faster and faster until it was in the air. I then started to think about Julie. What would she do? Would I ever see her again? Then I thought about it even more. I very well may see her again if there were to be a massive draft in which even women would be included. I didn’t want to see her if that’s what it meant. I had my head in my hands now; I just couldn’t bear for anyone to look at me, to see a tough guy like me about to burst into to tears.
I listened and everyone was quiet, only the engines could be heard; I was able to pull myself together and look up at Matty.
“So, you married?” I asked
“No, not yet,” he responded, “I will be January 3rd, rather, would have been. I should have a picture with me.”
He pulled out his wallet to find a picture within in. It was a picture of him and his fiancée sitting on a beach.
“This is when you lived back in California?”
“Yeah, and how about you? You married?”
“Yup, almost five years now”
“What’s her name?”
“Julie.”
“Nice name, any kids?”
“No, but she wants to.”
Chops was sitting next to me, with his head in his hands.
“You ok man?” I asked
“I don’t do well as a passenger.”
“You’re in planes all the time, how can you get sick?”
“As a pilot, I know what to expect, but as a passenger, I don’t see what’s happening,” he said as he groaned while experiencing a sharp turn.
Matty leaned forward to speak to Chops
“Hey Chops,” he said
“Yeah?”
“You married?”
“Nope.”
“You with anyone?”
“Nope.”
“How’s that possible? I mean look at yourself, you’d really be a catch for somebody.”
“Just waiting for the right person.”
“Makes sense I guess.”
“Hey guys,” I said, “You might want to get some sleep now, who knows when we’ll be able to later.”
I put my head down in my lap, but I couldn’t sleep, as my mind was wandering too much. A few hours later, the pilot got on the intercom.
“This is the pilot speaking. We’ve just gotten some updates on the situation. China has recently surrendered, but the Räznovians have continued to invade. They have released a video message, but we are unable to show it to you on the plane due to the lack of monitors. Also, NATO has declared unrestricted war with Räznovia. The UN is currently working out an agreement with all of its members to create “The World Alliance”. For all of you wondering, there has been no attack on Europe, only on China. It will be about half an hour before we land, and I will keep you updated as best as I can. May God be with you in this time of great peril.”

What a sight it was upon landing. Just before we landed, we could see what looked like millions of tents, and thousands of bonfires spread throughout. It looked more like a refugee camp than a military camp. Bonfires marked the paths of the various runways, while thousands of planes filled the sky prepared to land. There was a layer of ice on the ground which had been cleared away and because of that, the camp was a muddy mess. It was a hard landing, and we had only but a minute to exit the plane before it would take off again to make room for the next one. The roar of all of the planes overhead was deafening, the sight of the bonfires made me feel as if I was walking in the poor part of Houston, and it was cold enough to freeze your body to the bones. We knew that America was being emptied all into this one place, ready for an attack. We were going to give it our all, right here, and right now. Among the crowd of men, the three of us made our way to our tent. It was a meager tent, barely even able to keep out the snow. We huddled by a bonfire for warmth in the bitter Arctic cold, wondering if we would ever go home.
“I don’t think it’s really hit me yet,” I said, “Maybe I’ll just wake up tomorrow to find out that this is all a dream.”
“Let’s all hope so,” responded Chops
“I mean, I have a turkey at home that’s almost done thawing, and it needs to be cooked!”
“Ahh, don’t talk about being cooked, I’m so cold.”
“I think we all are.”
A man in a thick military coat came and put some more wood into the fire, and sparks started to fly everywhere.
“Hey, that wood’s wet, don’t put it in the fire!” said Matty
“It’s all we got around here. And you should be happy you have this one even. I’ve heard some have already had to be treated for frostbite.”
The sparks stopped, and the flames grew higher.
“See, it’s better already.”
The man left, dragging his cart of wood alongside him in the mud. He went to the next fire, and threw in a piece of wood, and then disappeared in the darkness.
“It’s as dark as midnight right now,” said Matty as he looked up into the sky.
“Well, it’s really only four in the afternoon here” said Chops as he adjusted his watch.
I couldn’t help to wonder why the Räznovians committed such a treacherous act. They must have known of the consequences, so why would they risk everything they had? I knew that I would find out eventually, or rather, I hoped that I would find out eventually.
“Oh God, what has the world come to?” I said.
Suddenly, my radio started to beep. General Reeves was attempting to contact me.
“Bradley, Jacobson, Wilson, I need to speak with you immediately regarding our attack plan.”
“Well, you heard him, let’s get on over there,” I said
We started to make our way through the crowd of people to where the general’s tent would be.
“You think his place’ll be heated?” said Matty.
“Oh, I hope so,” responded Chops, “my hands are freezing!”
We eventually made it to the tent, only to find that it was no better than ours.
“Come in, come in,” Reeves said while signaling us to enter.
We sat down on some of the chairs in the tent, which was far better than sitting in the cold, wet, and muddy snow.
“Well, it looks like we’re going to have the hard job” he said.
“Whaddya mean?!” I said
“We’ve been given our orders; we’re to go right down the center.”
“Just my luck,” said Chops quietly.
“Wilson, we have been able to supply you and your men with some planes. I’m sorry we couldn’t bring the ones from our base, they just couldn’t make the flight.”
“Thanks for the consideration” he responded sarcastically.
“I will be honest with you, we know close to nothing about their defenses. I am uncertain that an aerial insertion would be our best option because of this, as they may have enough anti-air to cause significant casualties. I am certain though that they will not turn their own land into an uninhabitable zone, unlike what they did to China. The strait is frozen over; it should be strong enough to hold the tanks. So, our plan in this: Alec, you and your men go in first at 10:00 hours tomorrow along with close air support from Chops. Five minutes later, Matty will follow in to aid Chops in case he meets resistance. Your primary objective will be to secure the town of Keyyekan and to clear out any hostiles in the region. You will then move south to regroup with the forces at Pinakul by 20:00. Once you reach land, it should be about 15 miles, give or take, from Keyyekan to Pinakul. Good luck.”
That was all that he had to say to us, no more, no less. We left the tent to see yet even more commanders waiting to go inside, waiting to receive their death sentences. We knew that we may very well not survive the attack, and as such, did not get a single minute of sleep that night, but only laid awake, questioning our possibilities of survival.

The morning of the attack came, and from what I saw, nobody was well rested. It had been a long day yesterday, and we knew that they were only going to get even longer from this point onward. Chops, however, looked fine. Matty, on the other hand, looked exactly like he felt. He could barely keep his eyes open, or stop himself from shaking. I dared not ask if it was from the cold, or from fear.
We exited our tent to find everyone participating in a massive exodus from the camp. Chops headed toward the airfield as walked over to where I expected my tank battalion to be.
“Is my tank ready?” I asked one of the maintenance workers.
“As ready as it’s ever going to get up here,” he responded.
Just then, my radio started to beep.
“This is General Epps of the American Armed Forces” the man said confidently. This was no ordinary man. General Epps was a legend for what he did in the Mexican Rebellions; it was not a surprise that he would be organizing this attack, “I know that many of you have questions about why we are here, and why we are attacking. Just let me say to you, that this operation is essential to the well being of humanity as we know it. Today, we fight for our survival. If we fail here, the Räznovians will move in and take Alaska. If we fail here, the Räznovians will move south and take the west coast. If they do such a thing, it would be all over. But what we do know, is that they will kill every man, woman, and child they encounter, just as they have shown us in China! The fate of humanity is at stake, right here, and right now! We are going to give this battle our all, but if we don’t, we will fail! Do not fail the country you fight for, do not disgrace your homeland! Do not run from the face of certain death! I ask of you, give your lives, so that the free world can live! Men, move onward, in defense of the homeland!”
With that said, we started to move forward, knowing that we would likely not live to ever see our homes again.

It took us quite a while to cross the ice before we first started to encounter barrages of artillery fire. We were, however, not too concerned about the ice breaking as it was several feet thick. We went as fast as we could across the ice. The tanks were at full speed, and the standard infantrymen were nearly sprinting. Every so often, I would feel the vibrations of an explosion that just missed us. It almost seemed as if they were not hitting anything, which was quite difficult considering just how many people were charging the beaches. I was surprised that there was in fact so little resistance. We continued onward with no intention of turning back, and then I heard a rumble. We eventually made it to the shoreline, fighting our way through, but I could not stop wondering what that rumble was. It continued, but got louder and louder as time progressed. For some reason, I decided to look back, and what I saw horrified me. Just as I looked, hundreds of explosives, all in a line, detonated underneath the ice. The ice then started to crack, and people fell in the water. I could hear screaming, and then my radio started to beep.
“Keep moving forward men! Keep moving!” shouted the General
I did as I was told, and continued to fight onward, while still keeping an eye on what was going on behind me. Just then, dozens of submarines surfaced from the gaps in the ice sheet. These submarines, however, did not seem like the typical type. These monsters were enormous, even larger than our largest aircraft carrier. Then, they opened fire. They were shooting point blank at our men, and to make things worse, the ice cracked right at the shoreline: the men still on the ice were trapped.
“All men still on the ice retreat! Retreat!!” said Epps.
I picked up my radio.
“Chops, see if you can take any of those things out!”
“Will do!”
“For those of you already landed…” Epps continued, “You’re on your own.”
I could see Chops right above my head as he fired. Dozens of missiles hit the beasts, but they didn’t even make a dent.
“It’s not working!” he said, “What should I do?!”
“Take out some of that artillery!”
The men on the ice were being cut to pieces, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. “I guess this is why there’s so little resistance on the beach!” I said, “Have you heard anything from Matty?”
“No, I haven’t.”
“He should have been right behind me. If so, may he rest in peace.”

