Help needed with Starting Races for New Campaign

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

I am trying to put together some starting races for a new campaign. This will be my first 'novelised' campaign report so I will be putting a lot of time and effort into the campaign. Therefore I would prefer to start with power blocs that are as realistic as possible and avoid anything too contrived. The campaign will start as conventional in 2025, which gives 15 years of political change to work with. I have managed to sort out most of the world but there are a few standouts that don't really fit very well into one of the existing alliances so I am open to suggestion and advice. The 'races' I have so far are:

1) European Union: Existing EU countries plus Turkey, which is likely to be a member before 2025.
2) United States (plus Canada, Australia, New Zealand). The three other countries all have strong military and cultural ties to the US and the US seems their most likely partner. I am open to persuasion if any inhabitants of those countries on the list believe they would join up with someone else or perhaps go it alone.
3) People's Republic of China
4) Commonwealth of Independent States (Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan). Ukraine might actually be a member of the EU by 2025 but I have left it with the CIS countries to give the CIS a little more economic power.
5) Japan
6) India (India plus nearby countries such as Sri Lanka and Nepal)
7) Union of South American Nations. This is a proto-EU body formed in May 2008 by all of the South American States. There is background on wiki at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_of_S ... an_Nations. I am assuming by 2025 it will be capable of mounting a joint economic/research effort. By then I am also assuming that Mexico and some central American countries would join. It's possible Mexico might team up with the US or go it alone but I thought this option was more likely.
8) ASEAN (Indonesia, Malaysia, the Phillipines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Burma, Brunei). ASEAN, or the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, was formed in 1967 and is primarily an economic organization. I am working on the assumption that closer political ties will develop over the next 15 years and that with the race into space, the countries will be pushed closer together out of mutual self-interest. One point of interest is that the official language of ASEAN is English.
9) Arab League (Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, Kuwait, Algeria, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, UAE, Mauritania, Somalia, Palestine, Djibouti, Comoros, Iraq?). The Arab League was formed in 1945 and has steadily grown in size since then. Although the Arab countries don't always see eye-to-eye, they do have a lot of historial and cultural ties. This organization is primarily political rather than economic so I am assuming some economic integeration by the start of the campaign.
10) African Union (minus those African countries already in the Arab League). I am not sure of whether this organization is capable of operating as a whole given the fairly wide cultural, political and economic differences spanning the whole African continent. However, the alternative is to break it down further into units such as the Southern African Development Community, which would have very minor economic power. Even as a whole, this is the weakest of the ten power blocs by some margin.

That leaves a number of countries which don't fit neatly into one of the above blocs. I am obviously not going to worry about states such as the Maldives or the Cape Verde Islands (apologies to anyone on the list from those very pleasant but not economically significant areas of the world) but there are several countries I would like to cover.

South Korea: Doesn't really fit neatly anywhere. Can't see them allying with Japan given the history or China. The US is a useful military ally but doesn't really share any cultural identity. I have read up a little on South Korean foreign relations (yes, I am a geek) and nothing springs to mind. They do have some economic agreement with ASEAN so I guess that might be a possibility.

Republic of China (Taiwan). A similar situation to South Korea.

Israel: The US is the obvious choice but it's also possible Israel could eventually join the EU at some point. A third possibility is to go it alone. It would be interesting to explore the possibility of a Israeli-settled planet that could attract colonization from the Jewish populations of other countries. Not sure how I would handle that in-game, although with this campaign I am considering the option of 'passive races'. These would be races with no economic impact in the game and no TN capability but they would provide a pool of additional colonists for other governments.

Iran: The Islamic Republic of Iran doen't really have any significant allies and is not a member of any major economic or political power blocs. It has some shared earthly interests with the Arab League with regard to Israel but once the human race expands into space, that may cease to be a factor. Despite it's limited economic power in relation to the major power blocs, I am inclined to believe Iran would try to go it alone.

Pakistan: Pakistan does have ties with China and some links to the countries within the Arab league but I am not sure they are strong enough for Pakistan to join with them. Possibly another go it alone country, or perhaps if Islamic groups gained the upper hand within the country it would find common ground with its neighbour Iran.

North Korea. While a threat to regional stability, North Korea has minimal economic power so I will probably include it with China. I don't think it warrants inclusion as a separate power.

Any comments and/or suggestions regarding the above are very welcome.

