NationStates Jolt Archive

OOC: I just needed a factbook.

The Democratic Republic of Epsilon Halo
Background Data
Official Name: Democratic Republic of Epsilon Halo
Common Name: Epsilon Halo
Abbreviation: DREH, EH, or Ep Halo
Government: real Democracy
Capital:North Point
Leader:President David Cheyenne
Formation:1989 CE ("modern/second/united Republic" Epsilon Halo), 1880CE ("first Republic" Epsilon Halo), 645BCE ("historic" Epsilon Halo)

Population:692 million
Per sq. km:1321
Male/Female:49%/51%
Average Age:37
Average Height:5'11"
Average Weight:55kg
Life Expectancy:88 yrs 344days

Currency:Epsilon Dollar(abbreviated e$)
GDP:33.934 trillion e$
Average GDP/Person:e$71,819
Exchange Rate To the US Dollare$1=$1.12
Dominant Industry:Arms Manufacturing, Pizza Delivery, Information Technology, Cheese Exports

Military
Disclaimer: All numbers are approximate
Total Manpower(Active/Reserves+Militia):6.3 million/10 million
Branches:4+Militia
Marines:2.35 million, 55,500 aircraft
Navy:1.95 million, 506 ships, 8,000 aircraft
Aerospace Command:2.1 million men, 950,000 aircraft, 1,080 nuclear warheads, 22 OMDS platforms, 400 satellites, 5 spacecraft

Geography
Latitude+Longitude(@North Point):65 north, 15 east
Highest Point:Mt.Pyke, 2,054m
Lowest Point:Furnace Hole, -200m
Average altitude:230m
Area:1,980,551 sq.km
Average Temperature:15 degrees Centigrade
Highest Recorded:50 degrees
Lowest Recorded:-65 degrees

History

Early History (first settlement to 400 BCE)
Epsilon Halo was the result of close to 2,600 years of factional conflict.
The early inhabitants were mostly tribal when they came to settle the islands. The five major ethnicities are genetically similar, leading to the belief that the first inhabitants fragmented before their migration and settled in the Alpha, Epsilon, Kappa, Rho and Psi islands around 645BCE. For the first 200 years or so of their stay, they were mainly semi-nomadic tribes. Around 421 BCE, cities started emerging in these islands, and it seemed that the 24-island archipelago was to bee five small nations.

Classical History (400BCE to 500CE)
For about 210 years up to 196BCE, it was mostly the factions meeting each other, beginnings of trade, and the beginnings of separate cultures. The Alpha group were theocratic and artistic, Epsilon was scientific and militant, Kappa was capitalist and isolationist, and Rho and Psi became militant, only to fight each other.

Then, up to about 150BCE, the first major wars erupted between Rho and Psi, and Kappa and Epsilon. Alpha, being more on the pacifist side then, sat out the warfare.The war between Rho and Psi was a result of military tension reaching a critical point. Initially, Psi had the upper hand with its preemptive invasion and better army, but Rho had the better navy and soon choked off the force, and destroying them while they were retreating back to Psi, in what is now known as the Massacre of Siever bay, and the end of Psi Halo.The war between Epsilon and Kappa Halo resulted from their differing values and political scandals. It was marked by great battles or skirmishes, in which both sides won about the same numbers. Each side got its share of folk legends from the war, even though it ended in a stalemate after the five-year battle over the Pike Cape Hills.Near the imperial Age of Rome was the dawn of the first age of rapid technological advancement in all areas of life, such as the smokeless lamp, which kept flash fires from happening, the heavy duty crane, and the Iota Crossbow.

Oligarchic Era (512CE-1250CE)
Then, at around 512CE, the era began to fade and civil tensions arose. The rather liberal governments that developed in the era were unable to quell the intensifying turmoil and collapsed in 520, new governments arose, all having conservative oligarchies, or in the case of Alpha Halo, a monarchy. Trade slowed between the nations to almost a halt.

In Alpha Halo, Catholic Christianity was introduced in 523 CE, and the theocracy quickly threw away their previous religion in favor of a modified version of it, because the new religion helped solve issues unaddressed by their old one.The monarchy was ruled by the Cardinal.

Epsilon adopted a proto-communist oligarchy called the Supreme Council. It took whatever scientists there were under government control, and also started equalizing the distribution of property and upholded the downtrodden farmers and craftsmen. This government mutated a lot over the years, and was the only one to reject large merchant guilds and later, businesses, until late 2007, where a landmark act returned some industries back to the private sector for the first time in 1,500 years.