My battalion continued to press on; even though we knew that there would be no re-enforcements. Chops, meanwhile, was flying above us, providing cover as needed. We eventually took Keyyekan, as there was little resistance. It would be in this town that we would create a fort as we awaited extraction. We made mounds of snow and ice around the city, and placed rubble of destroyed buildings around it. This makeshift wall would be all that we would to help defend ourselves from possible retaliatory attacks. The attacks came, but they were very minor, nothing like what we expected to see. I was surprised that there were so few people in this region defending the Eastern border of Räznovia, as they must have known that we would attack in response to their actions against China. I don’t know why they would just abandon their eastern border like that. Chops, meanwhile, had run out of fuel, and had to land the plane on the beach.
“Well, it looks like I’m gonna have to join you guys now,” he said as he got out of the plane.
“Well, I hope that you don’t mind sitting in a tank for too long, because I was thinking that we should move inland. Right now, we’re a sitting duck for any artillery that we weren’t able to take out, but we haven’t seen any other heavy resistance yet either.”
“What does Epps have to say about this?”
“My radio is out, I can’t get a signal anywhere around here. It must be some sort of jammer. I don’t know what anyone else is doing, barely anyone made it to shore.”
“Want my opinion?”
“Sure.”
“If we stay here, we’ll probably get killed. I mean, look at this wall, its made out of rubble! If we are attacked, we’ll all be killed. We at least need to be a moving target”
“You make a good point; I’ll get my men ready.”
I assembled my men at the town square to tell them the news. They were generally mixed about my decision, but they still knew that it was the decision that they would have to follow through to their deaths if need be. We got in our tanks, and moved out to Pinakul, not knowing what we were about to face.

On our way, we faced no defensive force, which surprised us greatly. But what was even more shocking, was what we saw on the way to Pinakul. At the base of one of the mountains, there was a set of railroad tracks. My eyes followed them to the entrance of a mine. There were two guards at the entrance that I could see, there were probably more inside. Then, an alarm went off. Spotlights turned on, and were pointing right at us. Then, the entrance to the mine started to close. I knew that whatever was in there must be extremely valuable if they were guarding it this well. I ordered my men to fire at the door, and when the shell hit the motor closing the door, it stopped closing. We went at full speed down the hill, with artillery firing at us, most of which missed us, but we did lose one tank before we got down. Once we got to the base of the mountain and approached the entrance to the mine, the two men ran not inside, but toward our tank column. They were screaming something, but I couldn’t make it out. Then, they detonated themselves as they threw themselves underneath one of the tanks. I couldn’t believe that they would resort to such tactics. Luckily our tanks had been retrofitted with mine armor on the bottom which protected us from the blast. We entered the mine to find people setting up explosives, and screaming things. We got out of our tanks and ran towards them. They tried to kill some of us with handguns, but our machine guns were far superior. We moved further into the mine to find something that looked like an ammo depot. We then found something that instilled horror within me. I could not believe what I saw before me.
“Does anyone here by any chance know how to dismantle a nuke?” I asked my comrades
“Holy mother of God!” Chops shouted, “There’s a nuke in here??!!”
There was a brief pause while everyone looked at each other for a moment. Then, a man came forward.
“I might be able to do something…” he said.
“What’s your name?” I asked.
“Matthew Hurk.”
I then remembered what had happened to Matty on the ice, and a sense of sadness came over me.
“Ok Matt, what do you need?”
“I think I just need a screwdriver and some wire cutters.”
“Umm, Chops, do you see anything like that…maybe that there, yeah, that’ll work, give it here…here you go.”
I handed him the supplies, and he opened the cover. There must have been dozens of wires in there. I prayed that the annoying electronic ticking would not be the last thing that I would ever hear.
“I’m not sure which one I need to cut,” he said, “I mean, there must be dozens of wires and only one will deactivate it, I’ll try to find the power source and take it out from there.”
None of us could be any more nervous than what we already were. But, in the end, he was able to deactivate it and for that, I can almost guarantee a promotion. Chops then started to take pictures of everything in the mine, and started sending them back to base once we realized our communications had been restored. “Hey, Alec, come over here for a second,” he said to me, “is that a door there?”
It was hidden behind the ammunition so we didn’t see it at first. Chops went over and opened up the door to find a room full of computers, with a sign that said “Head SatImFab Center, Eastern Sector.”
“What is this place?” I said, “hey, SatImFab… Satellite something…Im, Im… Image! Yeah, Satellite Image”
“Fabrication?”
“Yes!”
“It says that on one of the computers”
“Radio Epps, we need to let them know about this”
I promptly called Epps to let him know what the situation was. At first, he didn’t respond, but eventually, all I could hear was cursing. The Räznovians had beaten us today, both physically, and technologically, but we would continue to fight on in the name of capitalism. Ever since the birth of communism, we have been trained to despise it, no matter what. A brief thought came across my mind, “It can’t be that bad if their technology is this good”; I quickly eradicated the treasonous thought from my head as I looked over at Chops, fiddling with one of the computers.
“What are you doing?” I asked
“Just looking at some of the actual satellite images, looks like this area is pretty much defenseless… wait, what’s this? Let me zoom over here…Alec, come here, take a look at this!”
I was shocked by what I saw. There must have been at least five infantry battalions coming our way from the west. The Räznovians wanted their mine back.
“Listen up!” I started as I brought the men back together, “There is a massive Räznovian force coming our way to take back the mine, set up five of the tanks in standard defense formation, everyone else, abandon your tanks and fight on foot…How much time do we have Chops?”
“Not too much, 15 minutes maybe, I don’t know the terrain too well so I can’t really say”
“You heard him men, we have 15 minutes before we will have to fight for our lives! At all costs, we must not let the Räznovians retake this mine, if they do, they will have complete satellite cover, and we cannot allow that at all! Fight to your death, in defense of the homeland!”

There were two tanks longwise, completely blocking the mine. Behind, there were another three tanks with their cannons between the gaps of the turrets of the two tanks in front. Taking cover behind the tanks, were dozens of men, holding whatever guns they could find. These men were ready to fight to their death, because they knew, that if they failed here, millions more would be killed trying to invade Räznovia again, and even then, it would not ensure that the mainland would be safe.
“I’ll radio Epps one more time,” I said.
I took out the radio to find that the battery was dead, there was now no way to call for backup, if any could be sent. Regardless of that, I could hear the roar of the engines outside. They were here.
I myself was behind one of the tanks, ready to fight alongside my men. All of us were hiding behind the tanks, and ready to jump up shooting.
I signaled with my hands, “3…2…1…” once the Räznovians were within range, and as such, we jumped up from behind the tanks, and The Battle of Christmas Day began.

