NationStates Jolt Archive

The motto may appear from the outside a little suspect, but the people of the Pyekan-Kuogu have every reason to believe in their race's superiority. They work hard day after day and see posters depicting grand parades, their uninformed eyes believing the poor editing tricks to be actual representations of countless millions of tanks and planes, the modernity of which they have no cause to doubt. A retro-thirties IJA tankette appears as if a powerful beast to a man who spends his days pushing a plough behind an ox.

THE PYEKAN-KUOGU OF PYEKI

http://www.nationstates.net/images/flags/uploads/pyeki.jpg

Government and Background

The Pyekan-Kuogu of Pyeki is defined by firm introspection and rigid authoritarian structure. The masses have in common a number of things: first, Pyeki is racially homogeneous; second, millions achieve little beyond subsistence for their long hours of hard labour; and, third, their limited organised education deals with only one thing beyond basic practical schooling for the benefit of the economy, and that is the issue of the divinity and miracles of Emperor Pan Yoshimura.

For the past sixty years, Pyeki has suffered in the dark, barely a state, broken by a quite cowardly backing of what ultimately turned-out to be the wrong horse in the race that we call World War Two. Pyeki did not become officially involved in hostilities, but showed as much pro-Axis bias as the US showed the Allies before its belated entry into the conflict. After the war, Pyeki's limited external ties were frayed, and the already backwards nation failed to keep pace with the modern world. Feudal conflict over-took the land as warrior sects fought -often with blade and bow even in the late C20th- back and forth and peasants died for them in battle or fell to hunger and disease. While other populations doubled, Pyeki's shrank a noticible few percent.

By the end of the century a force for new order was rising in Pyeki, and would soon bear direct relation to any discussion of Pyekan government. The Garcat-Laur is thought by some to be an ancient warrior sect, while others dismiss the tales as myth for the few traditional tales that give mention to it speak in fantastic terms of the great wisdom and varied prowess of the sect's mysterious membership. Pyeki has many old fables, and Garcat-Laur is but one of a great many otherwise forgotten names or terms used. Still, it is today attributed by a very few foreign, 'experts' to what may be Pyeki's secret police, or perhaps a significant warlord or criminal element.

In truth it is a blanket term that does include the Pyekan-Kuogu's secret police as well as a counter-espionage unit and the body to which they are secretly subservient. Known to none outside Pyeki and a tiny fraction of a percent of the population inside, the Garcat-Laur today is a conspiracy of Pyekan bigshots: Pyekan National Defence Force Captain Jun Tazaki, General Eisei Amamoto, Doctor Hisaya Ito, and Admiral Akihiko Hirata. These men, unknown to foreign publics, governments, and intelligence agencies as to their own people, are behind Pyeki's reformation.

Planning a future for Pyeki the conspirators formed for themselves a secret society and named it after an obscure reference in national mythology. They searched for a suitable ideology, and were drawn to the examples of men like Saloth Sar and Kim Il-Sung, but significantly not so much to the likes of Stalin: they wanted to make a lasting way for Pyeki, not merely to secure personal power in their own lifetimes, and so ideas such as the Anka Doctrine and Juche appealed strongly. Long-term observation by these unnervingly patient conspirators, though, lead them to believe that these examples were flawed. Their investigations turned up many religious examples that had significant appeal, but likewise displayed the difficulties in controlling such things as faith. The interpretation of an other-worldly god's wishes could not be out-sourced without losing control of it, and while a people may remain faithful to their understanding of a god, there was nothing to insure that they would remain equally faithful to interpreters or other priestly classes.

Likewise, the conspirators were admirers, like many Pyekan in the previous generation, of Imperial Japan and the devotion that many of its citizens displayed. They were almost surprised to realise that most Japanese never heard their emperor speak until total defeat was upon them, and that they did not need to actually hear his voice or see him in person. They were not unimpressed by the realities of Japan's defeat, however, and significantly by a famous photograph depicting a timid-looking emperor dwarfed by a victorious American commander. The felling of other figureheads around the world and the collapse of personality cults following death, disgrace, or simple mistakes gave the conspirators much to consider.

Emperor Pan Yoshimura... is a fiction. Millions of Pyekan believe absolutely in his divinity, in his miracles, in his physical presence somewhere amongst them. But he does not exist. He can not fall to an assassin's bullet, he is, in a way, infallible, he can not be captured or otherwise conquered, and an enemy who somehow uncovers the fact of his none-existance is only likely to be ridiculed and resisted all the more keenly. Emperor Pan Yoshimura is a godly being able to evade any threat, walk silently on clouds, take responsibility for any improbable military victories. He is a real man able to correct any misreading of his decree. He is a Garcat-Laur puppet who can't disappoint, fall-down, or reveal himself nor his strings and their operators. If Pyeki falls and its enemies search behind every tree in the territory the Emperor will go free and continue to inspire his people all the more by his invulnerability, all the while shielding from view those men truthfully in power.

So far as the world knows, a mysterious man named Pan Yoshimura, never seen in public, is totalitarian master of the Pyekan-Kuogu.

[OoC: Hey, sorry, I don't know how to reply to this ICly...but I'd like to OOCly say welcome to Nationstates (providing this is actually a new nation, not a puppet). Your style of writing really caught me, I love how you describe the personality cult...brilliant stuff. If you ever want to RP with someone or need a little help learning the ropes of NS (something I doubt you will need to learn, as you already have the "awesome writing" part down), feel free to hit me up on MSN at " caspianwally@hotmail.com " or AIM at " Kriegorgrad ".

Anyway...please continue, I actually enjoyed this, it's not the pretentious tripe that makes up alot of NS's writing (God, I'm gonna' pay for that one).]

[OOC: Don't worry about it, and thank you! I have been around, but I'm prone to phases and fads that don't quite work out: I want to make Pyeki really stick, so I appreciate your positive comments! I know there's not very much that anyone can do IC at the moment, but hopefully this will be a useful reference in future. I just need to find a good way to get IC interaction started, given that Pyeki's is obviously not a society very conducive to foreign investment and tourism et cetera. It's tempting to massacre a whole mess of people, because quite frankly that sort of thing is going to be par for the course in Pyeki, but it's just a bit of a cheap move if it's not tangled up in international relations, I think. Long story short, more information coming and I'll just be keeping my eyes open for a way to link Pyekan politics or some such with those of other nations.]

Repeating what Kriegorgrad said, big welcome and hope you enjoy your stay..if you ever need help with anything message me on MSN "matt.labunda@gmail.com"

nice ideas, good begging and background to your nation. pity i started off bad

OOC: I've got to agree with Krieg and Hogsweat, great job!

If you need anything, let me know via TG.

Economy

The Pyekan economy is driven centrally by the nation's control-freak authorities. A large part of it is concerned with jungle agriculture, a larger part with cultivation of rice paddies, and most of what remains with the upkeep of a somewhat dated industrial base geared to military production. There is no official unemployment but significant poverty, with many people being supplied with quite basic food rations and having access to little else. In truth many have no fixed income and get by through subsistence agriculture and very limited sale of rice when fortunate enough to have a surplus or by handicrafts and sale of labour when harvest work is slow at home.