Steve

[sloanjh]

A few random comments:

1)  Are you thinking of alliances here (e.g. NATO) or actual political entities (e.g. EU)?  I think the odds of significant political consolidation over the next 15 years are low and trying to justify it would knock readers' out of "suspension of disbelief" mode.  Alliance structures, OTOH, are much more volatile, and easier to put together because they don't trounce peoples' cultural identity so much.  Note that in my first reading of your mail, I parsed it in terms of political union (probably because you led with EU).  If you were talking 2050 or 2075 I'd have a different reaction here, but 2025 is just too soon for significant political consolidation IMHO.

2)  US/Canada/Aus/NZ - For political union, I think Aus and NZ are too far away from the US for it to be realistic.  As for the Canada/US political dynamic, I think it's very similar to the Scotland/England dynamic, i.e. Canada is a significantly smaller population that doesn't want to be culturally absorbed.  In other words, I don't see a lot of potential for a US/Canada political union in the next 15 years.

All of the above changes if we're talking alliance, however.  Canada and the US (and arguably Britain) are VERY tightly coupled in terms of military policy; and I think we're pretty strongly aligned with Australia as well.  Note that there's been tension between US and NZ in the past over nukes/militarism - my recollection is that the NZ government has opposed the US in the past on these sorts of things, i.e. they're much more pacifist (a potential point of conflict in "switching" decisions - see below).

The other possibility (especially for Australia) would be to put them in ASEAN.

3)  How about CIS for Iran?  I was going to agree with them going it alone, but realized that they have fairly close ties with Russia.  Or they might be a "switcher" (see below).

4)  For political union, I would put South Korea and Taiwan into ASEAN (actually, I thought that South Korea already was in it), unless you decide that Chinese reunification has taken place in which case Taiwan goes to China (of course).  For alliances, I'd add the possibility of either of them being in the US bloc.  Again, both of these make good candidates for switchers.

5)  From a dramatic point of view, having Israel go it alone is very appealing.  You'd have to figure out a way to give them a significant "edge" (such as a corner on some mineral), though, otherwise they'll be swamped by larger populations.  Again, the US makes sense from an alliance point of view, but not from a political union point of view.

6)  I agree on North Korea and Pakistan.  

A few random game mechanics thoughts:

1)  How about individual mineral reserves for the various Aurora populations on the same world?  This would allow a small, isolated country (such as Iran) to have economic leverage if they had e.g. 75% of the world's duranium reserves.

2)  If you go down the "alliance" route for power blocs (which I think you should), then it might be interesting to put "bloc-switching" into the role playing.  For example Britain might switch back and forth between the US bloc and the EU; similarly for Australia - they might start in the US bloc but switch to ASEAN due to immigration from Indonesia.  Similarly Iran could move between blocs.  The trick here from a mechanics point of view would be to keep some record of the initial % of the economy of the bloc that the member countries represent, and what the initial econ rating was.  For example, take China (low initial econ rating), Taiwan, (medium) and US (high).  Taiwan might start in the US block, then switch to China if unification takes place.  At that point, you'd want to extract some percentage of the US block capital and population, and recalculate the average econ efficiency (it would go up, since Taiwan was lower efficiency than US) then add the capital and population to China and recalculate efficiency (it would again go up, since Taiwan was higher than US).  Note that this doesn't have to be tracked by Aurora - you could do it with a spreadsheet or write a little program that queries the Aurora DB and does the appropriate calculations.

John

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

A few random comments:

1)  Are you thinking of alliances here (e.g. NATO) or actual political entities (e.g. EU)?  I think the odds of significant political consolidation over the next 15 years are low and trying to justify it would knock readers' out of "suspension of disbelief" mode.  Alliance structures, OTOH, are much more volatile, and easier to put together because they don't trounce peoples' cultural identity so much.  Note that in my first reading of your mail, I parsed it in terms of political union (probably because you led with EU).  If you were talking 2050 or 2075 I'd have a different reaction here, but 2025 is just too soon for significant political consolidation IMHO.

Thanks for the comments. I am assuming the power blocs are economic and military alliances rather than political unions so within the fiction I would still refer to units built in different countries within an alliance. My first inclination was to have all the countries individually and use the new diplomatic rules to allow them to share survey data and tech. Unfortunately, once I started looking at that more closely I realised it would lead to a huge number of countries.