By the end of the fighting, there were bodies everywhere. In front, hundreds of Räznovians filled the entrance to the mine. Behind me, dozens of my own men were dead. Only a handful of men had survived the ordeal. Several of the tanks were destroyed. I was thankfully not one of the casualties, nor was Chops. There was only one tank left that wasn’t engulfed in flames, so we chose that one to drive back to the beach. Before we left, however, we knew that the Räznovians could not be allowed to retake the SatImFab center, and as such, we prepared to detonate what we had previously dismantled. Matt, one of the survivors of the battle, was able to reconfigure the weapon after struggling with it for a little while.
“We should have two hours before it goes off,” he said, “that should give us enough time…”
We quickly got in the tank and drove through the burning wreckage. We got to the beach as fast as we could to find a pair of helicopters waiting for us.
“We didn’t know if you would be here!” One of the men tried to shout over the deafening noise of the rotors.
“We need to get out of here, right now!” I told him, “We only have half an hour left”
“Half an hour for wha…”
“Just get us out of here!”
We all hurried into the helicopters and proceeded back to the base camp. I took the radio of one of the men to call Epps.
“Epps, we have an emergency over here!” I started, “The Räznovians tried to retake the mine. We were able to hold it, but we suffered severe casualties, and there are probably even more on their way right now.”
“We can’t let them retake it! Why did you abandon it?! You should be defending it with your lives!!”
“I know sir, and we did, but we have timed the mine to be destroyed”
“How? Surely all of the weapons there cannot penetrate the thick concrete to cause a collapse…”
“There is one weapon there that will do something like that.”
“Please don’t tell me you did what I think you did…”
“Cover your eyes in uhh, let’s see, twenty eight minutes and thirteen seconds.”
Yet again, I heard more cursing over the radio but I mostly ignored it. I leaned back in my seat, and after around two and a half days, I finally went to sleep.
We got back to the base to find many empty tents, far too many for comfort. I looked at my watch, three minutes remained. I used that time to find a phone to call Julie; she must have been worried as can be, seeing how millions were killed in the Icy Grave Massacre. But then again, the military might be covering it up, as to not let the population panic that we could be losing the war.
I dialed her office number, there was no answer
I then dialed her sister’s house; it rang three times before someone picked up
“Julie?”
“Ohh, Alec, its you! Hold on, I’ll put her on…Julie, it’s Alec…No, I’m not kidding!”
“Alec?”
“Julie, are you there?”
“Alec! Yes, I’m here! I was so worr…”
“I don’t have much time before I’m gonna lose the signal.”
“Why? What going to happen?”
“You know I can’t tell you, just make sure you nail that commie Kuiter for what he’s caused, he deserves nothing less than a slow and painful death.”
“Kuiter’s gone Alec; he went missing a few hours after the attacks.”
“Did Vostov rescue him?”
“No, we don’t think so, we found his tongue; it was cut out and someone tried to mail it to the president, but I have to say, the police are not exactly giving their full effort to find his captors. We think it’s the people that were guarding him at the prison; they all took the week off the day after Kuiter went missing and they were the ones on guard when the cameras there went out. Their homes haven’t even been searched, and I doubt that they will…”
“I need to go now; I don’t have much time left…”
“Alec?”
“Yes?”
“I love you.”
“I love you too Julie.”
“Be safe out there Alec.”
“I will.”
The timer on my clock went off, there was five seconds left. I dove headfirst into a nearby ditch and covered my eyes with my hands. All of the sudden, everything went quiet, and I could see light. Even though it was dark outside, and I was in a ditch with my hands over my eyes, I could still see the extraordinarily powerful light. It was just so bright. I started screaming at the top of my lungs, but I couldn’t even hear myself. It became loud, and frightening, but then the light subsided. I got up from out of the ditch and looked back towards Räznovia; all that I could see was fire. I knew right then and there, that I would never want to experience another nuclear detonation again, as long as I live.

Of course Epps wanted to question me on my actions. I explained to him what happened to us, and why we needed to do what we did. After about an hour of convincing, he had pardoned me. In essence, we were extremely fortunate that I had destroyed the mine in that manner, as now, whatever defenses there were in Räznovia had been incinerated in the blast. Now was our opportunity to attack, so we did. However, this attack would be quite different than the last attack as the ice had become extremely unstable. Thousands of transport planes were to take off, and head across the Bering, each carrying a payload of three tanks with a parachute attached to it. This is a very risky procedure, as if any artillery somehow survived, the tanks would be shot down mid way down, leading to the certain death of whoever was inside of it.
I made my way to the runway, to find hundreds of plane in the sky, circling, waiting to make a quick landing, pick up their cargo, and to take off again. This time it did seem a bit more organized, but it was still a disgrace to see the American army looking more like a rabble than anything else. Nonetheless we were still going to attack, because we had to. I got in the transport plane and it promptly took off. Only inside of the transport did we harness the parachute onto the tank. I felt a little uneasy about the situation, but there was nothing that I could do. After strapping the parachute on, my men got in the tank, and prepared for the fight ahead.
In total, my battalion was in twenty different aircraft. The rest of the army was in thousands of other aircraft. A voice came on the radio
“This is General Epps,” it started, “the last time that we tried to invade was a total failure, and I will take full responsibility for that when I get back to Washington. Until then, I’m still in charge here. This is our biggest opportunity that we may ever get to invade Räznovia. There will be no retreat this time, it will not be possible. We have nobody in reserves either, every single one of you is going to invade! Do not let down your homeland! This is the last time I will ask this of you, risk your life, so that the American people can live! Down with Räznovia! Down with Communism!”

The pilot was counting down over the intercom
“5…4…3…”
There was not much time left before we were about to fight for our lives again
“2…1…now!”
I closed my eyes and leaned back in my seat. I felt weightless as we fell out from beneath the aircraft. It was a quite wonderful feeling I must admit. We continued to fall, and I started to worry that the parachute was not opening. Suddenly, I felt a jolt go through me. The chute opened. Not long after, we landed. One of my men quickly got out of the tank and cut off the parachute, and got back inside.
“It looks like there aren’t many Reds out here” he said as he closed the lid.
“Still, don’t let down your guard. I’m sure there are some nearby waiting to ambush us”
There never were. The area was wasteland. The nuke must have killed them all. And to think that this happened in so many places in China, except instead of mountain sides, they were cities that were at ground zero. We continued to move inland and met no resistance at all. I was surprised at this fact. For hours we traveled and saw not a living soul. Our army of millions had invaded, and yet there was no one to fight! We eventually made our way past the mountains, and down south. After we liberated the far eastern border, we were to assault Vladivostok. We were sure that there would be heavy resistance there. I went first into the city. I ran over a small barricade with my tank, to see papers littering the streets. I stopped my tank and got out. I picked up one of the papers and read it.
“ATTENTION! By orders of President Peter Vostov, all people east of the Volga River are to evacuate westward towards the cities. Those who cannot evacuate, or choose not to, are outside the protection of the Räznovian army.”
There was silence among my men. We knew that the people here had left, and there was nothing left for us to do here. I reported my findings back to Epps and he told us to continue moving south, and to see if we could find any survivors in what remained of China, and to pursue the Räznovian army and engage when possible. The radioactivity was not going to be a problem for our tanks, as they were old, still from the times before non-proliferation treaty. Nobody would admit it, but the West had fallen behind in military technology. We were still using weapons from the Mexican Rebellions ten years ago! Who knows what the Räznovians were really doing, locked away in their “frozen paradise”. We already knew that they were able to infiltrate our satellites and replace our images with their own! What else could they be hiding?
We continued our way southward, into China, following “The Horde” as it was called. When I saw the craters in China, I will admit that I cried. Millions upon millions of people had been living here just a few days earlier, now every single one of them was dead. There was not a soul around. No stray animals, no vegetation, just blackened earth. I did not even recognize Beijing when we came to it, only from a person who translated a street sign that was on the ground did we know what lay before us.
Chops at this point had joined us on the ground, as we couldn’t supply enough fuel to our men in the air. Everybody capable was being sent after the horde, even if they were not trained to fight in that particular manner. We Capitalists were desperate to rid the world of Communism, and we were prepared to do anything to accomplish that objective.

The Räznovians were pushing hard into India. The people of India had fled into neighboring Pakistan, revealing their desperation. The Indian army fought hard at the passes, but was eventually overcome by The Horde. The World Alliance was planning on meeting them at the other end of India, at the mountains that they would again have to pass to continue on. I myself was following behind them, along with the rest of the American Army. Armies from South America and Africa were coming from the south, by sea. This would be the place that we would fight. The Räznovians were being surrounded and they knew it, which is why after weeks of continuous movement, they stopped upon a massive hill, and began digging. I was amazed by how resilient their army was. It had been such a long time since they had eaten a decent meal, or slept in a decent bed. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to press on like they had already. Those people could not be ordinary men.
They continued digging; day after day, night after night. There must have been millions on each side, ready to fight, and nobody seemed to have the upper hand. The days and nights passed without any conflict, but there was still continuous digging. It was as if they were possessed by something that made them superhuman! The rest of the American army arrived not too long after I did. It was as if the entire world was being emptied all into this one spot. I knew the outcome couldn’t be good. I got my orders from Epps.
“You deserve a little break, don’t you?” he asked me
“You know just as well as I sir, I’ll follow my orders to the death”
“You almost single handedly caused the success of the invasion from what you did in the mine. You have come all the way here on half rations, you deserve a break. You can sit out this fight if you want”
“Thank you sir; my men are tired, I’m sure they’ll appreciate the break”
I decided to talk it over with my men
“What? You mean we’re not gonna fight? We came all this way here for nothing?!”
What could I do, they wanted to fight. I talked about it with Epps again; he decided to put us in the rear. We probably wouldn’t be doing any fighting, but at least we’d get a front row seat. Before we set off, I tried to call Julie again. She didn’t answer. I hoped that she was just out doing something, but deep inside, I knew the draft had gotten to her. Her job was non-essential to the well being of the country, eventually she would be called upon to protect the homeland. Our army was large, but it was just not big enough for a war of this magnitude.
Artillery had been pounding away at the fortification ever since we got here. Last night, they even started to call in the air support. What a sight it was when thirty or forty fuel air bombs would go off at a time. It’s on old-fashioned technique, but it would get the job done when we had so few supplies. I was surprised by how little armor we had in the World Alliance army; it was nearly all infantry! I suppose most of the troops were people caught in the drafts. They didn’t know what they were doing here, just that they were defending their homeland. They were going to die and they all knew it. They must have known it would be suicide to charge upon a well defended hill like that. Just before the time of the attack, I walked around the camp, visiting the new recruits. I could see fear in their eyes. A few of them were pretending to laugh at the idea of death, but I could see it within them, they were scared. There was a mere boy I found that was just sitting on the corner of his cot, leaning back and forth while holding a picture of someone, probably of someone very close to him. I would do the same myself only if my men wouldn’t have to see that weak side of me. I made my way back to my battalion when the time approached, and after the long and painful wait the siren went off, and we started to move forward.

