The Rising Sun against the Dragon.
The Red Banner against the Imperial Court
The new ways against the old.
The Socialist Principality of Santoak vs the Imperial Union of China.
The two powers have always been in conflict directly or indirectly for nearly a thousand years. Ever since Santoak emerged from the warring period and ran headfirst in the Chinese hegemony the fate of Eastern Asia always hung in the balance of these two opponents, smaller nations consigned to being pawns in an all-consuming chess game of imperialists on all sides. Not even the December Revolution in 1920 and the overthrow of the old Santoak Imperial Systems and the denouncement of imperialism in the general end this game. Merely, it changed faces.
For China, it was order and stability against the insanity of the revolutionaries. For Santoak, it was freedom and liberty against a rotten imperial system. No longer was this chess game limited to the elite of both nations but it was now a people's war between the two.
And in 1954 this people's war came to its logical but no less horrific conclusion in the form of the Great Asian War as both Santoak and China alongside other international powers clashed on a scale never before seen with a staggering death toll that overlapped that of the Black Plague with over a hundred million perishing in this war of insanity. However, in a conflict full of utter hatred on both sides, Santoak took it too far.
They didn't seek to defeat the Chinese but to exterminate them to put this eternal rivalry once and for all. While no systematic extermination was carried out it was with extreme callousness that the Santoak Self-Defence Forces executed the war with strategic bombing deliberately targeting civilians in a bid to "reduce the enemy's workforce" and targeting agriculture infrastructure to cause famines. Such was the scale that by the time the war ended after a limited nuclear exchange, it is calculated that a tenth of the Chinese population perished as a direct cause of Santoak's actions. To this day Santoak has denied this has ever taken place. Even in the most reconciliatory and progressive citizens, it is seen as an unfortunate byproduct that by no means they should be held guilty for.
There is no genocide in China.
But Santoak's attempts to curtail China failed. The Imperial Union and its Divine Mandate live on. Reformed in the wake of revolts, yes, but intact. The Chinese people will not be cowed by Santoak nor accept a position in servitude. Even though the two nations were forced to cooperate in the face of First Impact and the subsequent Angelic Attacks, there is no denying that the two superpowers are fated to lock horns with each other in a final show-down that would end this rivalry once and for all. It's just that the first spark came before Santoak expected it.
Even to this day after the end of the Great Asian War the islands of Hainan and Formosa still remain under Santoak occupation but officially are under the control of the Revolutionary People's Republic of China made of the left wing that was forced to flee the mainland after the failed 1964 uprising. While strongly trying to maintain their independence and hopes of returning to the mainland, they are functionally nothing less than a puppet state.
The Imperial Union ever since the 90s has made repeated claims and moves against the RPRC as it views the islands of Hainan and Formosa as core Chinese territories under occupation and that the RPRC is nothing less than a gaggle of war criminals and traitors. Cross-strait relations have then been... complicated to say the least as for the past three decades it has remained in a disturbing limbo but a peaceful one albeit with watchful eyes on all sides ready for the other to make the move. Santoak always expected to be the first having accepted a decisive battle doctrine where the first attacker would be able to shape the battlefield to their desires.
As a result, it completely caught them off guard when on January 1st, 2025 the island of Hainan came under bombardment and Chinese forces began to cross the Hainan Straits.
The Hainan War had begun.
Factions:
The Santoak Self-Defence Forces (SSDF) and the People's Liberation Army (PLA)
To say that the SSDF and the PLA were caught off guard. This wasn't how it should have gone down. They should have been the first to make the move. They should have detected the major build-up but a series of intelligence failures all along the chain failed to detect this massing. And they now would pay. While the SSDF and its troops are some of the best in the world, equipped in some cases with technology decades ahead of any other nation, the same cannot be said of the PLA which has been given second-hand SSDF equipment with generally low-morale and poor training. It now seems the choice to defang the PLA in favor of keeping Formosa under Tokyo-2s boot has come to bite them back in the ass.
But they're still not without teeth. While reinforcements will be limited thanks to Santoak desperately working behind the scenes to prevent this from escalating to a Second Great Asian War they still have enough forces to hopefully hold the island. The question is: do they have the will?
Estimated Forces:
- SSDF 1st Ranger Division
- SSDF 1st Airborne Brigade
- SSDF 11th Manoeuvre Bridage
- SSDF 13th Infantry Brigade
- PLA 584 Armor Division
- PLA 172 Armor Division
- PLA 333 Mechanized Infantry Brigade
- PLA 234 Mechanized Infantry Brigade
- PLA 1 Artillery Brigade
- PLA 2 Artillery Brigade
Manpower: 54,000
Supporters:
Republic of Narmapia - Aircraft and Naval Support
People's Federation of Novovaritsya - 35,727 men
The Imperial Guard
It has been said that to the Imperial Guard, the lives of its troops are cheap currency to be thrown away. This may have been true during the 2007 Vladivostok War where Chinese volunteers infamously participated in what seemed like human wave attacks against Santokian forces but 16 years of aggressive reforms have transformed the Imperial Guard into a more sophisticated force capable of going toe to toe against the SSDF and PLA. However, despite these reforms and a fanatical desire to retake the core territories, the Imperial Guard is still facing an uphill battle in one of the most dangerous operations known to man while at the same time hamstrung by limited reinforcements due to the Nanking also wishing to prevent this conflict from escalating to another Great Asian War.
Estimated Forces
- 1st Imperial Amphibious Mechanized Infantry Division
- 3rd Imperial Amphibious Mechanized Armoured Division
- 132nd Imperial Infantry Division
- 28th Imperial Infantry Division
- 6th Imperial Armored Division
- 10th Imperial Armored Division
- 52nd Imperial Mountain Motorized Infantry Brigade.
- 32nd Imperial Helicopter Airborne Brigade
- 22nd Imperial Rocket Artillery Division
- 9th Imperial Artillery Division
Manpower: 150,000
Supporters:
Third Federal Republic of Czaslyudian Peoples (FRCP) - Intelligence and sabotage
New Republic of Hathian Prime - 4,800 soldiers
Characters:
Ivan Crossland
Rafael Dale
Boris Nikolaev Vinogradov
And thus begins the Hainan War. I hope you guys join and enjoy yourselves on either side. The idea I have and an overall theme of this entire RP are the sins of the past of all nations involved and that this conflict just has a way of coaxing out of all those involved. This is much less a war and more a sad reflection for all involved that brought them here in the first place.
As for military numbers, I won't put a hard limit just be aware of reasonable political constraints and the logistics involved.
And you don't just have to app soldiers but can RP as civilians and individuals caught in the crossfire. By all circumstances, Hainan is the same as real life with airfields and cities where they are currently.
I haven't really done an RP like this before but I hope that everyone enjoys it!
Discord link: https://discord.gg/pWMpnPSf76
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