2)  US/Canada/Aus/NZ - For political union, I think Aus and NZ are too far away from the US for it to be realistic.  As for the Canada/US political dynamic, I think it's very similar to the Scotland/England dynamic, i.e. Canada is a significantly smaller population that doesn't want to be culturally absorbed.  In other words, I don't see a lot of potential for a US/Canada political union in the next 15 years.

All of the above changes if we're talking alliance, however.  Canada and the US (and arguably Britain) are VERY tightly coupled in terms of military policy; and I think we're pretty strongly aligned with Australia as well.  Note that there's been tension between US and NZ in the past over nukes/militarism - my recollection is that the NZ government has opposed the US in the past on these sorts of things, i.e. they're much more pacifist (a potential point of conflict in "switching" decisions - see below).

It is in terms of Alliance rather than political union and I did seriously consider including the UK within the USA power bloc. The UK is more tied to the US in terms of security but tied into the EU in terms of economics. However, in the last European elections, the UK Independence Party came second behind the euro-sceptic Conservatives and pushed the ruling Labour Party into 3rd place. The UK is generally a euro-sceptic country so it wouldn't be too unreaslistic if the UK decided to link up with a US-led coalition for what would be a new industrial revolution

The other possibility (especially for Australia) would be to put them in ASEAN.

Yes, I did consider that. I read up on Australian foreign relations and they seem closer to the US than their neighbours.

3)  How about CIS for Iran?  I was going to agree with them going it alone, but realized that they have fairly close ties with Russia.  Or they might be a "switcher" (see below).

CIS is an interesting suggestion, especially if Iran moved to a less confrontational attitude over time.

4)  For political union, I would put South Korea and Taiwan into ASEAN (actually, I thought that South Korea already was in it), unless you decide that Chinese reunification has taken place in which case Taiwan goes to China (of course).  For alliances, I'd add the possibility of either of them being in the US bloc.  Again, both of these make good candidates for switchers.

ROK has a free trade agreement with ASEAN but isn't actually a member. ROC would like to be more involved with ASEAN but there are diplomatic objections from the PRC. It probably wouldn't be a huge leap to assume that both countries become members in the next 15 years or so.

5)  From a dramatic point of view, having Israel go it alone is very appealing.  You'd have to figure out a way to give them a significant "edge" (such as a corner on some mineral), though, otherwise they'll be swamped by larger populations.  Again, the US makes sense from an alliance point of view, but not from a political union point of view.

Even without a significant edge, there could potentially be a simialr situation to the one that exists now. The US would provide technical and military aid, giving a small Israel planetary population a significant military capability. As long as the Israel population was able to maintain the ships, they would have a capability beyond that which their pop size would suggest. PDCs in particular would be useful due to their lack of a maintenace requirement. It would fascinating to see how capable you could make a population of maybe ten million (assuming a general exodus from Israel and some jewish immigration from other countries). Building up an Israel merchant marine would also be a way to boost their capability.

1)  How about individual mineral reserves for the various Aurora populations on the same world?  This would allow a small, isolated country (such as Iran) to have economic leverage if they had e.g. 75% of the world's duranium reserves.

I have considered this in the past but there are a lot of problems. For example, if one state has a colony and a second state lands on the same planet, how much of the minerals reserves move to the second state. Obviously it gets more complex with more states. How does changing population affect the balance? I think for this to work, each planet would have to have a certain number of 'planetary locations' and each population would occupy one or more locations. This would be tied into ground combat so that different locations could be fought over. It adds a lot of complexity though, especially as I would have to hold mineral records for every location on every planet with minerals and also display that information. When I eventually get around to planetary surfaces I will probably get into this in more detail.

2)  If you go down the "alliance" route for power blocs (which I think you should), then it might be interesting to put "bloc-switching" into the role playing.  For example Britain might switch back and forth between the US bloc and the EU; similarly for Australia - they might start in the US bloc but switch to ASEAN due to immigration from Indonesia.  Similarly Iran could move between blocs.  The trick here from a mechanics point of view would be to keep some record of the initial % of the economy of the bloc that the member countries represent, and what the initial econ rating was.  For example, take China (low initial econ rating), Taiwan, (medium) and US (high).  Taiwan might start in the US block, then switch to China if unification takes place.  At that point, you'd want to extract some percentage of the US block capital and population, and recalculate the average econ efficiency (it would go up, since Taiwan was lower efficiency than US) then add the capital and population to China and recalculate efficiency (it would again go up, since Taiwan was higher than US).  Note that this doesn't have to be tracked by Aurora - you could do it with a spreadsheet or write a little program that queries the Aurora DB and does the appropriate calculations.