There was a circle of three trenches, each several feet wide and tens of feet deep. There was no way a tank could cross them. There was a trench at the very base of the hill, with a small opening to allow vehicles to pass. About seventy feet further up the hill, there was another trench, with a similar opening. Towards the top, there was the last trench, again, with an opening. Nobody knew why there were the openings. Maybe they didn’t have time to dig there, we didn’t know. All that mattered was that we were about to rush the hill. This was our chance to destroy The Horde.
People at the front were running as fast as they could to get to the trenches. It almost reminded me of a famous charge back in July of 1863. People were running forward, knowing they were going to be killed, but they still pressed on. Our determination was immense. The first trench fell in a matter of minutes, and we were moving on to the second when from the top of the hill, I could see a column of tanks coming down at full speed. It would be suicide for them to counter attack right now! Then it occurred to me, they aren’t stupid, they know its suicide too! What plan could involve that, going right into the center of the enemy formation?
I pulled out the radio and proceeded to contact Epps
“Epps, we have a serious problem over here!”
“What are you talking about? The attack is going just as planned!”
“The tanks! The tanks coming out of the fort! Its suicide and they know it.”
“What are you talking about? You don’t think…”
“We need to get everyone out of here, NOW!!!”
I was becoming accustomed to hearing his cursing over the radio at this point
“All World Alliance forces get out of the area immediately! Urgent! Get out of the area immediately! Fall back! Retreat!”
It was too late for most of the people already there. The Räznovians were going to lose this battle and they knew it, so they were going to take as many people as they could with them.
“Hurk, get us out of here, full speed”
“But sir…”
“DO IT!!!”
I’m ashamed to say we may have even run over some of our own men while we were trying to get out of there, but they wouldn’t have made it anyway. I could see the speedometer on the tank; we were going 150 miles per hour, full speed. I looked behind us to see that the enemy tanks had stopped. They were about to do the unthinkable.
“Brace for impact!”
Once again, I saw light; the cameras on the tank went out; then I felt weightless. I could hear the sound of the engine going full blast, but there was no traction; we had to have been airborne. I felt a huge jolt go through me; we hit the ground. We starting rolling, and continued rolling for the longest of time. I dared not open the hatch to look back once we stopped. Its one thing when something like that happens over enemy territory, but when it’s your friends that are on the receiving end, it hurts, badly.

When we drove back towards the crater, all I could see was death. There were bodies littering the ground near the edge of the crater, but then, the bodies started fading away as we got closer to the center. There was steam coming from the ground, even closer to the center, the earth was so hot that the dirt itself was still smoldering. I could see scraps of metal, twisted all out of proportion; I could hear one of my men behind me throw up from the sight of the scorched earth and bodies. Just a few thousand of us survived, essentially nothing compared to the millions that were here just a few moments ago. It was now more than ever that I hoped the radiation protection was working.
My radio started to beep.
“Glad to see you made it Alec,” Epps said.
All I could think of saying was “what were you thinking?! Using tactics like that is insane!” but rather, I kept my mouth shut and gave the radio to Chops.
“I think he’s too upset to talk right now,” Chops said, “what’s the status of the situation”
“Well, their timing could not be any more perfect. Ukraine is crying for help, but we can’t send any right now, our main force has been wiped out as you just saw.”
“What are you saying about Ukraine?”
“The Räznovians are invading Eastern Europe now, it’s practically undefended, and we need to get everyone we can over there immediately.”
“Do they have any planes I can use Europe?”
“Plenty of planes but no one to fill ‘em.”
“I’ll get there as fast as I can, I think I’d like a little change of scenery…Alec, we gotta go”
“I heard, I heard…” I said, “I’ll get the men ready.”
“I still can’t believe they didn’t have me flying today, I mean if I was, I probably would have died today”
“Ehh, you would’ve been fine. You know you’d be the first one I’d tell, and you’d go full throttle out of there! You and your F-35…”
“I never thought I’d fall in love with a plane…”
“Ok men, breaks over,” I said to my men, “we gotta go now.”
I could now see not only fear in their eyes, but hope. Even though we had lost our main force, the Räznovian’s had also lost their main army. If we could hold them in Europe, we may just be able to turn the tide of this horrific war.
We were once again on the move, being used like pieces in a little game. Except, this game wasn’t so little, and the pieces were real people, and most of them had just melted when they were exposed to the surface of the sun for a little too long. We eventually made it to Warsaw, where they were setting up defenses. Ukraine had completely fallen by the time that we got there. Once the Räznovians crossed the border, it was over for the Ukrainians. The civilians fled Westward while what little men they had hopelessly defended the front line. A man by the name of Oleksaander Kamarzov led a hopeless charge straight into the Räznovian lines to protect the fleeing civilians of Dnepropetrovsk. The people were able to make it out of the city but Kamarzov’s forces suffered one hundred percent casualties, not a single man made it out of there alive. They were able to hold back the might of Räznovia for close to four hours, and in that time, we were able to bring in reinforcements. Ukraine was eventually taken, and in a matter of hours before they reached Warsaw, we landed, and started digging.

“I just wanna sit in a hole and die” I said to Chops as I rubbed my head, “I can’t take much more of this!”
“Snap out of it man” he said, “I’m sure this war won’t go on forever, somebody will have to give up sooner or later…”
“That’s the problem, Capitalists are the most stubborn people that have ever existed, and Communists the most determined.”
There was silence between us as we sat in the small room. It had belonged to the owners of the house before they were forced to evacuate. There was not a single civilian left in Warsaw; the World alliance had learned its lesson at Dnepropetrovsk.
“When do you think they’ll be here Alec?”
“I don’t know. I’m so tired; I haven’t slept in weeks.”
“I hear ya man.”
My radio beeped.
“This is General Epps of the World Alliance forces; there shall be a debriefing in fifteen minutes.”
“I’ve had it with these debriefings!” I shouted to myself, “I’ve had enough of all of this!”
“Alec,” Chops said, “Your radio’s still on.”
“Sir,” I said into the radio, “if I ever find Vostov, I will personally kill him.”
“Then you especially want to come to this debriefing, I’ll expect to see you.”
I turned off the radio and screamed at the top of my lungs, but still made my way to the meeting.
“Thank you to all of you that have come to this,” Epps started, “There have been some recent developments in the war. What we do know, is that the Räznovians will be here within a matter of hours, so we must be prepared to defend this city at all costs. More importantly, we have Vostov in custody.”
“What?? where is he?!?!” someone screamed out. He had to be restrained by the people sitting next to him.
“We got a message from an informant stating that he was in a prison in Moscow. Apparently, there had been a silent coup and Gregoriev now has control over the country.”
“It’s a trap! Those dirty Räznovians, they’ll tell you anything!” someone else screamed out, “We should have his head now before he escapes!”
“Please, be quiet. We have checked his story out, several times. He was on the verge of death when we rescued him and he is willing to co-operate with us in exchange for his safety. He’s given us information about the presidential complex, where Gregoriev may be, and what their main strategies are. I have called you here to ask for a squadron to volunteer, to go deep into Räznovian territory, and destroy the presidential complex where it is believed that Gregoriev will be.”
Chops turned his head towards me.
“Don’t you dare do it” I said to him quietly.
He didn’t say anything back to me, but he had a look of longing in his eyes. He felt as if he needed to do anything that he could to help the war effort; he just stood up from his seat and turned his head toward me. It almost looked as if he had had enough of this war too, and he just wanted his time of peace. I let out my emotions, he never did, and maybe that’s why I had missed it. He wanted his war to be over, even if it had to continue for everyone else.
“I’m sorry Alec” he said, “I have to do this, I just have to.”
“Thank you for volunteering Charles,” Epps started as Chops stood up, “you and your squadron will need to be ready by dark. I know that all of you have gone through a lot in the past few weeks, but if this mission succeeds, we very well may just win the war right here. Once they attack starts here, prepare to go airborne Charles. It’s the biggest diversion you’re ever gonna get here, don’t mess this up.”
“I won’t sir.”
Nightfall came, and as much as I wanted to go to sleep, I couldn’t, because the lights of the Räznovian flares from the tanks were getting brighter and brighter, as they got ever so close.

