The Orient Pearl in the Mud: A Philippines CWE AAR

[JackOfHearts101217]

Note: This is my first attempt at an aar and only the second time I have tried to play a game of CWE as the Philippines. I gave up on that game from an earlier version as waiting for nuclear war modifiers to disappear so I could form ASEAN was not a fun experience (also, I could never grasp the meta of CWE combat's much higher attack values)


Introduction:
We have become cynical about bells that, we are assured, toll for all mankind but turned out to have been tolling only for us. - Nick Joaquin. Culture and History pg. 385 "Junking the Heritage".

The long dark night is over, but the new dawn on the horizon still carries a faint shade of gray.

Gone is the pearl of the orient seas.
Gone are the labors of the first Filipino masons, their most prized works that combined the styles of Spain and China into something unique.
Gone are tens of thousands of brothers and sisters, slain by starvation, disease, flames, bullets and blades brought by the vile Hapones.
Gone is the innocence and lack of worldly awareness of our fathers and mothers.

All that remains is a nation of the uncertain and the broken.

Where will the next century find us?

Diyos amang makapangyarihan, ipagtanggol mo po kami.

 

[JackOfHearts101217]

Chapter 1
1/1/1946
Three months, three long months have passed since the Americans used their wonderful new weapons, the Atomic bombs, to scare the Japanese into ceasing hostilities. In that time, the Americans reestablished the Commonwealth government under me, Sr. Quezon having died two years ago in the midst of our American exile.

The 90 days since the silencing of the guns have not done wonders for our national situation, however.

Of the 120 independent nations that currently exist, we are ranked 74th. This means that there are 73 nations before us who get to buy goods from the world market first. Even if we somehow were of higher rank, we have no money with which to buy goods, almost requiring us to subsist on loans from the UN members.

We have no prestige, due to being fully occupied by the Japanese for almost three years, and we have no factories as the Americans ruled us as a colonial state, only freeing us to be a puppet in 1935. Our military is rated by the UN security Council to possess a force projection score of 7 (contrast with the American score of 2511) and is currently made up of 12000 men. 9000 irregular infantry and 3000 artillerists, with space to build another 12000 men.

Even in this regard, we fail however. As a barely educated ex-colony we lack the tech to even build artillery, planes, tanks and all the other accoutrements of modern war. It also goes without saying that we lack naval bases and railroads because we are too tech-ignorant to build them. The one saving grace we have here is that our academia is obsessed with the cult of industry and commerce so it should be slightly easier to advance our knowledge in these fields

Our current geopolitical situation is, ironically, developing into a more scary situation than that of the pre-war. To the west, Vietnam has been split between the Communist anti-imperialists and the French colonizers who will never be able to keep peace with each other, while above them, the Nationalist Chinese and communist Chinese are fighting a brutal civil war, the winner of which will undoubtedly become a new world power. To our south the British and Dutch still maintain direct rule over their colonies, although the Dutch are fighting the Indonesian independence movement and the British may leave Sabah soon, allowing us to claim our rightful North Bornean Clay.

If we hope to prosper once more and reclaim our status as the pearl of the orient seas, much will need to be done. I hope I can do what is expected of me.
-Sergio Osmena, 2nd President of the Philippine Commonwealth

 

[JackOfHearts101217]

Chapter 2
The intellectuals are already heavily obsessed with the west's ideologies on business, so I told them to use that obsession for something useful and get to researching Keynesian Economics ASAP. I also chose to raise taxes across the board to put some money in the commonwealth coffers.

Moving away from the monetary situation however, I managed to regain some prestige for our land by joining the International Monetary fund, and to better administer our broken lands, I have encouraged the populace of Luzon and Mindanao Island to take up jobs in the commonwealth bureaucracy.

Hopefully, we will soon have enough money to sustain all these efforts.

 

[Idhrendur]

Welcome to AAR writing! And here's hoping for the Philippines to rise!

 

[JackOfHearts101217]

Welcome to AAR writing! And here's hoping for the Philippines to rise!

Thank you! I wish it had gone better tbh. I no lifed it a few hours ago until I reached 1971, and I stopped there bc the American ai pulled a pro gamer move on me, their defenseless little puppet

 

[DensleyBlair]

Glad to see another Vicky AAR, and a Filipino CWE campaign at that! Super interesting to see where this goes.

Welcome to AAR writing, and best of luck.

 

[the_hdk]

good luck will follow