Maybe I could find someway to have sub-groups within a population. Hmm! I can already have populations of different species within the same Empire, so if I made each country a species I could have a population for each country on Earth but grouped into Empires for all other purposes. Transfering pops within Empires is already setup within the game. In fact, I wouldn't do it for every country because some wouldn't make that much difference if they switched but I could do it for every country over a certain population or economic strength.

Even so, I am not sure if that would work because some things are better when the pops are grouped into one, such as maintenance facilities or research. It would also mean I would have to specify individual groups for colonization and it would result in every individual pop having it's own trade. As you suggest, perhaps the simplest thing is just to maintain a record of the percentage that each country provides to the overall economy. I'll give it some thought.

Steve

[welchbloke]

From my, limited, interaction with the aussies; I would agree with you Steve that they are far more coupled with the US than the ASEAN nations.  In fact, a lot of their planning considerations seem to revolve around the ASEAN nations becoming a military threat in the mid to long term.
I agree that the North Koreans are a conundrum, in terms of alliances you could be really contentious and join the NK's with Iran.  They appear to already share ballistic missile technology.  Aside form tweaking the US's nose they don't have much in common however and I would guess a real alliance would not last long.
The Israelis and the South Koreans are even more of an issue to my mind.  Both are extremely independent and unlikely to enter into established alliances.  You could create some kind of external threat to force them to join with the US/EU/ASEAN etc.
My 5p anyway.

[sloanjh]

Even so, I am not sure if that would work because some things are better when the pops are grouped into one, such as maintenance facilities or research. It would also mean I would have to specify individual groups for colonization and it would result in every individual pop having it's own trade. As you suggest, perhaps the simplest thing is just to maintain a record of the percentage that each country provides to the overall economy. I'll give it some thought.

I was actually suggesting a hair more sophistication than this.  I was mainly thinking of the starting economic economic efficiency, i.e. the concept you put in to differentiate between e.g. China and the US so that wealth production isn't tied to pure population, and so that countries that start out wealthy get a bigger bang for the same economic expansion research.  The idea would be to track initial percentages of population and installations independently (hmmm - and maybe even relative tech levels), along with base economic efficiency modifier (presumably the number that you enter in the start-up screen).  When a country switched, you could then use these to calculate the portion of each sector that "belongs" to that country.  Not a big difference, but individual tracking would allow a country like Israel to specialize in economic productivity and research, for example, while not having many mines.

John

[mavikfelna]

Pakistan is a tough call. They are populous enough and developed enough that they should be able to stand on their own if they can withstand the internal pressures from their dis-separate ethnic populations. I could possibly see them allying with the CIS to counter the Indian influence but it would take some real gyrations to do that.

North Korea should either go to the RoK or China. I have a feeling once Kim Jon Il and his son are out of the picture they will merge with the South pretty readily. Or, Kim's son will ally himself with China and become little more than a puppet for them.

Israel is likely best left as an independent entity using the US as it's military shield in exchange for tech and economic cooperation.

I like the idea of Iran joining the CIS but it would require the current revolution there to have seen enough success to replace the current leadership by that time.

South America and Africa are best grouped into the super continental nations as you've outlined.

Taiwan will likely be reunified with China in exchange for limited democratic reforms in China itself. There is already movement in this direction by some members of the Taiwanese government though I don't know how popular the movement is nor how well their negotiations have been going with China. I could see a more moderate Chinese premiere coming to power in the near future that would be willing to enable the reforms that would bring the Taiwanese back. This sort of situation would be a huge boost for the Chinese economy and might make them a larger and more vibrant economy than the US.

South Korea would either join with the US or ASEAN, most likely with the US, if the above Chinese situation happened simply to save themselves from the Chinese. Particularly if the Australian/NZ/US alliance was in place to compete with the same situation.

--Mav

[ShadoCat]

Steve, mt 2 bits:

Mexico:  Their government will likely collapse soon.  There are two possibilities from this: they will be taken over by criminal interests (part of the Columbia to US channel) and become a non-participant or they will end up with a US puppet government.  If the government doesn't collapse, it will be because of strong external support (US or...  ...Russian?).  If Russia is the supporter, Mexico will likely join the South American league.  If Mexico were to go into the Russian camp, the US would interfere enough to take them out of the picture.