Agriculture is largely without mechanisation and chemicals, but is fairly efficient by its primitive standards as a number of fruits and animals are kept in semi-domestication around jungles and villages and a great many ingenious man/water/wind/animal-powered contraptions and complicated earthworks and irrigation are employed in rice farming. Though employed technology is in some cases thousands of years old, Pyekan crop yields are often better than anything seen in the rest of the world until after the First World War. Problems only arise when sudden political changes or unforseen natural disasters significantly alter either needs or means in a given year.

Pyekan industry appears even more horrific in its technical feebleness, and it does rely on human muscle to an extreme degree. The Pyekan have knowledge of many twentieth-century concepts but tend to pursue their realisation by almost primeval means. People can be found turning wheels, as can animals, where an electric motor or combustion engine might be expected. Waterpower is widely employed, but this is usually a direct kinetic application not a hydroelectrical mission. Wood is the nation's primary fuel (or else rice is, since it fuels most of the population), though very small quantities of coal, oil, and natural gas are extracted by unambitious pumps and shafts sunk by hand: most of the product is stockpiled for military use.

It is thought that if Pyeki were to seek monetary wealth it would be with a view to re-armament and would be driven by export of timber, natural rubber, exotic animals, and perhaps fruits, nuts, and rice (likely with little regard for domestic needs).

Geography

Pyeki's borders are not perfectly defined, but they are quite far-flung. Conquest has been averted inspite of primitive technology because of hostile terrain and a degree of introspection that has made Pyeki few enemies.

The nation's relatively sparse population is in part a consequence of the nation's terrain, which ranges from tropical jungle to hard highland. The climate is tropical and, over most of its territory, monsoonal.

Access to the ocean is limited, being available only around the Panaku river delta, and for the most part Pyeki is surrounded by foreign territory.

To Pyeki's east lies the People's Communist State of North Calaveras, while to the north is the Republic of Thestan.

Population

Census records in Pyeki have not been frequently updated by tradition and criteria have rarely been clear. Many Pyekan live in isolation in difficult mountains, deep jungle, or remote valleys, and until the era of the Pyekan-Kuogu it is possible that whole sections of the loosely associated society were neglected.

Pyekan National Defence Forces

Figures given at 500 million population, to be added again each time the total population passes that number.

12,000,000 regular personnel
15,000,000 reserve personnel (in PNATR: some would be assigned to Air Defence Force and Navy in times of war)

PYEKAN NATIONAL ARMY TRAINING RESERVE
15,000,000 men aged 15-45 and unmarried women aged 25-32 who are not part of the regular PNDF or of govt. or primary military industry, training 48 days per year

Infantry Weapons

*Model 1908 Parabellum Luger automatic pistol in 9x19mm [Purchased in massive quantities and still in service decades later]
*Mark 2 Sten sub-machinegun in 9x19mm [Also includes still cheaper workshop copies of questionable merit in combat]
*M1898K Kar 98K Mauser carbine in 7.92x57mm [Most now re-stocked with native Pyekan woods to prevent splitting in local humidity]
*Mark 10 Vickers general-purpose machinegun in 7.92x57mm [Due presumably to its expense, this is not widely seen]

*Model 24 stick-grenade [Often used as the basis of improvised booby-traps and mines]
*Panzerfaust 150 rocket-propelled anti-tank grenade [Reused up to ten times by policy and perhaps more by practice, range is over 100m and penetration towards 200mm]

Artillery

*PAK-36 37mm Anti-Tank Gun
*PAK-38 50mm Anti-Tank Gun [Out of PNA favour due to immobility and poorly suited to the PNATR since vehicles are needed for movement]
*Type-92 70mm Battalion Gun [Infantry gun of just 8 calibres, very light and mobile]

Vehicles

*Type 89 Otsu I-Go Medium Tank

*SS-Ki Engineer Tank

[b]PYEKAN NATIONAL ARMY
11,500,000 regular personnel

Infantry Weapons

*P38 Walther automatic pistol in 9x19mm
*MP40 sub-machinegun in 9x19mm
*Number 5 Lee-Enfield jungle carbine in 7.92x57mm
*Number 4 Lee-Enfield rifle in 7.92x57mm
*Number 4 Lee-Enfield sniper's rifle in 7.92x57mm
*L5 Bren light-machinegun in 7.92x57mm
*MG42 general-purpose machinegun in 7.92x57mm

*Number 36M Mills Bomb fragmentation hand-grenade
*Panzerfaust 150 rocket-propelled anti-tank grenade
*Raketenpanzerbüchse 54/1 Panzerschreck rocket-propelled anti-tank grenade [180m range and above 200mm armour penetration]

Artillery

*Type-92 70mm Battalion Gun
*PAK-40 75mm Anti-Tank Gun
*Flak-37 88mm Anti-Tank/Anti-Aircraft Gun
*PAW Panzerabwehrwerfer 105mm Lightweight Recoilless Anti-Tank Rifle
*Flak 105mm Anti-Tank/Anti-Aircraft Gun

*25 Pounder Gun/Howitzer (and Number 27 Gun Trailer)

*Nebelwerfer Rocket-Launcher

Vehicles

Armoured vehicles are typically of Imperial Japanese Army origin by design, re-armed with guns available to the PNDF. Nomenclature of armour especially is hopelessly confusing thanks to a ramshackle mix of original Japanese and new Pyekan designations (even in reference to two totally unrelated calendars!).

*BMW R/75 746cc Motorcycle (and sidecar versions)

*Pyekan Military Trike [746cc frieght carrier also used in civil duties and able to carry several hundred kilos]

*Model 95 4x4 Scout Car Kurogane

*Type 2595 So-Ki Armoured Railroad Car [Able to switch between running on narrow, standard, and broad gage rail on wheels or on/off road on tracks; fitted with five machine-gun stilts but not always armed]

*Type 92 A-I-GO Amphibious Tankette [Weighing 3.5 tons this is sometimes called a heavy armoured car, 13mm hull gun and 7.92mm turret gun]
*Model 94 TK Tankette [TK indicates a 'special tractor': used to tow [amongst other things] trailers spraying toxic gas or counter-toxin bleaching powder]
*Type 97 Te-Ke Tankette [4.5 ton machine, the PNDF version is armed with a 37mm gun based on the Pak 36]
*Type 0 Chi-Pan Medium Tank [Weight under 18 tons, 50mm gun, 240hp diesel engine, development of Type 97 Chi-Ha medium tank]
*Type 0 Chi-Pan Flame Tank

*Type 0 Chi-Pan 75mm Self-Propelled Gun
*Type 1 Ho-Ro 150mm Self-Propelled Gun

*Type 0 Chi-Ha Flakvierling 4x20mm Self-Propelled Anti-Aircraft Gun
*Type 0 Chi-Pan Flak-43 1x37mm Self-Propelled Anti-Aircraft Gun
*Type 98 Half-Track 2x20mm Self-Propelled Anti-Aircraft Gun

*Type 1 Ho-Ha Half-Track [6.5 ton armoured personnel carrier, 3 machineguns, 8mm armour, up to 15 persons]

*Type 0 Chi-Ha Armoured Recovery Vehicle
*Type 0 Chi-Ha Armoured Vehicle-Launched Bridge
*Type 0 Chi-Ha Armoured Flail Mine-Clearer
*Type 0 Chi-Ha Armoured Engineer Vehicle
*Type 98 So-Da Armoured Ammunition Carrier [Based upon the Te-Ke tankette]

