Factbook Question/Answer Thread

[Soleanna]

You should convert to wiki-style, would make it easier to read.

Yeah like my wiki-style ( ͡~ ͜ʖ ͡°)

[Panjiang]

Depending on how much you want to be a prisoner to history, many of the socialist and communist governments of the past kept around relatively large standing militaries in order to maintain their grip on power and enforce their policies. North Korea and China have two of the largest standing armies in the world. Vietnam also has a pretty large standing army. In fact, judging by this list, Vietnam and North Korea have very large reserve forces as well. Also keep in mind that most governments do not spend more than 5% of their GDP on the military.

A quick note: in your factbook you said that the communist rebels, at their peak, numbered around ten million. Depending on how realistic you want things to be, this number is rather absurd. Now, I don't know your country's population, but even Mao's rebels numbered under five million in 1949.

First off, if I may, I'd like to point out that the militaries of socialist governments of the past, such as the DPRK & China—negating my personal thoughts on the DPRK and their less-than-actually-socialist economy—had their military for the sole purpose of the defense of the people, not for "maintaining their grip on power", maybe for maintaining the power of the people, but nothing outrageous. I'd also like to make a comment on the note you had. My memory is bad, but I don't recall saying ten-million, if I did, I may change it, thank you. But, the population of China at the time I believe was under 600,000,000, my population is above and beyond 2,000,000,000, the last time I checked, so ten-million wouldn't be entirely unrealistic considering the revolutionaries Mao guided were, according to you, just under five million, with a population of that size.

So, nonetheless, the information you provided has been useful, I will definitely take it all in when writing up the section for the navy. I'll assure the overall budget for my military will only be 1-3% of the GDP.

I do have a question though. In a primarily peasant-based country such as mine, how exactly would that change the dynamics of military branches, like the navy? Our ships would be of low quality, too our weaponry, even with our wealth, I assume. What would we be reduced to using? What would our tactics be reduced to if at war?

This'll be my last comment on this issue. The idea that the militaries of past and present socialist countries, including the DPRK, were not instruments of the national governments and used to suppress all dissent is, frankly, ludicrous. From Prague Spring to Tiananmen Square, those governments have used their militaries to brutally and quickly crush any form of opposition, violent or nonviolent. The only people being defended were the central governments and the Party leaders. The pronouncements that they were defending the happy and prosperous workers and farms from the evils of democracy and capitalism is a bunch of crock and as blatant a form of propaganda as I've ever come across. But, that's not the point of this thread so I'm done with it.

The ten million number I found came from your factbook. Given that your populations is around two billion, that number wouldn't be unduly large or unreasonable. Again, depending on how much of a slave you want to be to reality, it may be a good idea to determine, if you haven't already, how developed and industrialized your country was prior to the revolution. Who supplied them with the weapons? Usually, rebel forces of all ideological bents are sometimes funded and often supplied by foreign powers who are either ideologically aligned with them or ideologically/geopolitically opposed to whoever the enemies of the rebels are. Unless the national government was basically days from collapsing in on itself, rebel forces usually have a poor track record of overthrowing the government on their own unless they are receiving foreign weapons and intelligence or the military is leading the rebellion.

I do have a question though. In a primarily peasant-based country such as mine, how exactly would that change the dynamics of military branches, like the navy? Our ships would be of low quality, too our weaponry, even with our wealth, I assume. What would we be reduced to using? What would our tactics be reduced to if at war?

I can't really answer that. While national cultures, at least to me, seem to play some roll in what tactics are preferred during wartime (Japan and its last stand tactics during the final years of the Second World War come to mind), the far more important factors that dictate what any unit does has to do with the situation they are faced with. How low are they on supplies? How powerful is the enemy force? Who is commanding what units? How much trust exists between the enlisted soldiers and the officers? How well-trained are the officers? What's the quality of weapons that they are using? What's the local terrain like? Are they attacking? Defending? Counter-attacking? Conducting a delaying action? Do they have air support? Does the enemy have air support? How well-trained are the soldiers? How well-trained are the enemy? Etcetera and ad infinitum.

What do you mean by "our wealth"? What's the GDP and GDP per capita of Kiosanda?

Also, the Military Realism thread is another great place to go if you're looking for more tips on, well, military realism. People who are more knowledgeable than me on this subject hang out there.

[Zhouran]

With that said, does anyone have any tips on what I could do for my military section, basing it off of a Wikipedia-styled article?

Well there's factbook templates here like mines and basically you just fill out the infobox like how much personnel you have or how much your government spends on defense, then you have a block of text that basically describes your military in general. It's not difficult and in fact it's probably the easiest thing to do for a military factbook.

First off, if I may, I'd like to point out that the militaries of socialist governments of the past, such as the DPRK & China—negating my personal thoughts on the DPRK and their less-than-actually-socialist economy—had their military for the sole purpose of the defense of the people, not for "maintaining their grip on power", maybe for maintaining the power of the people, but nothing outrageous.

That's a subjective statement.

negating my personal thoughts on the DPRK and their less-than-actually-socialist economy

North Korea is economically socialistic. Being socialist doesn't mean automatically being communist.