I could hear the mortar shells incoming once they had arrived. For about two hours, they bombarded the city with artillery, but it barely did anything to our defenses. Once the army came, Chops proceeded to carry out his mission; he got in his plane, and took off, not knowing what awaited him. I took my battalion to guard the Poniatowskiego Bridge. We were prepared to blow all of the bridges to stop their advance if we had to.
“What do you see from up there Chops?”
“Lots of tank battalions; I can’t count them all! Maybe 30 or 40, I can’t tell, maybe more.”
“Ok, well carry on with your mission.”
I could hear fighting in the distance, and could see the glow of fire on the clouds above. My men were in their standard defensive positions, exactly like what saved us in the mines, except this time we had the rest of the tanks lined against the river. We were ready to fight, and that we did. There, we fought like men possessed. Not a single Räznovian made it more than halfway across the bridge. As soon as a tank would go on the bridge, we would blow it to pieces. Some of their infantry tried even swimming across the icy water, but we would take care of them before they made it to the other side. I don’t even know how someone would be able to swim in that water with all of that gear on!
“How’re you doing up there Chops?”
“I should be getting there shortly. I’m not sure if they’ve spotted me ye… Oh no, no, no, no! The air raid siren just went on. How could they have seen me? Come on, I’m almost there…”
“Hang in there Chops, you can do this!”
“They’re launching planes…Ah no; I’ve got two of ‘em behind me. Launching rear facing missiles…of course they’re jammed, this plane isn’t worth anything! Man I wish I was in mine now.”
Yet again, I could hear cursing over the radio; it was a surprise to hear it coming from him this time.
“They’re firing at me, two missiles incoming! Come on, come on, come on, come on! I broke it. Ok, I’m getting a lock on the complex…missiles fired.”
“Now get out of there!”
“Those two are still following me. I’m gonna need to take care of them first.”
I heard a large boom come from the radio.
“I’m hit, I’m trailing fire. Where’d that missile come from? Ahh, look at all of those houses below, I can’t bail now, where’d the plane land?”
“Just bail out! Who cares about the houses?”
“Right over Moscow, you’ve gotta be kidding me! They’d torture me to death anyway.”
“I don’t care if they torture you, bail out! I’m not asking you!”
“Ohh fine…The eject handle’s stuck, some fine aircraft this is…It looks like there’s a field up ahead; I’ll try to land there…wait, never mind, there’s pond right in the middle of it.”
“How much longer do you think you have, maybe I can find an airfield for you.”
“And just deliver myself to them? I can see a tank battalion beneath me on the highway; it looks like its support going towards Warsaw, maybe I could just…”
“Don’t you dare do what I think you’re about to Chops, don’t you dare! We can get you out of there!”
“Ahh, don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine. I did what I needed to do, that’s all that matters, right?”
“Chops! No, don’t!”
“I’m gonna miss that voice. You take care of yourself…”
There was silence, and then the channel turned to static.
“Chops!!!”
I got on my knees and held my head in my hands. After a little while, I was able to pull myself back together and call Epps.
“Chops didn’t make it” I said, “Do you know the status of his mission?”
“The complex was destroyed, but we still don’t know if Gregoriev was inside at the time. Our informant has yet to respond to us. I know this is a bad time for you, but we’re going to be moving out now. Their army is on the retreat and now is our chance to invade the mainland. We won’t have long before they meet up with reinforcements.”
“Yes sir, I’ll prepare my men.”
I could not help but feel a sense of loneliness instilled within me. Matty was gone, and now Chops was gone too. I guess I was to be next if the pattern continued. We advanced with little impediment. The roads were generally clear and there were no armies to stop us. We eventually made our way into Räznovia. It was the first time a foreigner had been inside the country ever since they closed their borders fifteen years ago. I could not help myself from feeling a bit happy, as I knew that from here on out, we wouldn’t turn back, and that Chops death would not be in vain; we would fight to the end if we had to. We were winning at this point and we all knew it. Even though millions had been killed in India, it was truly a loss for both sides, as the Räznovians no longer had that army for future use. They had suffered a severe blow at Warsaw to the point that they were now being pushed back at full speed. I then remembered how desperate they sometimes get; just out of a gut feeling, I looked up at the sky from the camera inside my tank. There were trails of white. My eyes followed the trails to find balls of fire at the ends of the trails; there must have been at least ten of these rockets.
“Epps, there’re rockets up there!” I said on my radio.
“I know Alec, I know. We spotted them on radar a few minutes ago. We don’t want to panic the men, I’m sorry Alec.”
“What, what are you talking abou…”
I stopped talking for a moment and opened the hatch. I looked up at the night sky and saw the rockets curving downward.
I grabbed my picture of Julie from my pocket and held it against my chest; I closed my eyes, and everything went white…

Part 2:

I always thought differently as a child; I never played those mindless video games, nor ever “hung out”; I devoted my life to my studies. My parents expected no less from me, as they would send me to only the best schools in Moscow, even if they didn’t have the money for it. I could see it in their eyes, that I was their only hope of escaping the cruelty and harshness of downtown Moscow, and move somewhere else where one would not have to struggle to put food on the table every night. The truth was, my father was in the Russian Mafia, he was forced to do so in order to pay for my education. I wanted to quit my school as soon as I found this out so that he wouldn’t have to hurt anyone against his will, but he was already in too deep. It eventually came to the point that I couldn’t focus on anything, and I found myself continuously looking over my shoulder; I would frequently cry myself to sleep. One year, my father neglected to pay his taxes on time, and soon enough, the police arrived at our house. Thinking that somebody had squealed on him, he told us to get out of the house, and that he would “talk” to the police. When I arrived at my grandparent’s house later that day, I saw a picture of my father on the nightly news, and my mother cried. I didn’t quite know what had happened, but when I asked my mother when he was coming back, she only responded “tonight, he’s having dinner with God” which was followed by a burst of tears. All of this occurred when I was but in the fifth grade, a mere child, and these experiences are what prepared me for what I was about to face throughout the course of my dreadful life.
I lived with my grandparents after the incident and therefore was withdrawn from the private school which I had been attending for the previous five years; I was now in the standard, public school system in which I was able to excel as it was far less demanding of me. I was not the greatest student, I will admit, but I was far better than the average person. I grew up quickly, and even skipped a grade, and eventually received several scholarships to various colleges; some were even located in America. My mother urged me to go, even though doing so would take food off of her table every night. At first I refused, but once she threatened to hurt herself if I did not go, I could not bear to say no. I was accepted at the University of Southern California and therefore and left Moscow for the first time, not knowing what was to become of me.

When I arrived in Los Angeles, I was disgusted by what I saw. When I was young, I heard tales of the wealth that existed in America; I saw none of it. I had heard of how people would arrive with twenty dollars in their pocket and turn it into millions before the year was out, which far more than what most people would make in their lifetime if they were considered “rich” where I used to live. True, I did see many people in formal attire, but I was shocked to see homeless people in the alleys. I reflected for a moment, about how people in such a great country could be no better off than me. I then came to the conclusion that these people were to blame, that they had made poor decisions in their life, causing them to be where they were today. It must have been their fault if America is in fact so great. What other reason would there be?
I continued to receive excellent grades at school, and I even got a job at a local store. Almost all of this money went back to Russia, so that my mother could buy food for herself and the rest of my family. I never could figure out why they had sent me to the good schools and not any of my brothers. I suppose they had already given up on them. One day, as I was walking home from work, I saw three teenagers kicking and punching a homeless man on the side of the street.
“Hey, get off of him! I’m calling the police!” I shouted at them as they promptly ran away.
“Sir, are you ok?”
There was no response from the long, gray-haired man.
“Sir?”
I heard a subtle weeping coming from beneath his rags. It was a pathetic sight. He was curled into a ball on the side of the street, as if he had become accustomed to this type of treatment. Then, he started to speak in an uneasy voice.
“I was not always this way,” he said, “but they just couldn’t see past it. They couldn’t see past it…”
I helped him up and walked him over to a nearby fast food restaurant. Through his rags, I could only see his skin and bones, there was nothing to him. This man was worse off than I had ever been.
“I can’t accept your charity,” he said as I opened the door to the restaurant.
I responded not with words, but with a hand gesture to go inside. He slowly made his way to the counter and squinted at the menu on the wall. He ordered a small hamburger when he was asked what he would like, and once we received our food, we sat down at one of the many open tables.
“Why did you help me?” he asked.
“Why would I not help a man in need? Everyone in my family was taught to help others that are worse off than we are, after all, it could be me in your situation.”
“You obviously do not know who I am then, do you…” He said as he looked over his shoulder.
“You are a human, that’s good enough for me.”
There was silence for a few moments as he finished his small meal.
“That’s all that I had to eat in three days” he said, “thank you so much for your generosity.”
He started to get up, thought for a moment, and sat back down.
“My name is Gregor Räznov,” he said, “what’s your name?”
“Peter Vostov” I replied as I held out my hand which he proceeded to shake. I could see many scars on his hand; this man had lived a harsh life.