*Type One 4x2 Truck [Pyekan-manufacture of Japanese truck made by Toyota and Nissan, near copy of Chevrolet truck]

*Model 94 3/4-ton Tracked Trailer [Towed behind various tankettes]

Other Defences

*Pyekan Armoured Train [None standard configuration, usually armed with 7.92 and 13mm machineguns and 20 and 37mm cannons]

*S-Mine/Schrapnell-Mine Anti-Personnel Mine
*Tellermine Anti-Tank Mine
*Holzmine Wooden Anti-Tank Mine

*Goliath Remote-Controlled Vehicle (with 166lb TNT charge)

Elite Troops
270 special forces known as the Dogfish Unit
8,000 hand-picked PNA veterans organised in the Unwavering Regiment

Infantry Weapons

*GP35 Browning High-Power automatic pistol in 9x19mm
*MP40 sub-machinegun in 9x19mm
*StG44 assault rifle in 7.92x33mm
*Number 5 Lee-Enfield jungle carbine in 7.92x57mm
*Number 4 Lee-Enfield sniper's rifle in 7.92x57mm
*L5 Bren light-machinegun in 7.92x57mm
*MG42 general-purpose machinegun in 7.92x57mm

*Number 36M Mills Bomb fragmentation hand-grenade
*Panzerfaust 150 rocket-propelled anti-tank grenade

[b]PYEKAN NATIONAL AIR DEFENCE FORCE
300,000 personnel

Anti-Aircraft Systems

*Flakvierling 4x20mm Towed Gun
*Flak-43 37mm Automatic Gun
*Flak-37 88mm Anti-Tank/Anti-Aircraft Gun [Ceiling 8km]
*Flak 105mm Anti-Tank/Anti-Aircraft Gun
*Flak-40 128mm Anti-Aircraft Gun [10rpm, 21km range and 11.5km ceiling, mobile only by rail]

Fighters- Interceptors and Attackers

*Nakajima Ki-84 Hayate [Capable of around 400mph speeds and armed with 4x20mm cannon 2x250kg bombs]
*Mitsubishi Ki-202 Shusui-kai [Catapult-launched rocket-driven interceptor capable of 560mph and armed with 2x20mm cannon in Pyekan service]
*Nakajima Ki-201 Karyu [Twin-engine turbojet fighter-bomber; over 12km ceiling; over 500mph top speed; 2x20mm cannon, 1x800kg bomb]
*Kawasaki Ki-45 KAIc Toryu [Twin piston-engine two-seat long-range night fighter with centimetric radar; 336mph; 1x37mm, 2x20mm, 1x7.92mm ]

Bombs

250kg
500kg
800kg


[u]PYEKAN NATIONAL NAVY
200,000 personnel



[OOC: This section undergoing expansion. Question: is the format reasonably clear, or is it too hard to understand?]

Key Individuals: Characters of the Pyekan-Kuogu

Emperor Pan Yoshimura

As earlier stated, the Emperor does not exist. He is a creation of the secret Garcat-Luar conspiracy that rules Pyeki under the auspices of a fictional people's parliament associated with his divine person. Pan Yoshimura is, of course, never seen in public and his exact likeness is never displayed, though many Pyekan possess various idols dedicated to their beloved Emperor.
The purpose of this imagined being is to combine the infallibility and immortality of an ethereal god with the identifiable form and concrete commandment of a living leader and champion. There can be no bickering amongst theologians and clerics over the interpretation of divine words or signs when said words are universally believed to originate from a man amongst them, and on the other hand there is no prospect of the mythical Emperor being assassinated, falling ill, or being made to look personally inferior to a foe.
Personally, Pan Yoshimura is a great many things. Millions of Pyekan will tell you that he enjoys a dawn stroll on the clouds, thousands that he is a keen cultivator of fantastic new breeds of fish such as the purple fire-angler and the dancing tree flounder, none of which sounds absurd to them. Some believe that he is wed to an ancient goddess, some that he is unwed, and curiously enough are as likely to shrug or laugh over their differences of opinion as anything else, possibly hinting that they know how ignorant they are of his life and don't expect ever to change that.

Jun Tazaki

Eisei Amamoto

Hisaya Ito

Akihiko Hirata

OOC: very good thread. particularly for a new guy. if you need help, don hesitate not to talk to me cos you're already better. only one quibble: you dont have enough population for much of an army. oh yeah, and the title did sound like you were one of the annoying type who try to say "I concers teh wordl bcos i is teh uber 1111" and so on. sorry. again, other than that, good thread.

[OOC: The title is our national motto (as yet I don't think anyone's noticed that we stole it from Imperial Japan, and they weren't exactly more justified in making the claim, but did it anyway!), but, no, that doesn't make it true. Not all Americans put their trust in God, but that didn't deter congress from stating otherwise in designating the national motto. I don't mean that to sound like a snappy, defensive retort, I just want to qualify my choice.

Now, around four in every hundred Pyekan are enroled in the regular military, almost all being in the army, and while this is sustainable given the nature of our economic life and the state of that military, again, no, it doesn't make the claim to power all that true, either.

Anyway, thank you, again. Next (I know, I've not finished the other sections: I am a scatter-brain) I will try to elaborate on the institutions that constitute the Pyeki state aparatus.]

OOC: scatter-brain you seem not to be. you manage to keep coherent through all of this. more than i can do...

OOC: Wonderfully well done. If you are in need of cheap armaments, I specialize in that. I sell a cheap self-loading rifle package in my official storefront, and I sell single amounts of arms in a 'Black Market' storefront. We accept trade agreements as payment. We are in need of timber, and....how should I put this....human resources.

Before any goes nuts on me for slavery, it isn't slavery. They are paid, its more of indentured servitude. They work as mercenaries for us, after a 2 year contract, they may leave, or choose to stay. Around 10% choose to stay and recieve more training.

Self-Loading Rifle Package

Maybe you don't like ARs, can't afford them? Need accuracy? Sniping? Well this will help you. We supply 2 types of self-loading rifles to help you with that.

Choose from the Simonov SKS carbine (greater power and accuracy) or M1 Carbine (higher rate of fire, higher magazine capacity)

10,000 rifles with an extra 1 million rounds

$1.1 million US
$1.5 million with scopes

Katana Corp. AR-550 "Conscript" Ultralight Modern Assault Rifle

Nicknamed the Conscript for its ease of use and is marketed toward the poorly trained conscript armies, while still being useful for better trained armies who don't wish to invest in heavy, and overaccessoried rifles. Large ammo capacity, while being reasonable accurate, though a slightly higher recoil and reduced rate of fire.

Semiautomatic is preferred but it also has a 2 round burst setting and full automatic

And for ceremonial purposes a bayonet knife can be mounted, however this sacrifices a grenade launcher.

Specs:
Caliber: 5.45*39mm Caseless or 5.56 Caseless or 5.7x28mm SS190C or Leafanistani 6.5*43mm "Tesla"
Action: Gas operated, rotating bolt with 2 lugs
Weight: 2.2 kg (with empty magazine without bayonet); 2.5 kg (with loaded magazine)
Length: 750 mm
Rate of fire: 510 rounds per minute
Magazine capacity: 50 rounds
Effective range: 650 m

Optional underbarrel 25mm grenade launcher can be added.

Only a metal sight, calibrated for 200/500m is available however, a rail is mounted on the top for scopes and the like.

Each rifle is made of stamped metal parts with significant polymer body construction.