If Turkey becomes part of the EU, Russia is likely to get very friendly with Iran to put pressure on Turkey.

Israel is likely to be very loosely tied to the US.  They like their independence but they will need access to space.  Given their funding pf political campaigns in the US, they are likely to get US assistance no mater how little benefit they actually provide the US.

If the Asian league appears strong enough, South Korea might join them.  Otherwise, they will join a US coalition simply to protect themselves from Japan and China.  If US ties to Japan weaken, SK will be even more likely to join the US.

North Korea, if it survives, will likely join SK unless it does something suicidal. In which case, we might see the first US-China alliance since WWII.

For Taiwan, I only see two likely outcomes: US alliance or being pulled back to China.  The pull back to China is the likely outcome if they break ties with the US and join the Asian alliance.

Pakistan is the real odd case.  If the Muslims overthrow the government, they will likely try to join the Islamic alliance.  If that happens, India may or may not intervene. If Pakistan does not go Islamic, Russia and China are likely to court Pakistan (and the US, not one for learning from mistakes, will continue to do so) to protect them from India and the Islamic alliance.

I can't see the African nations cooperating enough to be anything but a minor distraction to anyone.

[ZimRathbone]

Re OZ & NZ:

Both have recently (in the last two years or so) changed governments, Australia from Liberal & Nationalist Coalition (read Conservative from a UK standpoint) to Labor (more or less like New Labour) and NZ the other way around from Labour to Nationals.  Accordingly I think that you'll find the Kiwis a little less in conflict with US interests than before, and the Aussies not quite as supportive as previous administrations - the changes are pretty mild tho, I dont really see OZ prefering ASEAN to the US yet. While there is the same Scotland/England dynamic between NZ & OZ, I think that they too are both much closer to each other than anyone else.

I cant really speak about NZ militarilly, but Australia is very closely coupled to the US in military terms (much more so than the UK is, I think), and likely to be so for the foreseeable future.  There are still very significant links to UK military forces as well, I regularly attended lectures given by RAF & RN personnel, but not so much that I think it likely that there would ever be much movement towards a Commonwealth based alliance.  Australia is far more likely to ditch the links with the Crown, and formally become a Republic (especially if Charlie succeeds), if we can ever agree on how to select the Head of State.    Of course the Australians will continue to hold more important links with England (like the recent events at Headingley).

All in all while the ANZAC nations *might* go it alone, they re MUCH more likely to join in with the US in a military (if not political) sense.

[Sotak246]

Just dropping in my 2cents

ShadoCat wrote:

Mexico: Their government will likely collapse soon.

ShadoCat is on the mark here from what I have seen and heard.  Open sources give the Mexican Govt. 1-5 years before it collapses, unless something drasticaly changes.  They are facing the Cartels in the North, which are increadibly well trained and armed, they are on equal footing with the Mexican army in every department except heavy armor.  It even looks like the Cartels are strarting to form their own alliance and if they do who doesn't think that a multibillion dollar(U.S.) criminal orgaization can't buy or steal even heavy armor, if you have doubts go to Northern Mexico and notice the Cartels are commonly more heavly armed then the regular army patrols.  In the south Mexico is faced with a rebel movement by the native Mexicans.  This movement is becoming a bigger and bigger thorn in Mexico's side every year and they can't put it down, even using some very heavy handed methods.  As too what camp they could end up in the most likely canadite is the U.S.  The U.S. sends hundreds of millions of dollars every year to Mexico just to keep their govt running and fighting the Cartels.  If it does collapse someone will have to move in or face a country run by drug Cartels.  You can expect the U.S. to be in the running to be that someone if for no other reason then to protect itself from the rampant crime and violence that will flow north from a lawless neighbor and too keep some unfriendly govt. from setting up shop next door.

[Randy]

With regaurds to "2) United States (plus Canada, Australia, New Zealand). "

To make it interesting, you might want to consider it as "Canada (plus US, Australia, NZ)"
putting Canada as the senior member. Why? It won't be too much longer before the US is resource starved for many of the resources that are available aplenty in Canada. You could also argue that a lot of the TNEs will be found in the mountains/artic regions further increasing the value of Canada...


  Of course, this is my unbiased opinion...