“Don’t mind me asking,” I started, “but you were saying earlier that you were not always this way…”
“You must not tell anyone of this if you truly wish to hear my story,” he said as he looked over his shoulder again, spotting two men in suits sitting near the door. He leaned forward in his chair and spoke quietly into my ear, “I used to teach at a place called MIT, I’m sure you have heard of it. In fact, I was one of the researchers in their physics department. One day, one of my students, Daniel Kuiter, approached me. He was very good at school, and he was also working with me part time. He truly was a good person, very likable, and very industrious. He started to talk with me about Communism. At first, I wanted nothing to hear of it, but he continued anyway. He suggested that it could very well work, if there were to be several reforms.”
I hesitated for a minute. Could this man be lying? But then again, if he is just after the food I can provide, why would he try to drive me away by speaking of such nonsense? After a moment, I built up the courage to continue the conversation.
“What kind of reforms?”
“Well, if there were to be a fair redistribution of wealth to start with.”
“But couldn’t that lead to unrest? I mean, that would only cause corruption…”
“But see, that’s the thing. The leader of this theoretical society would also be included, along with all members of the government. Suddenly, you’re looking at the average man getting a little more profit than he normally would. I’ve worked out the numbers.”
“But how would you stop the leader from becoming corrupt?”
“You see, that’s where his ingenuity kicks in. The media would play a key role in this society, and would keep a close eye on the president at all times. Further, it would be the media that would hold the elections every five years. Political parties would be outlawed, and theoretically, the media would not be able to be bribed if everybody gets practically the same wages.”
“Practically? Why is it not the same?”
“Ohh yes, I forgot to tell you. All of the companies would be state owned to start with. From there, there would be supervisors to see how hard people are working. If little effort is given to the task at hand, your pay will reflect that. If you work very hard, your pay will also reflect that.”
“So you mean if you have a desk job, you will be poorer than a farmer?”
“More or less; I know it sounds as if this would make a wealth divide, but at least now, wealth would be allotted fairly. But you must remember, we live in a Capitalistic world, they would do anything to see Communism fade away into nothing. While we technically have freedom of speech, people are usually arrested on false charges or go missing in this country. This type of ‘justice’ goes off the books here.”
I looked at him, thinking about what he had told me. I suppose than in this place, or anywhere on Earth for that matter, such sayings could get one killed. Whether it was by friends, family, or the government, it was not safe to speak of such anti-Capitalist topics. The only thing keeping him alive was the fact that he had no means of leading a revolution; rather, he no longer has means to do so. Governments can easily cover up the death of a single commoner, and they would not hesitate to do so if the fate of their country and livelihood was a stake.
“I’m sorry to take up so much of your time,” he said to me, “it must be getting late now…”
I looked outside to find that it was already dark.
“I do need to get going,” I said, thinking of an obligation I had previously made to a study partner, “I hope that I will see you tomorrow.”
I never did.
The next morning, I woke up, still trying to get my mind around what I had heard the night before. Seemingly out of the blue, I asked my roommate if he was a Communist.
“Ha! Me? A Communist?! Nobody is a Communist anymore! Not even the Koreans are Communist!”
I went back to the fast-food restaurant that I had been to the night before, only to find Gregor absent. I didn’t think much of it at first, but then I looked in an alleyway nearby. I found his body propped up against the dumpster. As I pulled out my phone to call the police, I noticed how he had died. There was a single gunshot wound in his forehead, almost as if he had been killed by a professional but made to look like a typical robbery. Perhaps I was just paranoid, but I felt I needed to take action. Fearing for my own safety, I dropped out of school later that day, and got on the next flight back to Moscow, hoping the men at the restaurant didn’t know who I was.

I returned to Moscow only to make a gruesome discovery. The house that my mother, brothers, and grandparents were living at was burned down, and all that were inside were killed. Nobody from the police had bothered to contact me while I was in California, and all the money I had been sending had mysteriously “vanished”. I was able to rent a small flat with what money I had left, but I knew that I wouldn’t be able to pay for it for much longer. It was as if the world was against me, and there was nothing that I could do to change it.
I never did get a job in Moscow, as I merely stayed in my apartment all day, making plans for what would seem like a perfect Communist world. It didn’t take long for me to run out of money, and when I was evicted, I made an appeal to the Russian government. I told them of my new ideas, and why this new version of Communism was better. After being laughed out of the complex, all that I could think of was what Gregor had once said to me, that they just couldn’t get past the fact that it was still Communism. No matter how many changes you could make, the name of it was enough to turn people away. I walked around Moscow for hours after that, as I had nowhere to return to. I eventually found myself at a local university, where I was amazed by what I saw. Walking out of one of the buildings was my old friend, Antwon Gregoriev. I had not seen him since I had left Moscow for America; I immediately went over to talk to him.
“Ah, Andy!” I said to him as I ran up to him to give him a hug, “It’s been years since I’ve seen you!”
“Yes, yes, it has been.”
“So, what have you been doing with yourself?”
“I lecture from time to time at Moscow University, but other than that, I don’t have a steady job.”
“Yeah, it’s like that here in Russia.”
“You went to the U.S., right?”
“Yeah, but I didn’t stay for the whole time.”
“Why not?”
“You have plans for this afternoon?”
“No, why?”
“Would you mind if we went over to your place to catch up?”
“Not at all! I can make us some tea.”
We went back to his place and we discussed what I had seen in Los Angeles. I talked about Gregor Räznov quite a bit. We discussed for hours what I had learned; not what I had learned at school, but what I had learned about Communism, and how it could work. After being appalled by what I was saying, he eventually willed himself to listen to me. He had this look on his face, I hadn’t seen that look in many years; it was the look of hope, this is what I was bringing the world.
“I’m lecturing tonight night at the university,” he said, “and I would like you to present your information, if you would like.”
“I would be honored if you were to do that.”
With that said, we headed toward the University, unaware of what was about to happen the very next day.

“Welcome, my friends,” Andy started, “there has been a change in tonight’s schedule. Today, I have brought a guest speaker to lecture for us tonight. He has recently come back from America, and would like to share his findings with us. Please welcome, Peter Vostov!”
There was barely any clapping as I walked on stage. I wasn’t sure if I would be able to speak to a crowd of several hundred, but I may as well give it a try. At this point I, nor the world, had anything to lose.
“Thank you Andy,” I started, “I’m sure all of you have heard stories of America, the kind where a person arrives with nothing but the clothes on their backs and turns it into millions before the year is out. I will tell you now, what you have been told, and what you have dreamed of, is a lie. If you thought that the Soviet Union was bad, anyone could make the argument that America is even worse. I have personally seen what Capitalism has done to humanity, we have all seen it. When you drove here, did you not see at least one homeless man on the street begging for food? I guarantee that not a single one of you stopped for that man to give him that last bite of your donut. This is what the disease of Capitalism has done to us. Whenever we can, we take from the poor and give it to the rich! You may try to justify to yourself, these people have failed in life, and they have only made poor decisions, so they deserve what they receive. Let me tell you now, that thought is completely false! The people on the streets are the hardest working out of all of us! Let me ask you this, who would be more deserving of vast sums of money? Would it be the rich man who essentially won the lottery in the stock market and now makes a living selling overpriced electronics to innocent people? Or would it be the man who lives in a broken down house that works eighteen hours a day just to struggle to put food on the table for the entire family? It is the man who works the hardest! That is who deserves the greatest reward! Why is it that those who contribute nothing to society always receive everything in return? Why is it that those who contribute all but their life to society get nothing in return? It is because the world is ripe with the disease of Capitalism! If we were to see someone sleeping in rags against a dumpster, we would think nothing of him; maybe ten of you, out of the three hundred here, would even offer him something to eat, while maybe half of you would kick him if he was in your way. Are we so infected with the disease of Capitalism that we would not even bear to notice that we kick those who have fallen? We are morally obligated, as members of the human race, to help up our comrades, to support those who have unjustly fallen. Why would we not help them? If you were in their place, how would you feel of your position? Rather, what would you think of humanity? You would see just how horrid civilization really is, you would see just how terrible the world is, you would see just how barbaric we all really are. But what if we could change all of this, what if we truly could? Would the world not be a better place than where it is now? The answer to that is simple; humanity cannot sink any lower to what it is already, why not try to fix what was wrong with previous attempts at Communism? If we cannot fall any lower, then that means this will succeed! I urge all of you, every single one of you, to go home to your family and friends, tell them what you have heard here. If you feel that I am wrong, than so be it, I am wrong, but for those that believe I am right, embrace these ideals, as this is what can lift humanity out of the hole it has dug itself!”
There was nothing but silence for the next few minutes. There was a young man towards the back that got up, and softly started clapping. Another person joined in, and soon enough, the entire room was shaking from the power of the thunderous applause. I held my fist in the air as I shouted “Hail Communism!”
The audience replied in kind.
As I made my way towards the exit, the people were patting my back, as if I had given them hope, something humanity has not seen in generations. For that moment, I had a feeling as if I had great power, and I will admit it felt good. When I made it back to Andy’s apartment, the only thing he said to me before we went to bed was “There’s no going back now, we have to watch ourselves, don’t expect to live too long if we don’t do anything soon.”
I wasn’t quite sure what he meant by that at first, but I would soon come to realize his intentions.
I woke up the next day, and made myself some breakfast. As I turned on the TV, I saw something very unusual. Instead of the soap operas that are normally on, there was a special news report.
“For those of you just joining us, we are at the campus of Moscow University,”
I dropped my plate on the floor,
“There are students speaking out against the government, saying that it is…”
I immediately woke up Andy and told him to look at the TV. The only thing I heard come from him was a gasp. I went to the front of the apartment and signaled a taxi.
“Moscow University, hurry!”
“Hey hey, calm dow…”
“I’ll pay you twice as much if you hurry!!!”
“Yes sir…”
He sped through the streets like a mad man, weaving in and out of traffic; I was praying for my life. I arrived at the campus to find a media circus, and I approached one of the reporters.
“Excuse me mam?”
“Ahh, hold on… what?”
“I know why the students are protesting here.”
“It’s because of the supposedly corrupt government, everyone knows that”
“I know the truth! They are pro-Communist!”
“How could that be? Communism is dead…”
“It has been revived.”