Kappa's oligarchy was made of the richest men on the nation, and thus turned the manual workers into virtually, slaves. Obviously, the unhappy workers revolted in 800 CE and brought a more even society. After clashing ideologies of total equality and pro-merchant guild policies, it abandoned the latter for the sake of stability, and luckily it retained it economic juggernaut. It later merged happily with Epsilon in 1132 CE.

Rho cut itself off from the world, where it encountered Catholic Christianity in 553CE. It then fostered a dictatorship, which took accounts into a larger navy and a better army then its classical ancestors. It claimed the Outer Halo Islands( Alpeh, Beth, Gimel, Daleth, He, and Waw) in 944CE, which was the last regionally noticeable act until it came back to the factional competition in 1650CE.

Rediscovery Era (1250 CE-1371 CE)
Around 1250 CE came the first decrees to explore beyond what was now forgotten due to half a millennium of isolationism. At 1263 CE came the first datable record of international/factional contact, written by an Alpha explorer named "Crusader Paul" about Epsilon:
"...And then we set foot on the ground. We were expecting unholy savages, but instead we encountered a thriving civilization, not so much unlike ours, but with something very different...as we approached a large village, Father Markus advised us to leave the swordsmen and archers behind, to proceed, as to not cause any turmoil for these fellow men...as we met with locals, their tongue was easy to dechiper, so eerily similar to ours, as if they were our lost cousins..."
as Crusader noticed, the dialects have only changed slightly. More rude awakenings were to follow, as inter-factional contact strengthened again.

By 1300 CE, every one of the three factions have reestablished contact with another, and trade began to reestablish. For a while, it seemed even cordial.

Then, at 1337 CE, gunpowder-based weapons were introduced to every faction within six months. Epsilon tinkered with their matchlock muskets until 10 years later it came out with the friction-spark musket. Alpha and Rho regarded the new weapons with suspicion but quickly produced untold numbers of them.

With the introduction of firearms came a rise in tension. Epsilon was relatively secular, and its religious base was a conglomerate of liberal versions of Judaism and Christianity. This evoked backlash from theocratic Alpha and Rho, and both nations were then constantly ridiculed for their primitive technologies by Epsilon. This led to an arms race of sorts, which erupted into full-scale war in 1371 CE.

First Halo Islands' War(1371 CE-1399CE)
The first interfactional war came from a fight between a Rho privateer caravel and an Epsilon navy gunship. The gunship sank the caravel, causing a holy decree that Alpha and Rho will band together in the Holy Crusade to crush Epsilon.

The first major battles came at the Siege of King's Hill, in which a combined force of 2,900 Crusaders laid siege to a 650-man garrison on the King's Hill, located on the northwestern coasts of Epsilon Halo. It lasted two and a half months, with the Crusader's retreat after a furious bombardment from the fort. Total casualties were Crusaders: 1,564 men killed, 0 wounded, 0 prisoners (all wounded were killed by another shot reportedly within 35 seconds, no raiding parties were sent by either side); Epsilon Soldiers: 9 killed, 13 wounded, 0 prisoners.

Despite early victories, the tide turned against Epsilon's favor as it began to lose simply because it was fighting two fronts, and at that time, Epsilon's army was just simply stretched too thin.. They were engaged in a war of attrition with Alpha on Epsilon Halo's northern coast, and Rho had gained island by island, slowly but constantly, until they were at Zeta, one island from Epsilon. When Zeta fell, according to records, in November 20, 1387 CE, Epsilon was now fighting for its life.

As expected, both aggressors launched a massive invasion nine months after the Fall of Zeta, sparking the Battle of Epsilon Halo. It turned out to one of the largest amphibious debacles in the history of the islands. Even though the battle was carried across even the inner parts of the island, the Epsilon soldiers had the advantage of logistics and militiamen, and a great strategy. They let the attackers have the coast, while their navy sunk an estimated 98% of the entire Crusader navy, which were undermanned because so many sailors were onshore fighting. The defenders used the forests and their drab uniforms as camouflage, making their cities and forests like black holes, and used their cannons to demolish Crusader catapults, making siege warfare an impossibility.

Starting from 1389 was an aggressive 10-year reclamation effort made by Epsilon. They swept Crusader ships from the seas, and aggressively retook the islands overrun, at the end of which we find the beginnings of partisan warfare, recorded by a Epsilon platoon commander in 1391 as he entered a town in Nu Halo experiencing this:
"The village was in worse condition than when we retreated. We did not expect the Marauders to savage buildings, especially the town church, which seemed to be nearly demolished from what looked like gunfire...as our Contingent approached, some of the townsmen were locked in a fierce battle, firing their Muskets from behind overturned tables, heaps of Rubbel...an amazing Sight, to see these brave men and women fighting, for 18 Years since we retreated, some folk whom we only knew as children were now men, taking their fathers' places in the battles..."
Most of the partisan battles were years long, drawn-out guerilla warfare. Two generations had passed when the soldiers had fallen back to its last stand, seized fate by the throat, and came back with a vengeance. This led to the establishment of the Partisans, the oldest, the most famous, the most prestigious militia group, and the beginnings of the modern Militia.