But, the population of China at the time I believe was under 600,000,000, my population is above and beyond 2,000,000,000, the last time I checked, so ten-million wouldn't be entirely unrealistic considering the revolutionaries Mao guided were, according to you, just under five million, with a population of that size.

Having a population of 2 billion and above is way too much in a realistic setting.

In a primarily peasant-based country such as mine, how exactly would that change the dynamics of military branches, like the navy? Our ships would be of low quality, too our weaponry, even with our wealth, I assume. What would we be reduced to using? What would our tactics be reduced to if at war?

In a primarily peasant-based country, your nation's military will get easily steamrolled by a technologically superior, highly-mechanized, full-spectrum combined-arms military. The only thing your military might be effective at is guerrilla warfare.

During much of the Cold War following the Sino-Soviet Split, the PRC lagged way behind the USSR in quality of their military and weapons. At the start of the Cultural Revolution, Mao Zedong abolished ranks, uniforms and military structural hierarchy, and basically threw away military professionalism and efficiency in exchange for petty dogmatic loyalty to the party. In other words: Mao turned the PLA from an actual military to a large, unprofessional pseudo-paramilitary "guerrilla" force. Had a war between the PRC and USSR actually happened, the Soviets would have easily steamrolled the PLA in conventional combat and march towards Beijing, the only thing that could at least slow down the Soviet advance would be the use of guerrilla warfare (a tactic Mao favored due to experiences in the Japanese invasion of China during WW2).

Basically, your military would probably be in a similar situation like China during the 60s to early 80s. In a modern day battlefield, your military isn't gonna fight efficiently against, let's say, the US military, and pretty much your military would be reduced to fighting in an asymmetric warfare scenario like a paramilitary. Your navy would basically be a brown-water/green-water navy using less-than-sophisticated warships, your best hope is that your navy uses small missiles boats (fast attack craft) since those can actually be a big threat to enemy fleets. Your air force would be flying outdated fighter jets that are almost hopeless in a 21st century aerial battle, and (assuming your air force uses Soviet-style training) your pilots would be less skilled and experienced in A2A combat against a technologically- and skillfully-superior enemy like the US Air Force or Royal Air Force.

[Panjiang]

Basically, your military would probably be in a similar situation like China during the 60s to early 80s. In a modern day battlefield, your military isn't gonna fight efficiently against, let's say, the US military, and pretty much your military would be reduced to fighting in an asymmetric warfare scenario like a paramilitary. Your navy would basically be a brown-water/green-water navy using less-than-sophisticated warships, your best hope is that your navy uses small missiles boats (fast attack craft) since those can actually be a big threat to enemy fleets. Your air force would be flying outdated fighter jets that are almost hopeless in a 21st century aerial battle, and (assuming your air force uses Soviet-style training) your pilots would be less skilled and experienced in A2A combat against a technologically- and skillfully-superior enemy like the US Air Force or Royal Air Force.

Since Zhouran brought some of this stuff up, something else I'd like to add is that investing in missile defense would probably be a more effective strategy than investing in a strong navy. North Korea deals with its lack of a strong navy, and probably air force, by investing in the construction of numerous anti-air and anti-ship missile platforms. Also, while China's military is no longer as skewed towards guerilla warfare as it used to be and they've been rapidly expanding their navy in the last decade or two, they have also invested in a particularly powerful missile defense shield, so to speak.

What does this shield consist of? Beyond stationary missile launch platforms, they've also built long underground tunnels along the coasts that would allow missile vehicles the ability to rapidly travel up and down the Chinese coast without fear of being targeted by aircraft operated by the United States Air Force and Navy. From what I've read, this missile shield is designed to deny the United States Navy, especially its carriers, access to the East and South China Seas should a non-nuclear war or conflict break out. Similarly, they', and North Korea, have invested in the construction of a lot of coastal defense submarines. As you may have guessed, these submarines are armed with a lot of anti-ship missiles. Just over a third of all non-nuclear submarines are owned and operated by the Chinese (60) and North Korean (72) militaries. In contrast, the US Navy operates just under half of the world's nuclear submarines.

Another good resource.

[Fatatatutti]

I'd assume our army, navy, airforce, and what have you, would resemble such.

If you're designing your military from scratch, think about what you need instead of just building a random military that you can brag about. How would an enemy attack you and how could you prevent it? If you have a lot of coastline, you'll need a big Navy. If you have navigable rivers that are accessible to your enemies, you'll need to cover them too. If you have a lot of open terrain, your Army will need to be mechanized. And so on.

[Great Nortend]

Hullo. I'd like some feedback on two of my newest factbooks, https://www.nationstates.net/nation=gre ... id=1005046 and https://www.nationstates.net/nation=gre ... id=1004529.

I'm not too sure how balanced the military one is for a population of 32,000,000 and I don't really understand how the number of tanks, cannon, ships, frigates &c. are calculated. Any tips would be appreciated. The judicial one is fairly simple though some help in reading it and general suggestions would be welcome.