10,000 AR-550s with 750,000 extra rounds cost $1.5 million US

We can supply you with a decent army, navy, airforce, and marines very quickly, and we can offer you a 50% discount on your first purchase.

Institutions

Pangkai

Freely translated as the Pyekan nationalist democratic organisation, this is nominally the popular parliament that carries out in action the Emperor's wishes for his beloved people.
In fact the Pangkai is a facade behind which sit the Garcat-Laur conspirators, and while most Pyekan, even local authorities and military officers, believe the Pangkai to be a body of hundreds drawn from the masses (plenty of you, readers, have voted for individuals who did not end up in office, the difference in Pyeki is that it is seemingly impossible to find anybody who voted for someone that did end up in office), it is not so. Just four men comprise the core of the Garcat-Laur, and the hundreds of the parliament are in many cases no more real than Emperor Pan Yoshimura. Some that do exist are amongst the special few aware of Pyeki's truth, and others of the few real flesh and bone parliamentarians are as much puppets as the fictitious Emperor.
Some of the real Pangkai parliamentarians are zealous officers of the Unwavering Regiment.

Unwavering Regiment

This is on face value likely to be taken for an elite division of the PNA. That would be close to the truth, but hardly expansive. Some elements of the Unwavering Regiment's officer corps represent almost the only men outside the Garcat-Laur with even the slightest knowledge of the truth behind the nation's restructuring. However, even these few, mentioned as relatively enlightened members of the Pangkai, fall short of receiving anything like full disclosure, and their levels of knowledge vary.
The Unwavering Regiment is most keenly marked-out by the jaw-dropping fanaticism, indoctrination, and brutality of its ranks. These ranks are filled by the most extreme products of Pyeki's institutionalisation of political education and violence, young men, and sometimes women, capable of extreme acts and, as the name suggests, unwavering in their obedience.

Dogfish Unit

The Dogfish, as they are known, are a frightening group. Less than one in a million Pyekan is counted amongst the ranks of this fighting unit. It is a strange thing that the Dogfish frequently lack the discipline of their peers in the Unwavering Regiment. The indoctrination of its members often seems to be equally unusual, appearing far less ridgid. This does not mean, however, that the Dogfish are disinterested in the politics of the Pyekan-Kuogu and the restructuring: they are in fact amongst the most committed defenders of these things. Dogfish are characterised by fierce intelligence along with their fighting skills, which are born of Pyeki's somewhat dishonourable equivalent to the Samurai of the nation's most admired cultural neighbour. The above-average smarts of the Dogfish might make them politically dangerous, but it appears that these mysterious warriors channel most of their cunning into the art of killing, being apparently selected from the nation's disproportionately deep pool of sociopaths.
The Dogfish are deadly and intelligent, but they are few and their number includes no major public figures, which is owing to their top secret operations: as such, the formation is not considered a likely source of possible future leadership challenge, and continues to receive fierce training and to be given first refusal on the brightest minds and fittest bodies of the Pyekan military's human resource rosta.

OOC:This is superb. I like it alot.

[OOC: Thank you, too!
Leafanistan, don't take it personally if the Pyekan don't respond. The authorities are not keen to introduce alien influences unless they're sure it's worth it. Still, there is a chance of some trade in future, but the Pyekan probably won't buy rifles unless they suddenly find themselves heading into war.]

[OOC: Excellent thread. I loved reading the details of your country, as they were superbly fleshed out and described. Just to clarify, is your country essentially NSEarth's version of Imperial Japan in the 1930s and 1940s? If so, we probably wouldn't get along too well ICly, because we abhor fanatic and intolerant regimes (we've faced countless threats from extremist Islamic regimes and terrorist groups). If you're more tolerant than Imperial Japan, then perhaps we could help you modernize sometime down the road. Regardless, I'll enjoy watching your future threads. Keep up the great work!]

[OOC: Well, Pyeki was a fairly pathetic hanger-on to Imperial Japan in its day, chirping-up to add its voice to any international declaration that the Japanese made, whether or not it really made sense to the Pyekan nation's interests. Most Pyekan of the older generation were brought up in admiration of Imperial Japan, and the reformation of Pyeki society in recent years has been done with at least a nod to that society. There are other influences, though. Despite the institution of a [secretly fictional] emperor inspired by Imperial Japan's [real one], there are some pretenses to social revolution, which I will address more clearly in time. A degree of levelling-down is being carried out, and on a somewhat shallow level observers might see how the reformation owes something to forces like the Khmer Rouge and other Asian revolutions.]

Constitution

The constitution of the Pyekan-Kuogu does several things. First and foremost it asserts the infallibility of the Emperor. Second, it confirms the Pangkai as the conduit through which the people and their Emperor are connected.
The constitution does other things, too, such as setting out popular obligation to the defence of territory, Emperor, and the constitution itself.
Some of the populist provisions of the constitution include a declaration of the equality of men and women, and that the Pyekan-Kuogu shall endure no idleness, meaning, essentially, that there shall be full employment. Of course, this involves no reference to forced labour.
A paragraph on foreign relations reminds Pyekan of the inferiority of foreigners, those not blessed by the attentions of the Emperor, but promises good relations with Pyeki's neighbours.
Most Pyekan have little time for learning their constitution, though the younger generation is receiving increased exposure to it in their free education (another facet of the constitution's generous provision!)

[Bump for minor additions]

If you accept the proposal, i'll put it into more nicer terms, but would you like an embassy exchange with me? Or maybe just a Hogsweatian embassy in Pyeki. I don't know what your people would think if they saw the [relative] richness of the Hogsweatians compared to Pyeki [propaganda and all. it's why Hogsweatians aren't allowed abroad]

[OOC: Well, I suppose that I need some mechanism for getting involved with the wider world. Presumably it would make sense that other nations have pre-existing embassies in Pyeki before the rise of the modern order. In the past it was a barely cohesive state ruled by a series of minor and usually disputed emperors, kings, queens, prime ministers, generals, priests, and military juntas, and it is only in the last few years that the Pangkai and Emperor Pan Yoshimura have (apparently) brought stability and the modern state.
Anyone who really wanted to could establish an embassy in one of the districts most influenced by the outside, especially after WWII when Pyeki basically collapsed into an incapable mess without Imperial Japan to lean on. Of course, this means that most nations won't have invested heavily in keeping a presence in Pyeki, so most likely people won't have noticed that foreigners are doing so much better than them, you know?
Now, of course, there's the danger that the secret Garcat-Laur conspiracy might turn its energies against such foreign influences, but only time will tell.]

ooc: Oh my fucking god, this is some of the best new RP I've ever seen. It blows my first RPs out of the water. Hell, it blows my current RPs out of the water. This deserves a response. Oh btw, Imperial Japan=Upper Xen. The guy that kicked Imperial Japan (aka Upper Xen's ass)=Me. Note that Upper Xen isn't the only Japan-esque nation, but he is the best and most consistent one.

IC:

Daducheng, MP,

"Yet another tinpot dictatorship on the international scene? What the hell is with these people?" The Great Leader Li clicked on the news link in his browser box. The Great Leader checked off the criteria for a tinpot dictatorship in his head. Propaganda? Yup. Feelings of Superiority? Hell Yea. Conspiracy? Most certainly, Personality Cult? Hell yes. So Pyeki was a dyed in the wool tinpot dictatorship. Brilliant, yet another contribution to the diversity of government types in the world. Oh well. MassPwnage was just as guilty of being as tinpot dicatorship as Pyeki was.

