United States

= United States = The United States of America is a currently neutral and democratic country located in North America. It borders Canada to the north and Mexico to the south.

History
While the United States' economy grew tremendously due to the events of the Weltkrieg, where American banks and factories supplied the Entente, the 1920s were disastrous. The military and political collapse of the old French and British governments meant that any American investments or loans contracted to these nations were irrecoverably lost. German dominance over world trade ensured that America was progressively forced out of markets in Europe, Africa, Asia and even parts of South America via national embargoes. A slow yet inexorable economic decline ensued, followed by an increasingly vicious interior social and political conflict.

Until now, the two-party system that had dominated the nation since the end of the Civil War had remained in place, with the Democratic and Republican parties maintaining the support of American industry and big business, with any 'extremist' groups being fragmented and disunited. However, the inefficient second term of President Hoover has seen a significant shift in the political constellation of the United States. Two grand coalitions have formed to challenge the traditional Democratic and Republican parties - one uniting the forces of the populist and technocratic right as the America First Union Party, and the other the revolutionary left as the Combined Syndicates of America, with each mobilizing to fight for their own candidate to become the 32nd President of the United States come election time in 1936.

Politics
President: Herbert Clark Hoover (Republican, born 10 August 1874)

Vice President: Charles Curtis (Republican, born 25 January 1860)

Secretary of State: Henry Lewis Stimson (Republican, born 21 September 1867)

Secretary of Commerce: Roy Dikeman Chapin (Republican, born 23 February 1880)

Secretary of the Interior: Ray Lyman Wilbur (Republican, born 13 April 1875)

Head of Signals Intelligence Service: William Frederick Friedman (born 24 September 1891)

Secretary of War: Patrick Jay Hurley (Republican, born 8 January 1883)

Chief of Staff of the United States Army: Major General Douglas MacArthur (born 26 January 1880)

Chief of Naval Operations: Rear Admiral Robert Lee Ghormley (born 15 October 1883)

Chief of the United States Army Air Corps: Major General Edward Vernon Rickenbacker (born 8 October 1890)

As part of the presidential election of 1936, President Hoover is to step down, and his Vice President, Charles Curtis, is to run for the Presidency as the Republican candidate, with Frank Knox as his running mate. John Nance Garner, supported by Henry A. Wallace, is the candidate for the Democrats.

The America First Union Party has selected Huey Long, Senator of Louisiana, as its candidate. With its support coming primarily from the depressed agricultural regions of the Deep South, the new party combines traditional populism with industrial capitalist models of organization, demanding redistribution of wealth and social welfare within a strong, centralized, corporatist economic structure, controlled by a paternalistic economic and political elite.

The Combined Syndicates of America are led by John 'Jack' Reed, who turned into a savvy political operator during his time in Russia during its revolution and civil war. Uniting various spectrums of socialist, syndicalist and communist thought, the C.S.A. have mobilized the surging throngs of workers embedded in America's industrial heartlands of the Midwest.

All sides are currently organizing for the elections, and are restraining their supporters from resorting to violence. However, should the result not move in their favour, the two radical parties have both formed formidable volunteer and paramilitary sub-organizations, which could quickly replace the authority of the Federal Government in their areas of dominance. However, states on the western seaboard have, unlike the rest of the country, prospered, largely in part due to maritime trade with Russia and Japan, and so are likely to remain neutral or defend the status quo of the two-party system should any interior conflicts arise.

Military
The US Military is comprised of four service branches: The Army, the Navy, the Marine Corps and the Coast Guard; within the Army is the Army Air Corps. In general, the US Forces have huge potential, as the United States is one of the foremost industrial nations in the world and has a large population with many innovative thinkers. Yet the armed forces are quite divided due to the larger political tensions resonating throughout the country; party loyalty within the ranks make some question the validity of their service, and even their nation itself.

Army
The US Army is the largest service branch by number of men enlisted. Currently it contains four divisions: three infantry and one cavalry. Although the US Army is neither large nor powerful when compared to the German Heer, the nation itself has huge manpower reserves and current industry means that the Army could easily outfit as much as two hundred full-strength divisions if prioritized.

Navy
The US Navy is the most modern and powerful branch of the military. It is one of the few navies in the world that operates aircraft carriers and acts as a 'blue-water' navy, boasting a significant amount of capital ships. The Navy maintains a presence in two oceans, the Pacific and the Atlantic; the Pacific Fleet being the stronger of the two.

Army Air Corps
The US Army Air Corps is directly subordinate to the Army and, as such, is currently operated as a supporting force, covering soldiers on the ground from above and providing tactical reconnaissance. While technically an Army sub-branch, the Air Corps has sought to expand its operations to the US Navy and, perhaps, become its own independent branch should the need eventually arise for such a large aerial force.

Foreign relations
The United States has political, economic and military control over Liberia, a small country in West Africa, and the Philippines, an island nation located in the western Pacific Ocean.

Friendly relations exist with Cuba, Honduras, Panama, Liberia, the Philippines and the United Provinces.

Unfriendly relations exist with Mexico, Centroamerica and Germany.

Culture
The United States is considered a hot-spot for immigration from all over the world, and as such is an extraordinarily heterogeneous society, retaining the cultural heritage of hundreds of ethnicities and nationalities from around the world. As such the nation is a melting pot of cuisine, art, literature and, most importantly, politics; due to the sheer number of people arriving at Ellis Island each day, practically every ideology known to man has at least a nominal presence within the United States, which leaves the nation more susceptible to internal conflicts and even civil unrest should the current administration remain inefficient and arbitrary.

Summary
The United States is a large nation that has the ability to become an economic and military superpower if properly managed and guided. As a swirl of ideologies and nationalities congregate in the many great cities of the eastern seaboard the future of the United States is an ever-changing one.