[ooc]I've started a game of Aurora already, with the basic idea of the backstory leading up to it. This is that backstory, albeit still unfinished, which I wrote in about 2/3 hours last night. Posting it now for feedback while I am at work today. Let me know what you guys think! Thanks. (Don't be afraid to tell me it's awful
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In 2019, facing overwhelming economic and political challenges at home and abroad, the various nations of the European Union unified, forming a new superpower. By mid 2020, the EU emerged from its deep recession as the world's foremost economic power, and its power and influence were such that many countries, including most of North Africa, the Middle East, and, surprisingly, Russia, were vying to join it. Meanwhile, India, China, and the United States watched its rise with mixed feelings of envy, suspicion, and, in one case, pure hatred.
Following the rise of the EU, the world experienced a short period of relative peace and growth. However, it would not last. On October 19th, 2022, a radical ultra-nationalist Taiwanese terrorist group struck an enormous blow against the People's Republic of China: During the quinquennial National Congress of the Communist Party of China, a crudely made, low-yield nuclear device was detonated in Tienanmen Square in Beijing, destroying the Great Hall of the People, which was hosting the Congress, decimating the surrounding area and Party monuments, and quickly decapitating the upper echelon of the Chinese Communist government. Within hours, India, seeing its chance to rival the power of the EU, put into action a contingency plan for immediate war with China.
In the early hours of October 21st, 2022, elements of the Indian Army crossed the Chinese and Nepalese borders, igniting a conflict that would become the bloodiest in human history. Caught unawares, a major portion of the People's Liberation Army Navy's surface forces were destroyed or crippled by an overwhelming Indian airstrike against the PLAN bases at Zhan Jiang and Dinghai launched from India's two carriers modern carriers, the INS
Vikrant and the INS
Vishal. At the same time, the Indian Air Force leveled Chinese air defense installations, airfields, supply depots, and all known troop concentrations along its border with India and Nepal, carefully sparing civilian and industrial targets. Utterly unprepared for war, demoralized by the Tienanmen Bombing, and without higher orders, very few Chinese ground units resisted the Indian advance for more than a few hours. Nepal capitulated on the 22nd, and, by the end of October, Indian troops had pushed well into China, controlling an area as far east as Golmud, Qinghai, and as far north as Korla, Xinjiang.
Naturally, the world did not stand idly by in the face of India's unwarranted aggression. The United States, Russia, and the European Union, which, having eagerly allowed new countries into the fold, was now the largest country on Earth with its flag flying over Europe, North Africa, and parts of the Middle East, lodged official complaints to the Republic of India, and promptly closed their respective embassies in New Delhi. Additionally, the United Nations Security Council, whose permanent members were now the United States, the European Union, China, Brazil, and Russia, passed a resolution condemning the war and urging an immediate cessation of hostilities and withdrawal of Indian forces to pre-war borders. Predictably, neither these actions nor the pleas of the provisional Chinese government had any effect.
However, by September 1st, the People's Liberation Army had finally staggered to its feet. Drawing a line from Jiuquan in the north to just west of Kangding in the south, the newly-promoted four-star commanding the PLA's General Staff, essentially the highest military command in the PLA, hoped to halt the Indian advance long enough to mobilize his vast reserves of men and material, as well as redeploy active forces west to bolster his defense. For the first two weeks of September, the Chinese held fast, and to all the world it looked as though India had lost the initiative. On September 19th, it took it back.
All along the Chinese line that morning, those soldiers who were fortunate enough to wake up found themselves greeted by nuclear fire. India had simultaneously dropped 37 tactical nuclear weapons on weak points in the Chinese line and rear. The surviving elements of the PLA immediately began what was called a strategic withdrawal, but was more akin a general rout, with the leading elements of the Indian army only a few kilometers behind in some instances. By the 20th, the Chinese had lost over 300 kilometers, in some areas, and showed no sign of mounting an effective defense. Given another week, some five hundred thousand reservists would have arrived in Central China, capable of halting the Indian advance cold. Unfortunately for some hundreds of millions of civilians, they were not to be given that chance.
On September 21st, the provisional government of the People's Republic of China was convinced that the PLA could not stop the Indian spearhead. Seeing no alternative, and citing India's nuclear attack on the 19th, they unanimously agreed to order a general nuclear attack on the subcontinent. On the morning of the 22nd, while their countrymen fought a desperate holding action in Central China, the crews of China's four
Jin-Type 3 ballistic missile submarines anxiously sortied their vessels from the surviving naval base of Qingdao in the Yellow Sea. Escorted by China's eleven nuclear fast attack submarines, the
Jins began their long, quiet journey to the Indian Ocean, taking a route south through Indonesia and past the northern coast of Australia in an attempt to avoid Indian naval patrols, while on the international scene, Russia, citing the sudden Indian threat, began the process of joining the European Union, and the US and EU began discussing the possibility of intervention.