The Great Leader played with the idea of simply moving in a large military force to crush the Pyeki government and convert its populace into glue.... But that would be unethical and a pointless exercise in violence... Of course, there was something else that was unethical and a pointless exercise in violence, but this one didn't involve any real killing. It was called television. The Great Leader decided to see if he could engage in something unethical and pointlessly violent, so he began to type an email to the people in charge.

~*~*~*~*~

TO: Whoever Runs Pyeki, I'm guessing it's some sort of conspiracy manipulating a puppet Emperor.

FROM: The Government of MassPwnage.

Greetings from the Government of MassPwnage, yet another tinpot dicatorship on this pathetic ball of dirt we call a planet. Well anyway, from one tinpot dictatorship to another, mind if we send a couple of camera crews over to make a few documentaries on how your people live? Our anthropology students would benefit greatly from learning about the ways of primitive socities and our general populace could get a few cheap laughs. What you stand to gain from our camera crews going in is that you can gauge just what your population thinks about the government, and of course, prove that you're secure enough in your propaganda techniques, so that foreign influences can roam about your nation and your people would still believe in their superority. If you refuse our request, it just means that you don't have enough of a grasp on your cajones to deal with your people and your problems. Of course, your refusal will be made VERY public, especially to your populace, via our excellent propaganda services. What would they think if their government thought that they were unworthy of appearing on TV despite the fact that you say they're superior every day?

Just think about our request and let us know as soon as possible whether or not you will allow us to bring in a television crew or 2.

Sincerely,
Your Fellow Conspirators

The communiqué from MassPwnage was... less than diplomatic. After the minor miracle of its receipt by the archaic systems of the Pyekan-Kuogu's tiny Diplomatic Technical Section, infiltrated by (figuratively speaking) half-blind agents of the Garcat-Laur, the approach was considered by the conspiracy's four-chambered heart.

The allegation of conspiracy and dictatorship, so bluntly delivered, was personally infuriating to the Garcat-Laur, Captain Jun Tazaki especially, but efforts were made to get beyond that and to the real politics of the matter. The term, "primitive socitieties" would have destroyed that and probably seen the Emperor declaring MassPwnage a blood enemy of the Pyekan-Kuogu, but, fortunately, the conspirators spoke no English and, in translation, some of the derision was lost. They were able to read, "primitive" in a context that did not displease them and it was identified as reference to the Year Zero model that saw the Pyekan masses replacing employment (and unemployment) with work and varied foreign systems with bare, pure domestic culture alone. "Cheap laughs" was a term that didn't translate well but was dismissed as something of an aside, and anyway, perhaps the laughs were joyous in light of Pyekan liberation by the on-going reformation.

Diplomatic incident narrowly averted.

The four moved on. Public? Propaganda services? From this, Jun Tazaki inferred espionage, infiltration, a dangerous pollution. The PNDF Captain banged his fist on the table before him and quite barked promises to uncover and uproot foreign agents in Pyeki to destroy this unacceptable security risk. General Amamoto, however, was with the remaining two men in being a little less excited by the communiqué as a whole. It made sense to let the people see that their Emperor had finally opened the door to some of the countless foreign societies wishing to pay homage to the Pyekan-Kuogu and its great people. If foreigners wanted to come and see the reformation in action, it must be because they were astounded by Pyeki's economic miracle; if they wanted to come and film the Emperor's domain, it must be owing to Pan Yoshimura's confirmation as an equal to the Meiji and Hirohito Emperors.

In time, the government of MassPwnage was granted leave to alight television crews in Pyeki, where upon they would be assigned guides for their satisfactory accommodation in town and safe and efficient touring of country. There was some talk of natural dangers to foreigners and of the sensitivity and consideration required when potentially touring natural and and manually-maintained sources of Pyekan economic and work life.

...Which probably was meant to be as confusing as it sounded.

[Bump]

[tag - hit me up in the Tiastan thread! Oh, and score on the military section - I haven't seen a nicer antique military than this since Dra-pol started up!!n We should almost have a war sometime, then we can trade vintage rounds from the trenches ;) ]

Somewhere in Pyeki:

"We're lost aren't we?"

"Yes Cindy, we're lost. On the flip side though, we did manage to convince those guides that we were ripped apart by those wild beasts."

"Marv, that's not a good thing. We're tens of thousands of kilometers from home in some odd bamboo forest, with illegal footage of Pyeki citizenry on cameras that are probably banned for use here."

"Oh great... well at least we still have the ComSat uplinks on our cameras. Let's upload our footage at least."

"Yea... and screw up radio communications throughout this entire dump of a country? Brilliant Marv, what's next, try to take on their army?"

"Well, I think we can take out their army. Seriously, did you SEE how old those tanks looked?"

"Well they can still kill us, can't they?"

"Duh, but it's not like they can find us if we run."

"Yea yea yea... Whatever you do, don't upload the footage to the ComSats..."

"Uuuhh.... too late?"

"Oh.... now you've done it Marv.... We are screwwwweed!"

~*~*~*~

ooc: TG me if you object to Marv uploading the footage, i'll edit it so that he doesn't.

The ancient-looking tank seen by the foreigners was in fact a Type 89 Otsu I-Go Medium Tank based upon the British Vickers Medium C that appeared in 1926 and was exported to Ireland and Japan before finding its way to Pyeki from the latter in rebuilt form. The Pyekan example spotted was armed with a 37mm anti-tank gun adapted from the Pak 36, and one was left to wonder at its utility.

The outsiders probably wouldn't have been able to tell, but the I-Go indicates the presence of elements of the irregular Pyekan National Army Training Reserve.

Such a vehicle was beneath the interest of the regular PNA that was now activating in response to the vanishing of a Cindy and a Marv. The command was frantic, the Pangkai buzzing with talk of foreign espionage related to those threats that earlier so enraged Captain Tazaki, and soldiers being gradually made aware that the Emperor's trust had been betrayed. It didn't take much to whip-up nationalist antagonism in the Pyekan.

When no bodies were recovered, the PNA burst into action. In fact it was the Army Training Reserve that activated most quickly, being scattered far and wide through the countryside and jungles, but it was soon joined by advisory and command elements of the regular military, which demonstrated its contempt for the I-Go tanks filmed by the outsiders by rumbling into action aboard reconditioned bolted-construction seventeen-ton retro-forties Type 0 Chi-Pan Medium Tanks and Ju-Sokosha and Te-Ke tankettes that weren't even proof against heavy rifle fire!

Thousands of soldiers and dozens of vehicles crashed through the jungle in search of foreign spies, and it was now that the most shocking footage would be up for the taking to anyone brave, skilled, or mad enough to take it as bayonet-weilding troops rushed through villages tearing up everything in sight and brutally interrogating locals. Before now there hadn't been much to capture beyond miles and miles of wilderness and tiny villages working paddy fields.

It may have been possible to note that almost all villages contained eight family homes, that few government buildings and no obvious religious structures existied, indeed, public buildings were thin on the ground. Factories were hard to find, civilian vehicles didn't seem to exist beyond cow-drawn carts and man-powered contraptions and small wooden boats, that was unless the foreigners had been fortunate enough to stumble across one of the railway lines that cut unexpetedly through thick jungle bearing a tiny number of small steam engines on industrial and agricultural business.