She set up the camera for an interview with me; this would most likely be the shining moment in her career if things went right for her.
“To all of you watching,” I started, “there may be many questions regarding the truth behind this riot. Last night I, presented information based upon my research in America. What I have found there, is far from what I expected. I discovered the evils of Capitalism! There were professors of physics living on the streets solely because they were Communist! When anyone hears the word Communist, you are trained to feel a sense of horror and disgust, while in fact Communism is not evil! It is centered on the well being of the people! We are trained by the Capitalistic education system to despise Communism, and embrace Capitalism. While the Communist party may have had some evil dictators in the past, we will still live on! Rome had its share of evil dictators too, and as a result it fell! Now, replace Stalin and Nero with good, with Trajan or Augustus! When you remove what failed in the system before, then we shall not fall! If there is a truly free media in this hypothetical Communist society, nobody would question our acts; they would already know what they are! Communism had fallen previously from unfit rulers, and mistrust. If that is taken out of the equation, Communism would most certainly thrive!”
The reporter was in shock by what I had said. She could not believe that I was risking my life by promoting Communism.
Just a few moments after the interview, the protesters started to become violent. The police that were stationed around the campus had stones and other materials being thrown at them; several officers had to be taken to the hospital. Dmitry Medevedev then ordered for the military to be sent in, and for the protesters to be warned one last time. When the tanks became visible, rather than dispersing, the students began setting up barricades, not that it would do anything. They refused to surrender to the military, and as such, on live TV, the tanks moved in, and slaughtered every single living person on the campus. For the people watching, this was a horrendous scene, as there was no time to censor anything. The people of Russia rapidly became believers, and then my following had grown from a few hundred college students, to millions of Russian citizens in the span of a day! These people would spawn more and more followers, meaning Communism would one again rise, and the world would never be the same again.

Life was miserable in Moscow after the massacre. The city was under martial law, but what else would happen? The world did not want Communism back, and they would do anything to stop it. I decided to go underground until things started to cool off. Andy would bring me my food every day so that I would not risk my life by showing my face to anyone. One day, he brought me something very useful. He apparently had been gathering up money from supporters which he used to buy me a computer. It was nothing fancy, just something basic, but it would be what I would use to communicate with my supporters en mass. The first thing that I did was create a website, with Andy’s help, that would display news and eventually orders. It used to be that revolutions started in taverns, where groups of drunks decided to do something about the government that they didn’t like, but now, the world had changed. The world had become more virtualized in that sense, and to ignore the powers of technology would be most certainly fatal. My parents always spoke of how they “could never trust robots to do anything,” but I knew better than that. One day, one of my supporters came to me, he was some sort of expert with computers, and he said that he could help me.
“How badly do you want Communism to succeed?” he asked me.
“How badly do you want the world to be free?” I replied.
“I have some information about the Russian Army. It’s pretty basic, but we can use it to our advantage. The internet plays a vital role in the operation of any army these days. This is how orders are received, and data is relayed. Almost nothing is done over the radio anymore. If we were able to somehow down the internet for a day, or even just a few minutes, the world would be in a complete panic. If that were to happen, we would easily be able to take control of the city.”
“And if we fail at taking the city?”
“You really already have the city, only Medevedev remains, with his small army protecting the presidential complex. They will not kill millions of people storming the complex, they won’t be able to.”
“Millions?”
“Yes, nearly everyone in Moscow is a believer now. The Russians are losing control of the city and they know it. If we do not act soon, Medevedev will flee and then he will kill off our supporters.”
“That’s an interesting idea. What is your name?”
“My friend, my name is Daniel Kuiter. I was the student of Gregor Räznov. I am the one who enlightened him”

It was to be done. The city was to be taken by force with the help of my supporters. Daniel was organizing the attack on the internet as Andy was gathering the people to storm the presidential complex. It was all set, it was all in motion. This could not be stopped now. Too many innocent people had died; it was time for us to return the favor to those who were guilty; guilty of being infected with the disease of Capitalism, guilty of taking from the poor and giving it to the rich so that they could have banquets large enough to feed hundreds of people and mansions thousands of square meters while my comrades barely kept themselves from starvation while living on the streets! It was time for justice to be done! We were the ones once accused of wrongdoing; that we stole, and were not to be trusted. We had to do what we had to, to survive! It was the rich, in essence, who robbed the innocent people! It was the rich who stole from the poor when they had nothing to begin with! It was time to end this great disparity; it was time for all of us to be equal! No longer would anyone be homeless, go hungry, or have to do things that you normally would never do just so that your child could get a decent education! It was time to end all of the evils of Capitalism, and consequently, expel Medevedev from this country!

It was unusually quiet on that winter morning in 2012. It was just two days until Christmas, but that did not matter to anyone. It was warm that day, maybe it was a sign. I put on a light coat and proceeded with Andy to the congregation point. There was nobody on the streets when I got there, just the sporadic piece of garbage. Then, after a few minutes, a lone person came. Then another, this time wielding some sort of knife. After about half an hour, there must have been thousands of people waiting there. Many had weapons, ready to fight, and possibly die, in the name of Communism. I awaited the signal from Daniel, to tell me that the internet was down. Our window of opportunity would be short, as he wouldn’t be able to keep it down long at all. The world would be in a state of total chaos if we took too long. More and more people kept arriving. I could no longer estimate how many there were, I only knew that it would be more than enough to storm the presidential complex. Then, I saw a flare come out of one of the buildings. It was the signal, it was time to move.
We marched on towards the compound. There were guards, but they did nothing to stop us from breaking down the gate. They were on our side. The roar of the crowd was deafening when the first of the people entered the complex, but not deafening enough to cover the sound of a helicopter powering up. We could see it in the distance, the President was fleeing. I pointed towards the helicopter to show Andy where it was; he was running as fast as he could to stop it from taking off, as were many people behind him that could possibly weigh it down enough to keep it from taking off. There were several guards getting on, holding guns, taking aim at the crowd. I’m not quite sure why they didn’t shoot Andy when they had the chance, maybe they were on our side as well. Regardless, Andy didn’t make it there in time, and the helicopter began to take off; that is when I lost control of the crowd. One person started to throw stones at the helicopter, a gunshot followed. A person from the crowd had struck a critical point in the propeller system. The helicopter started to lose altitude very rapidly; then the propellers stopped altogether. In a huge ball of fire the helicopter crashed, Medevedev was dead. In an informal election held moments after the crash, I was named the President of Räznovia.

There was no going back now. I was a major target of the entire world. Communism once again had its stronghold, but there was no way that I would let it fall. Only through my determination would the country thrive. The only way that the people would trust me as a Communist leader is if they knew everything that was going on in the government.
“Andy, get me someone from the media over here, I want to make an announcement.”
A few minutes later, Andy returned with a cameraman.
“I want this to be sent to every government that’s opposed to our Communist rule.”
“You mean all of them then?” he replied as I chuckled at that thought.
The cameraman signaled with his hands that the recording was about to begin.
“Good evening to all of you watching this. Moments ago, a crowd of my supporters broke into the Presidential Complex and assassinated President Medevedev. I will not deny this. In fact, I will try my best as president to allow all matters, no matter how large or small, to be observed by the people. I wish to keep no secrets from anyone. It is because of secrecy that the Soviet Union fell. But may I remind you, this is not the Soviet Union we are in now, this is Räznovia. It is because of evil dictators that Communism has never worked before. To counter that measure, the media shall hold a poll, every five years. If my approval ratings ever fall underneath sixty percent, there shall be elections. But there is one thing that I feel that we must do in order to succeed as a nation. We must close our borders. If any of you are not satisfied with any of my decisions, you may leave at any time. But our borders will be one way only. Anyone may choose to leave, but no one may enter. We do not want to become too dependant of foreign trade before we know that we can sustain ourselves first.
Many of you already know what my main philosophy is. The Capitalist government is corrupt, and there is no way to fix it. Take Mexico for instance; their leadership became so corrupt, that the only way out of their enormous national debt was to offer their country for sale to the Americans! It is my theory, that if the people know every move that you make, you cannot become corrupt; you wouldn’t dare to do so. This is how you have a foolproof Communist system! If you take out the only thing that was bad in previous trials, then it shall not fail! Remove corruption from the system and you truly have a paradise! Now, I ask all of you within our borders that do not agree with my terms to leave. If anybody has any questions regarding any of these matters, feel free to speak to me. I would be glad to sit down with anyone, from any nation, to speak about anything. I know that many people would enjoy seeing this country fall within the first few weeks, but I can guarantee you, it will not.
Long live Communism, long live Räznovia”