By the end of September, the Indian advance had begun to slow, due in part to the battle entering more developed regions, but mostly to the seven hundred fifty thousand reservists that had been committed to the fight simultaneously on the 28th. Seeing the possibility of the war turning static once more, Indian High Command began to debate the renewed use of tactical nukes to break the Chinese lines. However,concerned by the likelihood of a Chinese counter-strike, and still amazed that none emerged from the strikes earlier in the month, which had been personally ordered by the Prime Minister, and unwilling to bring about a full-scale nuclear war, they resolved to give their commanders time to regain momentum. On the 4th of November, a detailed report on that decision was sent via courier aircraft back to New Delhi, along with the recommendation that further military action should be strictly conventional in nature. Perhaps, had the Prime Minister seen that report, she would have agreed. Perhaps, had the 1 megaton nuclear warhead not landed less than a quarter of a mile from the Prime Minister's residence at three minutes past seven in the evening, Indian Standard Time. Within fifteen minutes of her death, Delhi, Calcutta, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, and eighty-four other cities across India were transformed into radioactive infernos. In Delhi alone, over eleven million perished in an instant. Across the subcontinent, just under one billion Indians died in a period of less than an hour.
Before the world could begin to comprehend the atrocity, the admiral commanding the Indian fleet in the East China Sea, recognizing that he was likely the senior surviving officer of the Indian Navy, and filled with a burning, insatiable anger over the deaths of untold millions of his countrymen, chose not to wait for the command that would never come. While the mushroom clouds still reigned over the skies of India, his carriers began launching aircraft to take part in the world's first carrier-based nuclear strike.
The
Jin strike force was scarcely 40 kilometers from the where it launched its missiles when the first Indian warhead detonated in the heart of Beijing. Ironically, the interim Chinese President, having no knowledge of the nuclear strike capability of the Indian Navy, died mid-sentence, exhorting the glorious victory he had won over the Indian invaders. In less than thirty minutes, the entire eastern seaboard of China was transformed into a smouldering, radioactive ruin. Over 700 million civilians lie slain. Over a period of 2 hours, just shy of 1.8 billion people were killed. Fortunately, neither country was capable of any further meaningful nuclear strike. In central China, the senior officer on each side contacted each other, and both agreed that not only were they likely the ranking officer in their respective countries, but also that they no longer had countries to fight over. An immediate ceasefire was declared, and by the next day, Indian soldiers found themselves among their Chinese counterparts, no longer bitter enemies, but men who had only done their duty. Faced with the unimaginable disaster that had befallen their peoples, both sides recognized that all they could now do was rebuild.
The rest of the world, after confirming that they were not the target of the nuclear onslaught, could do nothing more than stand idly by and watch in unbridled horror has China and India destroyed themselves. Roughly two hours after the last warhead fell, an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council was called to discuss possible reactions. In an unprecedented move, the European Union suggested that, to prevent such a catastrophe from happening again, the United Nations should from a single, planet-wide government. Although initially met with skepticism from the United States, Japan, Brazil, and Russia, still independent of the EU, surprisingly quickly rallied behind the EU platform. However, that discussion was put on hold, and it was quickly decided that a UN Peace Keeping mission would be organized and sent to Central China to maintain order and stability, as well as deal with the 1.3 billion Chinese and Indian soldiers milling about.
Three days after the Indo-Chinese war ended, the UN mission began to deploy to China, and was a truly multi-national force. Fears that the Indian's and Chinese would meet them with hostility were quickly cast aside as they encountered joint Indian-Chinese units already beginning to restore order in the area. On the 10th, the Security Council reconvened to discuss the EU's One-World Government proposal. One month later, on December 10th, 2022, the Council voted unanimously to reincorporate the United Nations under the charter of the United Earth Republic (UER). The Republic would be headed by a President, and have a legislative body resembling a mix between the US Congress and British Parliament, and a judicial branch headed by the Supreme Court of the Republic, and the various elections necessary would begin in late 2023. Although initially met with incredulity worldwide, the resolution was quickly accepted and lauded by all as the Great Unification, the end of all wars, the greatest single political feat in the history of man.