The Pangkai openly declared that spies from MassPwnage had infiltrated the Pyekan-Kuogu, claimed that they had killed the guides assigned to them, promised that they would be hunted down and killed, and announced the closure of Pyeki to all facets of the responsible nation, saying that the fate of these spies would stand as a warning to all those who would insult the integrity of the Emperor.

[OOC: Hah, that sounds all right to me, Tiastan: makes more sense than Pyeki trying to fight nations one hundred times its size, anyway!]

[OOC: This is some rather interesting RP. If I wasn't future tech, I'd join in. Keep up the good reading.]

Pyeki: Somewhere out of the earshot of the troops.

"I told you they were primitives Cindy... Take a look at some of this classic totalitarian footage!"

"Oh god, so we really did come to some tinpot cliche dictatorship... AND we're going to die!"

"Yea... but it's so... so... interesting here. I mean, the culture's unique, the people are totally oblivious, and they're still using ox-drawn carts for f*ck's sake. Look Cindy, it's either this, or we get posted to a war zone somewhere, where we can get taken out by an artillery barrage."

"WE ARE IN A F*CKING WARZONE MARV!" shouted Cindy. She suddenly stopped.

"What?" wondered Marv, "Aren't you going to finish your rant?"

"Later. I think they heard us. Start running."

They ran, they ran really, really quickly.

IC:The Tech-Com Corporations CEO was rustling through the papers on his desk. He had twenty minutes before he had to go to a board meeting. He picked up a newspaper and began to read it. He found an interesting article on the 6th page. Something about a nation named Pyeki and all that.

He blinked, then a bit of a smile came across his face. He pressed the intercom button on his phone.

"Nervorovich..." He said,

A whiles afterwards...

The door opened and Tech-Coms Chief Executives walked in.

"What information do we have on this 'Pyeki' nation?"

The Executive of Security said, "Never heard of them... Ill request a document from the Consortium... I think they will give us some info."

The Tech-Com CEO looked at the clock, then sighed, "Thank you gentlemen for your time..."

Sometime later...

The CEO walked out of his conference and back to his office. He was met by the Executive of Security.

"Consortium sent us the info we requested. Here."

The CEO read over the summary then looked up, "Analysis?"

"I think they hit it spot on, some clever conspiracy that fools the populace and is designed to keep them fooled even after they are dead... but I digress, it would be interesting to do buisness with these people. We might want to appeal to their belief."

Official Message From the Tech-Com Corporation to his Divine Majesty of Pyeki
"We welcome your nation to the world and are sorry to hear that you are having trouble with spies. But enough with the dramatics... we are willing to offer you the raw and proccessed resources we have... so long as you can pay for them. We understand that your people are naturally suspicious of outsiders, so we will pledge that our workers do not leave whatever port they go too. If any do so... you may do as you wish with them. Thank you for your time."
End Message

OOC:The Tech-Com Corporation is indeed keeping its word. Its a corporation, primarily interested in money, and the Red Tidean Goverment doesnt really have that much interest in your country anyways.

The diplomatic approach from the Tech-Com Corporation was taken more favourably by the Pangkai, which was appreciative of the foreign corporation's recognition of Pan Yoshimura's divinity. Some ministers wanted to initiate trade right away, just to reinforce the correctness of dealing respectfully with the Pyekan-Kuogu as opposed to prodding at it like some science experiment. Others angrily insisted that recent events only proved that foreigners were a negative force and a chain around the ankle of national development.

But, really, none of this mattered in the short-term. The three Garcat-Laur still in-country had decided the Emperor's decree. The Tech-Com Corporation would be allowed to do business in some of Pyeki's minor ports.

This would entail small contracts for the Corporation -either directly or through sub-contractors to be arranged by Tech-Com- to develop minimal port facilities. These really would be minimal and meant little more than the construction of basic moorings, a small warehouse or two, and perhaps some dredging work if required. Pyeki labour would probably be made available for unskilled work in pursuit of these aims. Actual trade would be light, but the Pyekan-Kuogu would probably look to build-up some currency reserves by employing Tech-Com to export timber, some gems, and quite possibly narcotics if possible, on Pyeki's behalf, and then to use such currency for periodic bulk buying of iron, steel, and construction materials to feed the nation's somewhat random bursts of activity when the Emperor decides that a new railway link is needed in the deep jungle, for example.

This will mean that quite often months may pass without significant purchases being forthcoming, but if the Corporation is prepared to deal in the products of significant deforestation and drug plantations there are profits to be had in the long term.

[OOC: MP I haven't done anything yet because I'm not sure if you'd think it a bit cheap of me to just kill-off your reporters. I suppose I'll say that if you have a clever plan to get them out, do it next post, if not I shall have somebody catch-up with them and then we can try to make something of the consequences.]

The CEO was doing paper work when the Minister of Foreign Dealings came in.

"What is it?" The Tech-Com CEO said without looking up.

"Well, the Pyekians have accepted the offer. Theyll let us build the port facilities, they also want to export us timber, gems, and... narcotics. There is a possbility they may purchase some other things now and then."

The CEO sat thoughtfully, "The Red Tide Mafias Opium and Marijuana harvests have been poor lately, " Foreign Dealings didnt ask where he got that information. "we could strike some deals with them for these drugs. And the gems interest me, we could fashion them into jewels worth more then we would buy the materials for. Timber is not that important here... most of the buildings are made of steel beams. And the South-Western Rainforests are rich in it. Still, I see benefits in a deal with these people."

Official Message From Tech-Com Corporation to his Divine Majesty of Pyeki
"We accept your offer. We do not really need any timber, but the gems and narcotics deal greatly intrigue us. We will gladly construct the port facilities for you. We hope to become good buisness partners."
End Message

ooc: go ahead and capture them, but don't kill them. Oh yea, their cameras have nanocrystalline boundary nickel-hydride batteries. Meaning that the batteries last up to 4 weeks of constant running before going dead. Feel free to have your soldiers play around with the cameras (without knowing that they're constantly uploading footage)

The foreign journalists, after painful hours of flight through inhospitable country, appeared to have made good their escape from inquisitive Pyekan irregulars by the time they came upon an impressive natural feature: the largest river in the country. This was an impressive body of water. Though slow-moving for most of its length, it was often tens, even scores of metres wide and its depth fluctuated greatly. The river was also home to a nasty array of unfriendly fauna, from tiny fish that would make homes where a person least wanted to giant serpants that would make meals of men. Still, it might be followed towards the coast and perhaps the only half-realistic point of extraction from the Pyekan-Kuogu.

Unfortunately, the outsiders hadn't made much progress in the even more than usually difficult terrain of the east bank when there appeared on the western side a party of PNDF regulars. Much shouting followed, along with a rifle shot that landed in a massive creeping vine less than two feet from Cindy's head, but it appeared that the soldiers were no more willing to take the plunge than the foreigners would have been. As the journalists tried to struggle back away from the bank and out of sight, the sound of a 6 cylinder gasoline engine reached them from the other side.