[Beersatron]

What about having the Aussies and New Zealanders go it alone as the Anzacs of old at the start of the game?

You can then play it out that the North American block have to court the Anzacs into an alliance/merger as the game progresses.

[Thorgarth]

Steve,

I could see Isreal allied with countries that border with her-Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan.  Syria may be more of a stretch.   Some incident to be the motive for the close cooperation and alliance.  While Ethiopia is far, there is a strong attachment to Isreal within certain segments.   Turkey, even more of a stretch.
It would give a better population base and education starting point.

[IanD]

Steve,
How do you plan to rationalise the Outer Space Treaty (1967) that bans nuclear weapons in space and is still in force.

I have rationalised the world (to me ) into some 17 factions would anyone be interested in seeing it and if so where would I post it?

A final plea can we have non-nuclear AMMs? This is purely due to above treaty. Otherwise when my alliances finally leave Sol they will have no AMMs to counter an NPR using missiles. So both precursors and NPRs may just eat the unlucky alliance that develops torpedos alive. I know that just having AAMs is no sure defence, since in my 4.1 game my PD fire control refuses to lock onto incoming (Star Dragon) missiles.

Regards

[SteveAlt]

How do you plan to rationalise the Outer Space Treaty (1967) that bans nuclear weapons in space and is still in force.

So far I have successfuly ignored it ) into some 17 factions would anyone be interested in seeing it and if so where would I post it?[/quote]
I would be interested. As to where to post it, that is a good question. Erik, how about a Scenario forum for players to suggest possible Aurora scenarios or post useful setup information.

A final plea can we have non-nuclear AMMs? This is purely due to above treaty. Otherwise when my alliances finally leave Sol they will have no AMMs to counter an NPR using missiles. So both precursors and NPRs may just eat the unlucky alliance that develops torpedos alive. I know that just having AAMs is no sure defence, since in my 4.1 game my PD fire control refuses to lock onto incoming (Star Dragon) missiles.

I think within the game, you could just assume they were non-nuclear. Even if I created a non-nuclear version, it probably would be no different in game mechanics terms.

Steve

[SteveAlt]

Thanks for all the feedback and suggestions. I have decided to revise the starting setup as listed below. I have also decided to change the starting premise to the same as my first ever Aurora campaign with some type of interstellar object (black hole perhaps) on its way to wipe out the Sol system in 40-50 years. So it will be a conventional start but with a time constraint on getting into space. As this will be my first 'novelised' campaign, I thought that would provide a interesting long-term threat. The main changes from my original OOB are:

1) The UK will ally with the US instead of the EU, mainly on the basis that when national survival is at stake the UK is more likely to trust the US than Europe. The US-led Coalition and the EU will still be close allies anyway.
2) South Korea and Taiwan will ally with ASEAN, making it one of the most powerful blocs in the game.
3) The Islamic countries will be split into two separate blocs. The Islamic Alliance, which will be Iran, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iraq and the Gulf States, and the Arab League, which will be all of the Arab states that are not in the Islamic Alliance. This assumes that the Islamic fundamentalist forces in Saudi and Pakistan gain power and that support of Iraq by the West becomes untenable in that situation. The Gulf States would have little choice but to join.
4) Israel will go it alone, stongly supported by the US.

So the twelve starting powers are:

1) European Union: Existing EU countries minus the UK but plus Turkey, which is likely to be a member before 2025.
2) Coalition: United States, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand.
3) People's Republic of China
4) Commonwealth of Independent States: Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan.
5) Japan
6) India: India plus nearby countries such as Sri Lanka and Nepal
7) Union of South American Nations: All South and Central American countries
8) ASEAN: South Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Phillipines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Burma, Brunei.
9) Islamic Alliance: Iran, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iraq, Gulf States.
10) Arab League: Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, Mauritania, Somalia, Palestine, Djibouti, Comoros.
11) African Union: All of Africa minus those African countries already in the Arab League.
12) Israel:

I have setup the various starting treaties as shown below:

N: Neutral relationship.
T: Neutral relationship plus trade access
FT: Friendly relationship plus trade access
All: Allied and all treaties in force (including geo, grav and tech)

The strong alliances are Coalition - EU, Coalition - Israel, CIS - India and Islamic Alliance - Arab League.
Japan has friendly relations with the West and with ASEAN.

[attachment=0:2tb3lxir]Diplomacy.GIF[/attachment:2tb3lxir]
Steve