Geography

Epsilon Halo is generally known as a rather cold, rocky, barren, island nation. It contains 24 islands in the main chain, the Halo chain, and 6 in the smaller chain, the Outer Halo chain, about 138 smaller islands called the Interim Islands, plus one large island, Caldera. It was the result of a thrice-collapsed volcano, which formed Outer Halo first about 30 million years ago, then Halo at about 25 million, Interim at 18 million, and then Caldera about 5 million.

The Outer Halo Islands are named after the first six letters of the Phoenician alphabet. The islands are, on average, two times larger than most Halo islands, aside from the huge Epsilon, which dwarfs all aside from Caldera, and Sigma, which is larger than all the Outer Halo islands but smaller than Epsilon. They are also the flattest, with only a few small hills to mark the landscape. They make up the core of Epsilon's agriculture, although serious effort is being put into hydroponic, cloning, and aquaculture facilities distributed throughout the nation.

The main Halo chain contains 24 islands, just enough for every letter of the Greek alphabet. It is slightly rockier than Outer Halo, with a lot more hills and some mountains, but still with considerable amounts of level area. It contains most of the nation's industries, and the capital, North Point. They are arranged in a crescent in which the tips almost touch each other.

The Interim Islands are rather flat, only because they are so small, about 30 square kilometers on average. They contain some smaller cities and has the closest point to the mainland continent, Nathaniel's Isle. Many of the nation's folk recipes originate from the Interim.

Caldera is the rockiest of all, with small but regular volcanic activity from its 5 shield volcanoes. It contains almost every mineral deposit in the nation, plus military installations such as missile silos and Emergency Fallback bases.

On average, the farther north you go, the rockier it becomes.

The waters of Epsilon Halo are known to be rather calm. It is also rich in oil deposits, and edible marine life. Speculations have arisen that the waters around Caldera contain vast reserves of mineral deposits in the ocean floor, which was confirmed recently by a private expedition submarine named the Nemo, the mineral being uranium and various industiral metals.

Demographics

The population of Epsilon Halo is 617 million, growing at a steady rate of 1.5%. Due to the rather small size of the country, many offshore cities are being raised, and many live in apartments. Arcology is also in development.

The poverty line is an annual income of less than e$15,550. The minimum wage pays e$17,098 a year, after taxes. About 3.8% of the population live in poverty, and 3% of the population is unemployed, with 10% of the number being those in interim between jobs.

Epsilon Halo is an ethnically non-diverse nation, although minority groups are on the rise. Here is a breakdown from the 2000 Millennium Total Census, which was the most comprehensive census in the nation's history, and will be until 3000 CE:
-Native Halo Islander*:40%
-Mixed Ethnicity:30%
-Cuban:19%
-Russian:18%
-Greek:17%
-British:12%
-Native American:2%
-Other:1%

*Native Halo Islander means people who can show that their direct family (parents) have been born in the Halo Islands, traceable back 1,000 years.

Epsilon Halo is entirely literate above the age of 14. This is because of the low immigration rate.

Military

The Epsilon Halo Military is the main instrument of international combat interventions, aside from any Epsilon units in UN peacekeeping. It numbers 6,300,000 in active numbers, just above 1% of the population, and 10,197,156 serve in the Militia with 2 million in the Reserves, leading private lives for the most part, and then when called for, serving as a line of defense, aiding in emergencies, and helping the active force as logistical and sometimes combat aid. If possible, regulars are always called upon first, then the Reserves, and then the Militia.

The numbers are kept as simple as possible, each recruit above service quota being redirected into the corresponding Militia/Reserve branch the draftee signed up for when applying. This is done with good cooperation with the Census Office.

The military, albeit large, has just let itself be studied by an independent team of researchers, and found out it can land a corps, or 3,000, troops anywhere in the globe within 18 hours. It is also well-trained and equipped, using modernized and modified versions of older, more tested weaponry to help keep R&D costs low, and has and element of futuristic weaponry.

The military has only intervened in government once: during the 1976 attempted coup of Epsilon Halo government by then Alpha Halo forces, keeping order in the nation until elections were completed to replace the dead officials, and exact horrible revenge. Due to a presently great PR and a code of honor, they are only to intervene in "the government of the nation, or leading the nation" only if "it is in clear and imminent danger of unwillingly submitting to threats both external and internal, whereas a civilian government is either incapable of performing such acts or is nonexistent, in order to protect the future existence of the nation itself."