Looking back they would see the incredible sight of a Pyekan-production Type 92 A-I-Go Amphibious Tankette, a three and a half ton vehicle affixed with floats and a propellor and sporting the ever so fearsome armament of a hull-mounted 13mm machinegun backed-up by a 7.92mm weapon shoe-horned into a tiny one-man turret. The jaw-droppingly archaic device was swimming across the great water obstacle and towards the journalists, a number of soldiers dragged through the water with it after attaching to the hull some poles cut from local wood while their rifles sat on top of the vehicle's awkward-looking floats.

The whole assembly was soon ashore on the eastern bank and confronting the intruders with a spirited display of steel in tank and bayonets. The captives, relieved of their posessions and stripped half naked, were promptly marched on through jungle with the sound of aggressive chatter and a 45hp motor. They may have been surprised to be taken along quite managable trails that existed previously unseen to them just yards from the thick jungle through which they'd previously struggled in ignorance. It was amazing to see nothing but jungle until actually standing in the middle of a path that would suddenly spring up through miles of jungle, but with bayonets frequently jabbing their exposed skin and a frantic pace kept up in spite of stiffling humidity, there was little time to wonder how they'd missed the trails before.

The Pyekan-Kuogu soon made another announcement, declaring that spies had in fact been captured, though no effort was made by central authorities to do such things as relieve the victorious soldiers of the plunder they hadn't reported taking, and by now several hours of a brutal-paced march through the jungle was being joined on camera by shots of the make-shift prison improvised for the MassPwnage citizens: specifically the filthy pig-sty below a raised hut in the village to which they'd been taken. Soldiers stationed at a small outpost a few hundred yards from the village made jokes at the expense of their captives, who were now living in a family's toilet (for the semi-feral pigs usually kept at the village lived off what fell from the convenience in the hut above, and the prisoners would now be jokingly invited to do the same).

OOC: Now this is a pretty good thread here. Pyeki, you are great. Would you have any problems with my country getting involved by, say, sensing in some Navy Infantry (Maybe a dozen or so) to rescue the reporters from MassPwnage? I have not had any combat/espionage experience in NS since my last nation was deleted due to lack of use, and I would like to refresh myself a little bit.

~ Romandeos.

ooc: I'LL be the ones saving them. Oh yea, MP is made of bigger and deeper jungles than the ones found in Pyeki, Cindy and Marv would have no trouble finding their way around.

IC:

"Damnit Marv! Look what you did to us! We're living in a fucking pigsty!"

"Hey, hey, it's not my fault, remember, MPCN assigned us to this dump."

"Yea, but did you have to slip away from those guides?"

"Umm.... Well... it made for better footage!"

"Marv, you'd take a nosedive into the Tomb of the Mutilated for better footage."

"But it's all in the name of great journalism."

"Great journalism? It'll be great, but you won't be alive to reap the benefits."

"Ugh... Look Cindy, I'm sure we'll be rescued by the government. After all, isn't this the sort of stuff that they do?"

"If the drug addled powers that be bother to remember us, we might get rescued.... If they remember us of course."

"Oh don't be so pessimistic Cindy.... UGH! Last night's dinner! Damn their food tastes like shit...."

"Don't complain Marv, it's your fault that you're here."

"What? It was your idea in the first place!"

"Come on, why would I even suggest running away from those guides? Do you think I'm stupid?!"

"You know I do Cindy.... You know I do..."

~*~*~*~*~

Pwnage Central:

"Alright..... So our 2 reporters finally got themselves captured."

"Yea... do we save them?"

"Maybe later... I think."

It took several days, but the prisoners were eventually moved from their makeshift prison, fed a handfull of rice a piece and given fresh water for just about the first time, and spared the trouble of marching. They were instead put aboard a shaky-looking Type One 4x2 Truck, another archaic Japanese design based upon a Chevrolet truck, and driven several uncomfortable miles until the going became too difficult for the Pyekan-built machine and it was back to foot. This time the walk lasted only a matter of minutes before the party, consisting mainly of soldiers clearly a cut-above those who originally captured the foreigners, came-upon a railway line through jungle that was gradually giving-way to an impressive landscape of small hills and narrow valleys.

A brief wait and the group, which included a few officers now playing about with the captured camera equipment, was treated to the sight of their new transport, struggling up a slight incline around a soft bend to their right. It appeared to be another tiny tank pulling a cart along the rails, and, essentially, that's what it was. Specifically the engine unit was a Type 2595 So-Ki Armoured Railroad Car, an odd machine now running on rail weels but also capable of moving on road and cross-country on its own tracks.

Everybody crushed aboard the cart and moved off at speeds that reached several dozen miles per hour on level stretches of the line, which itself was a frightening narrow gage railway leaping over valleys and between hills on bridges that in many cases were made of bamboo and lashings.

The captives were being taken deeper into the Pyekan-Kuogu's more than two hundred thousand kilometre territory.

Pwnage Central, a few days before Cindy and Marv were moved:

"We need a stick of HALO treejumpers, CSAR capable.... They'll make the extraction... idiots didn't turn off the cameras they took, they've been broadcasting to us all day..."

"Ah... Alright, so we treejump into the Pyeki jungles with a stick of paratroopers... then what? How do we make the extraction though?"

"That might take some thinking.... Just assemble the damn the paratroopers.... And no causing any international incidents either, got it? I don't want other nations thinking that we're picking on a smaller nation."

"Oh come on.... just a couple of SEAD aircraft."

"No."

"Damn... Oh well."

~*~*~*~
1 Imperial Guard Pathfinder Army Air Base:

"Alright. Your mission has officially been classified as top secret..."

"But sir, it's all over the news... hell, there are cameras right behind you."

"Shut up, it's supposed to be a secret!"

"Right sir..."

"Anyway, you need to make a CSAR extraction from Pyeki. Without being found.... The plane leaves in 10 minutes... gear up."

Little Pyeki, kept in admiration of Imperial Japan until its collapse, showed little obvious sign of preparedness to repel attack from the air. Its radar net was primitive and full of holes wide enough for a star destroyer to slip through, though many of its antenna and dishes were mobile or quite well entrenched. The nation had no major paved runways or modern aerodromes. It relied far more heavily on anti-aircraft artillery than on surface to air missiles, but the truth here was that flying lower than a few thousand metres over the jungles and hills of the Pyekan-Kuogo left one highly vulnerable to repeated perforation by munitions from 7.92 to 128mm calibre.

It was rare for Pyekan to turn their faces to the sky. Nothing ever called their attention in that direction, and for most it was hard to see through the canopy in any event.

Something unknown about the state, however, was a military secret guarded by the Garcat-Laur conspirators and the elite Dogfish warriors. Pyeki's radar technology was decades behind the cutting edge, and investment was insufficient to convince anyone of the Pangkai's interest in catching-up or in improving the grid's coverage. But the jungle was full of oddities never seen by the outside, and rarely seen by natives who typically would ignore them as useless mysteries. These oddities, strange carvings and weird contraptions, were visited by Dogfish and other elites and officials. These were Pyeki's acoustic early-warning systems.

Some were baffling dishes cut into the stone of the nation's many cliff faces and hillsides, deep enough to hide a real tank -let alone one of Pyeki's- from view, massive enough to contain a small lake's water, they faced at angles into the sky. Their function was to alert guards to the presence of helicopters and other slow-moving aircraft and, in areas with limited visibility thanks to jungle coverage and rough terrain, to pick-out fast-moving aircraft (which, in other environments, would be visible almost as soon as the systems picked-up their sound).