Within the first few years, there were several assassination attempts against me. We could never figure out which Capitalistic country was sending the assassins, but I knew that there was a bounty on my head. They became so frequent that after the first five years, none of my speeches were in public. I resided in the presidential complex day after day, month after month, year after year. My approval rating, as monitored by an independent media, never fell below 80 percent; a remarkable feat in any country let alone a Communist society.
Upon the discovery that an American civilian participated in the revolution and achieved a high ranking position within the government, the Americans demanded the extradition of Daniel Kuiter. I was extremely hesitant at first, as I knew that if it had not been for him, I would likely be imprisoned or dead. After numerous threats of full scale invasions, I was urged by Andy to “let the Americans have him; even though he’s helped us in the past, we cannot let him destroy our future”. I did wait several years until we let him go, we knew what he was going to face when he would step in the American courtroom. He was being charged with something minor, theft I think it was, but we all knew why the Americans wanted him back: they wanted him dead. They could not bear the idea that they had something to do with the development of a Communist nation.
Not long after I had taken control of the country, I devoted a great deal of resources to science and technology. I knew that the West was starting to fall behind in their technological capabilities ever since a mere college student was able to shut down the internet for a few moments, and this was the field in which we could surpass the rest of the world. There were two things in particular that I found quite fascinating. The first was something called SatImFab, or Satellite Image Fabrication. It did not have a very long range, so a center would have to be placed every hundred kilometers or so, leaving us to build thousands along the borders, which made plenty of jobs for our comrades. Another thing that caught my attention was the Genetically Enhanced Persons Project. These GEPs would grow at twice the rate of a typical person, and yet be twice as strong! They could even survive for weeks without food, water of sleep! But best of all, they were obedient. If they were given an order, they would follow it to the death. They would only obey a predetermined person, meaning myself. I knew right then and there that we had created the perfect soldier, and that I would have to create as many as I could, as fast as I could, if we were ever going to survive the external pressures exerted on us by surrounding Capitalist nations.
In the year 2022, ten years after the revolution, there was an enormous gathering of officials from all corners of the earth. They arrived in Moscow to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty as drafted by the Prime Minister of England. I agreed to sign it only if the gathering would be held in Räznovia, which I thought may relieve some tensions between us and the West. Moments after the signing, Andy approached me claiming that “this was Capitalist trickery, and they cannot be trusted”. In the end, we used our technology to conceal the fact that we did not dismantle all of the weapons, but kept some in the SatImFab centers which were hidden far underground.
One fateful day, in the winter of 2027, just a few days before we were to open our borders, there was a massive storm near the Chinese border. Somehow one of the mines collapsed on itself, and out of fear of contaminating the ground around it, a team of people went to recover the nuclear weapons under the cover of the SatImFab. It was later revealed that a Chinese border man saw the commotion in the supposedly uninhabited area. I sent some diplomats to try to bribe him from speaking to his superiors regarding what he saw. When he refused, we had no choice but to silence him. His disappearance would be noticed, which would launch an investigation which would likely lead to the discovery of the weapons in the mines. Andy advised me of my options. We could explain how we broke the treaty and likely go to war with the entire Capitalistic world in which we would likely lose, or we could have a pre-emptive strike on the nation that would win the war in the name of Capitalism. I decided to go with the latter, and strike China with all we could afford to lose. On December twenty third, 2027, 137 nuclear weapons detonated on Chinese soil, causing the most horrendous war that humanity would ever face.
A few weeks into the war, we knew that we were losing. There was no point in trying to hide that fact.
“It’s all my fault Peter,” Andy said to me in the war room underneath the presidential complex, “if we just obeyed the treaty none of this would have happened…”
“You were just looking out for the well being of the country Andy.”
“When they get here, they will find us, and they will kill us, we both know that. But what if there was a way that we wouldn’t be publically executed…”
“Andy, what are you talking about? I can’t allow you to do anything reckless to save yourself!
“It is not for me but for you! What if there was a silent coup right before the war started? What if I’m some war hungry beast that imprisoned you because you wanted peace?”
“Andy, I will not tolerate this!” I said as I stood up, “We’re in this together, we have been from the beginning, and I will not allow anyone to abandon their duties. Now please, we need to figure out our next move. I’m thinking of sending twelve…”
He took the gun from a guard standing next to him and pointed it at my head
“Peter, I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to ask you to leave. Guards, take him to the prison. Peter, make some sort of radio signal to tell the West that you’re being held captive. They will try to rescue you and they will hear your side of the story. With any luck, they’ll believe you. I’m sorry it had to come to this…”
They did believe me. I was rescued from the prison a few days after I sent the distress message. I was taken to Warsaw, where they were preparing the defenses for an incoming fight. I told them what I knew of the military strategies that we used, but then it occurred to me, I actually knew quite little of what was happening, as it was Andy that was doing all of the work. When the Battle of Warsaw was over, the World Alliance forces moved forward into Räznovia. I followed them there, along with General Epps of The United States. When I saw streaks of light in the sky, I knew exactly what was happening. It was out plan X, our final resort when we had nothing left; Andy had given the order to detonate several nuclear weapons on our own soil to hold off the advance. That was the first time I ever saw the light with my own eyes. I felt a sense of sadness when I saw it. This is what I had caused; rather, this is what I allowed Andy to cause. By trusting him, he essentially had even more power than I. He was the politician between the two of us; I was a mere college drop-out. He had manipulated me so that he could achieve power. When I saw the light, I cried. I cried for the Räznovians that were caught in the blast. I cried for the World Alliance forces that had been annihilated. I cried for myself, for believing that all people were truly good. The coup was not hypothetical at all, I just failed to realize that I lost control of my country the moment Medevedev was killed.
Another attack was launched a few days later, this time there was no resistance. I made it public that I was no longer the leader, and as such, the people stopped accepting orders from Gregoriev. He was later captured and put on trial once the presidential complex was raided by World Alliance forces. There was not a single defense lawyer that would stand up for him as the outcome was predetermined; we knew he would be sentenced to death. Three days after the trial, Gregoriev stood upon a hill, overlooking what remained of Beijing. There were hundreds of reporters from the media there to watch him die. He was escorted to the still barely smoldering epicenter, where his radiation suit was taken off, and therefore suffered a slow and painful death. He deserved no less.
I then thought to myself “Communism can never succeed.”
That statement is true in every sense. Communism can never succeed because we live in a Capitalistic world, with Capitalistic ideals. It is in human nature to strive to be superior to your neighbor. Communism prohibits this determination which has caused mankind to thrive for thousands of years. While it may be unjust that people sleep on the streets while others have feasts in their mansions, it is necessary for the survival of civilization. Those who govern will always be superior to those who do light work. Those who do light work will always be superior to those who do heavy labor. While it is unjust that those who work the hardest in life get next to nothing, it is the way that it must be. In the end, Communism can never succeed, which is what I have proved to the world by causing the most horrific war in the history of mankind. Communism can never succeed because we live in a Capitalistic world, and that will never change, as it is the obligation of the human race to be superior to your comrades.

The Articles of Vostovian Communism:
- All people are equal, there are to be no exceptions
- Wealth will be allotted based on effort given to work (both mental and physical effort)
- All people must work directly for the government for at least three months of the year
- All people shall be housed and fed under comfortable conditions
- Currency is to be abolished; all non-essential purchases must be made at the company store, which will be supplied by the government
- All companies are to be controlled by the government; the only exception is a single, independent media
- The media may report on any and all government actions with the exception of matters related to that of the defense of the nation
- The national language is to be English
- If anyone is found to actively work against the Communist government, that person must find arrangements with another nation within one week, or else that person shall be imprisoned indefinitely
- If anyone attempts to enter the country, that person shall be sent back to the country from which they came
- All people have the right to leave the country, however once a person has left, they may not return unless they have approval by the acting President
- If the approval rating of the President falls below sixty percent, elections shall be held to find a suitable replacement
- If a person is in a position to become President, the acting President may not deport or imprison him unless there is evidence, beyond reasonable doubt, of severe treason
- The President shall have complete control over the military unless seventy percent or more of the President’s advisors protest against this
- In the event that the President is unable to fulfill his duties, the advisor of the military shall assume the President’s duties until a suitable replacement has been found
- The political party system is to be abolished; if one lives in Räznovia, that person must embrace Communism
- The borders shall reopen exactly 15 years after the Revolution; December 23, 2012