[Sunset]

Hullo. I'd like some feedback on two of my newest factbooks, https://www.nationstates.net/nation=gre ... id=1005046 and https://www.nationstates.net/nation=gre ... id=1004529.

I'm not too sure how balanced the military one is for a population of 32,000,000 and I don't really understand how the number of tanks, cannon, ships, frigates &c. are calculated. Any tips would be appreciated. The judicial one is fairly simple though some help in reading it and general suggestions would be welcome.

Instead of concerning yourself with specific numbers, ask another question first: Do you need the numbers? If you're part of a roleplay group or region where numbers are heavily emphasized, then I would consult with said group to determine the numbers. But if you're not, then I wouldn't list numbers. Instead (and depending on your personal (or your government's) style, list something like strengths and weaknesses instead. Or strengths, if your factbook is supposed to be more propaganda than fact. 'The army is heavily centered around the mechanized infantry' or 'Great Nortend emphasizes the air service in order to offset its low population and...'

Remember this as well; Unless you've decided to fix things as a static 'this is where we are now, this is where we'll always be' those numbers will all change as your population goes up (or down - cause we're invading next week!) and using adjectives instead (strong, modest, weak) will serve over the entire range of growth and decline.

(In the end, all of the numbers regarding tanks, cannon, ships, etc are made up. By everyone. Yes, all the numbers are made up and the points don't matter.)

[Moskva-Rask]

When a country enters the global market, they tend to thrive when the government promotes free trade, so when a big country's economy falters, like in the Great Depression for the USA, it sends a backlash around the world for every nation is sort of intertwined with each other, so what's best for a country's economic growth and stability? Moderation with Protectionism, or rapid growth but potential problems with free trade, or even not interfering at all in the French Laissez-Faire system. I genuinely wish to know this so I would like you opinion for this because I want to create a role-play in my Factbook, so out of the ones I list or any you find that you think are best, tell me how you feel about them

Types of economic policies

1. Fiscal Policy: Changes in government spending or taxation to give way for heightened economic growth

2. Monetary Policy: Changes in the money supply to alter interest rates(used to influence the rate of inflation

3. Supply-Side Policy: Attempts to increase the productive capacity of the economy

4. Protectionism: Protecting a county's domestic industries by raising tariffs

5. Mercantilism: Government regulation on a nation's economy for the purpose of augmenting state power at the expense at a military or economic rival

[East Apikai]

I'm confused on where news threads are supposed to go? Because I've seen them here, in NS and in II.

[The State of Monavia]

I'm confused on where news threads are supposed to go? Because I've seen them here, in NS and in II.

IC news threads can technically go in either place, but they usually get more exposure if you post them in I.I.

[Stalineland]

Hello,

How can I modify the map of my confederation in order to add myself on the map?

Thx

[Ente Ente]

Any Image Manipulation will do, I'd say.
Best ask the person responsible for the map there to include you though.

[The Pacifican Islands]

Hi everyone! Just a quick question. How would I create a table with a split in the middle like shown above?

[MeGaSuCcLoRd]

Hey i am willing to trade my army for everyones tigers message me for tigers

[Frisbeeteria]

How would I create a table with a split in the middle like shown above?

On a different website. NS formatting is terrible at tables.

[A m e n r i a]

So yea, I'm thinking of writing a factbook on Amenria's ideology, since it's something I came up with myself. May I please have some references?

[Sefionto-Redu]

How do you get those realistic looking pictures of cities, buildings and people?

[A m e n r i a]

How do you get those realistic looking pictures of cities, buildings and people?

For cities and buildings? Look up Deviantart. For people, just use someone else as a model for your character. I use Kpop celebrities for my characters.

[Sefionto-Redu]

What do you mean by use someone else as a model?

[Sunset]

What do you mean by use someone else as a model?

Some people will take a picture of a real person - an actor, or someone they feel 'looks' like their character, and then use that as the representative image of that character. There are other ways to do it though, and you might look into them. One method that I use isn't 'realistic' but it is easy and gives good representative results; Games like Sims 2, 3, or 4 will let you make characters with a surprising level of detail. If you're okay with a little more cartoon-y, that would be a good route. Another would be a game like Fallout 4, which would give more 'gritty'-realistic character portraits, while if you're going for a fantasy nation you might consider Skyrim. I've seen character portraits from all over though - if you see one in someone's factbook that you like? Ask.

The same goes with any other picture. Ask them where they found it and how and then look for similar.

[New Emeline]

I see a lot of these wiki-style factbook templates, where do I find them?

[Sunset]

I see a lot of these wiki-style factbook templates, where do I find them?

viewtopic.php?f=23&t=256878 <- Check here - a lot of people start here and then go their own way.

[New Emeline]

I see a lot of these wiki-style factbook templates, where do I find them?

viewtopic.php?f=23&t=256878 <- Check here - a lot of people start here and then go their own way.

Thanks!

[New Emeline]

Side question: how do you access bookmarked posts

[Sunset]

Side question: how do you access bookmarked posts

User Control Panel > Manage Bookmarks.