Others were trollies pulled by men, beasts, cycles, motor-trikes, steam-trains, tankettes, and trucks, bristling with a spongework of cones looking like musical horns, while some more were a little more sophisticated in their use of electronics: the isolated Pyekan state had followed-up the acoustic technologies it better understood in the years that most of the world was swept off its feet by radar.

There was no doubting the advantages of radar, especially in its range and sometimes in target handling, but Pyeki's systems were all passive. That meant that they could not be detected as radar systems may be, and were highly likely to survive enemy SEAD operations. They all lacked the range of the best modern radar, but some of the basins cut into rock were really epic, easy to miss with the eye because they were so huge, like an Incan pyramid, giving them at least a useful range, and some of the more recent mobile systems were surprisingly advanced by usual Pyekan standards. More than that, they needed no line of sight, and cut through the chaos of the jungle and the highlands as if they weren't there: they could hear a helicopter gunship at low altitude on the far side of a rise while that helicopter's sensors were blisfully unaware of the guns, rocketry, and aircraft bearing down on it with the acoustic system's guidance. And, by and large, the systems were dirt cheap and appeared by the thousand across the land.

An ancient proverb aptly states: in Pyeki, the trees have whiskers and the whispering wind listens as well. It sounded more elegant in the national tongue...

MP Central:

"Alright... supression of their air defences should be relatively easy.... Seriously, did you take a look at some of their radar?"

"These radiation emission based spy sat pics show some serious lack of coverage with radar."

"Radar's probably useless, except in clearings or mountains though, or if they're mounted at the tops of the trees, and their trees aren't as big as ours... so it's doubtful that they have radar. If they're using something to detect our planes, it would probably be visual in nature, or something that's passive and can be stuck in the jungle."

"MAD?"

"Start thinking along those lines. Whatever they have, has be useful through thick tree cover. Have the aircraft with the paras onboard the plane we sent land on an aircraft carrier while we try to figure out what they've got. "

The captured foreigners had been pulled along a frightening narrow-gague railway at forty miles per hour in a crowded tub behind a strange tankette that clattered over gorges and through dense jungle, often supported by bamboo stilts and grass lashings. This only came to an end at a remote station, partly covered by forest canopy and protected by a dual-mounted MG-42 machinegun post pointing its guns lazily into the presently sunny sky.

Also visible, rusting in a siding, was a railway-cart mounting an acoustic early-warning system of a very old sort, being primarily composed of what looked like a lot of megaphones.

Soldiers from the odd little prison train stepped off to talk with the stationmaster, a sweaty little man chewing a piece of grass as he laughed with the officers. He was also wearing basic military fatigues, though they were crumpled and spotted with his perspiration.

The sight became stranger when a couple of scrawny lads came out from the station's, well, there was no fair description better than, "bamboo shack" and joined a number of soldiers in helping to transfer the tankette and its car to a more substantial rail line. The vehicle proved able to adjust its wheels to go from narrow to medium gague running in a matter of minutes, and the party was soon moving again, the tankette having taken on fuel at the station, though it was dispensed not from a pump but a line of bottles, jugs, wooden containers, and what looked like large eggs.

This leg of the journey brought the party close to the Tiastani border, where they would witness the over-flight of a Kawasaki Ki-45 KAIc Toryu (Dragon-Slayer): a long-range night-fighter driven by two Mitsubishi piston engines and armed with two 20mm cannon, a 7.92mm machinegun, and a 37mm cannon. An observer in the know would understand the aircraft to be one of a minority in the tiny Pyekan National Air Defence Force to be fitted with nose-mounted centimetric radar. On the rear face of a steep hill near the border, figures could be seen digging earthwork defences and hauling up battallion and mountain guns, and the prisoners were brought close by as more modern acoustic detection equipment and quick-fire anti-aircraft guns were hauled about. A temporary prison camp at a military outpost supporting anti-smuggling operations was now to be made home for the two captives.

[Military portion of factbook (army and air force sections) slightly expanded with new entries]

[And a little more. Work on individuals and national character on-going. Another thank-you for the positive feed-back thus far!]

OOC:I think I will get to RPing the construction of the docks...

IC:A designated port construction area along the coast of Pyeki...

The construction ships dropped anchor as close as they could to the shore, construction equipment began to be loaded into a WW2-era LST. The single ship steamed over to the area, dropped its doors, and let the tractors roll out. The rules were explained to the construction crews in a briefing, which were heavy on intimidation(as usual) and made VERY clear. The LST came off the shores and steamed back towards the contstruction ship to get some more cargo.

Pyeki workers were not in short supply, though they were clearly lacking in modern skills. Still, at the great Panaku river delta they engaged in works towards the establishment of small port facilities.

[Lazy bump, nothing much added but it has been a while since I was around]

[An I have returned bump]

[Keep up the views, there's a war on, after all]

[Another one of those rare bumps]

[Minor update to geography section: we now have neighbours!]

ooc: This is the most comprehensive nation concept I've seen in a long time, and I like it a lot. Well done!

In the unlikely event you're ever interested in RPing with a PMT nation, toss me a message on AIM/MSN or through TG sometime. :)

The United Socialist States of New Brittonia wishes to establish diplomatic relations with Pyeki. With your permission, of corse, we wish to sen 200.000 members of the New Brittonian Service Corps to Pyeki. If the first mission becomes a success, we wish to deploy several affiliated contingents of the New Brittonian Ministry of National Service to pryiki.

Signed,
Foreign Minister of the United Socialist States of New Brittonia
Nabila Kachab

OOC: People think that the Service Corps is military, check out the New Brittonian Ministry of National Service link in my sig.

the militarist thocracy of Rogue Protoss wishes to help Pyeki advance its economy, by mining and shipping

New Brittonia's Nabila Kachab receives an official reply from the Pyekan-Kuogu in good time and flowery diplomatic language, but it conveys little more than empty respectfulness. The communique bears the personal seal of Emperor Pan Yoshimura and is signed by several representatives of the Pangkai, and while it describes a strong desire for peace and co-operation -possibly the most over-used term in Pyekan political discourse- it does not appear to approve the request for deployment of Service Corps.

In truth the Garcat-Laur can not allow such large scale foreign scrutiny of Pyeki as it stands today, nor can its membership bear to think of what might happen if the public came to realise their nation's economic inferiority and the unusualness of their political and social repression.

Still, a limited diplomatic exchange is suggested, including establishment of embassies, a small island on the Panaku delta being offered as grounds for the New Brittonian presence, and the Pangkai offers timber exports and expresses an interest in motor fuels.

Rogue Protoss gets similar treatment. The Pyekan authorities aren't keen to see foreigners trapsing through their territory, but will consider trade relations that, "may blossom into more once a relationship is established".

[Thanks for the kind words and interest! Pressed for time, must dash!]

The Principality of Fordock would like to establish trade and diplomatic representation with Pyeki. We offer Food in exchange for any sort of metal you might have.

OOC: I remember seeing this thread last year. It sounded pretty good, you've got a great style of writing. If you're still looking for some way to introduce yourself to the outside world, you could have an aircraft crash land in you're island

Thank you for this offer, although we lament you to not allow the Service Corps to come into your nation, we accept your doing so. We ask to use this island to house our embassy and to also be the home of many, Brittonian-sponsored, schools and universities.

Thank you for understanding,
Foreign Minister of the United Socialist States of New Brittonia
Nabila Katchab