Marines

Epsilon Halo, due to its being an island chain, has combined its Army and AmphCorps into the Marines. The Marines and the Navy are technically two separate branches, but they often operate like one, being that much effort is spent on amphibious landings.

The Marines runs 2,350,000 in number. It is responsible for ground warfare, peacekeeping, and limited aerial combat. It is divided into 14 divisions 150,000 men in number, a 100,000-man Logistics Corps called the L-Corps, plus a 150,000-man Marine Air Force. 2 divisions make up 1 War Group. The MAF and the L-Corps make up the Special Group.

1st War Group
-1st General Division
-33rd Shock Tanks Division

2nd War Group
-5th Light Infantry Division
-68th Paratrooper Division

3rd War Group
-41st AA-AT Division
-9th Armored Infantry Division

4th War Group
-118th Special Terrain Division
-909th Mechanized Division

5th War Group
-66th Airborne Mechanized Division
-903rd Infantry Division

6th War Group
-2nd Grenadier Division
-51st Artillery Division

7th War Group
-902nd Infantry Division
-910th Mechanized Division

8th Special Group
-Marine Air Force
-Logistics Corps


Organization

The Military groups all ground forces this way. Every piece of crewed equipment is made to conform to this organization.

-5 soldiers: 1 fireteam
-3 fireteams: 1 squad: 15 soldiers
-4 squads: 1 platoon: 60 soldiers
-5 platoons: 1 company: 300 soldiers
-10 companies: 1 corps: 3,000 soldiers
-5 corps: 1 regiment: 15,000 soldiers
-10 regiments: 1 division: 150,000 soldiers
-2 divisions: 1 War Group: 300,000 soldiers

Weapons

The standard issue rifle of the Epsilon Halo Marines are the M85, M86, and M55. They are all loaded in a cased telescoping round, the 8x40mm Fragmentation Rifle Round. The rifles are known for its reliability, accuracy, and ease of use, the "Golden Three" known to gun makers in the nation. The specifics for the rifles are listed below.

M85
-Length: 0.65 meters
-Barrel length: 368mm
-Weight: 1.9 kg loaded
-Cartridge: 8x40mm FRR
-Feed system: Bullpup, 45-round rail magazine
-Action: recoil-operated blowback bolt
-Ejection: Ambidextrous
-Modes of fire: Semiautomatic, 3-round burst, full automatic
-Rate of fire: 1270 rpm
-Muzzle Velocity: 650mps
-Range: 700 meters
-Material: Composite, Ferroplastic (Metal+plastic compound, cheap to manufacture)

M86
-Length: 0.85 meters
-Barrel length: 455mm
-Weight: 2.3 kg loaded
-Cartridge: 8x40mm FRR
-Feed system: Bullpup, 36-round STANAG magazine
-Action: recoil-operated blowback bolt
-Ejection: Ambidextrous
-Modes of fire: Semiautomatic, 3-round burst, full automatic
-Rate of fire: 1080 rpm on both burst and full auto
-Muzzle Velocity: 723mps
-Effective Range: 550 meters
-Material: Composite polymer



Navy

The Epsilon Halo Navy is the seaborne combat arm of the Military. It is based on small to medium sized ships, and is a mix of brown and blue water ships. There are only 10 capital ships, the six spaceborne Instinct-class frigates and the four Type X carriers.

The Navy operates these types of ships:
-Littoral combat ships
-Jaguar-class
-Panther-class
-Leopard-class
-Attack submarines
-880-class
-450-class
-Missile submarines
-Warhammer-class
-Trident-class
-Halberd-class
-Destroyers
-Red Tide-class
-Medium Cruisers
-Seahawk-class
-Carriers
-Type X
-Type S
-Transports
-Pelican-class
-Dropship-class
-Logistical ships
-Riveter-class

Economy

The Ep Halo economy is largely devoted to arms manufacturing, due to the high amount of hunters in Epsilon Halo, and the Militia's code of buying guns individually, not Armory-issued like the regular military. Also, guns shelved in the Armory do not have a long shelf life, as they usually are recycled for newer firearms, which must be procured from firearms manufacturers. The two exceptions to this are the Armory stockpile of FN FAL rifles and M1911 pistols, saved for extreme emergencies.

Information Technology is also a major industry, as the Q-Series Mechanical Arm Augmentation needs a computer to control its joints. Many citizens in Ep Halo are computer owners, and many do like gaming.